Accident of Birth

February 8

ACCIDENT OF BIRTH

We are here together, born the millstones about one another’s necks. Parentage equates to persuasion and I hold these strangers to my breast. Minds having chosen, violent turns skew off radar’s blip. I am held by guilt’s tight sutures to this motley mass. I long for the freedom of birds to fly far from my nest mates. Possessing sense enough not to neighbor with owners of my same genetic skin, I dream to be a turtle of the sea and meet each other in neutral waterways, friends for seasons of choice, far from the family shore. Accidents brought us together. Let kindness emancipate us.

Test your mind with poetry.

*

From Pen to Progress

“Leave those gaters in the paddock

awhile longer,” said my sponsor.

I gave a little better than a cursory glance

at the hulking forms

though I did stay strictly on my side of the fence

and grasped tighter the hand of my custodian.

The onceover, worked fine as my first pass through

the creatures of the swamp,

I didn’t fully grasp what lay beyond the petting zoo,

but given my newness this wasn’t entirely a bad thing.

On second run I was in a boat

with a glass bottom and a guide, I had vision, clarity.

Third time through was a charm,

swim fins and a rope tied about my waist,

it was all too real.

I floundered and had to be hauled bodily

by my home group, my sponsor stood anchor.

I have numbered and charted these murky waters now

and I see the lure they have for my ailing, twisted mind;

The intensity of the brutes awash

and the dark calling to dark

makes that sick sense that only an alcoholic can parse.

I have to take to those byways

with supplies and reinforcements.

Never swim alone!