Your sweet promise
coats me like a varnish,
wrapping my sticky desires
in an airless
human
skin-tight
vault.

Fatally sealed,
this timeless wait in madness,
this paused intent
of craftsmanship

one unstepped
frozen
foot ahead

contains me like a parasite,
and I, far from drowning,
hibernate within;
mirages of possibility,
seeming eons of time

– bereft of touch –

pass me by, imprisoned.

But wide awake alone,
insane,
inside this vacuumed husk,
I quench my heart

– reflection –

while my hunger,
still un-fed,
provides the popcorn
and the trailers
to the feature film
that scratches at my
fading,
timeless,
statuesque,
and stunted soul.

I wait (believing)

baited and entombed,

for the next civilisation
to unbury me

and recreate a reason
for my being here
that parallels an excuse
for their own.