Animal fear is relentless,
purposeful, and unchallenged.
Human fear is kept
in little boxes or else we’d
never have any fun.
We have complex systems
of forgetting, of stepping over,
of blocking out. It works so well
we box the rest of our existence
with it, too. We put our love in
plastic containers with lines on the side
to measure the volume. We stack up
tasks, we seal in feelings with plastic lids,
we stick on labels and expiration dates.
We build up walls of little boxes
so we never see beyond
the things we know, the things
we keep in the dark.