Husk body, you have betrayed me.
Solid flesh, miles of it,
Moored to sweat and cell-stained bedsheets.
You pin yourself here with the weight of your thoughts,
Each rumination heavy as lead;
You fall like a tree in the heart of the forest.
This, my unwitnessed descent into mania.
Indomitable exhaustion demands elusive sleep,
Clammy as a fever dream.
You cannot sleep; you watch the light show projected on the back of your eyelids:
Red vein phantasmagoria,
Pulsing light socket vision.
When you rise — red-eyed, catatonic — you are heavier than even your thoughts,
Sluggish neural pathways congealed into stagnant rivers,
Nerves firing in some far-off dimension.
About the Creator
Jennifer Ashley
🇨🇦 Canadian Storyteller
♾️ Metis Nation
🎓 UVic Alumni 2020
Writing published by Kingston Writers Press, Young Poets of Canada, Morning Rain Publishing, & the BC Metis Federation to teach Michif in Canadian schools.
✨YA Magical Realism✨
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