Late to the party

Poem

Anxiety is like the game
which you lose 
when you think about the game

we’re all playing it

by any other name 
the alert perceptions 
of ones-self
are natures preservation 
mechanism 
but, when the caveman can’t run 
it is a prism 
where all your insecurities 
are reflected back
a prison
in a disco ball 

peering through the crack
the party is going on all around
still outside
nowhere to found
can’t climb down

down

down

we go

inside 
into a little hole
of isolating thought

ones downed 
and, twitching
from the taser
enforcing 
the no fun
policy
the law of psychology
that won’t set one free

a life sentence 

waking up late 
after, little sleep
the man with the paper umbrella
lead his black sheep
hooves, to the cafe
crushed a sleeping pill
over saintly benefaction
eggs benedict
chewed the hay
- bless thou the stomach
and, hope to feel
ones devilled mind
eggnesthetized
stitched to the chair
upholstered 
and disguised 
he surveyed the yolk
dribbling in feral ribbons
away from the body
of the beast 
he’d created

shakes tempered
once shrieking gibbons 
now, coffin ready stillness

the black of 
breakfast Guinness 
glissading forth 
over froth
into decanter
beneath table cloth
hair of the dog
to season the broth 
of disquiet
deafened, dumbed 
and blinded
to satisfaction 

the world walks by 
in silence  
masked, and insensate
voices kiss cheeks
lethal
without violence 
the pepper 
of airborne droplets
attack
in world of tv static

numb, for the moment
stunned, unconscious
he wondered 
what he was ever worried about ...

Oh fuck
- for fuck’s sake -

he just lost the game, again. 

© Darius the Mate 21-01-2022

Written for Shay’s Word Garden, Word List # 9.