Some think themselves prisoners
alone and cold in a cage from between whose bars
the light around them does not filter through.

They place their freedom in the upturned palms of lovers
keys folded into their warm hands
“You save me,” they say, “every day from this wretched place inside myself
and if you leave, I will be trapped there again.
Please don’t ever leave.”

But the hands of lovers are not keys,
they’re our inspiration. Our call to action
and our bodies are not a cage
and our minds are not a prison
and the only person that can pull us from the sinkholes that we build inside ourselves,
is ourselves.