Garbled

He moves the pieces around the board
Without seeing them, his muscle memory
Responses to the other side accurate, his
Brain active with some other thought, some
Other game, some other temptation somewhere
In another life, one of his many others, where
He hides himself when any of his existences
Are too much for him. He is a tower, a
Horse, a bishop, a pawn, but never
King nor Queen, their corruption too cloying
For comfort and honesty. He sighs into his
Garbled body, his fingers on the warm wood
Of another piece. Sometimes he plays God
And wins. Sometimes he is God and loses.

R 03/11/2023 18:00

I need offer no excuses for there not having been a narrative for some time. The poetry mostly speaks for itself.

I have been struggling after a tooth extraction a few weeks ago but am hoping that it’s gradually healing. I hate teeth. As I said in a poem a while back, they are nature’s worst design, because they aren’t impervious to wear and tear. I suppose our bodies are like that, too. In fact, looking around the world as it is right now, it becomes fairly obvious (if it wasn’t already) that humankind is one massive misdesign by whoever designed it.

This time of year, when the clocks go back, is one of my least favourite times of year, too. Why this messing with our biorhythms, constantly? And if they are to be messed with, in all ways, why the interminable wait for the clocks to go forward again. There’s an imbalance, six months of misery, madness, and misgrowth.

We veer down strange paths right now. Wrong paths.