While pods of people prattle on,

I peer profoundly at the pier 

through pink pellucid wine 

that quivers in this glass of mine.  

 

My words are empty, 

and so I do not speak.

My eyes are heavy, 

and so I want to sleep. 

 

Clouds adorn my shielding mask,

absorbing every breath,

prepared to burst into a rain 

of phlegm and old champagne.

 

This mask of sky can only hide 

the fact I do not smile;

I wish it hid my eyes instead

so I could rest awhile. 

 

I cannot stand the bugs, I say, 

they’re eating me alive.

But no one seems to hear me 

or see me flee inside.

 

This is not my house but still 

I hide upstairs and cry.

 

I hear all of their voices

softly carried through the air:

like hot wind through tall grass,

they blow straight through my hair.

 

I prefer to watch this cruel world glow

through the safety of an old window,

on the comfort of another’s bed

where I can try to disinfect my head.

 

Soon this silent chamber

hears my mind go into labor,

and it’s saturated in naught but

the sticky silk of my dark thoughts:

 

cobwebs strung across the room,

like the inside of an ancient tomb,

they delicately droop beneath

the dust of my despair.

 

O, please let me decay 

into the waves that sway the bay 

Or into clouds that sail the sky,

Let me be anything but I…