Woke up to static—
     visual snow,
     signal crackling,
     vision fracturing,
     stars streaking the edges,

     like an old TV on a stormy night.

Sound too loud.
Light too sharp.
Every whisper—a blade hidden within.

My brain—
   swollen past reason,
   suddenly too big,
   pressing bone
         to nerve,
         to blood,
         to every raw,
            screaming cell,
            bangin'
            _hard_
            against the walls of my skull,
            *demanding*
                 I
                pay
             attention.

Hot water took the edge off— barely.

Half-submerged,
     ears underwater,
     eyes shut tight,

     trying to drown out that jackhammer behind my eyelids—
     the pulse pounding, every beat a burst of white noise.

Couldn’t chat.
Couldn’t text.

Your name caught in my throat,
          unable to escape,
      trapped behind the ache;

      but you were still there,
      quiet as the storm wasn’t.

Even at the worst, the ache found room to fit you in.

Just your name, —Mari—
     folded between the pulses,
     whispered inside the pain—
      quiet enough not to hurt,
      loud enough to feel.
      (always there,
              even when all
                   else is static)

A steady, whispered reminder that not every pulse is pain.

So now I’m here,
   finally surfacing,
   squinting back into the day, (carefully)
        head tender but intact, (as intact as it gets)

   …thoughts clearing…

   just enough to tell you—

I missed you
  even when my brain
  couldn’t find the words.
               (even then)
         (especially then)