the real subject is always you

I’m always trying to turn my fear

into a fire I can’t extinguish.

Right now I’m trying to turn my fear

over not connecting with you, reader,

into a kind of flexibility

or acceptable wavering of that experience,

though I suppose

there is no real way to know for sure

I’ve gotten through to you

since I can’t make you feel

or think anything.

But who am I kidding? I can’t get real

for beans.

Even now, I’m trying to convince myself

there is a way to prove to you,

prove to myself, once and for all,

that I am here, now, totally feel-able,

whatever that means.

I know that as long as I try to come

through this page I know I can’t pass through,

I’ll never get there.

And though I could change how I think

about what it means to be there,

I wouldn’t stay tricked for long.

I’d get bored with my own shenanigans,

and want to spread

wildfire into the next, driest thing,

infernal as water.