My body is a cage.

This weekend I fell,

slow motion,

into a fog of depression the likes of which I haven't faced in a while.

Each morning I'd wake to a day that stretched endlessly in front of me, void of anything interesting or meaningful,

like all the light had been sucked from the world.

After a brief search for distractions-- something to read, something to watch, something to think about-- I'd inevitably end up back in bed, buried beneath the covers

sinking in to oblivion

sleeping until my head and my body both ached.

J was unable to rouse me, try as he might to push me out the door.

"Go running," he'd plead. "You'll feel better."

but I couldn't seem to get my limbs to cooperate.

Or my mind to quiet

its endless chant,

"Useless, useless, useless."

{At times like these, my bed has a gravitational force

far greater than my willpower.}

I never seem to know what triggers it.

Likewise, when I hit bottom and am finally able to look up,

and squint at the watery sun,

I am equally unable to vocalize what has ended it.

but I'm relieved.

Now I run {though my legs feel like they move through molasses} and pray

that the depression stays away. That this really is

the end.

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