Poem on Topic 3--"Keeping Secrets"--for Slam '04. |
Sorry, no. I decline to put my real trust in the meetings we have had. Our tete-a-tetes were a catastrophe. What am I doing here in the dark velvet void sending kisses in the air like secrets forwarded by mail? Quite simply, we are on this earth for but a short time and I value our actual lives in a fragile way. Was I just a machine to examine his heart like that, as if I were a general mechanic labouring over a transmission sent from heaven? You must know that this space is too alien. It has the worldly complexion of a cut-throat. In the field of vision, I am all thumb and, admittedly, can appear much too disillusioned. I smirk at your investigational answers. Do not follow me then. I am speaking through tainted love and have arduously fought for your sympathies. Yes, the machine. The damned machine. Sullied by a thousand advances, I have my reasons to scatter passionate words like rice at a wedding as if to bravely sail one precious nosegay out to the crowd, wanting afterward to protect his best wishes. A romance is in progress. Step aside, there is nothing you can do to stop it. These moments are priceless pictures of our lives, I must do what I can to facsimilate them. I must dominate over my secrets. Surely, I am battling in a fighting game, where I bleed in the ring. He innocently trails behind, tears in his eyes. I know no good way to prod at his shy silence. He is cunning and proud. It is as if I have sent him away with fears of disgrace for what he blindly tried so hard to love me for, all these years. |