In this crooked dead end and twisting chill,

they feed the fire to burn our bridges

with a kindling of our poetry.

Hide your journal and words in your heart.

Do not risk a thought,

because those knocks at your door

have come to kill the light inside of you.

Hide your light in shooting stars.

They have come to excise your smiles from your lips

like ruthless surgeons, and

pontificate the dangers of song,

stealing them from your mouths.

Hide joy somewhere new.

Satan sits at the funeral feast

of our breathless, hungry and tired ancestors.

Hide your dreams in the children.