truth tectonics
(the plates of who we are might slide)

I want
to love
believe me
but
I’m sick
and illness doesn’t love
or
adverse conditions one must live with

so
forget love
except
to keep it on a list
in someone else’s closet
kept
until all things are better
then I might
open certain doors
to find
what had been put away for me
and
now I’m ready

reticence
with
reason
don’t you think
I must be whole before
I might share
parts
while the parts must be sound
so that
among other things
I’m
acceptable
also persuasive

solve the problems first then
share
unless
ah
there’s
some truth in the parts
some sharing beyond bleating
beyond bleeding for
my cause
that is
only proper to exclude myself from life
and also stay away
from
real worldly exchange

and
what is that
a thorn I hear about
that is never pulled
that
can’t be sliced from the otherwise
acceptable
plant

and yet one speaks
truth
to pain as well to virtue
and both might
count
in discourse
even to influence the larger
better lives

and
maybe so

I could say something
out of insufficiency
that
could be heard and might change
even hale things

lives
to find they have their splinters
too
even fractures and the broken parts
that never
seem to heal

hmm
so many
could it be all of us
who suffer
something broken
even
shameful

and still might have to live
to share
all the truth of how it is to live
fallen
and to find
like
um
everyone

c l couch


. . . but on my own behalf I will not boast, except about my weaknesses. . . . a thorn in the flesh was given to me, . . .

photo by vegonaise on Unsplash