Poetry: Numb

Numb

It starts in a tent.

I sit there surrounded by only my thoughts.

We discuss together, dream together.

Our mind opens, I am free to speak from my heart.

The thoughts listen and grow, becoming people,

Alive like me.

We sit there, talking for hours on end.

Believing, wishing, dreaming.

And when things start to change,

I feel so free. I am speaking from my heart.

The tent is filled with growing thoughts,

Talking all at once. Taking on bodies of their

Own.

It is not crowded here, but we are

comfortably close. I say a few words.

Free and true. Or so I have been

lead to believe.

Amongst the many voices, mine is not lost.

I say, “I need to check on him.”

Silence.

The crowd of thoughts slices through me

like ice on my brain. The stares I’m given

feed right into my mind and frown at my

Thoughts. My thoughts.

And then, like a wave they reply,

“No.”

Voices melting into one, not angry,

but strong.

I can feel their force pin my arms to my side.

I cannot move from my thoughts. I have been

restrained.

I struggle to break free, forced to tears.

Betrayed.

My thoughts have grown with me,

Turned on me, put harm on me.

They are bigger than ever, the tent

smaller. It is hard to think.

Everybody is shouting at me and I

cannot find my true voice.

I am stuck here, but I can hear him calling.

He needs me, I know it.

And I know I need him.

If only a little.

Now I am angry. My tears burn through my cheeks,

fueling my desire to escape this.

I fight my way free from the shackles of my thoughts

and I can hear him calling.

I slip free from these ties and slide under the tent.

Thoughts try to drag me back

but I am too far gone now.

They do not cloud me anymore,

I know where I have got to be;

With him.

I am standing in a field. Blazing

white sunlight waters my eyes once more.

The dark thoughts run back into the safe tent.

They are no match for the quiet air.

I listen.

I can find my voice here.

I know where to go.

Down to the pub.

The door opens with a ring, but no one stirs.

People sit hunched over the bar,

Listening to static.

I walk over, footsteps knocking on a hollow floor.

Now I lean, hunched at the bar, scouting the room.

I see him, sipping on a pint of gin.

His thoughts are with him, trapping his arms to his side.

He looks thinner than last time, his skin more shadowed too.

The eyes are the same.

Glossy and cold they draw me in, as always.

Knees knocking together, I search for courage.

Instead I pay for a large, strong drink and

Steal a glance in his direction.

He stares at me, speaking to me with silence.

I look away as sadness clouds my vision.

I was right to come.

He is worse, I can feel it.

I splash my drink over to his table.

I can never control my nerves around him.

Squeezing past his thoughts, I sit down beside him.

He looks through me with a frozen stare.

To him, I am broken, I am a ghost.

But I battle through this, it is normal.

I speak to him, no higher than a whisper,

No harsher than a hum.

“It happened again?”

He replies with a nod and his eyes slide down to his wrists.

My gaze follows, to see red.

I touch them, he winces but does not stop me.

I let his sadness flow from him to me.

In this way we are connected.

I know his pain and him mine.

Both trying to die but are saved somehow.

We are able to numb each other’s pain for one

Moment.

I refuse to live without this.

Dangerous as it might be.

With no words I save him and he, me.

Two bodies connected by accident and then divided.

Always wanting to return.

Together this gap between us was made,

Unfixable, irreversible.

We live apart, broken and unchanging.

Hopelessly craving this moment together.

To calm us, to satisfy our needs.

To check that we can still feel.

Before too long I will become

Addicted. I will leave but crave to stay.

But this is all I can allow myself, it is

No solution.

I stand to go with one final look goodbye.

We can survive a while longer now.

I will not know how long to bleed before

We can be healed again.

I know though that my thoughts are calm and

We are both living.

I am able to listen to the voices around me.

I can relax. I can sleep.

I can pretend for a little longer that without him

I am fine.