Anxiety

Hey Fiona.

I like this. It effects me on a visceral level like good poetry should. I like the personification of anxiety. I get the image of a Victorian woman in a corset cinched tight. I would cut "feminine clothing" since the subsequent lines make that obvious. I like your transition from the finery to the psychiatric - very well done. I love the third stanza which brings the reader back to her vulnerable physicality. I would also lose "curiously" in the first stanza and simply say "which remind me of," because the whole poem is surreal, yet very real to anyone who has suffered anxiety. Curiously is too much a judgement word. The last line doesn't quite do it for me. I think there may be another line in you for this. This is just my opinion. I really like the poem and am so happy to be reading your work again. You got talent.

Lucy