A small black box
in a small black room
in a small black building
in a ******* world.

"You're just doing a favor for a friend.
So don't worry if it's not your best.
Just get out there and do it."

But when do the favors stop being favors?

Pedal
weighed down with worries-
Wheel
locked in place by fear

I speed into a busy intersection,
both armless
and legless.

Motion
a change in position or time...

...But I'm not going anywhere...
Everything is coming to me.

And it's coming slowly.

It's dark now.
I can't see you--
standing in that intersection,
but I know you're there.

And I will hit you.
Eventually.

There's a voice I long to hear.
I want to be able
    to soak up its words
        like some photosynthetic freak of nature.
But I'm sitting at the back of this bus.
    And all I can see is...

Awaken from a glimpse of something horrific.
Something that I can't yet understand.
    Perhaps too soon.
    Perhaps too late...

For now, I try to make sense
    of the tangled mess of highway
    perpetually stuck in rush hour
    inside my head.

So I speed on
    towards the intersection
        still terrified
        still helpless
        still towards you

I don't want to be the one to make that decision
again.
I'm sick and tired of being in this state;
the limbo where I
bend over backwards
trying to safely get under that bar--
just to get back in line and do it again.
All over again.

You see, the worst thing about this sick game
is that it gets harder the longer it goes.
Some ******* is holding a beam
a foot above the ground and
I
have to slither under it.

I suppose I could quit now...
Forfeit before it gets too hard
and I break my back.
But then again, I could still win.

And somebody is singing a song
in the background
"Every limbo boy and girl..."

And it's stuck on loop and there's no escape.

Until one time I break my back
trying to get under a bar that is too low.
"All around the limbo world..."

Though the pain is unbearable,
it's better than being part of that game.

"Gonna do the limbo rock..."

And just like that the game starts over.
But this time I have to start from where I left off:
broken and tired.
And one foot off the ground.

"All around the limbo clock"

Floating in suspension
above a tile matrix.
Somewhere in that matrix
there is a consistency--
a ratio of blue tiles
to white tiles.

Blue,
blue,
blue,
blue,
WHITE.
...white?

Was it white?

Startled by a barrier
the ratio has been
blurred.

Somehow losing track of
the one thing that matters,
brings back the
real
goal.

Caught up in minutiae,
trapped in a cerulean mass...
no time has elapsed,
but time has passed.

White.
All around me,
Everything I see--
White.

Blinded by lights,
Brighter than the sun,
Iridescent and reflected by
all of the
White.

A sickly woman in a nightgown.
A set of tubes.
"Breathe through your nose."

A series of small bites
in a location that I can't find.
And then the scream of some horrid machine,
Like the scream of an insolent child.

A large,
violent pain is radiated.
The smell of burning is the same as its taste.

Curled toes,
Tense muscles,
Wet eyes.
"Are you okay?"

More drugs.

Eyes closed,
everything moves at a slow pace,
as if I'm simply watching it happen
from a stool in the corner.

Writhing,
the sound of crunching bones
somewhere in my head.
"Just breathe through your nose."
Yeah.
Okay.

A hand pulls a string,
but I don't feel anything.
Like a puppet doing its master's bidding,
so I obey and succumb to this disembodied hand.

Slowly I am lifted
from the dream world I am in.
Bright lights fade,
I am reborn as a helpless child.

But I have legs just the same as you.
I can ******* walk,
so let me walk.
Don't you see?
Those drugs don't make me incapable of handling myself.

...Or do they?

"Don't stand up so fast."
Don't worry.
I know the limitations of this new person.
But the taste of blood reminds me of who I was.

And going back is equally as scary as going forward.

Numbers tick down.
An idle buzzing.
A man speaking
   but
       no
           words
               come
                     out.

Muffled sounds from the other side of the room.
Running in circles
around what we really mean.

Perhaps if the buzzing would just...
                   STOP...

Outside people shuffle about like ants.
Preoccupied with the task at hand,
the ants carry an enormous weight
              blindly
back to their queen.

"I'd like to-"
buzzzzzzzzzz
"Start with-"
buzzzzzzzzzz

ENOUGH.


Silence
Everything feels different in the silence;
          numbers move more slowly;
          circles become lines;
Everything changes.