Red Smoke in Silent Water

Red Smoke in Silent Water

Silent water surrounds me,
         frozen, cold, a musty blue-brown to go with the brown bathtub tile.
It’s hard to tell how long it’s been when you’ve lost the whispered tick of time, but
         there must have been warmth once.
A warmth that hugged my bones, milky white and hollow with
         the memory of too many “used to’s” and “should be’s.”

Now, nothing but the string of red-something slithering from the
         holes in my lips where the needle conquered.
Red, lazy, slips and falls to my chin swells like a big red balloon,
         bloated, disgusting warm.
Don’t look down, I tell myself.
The tears, once warm, had stopped a while ago, ashamed –
         they could not stop the needle, could not stop it with their numbers.




                             I’m Cold



My bated breath catches momentarily, and then
         air sucking, wheezing through my body as I inhale in, out, in, out
         rise, fall, rise, fall, fall, fall
Down goes the red into cold water –
         the quietest of splashes, but I hear.
I look down.


Red balloon has caught the tip of silence, and suddenly, inevitably,
dissolved into red smoke in water that curls and weaves its way through ugly-colored velvet.
My heart starts to pound, throb for air as the darkness closes in,
desperately trying to say, through the smallest of cracks
                             through the smallest of whispers made loud,

(OhGod,no,ithurtssobadwhycan’tyoufixitbeforeitkillsmejezuschriststopisaidit’skillingme,can’tyouseemedyingcauseican’ttellyouwhy)

                   (Shhhhhhhh………)

I sewed my lips shut today.