The Paper Tent

written: december 2024

authors note: this poem came from a dream (maybe a borderline nightmare?) i had around that time. the feeling of realization and fear that something deeply wrong has happened stuck with me enough to write this.

The children build their paper tent
with one door and one window
All of them tell me to go inside
One friend goes, two friends go
But they don't come back

I follow and follow them inside
The small maze engulfs me whole
I turn and turn and think—
I am past the window.

I turn and think
Until I can't no more
All my thoughts come back to one thing
When nothing engulfs me whole
is that I'm past
the window.