The fight

A frown crosses my face.
I’m uncomfortable.
This thorn in my side hurts.
A few disjointed lines of music play around my mind and I lick my cold cracked lips.
My movements slowly start to strain against the bonds and they tighten in response.
Everything tightens.
There’s alarm in the air.
Something is wrong; defeat begins to get scared.
Something is rising in myself that astounds them all.
Haven’t they got me roped and tied?
It looks like me and yet it isn’t me.
Is it alive?
Amongst all this darkness why is light intruding?

Something snaps and I lurch to one side.
The strain is nearly choking me as opposition digs in its heels.
All the reasons against this are thundering in my ears but my heart is burning with a heat that won’t give up.
Is that a laugh that is heard?
Another crack and the thorn is loosened, its poison still pulsing into nowhere.
Now it’s desperate.
I’m a dead man walking, fueled with fire from another world , remembering the way the music runs.
Again a rending of bonds and my arms are free.
Hopelessness shifting into hope.
That is laughter!