In My Stomach

In this shadow, I shrink and it knows
I can’t move. It is making me cold.
And it grows in my stomach like mold.
It keeps me just sick enough to stay home.

Kill the lights. Curtains cover closed blinds.
Build a wall of stone and steel that will never come down.
Let the dust colonize just like James the first.
There will be no blood this time.
In silence, I’m yours. Twice dead-bolt the doors.

I’ve been followed by a face marked with pain.
It came close once and he just learned my name.
Every day he grows taller, he looks down at my heart,
and through my throat, he could reach in and pull me apart.

It gets worse when he contacts my eyes.
He can see right through to everything that blackened my veins
and his sounds resonate up and down,
like a march through me, this battlefield,
there’s just not much left, so silence the rest.

In this shadow, I shrink and it knows
I can’t move, I can’t sleep.
Terrified by my own bloodshot eyes.

So, I’ll wait here and pray.
I prayed that I was all wrong about prayer.
And I do know that this is truly tired.

It still grows in my stomach like mold.
It keeps me just sick enough to stay home, all alone.