So, Stop My Tongue - I Bite!

When I am here,
I remember not
all that was there,
though it seeps into my pores
condenses awareness,
restricting breath and body,
clawing at my throat.

I would throw this beast
from off my back.
Excepting that now
it dwells within.

This phantom limb beside me
stays one step ahead,
and as I die,
it feeds.

I'll calculate, dividing
the pattern which the street lamp
makes upon the door.
It entombs me,
and I am none 
so full
as to rise again.
Are you?

In these hours
I thirst
for a drop of desire:
To awaken to a day
and once,
just a little,
fill the void I fostered
with every backward step.

I may not be entirely my own,
but neither am I yours -
I will not submit to your drive,
to your sad and withered state
that sickens to the core.

This is not regret,
this is somnolent lust
alternating with acid rage
that stops my tongue
at the brink of ecstasy.

So, gingerly
and with great precision
I button my cuffs once more.

I begin again,
with a tune in my mind
that haunts
though even that
I can safely disavow.

These gusts that brush against me,
bring up the dust
that had settled over spirit -
their force is sinister
for with them comes
the anticipation of the past:

I take from that, also,
some measure of vitality
that prompts the urge
to strike against the claim
you tried to stake
in me.