Fear is Metastatic

Izzy B.

• Artist Statement

  This poem focuses thematically on the disorientation and helplessness of feeling anxious, as the speaker is overtaken by their perceived lack of control over their own well-being. The speaker endeavors to discover what caused their instability and what exactly is wrong by externalizing their psychological struggles, comparing them to cancer metastasis and scar tissue, while additionally reviewing physical symptoms they are experiencing---their tears and their shaking hands. Try as they might to figure out what is wrong, their loss of control and sense of hopelessness is conveyed in the end when they begin to recognize that an analysis of their current state will not halt the outwardly spreading effects of their declining mental health, and is perhaps even facilitating this ripple effect.

• Creative Statement

  Creativity is the translator through which a writer's feelings of joy, grief, love, guilt, hope, and shame can be put into words. It is what makes it possible for feelings that within us seem altogether indescribable to be shared with others as a tangible work of art.