8.22.2013

Life Came at Me Like a Speeding Train

I don't know what I was doing before this,
Something to do with school assignments, schedules, structured monotony.
I've suddenly forgotten the location of my brakes, the functions of my GPS,
The simple difference between my left and my right.
And now it's night.

The only lights I see are warning (signals),
For some sort of crossroad is up ahead. 
I'm searching for something familiar in the darkness,
But your leading hands are no where to be found.

There's a whistle in the distance,
The sound burgeons, swells in volume as the seconds pass,
And I slowly come to my senses.
I hear, then feel, then see that it's fast approaching,
And I can't stop this train.
I prepare for the blow, 
For a moment contemplate fate,
And pray one last selfish prayer.

A high-pitched ringing disturbs my stupor,
It is deafening and does not falter.
I am blind (or perhaps I have just moved away from the light?).
And there's numbness,
The kind you get when your body is too shocked to deal with the injury,
The kind you get when the imminent pain is too great to bear.

My mind is left broken, 
Like a heart skipping too many beats,
Like a scratched record on repeat.
It keeps taking me back and forth, back and forth,
Between this convoluted present and that one time...
Before all the chaos, the confusion, the crash.

I want to escape entirely into that elusive peace, my precious past. 
If my future is to be spent in recovery from this collision,
Then I'll spend eternity running away from tomorrow.

© 08.2013 Alexandra Hall

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