No Sure Things
of well-intentioned trespass,
enthusiasts scrambling over basalt boulders
and slithering under calcium curtains,
like novice explorers pulled by flashlights
down dark spiral tunnels
through slick limestone openings
to the next opal pool
in another magnificent cavern,
the route invisible as silt,
escape, and the need for it, out of mind,
emboldened by past conquests,
we have become enchanted
with a new raison d’etre.
With over-confidence matching
misplaced courage, exhilaration echoes.
Rationalizations tumble in a rock slide
from our pounding hearts:
there is no other choice
how can we lose
everything depends on this
But even as we splash
our excitement like limey water,
we begin to hear the slow drip
of too easy, smell the stale air
of too fast, too far.
One by one, we realize that once in,
trapped by our choices
we don’t have a clue how we got here
or which dimly lit passage
might be the way out.
Hashtags: #CaveRescue #Thailand #scuba
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