This poem is not mine. But it is a favorite of mine. I think of it a lot when trying to make sense of violent events in my past. I also think of it when I feel that I, and maybe all people who grapple with PTSD are like a lone, tired warrior up on a hill, looking at the horrors and wars of life, and feeling very chilled and frightened, and on your own.



ALONE



From childhood's hour I have not been
As others were; I have not seen
As others saw; I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I loved, I loved alone.
Then- in my childhood, in the dawn
Of a most stormy life- was drawn
From every depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still:
From the torrent, or the fountain,
From the red cliff of the mountain,
From the sun that round me rolled
In its autumn tint of gold,
From the lightning in the sky
As it passed me flying by,
From the thunder and the storm,
And the cloud that took the form
(When the rest of Heaven was blue)
Of a demon in my view.



By Edgar Allen Poe