A Poem a Day (622): Kicking the can

 
Kicking the can
 
They build fences, paint them ivory white,
staple them together, immobile bodies,
built thus high so they cannot fall.
You can’t pass either. Clearly, No Entry.
 
There are silences doomed to win,
the self-created, the unwitnessed,
those generated by the masses, disgorged.
We plan a life in man-made widgets.
 
The can opens, jagged-edged teeth.
Globules of pop drip, accumulate,
and you wonder why you opened it.
Was it to drink or to learn something?
 
Did the recipe change or is it still medicinal,
a sustenance for our woes, to bathe them?
The secret ingredient used to be cocaine,
some say. Did you get it on prescription?
 
We clench the light in fist, in a bracket,
shut it away from all these prying faces.
They don’t want it to escape, to wander,
in case someone shows what it really is.
.
All these heartfelt promises, they fade away,
and so they hide the light in brackets.
They may even dig a hole and sink it,
shun completely, so it can never breathe.
One day.
 
Copyright Vickie Johnstone, February 22, 2024