Here be Lions

Beyond the fringes of the known,
pioneer cartographers would mark
voids on their maps with three words
hinting at unspoken qualms,
fusing warning with foreboding,
feasible with make-believe,
in the succinct but cryptic formulation:
Here be Lions.

Tonight the lions are restless,
lurking just beyond light's feeble mantle
emanating from the bedside
reading-lamp by which I write,
in rampantly lush grasses
where unease is palpable and rife.

Beneath a sky whose threshold
has descended, masking swarms of stars,
they pad and prowl, with foliage
as camouflage, and bide their time
within the slim perimeter of stripling palms,
as sensory antennae register the small,
disquieting signs that something is at large,
a skulking beast, perhaps about to strike:
noting on the cyber-chart of consciousness,
whose scouts are on reconnaissance
beyond the flimsy wooden walls,
the likely incidence of predators,
their aspect leonine.

Confronting horror vacui with less-
than-comforting placebos - words
whose implications stalk
the would-be sleeper's peace of mind,
and prey on agents of repose
with teasing ambiguities
concealing more than they define,
portending more than they reveal,
insomniacs find common ground
with blind spots of cartographers,
challenging the phobias that gnaw at them
with 'Here be Lions'.