A stranger has entered my bedroom. It is not yet dawn.

He stands above me on the bed - straddles my head

with his heavy black boots. His palms, one on my left temple

and one on my right, squeeze my skull like ice hooks.

His jaw is clenched, his shoulders thrown back

in an attempt to lift my head from the pillow.

I arch my body like a stretching cat; the roots of my teeth

pound, pound, pound in time with his blasphemous curses.

Then this man, this stranger uninvited, pushes his fist

through my eye and into my brain. He calls each drop

of my blood to follow him there, and then, like a wet dishrag,

he wrings them out until they scream to return to my limbs.

He places a hot stone at the base of my neck to hold my spine rigid

and pin my shoulders to my ears. My feet stretch to find

the corners of my world. I stare at this man who straddles me,

and wonder if this is the moment in which I shall die.