Agoraphobia

Agoraphobia

Frozen like an icicle

Hanging from the door frame

I thaw slowly, push with resistance

One foot out into the rush of world.

Each step highly strung,

Footprints left on doorsteps

Behind me, follow in procession

Like mourners in the cortège

Of laughter remembered.

The rain falls heavier

Offers a drenching, a baptism,

I move faster on returning

To the dangerous safety of being alone,

The crushing testimony of silence,

The unbearable wrongness of being,

Unpeel the hide of secrets and bury

Them under floorboards, under beds,

Under memory’s ever increasing weight.

Dread growing at the thought

Of conversation unravelling me,

The accidental touch of strangers

And the nausea of their apologies.

Frozen like an icicle

Waiting to snap

As if I wasn’t already

Broken.