Folded into Discomfort

A funny thing happens to you when I ask you questions and push on your back. With a single feeble hand, I fold you in to your discomfort. It’s not funny in a way that’s comical, but funny because it is peculiar. Peculiar that you let me do it at all.

A man of all your strength and prestige.

And little me.

You have crafted an elaborate, tough exterior with trap doors and armored knights on the battlements. You’re scared that if you let someone into your castle, they might put poison in your well and see the monsters you have hidden within. The only thing in my pockets is pen and paper, and I have scary monsters locked inside my castle, too.

The cobbled walls crumble under my kisses that heal playard scratches. I can lull the clanking army in your mind to sleep with tales of fatuous giants defeated by stones and heroines escaping castles shrouded in vines ripe with thorns and snakes.

It’s peculiar how a woman as gentle as me can make a hard man like you soft, a boy once more.

I can tell you that even the brave knights have nightmares, too.