The discomfort is rolling off of me in waves

and they are palpable, tangible on the tip of my tongue,

tasting of the metal that seeps into your teeth

from a jaw clenched around cutlery.

My insides are roiling, rolling around,

and I fear they won't stop until I burst, candy guts

spilling out onto the pavement like the blur of

neon graffiti against fluorescent lights in a tunnel.

I used to joke about it, but now my lanyard

is coiled around my neck like a cobra, a noose

whose threads slip against each other to knot

at the hollow of my throat.

My forehead is creased, stress digging furrows

into my skin. Stretching fields filled

with aching farm workers crouched over

burrowing into my flesh.

It is only minutes drawn out into hours

before I return,

embraced by safe familiarity,

and I feel my muscles unwind,

shedding anxiety at the door

like a second skin.