The constriction is covert, 

the strings are made of silk:

it's attrition by stealth. 

 

The letters from prison, 

penned by unreason

in the syntax of petulance, 

unfurl the frustration

over the failure

of the fabled 

to materialize in 

the realm of the real. 

 

And the dullness

promised in a hiss

one can play deaf to

no more, gently seeps 

into veins, like a strain

of lackadaisical wolfsbane.