Bite

by Harry Calhoun


The seizure makes you strange.
Everyone is not like you, any more
crawling back into the mindless dark

and wakening back to substance
not knowing where you’ve been,
the green mind you’ve crawled. The weird mold

of it makes you take medicine as scary and rough
as any terrain you’ve never crossed, makes you sick and
different and hard to swallow. The spasms

make you strange to yourself, broken ribs
and savage gnawings on your unconsciously bitten tongue
a revenant. A ghost to yourself, words you choose hesitant

and frightening to you as the blood that poured
from you pure, poor lost and ancient tongue.
Chew this thoughtfully and express it as you can

through your vociferously voided self.