I would describe myself as mercurial. a burning soul smoldering under moon white marble skin. sometime I feel like a hurricane, a symptom of the moon and the ocean’s conspiring, waves churning and frothing in the space between my skin, bones turned to mush, tornado sand, by violent ebbs and flows. And then my insides burst into flames, a field of bright purple lillies blossoming into a raging heat of reds and oranges, a roaring wave of fire, a perfume bottle crashing on unblemished stone, glittering old glass marking a battlefield on the bathroom floor, an explosion of nostalgia so sickly sweet it tickles the nose.
No! I am melting and churning and burning until I am empty. Ashes swept away by an old maid, forgetful and quick to turn the page. “Don’t look back don’t look back don’t look back”. She chains up the moon and the stars and tells me to look away from the ocean lest it come crashing down again. don’t get too close to the mirror lest it break. don’t unfurl your flower lest it burn.
I become the moon or something less romantic. cool empty numb. how can you expect a ravaged being to give you the time? what am I to do if the world is not on fire? I wouldn’t feel a thing.
I wait, wondering if the world is over, and, if so, how do I get out of it? maybe if I crawl along in the emptiness I’ll bump into a backdoor. maybe it’ll lead me to my moon and stars just right not burning and whirling but a door opening from darkness into just right. should I make a more concerted effort? go to the right and then the left. which way do you go when it all looks the same? how do you remember where to go when all you’ve done is forget?
Oh it’s hazy and dark and I’ve forgotten what I was on about. I can feel the cold coming. have I recovered? I fear this is the nothing before the storm. that lapse in time and everything important that makes me want to jump out of a window, watch my bones crack open and see what’s going on in there.
how can I walk when I don’t have anything to hold me up? how do I describe rain in july? I’ve simply melted and washed away.
let me go, let me ride this wave like a lullaby. as long as I’m tethered here I know the ocean will rise and batter me to death before burning and crackling hot broken glass.
I’m rising again. If only I could stop this emptiness this explosion this numb wave of nothing ever really happens at least not to me does it?
Is this what it’s like to be human? not full of organs and white blood cells and a beating, breathing heart, but to feel the galaxy blossom and die under your skin? all while sitting in that marble room listening to that dreadfully LOUD fan I wish I could stand up? or maybe they could stop talking?
do they feel it too? how could they pink and smiling sodium peroxide toothpaste harsh and laughing cutting open their faces with an ugly yell will they ever stop SCREAMING?
oh here they go AGAIN. no no no here I go again.
the fields are burning from their foggy glance. how can I when they? do they know? could they feel the same? are we the same? am I empty like they are empty? do they crash and ride high soar to the sun and back and swoop into the ocean elated and ALIVE????? am I merely a figment of my imagination? is this it?
don’t look back. it’s coming right at me.
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