the static apneatic

though
antonio stradivari did not design a violin
specifically
for playing when she is around
one finds the need to go to their closet to
get that instrument that they played when they were a
kid
to then dust it off
& start sliding the bow back and
forth
as when she gets going
the other coworkers can’t do anything but be
unwillingly
invited
to her pity party.

the static apneatic is in her late 40’s
maybe early 50’s---
you know she’d love you to ask
or
make an estimate
so that she could take offense
or talk of all the things that she hasn’t done
which she could have done
but instead
she had children.

her husband, as far as her coworkers are concerned
is a complete
waste
of
space---at least that’s how he is characterized.

he used to talk when he was younger it seems,
but now,
30 years later (30 years of a faithful marriage),
this man whose name we don’t know,
well
he doesn’t talk as much to her
and
all he does is work
and
she walks around the workplace offering up verses of
eric carmen’s “all by myself” to the room
in a sort of whimper
which we are all supposed to spend time trying to
hear?

she’s locked in something that she doesn’t want to be in---
yes,
she’s standing there,
stationary---
this static apneatic,
she is
upright & holding her breath in the water.

she’s in a secure & complacent pool---
bought
&
paid for---
but she closes her eyes and wishes that she was able to
hold her breath in a more exciting body of water---
maybe a river,
a deep stream,
or in the middle of a monsoon somewhere.

but you & i & all the people that we work with know that she would
never
ever
pack up this life that she hates
& go anywhere else in the attempt to
better her own
life.

and just how satisfying would that process be?
think about it---
that first attempt to actually breathe above the surface of the water again---
after all the years spent holding all that really mattered inside her.

her true self,
waiting alone---
consuming its final meal of sustenance before walking those
39 steps to its final end---
gassed,
hung,
lethally injected into a complete departure from the reality
which
only
she
can change.
having an excuse for every reason to move forward on her own,
she alone is trying to beat out
david blaine
&
those that came before him.

and like blaine on opera,
she’s watching the clock as the seconds pile up
& she’s feeling the deadening in her arm---
secretly hoping for a heart attack
(something that would simply wash this all away).

the static apneatic,
a devout catholic of more years than the miserable marriage has
tolled,
stares up through the water,
searching for an answer---
praying &
pleading,
to that which she blames for putting her there, while at the same moment,
feeling that only this thing can
lift her from this place in which she will surely
perish---
sooner or later.

& though her legs are stiff,
her muscles ache,
her mind it pangs,
&
her heart it yearns without a pause for rest---
she still hasn’t lost the ability to cry
underwater.