Those thoughts came across as vacuous and venomous
hardly worth the time taken to think them
blown out of proportion
creeping like a terrible octopus from a wooden chest
just like in that nightmare you had
and they scared you just the same
so you sleep with a spear next your dresser

Those thoughts tried to kill us
and tried to tear us to shreds,
or to split us in twain or strangle us whole
(as a terrible octopus might)
they tried to inject their terrible venoms –
a cockail of pain and wrtetch and necrosis –
but your spear was at the ready

And when I ran to you to warn you
you were standing over the fleshy, spineless corpse
of some terrible octopus,
And though your spear was snapped in two
and the monster’s tentacles were still squirming
I knew you had won the thing
and I knew that we were going to be alright