Romance is Complicated

graphite drawing

The heart is a tough nut to crack!

Cynics All (Turnabout is Fair Play)
He knew the patter well; he said his lines
Like memorizing store-bought valentines
Meant to purloin a schoolgirl’s stony heart,
But his intent was different from the start,
Because the walls he’d breach were harder stone
Than made by schoolgirl innocence alone,
Were built of granite mortared all with lies
Told earlier by men who’d fantasize
That such a flimsy imitation love
Could be the trinket she’d be greedy of
Accepting, that she’d bend to such poor jewels,
But she’d built fortresses against the fools–
So he, like all his predecessors, fell
Because she knew the patter all too well–
Until at last there came the honest man
Who spoke the truth;
She took his heart and ran.

 

Uniquely Me

graphite drawingBe Not Ill at Ease

Around my sprockets and my spleen lurk what no doctor’s ever seen,

a plethora of arcane ills impossible to treat with pills

or pessaries, with tinctures, teas, or magic potions for disease–

not curable by overhaul of engine, tune-up, electrol-

ysis, electric shock–it’s thought by some I will infect them; not

true, though, for what seems to be feared is not contagious–

I’m just weird.