Out of Reach

Bubble wrapped mind, safe but cut off,

this feeling, like I'm embracing

somebody while wearing thick gloves,

like overprotected sex,

this head full of static,

strange motion-stillness,

too many voices, an ocean of them,

indistinct and fleeting, a wave's

roar when I want the articulate,

modulated drops--

there's something between where

my mind is and where

I want it to be--

searching for the bottom

of a murky river--

I'm kept out of the water

by someone or something,

away from the free-swimming ideas--

things just out of reach, like whatever

it was that you returned to the room

to get--

it's like that, even now, with these words

pulled out like slivers, slowly, offering

some relief, but ending there,

an absence, a negative space.