A word is born. It grows in the mind like a babe from seed. It wriggles and writhes, and exponentially rises, until suddenly – an Idea. The word shoots forth and multiplies, becomes complex. It is not yet whole, but it doesn’t need to be. That will come with time.
***
Mindless babbling.
The voice of a wretched scavenger.
Nothing is clear, and everything is dangerously near.
A fully formed thought, just out of reach teases me, tantalising… touching my fingertips like a tongue to lips. Never quite close enough to satisfy, it is enough to madden even the most unhinged of minds. Mine.
“Sitting at a typewriter and bleeding”, because it is just that easy,
but my blood is not ink, and my mouth is as dry as my brain.
There will be no rainfall this year.
Words that once subverted are inverted and senseless.
Relentlessly empty.
Wordless babble posing as complex thought.
My mind has been robbed. Not violently, not glamorously, but slowly and painfully depleted.
Left for dead, abandoned, bleeding out for hours, months, years…
My tongue does not remember the taste of poetry.
My fingers do not remember rhythm.
My voice has cracked for the last time, and my soul is numb.
Innocent babbling.
Forgive me, for I know not what I say.
My words are hostage and I am powerless to save.
Who will rescue me now? When I cannot cry for help –
Who will see me?
Who will comfort me and give life to my thoughts, lost even unto myself?
I do not know myself.
My mind, my mind, why have you forsaken me?
Rambling, rambling, I am betrayed!
I did not earn this punishment,
this slow-burning fire of hell,
this living inferno that steals the very breath from my lungs!
My organs rot inside me, I must remain
decrepitly skeletal, necrotic, ashamed.
Desperate for redemption, I ready my soul
and tense each fibre of my being –
with one final heave I express the vocal gland, and-
Nothing.
The whispering sigh of failure without relief.
emtage 
*applauds* Nicely writ! The words are still with you 🙂
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Thank you! A huge compliment coming from you!
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It always starts with babbling and rambling. Some days they make sense, others, not so. But I’m glad to see you’re writing again! 😊
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Thanks Annie! I’m so glad to be back. Not quite regularly posting yet, but it’s a start!
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Wow! I feel like this often of late but cannot convey it as elegantly as you did here 🙂
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Thank you! Don’t be fooled though, this was many years in the making – at the height of the illness that inspired it I could hardly string two words together, let alone write poetry. I’m so happy to finally be able to express what it was like!
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I can relate, many poems of mine of late (although they are more for processing right now rather than artistic value) are an accumulation of years through the sentences. I’m glad you are no longer at the peak of illness and that healing frees you to write again.
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Theres a lot of value in writing as therapy. I’m trying to get out of the mindset that every piece has to be art. It’s beautiful when it happens, but those little moments just as important 🙂
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Yes!!! For me growing up I had used it for self validation. I can’t just remove or devalue that process when sharing on WP. So I think of it all as part of the whole and had decided not to defend myself as a poet or poetic quality. It is freeing to use writing for whatever purposes I decide is needed at the time 🙂
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