Losing is a habit
engrained upon my hands,
claiming to be something I am not
Peering in with one wicked eye
fashioned of big words
from worn out dictionary pages

my thoughts are fire in lower case flames
complete with soiled ash
and filaments swinging in the breeze
searching for the unburned match,
the last one… in a long line of empty phrases

blank pages filled with everything conceived
along street water girths and cigarette butts
arranged in the shape of a question mark
on my Walmart coffee table…
never once questioning why

Oh I have written, I have penned
and my quill is soft and filled with ink
of another’s pain, dripping on tree leaf mosaics
and carpenter footprints,
leading down that path that I lure
unsuspecting verses now lost with me

For I am the loser in this game
only because I chose to play by my rules
Penalties don’t count in my court
for I am blind to the truth
that I am nothing more than me…only what I seem