Fighting Back

Outside of time and space
I find myself drifting
Spinning endlessly

Fighting the drifting
Searching frantically
For a grasp of the tangible

The real eludes my grasp
Time filtters by
Outside of my perception

I am a paragon of uselessness
Trapped in a void of nothing
An angry shell with no voice

Screaming loudly at the illusion
Seeking to shatter the fabricated
Unseen prison walls holding me

The cold steel of the real
The shackles that keep me
Tangled in the illusory

My mind begins to understand
Pain stings through me
The chains that bind become red hot

Colder than ice
Hotter than fire
Shooting arrows of pain

But that is something
It is real
It is feeling

I find myself reeling
Unknown input drowns me
In a sea of sensation

I have been without
Passion and joy for so long
I had seemingly forgotton

But memories unlocked
Bring happiness
And relief

The short, sharp pain turns
To something altogher different
The hot and the cold fuse

As I land
Warm and content
Back in the land of the real

The place from whence I came
And where I indeed belong.

     -- Bem Ajani Jones-Bey (09.27.2002)