Snooze

My alarm goes off, my eyes open, and I feel instant dread. Another morning, I wake up not dead. An eternal sleep sounds like the ultimate peace.

Sleeping has been my escape for so long. Once I get the noises and chatter to turn off in my mind, I drift away to the safest place. A period of time I am granted permission to be unconscious. I spend too many hours of my day overly conscious. Waiting and longing to turn it all off again. Sleepless nights are like torture, eliminating the one thing I fall back on when everything is overwhelming. Nightmares jeopardize the solitude I seek, and occasionally leave me feeling worse than before. Reminding me that there is no true escape from the things that haunt us. Maybe I should take a pill that guarantees restless sleep? Maybe something stronger that will let me forever be.

When my eyes are heavy, but my mind refuses to shut down, I eventually allow the thoughts building in my head to pour out through my exhausted relief valve. One I don't have control over anymore. I let the words dance from my mind to the blank canvas of a screen, creating something tragic, beautiful, worthless and all that in between. Rhyming, crying, random or heartfelt, it all comes out when I allow myself the time to write it down. When I try to put my thoughts into words, sometimes a wall rises up, blocking anything from connecting brain to page. I suddenly feel inept and speechless, unable to form a basic sentence. Leaving me hopeless and discouraged, I give up. Back to bed until the alarm goes off again.