I Sweep my Emotions

I Sweep my Emotions

 

I was tempted to lie about my status,
to tell you I felt loved and whole.
It’s not that I’m left alone, or misheard,
or disrupted by delusions of my late afternoon words.
I was even questioned in the friendliest of ways
about my plans for the afternoon and weekend.

There are dozens of friends I could call on,
there are maybe a hundred that know my name;
there are scores who have witnessed my wounds,
and fewer who blame me for my forgotten moods.

Even as I sit down to write this, I question every
word or phrase,
I sweep my emotions out the front door and do not know
if they will return in the morning to
remind me how stolen I feel. I remember the voices
who said I drank the Kool-Aid,
who told me to get over it,
who said I shouldn’t feel any sort of way. Even the sun
feels foreign on this summer afternoon.

I’ve asked, as if anyone is listening, if it is dark yet.
I’ve wondered how long the days can be. I’ve wasted
my days with endless talking heads and tried to write when
all I knew were tasteless odes to disembodied heroes.

I heard it was a five-year-old’s birthday in the restaurant
I retire to when I want to read and sip a beer. I gave her a dollar
and loved the way she giggled and smiled. If only I knew
every child’s birthday.

Someone said I was obsessed with politics when all I
wanted
was for a few believers to love the Sermon on the Mount
more than their pet projects that canceled the hopes of
thousands. When will love be the answer? When will
devotion look like another helping of soup without
questions for the hungry ones who only needed a
spot of daylight to create unconscious acceptance?

I won’t lie again to be more accepted. I won’t
support your rebuttal of good science. I’ll stand
up every day for the unassuming immigrant who only
wants to find a new place to call home.