To Sleep At Night
“I don’t want to hurt you,” he said.
“I’m sorry for causing you pain,” whispered the other.
“You’re just too great,” eked out one.
“This kills me,” the most recent moaned.
Sometimes their wide thumbs slowly brush crystal tears from blushed cheeks.
Each of them plead.
That’s all it is. Saying
“I don’t want to hurt you,” in any variation.
A reassurance to themselves that
They can go on hurting,
Go on flashing and striking too bright like lightning.
They may do
Whatever it is they were going
To do, and say
Whatever it is they were going
To say.
The nature of these men is this: once they decide to inflict, they will.
The axe always falls.
Even if gravity suspends the blade for a while,
Pauses just a moment to feel rain in a storm.
The pleas,
Droughted plains of woven conversation and
Self depreciation,
Begging, frowning, heaving their longing for
A conscience free of guilt.
Mind you,
Greedy desire for a free conscience is
Not an apology.
After a storm,
There isn’t care for those they hurt.
They plead so that when the day is over, and
Blue velvet splashes with the moon,
They don’t hurt themselves.
BLB