Sometimes I feel cold, even paralyzed
My interior world needs to sanitize
I’ve got to step through or I’ll dissipate…
~*~
the bitter of tea, the tang of lemon—and that subtle hint of summertime sweetness, melting into my tongue in one drowsy haze.
paint-stained hands clutch at the warm mug for dear life, and i take tentative sips and let the aromatic seasons dance around my mouth a bit, as if this very dark liquid itself was my final tether to this plane of existence.
perhaps, in some ways, it quite is.
the effect of sleepiness arrives to swoop me back in sluggishly, allowing me to momentarily lean back and stare blankly at the faces on the wall, all eager teeth and pastel craft paper, curling and fading all the way to wandering oblivion; but only a single smile really captured my absent mind’s attention. i wryly picture how it would look against later impressions of dirty blonde and crystalline azure, peeking rather shyly behind deep laugh lines and a few animated freckles peppered across pale skin, endearingly elusive.
sinking in; and sinking still. the effervescent mania that violently grabs me by the shoulders and dares to push its reckless fingers right in the middle of my tender ribcage, refusing to cease digging around until it finally hits something vital. lung, artery—the unfortunate heart itself, perhaps?
but—as i am melancholically assuaged—i am sure it will find only a hollow cavity where a beating organ used to rest. disappointed? not really. i’m painfully aware that already long ago have i been deemed one of the young naivetes who willingly sold it away, to someone who didn’t even know they were searching for damaged antiques. i practically gave it away for nothing.
and yet, where is it now?
is it gathering cracks and dents in someone’s mantlepiece, within a dusty old bungalow? is it buried lost under a child’s messy closet, along with broken toys and past innocence and all their other outgrown things? perhaps, has it already been traded away by its secondhand owner without a brief hesitant thought or a pause of chagrin, in exchange of a better, prettier, newer one?
ah, no matter…no matter. i no longer feel it anymore, anyhow.
cosmic snapshots. a feline grey and glimmering yellow eyes. lilting snatches of an unwritten song dedicated to the moon. murky rain dripping rhythmically from the plastered holes on the ceiling. a perfect pink photograph more potent than any flavour of tea or dosage of coffee, keeping me up well into the witching hours and then some. just another wordless poet. just another tired pen.
your bitter blue. my summertime sadness. the promise of morning, and nothing else.
~*~
And you know
You’re a terrible sight
But you’ll be just fine…
A Lost Painting
The Cynical Obscurantist 