10-Sharp on the tongue

It’s not always metaphors and laughter, cramming desire

and pouring tenderness, there are these lingering subtractions

we cannot elude, the discord of the plastic, the saline cloth of

our daily works, thick with small pains, the feverish breath

of cells gone wrong, though each harbors a tinge of you and I,

the unasked questions floating around like deflated balloons.

How can this unribbed love fit such tiny bed, stretch its doubts,

clog pores and breath alike, best to have music to sweeten sadness

and a smile to fill up the iPhone screens, don’t be facile, this curse

of the simple-minded, better yet, its lure, brimming your lines,

choices, the smile, even. Humankind keeps on gasping without

aim or brain, self-virusing itself and why even bother to hold you?

Out in the lipped-snowed grass, nothing moves. Mole nests pepper

the yard, small murders waiting for the drizzle to dry up, days to spin free.