I Am A Work In Progress

Caesar cried; writhed in the sand, slamming “damn its” at a granite Alexander. “At 26, his world paid fealty!” At 33, Caesar barely seized what touched the sea.

I look at me—an icon of insanity, all I should be a fantasy, suicide cheats piled double wide, crippled, suckling nipples ripe with lies.

What am I? A tower shrine designed with vodka bottle bricks tricked out Jenga style, a mile above an isle of my vanity, to climb to Jesus just to babble. Buttressed wings of gossip chocked with candied ash can revenants, spackle frocked causerie in black bile files, Taaka shots to gimcrack flings, wooed lusty skanks and pranks busted beyond disgust.

Cough cuss awake ‘neath holey blankets, cold on cobblestone, hobble home lobbing gobs of maybe aspirin washed back with ghosts of spirits I aspired to. Cigarette butts in beer can kissed mornings, spent like youth on routes to heaven by the fifth, silly twit.

Try selling what bleeds in me, stained crumpled recipes of dreams, worn themes of schemes long dry of steam, pawn shuns, unfit, under market, stall graffiti where fleas pee. Trembled hands scratch carpets rags of fixes revived by seeds contrived diseases mix for freeing me of me.

I sing to God at dawn, repentant pleas through cans with strings of blurry alibi lines droned in keys of used to be. By abstinence deny absent reaches of arms to hold me when I cry.

What am I? A faded whisper on the wind, wails of rumors blended in thin, tin bells of rapture captured by a spell forgotten as a sigh; glorious as needles flying from a withered pine crying through the winter for snow to hide its brown, its burn subside beneath a blanket of white, one endless night.

What am I, a storm that care forgot, an empty Christmas tree lot, a prayer?

I am a part of all I’ve past, and some was good. My portrait Esher etched in scattered driftwood, wind borne chaff born to crash a bloodshot sunrise; pants half ankles mast, saluting Mecca, a heap of wrecked, compacted potential cowed in prayer; stoned raw and bare.

What am I? I am the moment I’m in. I’m crashed crystal hours blitzed with sin I gilded righteous. I am reborn with every breath, an engine fired blast by blast, an addict locked in loop. I purge the man from me with every step I stoop to, a deadbeat dad of hope in burning spoons, a cackling tragedy I repeat like a lone, loaned DVD where I die not asking why.

At 33, I hadn’t even conquered me. Now 60’s more or less a possibility, I let the lessons settle. In the dust I scribble sonnets to the sky as peace seeps through clefts regret left to heal.

What am I? I’m still alive, a vibe, a work in progress.