scar




scar 


maybe the enemy in the end 

is fatigue is how all this time

we are a library in our bodies

and in our minds and our call

numbers are smudged just there

on their spines or after a while

the shortest or longest (though I

don't know if I'm holding

the right call-card) things begin 

to be misshelved or loaned

or never returned or otherwise 

lost completely.  time was

when i could walk into some

carefully curated collection

and select the exact memory

with instinct maybe especially

by touch or smell or somehow

by the slope of the floor bearing

the heaviest weight of traffic

so that (only figuratively) a rolled

marble would stop bold against

the one lone knot of the otherwise

clear pine. and so.  you come to

know at the end of the road the close 

of the book you hold open 

closes all those old stories and they 

go to smoke or go to ghosts.  the pathos

after losing hope. don't

you when no one is looking touch

your fingers to your cheek and "see"

the braille there above the itch

and tingle and don't you give it

a pinch one last time before you can

finally sigh finally arrive and yet

never be able to describe the beyond

bone tired and lay in the hammock

of such a beautiful battle-earned 

scared life and stop just short of asking

yourself how the hell

did i get this far?

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