Sanity I

It was a box, my knees, elbows, crushed and bruised by
Sides I could not move.  I was sick, stricken, gasping
For air, food, light.  My rational mind had
Gone, a puff of smoke too grey, too voluminous for the
Fixed wood around my body, I had to expel it in order to
Breathe.  And the noise, the noise was horrendous, all that
Crashing and banging and honking keeping me awake.  No
Sleep, no sleep by night or day, not that I could tell the
Difference in light for the box was hermetic, emitting and
Absorbing nothing.  My mind only could rise, exude, break
Out of that box and I swooned in silence, in air, in lochs
And trees and all the hair of eternity was in there with me
With its skirts and its fragrance and its birds
Until they hammered on the wood and I was dragged back
To be there hemmed into the real.  All that blood from the
Scraping of skin seemed interminable and it rose around my
feet, made my toes curl.  I had to bite the wood eventually,
Chew through the coffin sides, digest the nails,
Hinges, padlock, key, suck up all the old sap until the hole 
Was big enough for me to ease my broken body free.
That inner sight saved me, saved my sanity, those coloured
Pictures blazed in that dark place, gave off fire enough to
Keep my heart from freezing with the pain.  When I tried to
Straighten, my body would not do what I told it to, but
The kaleidoscope that lanced my eyes, that dancing light,
Those glowing rivers, valleys, trees, told me that I
Looked on the world I had imagined, and found it real.

previous poem