The Room

We wish to escape the room but are held transfixed.
Bound by our lust to a world of dramatic understatement,
its prosaic imagery making mockery of mind,
smut exciting frenzy for fulfillment,
We watch hungrily
as confusion and ambition play at an angry, awkward coitus
just out of reach of our weak and groping fingers:
sight, smell, the feel, the sounds
of love/hate fucking mocking popular salivation.
Standing in silence we are found going blind
outside ourselves, disconsolate from wanting
and desirous of damnation as answer to
our all-consuming catechism.

Contrary to popular belief
there are few who care;
and bedlam waits there, smiling,
practicing airs, teeth gnashing,
while disconcerting stares,
blurry but visible still
drive the patient insane.

Inane broadcasts laughing
between the lines breaking
the iron chains of wanting
only to forge them anew, hardened with poisoned steel.
The collars and braces chafe
the bruises blister, burst and begin to seep
allowing the venom to exercise its occupation.
The frequency of hallucination swells.

Believing we are no longer tethered we tug,
pull forward and choke our voices,
wear the skin from our wrists during the struggle.
Believing we are no longer chained we smile,
cough until crimson strands adorn our gums
and deposits in the gaps between our clenched teeth.

And the old ones smile stains.
and the old ones remember the days
when they were first aware of their being here,
they remember those who modeled their rememberance –
jostling them into introspection with secret smiles
and what was left
unsaid, only gestured:
like nods between comrades who've seen too much war.

But let the record note nonchalantly:
the smiles have grown less enthusiastic as the years
have harvested convolusion in a horn of plenty.

They offer advice:

speak of their lives in hoarse whispers,
no longer able to cry out.

While we,
still drifting in and out of conciousness
can force ourselves to listen,
can choose to lend an ear,
Even as we massage the contusion over our own crushed windpipes,
fight to make out the words over the ringing,
with dried blood caked hands,
the taste of rusted metal thick
on our tongues, the scales still stuck
on our eyes releasing us
from the responsibility
of knowing.

And the old ones smile stains.
Those who have stretched their chains,
so that escape does not seem impossible
but still leaves us to wonder why they've not broken free.