A Thousand-Yard Stare

Barricaded in by the unrelenting barriers ofconfinement,In this small compartment in which I liveI can barely extend my limbs.Losing my complexion;Denied my visual capacity to see beyond a few feet inevery direction.I question Jehovah;Even the mirror’s reflection crowds my space, givingme feelings of claustrophobia.Bereft of freedom, I sit in somber and silent stillnesslike an empty body,With my face bearing an infinite expression ofmelancholy.

Staring a thousand yards into a parallel universeWhere the comforting memories of yesterday’s peaceand contentment are certainlyPolarized by today’s painful misfortunes andtomorrow’s uncertainties.

Staring a thousand yards into the distanceWhere in an instant I feel the gravityof my circumstance pulling intensely at my sanity,trying to divest me of my humanity,feeling like my life’s journey ‘til this point was allvanity.

Staring a thousand yards into the wall right in front ofmeI see images of friends and family carrying oncasually,

With infinite indifference to this solitary existence,Which consists of bare subsistence and inconsistentlegal assistance;Where friendships that were once close-knit,Despite my persistence, are now distant.My feeble heart tormented by my own insecuritiesregarding my love interest.

A thousand yards I stare into the great nowhere,The infamous abyss, an immense voidStaring attentively, deliberately injecting steroids intomy own misery.My mind wanders a thousand yards yonderWhere my sight detects a familiar emerging from themisted light.

Right before my eyes appears Lady Suicide —The Harlot,Adorned in a scarlet negligee.She does not walk, she glides,And with every strideHer hips sway in a way that is destructively seductive.Mysterious.And though I never take her serious,I reach out to touch her.Deliriously curious.

But she disappears...Right there.Her image dissipates into the air.Dissolved into the infinite nowhere,Along with everything else that was there...Within my thousand-yard stare.