It’s been a long time

Since I knew pain like this.

Maybe I never have.

That’s how it feels, anyway.

The slightest “wrong” motion

Activates the knife that slices through muscle

And mind—oh, yes, mind—

And that, of course, is the more serious issue

Since “muscle strain, probable tendinitis” will eventually run its course;

But the mind, out of its primordial fears that the slightest discomfort signals

Death itself,

Turns every annoying agony into fully developed existential angst,

And in such manner makes its own hell.