Tuesday, December 3, 2013

What Is This Weight?

My most recent poem.

What Is This Weight?

Not like being on the bottom of a pile
of sweaty guys at the goal line. Or carrying
a stout box on your back. More annoyance,
but slight, a pressure oozing the oil
out of an olive, slowly, a drop at a time.

What’s this smell, lying like a light fog
over the fields at dawn? A whiff of rot
perfumed in subtle shades of rustic rust,
something swirled from a heap of tarnished
detritus, half shiny in the dampness.

And this disquieting chill snaking
into every crevice, every nook, every bone,
a silent shiver that bores like the point
of a pick between molars that glisten white
and strong, marred only by old crowns?

3 comments:

Montag said...

It reminds me of the learned musings of a Confucian scholar, who was born into a time of troubles.

Unknown said...

Another reader said it sounded like aging. I think you're closer to my state of mind when writing it, but glad it resonates differently.

Montag said...

I was gonna say "old, retired, Confucian scholar.... of advanced years", but thought better of it.