Well, she taught me to be a man
In so many ways that mere thanks would
Be redundant
The superlatives would still be flowing
Long after the lexicon ran out of words.

But having said that, I stare at an old photograph
And wonder how she’s aged. Glad she did and hoping
There was pain involved of the kind that karma
Told me long ago had its vengeances stored up
Like cherries in a grandma’s Mason Jar.

But no, that’s shallow, and maybe untruthful
To boot. I wish her no harm. I like to think
I’m bigger than the sum of my petty snits;
Brighter than the shadow inside that ate
Everything I tried to consume.

She left me a wreck. So be it. No one
Was around to take pictures of the accident
And besides I don’t think she’d care if she ever saw them in
An album. It is the indifference I hate, and against which I
Cry out some nights, hoping for a Nicholas Sparks -like retribution.

If it’s anything to her, I moved on. There’s the wreckage of women
Who followed her she’ll find on the Trail of Broken Tears.
She should know, after her, I refined shallowness into an art form;
Turned my back on wet eyes and clinging hands;
Twisted my ears so no sound could reach them
Except the tinkling of a cocktail glass.

But even those excesses lost their allure soon enough
I am now as sober as a judge, and having devoured self-help books
Like sliders, learned a thing or two about myself
That made me, at least, the so-called better man

For a long time, and I knew it too, I was trying to prove
I could be Savior to a ghost. One long dead and longer gone,
Whose only chance to haunt me was when I blew out the candles
And told the exorcists to go home.

I think of her. Way too much if you ask me. Knowing it’s not
Reciprocated except perhaps when she stumbles across
Some old keepsake before it is tossed, without regret,
Into the Goodwill canister at the Wal-Mart.

Frustrating to someone who left so much debris in the road
Less traveled, and some nuggets of wisdom later that
People kindly called his poems.

09/21/2012

Posted on 09/21/2012
Copyright © 2025 Ken Harnisch