An Anaesthetised Mind

The ceiling, then appears the sky
Thoughts of Death, I don’t know why

The trolley’s still and spiritless
I wait for action, querulous

I hear the pounding of my heart
I smell the analgesic start

Paranoia makes me faint
My fingers tingle from the wait

The bullets shot, I feel so numb
Intoxicatingly dumb

Coagulating faces cluster
A smirking hum is all I muster

My heavy tongue an oral mace
My brain kneels down upon my face

Cryptic visions moan and swim
And then I mumble I love him

The anaesthetists’s laugh liquifies
And I try to mumble my goodbyes

Published 1999

I wrote this the night before I had an operation in my early 20s. Feeling anxious about the impending surgery I naturally put pen to paper as I often do and within an hour this came out. It’s not perfect but it’s my early work and was submitted in a portfolio of work while at University. I sent it to a publisher who subsequently chose it for an anthology of poems,