Oso Para Vos

DON’T ASK.

please don’t ask me how I am;
you can’t really expect
me to be any different
than I was yesterday.
we’re all really quite normal —
me, myself and I, and in
spite of our narcotic state can
be up and down simultaneously.
and don’t look at me too long;
I despise those “I know
how you must be feeling
eyes” and concerned tone.
why must you always misconstrue
the way my gaze avoids yours?
my anti-social disposition is
intended to protect you from us.
no — it doesn’t help to
speak slowly, pronouncing
each word with the sweetened
diction of a nun or nurse.
I honestly can’t tell you how to
act, for I have trouble enough
getting us to agree about
how we’ll shield you from me.
it’s really best to let me volunteer,
lest my unbridled demons unleash
their flame-throwing dragons to singe
the delicate threads of your own ego.
and you, so footloose, must avoid looking
back into the darkness whose glittering
maze of mirrors encapture those who poke
their noses where they don’t belong.
go ahead — ask me how I am …

CRUMPLED PAPER.

crumpled paper.
edges blood-stained
from paper cuts –
ridges of emotion
desperately trying to
conceal the words
of love that were
never meant to be
written for all posterity;
but merely muttered under
my breath in a moment
of mindless passion.

UNDER MY SKIN.

an overturned glass;
red wine rushes
across the tabletop.
I let it run over
the edge and stain
my off-white carpet,
knowing that it will
forever remain a
signature of our
kiss of passion;
a reminder of a
moment of forgetfulness
and a time when
I had you …
under my skin.

Tightrope.

I swear they make this tightrope
thinner each time I attempt to cross.
I remember how my psyche could once
dance endless sommersaults back and forth.
and how every now and then I would
laugh mercilessly to myself at how I
astonished and sometimes even
infuriated others with my devilish
dexterity of mind and wit.
but now, having fallen all too often,
I quiver at the sight of both
challengers and supporters; and
look upon success in reaching the
rope’s end as another day’s survival
rather than a demonstration of prowess.
I know a good sport never complains but,
I swear they make this tightrope
thinner each time I attempt to cross.

THREE-LEGGED WALTZ.

well hidden behind the portals
of passionless and watery eyes
the incessant carousel of an insomnious
three-legged waltz is revealed with
childlike vision; hypnotically in
syncopation with the murmur
of the inviolate ticking clock.
in this surface-like existence, well
beyond resistance and emotion,
every attempt to break through is
as futile as punching a pillow
or screaming in a dream.
and in the absence of promise we
eventually find solace in our perpetual
state of existentialism and blues –
and pretend not to recognize the
everpresent and bittersweet
scent of lemons exuding from
each and every passerby.