Sloth Room

Transparent, coloured layers Overlapping, Swirling, Dragging, Drawn out under the fluorescent lights Like a Nile River of pages, Slowly flowing through the classroom, Whisking away my eyes As if resisting demise, I turn to see my face lingering in the seconds past Black as coal, Black like space, Black ...like the sheep I am, Though my skin is blemished porcelain One, Two, Three It remains- Then it breaks into newsprint spheres Voices don’t make it to my ears, Can’t swim through the sludge Instead, silence sticks a vein-coated, bleached hand Through my ear drum And pulls blood from my canal in waves The paranoia of silence The shattering encounter- Remains.