the skin of reason

Ever entranced
by the pull of words,
I have been lulled to sleep
by my life’s routines,
clothing everything
in the skin of reason,
shielding me
from the rawness of the world
and the fearful intimacy
of its embrace.

And when I awaken
from my dream of the familiar,
I stand naked
like a newborn,
a tourist in my own world,
delighting in its newness,
its immediacy,
stripped of history,
pulsing with life.