the truth is

i don’t know

what the hell

i am doing

 

i am wholly

unprepared for

the life of the erudite

 

i cannot yet be

promoted to mentor

least of all sage

 

i’m still sitting here

figuring shit out

 

i pay my bills and

i make sure my child

is feed and clean

and relatively happy

 

happy is

a world

requiring passport

freedom the ticket

 

i try and then

i castigate myself

because there is

no try

there is only

do

 

then i am told by

a 6 year old

it doesn’t matter

yoda

isn’t

real

anyway

 

and its like

i just woke on

christmas and found

my mother with her

hand in the wrapping paper

 

yoda isn’t real.

who says shit like that?

 

of course yoda is

real and so are

the stars and my soul

and the way

the wind whistles

through winter bare trees

leaving me breathless.

 

love is an evil word.

turn it backwards/see, what i mean?

an evol word & besides who understands it?

 

he did.

the prince become

storyteller become

truthsayer become

subversive become

teacher become

sage became

ancestor

he did

 

which leads me back

to my point

i don’t know

what the hell

i am doing

 

i left poetry more

than a decade ago

 

i left her like a lover

whose sheets had

gone too cold

 

i left her with only

a few brief glances back

i just packed my bags

grabbed my train ticket

headed for life ala normal

bought a house

became a mother

got a divorce

and…

 

naw

they’re gonna to need

to stay and leave this ancestor

promotion for another time

 

i know its been generations

and we’ve come screaming

into a new millennium and

i have no idea how they did it

but even now as i open to the door

and stand on the threshold of

middle age i know

i’m not ready

 

are you?