Just because you’re paranoid it
doesn’t mean they’re not
out to get you

Someone is tapping my thought-waves.
(Oh, I know it’s not just me, but most
of the others are already stuck in the trap.)
Is it God? the gummint? intelligence?
the vicar? (he’s been acting odd lately.)

My pet snakes and the pitbull hound,
they can feel it too; they’re growing restless.
Someone is stalking my conclusions.
Hitmen of the subconscious? my Mum?
the brain squad? soul agents?

Uneasy dreams. And something else.
I’ve figured out how these things go:
First, thought-reading, then subtle coercion,
then total mind control. It scares me shitless,
thinking of what they could make me do.

I can field-strip an AK-47 blindfold,
dressed up as a stuffed squid. Unarmed,
I can immobilize any man twice my size;
but right now I’m helpless as a pancake
in a pigsty. I have to get out of this.

I wrote a secret message, a plea for help,
bottled it, sneaked down to the harbour
and threw it in. A hand, remarkably similar
to the one that caught Excalibur, popped
out of the turbid waters and snatched it.

Jane Røken

If you have any comments on this poem,  Jane Røken would be pleased to hear from you.