Rotten, forgotten lines
enunciated
from the mouths of strangers,
but I’ve always known exactly what they’ve had to say.
Scripted, encrypted in every way.
Scripted, encrypted… in life’s
grand play-
line after line, after their
every line.
But really,
I’d rather be a mime
than say exactly what I’ve gotta say-
yet still
I’m gonna say it anyway.
Life’s a play, a screenplay-
a film, if I
may
be a little metaphorical with
allegorical actors strayed around the sounds
of directors sitting on their Congress chairs.
Call the last line
Fate
or Destiny
or call it what it is---
just a bunch of shit
unwittingly fit within a
sated script.
Stages of pages filled with
cages of sages
that would enrage me
if I weren’t the one
saying it.
Line after line, I’m
saying their words
as mine,
with clapboards clapped
by the
hands of time
being the lone fragments of reality that I’m
willing or able to
barely define.
I’m
thinking I’d
rather be a mime
than say exactly what I’ve gotta say,
but still
I’m gonna say it anyway.
Curtain’s gone down,
drowned her gown
in tears.
Momma’s cried
‘cause her baby’s died and it’s
been years…
(But that’s just about the only time
we’re not acting
in some kinda way)
It’s
some kinda play
that’s never really more than just
some metaphor,
while an encore’s what I
truly need.
Heaven or hell’s swell
just as long
as he gets
some flowers at his feet.
So with
flowers at his feet,
he discreetly refers to himself in the third person,
while sadly
the first two never existed. But I’d
rather be a pantomime
with paint on my face.
Smile when I want to, and trace
what I must trace.
Erase what I erase,
NEVER saying their lines.
Ya see… Life’s a play for everyone,
but I swear it isn’t mine.
