Guarding an abundance of ages past and to come;
Outside an ethereal arboretum of
rustling sugar maples, green ash leaves dancing in the wind,
scarlet berries burst from the hawthorn branches.
Were two golems, anchored to their post.

Long green blades grazed their shins,
Discipline echoed off their clay skin.
A path submitted between them
As if the dirt beneath them was at their whim.

The constant breeze caused their skin
To crack, the pressure of perennial purpose
Created small canyons on their skull.
The scent of honeysuckles escaped their open crania.

No matter what approached their garden
Gargantuan locusts, pillagers in the shadows,
Nothing was stronger than the grip of
their hands melding into one another.

Whether it was learning long division,
Or naming all fifty states.
Nothing seemed to matter.
It all seemed so trivial.

The phantom that haunted me
Never left,
Not even in elementary.
I could not cope, nor concentrate.

Cafeteria feasts
Made of concentrate.
Paired with my inner confusion,
I tended to lose my lunch.

I tried to hold
Myself to a means
Of normalcy.
It wound up as ***** on my shoes.

The tension
The tugging
I quarrel with
Myself again.

Perturbed neurotransmitters buzz about
My subarachnoid space,
Leaving a void where
My voice of reason once was.

What was once my cortex,
Is now a coliseum.
Gladiators donned in the Armor of God
Clash with abhorrent avatars of psychedelic malevolence.

This battle ending,
In the stalest of stalemates.
Leaving myself as the only casualty,
The lone survivor.

Parts of me, now gone forever more
I mourn the corporals of my conscience
By carrying on with my day,
As I drag my feet into the horizon.

I subject myself,
My will
Unto your caring hands.

My spinal cord
Is simply a
Pedestal for your patella.

Let the grains of sand
Slip between your fingers,
My time runs on your own accord.

How can I be of assistance,
All I want is to be yours.

I ponder what my parents told me,
“The light in your eyes is back.”
Not because I am happy,
(or sober…)

Its because I stare at the dimly lit skyline
In the City of Brotherly Love,
In a melancholy manner.

While I could make some cliché allegory
Of a cigarette being another source of faint luminescence.

But I am a college student,
A speck of a presence drowning in dimwits,
With such bright futures ahead!
(Along with a large sum of debt.)

So while I sit and stare
At the city lights,
Soaking in suicidal thoughts at the SEPTA station.

Remember the light in my eyes
Is a reflection of those city lights.
Dimly lit,
Not aflame.
I have no one but myself to blame.

The grip on my disposable razor
Is tighter than the grip of my own reality.
Reflection distorted by the humid condensation,
I still see my hands trembling as I shave.
I still see the designer bags under my eyes.

The familiar aroma of shaving cream,
Paired with the sobering twinge
Of the nicks from my razor.
The haphazardly spilled pills,
Horizontal bottles in the medicine cabinet.

White-knuckling the porcelain sink,
Decorated with dried toothpaste and the blood of my gums.
I reflect to my reflection
Distorted by drip drops of tap water,

“Am I still myself?
Or simply a prospect of my own delusion?”