…into the void

Night turns to day, day turns to night
light becomes darkness, darkness becomes light
doors become windows, windows become doors
an endless spiral into madness, into fear and delusion
clockwise the world is turning, I hear it endlessly ticking
then everything grinds to a halt
racing time stops without warning, restarting in retrograde motion
spinning counter clockwise as minutes and hours crumble to dust
shadows fill the corners of darkness
where the impossible, the implausible, the unbelievable
relentlessly stalk me as if I am prey
reality dissolving like ice
the wild winds of madness circle, a fever affects my mind
I am lost in the labyrinth, the darkness swallows me whole
the only certainties, my heart is still beating
and the faint whispers, and the distant echoes
that beckon me back to me
I am lost in the twilight of this place, an emptiness devoid of sound
the threads unravelling, a fragile fabric coming apart
a jagged maze of memories, woven through with fantasy
each step erasing the present, the winding pathways of insanity
tangled thoughts shapeshifting in my mind
circling images I cannot grasp forming into rivers with no direction
where I am left far behind with the ghost of myself
lingering in the shadows, watching the stranger in my place
the image of me in the mirror fading to grey silhouette
as I answer the echoes that haunt me
clinging to the past in the moment
but it is buried deep within delicately unreachable in the dark
locked away inside of me, kept safely in the corners of my soul
where the armies of madness cannot reach
memories that cannot be replaced
a past that cannot be erased
I stare at the reflection before me, a stranger unknown yet familiar
she beckons to me, a moment of joy, a moment of sorrow
trying to find the pieces of me, the me I used to be
so close yet so far away, a lost reflection forever haunting me
now lost and alone I cannot find my home
the light is slowly fading into the depths below
circling thoughts that I cannot grasp, ghostly fragments of me
a memory undefined, a heavy stone
and again I spiral into the void
clinging to the ghost of me
© Ann Bagnall