Candle Fever

There’s nothing on my mind as I open the window and light a cinnamon scented candle.

The fragrant autumn air mixes with cinnamon creating a daydream difficult to dismantle.

My feet caressing the cold floor, circling and spinning with the music and the winds.

I lean forward and snap back, I wave my arms until I shake out the icky anxiety pins.

Nothing but the light, no one but the tiny warm flame and me waltzing around the room.

Nothing but the bare leaves levitating towards their death while trees await the next bloom.

The busy street by my building is almost suspiciously still, it’s quiet, it’s dead.

A nervous pain bites my skull. It might be the time to wrap myself up in the bed.

Nightmares enfold me, the dreams are all bad, they chew away at my deserved rest.

I try pinching myself but the scenery forces itself in my mind, it grows more obsessed.

The worst of demons try feasting on my fingers, I taste their venom in my system.

A pale girl in white passes me with her bike, yelling I should try and kiss them.

But I keep crawling backwards, turning my face away from their eleven tongues

Bruises all over my legs, one shoe missing…

The creature’s hissing, suddenly it lifts me up like tongs.

So high in the smoky air, there’s no way to breathe in, no way I can break free…

Suddenly, it lets me go and I’m falling – once I meet the ground, I’ll be nothing but debris.

Cold sweat pouring down my neck as I sit up in my dark bedroom through a violent scream.

Head pulsating through auras, through hallucinations, through shiver-like beams.

The mirror on the closet door looks frighteningly similar to the creature from the hellhole.

My mouth is dry, everything seems blurry – I swallow a pill and a bottle of water whole.

Shoulders shaking, pulse raising as I fantasise about dark figures weeping under my bed.

I pray to the same gods I curse out on workdays, I pray to the pastor I snapped like a thread.

Slowly, unwillingly the next day arrives, it lands on me with the force of seven seas.

The headache is still there and my vision is hazy, the pain is here to say, it seems.

I rock back and forth on the floor of the bathroom, I rock until I can no longer see.

The cloudy pictures slide by without making sense, I try to count breaths but only get to three.

The next time I open my eyes is the Monday morning, not sure how the weekend slipped by.

Twenty unanswered texts and five missed phone calls tell me I don’t have an alibi…

But who’s the victim? Why are my ankles scarred and thumbs – unsteady?

Why is my scorching head burning holes in the floor? Let me die already.

There are iron rods stabbed through my cervical vertebrae without visible wounds,

The pulsating pain echoes in my every nerve and muscle, my patience has no funds

So I shriek clawing at the tiles, punching the walls, scratching my thighs.

It hurts more every minute and I don’t care who gets scared by my morbid cries.

The film runs out of colour, it’s once again black for an eternity, it seems.

My weak wrists hold onto the last four walls standing while I float through the dreams.

One hour or one day, it all feels the same when you’re high in the agony peaks.

Not sure if I’m alive at all. Not sure if there’s any warmth in my neck or my blueish cheeks.

Contorted, forgotten, left alone in the room with my worst fear on the pedestal –

The vulnerability shows its crooked teeth and my polished stamina grows skeletal.

I gather the last of my spite to stand up and look into the gilded bathroom mirror

But the beast staring back at me has no familiar features so I let my blood simmer.

My palms look too clawlike, my scleras are scarlet, my neck – twisted to the side.

So I grab a lighter and the burnt out cinnamon candle

To destroy this monster with fire.