ANGER POISONS

ANGER POISONS

Anger poisons like hemlock tea,
Which is quite all right for Socrates,
Not so much for a man like me.

I am angry at my body,
How dare they desert me,
The muscles in my time of need?
I am angry at my fingers once so nimble,
That now uncertainly hunt and peck,
Anger flares like a forest fire,
Flaming and unchecked.

What, alas, happens to an anger unresolved?
It hangs in the air, a bitter mystery not evolved,
Anger is turned outward and the world it is chilled,
Anger turned inward relentlessly kills.
Anger when swallowed turns the soul hollow,
A nauseous, lonesome bitter pill.

I march like a soldier engulfed in flame,
Now and again I give my feelings a name.
Despite meditation, the comforting words on a gilded page,
There are times all I feel is a bitter, numbing rage.
It snarls and it simmers, to a nasty boil,
No compensation for its toil.

Anger poisons, but is hard to spit out,
Thus it leaves a cold bitter taste in my mouth,
Hanging on like the righteous bitch that it is,
Never vacationing in the tropical south,
Still I wait desperately, trying to break free,
Of this poisonous, perilous hemlock tea,
Quite all right for Socrates,
Not so much for a man like me.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2015
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED