And yet we lay afraid

 

 

This madness is beautiful; chaotic, illustrious, grand, and even divine

It's a sum of all the nights we lay in sweat wrapped under our sheets, confident, because it was all the armor we had

It was the conglomeration of all the shadows that passed over our windows in the night, probably just headlights from the street outside, but how could one ever be sure?

There were probably no monsters under our bed, no clowns with torn-away faces in our closets 

No hands stretching across our rooms to grasp and drag us into immeasurable depths

 

And yet we lay afraid

 

The bedtimes we spent laying awake in a cold pool of our own disregard for Mom's warnings not to watch that monster movie before bed

We knew it was fake

Just a movie

On a screen

 

And yet we lay afraid

 

Though possible, how likely are you to find your house being broken into, in the dead of the night? When your town lays dormant, and your pet is disturbed by nothing more than whatever dilemma they face in their dream?

How likely is it REALLY that you'll find the serial killer from ten states over, standing above you when you awake from a dreamless slumber? 

Not at all. 

 

And yet we lay afraid 

 

You're positive that your room stays the same when you close your eyes

No toys stray, no dolls move about

For they are plastic, and wooden, and can't do things on their own 

You're SO sure

 

And yet we lay afraid

 

We lay afraid at night when we know that we are safe and nothing can get to us and probably wouldn't bother with us even if they could, not because of what we know, but because of what we don't

 

We don't REALLY know that all our toys stay where they are supposed too

We don't REALLY know that there isn't someone wearing the face skin of your  neighbor standing outside your window, watching your every movement

Things are impossible for us to know for sure

 

And so, we lay afraid