Popcorn

Last night at work, I had a bit of a panic attack. Something like that, something similar. You don’t really know while you’re in it, why it happens, but the reasons were there, and I know them now. 

If all the words in the world were gone

And we were left with the thoughts in our heads,

The list of things to say wouldn't be that long,

If I had one sentence to speak before sentences were dead. 

on the night that you broke your eyes open,

cried into candy packets you found at the petrol station smelling like gasoline and regret

in your still-standing baby teeth like slabs of sugared marble there were

you get a line & i'll get a pole

honey - honey! july thickens, slows to a stop outside, get

your rod and line, the ones that used to be your father's. get

your heart from the closet and your coat from the floor,

When you are old

Your skin will become like paper,

And your bones will be like the wooden ribs

Of a lantern

So that the world will see the light in your chest.

But I don't need to wait

Sometimes it's hard to write poetry

It's almost like the words get stuck

in the folds of my mind before they reach the paper

Or maybe I just can't describe

memory