Insomnia - Continuous Prose Poetry

Insomnia
Nadia Murtaza

I can hear only the distant whoosh of cars on the highway, where ever they maybe whooshing to at this time of night. The air is still, I can feel my own breath slowly stutter it’s way through my lungs, slying around my throat - out through my nose. My chest is deepening in the secluded abyss,  in lining itself with the ringing of silence in my ears. This is a peaceful and muted war with my mind. The corners of the room are empty and the shadows  are melding tricks on my tired dilated, half blue, half green eyes. The mirror on my right is spectating light onto the strange, unexplained orange dot I was born with in my right eye - that I have convinced myself, will one day, enviably, lead to my permanent blindness.  I imagine not being able to see will feel a lot like this, the night before dawn, the sounds of the hidden chaos so deafeningly loud and completely silent, simultaneously; hollow and uncontrollable. And when I close my eyes, I can hear my pulse, I can hear the pitter patter of an irregular beat, a lot like myself, irregular; it seems only appropriate I have a distorted, confused heart beat to match. Bu – bum,  bu – bum, bbbubbubum. No Pattern, no synergy, no routine. I tap the rhythm onto the hard wood floor which is cluttered with book pages and literary magazines, scattered like toys on a nursery floor. The tap shuffles against the paper, like a snare drum, undefined and unassuming. Staring at my stagnant, un co ordinated tapping foot is proving dull and unsatisfying. My body is pulling itself toward the hard floor, magnetized by the smell, feel, cool surface that otherwise, on another day  would be ignored. Here I am, the side of my face flat against the cherry oak floorboards, my earlobe being brushed by a page of a crumpled New Yorker Magazine – I strain my eyes downwards to read the small print; the Issue is January 19th, 2012.  My eye lids are leering downwards, heavy, wholesome – peering through the lash lines within the last slither of light between my upper and lower lid, I tickle my senses and absorb the warm yellow beams from the lamp 3 feet away from me – until - darkness. Things are suddenly much colder, the floor is freezing – my legs pull themselves inwards, my knees nestling under my chin, caressed by my goose bumped, shivering arms. My right hand is massaging my left, I rotate the ring I wear on my middle finger 3 times before feeling the cold swells across my wrists, I’m gripping my wrist feeling my veins pulsating slower, softer underneath the uneven, scarred skin beneath my tattoo. My fingers drop to the floor, and draw small un meaningful circles next to my face. The sound of the motion is cardboard like,  but smooth, like a brush on canvas which is becoming dauntingly comforting and confusingly familiar. I stop. My ear is collecting the warmth from the weight of my head, long brown hair and cheek pressed like a dead weight against the ground. They say that when you press your ear against the mouth of a sea shell you can hear the ocean, the waves crashing on the shoreline, the water kissing the sand. I listen to the wood hugging my ear, the deep blossoming creeks move in perfect low motions, there is a draft of air between me and the wood that comes to resemble a wind, one that would winde and rustle through a forest. I adjust my head slightly and hit some paper, which transfects into a pile of leaves below a tall, towering oak tree, bellowing sounds of the earth that are out of pitch range for any regular human to hear. The cold, the cold from the injured earth, the cold from the artificial fantasy below my face. I am hunched in the fetal position and caging myself from the rest of the room. My eyes are jammed shut, and my breaths are inconsistent, my ears are blistering incredibly loud sirens of complete silence, my mind cannot shut itself off, all I want is to drift into simplicity, into seductive sleep.  I am wrestling with illusion, fighting with my imagination, being defeated by insane delusion. I have found the energy to pull myself up against my bed sheets, laying down on my right side, I cradle. Rocking back and forth my breaths are now getting louder and panicked, like a steam train taking off the tracks my soul is in a state of unrelenting anxiety. The distant whoosh of cars is elevating to screaming, screeches and serendipitous montages of my far away memories of relaxation, rest and peace. The train tracks have come to an end and the steam engine to a sudden unannounced stop, the CHOO CHOO loud and high, beyond description – I slam my hands against both ears and grip hard. Make it stop. I am begging myself to let me forget, I am begging myself to let me escape this cage, I am begging the night to again be my friend, my partner, my understanding. I pull the cover over my tangled haired head, thinking like a dramatic poet who is tied down to her unfulfilling bed.  I am waiting in my man made tent - for the dawn to creep in through the wooden shutter blinds so that I can start this over.  And when the moon rises into the midnight blue, one day, I will be able to slumber in peace again.

I hear the garbage truck, roaring at its morning rounds.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten.