James Mclain Poet Free verse

I Suffer From Metacognition

I watch the watcher in the mind’s dim hall,
A mirror facing mirror—endless sight.
Each thought, a pulse along a cortical wall,
Each doubt, a spark that will not sleep at night.

Within the folds where silent currents run—
The prefrontal cortex keeps its careful reign—
It weighs the thought before it is begun,
Then weighs again the weighing of the brain.

I do not simply think—I see the thought,
I trace its birth, its bias, and its end.
A private scientist of what is wrought,
Observer and observed that never blend.

O Metacognition—double-edged design—
You grant me sight no outward eye could claim:
To know I know… and question what is mine,
To doubt the self that speaks me into name.

You rise from circuits layered deep and wide—
The anterior cingulate cortex sounds alarms of doubt,
While networks knit experience inside,
And sift which thoughts to carry, which cast out.

You are control—the mind’s own guiding hand,
You monitor, evaluate, revise:
Like Executive Function taking stand,
Correcting errors no one else descries.

Yet burden walks beside your brilliant flame—
For constant knowing fractures simple peace.
To think of thinking is to play a game
Where certainty and silence never cease.

Still—without you, I drift, unmoored, unaware;
With you, I drown in depths I cannot flee.
O watcher in the watcher’s inward stare—
You are the cost… of knowing I am me.

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Paige Hind April 21, 2026 at 3:11 PM I had to read this very carefully. It almost sees/seems like PTSD. Except its like genius, where PTSD I think blocks sorts of thinking. You always write so very poignantly, James- always the best of me as one who reads your work,