Smashing Pomegranates
sometimes life feels like a betting game.
fast paced, cut low,
cards reshuffled,
every day.
a dance of fate and false control,
where the stakes are high
and sentiments slim, as buyers wait
for the gun to blow.
I think about this as I stand
at the pomegranate stand,
scanning a stack
of muted pink bowling balls.
I mull it over in my mind,
what would happen
had I not decided to stay ashore,
the day it rained at caper hill,
the day the waters got too frenzied,
and the current took me,
not the boy of nine,
and it was my corpse that lay,
dormant in the darkened bay,
lost in the folds of oysters and time
had I not glimpsed the woman in velvet,
that gloomy eve of autumn,
turned my head,
straightened my tie,
and stepped back for a better view,
and the red auto had splashed my tweed jacket
with blood, not water,
and it was my head that rolled,
down the sidewalk, in the cold,
a feast for rats and curious eyes.
had I not knocked the second bottle of port
off the rim of the porcelain tub,
but rather, finished it,
and sunk beneath the surface in a daze,
and it was my skin that creased
as my heart died, deceased
a victim of my own stupidity
now you see, I am a cursed man,
a slave to chance,
a player at a slot machine,
waiting to lose,
and there is no greater torture
than falling from the heights,
narrowly missing the jagged stones,
over and over
and over
again.
I look down at my fingers stained sanguine,
the smooth pink fruit,
crushed in my hand.
I reach for another
and throw it down sharply
if only to see it bleed.