Today’s Howard Nemerov: “Fables of the Moscow Subway”

My poem was written from this prompt: “Write about something that scares you.” So far, I haven’t titled any of my poems, but this one I can’t help but call “Fear.” What I’ve written below is one of my absolute worst fears, something I pray will never happen. Even now, I pray to God that it will not happen. (I wonder if I should even share this fear. Is it too much? Too raw?)

 

Fear

When they sleep in beds at night,

In darkness, under cover cold,

I hope they’re warm, but not too much.

Too much of the furnace, aluminum stove

With cracks that spit scentless poison or worse,

And in those ever-heating rooms, a fire should burst:

The flames emerge like nightmare dragons

Their bed-sheets turn to piles of ashes,

And they, their faces streaked with tears,

Cry for me who cannot come,

A wall of hot hell between us runs,

And their shrieks die,

Rising with house-smoke to the sky.