It’s hard, she said
being with someone like you.
I agree but say nothing.
What could I say?
If I was younger, my arrogance would have forced me to
argue the point.
I’m well past that so I sit,
silent and watchful,
waiting for what comes next.
What was the thing that broke her,
because this room reeks of things that are broken?
Perhaps it is my impatience with everything:
the casual racism of people I thought I knew
the blood-soaked moral superiority of christian conservatives
the price of avocados
Maybe I’m too satisfied at a job teaching kids the finer points of play?
Maybe my immaturity?
Maybe,
she’s just tired.
Neighborhood Watch
Somedays you go out in your neighborhood
And recognize nothing.
Who is the couple walking their dachshunds
In front of the house?
The man you buy coffee from, a stranger
The woman who says she is your daughters teacher,
A mystery.
It is an alien landscape
The sounds and smells and people
Seem familiar,
A little, but
Something in your mind insists
You haven’t been here before.
These days are like everything else clicks into
Place on waking except recognition.
You go through the day with a puzzled expression and
A vague smile, wondering when you will see something
recognizable.
A Bowl of Chaos
My body is a weather pattern
Moving slowly, gathering strength until I finally break
My mind a cauldron of barely contained bedlam
Waiting for that next slow train
To what happens next.
It’s true
And high time I was honest with myself
And you
I’m not reliable
Or organized
I most definitely do not have my shit
Dialed in and at this late date, probably never will.
Just like everyone thought back then
I always hope, though.
I freak out the small things
And relax in a world ending crisis
Secure in the knowledge that
My patron saints of
Brother Coyote, Sister Raven & the Monkey
King will always reveal a
Path that let’s us escape unscathed
I am the perfect foil.
Mike Horan was born in North Carolina, raised on a farm outside Nashville, Tennessee, and now makes his home in the desert outside Palm Springs, California. He teaches art at elementary school during the day, writes and does 'Dad' stuff during the evening, and practices Kung Fu in the spaces left.