Relief

He disappeared as he wrote it…
    
    Bones piercing through this rotting skin, 
    A pair of switchblades for elbows 
        Stabbing at each bend,
    His eyes an ocean of cataracts,
    His teeth dripping from his gums, 
    His few remaining hairs cloaked in grease, 
    His clothes drenched in venom, 
    His bare feet twisted blue, 
    His spine curved in makeshift design, 
    His veins shining like summer-sky tattoos, 
    His face painted grim by a serrated jaw line…

But his mind maintained its rhythm, 
The words sliding through a friction-less plain
As he navigated through a maze of introspection, 
A lifetime of emotions explained with joy or disdain, 
Guided by a gleam of absolute truth 
    Riding on a ripping tidal wave of death’s mangling hurricane. 


He stopped moving entirely near the end, 
Only his fingers danced
As his mind sent messages down 
to the empty vessel beneath 
And he typed the last letter
with great relief     And immediately slipped off 
    into the unknown, 
    his legacy firmly intact 
    in the world that he no longer called home. 

​
And no one ever saw it, 
    It was never framed and put on display, 
In fact, no one read single word, 
    But the message found its way.