The Trip

I turn things over in my mind as I spin the vile in my trembling palm.

Eyes forward. Focused. Clutching at my release – trying not to spill it's precious contents. I close my eyes and gulp down the bitter-sweet poison of my discontent with this realm. The other precious potions I've collected over the years can't help me now. Salves running through my fingers like spilled ink. Abstract meanderings buzz between my ears. Mind slowly drips down my sides, pooling into puddles of consciousness at my feet. The sky warps, bends and glares, with a pressured silence . Ants stream over bright blades of effervescence as I watch the cosmos form and dissipate within a single droplet suspended in time and space. I am God and God is me. As the eternal chatter melts away I slowly am taken held by singular awareness. The edge of that very awareness slowly burns inward, like paper gradually consumed by smoldering edges. Something calls. A yearning, longing, pulling. Head in the clouds, feet inspecting the bathroom tiles. A scratching, gnawing within contemplates the walls and wonders that lie beyond my peripheral. Demons dancing, just out of reach. Beckoning, burlesquing beasts rattle through my mind. Heavy breath and feathery strokes at my heels, unhealed. Am I in hell? I dive downward through the earth's core and meet with the devil himself, he speaks in a booming, crushing sing-song melody. Atop a throne is big as earth itself. I shoot upwards into a spinning galaxy where the stars have already burned out. I open my eyes and breath in the safety of the cool white sheets beneath by rapidly beating heart. Ever door of my once unconscious mind bursts open, contents heave into the hallways of my anxious mind. An eruption of my fears, fantasies, desires and filth. Doors blown apart, unable to be closed once more around my naivety. Minutes fold into eternity. I'm exhausted, overwhelmed, one step closer to that final doorway into nothingness. I swallow the button and stop the ride.

It's going to be a long journey to redemption.