A Mouthful of Colour

A poem about claustrophobia.

A MOUTHFUL OF COLOUR

How painful it must be

To be surrounded

Day after day

By people

You love and hate

Love, love is worse

Because they stay

At least those you hate

Go away

Such a colourful world

A sea

Full of bright fish

Endlessly darting

Never alone.

How painful.

When a corner

A nice, dark place

To hide

Is so beautiful

Music pounding

Washing all over me

So calm

So grey

So

Out of the way

They can't find me

Those fish

With their quickly snapping jaws

That pinch

Draw blood

Those people

They draw blood, too

In their own way

How sharp

A smile can be

A hundred smiles

A hundred tiny knives

A thousand tiny red drops

On the floor

Trampled

By the people

Washed away

By the cold seawater

Swept

By the fins

Of those dangerous fish

I'd like to be a shark

I'll eat them all

Without breathing

Then swim back to my corner

And laugh

Through a mouthful of colour.