Your easy laughter
Your jokes and smiles
And your jovial manner
Makes me feel so good, so comfortable…
And like a snail
I crawl
Out towards you…

But the ways of the world
And the complexities
Of the human mind
Make me feel so apprehensive, so terrified…
And like a snail
I keep
My shell handy, very close to myself….

To retreat into just in case
your soothing smile
changes into a devilish sneer
and your friendly hand
stretches itself out
to kill,
to snuff the very life out of me.

Jasbir Chatterjee

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-snail-2/