What she sees is anybody’s guess. 
Her brow is worried and her eyes stare at something. She’s
anxious and frantic as she fights the inner turmoil of the
beast that burrows into her guts, roiling her thoughts as it
preys on her mind, riding the weakness that’s intensified
with time as the memories flash by like the stops of a film
of her past with a father who fought his own mind. Not that
he beat her or ever raised his hand, but sometimes words
have a cruel weight of their own and they kill from the inside
and always alone even among family and those that she loved.
Like a velvet glove clutching a roll of hard coins his words
rained upon her with derision and threat well-meant but
spoken with anger when love would have left a soft bruise on
her breast. I feel her forcing herself to be still as if  she’s afraid
to feed the beast’s will. I feel too she’s afraid to look at my face,
as if I would ever judge her having been in her place; not the
same frantic anxiety and wrestling inside, but his words had
the effect of bringing my rage to the surface and not confining
my mind to the cage that locked her away at such a young age.
Finally, though, she can’t stand it and darts forward and sweeps
away the imaginary dust dirtying the counter.
Invisible to me, so very real to her.

Image by Calum Heath. Personality Disorder, for Vice Mag