Isolation
By
Mary P.( email: mpow60@chartertn.net )

May 9, 2001

There is no peace, no silence in my isolation. 
Thoughts like unruly children 
Run screaming in my head 
Of bygone dreams left crumbling, 
destroyed by the pain. 
Round and round they go, 
each one connected to the next. 
Ring around the rosies, a pocket full of posies.
Ashes, ashes, we all fall down. 
No, there is no peace, no silence in my isolation.

Like impertinent children, my thoughts are traitors. 
I  cannot sleep because of their conspiratous whispers 
That never stop reminding me of all I’ve lost. 
Humpty Dumpty sat on the wall 
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall. 
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men, 
Couldn’t put Humpty together again. 
There is no peace, no silence in my isolation.

NOTE: I have suffered for two years straight with severe facial pain left as a result of a bout with shingles. Unlike most, my pain involves all 3 branches and there is no escaping it. Surgery, medication, injections have not worked. I'm only 40 years old, but I feel like I've been left alone in my isolation and this poem reflects that. The next poem, "The Abyss," also reflects what I feel like most of the time.

 The Abyss

My soul is being swallowed by the pain.
Down down down into the abyss 
In gulps and swigs it consumes me 
day by week by month by year. T
here is no escape from it or peace to be found. 
It engulfs me wholly within the depths of its darkness. 
Like a fire-breathing dragon 
it rears its head and burns me beyond recognition. 
Like a parasite it hangs on sucking my life’s blood from me. 
It is in me. 
I cannot escape from it. 
My soul no longer begs for mercy.