8 poems on anxiety

Anxiety is a natural response to threat and fear that can affect an individual in various ways.

Poems on anxiety represented by various poets is an effort towards depicting the various states of anxiety in a myriad fashion.

Many poets use dramatic monologues to present the panic and fears experienced by people suffering from anxiety.

8 best poems on anxiety are:

1. Emily Dickinson, ‘We Grow Accustomed to the Dark’.

We grow accustomed to the Dark

When Light is put away

As when the Neighbour holds the Lamp

To witness her Goodbye

A Moment – We Uncertain step

For newness of the night

Then – fit our Vision to the Dark

And meet the Road – erect 

The primary line of this sonnet too gives the sonnet its fundamental topic: the way our eyes alter to the obscurity, fair as our minds adjust to the distress of life and contemplation of the ‘night’ that’s passing. The sonnet is, then, a reflection on the anxieties we have to confront with respect to our mortality, and how these fears can break out once more indeed in spite of the fact that most of the time we have learned to smother or disregard them.

2. W. B. Yeats, ‘The Second Coming’.

Turning and turning in the widening gyre

The falcon cannot hear the falconer.

Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;

Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,

The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere

The ceremony of innocence is drowned;

The best lack all conviction, while the worst

Are full of passionate intensity …

This poem was composed in 1919, in no time after the conclusion of the First World War and at a time when Yeats’s claim domestic country of Ireland was within the grasp of a battle for freedom. This poem, is one of his most noteworthy, captures the anxieties encompassing this minute of political alter with a few important and enigmatic symbolism, not slightest that ‘rough beast’ which ‘slouches towards Bethlehem to be born’.

3. D. H. Lawrence, ‘Anxiety’.

The hoar-frost crumbles in the sun,

The crisping steam of a train

Melts in the air, while two black birds

Sweep past the window again.

Along the vacant road, a red

Bicycle approaches; I wait

In a thaw of anxiety, for the boy

To leap down at our gate.

He has passed us by; but is it

Relief that starts in my breast?

Or a deeper bruise of knowing that still

She has no rest.

This brief sonnet by Lawrence (1885-1930) postures a few inquisitive questions for the reader who is (the ‘She’) in that last line? but it flawlessly passes on the anxieties of holding up for news, particularly of somebody’s passing or death.

4. Walt Whitman, ‘As I Ebb’d with the Ocean of Life’.

 

As I ebb’d with the ocean of life,

As I wended the shores I know,

As I walk’d where the ripples continually wash you Paumanok,

Where they rustle up hoarse and sibilant,

Where the fierce old mother endlessly cries for her castaways,

I musing late in the autumn day, gazing off southward,

Held by this electric self out of the pride of which I utter poems,

Was seiz’d by the spirit that trails in the lines underfoot,

The rim, the sediment that stands for all the water and all the land of the globe …

Whitman’s sweeping verse affected by the Scriptural Hymns of Ruler David is superbly suited to this sprawling, enthusiastic poem about self-doubt and a few kinds of mid-life emergencies.

5. Miriam Goodman, ‘Anxiety of Ten o’Clock’.

Account for all the work.

Do the arithmetic: this much finish

day by day. Feel better. You feel

you’re holding cats under a rug.

You balk, refuse your own assignments,

stalk reunion with your other,

lazy self, this one harnessed

in a soggy woolen swimsuit, body

doughy under puzzle straps. She asks

her one repeating question as if

what you have said definitively were

still unclear. In different ways she asks:

always a but, always a what if.

Always impossible to finish.

Goodman was a Jewish American artist whose work merits to be superior known. In this poem, whose title reviews Wallace Stevens’ popular ‘Disillusionment of Ten o’Clock’, Goodman expertly develops a poem around an arrangement of basic commands reviewing the poem.

6. Jean Valentine, ‘Sanctuary’.

People pray to each other. The way I say “you” to someone else,

respectfully, intimately, desperately. The way someone says

“you” to me, hopefully, expectantly, intensely …

—Huub Oosterhuis

You who I don’t know  

I don’t know how to talk to you  

—What is it like for you there?

Here … well, wanting solitude; and talk; friendship—

The uses of solitude. To imagine; to hear.

Learning braille. To imagine other solitudes.

But they will not be mine.

to wait, in the quiet; not to scatter the voices—

What are you afraid of?

What will happen. All this leaving. And meetings, yes. But death.  

What happens when you die?

“… not scatter the voices,”

Drown out. Not make a house, out of my own words. To be quiet in  

another throat; other eyes; listen for what it is like there. What  

word. What silence. Allowing. Uncertain: to drift, in the

restlessness … Repose. To run like water—

What is it like there, right now?

Listen: the crowding of the street; the room. Everyone hunches in  

against the crowding; holding their breath: against dread.

What do you dread?

What happens when you die?

What do you dread, in this room, now?

Not listening. Now. Not watching. Safe inside my own skin.

To die, not having listened. Not having asked … To have scattered  

life.

Yes, I know: the thread you have to keep finding, over again, to  

follow it back to life; I know. Impossible, sometimes.

Valentine (1934-2020) was an American writer who was the Modern York State Artist Laureate from 2008 to 2010. This sonnet sees Valentine’s speaker tending to an unidentified ‘you’ whom she doesn’t know how to convert to, and continues to invoke an arrangement of effective pictures for anxiety, counting a swarmed room

7. Elizabeth Bishop, ‘Little Exercise’.

Think of the storm roaming the sky uneasily

like a dog looking for a place to sleep in,

listen to it growling.

Think how they must look now, the mangrove keys

lying out there unresponsive to the lightning

in dark, coarse-fibred families,

where occasionally a heron may undo his head,

shake up his feathers, make an uncertain comment

when the surrounding water shines.

Think of the boulevard and the little palm trees

all stuck in rows, suddenly revealed

as fistfuls of limp fish-skeletons.

It is raining there. The boulevard

and its broken sidewalks with weeds in every crack

are relieved to be wet, the sea to be freshened.

Now the storm goes away again in a series

of small, badly lit battle-scenes,

each in “Another part of the field.”

Think of someone sleeping in the bottom of a row-boat

tied to a mangrove root or the pile of a bridge;

think of him as uninjured, barely disturbed

Bishop (1911-79) is one of the mammoths of twentieth-century American verse whose after death notoriety proceeds to develop and reinforce. This poem around anxiety passes on Bishop’s virtuoso for comparison, from the opening picture of the storm moving over the sky like a dog ‘looking for a put to rest in’. The poem is around the ways in which a few individuals are profoundly influenced by ‘storms’ (both exacting and allegorical) whereas others show up to be able to carry on, unperturbed.

8. W. H. Auden, ‘September 1, 1939’.

I sit in one of the dives

On Fifty-second Street

Uncertain and afraid

As the clever hopes expire

Of a low dishonest decade:

Waves of anger and fear

Circulate over the bright

And darkened lands of the earth,

Obsessing our private lives;

The unmentionable odour of death

Offends the September night.

Accurate scholarship can

Unearth the whole offence

From Luther until now

That has driven a culture mad,

Find what occurred at Linz,

What huge imago made

A psychopathic god:

I and the public know

What all schoolchildren learn,

Those to whom evil is done

Do evil in return.

Exiled Thucydides knew

All that a speech can say

About Democracy,

And what dictators do,

The elderly rubbish they talk

To an apathetic grave;

Analysed all in his book,

The enlightenment driven away,

The habit-forming pain,

Mismanagement and grief:

We must suffer them all again.

Into this neutral air

Where blind skyscrapers use

Their full height to proclaim

The strength of Collective Man,

Each language pours its vain

Competitive excuse:

But who can live for long

In an euphoric dream;

Out of the mirror they stare,

Imperialism’s face

And the international wrong.

Faces along the bar

Cling to their average day:

The lights must never go out,

The music must always play,

All the conventions conspire

To make this fort assume

The furniture of home;

Lest we should see where we are,

Lost in a haunted wood,

Children afraid of the night

Who have never been happy or good.

The windiest militant trash

Important Persons shout

Is not so crude as our wish:

What mad Nijinsky wrote

About Diaghilev

Is true of the normal heart;

For the error bred in the bone

Of each woman and each man

Craves what it cannot have,

Not universal love

But to be loved alone.

From the conservative dark

Into the ethical life

The dense commuters come,

Repeating their morning vow;

“I will be true to the wife,

I’ll concentrate more on my work,”

And helpless governors wake

To resume their compulsory game:

Who can release them now,

Who can reach the deaf,

Who can speak for the dumb?

All I have is a voice

To undo the folded lie,

The romantic lie in the brain

Of the sensual man-in-the-street

And the lie of Authority

Whose buildings grope the sky:

There is no such thing as the State

And no one exists alone;

Hunger allows no choice

To the citizen or the police;

We must love one another or die.

Defenceless under the night

Our world in stupor lies;

Yet, dotted everywhere,

Ironic points of light

Flash out wherever the Just

Exchange their messages:

May I, composed like them

Of Eros and of dust,

Beleaguered by the same

Negation and despair,

Show an affirming flame.

Much verse of the 1930s reflects a broader social and political anxiety around coming strife, and the verse of W. H. Auden (1907-73) could be a case in point. In this poem, composed on the day Germany announced war on Poland, Auden talks for numerous individuals who were cleared out feeling ‘uncertain and afraid’ as occasions in Europe raised.

What are the signs and symptoms of anxiety?

Anxiety is characterized by a set of signs and symptoms such as:

• Sweating
• Difficulty in breathing
• Shortness of breath
• Sense of choking
• Complaints of chest pain
• Shaking or trembling
• Nausea or vomiting
• Dizziness or Lightheadedness
• Fear of losing control over oneself and their environment
• Fear of impending doom
• Hot or cold flashes
• Tingling or numbness
• Increased heart rate

These symptoms vary in severity from person to person. However, it is noted that many people experience anxiety attacks that are not significantly displayed.

 What are some ways to manage anxiety?

Identify and acknowledge the triggers

The most significant strategy that can be used to control one’s anxiety is by identifying and acknowledging those triggers.

Being able to recognize what makes an individual anxious makes them better equipped to take action.

Relaxation techniques

 

Even though anxiety can be bought under an individual’s control it cannot be predicted. In such situations, it is necessary that an individual actively carries out relaxation techniques.

These might include meditation, yoga, and deep breathing which helps to reduce the intensity of anxiety within a short period.

Socialization

 

A key to reducing the frequency and intensity of anxiety attacks could be spending time with close family and friends.

The kind of emotional and practical support provided by these social and personal groups help the person feel connected and aid in distracting one’s mind from negative and recurring thoughts that lead to anxiety.

Apart from friends and families, individuals can also consider speaking to groups of people that are experiencing similar problems.

Set realistic goals

When an individual is feeling overwhelmed setting goals and targets keeping in mind priorities can help resolve overwhelming feelings of fear or panic.

Setting goals provides structure and routine to an individual’s life reducing space for uncertainty which can be a major trigger for anxiety in many cases.

Take up new challenges

Apart from doing activities that an individual is usually fond of and has expertise in, trying new and challenging activities that put an individual outside their comfort zone in a healthy manner may help reduce the stress and anger temporarily.

Signing up for new activities also provides a path to meeting people with similar stories and concerns.

Lifestyle changes

An individual’s lifestyle plays a major role in their experience of anxiety. An unhealthy and busy lifestyle usually leads to unhealthy eating, lack of exercise, lack of adequate sleep.

A combination of a well-set diet, exercise, and sleep can help to regulate an individual’s mood and equip them with a favorable coping mechanism.

these coping mechanisms in turn help to get control over once anxiety concerns in a more adaptable manner.

lack of proper diet, sleep, and exercise can make an individual sluggish, dependent, moody and vulnerable to anxiety attacks.

Making journal entries

Last but not least having a journal to write down how a person is feeling and thinking when they are anxious helps them to reflect upon their thoughts and feelings.

Putting down one’s thoughts and feelings onto a paper helps to provide a sense of temporary relief.

In the case of journal entry, a person does not even have to fear being judged by another person regarding their thoughts and feelings.

What are the therapy options for anxiety?

Cognitive-behavioral therapy

Cognitive-behavioral therapy helps an individual to control their anxiety by using strategies like relaxation and breathing. It works on the principles of replacing negative thoughts with positive ones.

Exposure therapy

Exposure therapy is a kind of therapy in which an individual is exposed to a particular stimulus that they usually fear or are anxious about in a graded order.

As and when the individual gets comfortable with the situation or stimulus introduced or exposed to them with each session individuals get more comfortable with a real-life situation that might have otherwise been a source for triggering anxiety.

Group therapy

 

It is based on the principle that when an individual interacts with other people who are suffering from the same fears they might not feel left alone or isolated. Group therapy usually involves a group of individuals who are experiencing similar symptoms and problems.

Medication

Anxiety can also be treated with the help of medication prescribed by a health care professional.

Though medication alone cannot help in reducing persistent anxiety it can help in restoring a sense of control and bring temporary relief. 

Online therapy  

In cases where reaching out physically to a professional is impossible or discomforting an individual can opt to seek help through the online medium. 

In this, the therapy sessions are carried out one-to-one over a video or audio call. Some individuals also prefer interacting with the therapist through text as well due to various reasons. One of the most common is the fear of being judged by the therapist or some personal hesitation. 

Online therapy can help individuals to regulate some aspects of their anxiety that aids individuals in carrying out a stress-free life over time

Citations

10 of the Best Poems about Anxiety

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57048/little-exercise-56d23a2603ae7

https://poets.org/poem/september-1-1939

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44214/preludes-56d22338dc954

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44214/preludes-56d22338dc954

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/44212/the-love-song-of-j-alfred-prufrock