Poetry Thursday: "I can show you fear in a handful of dust"

The Poetry Thursday: Traveling Edition is up at The Polka Dot Witch Blog. Last week, we were asked to think about fear and follow the prompt deep into our subconcious. This line from TS Elliot spoke to me, and so my poem about fear:

"I can show you fear in a handful of dust" --ts elliot

The sky is bell jar still. Absent
air stalls the toll of bells. The last vibration
dies but the ear clamors for the next
and the next. Fear waits in that space, trips
you at night, one shoe left in the hallway,
a coffee table placed just so to catch

the jut of hip. The bruise a temporary
birthmark to blemish this new infancy.
You screw your eyes shut and wail
but this is no comfortable helplessness
soothed with full breast and warm
blanket. In your first childhood,
you once knew how the tide swelled,
swallowed the day's labor on the sand.

--LJCohen, 2007

Follow the breadcrumbs back to Polka Dot Witch to find a link to next week's Poetry Thursday host, and while you're there, check in with the scary offerings of other PT participants.