Steamy window

You long to press your forehead
to the cold window pane
and breathe,
then trace a message of escape
in reverse.

Clutching your safety blanket,
liquid for lost fingers,
you wonder if another
one
could take all these cares away.

Tied to your wrist,
the silver string
that leads to your distant whole,
strains and twists,
trying to pull you from there.

The joyous,
swap their books with careless ease,
but you don’t know how to
because you’ve
never
had your own.

Beats flood your pulse,
and hit you with strobe and colour,
until your eyes hurt
in the dimness.

You climb the thread
to where you’ve been hiding
and wait
until the water recedes.