Rust

A sinister memory,
Wrenched the reins,
From the driver's grasp,
And sent the horses mad,
Foaming and shrieking,
Eyes rolling.

And then I was off,
Lashed by odd feelings,
Menaced and moaning,
Assaulted by the senses,
Whose refined weaponry,
Had hurriedly displaced me.

Old and undone,
I had lost my way,
In a conjurer's fog,
Where the sound clotted,
Where the light bled,
In hazy eddies.

Something,
Was sludging,
Through the murk,
Dreamily detached,
Druggedly vacant.

Something,
Was wandering,
Senseless,
Directionless,
Emotionless.

Something,
Was suckling,
Through the baleful swamp,
Studied in despair,
Steadied in step.

Then the Rust,
Lodged in my nostrils,
Stopped up my ears,
Coated my eyelids,
And coarsened my throat.