The Mirror at 34

yesterday
looking for love... i kissed a poet
and all his words turned to ash
filtering through my fingertips
we all came to feel the heart
bleed
but left only licking plexiglas
hiding in daylight's glare

i stood on man-made stone
looking for thought
but it had been kidnapped...
taken to the mitten's left side
where Jesus means "no"
and love is manufactured into
hatred

how
did all these people get in my room
when i'm pinned full of stripes
linked to my cuffs
necked to my tie
and brain-sheltered by a stingy brim
remember
when bourbon held answers

i wrote the world a love letter
but forgot they raised the postage
always a quart short
spited and unrequited
thirty four years since i escaped
ignorance

he lost on a really easy word
innocence
the nightly news just couldn't
believe middle schoolers no longer
knew how to spell "it"
did someone say burban?

i'm done
with playing blind man's bluff
with searching
and tricking myself with disdain
for answers...
question question question
and every once in a while
listen

she put all her love in a thimble
and washed my trouble
using only that gift
...it was a giant-sized thimble

in my twenties
i ducked and ran from truth
i just now compassed back
no 0ne but myself to blame
did someone say inosense?

today
i've found joy instead of happy
letting go the reigns
i kissed the heart
tasting
iron in the blood
thought in the brain
love on the skin
and
extraordinary from existence

--el vikingo