Fear Ice

Fear Ice

By L. Stewart Marsden

 

It’s frozen tendrils wrapped his heart at first
Then gripped his feet to meld his soles to soil,
And pierced his soul with long accusing fingers

The Fear Ice pulled him to its gaping maw
Hot white teeth gnashing to feast on his resolve
Dissolve his bravado in its cold, blank acid-filled belly

Reduce him to quivering, whimpering lack-of-backbone jelly
And roar the victory accusations:
“You aren’t,” “you can’t,” “you never will!”

As when a child, from under dark things and in darker corners
The Fear Ice had awaited him,
Reminding him, “You are mine.”

Yet the boy-man turned,
And burned with flame barely aglow
“I shall die, I know, but I shall not be dying when I go!”

“And you shall not sway over me
“And I will have the last to say
“No matter how you pierce or grip or roar!”

The Fear Ice shrank back to its lair of dark
And all but melted there,
Then turning from the boy, a man, to seek another.

 

1 Peter 5:8 (KJV)
Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil, as a roaring lion, walketh about, seeking whom he may devour.

Note: but for an extra vowel, “e,” the letters in the title Fear Ice can be rearranged to spell “fierce.”