Night Sweats…

in total darkness I awoke in cold sweat
in anxiety and claustrophobic
for the first time in my life
a sense of terror like
I could cease to
exist forever
the way
one
does
under
anesthesia
I could not sit still
or read and I walked
briskly around the rooms
of my little house wishing the sun
were up so I could run round the high school
football field down the street but it was one AM,
I remember my mother complaining of night mares
towards the end of her long life so I took a cold shower
and drank water and eliminated urine and worked on my
computer until my mind stopped racing and I am calm enough
to attempt sleep once more; I felt possessed or an attempt was
being made on me; am I the Blind Owl or the Raven, one, two, three
I was losing my mind but now I’ve finally got it back and am breathing
deeply and slowly filling the bottoms of my lungs with cool night air and
my hair is no longer upright but has lain back down and goose bumps gone away