Aubade for ADHD by Christie Beckwith

Not everyone's thoughts race in technicolor.

The lavender light weaving through the window screen is a canvas that paints my internal dialogue / my thoughts stampede / fast and loud / a stream / an assault / a (bubbling) stream of merlot thoughts / (stone sober) / pour / GUSH / flow / sofast / theycatchon themselves / relentless noise / who will read this / no one knows / how alone I feel / (I am not screaming) / yet / it is loud in here / the loneliness / the questioning / the tricks I learned / in therapy / to quench the goblins / she’s quiet because it’s hard to STOP / to interrupt the thoughts / to speak / I miss details / rinse repeat / rinse please repeat / yourself / I didn’t hear / no / it’s not that I wasn’t listening / it’s that I didn’t hear you / over the roaring synapses / rushing through my ears / I wish I could just snap / / and stand / alone / in a white room / full of nothing / maybe / one window for light / and a chair / (a footstool) / in the wholly / sacred / nothing / I wish I could think / happy thoughts / and lift off the ground / light as Tinkerbell / but there are twelve church bells / ringing in a tower / (God’s temple) / and I can’t reach the top / to turn / off / the Bruno Mars lyrics / this is a portrait / of a woman / on a crowded street / between a crosswalk / and a hard place / my twin bed / (a soft place) / with a three inch egg crate topper / I want to be steeped in a dream / where I float / or fly / I hear normal people don’t think / in color / don’t picture what they think / that sometimes they hear nothing / a mind with nothing / must be boring / must be calm / I joke / to pretend / joke / that I don’t need relief / that it’s either take the drugs / that would make a normal brain / see through walls / fist bump a train / at full speed / the speed is what calms me / down / fuck a normal / resting heartrate / it is good to meet me / (medicated) I am pissed / at four decades of / what if you just / why don’t you just / why can’t you just

Christie Beckwith has two pieces in Vol.6. Purchase a copy to read the second piece and hear their voice in our audiobook.

CHRISTIE BECKWITH is an author, poet, and freelance editor at Meraki Press. More importantly, she is a sparkle girlie and an excessive consumer of Dunkin’s coffee. You can find her at open mics and all over the US, where she travels for her day job doing Alzheimer’s research. She wants to live everywhere she visits, but is always happy to return to Massachusetts, where she loves her four boy humans, the cat, and their two dogs.