By Any Name

Dick Cavett described it best.

He said at its worst,

if there was a cure for it on your bedside table

and you simply had to reach out and take it,

it would require a strength you did not have.

Others afflicted have weighted in.

To Sylvia Plath it felt like a bell jar.

Black dogs is popular but not mean enough.

The dogs would have to be rabid, loose,

starved.

Slough of despond from a Welsh pundit sounds almost like

a poetic interlude.

The mean reds was Billie Holiday’s but sorry, Lady Day,

too pretty.

Country singers tell us time and again about

their plain old blues.

From William Styron came

Darkness Visible. And he should

know.

For me it is

A thief, the sorriest kind.

Wilier than me, and

stronger.

It steals my wit, my smile,

my every trace of ease,

my very heart.

Then it turns out my lightsbefore it leaves.