Watch Out

 

Vorbereitung auf den Angriff- Preparing for Attack 50 x 70 cm acryl/ink on canvas

SPRING CHICKEN

                                              What is more precise than precision? Illusion.

                                                                                       Marianne Moore

The way hesitation gets

worked into the ageing process,

as if all the wheels and levers of decision

were rusted up. Yes, it does suck, said

the little man with big cigar and handful  

of firecrackers—it being the Fourth and all—a little more  

certainty might help. Just a touch. When you were young      

life was all hurry up and wait for that Big Break  

to come sauntering up the front steps, say something    

interesting, assorted head hunters dropping by     

with languid sexually enhanced females  

filling your hot tub and talking, like, real slow. Then you wake up

in a thin-skinned bungalow, at the back of

an old friend’s property, amid the weeds, and you’re 35, then 45, then

and your flip-flops are worn down uneven, and you limp for some reason.   

To fiddle for a while with Rimbaud’s definition of self: “I”  

is every role you have ever played plus that certain something

unique: its due date, if you will, its shelf life. Okay, fair enough. Then what?

“Watch out,” slurs the lead singer just before

the guitar break: the gods are jealous of their privileges:

at the end of the nightshift don’t expect any overtime.