the worst kind of empath

[I'm going to call this one an unstable release, a beta build. I had the idea and I was just fiddling around with it, but I don't yet know where to go with it next. Stay tuned.]

[9.19: Nigh eight months later, I've finally finished this. Enjoy.]

"Grace" by Antoine.

I once knew a woman

in the sense of knowing

everything

about her.

Though the logic of my story is unclear,

my words are truth.

Something special, a force for now recumbent,

radiates inside me: it is

a curse, a blessing, a cursed redressing

of my muddled existentialism.

It is as I experience it a beast:

one which remains idle until

awakened by a passion of the heart.

It was winter; the date

was unnoticed and largely irrelevant.

I had ventured (on my own)

alone to take a moment to regret the past

and swallow all my memories and fears

via spirit-snatching spirit.

When I entered she noticed me:

I knew she was watching.

I could feel her eyes zero

in on my bastard soul

and I could feel her

loving me. This I could not help but feel.

I knew she was trouble but I could not

entrance her eyes to stray

from my throwaway countenance.

I call "another" --

she twitches --

down my throat --

she gets up, shit.

She approaches, goodness,

enters my life in an instant,

alighting on the barstool of my grief.

She utters and I dare to look her in the eyes;

I twitch with awe

at such a beautiful

disaster warning.

She is speaking but I can't under --

I zone in. "Hello ?

I'm Grace. You are ?"

Words are spilt;

we make plans.

I am in no fit state to love

but I cannot control my feelings;

she does.

You see, I am

the worst kind of empath.

Everything she feels I feel

stronger;

that is the rule of the beast.

From that day onward she was

my second nature, and (o misfortune !)

she being inexplicably madly in love with me,

I vowed my very life on her

and my every action was blinded by her

grace.

When she held me,

I smothered her with lovelust:

bound her tight within my armspan like a gift.

When she kissed me,

I was overcome with passion

and denied her time to pause for breath.

When she teased me,

I was truly tempted:

I threw her down and tore her open,

quelled my carnal craving for her sweetness.

I fleshed out her figure

while my ego cowered craven on the carpet.

When she grew angry,

I was livid,

screaming her out

with threats I'd never dreamed:

the more her brow furrowed,

the more I abhored her and

wished her to collapse dead from the red.

When she saddened,

I depressed,

brought cutlery to artery;

I slit the skin

and spilt the sin

that'd split me from my senses,

as she sobbed wetness on my shoulder.

She was the sixth.

I didn't mean to hurt her --

but I felt her feel for me

and couldn't stop before

it amplified reality.

The break-up was too much

for Grace

to take.

my slumber sanctuary

I couldn't sleep, so I write it out.

"Night Terrors" by Antoine.

Eyes wide open, I stare blindly at nothing of consequence;

Ears quarreling, I listen deafly to the sounds of lonely space;

Mouth motionlessly clarifies the ends of empty means;

And my body settles against the comfort of thoughtless content

As I try, retry to capture fleeting notions' power in my alphabet net.

My fingertips stutter as my mind strays to a thornier bush and

Darkness lays upon me as a blanket to raw skin.

The night beckons me to lie with her and I quiver uneasily;

My friend is hesitation and my enemy is the temptation of fear.

I can feel her presence yearning, pulling me inward

To a destination wrought with unpleasantries.

I turn to face her and I gaze deep into her heart

To find the solitary plague of blackness spreading over

All her eternal prisoners, of which I reluctantly am one.

She sends a message of cautionary horror

Through floating flecks of twitterspec freckles to my irises,

Prancing on her endless blinking black palette.

I am haunted by her bewitching whispered offers and I am

Morbidly astonished at the careless fragility of my happy thoughts.

Shivering, my will collapses and my aching brainstem

Convulsively succumbs to her demands.

In mere moments

My heartbeat accelerates,

I breathe more heavily,

My neuroses tremble at the cursed certainty of insecurity,

And my synapses scream in silent agonizing terror

At the gruesome imagery that has enveloped my consciousness.

Pressed against the cold sheets of my slumber sanctuary

I clench the air, release, and flicker soundlessly back into sleep.

I have been the victim of night terrors.

In the presence of morning I will not recall

What the night has done to me,

But when she dares revisit me next sundown

She will take advantage of my prone condition and

Torture my weeping, scarred and wounded conscience once again.

This she has promised me.