I write about love
about life, about firsts
exit wounds and shouts
I write about the past
about football and cheese
I write about the past
my childhood
My strangeness, my difference
I write about them
I think about them
My personal scapegoats
I blame small children who now know better
for my problems,
"I wasn't popular,
I was teased."
I say that, as if it's a free pass
to sympathy and support.
I hate it.
I do it without thinking - create tragedy where none existed
by calling in my scapegoats
compare things that can't compare
this life to that life
I've clung to it
the vestiges of the past
I'm tired of blaming small children
who are college students
army men, truckers, welders,
livestock jockeys, nurses
jewelry sellers
now
for things they can't remember
and things I shouldn't
We lived in those lives many years ago
and we have grown
changed
it's time to move on
from the cold comfort of memories past
into beautiful unknown.