It scrapes and breathes.

I’d like to say it rattles, but it’s far too firm a grip for that; I’d like to say it pushes me to action, but all too often I find myself isolated and afraid. There’s this monster inside of me, you see, and it can strike at any moment; it makes mountains out of mole hills when it warns me about the hidden corners of icebergs ahead.

And I can’t stand not knowing, so it whispers every possibility into my ears with all the persistence of a lover crooning that her mate is worth something, and it swallows me sweetly like that last spoonful of yoghurt before you start scraping out the plastic dish.

To think it’s all because of some natural order; to think it’s all because my fight or flight reaction—that thing that’s supposed to keep me alive—makes me burn my skin with Lysol and scald it with showers…

that breathes collision for the thousandth time between the warring proveniences of my mind…

it makes me feel that I must be something fundamentally broken. That the monster roars its approval every time I step away from something due to unseen danger.

And every time I regret that step, taken or no.