CHASM

CHASM

There’s a deep hollow chasm between our lives,
Reminiscent of stillborn friendship ties,
The scent of deception, the hint of your lies.

A gaping wound that will never mend,
A person on whom I once could depend,
Let me introduce the elephant in the room.
Her name’s Anita Bryant and she’s risen from the tomb.

You can say what you will, write what you want,
Do as you damn well please.
You can hide behind your scriptures
Your foot in the mouth disease.

You can hide out in your comfy home,
Pretend you are mystified by this poem.
But distance lingers,
Like grains of sand slipping through fingers,
A promise ring slipping down the drain,
And my tears are misting with the rain.

I used to think your friendship mattered,
But to the ground it has splintered and splattered.
Hypocrisy blows like a twister,
Your mock concern is bittersweet,
For I can only hear your words that blister,
Your turning and your fleeing feet.

I know not even where you are,
I don’t know if I care a smidge.
You’re lost in the hills of self-righteousness,
Like a troll in hiding under the bridge.
It will not be me to make the call,
Your absence matters not at all.
I balance vicariously on the railings.
You may as well go finger point,
Elucidate my human failings.

This train is running on labored breaths,
Panting through the mountain pass,
Friendship hideous and hoarse,
Dying its lost and little deaths,
Trampled like an overgrown golf course.
I’m way off par and I miss the tee,
So much for our felicity.

There’s a twinge that’s left of our former glory.
It echoes in my dreams.
It haunts my broken sleep at night.
And it rips at lonesome seams.
But that, alas, is all it is, a quiver and a twinge,
I long to feel Vesuvius, but I lie awake and cringe.

Cringe for the past and its gallant stories,
Weep for the loss of our former glories.
Tear out what’s left of my thinning hair,
While you and your memory vanish into air.

There’s a deep hollow chasm in our lives,
The stench of stillborn friendship ties,
The shallow grave of your deception and lies.
Gone are the hopes, the faith and the trust,
We are watercolors swirling in the deep August dust.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2012
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED