The boy in the labyrinth feels his irises widen. They have rippled into the blackest water. To watch a sunrise now would hammer his brain beyond what the world could contain. There would not be enough rooms where he could hide. He goes onward, hands in front of his face. The torch long since extinguished, though the sounds of its hunger still clicks in his ear. Straight and swift he moves. Feels his way through the dimensions of the cavern. Hears the drool of the beast drip on cooled granite. The boy’s eyes, so beautiful and deep. Secluded in the recesses of his sockets. Swallowed in an enfolding thirst.
Oliver de la Paz is the author of four books of poetry: Names Above Houses, Furious Lullaby, Requiem for the Orchard, and Post Subject: A Fable. He co-edited A Face to Meet the Faces: An Anthology of Contemporary Persona Poems, and co-chairs Kundiman’s advisory board. He teaches in the MFA program at Western Washington University.