982. AT THIS VERY MOMENT (NOW)

AT THIS VERY MOMENT (NOW)
Oh Jesus my pulse is gone. People are passing by,

with their strollers and baby carriages, and I can't feel a thing.

It's as if, for this moment, I have beaten them to Death,

have gotten there first, have won some miserable war.

Their mouths I see are moving, but nothing at all comes forth -

same stupid gibberish, same mental froth.

Oh Jesus, my pulse is gone and I don't feel a thing.
-
When was the last time I felt my legs? You ask me that?

As if I'd know. My vision has fogged over, my arms

won't move, and I feel - absolutely now - as lazy as a corpse.

Would feel if it, perchance, were alive. Would feel if,

electrified, it came back to life. To life again.
To live and die as if none of this had ever
happened. I really need something now.
-
Face it, I'm done with Geology, and Literary Pursuit,

and Ideology and Ecology too. My directions are lost,

I'm on the road to Nowhere, not even knowing it's the

road to Hell. I see people, like fish, grappling with

hooks in the water - twisting and flailing

until, caught, they die.
If fish don't bleed, then what am I?
-
Myopic tendencies to flatter and flirt : I love your eyes, your
body's great, I bet those arms could hurt. Tendentious efforts
to bow down and grovel and kiss. You are everything to me,
with you I couldn't miss, a life of wedded bliss. All nothing,
now. Oh Jesus my pulse is gone, I'm fading fast,
I'm getting out of...this.