sick day

by mathias

Posted to Poetry on 2003-01-14 10:58:00

something clear as sickness walks down
moon steps when the house sleeps
and always forgets its cure on the first floor.

drink water to hydrate day-dreams
because one does not sleep when
one’s body immunes itself.

too tired to take advantage of dark’s blanket
deceiving cold masks a one-hundred and two
degree temperature of dissapointment.

leather bomber jackets in heated rooms
kill only symptoms of conflict
while the battle climaxes underneath flesh.

soft-pad slippers slip on the floor
and stare at the ceiling looking
for hallucinations to walk the walls.

tentative fingertips pen the keyboard
searching for warmth and the discovery
of health in the dreary eyed head.

still the fever rages like and in Hell
stuck inside is like being stuck
in everyone but yourself.

as the sun smiles behind every window
for the masochistic realization
of mortality

to die twice or more is to keep
yourself alive.

christopher mathias, at home on a sick-day from school