Shelter

Pulling indifference over my head to ward off apprehension

over this requiem for basic common sense.

Ducking under bones of clear thinking suspended

in the thin air of emotional fragility

I feel I must hide from or be infected by.

In the lengthening shadows of reason

I hunker down, taciturn.

Fearful of plastic smothering, hovering everywhere,

I wrap my apprehension in cottons and wool.

My fearless demeanor is but a thin disguise,

my consciousness is desperate for shelter,

pleading for it; can you hear me now?

Thoughts exiled by government edict as dangerous

run through my poor brain all the same.

My politics are turning unbidden to anarchy;

such extremism seems pale opposed to the tyranny

pounding at the unguarded American gates.

Greedy fools assure that it can’t happen here

in spite of evidence accumulating on all fronts,

leave me terrified and disgusted and praying

to a god I never believed in for shelter.