fear factor
this is quite the cage I’m in, you see
suppose it is fear, consider it as such
for my nerves are trembling and my
heart quakes with calamity
for my eyes are open but unseeing and I
acutely sense a thrumming under the veins in my wrist
they lurk long and hardened, bloated and thick
I itch to rip them out
like roots wrenched from damp soil
and still the blood rushes on
soldiering hard and fast through the tunnels of war
so that the walls do not deflate and collapse
and yet
I wish they would, I wish
I could retch and rid myself
of the hesitation that has built a nest in my throat
and I could snatch my fingers away
from the crates full of dreams that lie crumbling on the shelf
and I call out for them but my lips are shut and my cords are cut
so they whisper to me instead
taunting me with their slimy tentacles of doubt
and they drag me into their lair beneath the sea where I
tread lightly
nimble fingers weaving and dripping and swelling and slipping
to build a raft before the waves soar higher, crashing
overhead; and it is too late