I'm talking to someone on the other end of the line

Convincing them to be a person

Instead of a spinning top on the brim of a mind.

It all hits at once: a sudden eruption

It all falls apart and then slowly back together.

Laying there defeated, exposed by the daylight

It strikes like the sudden slap of sobriety after a liquor-laden night

One that catches you somewhere between elation and malaise

Upon the realization that your mind's been returned to you, but its condition remains unchanged.

In the crux of disappointment, a hunger for hope takes its place.

With one foot in the door,

And an elbow keeping the window cracked -

In the seat nearest the exit,

Nearby an escape hatch;

I follow the procession of all those downtrodden and weary

Heaven-dazed and convinced by some ludacris notion

That not everything is lost - 

And hope is neither deceiving

Nor comes at a cost.