in Sunset Bay this morning - pretty but means nothing

my sister said at lunch yesterday that there's gotta be a screenplay at least outa this. he and I talking about Kafka and "Waiting for Godot" and Erdrich tricksters (Nanapush medicine is what we need now, how to slip the noose), as wailing continues around us, retraint gurneys carried in and out, staff glaring at us because glaring is all they do, ready to pounce and restrain while we do nothing but eat lunch. they seem increasingly annoyed that he doesn't act nuts, like why the fuck are you here, and we wonder that as well but not out loud. shrinking into ourselves. appear defeated. the screenplay for that has been written a million times. 

VIRGO (Aug. 23-Sept. 22). You don't expect things you want to come to come to you easily. You'll do the work that's uncomfortable, but not unsafe. Avoiding some kinds of pain keeps life good, while avoiding other kinds keeps it small. You know the difference.

now it's today, and that 👆 is what I thought overnight 👇. this pain means stay small. stay quiet. stay safe. 

like a prey animal, be still as a stone. 

until he gets out, there is nothing else. I do nothing else but orbit this. he does nothing but wait in mounting fear. our lives are held captive. it is illegal (unsafe) to ask for this kind of help. and once you've made that ask, you are a goner caught in legal hell, going dead behind your eyes, submitted to whatever. I am watching that dead hopelessness sink in behind eyes in the waiting room; behind the eyes of the visted it's usually already there. behind Huckforcat's eyes when I signed over the guns, I saw an exhausted wary worn similar. 

do not make eye contact; if you must, smile (lie).

🫩 

exhausted always on alert -_0 

not fight, flight flight flight flight against the trap around snapped shut on my ankle, my mind flailing not fighting

remember how you get out of a violent situation. silent, agree with whatever, go ice cold until it's not you (dissociate), leave just enough awareness to be ready to run as soon as there is opportunity. that's what you have to do when you are small and they are big and you are terrified. bide time.

like that. and that, over time, fills you with a snarling distrust of anyone getting anywhere near you. that's just a fact. it hardens your heart to stone. and I gotta get to stoney faster, my mind working nonstop