The Little Men - Erin's poetic portrayal of life with Endo

The Little Men

The little people have returned,

Marching up and down my veins.

Settled up against my bones

Beginning their attempts of destruction.

It’s a dull pain to start,

I barely noticed they have sneaked their way in.

I was asleep when they showed up.

It’s like an unscatchable itch under my skin. One in which you wish you had a fork to dig through the skin and flesh, into the torment where the pain resides.

A steady rush to the end of my nerves sets off a spark.

Like a man with a welding torch, he annoys me by flicking it on and off.

I moan in anguish.

I must not let the pain drive me mad.

I cannot be touched now.

My nerves are inflamed.

My hands swell, my ankles grow.

Encouraged I return to bed.

I find the pill bottles waiting there.

So many of them lined up like soldiers awaiting battle.

I look at them back and forth.

Which will numb?

Which ones are the fastest?

Which will poison the men?

Will they always be drilling inside me?

Pacing away, driving me nuts with pain?

I pop one in my mouth and swallow hard.

I have no energy to move from bed and grab some water.

I build saliva in my mouth to push the morphine down.

I picked morphine from the rest.

Morphine-the strongest of my army.

The coating melts on my tongue, bitterness and chalk.

Swallowed it becomes stuck.

I massage my throat, pushing it down.

I push it down.

That bitterness, it burns my throat.

I choke a bit.

The first hit.

The subtle high.

It spreads from the head down throughout my wretched body.

I call it warm light.

Soothing and constant it fills my veins, washes out the construction men, their tools, their mess.

For a few minutes I feel normal, minus the high of course.

The high.

Nothing is like it.

Nothing can top it to a person who lives with daily pain.

It is the only reassuring thing one who lives like possess.

Without it, certainly one would wish to die.

Stiff as a board your're afraid to move.

Afraid if you do the pain will return.

Motionless I stare at the ceiling.

When will it end?

It begins to return, that reoccurring dull pain.

I pop another and another…

It continues.

I am alone and all I do is think.

Is this my life?

If I take one more will this nauseating pain end? Or have I been left here to suffer silently?

Over and over again, the same thoughts, the same pills, the same battle.

Eventually, the pain will end, but it will be back shortly.

Like an addicted or love smitten court, it will return ambitiously determined.

The little men with their tools, noise and destruction.

The construction site, my body.

Their mission: to be noticed.

I muster the energy to move again.

The fight is over.

The dead silence hits me.

I start smiling again, but for how long?

I am always on guard, waiting.

Watching for the signs of their return.

The question is when?