Distortion

 

Heavy upon one's eyes hangs the grey pulse of the monitor screen.

It is as a vast, still ocean upon which nothing floats or is given.

One stares into the sharpened horizons of the blinking cursors,

allowing the sense of weight to slip away.

The horizons slice across one’s eyes in sharp strokes.

One is almost lost in these finite movements

until a ripple enters the calm:

a charged blast of color,

caused by some unseen force.

The ripple quivers, freezes, then sinks

into the electric depths of the network.

Straining one's eyes towards the monitor screen does not cause the ripple to reoccur.

In subsequent waves of time, one begins to believe that it never happened,

that the ripple was a mere squinting or blinking of one's eyes.

The skin under one's fingernails begins to itch

and in the moment it takes to relieve this affliction,

thoughts concerning the ripple are dispelled.

 

The hollow sun has no clouds to mask itself.

The barren landscape continues to rotate.

The monitor screen continues to burn as smooth as before.

One closes one’s eyes,

attempting to visualize this planet when, it is said,

the sun was a flame that would ascend in the sky.

One turns away from the monitor screen.

The stinging winds will soon begin again and pressure will rise.