Claustrophobia

Claustrophobia

Here I am again,

inside another seven-meter coffin.

Oh God! So black and dank

with pressing walls

but which I cannot see.

They're there, all right, invisible.

And I can smell their blackness.

Touch it with my nose if I bend forward.

Pungent smell and feel of pitchy soot—

as I so slowly…slowly…sink…down…down,

to nether regions of this stifling sepulchre.

Is there light at the bottom of the tunnel?

By memory, extrapolating from

a thousand, million, billion so it seems

of other downward terror trips,

I know the light is there.

And yet I cannot see it,

my girth and garment serving as a gasket

to keep the light from seeping up the casket

and through old-fashioned spectacles to eyes.

I hate it so, and fear so my confinement here.

And yet this night it is my very karma

To be here now, and then again,

and then again in other neighboring coffins.

To sink from sky, entrapped, to solid bottom,

where Lo! the light of seven thousand candles!

And freedom! Room to take unhampered breath at last!

And home-baked cookies—wash ’em down with milk!

Enjoy it, Fats! And as you place the packages, Forget!

that in a moment's time you must reverse yourself

in terror—rise, retrace that path, those dread-inducing narrows,

And meet again The Night. The Night.

Though black as soot, she has the stars, and has no stifling walls

To terrify the very bones and soul.

A moment in that cold and moonlit freedom,

Amidst the smells of animals, and then

Another chimney. Taking up my bundle,

I meet the crushing terror yet again.

The Dutch, thank God, prefer their gifts in shoes.