"If I must"

If I must lose my mind,
let it be by degrees
- better yet: by percents
of one hundred at least -
I don't want to sit waiting
for three sixty, no

as the horror grows in me
and on me
to know, and
to see creeping increments
carry me off.
Beyond my recall:
what I was, what I lost,
I can no longer grasp
comprehend,
or explain.
I can only sit huddled
in horror and pain,
and confusion: and shrink -
what is left of my "me"
in a corner that shrinks as we speak,
as I see
that what's left of my brain
is a tiny space left, that has cut
all that was of my mind

adrift

and it's gone past recall, can't chase after
can't see

and you won't let me be

no you won't let me be
you come into the tiniest space I have left.
and you reach with your hands and you grasp
and you press, and you do no damn good
because it can't be helped

but you won't let me go

you would lose even yourself.

And nearly do.

but
you won't let me be, through no end of pain, 'til I'm my self
again.

Finish saving my life
at the risk of your own, and then
tell me you can't
be my friend


If I must lose my mind:

let it be by degrees. All of them, in one snap
so you don't follow me,
drawn in slow by the horror of growing love lost
in the slipping away of the one
who you knew from their thoughts
to their heart and their soul -
you could not let them go seeing glimmers alive,
in control - if I must lose my mind:
let it be all at once, with no glimmers of hope
to confuse what you want.

Since I've lost you no matter what,
let's let it be

There's no need to have you bring me back
to me.