Love was so easy at 17 with you.
Hearts full of Simon and Garfunkel.
The only truth I knew was you, Kathy.
We brought our love to life in an MG.
The world was our oyster. We painted
it in watercolors and wrote poetry.

Angry eyed angels carried my life
to its proper end among fomenting
graves frowning as they will do.
Will my soul be found or forgotten?
We walk miles in God's weather to
promises we never find alive.

Chess pieces off the board.
Playing in the park in shade
of oaks dropping Fall's leaves.
They lie stiff under sheets in
foreign fields loved ones won't
recognize in tears and sobs and
prayers of despair to a deaf God.
Darkness ends the games tonight.

I'm a forgone conclusion
    and an empty promise.
    My words fail to inspire.
    My loves are always lost.
    Trouble always finds me.
    Read between the lines and
    find the real me with you
    inside my heart on my sleeve.

I sit here stunned stupid by wine
   finally happy but still not satisfied.
   What's missing? What will fill the void
   of all the lovers who went wrong?
   I just can't find the right song to soothe
   my savage beast. I don't have a lot of time.

Wrinkled skin and grey and stooped a once strong
man doing sweat work for a buck to buy beer and
smokes to sleep and open eyes and do it all again.
I hated school. Dead teach death.  I was just a tourist
visiting my life. I'm old and still a tourist.
I can't stand my old forgetful dying self.

Our masters have given us answers
        abandoned the truth to bend us to
        totalitarian dreams where everyone's
        a widget, cogs in wheels of commerce.
        They have homes for all the seasons.
        We live in boxes with lofty promises.