Second Draft

FEVER TRIP

-To Günter (Who was a Doggie)

My spinning brain matter aches,

My eyes following the

Green, blue and pink, dancing wildly,

From electric candles against white walls.

I know now it was you, Mr. Mosquito,

Who put this fever in me.

Wet and afraid of the next

Degree rising higher, warmer.

The lids of my eyes fall,

Landing in a familiar, confusion

Where fluorescent lights shine brighter,

And the comfort of home has changed.

On that very bed, where my eyes

Clasped hard and the fear took me, I feel the

Slimy claws, fishing below.

The slick slime finds my firm back

Ripping through its bedded ceiling

And my last defender.

“O please, O please, aren’t you home

From breakfast, yet, to save me?”

Cries made, with the breaking of

Fingernails on hard wood flooring. Then I

Feel the slime for the first time.

Wrapping its suction cupped fingers on my feet.

Deep to the dark, the slime claws pull,

As I run out of flooring to hopelessly clutch-

I hear the hope of bouncing bells,

Like the one’s on my Jessie’s neck, which

She kept, until worms ate her, too. I know

How you felt, now! But, like me, all Jessie

Did was watch.

And let the worm break bone and eat flesh.

“Go in peace, brother.”

Lids crack, letting in the faintest light, to my eyes.

Not the green, blue and pink, of before, but

Bright light, like white heat on my face.