Oblivion

One night, not to long ago
Upon the disturbing eve of midnight
I sat bolt upright in my disordered bed
My eyes were red and watery

I could hardly see my hands in front of me
The traffic roared outside my icy window
And the gentle whir of the radiator could be heard in the distance
Something was pulling anxiously at the edge of my mind

I turned and placed my cold feet on the floor
The carpet was gentle yet irritating
and when I stood I could feel ever single strand
Every strand piercing my skin...

I walked through my apartment and into the hallway
With nothing but a t-shirt and boxers
And I made my way to the rooftop
To dark and dreary oblivion

The roof was cold and wet with rain
Thousands of lights blared from the skyscrapers before me
Each one screamed at me
Screeching in a earsplitting! Disgusting! Torrent of vomit inducing anger!

And the streets below were roaring
Crammed with stampeding beasts
Filled with cars...
They were screaming at me too

The cold puddles on the unsteady roof
...they made my legs go numb
They made my very brain and spine...
Go numb

I walked to the edge
The edge of the roof
The edge of meaning
The edge of oblivion

I could feel the cold wind on my face
I could feel the devil prodding at my back
Stabbing me with his sharp black finger nail
Every single atom made of hatred and deceit


I wasn't sure what I was doing
Not to sure where I was for that matter
I wasn't in my body I can tell you that
I was more in my mind
Watching myself do this, from my own eyes
But someone else... something else was controlling me

I was in such a trance
One of mindless, hypnotic determination
Determination to end my trance
To finish...

The entire city screamed in agony
In hateful pain
I covered my ears…
But it didn’t help

My own self loathing
Joined with the loathing everything had for me
Coalesced in a sickening
Dreadful torrent of hate

I couldn’t stand such a feeling
I couldn’t take the pain
The pain that probed at my heart
Like billions of grains of hot sand

The devil had sunken his fiery claws into my heart

I looked down at the sidewalk below
Littered with soda cans
And trash bags
And cracked in every way possible

And right in the center of it all…
Was something that stopped me dead in my tracks
That held my mind captive
Something so simple…

A tree, standing rigidly in the sidewalk
Only a few of its limp, wet leaves clung to its scrawny limbs
It had obscenities carved into its bark
And its lower limbs were beaten profusely

Its entire frame seemed shaken
Yet is stood proudly
Its branches reaching up towards the skies, angrily
As if it were cursing God himself

I could only look at the pathetic thing
I was in shock
In a sort of “kick myself it’s so simple”
Kind of shock

I’d walked by this tree every single day
Whenever I come home from work
But I never thought anything of it
I couldn’t comprehend

I couldn’t comprehend how something so simple
Something like a tree
Something you see everyday
Can set the very example that you can live by

…the screaming had stopped
…the lights dimmed to a dull glow
…my vision became clear again
How foolish I must’ve looked

I felt the hot sand blow away
And the devils grip weakened
The anxious feeling in my mind slackened
And fell away like a rope that was tied poorly

But I could still feel the devil breathing down my neck
His breath was hot and moist…
I exhaled…
And he vanished…

So I stepped away from oblivion
And walked to the hallway
And entered my apartment
And I laid down in my bed

And I slept…