Zombie

Here's something I deleted earlier, from a longer piece:


I woke up, in the back of an ambulance, the pace of the car and my space on the stretcher stretching out my sense of space, and of place, and of time altogether. Zeno’s paradoxical arrow, I, wooden and lumber, almost made out of rubber, limber timber on the back of a turtle, on a turtle…all the way down. My head is still ringing, trying to shake off the rattle and wave, trying to say goodbye and rid my mind of his name.

I woke up, in a white hospital bed.

It felt like surfacing out from under a huge dark tide. I had a head full of formaldehyde; or was it turpentine? There was a nurse in the room with me. She had curly hair and familiar features.

She wore purple nail polish.

Had toenails like plum candy.