Spring upon the one that least expects it
because that pounce might start a reaction
not known in this lifetime, let alone in those books,
science papers, and coffee-table-I'll-read-it-later
catalogues. Those outlets, paper thin and tidy,
rely
on
fact.

Without fiction, and it's faux-character diction,
minds wouldn't wander, instead they'd be stuck to
statistics, tables, and those graphs awkwardly labelled.

Without fiction, we'd be thrown out of the poet-halls and reading clubs
with NOTICE OF EVICTION printed notes around our neck,
when all we had done was read what we thought.

Without fiction, there would be a fraction of me and you and us and those
missing, lost to somewhere not known here or mapped correctly, hidden underneath
the dirt, frozen water, the crust and snow.

Without fiction, we'd all be alone. Because that figment narrative
can either hide us when hunted or surprise us when confronted
with the one we wish to be with.