it’s been a long day
so i’ll just turn in early for the night;
mint toothpaste & detergent & lotion
mix in with the smell of my blankets
as the afterlife waits for me

and i like the way my sheets
wrap & cradle my beat body
like a mummy, tender heart in a jar
basket of eyes & bowl of liver.
the afterlife waits for me.

but i do not rest easy
as i spend the minutes turning
over in my grave,
vision spinning in the darkness
unbound & chaotic

& i can’t help feel the hours
seep into my flesh & bones;
the energy that i want to lack
changes into radio static,
unbound & chaotic

& as i watch the light
out my window change
from black to blue to purple & pink
i wonder if lavender oils
will really help me fall asleep

or the maybe it’ll be the sound of tapping rain,
or maybe if i change my pillow cover
or what if i tried to reset my time
or what if i tried to close my eyes
if i really tried to fall asleep

i can’t help but think
my room is a beast in itself;
electrical hum & emerald blood;
& when everyone sleeps, i am
alive & awake & breathing

the quiet i so desperately lack in the sun
i hate so desperately in the dark
because when i sit here
the world is asleep
and i speak with the moon,
awake & alive & breathing

Summer slips away
while I hide in my room
wasting time falling down
wondering if I’ll ever share
this wealth of love
I hoard on my mound
with someone besides myself:
a tragedy, curled up on the rug,
jaded by the compassion
that has been given up
and I can't get enough

I pinch in further to zoom
on the microcosm of my life
and see that it’s cropped
into a frame
without resolve or
anyone to blame-
a picture of me
with the blinds drawn,
frozen in a still shot,
hiding from the moon,
and it has me believing that
I might die alone
from lack of sleep
as I howl and brood

Morning breaks through
requesting me with warmth
and calling out to
wake me before noon-
I hear but don't listen,
instead I'll bask in this gloom,
listless

That surely must produce
some worthwhile art
in the end
even if something will always
feel like it is
missing

I am consumed by
negative spaces,
floating in between
death and the void,
looking for reason
that won't come
and there is no use
in running from darkness
when it's what brought us
here at birth
and the only thing
we part with in the dirt

If the way out is through,
why do they stay and
mock the despair
behind my eyelids?
They laugh as I search
for purpose that doesn't exist
in lieu of aliens that
I swear are real,
when reality has always been
my achilles heel

It's a dance of avoiding gravity
until inevitably strikes
a heavy blow
that life is
random circumstance
siphoning into black holes,
a collection of moments
that we will
forget to remember,
but how does one find peace
without answers?

Daylight starts peeking in
to see if I'm okay,
I disguise the sentiment
as irrelevant
when I could really use a break
from this carousel of fear
that only
wants me to want more
as if I am owed a life
that is somehow past due,
checked out by someone
who was less afraid
to step outside of their room

Sunlight omits
more concern over
reckless abandonment
as it greets my pacing force,
but there is no stopping
what was designed
without brakes,
carried by all the love and hate
that glorifies impulse to
sift through emptiness-
a sacrifice to this
blank screen
that consumes me with dread
over a deathless dream
stuck inside my head

10 days,
and 20 nights.

Sleeping,
but never resting.

I close my eyes,
tell my mind,
"You must stop!".

Silence arrives,
the calm before the disaster.

What will happen tomorrow?
And your love?
The payment?
The salary?

I want my body
to melt into the sheets,
to receive an embrace from the bed.

For the pillow
to absorb my thoughts.

For my soul to leave,
and return with the dawn.

I want to sleep,
so that in the morning I wake up,
as if yesterday
had never existed.