Chasing Himself

Peeling off in leprous shreds
a reel of emotion injuries
spooling toward suicide,
wading through his swamp of grief
from sleeping in the bed
of his newly deceased,

behind mournful eyes,
jowls pressed in permanent grimace
was a mind battering itself:
a trapped bird in a doomed state
of its nest netted with cobwebs.

His foundation nonexistent,
what was once there now was just despair.
Feeling tainted with calamity, he waited out his panic,
sleeping off the sensation of a drowning dismay.

Chasing himself from town to town,
anxiety shield raised,
he to use up his misfortune quota
by nursing sick satisfactions
in the night music of each new town.