• I. The Desert

    A red sun rises on this scorching desert in the middle of my mind
    Trapped in it like one who is comatose I try to reason my way out
    I protest that it’s just a dream
    I will wake up soon enough
    I have to
    I must
    I have been saying this to myself for god knows how long
    Decades
    Centuries even
    I see the exact same landscape consistently
    Unyieldingly
    Lack of perception would be better than this
    Because then at least my mind could invent something new
    But the desert that cannot exist continues to impend on my senses
    Like an unshift-able monolith it bears down on my consciousness
    Or unconsciousness
    Or whatever this is
    The only thing more massive and gargantuan then this paradox desert
    Is the thirst
    It is an all consuming thought
    Each moment my thirst is worse than the moment before
    And each moment it goes unslaked
    Each moment is more miserable than the last
    And each moment is the most miserable I’ve ever been
    For a while when I first was dropped into this paradox
    (Which seems like the moment of my birth because all I can ever remember
    No matter how far back I look
    Is this desert
    It is the only thing that I have ever known)
    I would walk
    Until I collapsed
    Hoping to find something
    I have long since given up
    And now I just lay
    In this one spot
    I do not ever sleep
    I do not ever dream
    I do not eat
    I do not drink
    I do not ever speak
    Because there is no one to speak too
    I don’t even know what my own voice sounds like
    But worst of all
    Worst of all
    I do not ever die

    II. The Nameless

    My thoughts can hardly be defined as sane
    How can one be sane when one’s very setting is insanity
    I am trapped in a paradox
    It is endless, it is senseless
    It is impossible and defiant of it’s own impossibility
    It has a more intricate personality than even myself
    And it has no name
    It can’t exist so I don’t think anyone ever named it
    As far as I can tell I am it’s only inhabitant
    Perhaps it has a name but it has long since forgotten it
    And if that is so it can’t have been a very good one
    So perhaps it is my duty to name it
    Perhaps once it is named it will cease to be a paradox
    Something that cannot exist cannot have a name right?
    Of course!
    That’s the answer!
    I give myself false hope knowing it’s false
    I know that there is no answer to this riddle
    And to search for one means madness
    But honestly in the situation I’m in madness
    Madness
    Is the least of my problems
    I start trying to think of a name
    What does one name an impossible desert
    I think of many characteristics of the desert
    Doom
    Desolation
    Despair
    Bleak
    Sullen
    Harsh
    Withering
    But not a name
    I struggle forever to come up with a name
    Because time has no meaning here
    This desert is completely static
    There is no dynamic here by which to measure time
    I am the only thing that changes
    And I am not trying to come up with a name for myself
    But perhaps that would be a good method
    By which to come to a name for the impossible desert
    What
    What is my name?
    I scream at the horrific realization
    That even if I did have a name
    Once
    I have forgotten it
    I am the nameless
    I do not ever die

    III. The Reflection

    I decide that before I can name the impossible desert
    I must first name myself
    I am horrified to find that I know infinitely more about the desert
    Than I know about me
    I don’t even know what I look like
    I have never seen my own reflection
    Reflection
    More than just a noun
    I know that much
    Although how I know it is also a mystery
    I know this language that I speak
    And I know the desert
    You may pity my lack of knowledge
    But do you honestly know that much more than me?
    I decide that if I don’t have a reflection
    Than I must reflect
    I search back through years upon years
    Decades upon decades
    Centuries upon centuries
    And throughout the entire span of my endless memory
    All I can find is the desert
    Not one observation about myself
    I have no personality
    There is not me
    I do not exist
    In a place that does not exist
    I am the nameless
    I do not ever die

    IV. Paradox

    My name is the nameless
    I am the impossible desert
    There is no distinction between the two of us
    This is hell
    These are my conclusions
    1.There is not me
    2. I do not exist
    3. In a place that does not exist
    4. I am the nameless
    5. I do not ever die

    V. Bereavement

    Five conclusions
    That spell out my name
    Not in letters or runes
    But in paradoxes
    They define it more truly than any other definition ever could
    I am everything and nothing
    I am birth without death
    I am impossible and yet still here
    I am
    I am not