Moments of hot relish
are brief, and farther between now than you remember;
so what is there to at last consider:
a feeding tube, multiple joints in need of a lube,
an axonal stimulation ( pharmaceutically enhanced )
which goes no where that one can discover?
Why do you stare? I’m not that cooked. Obsidian can be polished,
and reflects, but is never too good a mirror. Is that so strange?
The path from top is downwards.
Even the greatest success has this limitation,
and from heights like Mattsu Pichu
it’s a misty moonless flight of slippery stairs
to all the paraphernalia and the redundancies, and the exceptions
that characterize Medicare. Oh, I know that it is silly to bemoan
these beautiful pictures. And no, even though
one may discern the strains: some musical comedy,
announcing, for example, an infarction,
I shall not say, it’s time to contract;
let’s sell all those gorgeous gatherings on E-bay, at an auction,
sell and disassemble, until four walls only, and a nursing home
are all that remains of this melodramatic act.
But bipolar feelings hold us;
their constant changing purview
are like etchings on a stairwell. Poor light
and the ambiguities of vision sway one’s cognizance;
it’s a race, a kind of treadmill, and portrays
strong elements of futility.
Still, my friend, it’s best to hold on tight,
as long as the electric current has not been cancelled.
Life is a song, intoned to hoarseness, and often discordant.
It is like brittle clay, unformed, unfired.
You are not compelled to love it.
So these are the things we do.
We gather, and we give away.