tunneling out

if you lie still
long enough at
night and listen,
put your ears to
the floor
and stop your own
digging for a precious
minute, you can
hear them. the others
with their shovels
and picks, slowly
and quietly tunneling
out from under their
own lives. a bad
marriage, debt, old
age. illness,
depression.
each shovel
full of dirt
giving them more
room to breathe,
a silent hope that
on the other side
there is something
better. but they
know that the
jailer and the inmate
are one and it's
possible that
there is no exit,
no place better beyond
the walls, the fence,
where the dogs await
to give chase.