Time flows wetly beneath me,
Deeply, thickly, redly.
Time forms little pools at my feet.
Time leaves little trails to the window
And beyond?
Like strings of red beads on the hard wooden floor.
Time forms little droplets at the corners of my eyes.
Time spills over and runs down my cheeks.
Time falls all around me,
Like dark rain.
Time never lets go.
Time dries sticky around my toes.
Time dries in black runnels on my face,
Crusts around my eyelids,
Falls off in black flakes when i scratch and
When i blink.
Black flakes beneath my fingernails.
Time pulls me awake.
The hunger, the lust for time swells as a tide until
My eyelids flutter open.
I find myself on my back.
It's always night here.
The smells of wood and dust,
White dust,
Float up to me.
I think i can see the stars through the ceiling
But it's really the window.
Turning my head,
I feel time crinkle as it releases my hair from its grip.
The strings of time on the floor line from where my arm has fallen,
Across the hard wood,
Up the wall in fat splatters,
And to the sill.
Time splots sit on pieces of the broken glass in the frame.
Like black paint on ice.
The beads don't shimmer anymore,
Only dull, dark spots on the wood.
I've lost my mood.
I can't see the moon, but
I can feel the moonbeams like spider webs on my skin and on the floor,
Like strings.
My skin,
A thin layer of gray that holds me from spilling out of myself.
Could i tear it off?
Could i break the soft shell and release myself?
Could i peel my skin off like the layers of paper mache we used to construct as children?
Why do i recall that?
I remember everything.
Flashes of something slip into my head.
Faces, people, their words,
What did they say?
Spots of some forgotten childhood,
An adolescence too romantic to last.
Drops of something else...
Pictures.
Pictures flash by like clippings on a board,
Like still prints,
Yes!
Like still prints from spliced movie scenes,
Each accompanied by their own scar and pinprick of pain.
Time heightens and ebbs like a sea.
Time swirls around me.
I lay on my back,
On the paneled floor,
Cold, dark wood.
Excruciatingly aware, I begin to feel time beating in my chest,
Burning my throat.
Something stirs in my stomach.
New time,
Fresh time,
It’s running down my face.
Again the crinkling release,
Black flake snow
As I raise my arm to my mouth and nose.
It's time,
Fresh time,
New time.
It's me spilling out of myself.
Time is flowing again.
So much, my skin is so gray,
So paper thin, my skin is so paper thin,
Dead.
I begin to wonder…
Time.
I lay flat and still as night turns into night turns into night.
Time continues to spill.
It's all red smears on my gray skin,
My white tummy.
Time falls all round me in waves.
It's me,
It's me raining all around.
Finally, I slip.
Is time beneath me?
Falling, but I'm falling
Upward.
Is time above me?
Time.
And then i'm in the red haze.
The rushing silence.
Time where I belong.