(a poem about hypersensitivity)
no darkness consumes the soul
like the black of panic
flowing through the veins
and stealing every last drop of energy
to create a lightning bolt of passionate self-loathing
to suck the life
from not just this moment
but each instant to come
as an electrical storm within the spirit
focused on the lightning rod of the passing seconds
exterminating them
with the shallowest of breaths
and stealing the future from between my fingers
that taste of nothing but the blood
pounding between my ears
and echoing against my rib cage
suffocating the life from the moments
i had thought once i was able to steal back
from the mind that drinks my essence
and spits it into the river
where it drowns in the salt of earth
dragged from the depths of my long-dead desire
to stay awake
i reflect
yet know there is no reflection
no echo
no self to be seen
even if there was a mirror
i could look into
without crying and screaming
in the darkness of self
lost into the path
where light has no way to touch the feet
or the soul
or the spirit
or even the body
whose sensations have redefined haywire
and exploded
into an uncontrolled spiral of clouds
where ions charge themselves
then careen into the walls of the unconscious mind
where they sink deep below the surface
and start fires
with the flames of gunpowder on water
whose flames no longer consume
but only exploit those nearest
until their hearts swell to breaking
and their compassion turns to lost wanderings
in a desert of hopelessness
that smells vaguely sweet with orange blossoms and mint
until it drowns
in the missing footsteps of mirages of pretended sanity