caustic cleansers eating away at
caked on ash and peeling dead skin.
silent snowfall smothering wholly
dried up earth, a new, unmarked grave.

dribbling paint slathered thickly onto
walls erasing nicotine stains.
smooth-as-silk milk blotting out brightly
the emptiness of a clear glass.

merciful fluid starkly removes
sins of a pen lost from its thought.
What comes to blank out, smother, dissolve
the murky shadows in my head?