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You wakened in me a small animal -- a rodent, with all
Its fears compressed in a handful of flesh covered with hair --
A creature of night afraid of the daylight, horrified of
The dark, bereft of perfection and frightened of itself --
A beast which gnaws out a hole through my chest. It scrapes me inside.
I hear its squeak and its patter of paws, feel how it moves,
And shrink from each bite -- a shriek in my throat, one thought in my mind --
Of you.
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