Charity

He speaks only in quotes

Stolen from the last dying breath of the

Greatest living poets

A core of molten lava bubbles and glows

In place of a real human soul

Oh to be a real boy and

Not a fall down drunk

Oh to get up and go and

Not roll around in

All this shit

All the time

And any presence of mind

Has left him abandoned in a

Midnight parking lot

The single yellow streetlight

A spotlight

Over his broken frame

Mistaken for a halo by all those tossing coins

Into the empty brown hat at his feet.

Ice and other things like it

A slide downhill

Eris cursing you from above

You pretend to steady yourself

Steady your mind

So as not to appear

Foolish

Or unaware

There is no grip

You just

Allow the icy ground to take you

Logic states there has to be a bottom

An end at some point

You feel that

Breeze on your shoulder

Something passing you at speed

You’re locked in

Locked down

Rabbit in their line of sight

Circling the track

Pulled and pulled

That little box where you started

Has to reappear at some point

Then the level playing field

And mud in your eye

Always moving with the crowd

No traction

Gravity still weighing

Just an extra atmosphere or

Two

And down you go

The sea floor

Head in the diver’s helmet

No peripheral vision

Neck fixed

Locked forward

A little left

A little right and then

Climbing to the surface

Some light has to shine in sometime

Cloud and rain greet you

And colluding remain distant

Subtle

Hiding every star that would

Otherwise

Guide you.