Muroidea Paranoia

Inspired by Kafka's 'Metamorphosis'

Like Lucifer’s fall from grace
I dropped from the human race

Neurotic paranoid schizoaffective with addiction
Into the dark I retreated with my mental affliction
Dilapidating in desperation I prowl and sneak
Nearsightedly on hands and knees I rummage slink and creep
Scavenging the sewers, gutters, dumpsters, clutter and alleys
Of garbage and sewage for digestible grubbery
Filthy frizzled frazzled mangy hair crawling with lice and fleas
My surviving mustard-colored teeth decay with disease
Like tusks over my withered lips only a few remain
My dirty untrimmed fingernails are yellow and frayed
I’m harmless, yet people are startled at my sight
So I prowl in the lonely shadows of the night
My humanity is slowly disintegrating
Tweaking ticking twitching scratching shivering
Body constantly moving in psychomotor agitation
Chemical mortification of the flesh in declination
Some dumpsters are better than others
Some swill and garbage has more to offer
My inflamed olfactory detects odorants of molding
Leading me to a steel cornucopia of bakery leavings
Where I feast on musty maggot-infested sweet breads
With such abandon I’m oblivious to the iron jaws of death

“Hey Jack…Jack!
Come here quick!
Look at the huge rat
I caught in my trap!”

NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: Diagnosed with cancer can be a humbling experience. Though I never had a substance abuse problem, the synthetic opiates I took, along with the effects of chemo, were devastating to my psyche. Plagued with insomnia, I’d wander the streets at night. I looked like a wreck. My hair fell out in patches. Due to acute dry mouth, my teeth literally rotted out of my mouth.  People avoided me like the plague. I never felt so alone. For the fist time in my life, I identified with society’s outcasts. One night, I had a horrible nightmare that I was trapped in a dumpster crawling with rats. I awoke drenched in sweat and trembling in fear. My contribution to  the My Metamorphosis series is a dramatic reflection of those very dark days.