Sometimes I read
something I’ve written,
and not so long ago...
a couple of months,
last week,
or ten minutes,
and think:

“Man, you are really
full of ****!”

You want them to love you,
to fall into your depths,
dive into you,
you mud puddle,
you pothole full of last night’s
***** rain.

You don’t really feel that way:
you’re hollow...
a gourd,
a dried up well,
a stringless guitar
in a pawnshop window.

But it’s easy
to make something up,
almost as if deception
were a built in feature.

Doves feign broken wings,
Possums play dead,
Chameleons blend,
Anglerfish dangle their bait,
and men and women,
well...

This...."flaw"
carved by necessity
into our bones,
and written in our blood.

Yet we are shocked
when we are deceived,
like being surprised
every time we see
another person’s face
and discover it has a nose.