seems disconnected from her brain.
When she tries to explain her drowsiness,
she tells her doctor,
I fell asleep on Friday and didn’t wake up till Christmas.
Embarrassed, she stammers … I mean, Sunday! …
until Sunday.
And when tries to say she cleans her nose
with a Q-tip, out slips, toothpick.
Her tongue has a mind of its own.
She imagines it scanning grey matter,
seizing any random word similar in length or consonance.
Words emerge in fits and spasms
from great white caverns of her brain.
A frisson of fear travels her spine.
she tells her doctor,
I fell asleep on Friday and didn’t wake up till Christmas.
Embarrassed, she stammers … I mean, Sunday! …
until Sunday.
And when tries to say she cleans her nose
with a Q-tip, out slips, toothpick.
Her tongue has a mind of its own.
She imagines it scanning grey matter,
seizing any random word similar in length or consonance.
Words emerge in fits and spasms
from great white caverns of her brain.
A frisson of fear travels her spine.
Ann Howells has been writing poetry for some twenty years. Her work appeared recently in Agave, Apieron Review, Little Patuxent Review and other small press and university journals. She serves on the board of Dallas Poets Community (501-c-3) and edits the journal Illya’s Honey, recently taking it from print to digital.
Categories: Mental Health, Poetry, Themed
Tags: Ann Howells, e-zine, ezine, hyperbole, longing, melancholy, melancholy hyperbole, Mental Health, new, poem, poet, poetry, poets, submit, The madwoman’s tongue, writing
Melancholy Hyperbole 
Beautiful work. You capture the internal and external authentically and wrenchingly. Great title too.