Bringing up
the same old thing;
ruining our conversation.
If we don’t speak
what’s on our minds,
we will betray our hearts
for certain.
Stammering out another
line from a decrepit script.
You pretend to hear me,
but the effort you put in
to your charade
is less
than it used to be.
I wish everything were poetry.
Every word
set into the cadence
of our heartbeats,
and every act
in time with the revolutions
of the planets.
I wish everything
I said,
or did
was undeniable
and impactful
as nature.
Maybe then,
we wouldn’t be back here.
Maybe then,
I could tell you the truth;
that I am dying.
Not from some disease,
but from the lack
of meaning in my life.
Meaning that you swore
you would provide.
Instead, I muddle through the day,
trying to please the indifferent
and soothe the hostile.
At the end of the day,
my only confessors come
in bottles and cans,
smoked in holy incense.
I wanted poetry.
I wanted my life to mean something.
I thought
that if I learned the words,
and the rhythms,
and the melodies,
I could speak the language
of inspired moments.
I thought I could hope,
and that hope alone
would sing to me
like a bird
lighting upon the tree
outside my window,
welcoming me
to join the day.
Every word a chorus,
and every moment a song.
Each conversation
a doorway
to a new, hidden world.
Experience
has taught me
all of the hard lessons.
You have been
the arbiter
of those experiences.
I have decided
that we don’t have to have
this conversation
any longer.
I have learned from you
the poetry of dead things,
and the dead.
have no need of poetry.
I will describe life
from every moment
of my days;
on and on,
without you.
I will find my voice
and I will sing,
unafraid.
HG – 2022
