it evaporates. 

I try to pour my voice down like concrete; 

somehow,

I trace the path to its erasure 

So certain have I felt in my declarations 

until I have stood before you, 

my naked mouth agape, 

my whirling incantations lost

I would swear up and down I am not afraid 

and still of this I am sure – 

There is mercy in hesitation, 

I would perish without my contradictions.

I would suffocate without the things that I fear. 

originally published in Assignment Literary Magazine