Lines & Linens

In dark times
our own mortality,
thin as muslin,
brushes an earlobe,
unlike a lover, yet
lightly as a whisper

as this seductress touches
the soft spots,
a veil of adverbs
fall at our feet, deflated
as exhaled balloons,
Thule tends to hold nothing back.

In a single explosive moment
at the end of a whip,
we can only become
deafened and blinded on impact,
and it is inherently
common to cower
and not move
for fear-
For fear opposes bravery
and bravery takes nerve,
and nerves become raw
and thin
as muslin
rubbed back into cotton bolls.

Under this gossamer appearance,
what is soft
has been made to be
rid of
swords and armor
such as grown wild
or naturally part of We.


Painting by Henry Robert Morland (1716-1797), 'Woman doing laundry' in Public domain.