August 19, 2015

Pain wipes the slate clean of anything else .It interrupts every thought, deflects every line of reasoning. Every revery ends with consideration of it, what you might do to soften it, what position you might take to mitigate it, what medications, what food, what exercise. If you try to concentrate on something else, pain brings you back to itself if you relax even for a moment. So the last few days I’ve done my work, met my obligations, answered my email wincing with pain, thinking of nothing for very long but pain. Wake at two AM after the pills wear off, mind bright with pain, pain the one thing in life in the dark hours, encompassing, inescapable, reasonless. It’s not that it’s a very great pain, but it is enough. It endures, it returns, it sharpens and dulls so there is no extended consideration of anything else. I’ve whispered the sentence “I hate you” into the air more times in the last four days than in all the rest of my life. Whatever target I intend, I hope it’s hitting home.