In my family

sanity doesn’t come cheap

the stream of psycho joins us together

A stiff thread or a raging rope

We strum the strings of insanity

Like a well tuned band

Maybe it was all the creativity

The early reading

Maybe after generations of addictions

And prescriptions

Predictions and contradictions

It comes over us like fog

Engulfing the hill side

We march to a different drummer

Who cannot hold a beat

that lives in another county

 

Phobias,

Paranoias

OCD and delusions of martyrdom

poetry and piano playing

mixed with

artistic fervor and

feverish wonder

Sanity never claimed my family

We have to earn it, strive for it

And sometimes we must avoid each other

Avoid the murmurs of mayhem

and focus on friendships

And the familiar

and just focusing on focusing

We cannot blame, we are all the same

A part of us all

can claim to be insane

in my family

sanity doesn’t come cheap

For most of us

it doesn’t come at all

And the rest of us?

It is lurking right around the corner.

In it’s birthday suit and a bouquet of gardenias