I sit, curled, at the base of your spine: a malignant Kundalini ready not for awakening but already awake, ready for a taste of your fear.
Alternatively, you could think of me as a pool, where your face reflects distortedly and time loses its meaning as you stare into everything that is wrong with you and everything that will be wrong with you, failure looming beneath the surface like Grandfather Carp.
It could also be that I am a creature with tiny fingers and tinier joys, tying your intestines into complicated knots out of sheer malicious boredom; I am a brownie, if you will, and you have eaten me and I am wreaking havoc on the most delicate parts of you.
Perhaps you would rather see me as a virus whose only functions are to send ripples of discomfort through you, make your fingers and hands and knees and legs shudder as if it were the coldest day of the year and you were out in your birthday suit, make your mouth dry and your palms wet and the worry lines etch themselves into your forehead.
To me, it does not matter how you daydream and nightmare my form, only that you recognize it when I invade you, body and soul, and that you do not banish me before I kick your words from your head, loosen your hair and your clothes and your stomach, and prick holes in whoever it is (I do not care) that you intend to be when you walk out to glaring lights and thunderous applause.
1 comment:
Um, why has no one commented on this yet?? I thought this was an excellent analogy for stage fright, Jess. It's like a nasty little imp on your shoulder, clawing and biting everything away before you can tear it off your back, but by then it's too late.
I thought the different images you chose were all awesome. The only one that throws me off is the brownie, because brownies are entirely enjoyable even if they go straight to the hips lol but I really like the line "tying your intestines into complicated knots out of sheer malicious boredom." There's no real REASON to have stage fright, it just happens.
Most of all, I love how you end with the actor stepping out on stage and facing the audience. It made *me* feel nervous, after reading all the torment of stage fright.
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