BLOON

BLOON: to fade or discolour 

There were no excuses left. So I went to the beach today. About 15 minutes in tears started steaming down. Nature unearths healing with its brash, unapologetic wildness, burrowing deeper than flesh, blood and bone into primal more, knitting me back together with grandmother hands. On the walk home I break into a run, joints aching from misuse. Bemused and wondering if I'm hallucinating, a black balloon swims into focus hovering near some bushes, 1/3 empty of helium. I pick up it's string and pull it, bobbing, along: My little black pet cloud; my dark imperfections out for all to see. It now sits gently against the ceiling at my home's entrance, greeting all with a rubbery hello. A reminder of darkness as celebration. 

Later on, the party that never started is over. I'm dehydrated, hungry, swaddled in sensory neglect. My hair hangs in oily, broken streamers. I send little expeditions into myself, seeking motivation and discipline. Digging at the dirt under my nails, scraping my tongue across the grime on my teeth, brushing stringy hair in an attempt at beauty and only finding mirrored back the remains of that which died long ago. My momentum is set to comfort in disgust. My dishes, long dirty smell of a broken hearted flatline. I weave down the hall, detached, drunk with zombie thoughts. The balloon startles me again...this time it's now just under eye height, a sort of butler *** spectre. It has despair, black holes and uncertainty on a platter. Cracked concrete courtesy.

I spend some time falsely practicing at being helpful, volunteering, sacrificing the last few glints of moisture in my cup to whatever godless gods might be thirsty. I drag myself to shower, do some laundry, dishes and eat something more than just sugary blobs. Everything I do is just to avoid something else. Reeling back to the big room, a fish caught by fate, my attention is suddenly snared by the balloon and shocks me: It lolls on the floor, alive in my erratic, electric wake like a decapitated shadow, a Frankenstein's head of my flaws. "I know I can't escape you forever", I whisper to the void. Something comes echoing back, but it's gone before I can make it out; a dream left hovering on the quivering meniscus of remembrance.  

The balloon is now gone. Carried out in numb ceremony with a load of trash. The absence jars me more then its unpredictable, dark and planetary forehead. Somberly I seek SH solace knowing it doesn't make a dent in the house-sized boulder resting on me. Popping under the pressure of society, squeaking in agony beneath the towering weight of the ficklest ambition, I wonder once again why what once filled me so completely now flickers on and off like the last star at dawn. To attend trial every day and am found guilty, led away, caged and sentenced to watch the last hope fade forever behind bars. I jail myself and swallow the key. I ignore my screams. I ignore my needs. Only I can free me. There were no excuses left.