A PSYCHOTIC SEIZURE

sitting on a set of brick steps outside 
my apartment
oblivious to the deepening chill of late october 
we're on standard time again and the night has 
come earlier
perhaps my psychobiology is affected adversely 
by the curtailment of available daylight

psychotic seizure in progress 
ability to function again only after i can't say 
how long staring out into space paralyzed 
intellectually inert despite the presence of 
a good book

life right now is such a mess 
the world around you fades out 
and you become the only object for yourself as you 
suffer it through

the is no cure for this mental illness 
it just waxes and wanes 
but always comes back to plague you somehow 
it's not something that you can measure 
because if you could, then maybe you could 
defeat it
but complex people such as yourself living on
the fringe of society
are especially vulnerable to this malaise
and unfortunately these various diseases of the mind
are all part of your turf

but this time
i'm sitting down writing about it
trying to capture something of what it's like 
my account is so fragmentary that it pales by 
comparison to what is actually happening 
but i have the comfort of being able to recognize 
the fact
that just by being able to write about it at all 
i must be at heart a real fighter...