(no subject)

[mulekick]

Self Portrait at Thirty-Four:
Peachtree St, Peachtree Rd, and the train between.

This is unfinished, but I left it too long
and now I am out of time:

See the line twisting the length of my life
from the time I first saw myself until the time
I discovered how I had warped
my life around myself
as a tree will slowly swallow the wire of a fence
and pucker and bulge:

I do not like my feet- their psoriasis- the fruit of
some as yet unidentified tyranny of my own immune system.
I do not like the dark places on my skin, scars from bug bites, injections, and random small things of a season. I do not like the lilac turkey skin under my eyes.

I do not like to have my photo taken.

I do like my smile in photos when I do not know I am smiling and I do not
know my photo is being taken.
I do like my hairline and my gray(ing) hair and my biceps. I do like my shoulders.

I do not like how my chest is prone to sag or
how the skin on my back looks like a woman's. I do like how my chest
looks like my grandfather's and my back looks like my mother's.
I do like the muscles under the skin of my back.
I do like how my back tans and freckles.
I do not like age(ing).
I do not like my prematurely and deeply creased neck.

I do like my cock and my balls. And my jaw.
I do not like my earaches. I do not like my headaches.

I do not like the strange way my body is bisected
by a line in the middle, so any amount of belly I have
becomes two bellies-
Where does this line come from? What is is for?

I do like my tough monkey palms.

I do not like my weak and yellowing teeth.
I do like my voice and my accent. I do like my words and my wording.

I do like the love that has built up, in and out, all through my life.
I do not like my patience. I do like my patience.

When all this settles however, I do like my life.
When all this settles therefor, I know the best return I could receive
in this life, would be a second lifetime,

yet I know I would not live
my life again, even for the prize of a second bite.