Everything, Unnoticed

 

Everything moves so slowly.
On my to-do list, except time.
Everything drags like a shadow at dusk,
stretching, lengthening, never quite arriving.
Time alone sprints ahead, a thief
deserting with all that’s unfinished.
It slips through my fingers,
leaving chores and duties abandoned like broken tools.
Leaves me vulnerable—a poet waiting for the tax man to come.
I try to color my hair purple, but the dye runs clear—
only grey remains, as if even pigments scream, you're just old!
I dance incognito with strangers to kill the clicking of the clock.
Spend hours confronting my own reflection,
staring through fogged glass for anything new.
Don’t expose me to exile for the second time.
I’m too old to wage wars inside myself.
I’m an unknown poet, in the hand-me-downs of unread journals.
Why does Poetry ignore me? I’m in their backyard, Chicago suburbs.
I’m spinning like a top for their preeminent attention.
But now I don’t care at this age.
I want to resurrect Harriet Monroe,
back when she first published
Carl Sandburg's Chicago Poems.
Let her see from the beginning.
Skip the pedigrees— academia,
universities, the PhD-poor poets.
Check my heart instead.