phase one
a strand of hair tickles my cheek
as my fingers clench the plastic cup
casual chitter chatter muffled
with the flick of a switch
so that the pounding music
is replaced with my heartbeatphase two
my eyes flicker downwards
landing on a pair of shaky hands
whose fingers curl and relax
when my brain asks politelybut those are not my hands
they may be attached to my body
but these are foreign digits
unable to be recognised
within my binary codephase three
my chest begins to collapse inwards
unable to withstand the pressure
of these stimulations around me
pricking my skin and leaving scars
invisible to the naked eyeragged breaths scrape my lungs
while my parted lips vacuum air
but only five percent oxygen
reaches my aching brain
which clings to consciousness
with nails that pierce the cliff edge
crumbling beneath my fingertipsphase four
swaying from left to right
steering an imaginary car
which has long since lost its driverwondering when the vignette filter
will haze the edge of my vision
and whether my eyes will see
anything besides midnight
for the rest of eternityphase five
fear seeps through the cracks
which my heart was trying to heal
poisoning blood vessels
sending my pulse racing
at a million miles per second
competing against itself
in a race no one signed up forcontrolled by a puppeteer
who has released the strings
and sent my stomach plummetingpanic urges me to escape
but no one can hear these thoughts
dissipating before they leave my lipsswitching to fight or flight mode
when my only opponent is myselfwaiting for someone to rescue me
from the depths of the ocean
using only words of comfort
which skip across the surface
but never hit rock bottom
where my soul lies
weighed down by the anchor
of my catatonic mindfaint words reach my ears
from the other end of a tunnel
whose crackling signal sends me
fragments of information
a jigsaw puzzle with pieces
which the manufacturer
forgot to includephase six
my mind taps through frequencies
brushing a hand across piano keys
struggling to hit the right note
which returns vivid colours
back to their rightful objectswaking up from a nightmare
conjured by my own anxieties
as my breathing evens out
adjusting to the pulse
of a metronome in adagio
and eventually to graveblurred faces sharpen
traced with coloured pencils
doodles leaping out of a sketchbook
restored to three dimensions
the way they should bemy grip loosens on the
red solo cup whose plastic
snaps and crackles while
conversation blossoms
like a rose whose thorns
are only exposed to me.
YOU ARE READING
Coffee Culture
PoetryIn which tiny snippets of time are cut and pasted together. - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - Poetry #30 (29/01/19) © 2019 evethespy. All Rights Reserved.