There is no bright light to travel toward

[Todd]

Hell is oneself, Hell is alone, the other figures in it merely projections. –T.S. Eliot

There is no bright light to travel toward

The stories you’ve been told are wrong;
this is no mild passage

to golden streets—there is no comfort-
ing metaphor for this state.

The breath escapes,
the body shudders, exhales

Life unzips like an old coat,
discarded

Memories drown in the river.
facts remain

without significance. This is lost to us,
a Lethean draught, irremediable

concealing loves, cares that bind, tying
us to this world, that we may not leave

This woman at my bedside, my wife
presses a damp cloth to my face.

She has become
an actress in an old movie

that I might have watched once.
These recollections form an endless list

of mocking credits rolling
NamesUponNamesUponNames

in this oppressive quiet
ForeverForeverForever