I try to imagine how you feel—
if it’s real
or if it’s fleeting…
your heart beating so fast
it might fly from
the caverns of your chest.
It’s exhilaration meets sadness:
you can’t stop going going going.
Freedom meets madness:
you can’t stop knowing knowing knowing
that what’s good for you
doesn’t seem so good for you.
To rest for a while,
to pause,
to break
both literally and figuratively,
simultaneous destruction and reprieve,
without a chance to grieve
a world
without semicolons.
You often find yourself
at the edges of you,
all fringe
no fixture,
always alone, but never lonely.
But you need to stop,
you need to feel the absence
of everything
so you know how to better
fill the void,
to fill the empty that burrows
within em dashes
or ellipses
or blank spaces.
I try to imagine how you feel,
but for everyone it differs…
the diversity of suffering,
but the commonality of tears,
the nightmares, the fears,
the intense feeling
of no feeling at all.
And then there’s numb,
then there’s nothing,
your heart beating so slowly,
it sounds more whisper
than thump
thump thump
thump thump
until you just sort of know,
because the numb passes,
the heart beats louder
thump thump
thump thump
as I imagine it would when you realize
how good it feels to be alive.