Pain Killer

Cherry

By Shawn Scheer

Mon, 06 Oct 2014
  • 1211 reads
2 comments
 

It’s a white pill

gripped between bicuspids

crushed to powder

swallowed and ushered, dissolved and metabolized

 

It’s minutes passed

a slow haze

an ocean of numbness

drowning me, breaking thoughts like bleached stalks set in a sun drenched field

 

Enchanted it speaks

like walking sleep

a blade with dulled edge

cutting ties, freeing and quiet

 

Prescribed for passing pain

needed for survival

inanimate I sit, I wait

I rot and wither like a sunless flower

 

A count of thirty

dwindled down to three

another day’s worth

what to do though, when all is through?

 

Withdrawal, like a vulture, hovers overhead waiting to devour me

awaiting my re-submersion into sobriety

the agony of absence

no more white pills, no more lulling numbness

 

Feeling and only feeling

seething and unforgiving

Certificate 15
Poem
Miscellaneous

Comments

Submitted by scratch on

Strong feeling communicated well.  The anxiety at the end is almost palpable.  Excellent actually.

I'm uncertain about using "It's" at the start of the second stanza.  In my opinion it lends an unecessary ambiguity - do the minutes belong to the pill or are the minutes simply an example of the temporal passing?  Also the repetition/mirroring of the start of stanza one is unintentional I think and a little clumsy.

Typo:

"hovers over head (overhead) waiting to devour me".

 

Submitted by Shawn Scheer on

Thank you for the excellent feedback!  I've corrected the typo.  You've given me a lot to think about in regards to this:)  I will probably redraft this piece based on your feedback and see how it goes.  Thank you!