Detox by Ariel

Detox

by Ariel

It’s a slow burn where before it was racing.

Embers on embers, layers of an onion.

There is heat but no fire.

It isn’t uncomfortable but it isn’t peace.

It is a discordant hum, like a fluorescent light in a waiting room.

Is it waiting for me? To move on? Move through?

I can’t see the exit.

Not yet.

This is the detox of the mind.

A low dull ache where before there was blood.

Which is better? A blue melancholy, or an orange sunburst?

What does it mean to miss the hot tears?

To tread water on an endless horizon.

I conjure up the storm to remember the sun, but it still dissolves into the buzz of apprehension.

Move, I say, but my soul says stay.

Sit with it. Own it.

You do not recognize it but it has been waiting for you to notice.

Your shore is in view because it has been beneath you all along.