POETRY

Life, in Boxes — a free verse poem

Stress — an uncomfortable bedfellow

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

Life, in Boxes

I can feel it.
Tunneling inside of me,
burrowing through my gut.

It compels my feet to move
and move, to carry me from one
corner of this thinly-walled place
to the window, to corner again.

The floor creaks beneath me. It has born me
too long and is weary of me.

That must be cleaned, I note.
That must be packed.
That, and all else must be
carried and measured and assembled
— and there must be spackled and
painted and prepared for our breathing
and laughing and dancing into our
tomorrows — with spaces in place

for all that must be moved.

The details — burrowing stress tunnels
through my sleeping and resting
and all of my thinking is
stress beyond