Off-Kilter

I'm tripping sideways over my head—

drunk on vertigo and static breath.

I don't know what I’ve said—

blurry visions flicker red,

like traffic lights in a ghost town

no one's ever coming back to.

Memory is a smudge—

a dream peeled off in layers,

timelines unraveling like ribbon on fire.

It only goes.

Never lasts.

I’m a nobody.

Never had any money.

I enter a crowd—

no one turns.

Just bodies

buzzing with noise that forgets my name.

I’m all vinegar, no honey.

All bite, no balm.

My place?

Under the ground.

Six feet deep, to be precise.

Still cheap—

but that’s the price

for peace.

Unwind me.

Unhook me from the clock.

Release me from this knotted string called time.

To live is to die.

And I’m done with the ride.

The heights I’ve climbed

were just illusions

painted on the inside of a box.

None of it matters

if you smash the board on the floor.

Quit the game.

Quit the fool.

Duality is a crooked scale

and I’m unbalanced as fuck.

The lows—

they weren’t low,

they were abyss.

Lower than the deepest of seas.

I sank into the core,

and still,

there was more.

I shot through the other side—

found myself

lost in outer space,

with a cracked helmet

and a brain full of bees.

I lost my damn mind.

It’s hard to turn around

when up is just as fake as down.

No pull. No sound.

Just gravity’s ghost

and a silence that hums

like something ancient mourning.

The highs?

Yeah, they kissed the sky.

And maybe it felt good.

But wings mean nothing

when you’re chained to hell

by your own ankles.

Beauty?

I’ve seen it.

Too much of it.

It’s boring now.

Just sequins on a corpse.

The show drags on.

The actors forgot their lines

but the camera keeps rolling.

Turn off the channel.

Hit the bong.

Sleep forever.

Finally let your muscles

relax.

Because as long as you’re living—

there’s a knife in your back

with your own fingerprints

on the handle.