Rainy Day Flood
I am your scarecrow
discontent,
wind hitching up its skirts to get the momentum
for a running start that pushes me
from one foot
to the other.
I'm rockin' like the rain man
face turned up to meet these first drops
eyes closed and humming
something,
not a song, not a beat,
just an off-color buzz between lips
hiding a tongue too shy to lick them clean.
This is how it feels;
and then it's two steps forward,
two steps, two steps,
until I'm slippin' under these waves
and for two minutes
tryin' like hell to keep these tired eyes open
while the salt sears 'em like make-it-extra-spicy vindaloo in an indian restaurant
that don't tone it down for weak American tongues,
just so I can get a different goddamn perspective
for once,
and
I can get some air,
grow me some fucking gills,
push up, up!
Let me flying fish my way out
of this drowning swim I pull off
five months
too many.
I'm not scared of bein' tired
anymore.
I'm scared of bein' sick,
I'm scared this rot's gonna stick
this time.
I'm scared this melodramatic, charred earth wasteland
is gonna sear its cracks insidemy chest,
and I'll start leaking like a broken water main
in April.
I suspect,
while this soft cold slips in where my lungs used to be
pulsing out an underwater heartbeat,
that I should have learned
to swim.