MHI: THESE LETTERS OF MINE by Emily Ruth Verona

Trigger Warning: This piece addresses mental health

The HWA is pleased to launch its Mental Health Initiative, a coordinated roll-out of events, resources, and activities intended to promote positive mental health, foster the concept of hope, and challenge the stigma of mental illness in the horror genre. The initiative, run by the organization’s Wellness Committee, launches in June, and includes the following blog posts from Of Horror and Hope, a downloadable anthology of poems, flash fiction, and personal reflections on mental health by HWA members.

THESE LETTERS OF MINE
Emily Ruth Verona

obsessive compulsive disorder—
this is the diagnosis

omnipotent, calculating devil—
the name by which I know it

otherness: comical, deranged—
your superficial interpretation

occasionally chronic, debilitating—
how it blooms within

obscene, cauterizing delusions—
I lose myself to them

overt, consumptive, deadly—
hell swollen in the brain

onward, courage darling—
we must write our own way out

obstinate, critical, divine—
this acronym (anarchist);
these letters of mine