come lately
i dare predict that
some of you have shov'd
a once upon a love
all the way back
to the rear wall of
your never-mind,

beyond yesterday,

and just heave ho'd
the remains of all those
holiday gifts of whimsy
in a moment of silence
in an unmark'd grave
bearing a striking
resemblance to a
.31 ml twist tie
garbage bag


come lately
some of you
have more than likely
re-seal'd up the pain
that is 4ever tryin' to
exhume its way back
into your gut,
the squirmy kind
that begs to be let loose
to run crazy in your veins

(and you know?)
that come lately
i'm supposin'
some of you can
not risk keepin'
that old outdated
tatter'd box of
ill-fitting
kick'd around
once upon a time
pandora love
that hitch hiked its way
into the passenger seat
of your lonliness

for once upon a
not so long ago,
knowing what i think
now know, then perhaps even
a few of you would have done
ANYTHING to kick loose
the mental screws
from the inside of
your saran wrapp'd
sense of 02-02 hindsight
when that Houdini of a love
conceal'd the key to
equality from people
like you and like me

because come lately
there is no way that
anyone in their
right state of mind
should further deny self
from inhaling
aromatic whiffs of
summers eve feelings
that never could exhale
inside what all of us
one day realize is a
relic of leftover remnants,
all roll'd up in
the spider infest'd lining
of a moth-eaten trunk

and sooner than later
we all discover
that our pledge of
locked up promise ain'
nothin' but pleasure on reserve

just takin' up space
in the abandon'd attic
of relationships
where flesh'd out love
is nothing more than
a skeletal after-thought
tuck'd away every so
tightly in an
imaginary tinker box
of dry rot hope,

it's one of those lessons
that you took hold of
with all your might,
and dragg'd it
the edge of the alley
for the next scheduled
pick up


© 2004 by cynth'ya lewis reed
All rights reserved.





Cynth'ya Lewis Reed at the Authors Den