Down below the surface of what I have become

Is a swirling riptide of could-have-beens that will

Sometimes pull at my consciousness with icy fingers

And claw blackened nails of memory across the chambers

Of my heart, seeking out its crimson tears.

I thrash and struggle against jagged fragments of recollection

That form as a lump in my throat, blocking words that scream

To be heard above the din of my silence, walls long standing

Keeping vigil in the watches of my soul and patrolled only

By the shadows of what once dwelled there.

END

“Riptide”