suspect

The story is an old one, crooked folk meeting on a crooked road. The long leisurely stroll towards the double helping of just desserts. The words traded, the whistles wet. Some bargain offered, blood for blood, step for step. The dance before it knows it is dancing. The ritual lived by riot or by rote. The shadows scattering all around the fire.

I don't claim to know the sense of anything. I don't pledge to know even what I might mean. Everything is the matter except the method. Everything is wrong but the feel. There is loss in each reckoning, there is some small fight towards each fail. It is there for the asking, and I never know what to ask.

I say I wore you like a fever. I say I met you in my dreams. I wouldn't believe a word. I would say consider the source. What could you claim that could be trusted? What could you say that could ever confess the truth? I know what is lost because I know what I am missing. I know where it goes because I wrote it all out. Suspect and grieving, I can only take the same.