Jonah

In the deep places of the earth,
in the utmost depths of the sea,
in the alveoli of the lungs,
in the ventricles of the heart,
in the cavities of the teeth,
in the vesicles of volcanic rock,
in the vacuoles of the cytoplasm,
in the innermost chambers of death,
in the penetralia of the mind,
in the hull of the swart ship,
in the keel of the muffled storm,
in the caul of oblivion,
in the calyx of the dream,
in the shuck of oyster darkness,
in the ventral cavern of the whale,
in the musty cell of a nutshell,
bounded sleeping, enclosed unfeeling,
enveloped fainting, forgetting,
I prayed that I be plucked
from the inner to the outer
surface of mine own hell.