Dissociation Blues Poem by Cat Singh

The only way I can tell I am still in my body
is that my head hurts,
and my head is on my body,
and I can feel it aching there.
Today I pissed dark yellow
and couldn't remember the last time
I drank any water.
Today I floated through the store where I work
and forgot that I had feet.
Today the sides of my vision were fuzzy
and crinkly like a round baby's toy.
Today I heard someone crying in the bathroom
and my body responded in silent sobs.
Today I closed my eyes and forgot
they were closed
until I opened them again.

My ex calls me at night now
because he has no one else to talk to.
His voice sounds exactly as it did
when we were teenagers: pained and jovial
and generic at once,
like a Christmas movie or a bad comedian.
His voice enters my head
and ribbons through it like floss
between the teeth of my brain.
I barely feel it, but when I do,
it aches. It is a gentle prying apart;
a parting set of lips
that I can't see through the phone.
I don't feel much these days,
but last night I laid in bed like I was dead,
staring at the wall like only dead things can do.
Not looking but boring holes nonetheless.
When I woke from my stupor,
I cried like a child.

Once when I was 10 or 11,
my friends threw a beanbag that I sewed myself
onto the roof of our apartments.
I cried to my mom, and she held me for once.
She rocked me on the floor as we sat
in front of the oven waiting for something to bake.
I kept crying just so she would keep holding me
and speaking to me like I existed.
I wanted to exist
so badly…

The only way I can tell
I am still in my body
is that my head hurts
and my head is on my body
and I can feel it.

I can feel it
right there.