Squeeze Play

feel the heft

the slow persistent

tug

of chains and weights

around your legs and arms

for years

for decades

and when they're off

you're still held down

held in somehow

pinned and penned

not by the

lumbering distant thunder

that is pull

but by its absence

by the lightness and ease

sudden and empty

and suddenly empty

those limbs

are useless

with and by

their emancipation

and a simple thing

like a hug

is a dance turned

seizure in molasses

foreign and scary

an embrace on the moon

even while

your shackle burns

glossy pink bracelets

round wrists and ankles

are itchy with healing

and you're trying to

generate

the Goldilocks gravity

between you

and another

trying not

to lose hold

and to not crush

you and him

and the rock beneath your boots

an astronaut

like eight year old you