RECOVERY:

Back in the sanctuary of Essex, the wheat crop turned golden
whispers at night beneath our wide open windows as I lie awake.
The sky explodes, electric pink & yellow, bruised & medical,
smells of hospitals & power stations, crackles with a chemical
fizz, dumping bullish gobs of warm rain. I’m turned
inside-out, recovering from intense sleep deprivation, three
days of cigar smoke & recycled air.
Flying with two hung-over posh girls, talking plummy trash
about the fabulous damage they’ve committed on themselves.
Their cute playing with a toy town wound makes me flinch,
their naïvety around the dark side so sweet. They look & smell
bad, but I feel worse, built from reconstituted fragments of
historical hang-overs I barely hold together & no one has a clue.
I want to shower the pain off my skin, flush the system as the
inside of my numb head twists & contorts to face in the wrong
direction. I’m dogged by hallucinations, jerked in-&-out of
violent sleep, strapped into a world of sharp & cavorting shapes
that laugh & taunt & cut. But today is peaceful, simple, listening
to the rain & the whisper of the corn.

(K)