Mind Stress-Body Stress-Distress Poem by Bill Upton

Every negative in life morphs into stress.
Silently, without medical diagnosis, it is what kills us all.
No matter what it reads on the death certificate,
There is a paper trail flow chart leading back to it
As the underlying cause.

Our bodies and our minds lock down in negative situations.
We press unnecessary and premature panic buttons.
We over think despair.
We freeze our healthy, positive mental hard drives,
Our creative juices.
We self impose internal behavioral viruses
That set off alarms, thus disengaging us from simple realities.
We allow our 'fight or flight' chromosome formations
To wage battles of cognitive dissonance
In a separate universe we don't even recognize.
We call ourselves 'stressed out',
But we simply are mired in disappointment quicksand.
We choke with the game on the line.
The stress overpowers our subconscious heroism.
It slithers into our bloodstreams
And poisons our thoughts.

When we force resolution to our stress at the point of impact,
We feed its fever.
If we distance ourselves from the madness, however the method,
We can observe the sun magically, and through osmosis,
Rise again when morning comes.

99% of life's problems,
Life's frustrations,
Life's stresses
Can be solved by releasing our internal pressure valve
And allowing our inner, still, small voice of calm
To become the gradual, yet deliberate means
Of antiseptic nutrient.