She sleeps the sleep of the over indulged deep in a drug and alcohol induced stupor. Her breathing is barely perceptible hardly stirring the air where she lies. I resist the temptation to hold a mirror next to her perfect face Her clothes lie heaped upon the floor discarded like an old snake skin, this time, it seems, she managed to undress before falling into oblivion. I kiss her pale, porcelain shoulders and savour her delicate scent. Fortified by youth her beauty endures, her eyes remain clear and carry no luggage. For now at least, amphetamines and alcohol have yet to take their toll. She stirs as hallucinogenic apparitions visit her bemused and muddled mind. She dreams she is "Lucy in the sky, with diamonds" and squadrons of swine, watching "pink elephants on parade" hand in hand with Kurt Cobain, as thousands of decimated brain cells bow out with an extravagant flourish. In the morning she'll curse herself not for her excess or drunken misdemeanours, but because of the pore clogging make-up that, once again, she forgot to remove. May she live to regret the folly of youth without the legacy of fits and psychotic episodes. |