This restless and irritating
little tick in my skin
won't leave me alone.
I scratch and I pick
and I peel away
my flesh, digging
away the rotten.
My words are matted
cat hair and
malignant growths, needing
to be cut off and out.
I reek of apathy
and whiskey
and lies
and lost sleep
and I feel
as if I am
caught in a swirling
whirlpool of
the kind of loneliness
that consumes men whole.

This has to end.