Waking Up

Note: this piece is based on the time period 2017-2018. I wake very differently, these days.

Awake, not with a jolt,
just a faint realization that I’m still breathing.
Still alive.
I wonder about the day I maybe won’t wake.

Not with fear or trepidation.
A sort of resignation,
Perhaps there will be relief then,
for everyone.

No alarm has sounded.
I don’t seem to set it these days.
Falling asleep to beer,
waking when I need it again.

There’s not much in-between time.

I stretch an arm and leg across the bed
nobody else is there.
Of course not. Why would there be?
Chasing this kind of end

is very much a solitary pursuit.

Eyes remain closed,
I try to ascertain
If I have pulled the blind.
It’s bright behind my eyelids.

I guess I’m up in time for work.

Why do I leave them closed so long,
the light doesn’t hurt them?
It just reminds me that another
cycle on the hamster wheel is beginning.

I fumble about with my right hand
on the floor beside me.
Feeling an empty can or two,
Searching for a bottle top

longing for that jagged edge,
wondering if I could keep my eyes closed
and use the upturned cap to carve
a space enough

that light would reach, within me.

Pondering if tears of blood would
feel any different to those that
I’m used to each morning.
Perhaps they’d at least look better.

Ah, I can feel my earphones and ipod
buried under my living carcass.
Let’s see what it was that I fell asleep to
‘The Distillers’, nice.

Jem will be pleased. Her favourite band.

Ha. Who am I kidding,
She’s never pleased when I end up like this.
Will definitely need another drink
before dealing with the ordeal of speaking to her.

Everything seems less piercing, once I have
that wonderful, hazy armour.
Not that much different from the
slight fogginess that I have now.

I had best open my eyes soon.
Not quite sure why I go through this ritual,
keeping them closed,
as if that will keep out another day.

Another day to see if I don’t
fall off of the high wire I’ve set for myself
gambling everything each day,
daring it all to fall apart.

Drink
Work
Drink
Work
Drink
Work

Finish up in the pub on the platform
Grab some cans from the shop
for the train journey. Six, eight?
Eight to be safe.

There could be delays.

Walking like a stumbling,
slurring zombie along the platform-edge,
leaning out until the train arrives,
knowing I don’t have the bottle to jump.

I’ll keep using this stuff,
much how Layne Staley did with his
medication of choice
just waiting for the organs to stop.

Might make me fatter over the course I guess,
A small price to pay though.

Wandering back home to whatever
argument my own behaviour will cause
or maybe just to nothing,
lights-out again.

That’s often preferable.

Anyhow, that’s for later.

I find a full can on the floor,
Pull back the ringpull,
Hear the satisfying snap.
My cue

to open my eyes.

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