Love and Angst (for the last time)
by drumhound
I don't care
if I ever write
another poem
about love
...or angst.
For the twenty seventh time today
I read of a love
"unlike any other".
You know the one -
butterflies
goosebumps
can't breathe
best friend
life partner kind of love.
YES, YOU KNOW THE ONE!
Most of us do.
I've had seven myself.
But that's the power of love.
(Not the Huey Lewis meets
Celine Dion kind of love.)
The reality twisting
emotionally blinding
omen erasing
kind of love.
Where sixty percent of lovers
who were one hundred percent sure
they were different than everyone else
found some of the others
at the "Whoops I did it again" Prom
and started over
at the new, less improved dance
trying to forget the previous ones.
Some of them will have the courage
(or loss of memory)
to say how unique it is........again.
It makes one man weep, and another man sing.
And inevitably,
the third man will write about it.
Much to our unoriginal,
bad after-taste,
and at the very best "Isn't that sweet",
chagrin.
Sentimental geysers
of sincerest and irrepressible corn,
temper your naivety
and ponder your muse of passion
before you unveil puppy love
in the face of those who have bravely ridden the Rottweiler of amore'...
and even been bitten by it
once or twice.
Consider your thoughts on love.
Then reconsider your angst about its failings
.
How dare you have dread
if you haven't yet removed twenty five calendars
from the wall!?
It is a whiny pot of irony that reeks of 13 year old experience, hairless underarm machismo,
blatant high school drama posing as relevance, and that left over bottle of your dad's
cologne or favorite aunt's vanilla container you knew wouldn't be missed,
while you stained the olfactory neighborhood three blocks at a time.
The genuinity of youthful angst
holds the credibility of a hairpiece
on a televangelist.
This anxious cloak of writhing distress
must be earned as a veteran,
where only the scars of war
get a Purple Heart.
You can't just say you have it.
Angst is rewarded to
the single mom who lost her job
and has four children to feed,
and to the man who has to figure out
how to hide the diaper
he never thought he'd have to wear,
and to the parent who holds a dying child,
and the senior citizen who can't remember
where they live,
and the solitary soul who truly has no one.......
no one to call
in the darkest moments of their life.
The "poor me", single pimple, concert's sold out, boyfriend #17 sucks, inconvenient day
is wanting in qualifications, and we are irritated to hear your blathering interpretation of it.
We will hear you when your words come with bandages.
I don't care
if I ever write
another poem
about love...
because it has been done
and no one has ever gotten it right...
or angst
...because I am unworthy of the reward.
I think I will just write about
what other people shouldn't write about.
There is no end in this.