I am tumbling

mumbling, stumbling

humbled as I crumble

dumped on my rump

numb as I slump

my mind reels and peels

in circles and bumps

slow motion

no notion of emotion

empty and weak

life is bleak

at the bottom.

Laughing.

They’re all laughing.

They’re all turning to me and wondering why

I’m not.

And so I fake a smile, laugh a plastic laugh,

and hate myself

for not being able to laugh genuinely.

They never suspect it.

They never think that I’m empty.

Hollow.

Vacant.

Void.

They think I’m fine.

I won’t be the one to tell them

I’m not.

The feared night arrived

it was the Null that oppressed

the dark and silent

recesses of ransomed mind

so devoid of inner Life

#Numb #Challenge #Tanka

<font face="Helvetica" size="3" color="silver">01.23.2018</font>

I lie on porous gray rocks, blue paint scratched. My vision is crowded by ghostly green readouts—the closest, perhaps, that I come to organic pain. Stats confirm what I can physically see—my legs are glowing stumps. Actually, the legs themselves are fifteen meters away, the joints that once connected them burped into gas-rich froth. My arm is back there too. My other arm is firing a blast rifle. It will be destroyed, too, by precision fire, according to the probabilities running through my processor. Not that I care. A downed droid is a dead droid. The Roh don't bother repairing anneks who've sustained this percentage of damage (56%—now 87% as a green bolt eviscerates my weapon-arm). Cheaper to recycle the soldier for scrap. But I wasn't built for emotional complexity. My only concern is how many I can skyfall before a burst takes my processing unit.

Weaponless, armless, legless, I must no longer register as a threat, and I find myself staring at the enemy—those flying black squids—with the patience of stones.

#sciencefiction #robots #colonize #theroh #spaceandstuff

Words whisper around me, but they are not the soothing blankets my mother placed on me. They roll around in space, useless but not unheard. I let the gentle murmers of apologies and offers sway around my head, not understanding but hearing. I am trapped in a cloud of loneliness, but I am not alone. My world is untouched and broken. I am lost in a bubble that is all my own, and no intrusion bursts it. I am lost in memories that slip me out of reality. Any true thought is painful, sending sparks of fire through my body until I am woozy with agony. So I force myself to believe that you will still do everything we used to, that you are just taking a break. Every memory is a safe place, a drug, a sedative, for my torment. I live like this. Unbelieving, refusing to accept the truth. I lay with my head resting on the mossy bank, quiet and peaceful, away from people forcing me into healing. I see a snail creep across a strand of grass. It moves small and slow, but I see it slipping away. I think of how it reminds me of life, so slow you don’t hurry up, and so fast you don’t rest. And I think of you crawling, crawling out of my sight, and for the first time, I let the sharp pain in my chest consume me.

Feeling numb is something I am an expert at. If this statement is true, than why is it so hard to offer you a description in words? Don't take my word for it. Look at me. There is proof in my photographs. That far away look. Eyes down to the side. Hands clenched on my tight stomach. It is me in the picture but I am not there.

Feeling numb is a condition of living in the abstract. The body is alive in real time while the mind is fraught with worry blocking any opportunity for real time experiences. If I could give advice to my numb self I would say to myself, "Find a way to take a vacation from you."

You were gone so very long

The pain I felt turned into song

I wrote about our history

My love for you no mystery

As time went by I only waited

For your release, anticipated

I would have given anything

For safety that your arms would bring

Then I felt it dissipate

A month to go, was it too late?

Finally you returned home

By then I liked to be alone

You tried for that long waited kiss

I turned my head, it was a miss

I couldn't feel the victory

There was something dead in me

My heart no longer beat for you

It started singing it's own tune

Time had come and done it's thing

The pain that losing you would bring

You touched me but I didn't feel

The hurt inside started to heal

My defenses were in place

I was numb and couldn't taste

Nothing you could say or do

Convinced me that I needed you

Over me, you held no power

It had weakened by the hour

I tried to spark up the old flame

But only ashes there remained

You no longer held my heart

From there we slowly fell apart.

Oftentimes i feel

as if i were covered

by a light dusting of frost

like baking sugar.

My skin blue as irises,

smothered by pinpricks

of slender ice like a mountain

blanketed by snow.

My blood itself congeals

like sleet in my shallow veins

and my breath is suspended,

searingly bitter, in my throat.

My fingertips grow ashen

with frostbite as if charred

and the lashes of my eyes

are powdered by rime.

My heart, my soul, are numb.

I wonder what I'll do alone

My world has turned away from me

I feel like I'm a senseless drone

In times of grief our hearts bleed tears

Where have you gone that I can't come

A place that I can't even see

Inside, a stirring like a hum

In times of grief our hearts bleed tears

Ashamed I am my eyes are dry

I can't release my deepest fears

In solitude I wonder why

In times of grief our hearts bleed tears

Please tell me how I find my way

Release the sorrow inside me

The darkest moments seize the day

In times of grief our hearts bleed tears

(c) 2018 Miriam Ruff

You’re in tune to everything.

The way the bird chirps at exactly 2:04.

The position of your pencil and how it was before.

Then a blinding flash of light.

An explosion of sensory emotions as everything staggers downhill.

In a second life snaps your will.

The struggle of years only builds.

You can’t keep your head high.

Because who you once were has all but died.

Fresh pain every day.

In a derogatory comment.

In words uselessly spent.

Then there’s nothing.

No pain at all.

And your problems will surely start to fall.

Now you only need yourself.

To prevent your demise,

you’ve hardened into a shell in which the only holes are your eyes.