There are those who choose to remain in fear rather than do the thing that will bring them joy, life, and purpose.
Writing by The Maenad
Art by LE Francis

Panacea
Let me speak to you now
of those who would live within
the walled garden of fear
do you know that
among you there are those
who live in such fear
that they will knowingly
choose to remain in fear
than do the thing that
will bring them joy
life, and purpose?
Do you know of those
who live in such fear
that they would deny their
own truth and suborn it to
their ego’s fragile and grasping
conception of the world and the
things that are alive and hostile
within it, living in her
like some rogue new parasite?
Do you feel any compassion
or even dread for your fellow
able travellers through this
life, other passengers that sit
alongside us on the railcar
that rides toward Death?
Will you shake them or try
to spun them free of their
fearful reverie?
Will you help them be free with me?
Will you sit in the box of love and repeat
your words, words that cry your eyes
and harsh your speech, in the name
of saving some loved one or another
fellow passenger?
Would you sacrifice your love for their wisdom?
Give hope to those who have turned away
from you and will not sit and listen
to your words, your experiences
no no no they must instead listen only to their fear.
The dark train goes on forever, full of those who would be free.
About The Maenad

The Maenad is a long lost LA girl, a six foot one blonde towering over the Seattle skyline.
About LE Francis
LE Francis is a writer, artist, & musician making stuff from the rainshadow of the Washington Cascades. She is the fiction editor at Sage Cigarettes Magazine, sagecigarettes.com, & her debut poetry chapbook, “This spell of star & song,” is available through Bottlecap Press, bottlecap.press.
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