Immobility

Suddenly, my body loses its ability to move.

There is nothing to do.

I accept and even enjoy my paralysis.

I wrap silence around myself and explore my most intimate recesses.

Hidden roads lead to secret cities.

Though outside of the classroom is a riot of activity, here I am at an infinite remove from the events of the world.

I examine the contours of my mind without interruption.

I ball myself up in the hollow of a womb.

No one touches me anymore.

I feel the moist breath of midnight against my neck.

The night, it is invigorating.

A balmy, nocturnal wind traverses these empty spaces.

The wind is my creature.

I observe the shapes of the night with nyctalopian pupils.

Through the open window, I see the circling nightbirds.

How the nightbirds sway and swing in the air.

How they disappear into the vastitude of space.

The nightbirds are my creatures.

Now I am dissolving in the darkness.

Erase my outline.

My form deliquesces.

My head melts like a loaf of chocolate mousse on a sweltering summer’s day.

See my eyeholes widen.

My body fluidifies.

The surrounding atmosphere tightens around my skeletonized form like a transparent sheet.

A whirl of black envelops me.

I cast my mind into the abyss.

I am immersed in the weltering night.

The darkness deepens and thickens.

But from where I am lying, the core of darkness isn’t dark enough.

 

Joseph Suglia