plucking penitence

this is the partitioning of my well-practiced smile

i recruit recognition of me tooth by tooth

these are the particles of my problems

inhaled at my leisure

the limitless windows of beautiful pictures

i am sure somewhere their story continues

who brings the eyes that burn a lesson in me?

who knows but i am meant to die unlearned?

when i rise long before my time is required

i strike out to make the aching worth something

to turn tribulations into well-intended tribute

but i forget in the forgery of my character

that i am quite simple, unforgiving, a brute

go die! and other lies my fingers seize upon

frighten and affront my humanity

the charges levied against me each one 

trumped up to be my final say

and i say it is easy to lapse into the lap 

of one itching to scratch your head

but licentious and mangled memory

does no justice to the decision

does nothing except lapse recovery

resisting resentment one finds an existence

so rooted in failure it cannot fail

i accept that i have made an exception

that there must be no other way

by now the aching has turned chronic

would my words behave and settle

into neat rows of pleasure

i would have always been cured

but imitating the life breathed into them

they fester and ooze contradiction

making me wish i wrote fiction