Hyperaware of Nothing

Smoke, smog, and dirt cloy at my trachea.
My esophagus bulges and collapses.
I try to swallow down the bulge.
Nothing happens..
I can still breathe.
It is difficult yet quantifiable.
I can feel the pain, yet it is not pain.
I am filled up with this.
I fear both things may remain forever.

My head pounds, and in between each throb of pain is a blissful peace, more beautiful than I have ever felt.
Pound, release, throb, peace….

My neck, so tired, from holding my head up.
How long can we do this?
My neck, head, and I.
Our head is heavy.
It hurts to think how heavy it is.
That brain is in my head.
What does that mean?
How heavy is my brain?
Does it take up a huge proportion in weight of my head?

My nose is stuffed with thick, thick mucus.
So full that it should be pouring out.
It’s denseness stopping it.

I feel acne on my chin, my nose.
Feeling the surface of the skin which resembles a tiny mountainous range.
The pain of each touch a giveaway.
A forgotten feeling from years before.
I am forty years old.
I am not a teenager.
I feel acne and wrinkles.

My shoulders, elbows, wrists and hands ache.
Each bone feeling like a shard of glass.
Every muscle in my arms contracts and expands in time to the pounding in my head.

My breasts feel tender, aching, unrecognizable.
My thoughts return to my acne.
These breasts are not mine.
They are of me years ago.
The formation of my adult body.
The buds pulsating.
Again to the rhythm that is becoming familiar.

My lungs don’t fill as they should.
Starved of oxygen… not quite starved, not quite full.
Adequate. Keeping my unease in the forefront of my thoughts.

My heart, life itself, pumps erratically.
I have only just realized that every other body part pulsates in sync with the others.
I suppose I had assumed they were being control by the beating of my heart.
They are not.
How had I not have felt my heart’s attempts at fueling my body.
Devoid of sinus rhythm, the implications of which rattle me slightly.
Scary yet familiar.

My stomach rumbles with hunger,
Yet is simultaneously painfully taut.
A feeling of having gorged myself more than ever before.
I know both states cannot coexist.
They do.
I oscillate between extreme hunger and wanting to never see food again. Ever.
These oscillations timing is as expected.

That precious organ – both delicate and strong.
Breathing life into offspring.
Housing cells for nine months until they are birthed and fill their lungs for the first time.

I am in pain. Instantly recognizable as the shedding of flesh no longer needed this time around.
The pain is more severe than I have ever felt before.
Nothing is being produced or ejected from my vagina.

This agony should produce gushes of red.
It does not.
I fear I will faint.
I want to faint.
Instant relief from the torture.

My glutes ache. I have never had a butt-ache. I laugh briefly.
It feels like I expect a marathon runner’s arse feels. Giggle.
I will never know – running, heck walking – is difficult for me at the best of times.

My feet ache. Each of my ten toes.
The ball of my feet.
The arch.
The heel.
Ankle.
Calf.
Shin.
Crunching knee.
Thighs. Those fat, disgusting parts that I loathe.
Hips.
Everything aches. Bone and muscle.
I had heard of painful bones.
I had not experienced them.
It is excruciating.

I sense something in my body.
I am unsure of where.
It is water.
Ebbing and flowing, over and over,
It is constantly moving. Gaining ground on its journey, whatever that may be.
It may have a soul of its own.
Free will.
I have not.
Not wholly.

I love myself, at least I think I do.
Is my soul beautiful?
I do not know.
I am unsure of what that would look like.
Maybe it is beautiful.
Maybe it is ugly.
Maybe it lies somewhere in the middle.
I try to be a good human.
What does that mean?
I am angry, frustrated, jealous.
I often can identify these faults as they arise, and do nothing to stop them.
Is anyone a good person?

I do not like all this.
Am I wont to radically accept this fate of mine?
To remind myself that I am forty.
That things only get down from here.
I am not depressed right now.

Although my body.
My alleged temple.
Cursed by time.
Cursed by chance.
It falls apart, sooner than most.
I am not depressed.
I have been.
Very, very, very depressed.
Dangerously depressed.
Harrowing depression.
I am not she now.
My carers settled on the correct potions, the correct solution.
Making my gains visible, regardless of their size.
All of this makes life livable – barely – but there.

I still have to face tough things every single day.
But I go to bed each night.
Wake up the next day.
Over, and over, and over, and over.
The pattern continues.
Ad infinitum.