Silence: On repeat

 
 
The silence stretches  
out too long now,  
and it creates swarms of  
insects that furrow  
in the rotten wood  
of my guts  
 
You, as adept with your  
hands, mind, body,  
as you are  
 
can’t fix me.  
 
And the silence feels  
like being haunted,  
feels like being eaten alive,  
or like hiding under the covers  
because the dark  
has teeth.  
 
I know it’s anxiety,  
insecurity,  
fear.  
 
The tragic denouement  
is that I’m not built to patiently  
accept those emotions,  
or to work my way through them  
when they play  
on fucking repeat.  
 
No.  
I generally  
I kill the cause  
so it can’t hurt me.  
 
Because fuck if I’ve  
endured this life,  
this waste of existence  
to be enslaved  
by fucking fear,  
eaten alive by  
anxiety  
or made unsure of my  
value,  
my place in the world,  
 
for a single goddamn minute.  
 
(and you do that)  
 
 
You, as adept with your  
hands, mind, body,  
can create worlds.  
 
But you can’t create  
more minutes.  
 
 
And the silence  
 
 
s t r e t c h e s  
 
 
 
out