That's Life

Erde - Earth / ink, gouache, oilpastel, oil stick on cotteon rag paper 20 x 20 cm

SHARK ATTACK

You figure life has no choice but to make us small.

It eats us up, devours love and ambition.

Happiness a table-dancing

demiurge, flashing its tits, shaking its booty

always moving just out of reach.

Makes us want to buy stuff. Watch quiz shows.

Otherwise we would talk poetry

and see in every staircase an Everest—

uttering sonnets and planting flags.

Nothing would ever get done. Ego systems would

back up and the will to power go slack. You wouldn’t

have to stand up in a crowded restaurant while people

eat Rostbraten and Wienerschnitzel and potato salad

and deliver the first and last public oration of your career.

Laying everything out. Policy decisions, a few vital stats, mixed

reviews, tearful self-justification, instances of staggering defeat

leavened somewhat by one tiny victory snatched

from the cold waves of your waiter’s indifference.

You’ve stood your ground, said your piece. Now what?

Your third worst fear is that police

might haul you off to the psych ward of a

crumbling urban hospital. Your second worst fear   

is that a concerned neighbor might ask you to leave.

Your worst fear keeps circling back for another go.