A Cotton Bud

I am herebut notI'm present and I am tryingall the while silently screaming, hoping somebody will notice I amstuckbehind a wallnot even a wall, a hazeSurrounded by a cotton budfilling my eyes and my earsI can even feel it in my lungs, choking on it as I try to swallowto hold it down with everything elsethis is not in my headthis is a physical feelingI can feel it all, but nothing all at once

I don't understand it, at allout of no whereI am pushed behind myselfchoked by the white hazestruggling and strugglingand strugglingand strugglingit is so vivid and so very blurredI can see it and feel it but it itself is a haze, a blurwhite, a color as blank as the thing itself

but the haze will dropI know that muchwhat I don't know is howor whydoes it decide or do Ido I get help or do I do it on my ownhow will I understandfor next timehow to break the hazecan I shine a light at it like it were fogand it disperse and let me walk throughas if it never happenedor do I have to continueto struggle against the cottonwhat if I swallow too much cottonso there's no room for anything elsewho am I then?a voice of a friendsome lightencouragement from someone I loveless cottonhome to my animalsI can seea new morningthe fog is gonebut the cotton will stayit is no longer around me

but I have swallowed too much

it won't digest

it will sit there, and I will be lost in the fog once more

unlessI can figure it out

will I figure it out

is it, maybeas simple as justletting the cotton come back upthe same way it came in?can I?

or better,will I?