Complications

My friend’s wife has a certain power.  A queen in a land without royalty.

Sometimes, things move differently for me.  As I step outside of the regular stream of
events and just watch things stream by on fast forward.  Rum and coke to my lips, legs crossed, the
sun rising and lowering behind me, the plants twisting towards it, as beautiful
women and friends I love duck down and lift babies into the air, and pause.

My glass touches the table as lightly as I can manage.  My eyes turn up.  I look into the gathering darkness of the
apartment.  I sit back.  Begin again.

Sometimes things move a little too fast.  The bottle of rum empties without anyone
touching it, the dark liquid boiling, shuddering.  My glass empties and fills, the hint of a hand
taking it away and returning it, but nothing I can focus on.

This is the song of an addict. But alcohol is not an
enemy.  My fight is against prescribed
drugs.  The paper-thin, wounded, decaying
medicated wall between life and pain.  In
the spring, drifting out of my latest pain episode, I kick the relaxants
prescribed to bring me out of bed and back into the human world.  I slow down a bit, pull away, dip and drown
below the waterline.  I don’t miss the
drugs, I fear the pain.  This is the thin
line of oblivion.  This is the careful
whispering.  Will you need them again
tonight?  My lovers, my drugs?  Will I wake up at 2am screaming in pain, the
electric fire burning through my nerves, my face twitching, my eyes watering,
my tongue bitten through and a mouthful of blood?  Will the rush of the train hit me in the
morning?  The blast of air from the Metro
as it rolls into our station.  There,
slow down.  The wind tumbles out of the
tunnel, I am forced back, the fire hits, and I turn away, my hands to my face,
the pain pushing me against the concrete
wall and, freeze.

Spin around this empty body, this little boy in pain, this
terrible affliction.  There it is
again.  The pink pill.  The supplement.  Take as needed
in addition to the usual cocktail.  Side effects may include
dizziness.  Mood change.
Side effects may include falling backward into water.

Can’t you hear the
thunder?  You’d better run, you’d better
take cover.

I remember kissing.  I
remember biting into an apple, eating a cheeseburger.  I remember
smiling into the wind.  I remember simple days.

The pain leaves me and the bottle sits there, taunting
me.  You cheap whore.  Fifteen dollars, but those are friend
prices,
yes?  To those masses suffering on the
streets you go for $500.  You cheating,
vicious creature.  I would die without
you.  The pain would take me away.  Dear god, I feel myself
sinking into the
mattress.  Dear god, I can see this.  I can see the end
through this bottle.  Sunday best and memories of youth, the dance
into a party, the world at a fair, a dead mother’s hand holding
mine.  Blink, close those young eyes slowly, turn
your young head, look up at her.  Short
black hair, dark eyes, pale skin.  Burned
beyond recognition.  Consumed by
anger.  Close those young eyes
slowly.  Take a breath.  Hands across a gravestone, bought
cheaply,
last minute throwaway regrets.

The pain comes back.
It always comes back.  But it’s
not the nerves now.  Will you take me
away.  You dusty pink bastards.  May cause dizziness.
Waste my day away.  How many do I need to stop all this?  How
many of you will put me to bed?  How many of you will let me sigh
and smile in
my sleep?  How many to never, again, wake
with the pain?

Train in the distance.
Carries on the air, the Big Dipper above, holding the dreams of all
Humanity.  We’ll come to you.  On my back, waiting to be
picked up, no
friends back in the classroom, from sun to moon to stars to sun.
The way a hand feels in mine.  How to describe it?  How to
put it into words.  Raise your eyes, boy, look into hers.
Now, no longer mother.  Blue eyes and light brown hair, waiting
lips
and sharp nose.  Move closer and remember
everything, remember the happy time, play and fight.  Two dreamers
rolling in bed and the sheets
never come between us.  Nothing will come
between us.  Not until we do.  This pain that I built.

Little pink bastards.
There you are again.  How many of
you will erase that space between us?
The passage of time.  Do not take
with alcohol.

Here, we’ll pause.  I
want you to look at me through the vodka as I pour it into the
glass.  We’ll make it a dramatic scene.  We’ll put it in the
movie.  9pm.
Vodka.  Get off them.  Stop taking them.  The pain fades
but my head moves to the left
side and I prepare for it to return.  Any
minute now.  It starts with a gentle
tingle around the ear, it moves to my upper lip on the right side, it
tears
through my cheek, up along my nose, my eye flinches then closes, a
punch in the
face makes me lean back and removes me from the world.  Fire takes
hold of me and I move upwards,
watching my body fall away from me, as white-hot terror takes
hold.  Then it fades and I return.  First sound, then sight,
then I breathe
again.  Less then a second, before the
next pulse.  Repeat.  Return.
Pulse.  Then it holds, and I set
my jaw, press my neck against my shoulder, clinch my face, peel back my
lips,
hold my breath, wait for it to pass.  It
may be a minute, an hour, three weeks, three months.  It passes
and my body relaxes, slowly,
decompresses, falls back into itself, leaving only a headache, a dry
hollowness.  The pink pills help bring me
down from those episodes. Wake when needed.
The neck is first, cracking, snapping, returning to normal.
Slowly, over a few days, the shoulders
fall.  Then I start to catch my breath
and smile again.  Then the headaches
stop.  Then life begins and the speed,
running, power.  Freedom.  A hand on the bottle.
1600mg.

That hand that used to hold mine is dead.  I guess it’s a
skeleton now.  How we laughed, then.  How we fought
then.  A mother’s hand,  I can feel that dead flesh pressed
against my
hand right now.  You little pink
bastards.  You’re taking me inside,
again.  You’re taking me away again.  I can’t stop it.
I can’t stop this mother’s corpse.  I can’t stop that lover’s
kiss.  I can’t stop that broken bone.  I can’t stop that
punch to the jaw.  I can’t stop those laughs and tears and
screams.  All at once.  Again and again until…I wake
up.  Sucking air through my mouth.  Morning sun.
No more of you.  No more.

Until next time.
Until the fire builds again.
Until I spin, turn, freeze.

Now let’s turn around and rise up.  Away from that boy, above the station, above
a Maryland
suburb, into the air, the jetliner view, the nameless suburban layout, the
square patches, the white clouds, the heavy eyes, the roar of the engine.

Sleep now, dear.