Further off at the end of the tightrope
there is at least the semblance of safety – enticing, luring the next step towards it
if I could just break the paralysis currently holding me freezer-cold, immobile.
Mean Girl spits out her gum, cackles told you so!
Always biting off more than you can chew.
Usual waste of space. You’re goin’ down!
Logically, brain says, the steps have to be taken-because this precarious balance you hold
is not sustainable-will waiver- will break- and you will fall!
And yet leading leg will not budge and I strain every sinew
aware of hushed audience in the round
all eyes watching this ridiculous I can do this, I’ll be fine stance
feeding on the building tension, just waiting- and I’m flagging, I know it
feel roiling flutters within – as balance
slowly, slowly, ebbs and tips,
then hurtles me head-first like fledgling tipped over nest edge
to flounder in nosedive
turning and twisting through the air
wings frantically a-jerk, a-flap, fruitless
in the fear of fall-
and my only hope is that the net will hold- that something remains unbroken,
that no-one here knows me,
Mean Girl laughs hysterically, gives herself hiccups
and raises her glass to me with a sneer
I should have known I wasn’t up to it.