It's pretentious to even write at this point

How many ways can one ask for help?

Cradling the child nursed on whiskey and nettles

That knows nothing of air or grass or water

But the teat softly dripping.

Are we chained to the rock of machism?

Do we wait and gnash teeth in silence, solitude a cloak of comfort that grips tight

And whispers the fears of leaps and shots?

Do we not know that the words we imprison behind misaligned teeth can breathe through the gaps,

Haggard and fetid, a rib cage with a lion's head licking at the enamel?

Do we not shame ourselves the weakness that plagues our skin and riddles our minds with cancers, that corruptive touch of independence, that both shelters and kindles us?

Do we not feel the ache in our hearts as we sit,

Lonely as sparrows on the morning sun,

Side by side, but seeing no companion on the journey?

I wonder if anyone has concocted the cure 

In a laboratory full of crying memories

And the lash of insecurity the only sound in their head.

I wonder if this menagerie of monsters I've managed to mash into my mind is one that others have paid the price to see.

And if the ticket barker is to be believed,

These fears are one of a kind,

And no one on this Green Earth,

Had known, or ever will know

Again.