#604 - my destiny

28.viii.21

604

2.239

my destiny

notes towards an unwilled testament

 

is for unimportance

how can I overstate this?

 

were you to spread out my guts

you would see

this fate is written in the stars

 

it is as if I were stung by a dead bee

struck with feather

as if I were lit under the bushel

ten to the dozen, so on

 

and could I keep the tribe alive?

was it all down to me?

 

I gathered my moss on a roll

all unknown

who cared?

 

I made no ultimate sacrifice

never went down defending the citadel

there isn’t a statue of me

 

I was kept in proportion

set self to task

with palette knife, arpeggio

and just the occasional rhyme

 

I was never as good a tree

for standing

never did cloudshine ever so well

 

my going unnoticed will – and here

one hesitates to prophesy of course –

culminate in an unscheduled vanish

 

nothing of note will be missed

 

I was no good at music, art

and why should that stop anyone?

 

guilt? I blame religion

but you can’t take it with you

even when you’ve forgotten

 

it’s more admit than confess

 

I, multitudinous, all muttering

often barely awake

never much amounting

every time I say ‘proud’

they wonder

what’s he to be ashamed of, eh (?)

 

there are the ancestors

 

there are the others whom I was

but I could never help

 

I dizzied myself with the world

pants split

and then my sides

everyone else joined in

tripped up two

doubled up with

you would have fled too

 

call this condition human

I go with the vanishing odds of a planet

(only one of which to speak)

 

itched ached ailed

came hale

and did a body’s bidding

 

now you go first

let me catch up

probably I’ll sneak through

if not

fine ironies!

knew where to draw the line

 

there were times I thought

I might survive life

but as you now see…

 

it’s with

just these few crooked words I leave

and just this clumsy light