Comatose

In an irrevocable warp speed instant, my head collided into the likeness of drying tar, absorbing each horrid layer of concrete. That pitch-black, tacky substance covered my body, so that I was trapped, sightless, into immobility. With pounding pain, like a full force baseball bat swing to the skull, like a head cold amplified myriad times, my brain screamed for release inside walls of perpetual pressure, with nerve spasms massively extending beyond the central blow. The stench of blood-covered latex gloves and hand sanitizer attempting to halt disease, had me guessing that I was in a medical facility. I could taste metal, as if I was becoming part machine, conforming to constant monitor beeps. Morphine drips slipped me into hallucinations, or maybe just distressing dreams. My opaque mind tingled for air, breath gasping like an incessant snore, mouth slightly ajar. I imagined drools somewhere, but felt no dampness. Numbness soon overcame most pain, setting me into a panic of possible lost limbs, lost neck, lost head. Dread of the unknown cast me into a guarded sensation of always falling, anticipating the jarring end. Unable to scratch intermittent itches or ask for assistance, I twitched inwardly, trapped in a corridor of horrors, with siren flashes passing through the darkness, running for a door or window to open, or if locked, to kick vigorously through this mind prison. There are no doors. There are no windows. Only echoed pounding of familiar voices floating surrounded me. I could smell my wife's Tea Rose perfume upon approach, accompanied by my three mostly grown daughters with their authentic scent of home. Some named friends and acquaintances came at arbitrary times. Some offered slurred words in somber tones. Some were simply saturated in silence. All were drenched with unspeakable grief. Each loved one's screaming drop of saline made me cry inside, but I doubt it seeped outwardly. I longed to reach out to wipe away their liquid sorrow, but my muscles were limp, each limb like a redwood tree branch in stagnant air.