POEM - Ungracious & Unheard

The hours are beset with daylight,

but I am besieged by design

Someday, the sadness will catch me

like quicksand,

and I will kill my happy self

For what am I at my deepest?

A shadow, hid amongst the sunbeams

An echo of my long-lost lungs

A machine which is always waiting

to be back in the ghostly throes of solitude,

where no one stops me

from imagining myself beside you;

whether by force, or by dream

   

My now-quiet heart waits in vain

for the clean-slate sound of you

ringing that lonely doorbell;

a noise which will never come

Instead, I find myself falling asleep

in an over-bright room, where no one

thinks to hold me;

mask on, even while I’m unconscious

And the only hope I have any faith in

is that this big brain might accidentally

find you while my eyes are closed

Even here, however, clarity stalls

I’m often in paradise, obscuring agony;

hearing my children sing songs

which remind me of you, for example

Suddenly, something like the wind whispers,

“She wants to see you.”

I follow the sound into a new room

You’re topless on the floor,

forming letter shapes with your frame

There’s a game being played,

and a crowd of encouraging onlookers

You don’t even seem to notice my presence

   

Then again, I observe that your wide smile

does not match the distant look

in your eyes

The screen beneath you demands

letters which I’ve not seen you create

And there’s the nagging wonder

of why you’d ask me here

if you didn’t mean for me to see

what everyone else is failing to

Unfortunately, I’m awake before able

to make out any of what you’re spelling

And even my selfish mind cannot

will belief in some sort of dreamer’s communiqué

   

The truth is: you’re better off without me,

and I’m a time-bomb of denial

for the plain reading of reality;

that I’m better off without me too