in a lighter vein…?

 
FIRST THE KNEES GIVE OUT

First the knees give out then the
ship’s rudder then the bank account then the canary cage
then Uncle Henry’s moustache then the tablecloth begins to
fray the chair falls apart doors fall off their hinges the
cows start speaking in tongues the
eyes blur our food turns back to its
origins in the earth or on the hoof
the sky itself begins to look old as it has
never before usually perennially adolescent or even
in its eternal baby-blue infancy
trees begin to produce purses full of play money
hills begin to growl like overheated engines as they
start their climb
everyone else looks positively glamorous in black and
white or color

and so it goes as time goes by

waving one moment from a quick window
or being the one waved to
as everything actually revolves around
time’s immovable pivot

water falling backwards into the awed mouth of the
river from which it flowed

            8/11/2002 (from Through Rose-Colored Glasses)

Categories: Poems