CONFOUNDED CAGES

The needle remains affordable, the fingers are still attached;
another morning comes and another dawn is hatched.
The restless night contrasts the vile alternative of death
and cramping muscles remonstrate - but there is another breath.
Though it may be fading, the desire to climb the hill remains.
And this friend doth truly care; he has seen and knows thy pains.
'Though that friendly caring may not save the wasting of thy limbs,
and 'though that caring may never brighten the light of life that dims,
it will ease and calm the mind despite pain's deep solitude
and will guide the tangled mind into a state of rectitude
that shall confound the wily Joker who courts the inevitability of death
and whose morbid humour is the vanguard of life's last gasping breath.
So scold that Joker harshly (for he has planted depression's seed)
and decorate that cage's bars with memories age has freed.