What it's like to be crazy

I feel like I'm walking around in a glass box
looking out at the world
as they look in at me.

I'm walking around in this box
where within the invisible walls
is this thick smoldering air

Like a stench that surrounds my head
this substance I breathe is thick with intensity
like smoke off a cigarette.

Some days it takes on human characteristics.
it talks to me,
tells me to do things I shouldn't.

Choking me, tightening its grasp
it goes on speaking for hours
numbing my brain.

As I rock back and forth
I feel it coil itself around my body
crushing my strength, yelling.

Without warning it quiets,
Just as soon it asks
"So, this is what it's like to be crazy."