i made a shepards pie on a baking daygot my ingredients and put it on a trayi placed it in the oven and turned up the heaton the proper gas mark so it would cook the meati sat there for a while and got out my bookthought id have a read so the pie would cookthen i heard a tapping on the oven doorout popped the sheperd who was very sorebut from  my cooking lesson theres something that i learnt.do read book while cooking something could get burnt

i'd been saving
this cream colored
dress for you
with the silk lining
and lace flowers at the
hem,

instead i am brushing
pollen off my shoulders
knee deep in dandelions
pulling canada thistle
and sheperds purse

a black and white
filmstrip on the refrigerator
moving in stop motion
empty moscato
a blue flannel
and a half drunk
waterbottle still
on the right side
of my bed.

born to exile
risen in solitude
they leave me alone
I give them my gratitude
It's not lonely
or dark
or solemn
It's lovely
and stark
and quiet

I sit, uninhibited, uninterrupted
and watch
as the world wraps and folds and turns into itself
crumpling as the sheet of paper in the notebook or the universe
the one to be thrown away for mistakes made upon it
I understand all
but partake in little
I am not alone
I have my self

The broken
and the scared
and the token
They come to me for guidance
I do my part, give them satisfaction
and they return to their lives of alliance
while procrustean bigots sheperd them to war
but they are content, content with compliance


I don't loathe them
I don't love them
I respect them
as they do me

In this world of herds and sheperds
of predators and prey
of war
a world where good is named evil and evil is exalted
I do not lead
I do not follow
I watch
alone