THE COAT
Cynicism, my ugly coat
Donned when I go out,
Distorts my shape,
Provides escape,
And deflects evidential doubt.
My furry, fetid, mangled shroud
Protects me from the babbling crowd,
Slings of personal questions,
Arrows of unwelcome interventions.
Into the closet I hurl it at home,
Secure in my solitude
To secretly seek and secretly pray,
To secretly wonder the evening away.
She asked if I loved her.
Through my coat the answer came,
Love is a watery paint we use
To cover our loneliness in vain.
She sighed and left,
She might have cried.
I stayed and paid for coffee and lies,
Vowing to set the coat aside.
But when I opened the closet,
To make that final deposit,
The coat would not come off.
The threads had sunk into my skin,
A fatal infection of mortal sin.
Tighter and tighter the coat becomes,
My heart, it pounds like a thousand drums.
I cannot speak, I cannot move,
I cannot die or hope to recover.
How I long tonight for the warm embrace
Of my late, discarded lover.
