A couple of years ago, while teaching English in a school in Amman, Jordan, I was monitoring the high school students as they were taking their semester exams. Knowing that the new semester would begin with a section of poems, I decided to look at the text and brush up on what I was going to teach. I came upon that popular children's poem, "Hey diddle, diddle, the cat and the fiddle..." and wondered if I could come up with something using that same rhyming pattern. Twenty minutes later, "Trapped" was born. Now mind you, I did not write this. Like almost everything else I write or have written, I do not actually write it. I am more like a scribe. I just put the pen in my hand and hold on.
I’m out in the street,
Ice beneath my feet,
Spinning around in a daze.
Which way did they go?
I have to know,
For behind me the house is ablaze.
I didn’t light the fire.
Don’t call me a liar.
I said I didn’t want to play.
Something ‘ll go wrong,
It’s the same old song.
Nothin’ ‘ll go wrong, you say.
Come on you guys
Where did you hide?
I’m standing here cold and alone.
Don’t do this to me
Why can’t you see?
I just want to go back home.
Where ever you are,
Be it near or far
I want this to end right now.
Show me your face,
And do it in haste
I’m not kidding, no way, no how.
How did this start
And what was my part
In this messed up horrible prank.
A little old fire,
A few old tires,
From this cup I mistakenly drank.
The smoke is thick
And I’m feeling sick.
The blaze is getting higher than high.
Where did they go?
Are they laying low?
I won’t find them, even if I try.
So, here I stand
My heart in my hand
Fidgeting out here in the cold.
The streets are bare,
I look everywhere,
They’re gone as my conscience is told.
I sit on the ground
Snow all around
Wondering what my next move will be.
As if right on cue,
I hear anew.
“Beware the light.” A voice decreed.
I turn around
To face the sound
From whence the voice did come.
To my surprise
Before my eyes
Was an empty bottle of rum.
I must be asleep
Or thinking too deep,
Could it possibly, unthinkably be true?
That face on the label
Of the bottle did able
My mind to be muddled like goo.
This is too weird
The face with the beard
From the bottle he inharmoniously glared.
I glanced back again
Where I saw but a grin
And his beady black eyes just stared.
I blinked my eyes
And let out a sigh
Then suddenly a tap on my back.
Staring at his face
Then a sudden embrace
My buddy cried, “We were attacked!”
“Besieged by what?”
Was my curious thought.
“A bright penetrating light,” said he.
“We froze in mid step
Up the alley it crept
As to consume us. Oh, what could it be?”
“A light was all?
And it eerily called?
I’m not sure I quite understand.
It’s a light, nothing more,
No blood or guts galore?
And, by the way, where’s Bobby, Steven and Dan?”
“I heard a scream
As from a scary dream
And suddenly they completely vanished from sight.”
“Well, where did they go?”
My friend didn’t know
“They vanished, seemingly, into the night.”
I turned to go
But I wanted to show
My buddy that all would be fine.
When down in the snow
A shimmering glow
The bottle with the label re-designed.
Much to my horror
I started to roar
On the paper the faces of our friends.
They were horrible trapped
As if neatly wrapped
Behind the man with the grizzly grin.
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