Better Coffee, a Practice Poem
I wrote this in another place originally, but I feel as if I wanted it to be better so I’m reposting the re-written version here on this blog. I say I wrote this on a whim, but that’s not entirely true. I read a bad poem and was inspired to write again. Did I think I could write something better? No, I just thought that I should get better. Enjoy?
I was persistently a stranger, perplexingly so, to you whom I preferred.
That wasn't great because whenever you asked about myself
It was after I'd done something bad and it happened to be my fault.
Worst of all, coffee would taste undeservingly bitter as if
I were being punished. I really should have stopped counting
my comeuppances, the direct results of my shortcomings,
and my attempts at getting better without really trying.
I shouldn't have forgotten to count the times you willingly talked to me.
Sailing conversation amidst a vague tension leads to places and we explored
those locales like adolescents in a car on a Friday night. The saccharine air
of your locus was interesting in that, now, I only vaguely recall
the delight it (presumably) mutually stirred.
Providing something contrary to what either wanted is what it was.
I bore shields that spoke of nothing profound about myself
for a considerable length. You became an obligation. Things got old, like sin,
and my sins were borne on my soul to the point of your apparent boredom.
I can't blame you. Maybe the fruit of retrospect is that I exonerate myself too.
Still, these lamentations aren't exciting in the adventurous sort of way.
Danger was evidently not in any of my names, something
you've hopefully crossed out on a list.
A hope you're worth certainly. Coveting doesn't
suit me. I wouldn't love it if we had made it.
Fortunately, I made it off with this:
I am at least now someone who,
unlike that self in that one nightmare
after a day or two of forgetting my meds,
now has better coffee.