Confinement

The thought of spending the rest of my life in a cell has begun to wear
itself into my dreams. Even as I sleep, my actions are confined by a series
of walls that end in mazes. I have difficulty breathing. Many of my dreams
begin with me waking in another place. In one, I woke up underneath the
kitchen sink with a towel wrapped about my head. I found myself in a casing
of sorts. It was covered with dust so I brushed myself off; the surface
was glassy, somewhat transparent. I attempted to abandon it, realized that
it was not a body but a capsule, plugged. No smell, no touch, only blurred
vision; even the tearducts were sealed with a grey glue to prevent my escape.
It took on the aspects of an endless puzzle. I would wake up and spend the
entirety of the day attempting escape. The glass was resilient and would
not shatter. A knife would not pierce. Nothing could be ingested, tasted.
No breathing existed to be obstructed. Heights did not matter, cold and
heat had no effect. I lived in the foolproof splendor of the invincible,
yet was utterly exhausted and miserable.

After a few days, I found that the door was barred and locked from the outside,
the windows were painted shut. I was doubly encased.
Then I realized that this room was encased by the building,
the building by the atmosphere,
the atmosphere by a cold no-atmosphere
of space and gaseous matter and, finally,
that all this swam in the limitless soup of God's innards.
In the delirious upwards acceleration of dreams,
I discovered that escape was tedious.
Questions were not answered, letters
were stamped return.

I was ignored.


-    0    1    +