As I park the car outside my favourite coffee shop, I see something strange.

There are no other cars parked outside. I do not think I have ever seen this place without cars parked outside. It is one of the best coffee shops in town, in the country, in the world! How are there no cars?

Oh my God, are they going out of business? Where will I get my daily coffee from?! Where will I sit when I have nothing to do and nowhere to go? Where can I be completely useless?

I am home
But my mind is not

I am told to rest

Like rest is a room I can enter
While thoughts gnaw at my brain
Like bright fluorescent lights
That won’t turn off

The doors to the room
Have been sealed shut
And I am left outside
Scratching
Begging
Let me in please

What I would not do
For one hour
Of quiet
Of silence
Of stillness

Fracturing memories
Constricting thoughts
Dissonant crescendos
And the doors remain shut

The ambulance doors open and I blearily watch as I am moved out on a stretcher. The hospital. The dreaded hospital. All my fighting was for nothing.

My head spins as I am placed on a gurney. The lights are flashing. Straps bind me across the chest and legs. I give up and close my eyes. What will be will be.

“How did you manage to get yourself into this soup?” starlight demands.

I expected magic.

I thought
One word
And the stars would settle

I thought
One touch
And the fire would simmer

I thought
One note
And the music would quieten

I expected magic.

I have held this spell
For seven nights and seven days

I have held this spell
With fierce desire and hope

I have held this spell
But it weighs heavy in my hands

I expected magic.

How unbearable each day feels
When I am parched for relief
Already I ask
Why are my ruins not rebuilt?

Burn the world to the ground
It’s more than I can take
Raze it all, deface it all
Make it bleed and break

Fight the ennui, fight the job
Make room for the strange
Mundane is what pointless does
Quit, escape, change!

Restless seeps through senseless words
What am I doing and for what?
Tear every page, scream every word
Stab and kill every last thought

And when thoughts are dead
And every page is torn
When there is nothing left to raze
What more is there to burn?

Sheet music
Feral
Scattered

Bowl of rice
Untouched
Three days cold

Static on the radio
Right frequency
Wrong planet

An itch
Inside
Deep
My head
It burns

I wish something could help me.

White keys
Black keys
Blinding keys
Hypnotised

Empty sheet
Spiralling words
Stories stories
Shivering pen

The pill strip
Help?
No.
Not today

The bed
Sleep?
Why?
Pointless

I wish something could help me!

Stop ticking!
Bury the clock
Sound sound sound
Too much

Time froze.
I only had to breathe.

Time went backwards.
No decisions to make.

Time froze.
I could stop.

Time coalesced.
Not twelve things to track anymore.

Time froze.
Permission to rest.

Time hummed.
And the background went quiet.

Time froze.
No long-term thinking.

Time gave up.
And my unbounded pile of “everything I should be managing” vanished.

Desire awoke.
The candle was lit.

Clarity arrived.
And birthed wind.

Wind swirled.
And fanned the flames.

The day started like any other – horribly and limping wearily into existence. It started with the Sun forcing its way into my room and went all downhill from there. The alarm(s) rang, so did the doorbell, and so did my phone. I ignored them all. I could not, however, ignore the pit of anxiety in my stomach signalling the end of the world. A meeting.

Here I was, drowning in existential dread that worsened by the day, and there my laptop was, with the screen innocently off, pretending not to be the bearer of bad news.

A laugh echoes in the darkness around me. It is a familiar laugh, bouncing off invisible surfaces in the dark at random, a glimmer of light here and there, flitting, hitting me when I least expect it, from where I least expect it, echoing till it rings hollow. Someone clears their throat but I cannot tell where in the dark.

I see only the path, and only about ten paces ahead of me. The rest is intruding darkness, threatening to seep in from every direction. The edges of the path fade away into the dark.

Respite.

That was what I was promised.

I was desperate enough to believe and optimistic enough to try.

What I did not expect was that I would wake up in an unknown place around unknown people. Not one of them looked me in the eye, and for that I was glad. Was I just to exist?

The castle was quiet. Everything was muted somehow, dampened, quieter, slower, and softer. My footsteps in the cotton socks I had found by my bed were barely audible. The quiet did not help – anxiety gnawed at the pit of my stomach. What was with all the quiet? What was I doing here? Nothing could be right if nothing was wrong. How was this to help? How was it respite if it was not respite from my mind? I was promised respite. I thought they meant sleep. But no, I was wide awake and unable to sleep.