Scoring the walls with bloody claws and determination,
Long after our nails, fingers, and once hands wore to stubs,
With calloused arms, then teeth.
And it yields;
We explode through the chasm--vanquished, bloodstained, inured to pain.
The motivation was an illusion.
And our rupture in the wall, a hollow, ebbing upon entry, a foist.

And we scrabble at the walls with bloody claws;
Our nails, fingers, and once hands wore to stubs,
With calloused arms, then teeth,
And now quelled determination.
And are we further from the goad that prodded our advance?