Really Now!

by Anna Ruiz

Really now,
I should be quite comfortably numb
sitting with confusion,
(back seat driver that he is)
indeed, I’ve played
footsies with him
most of my life, though
he’d rather be called
“Death along the alternate
path of least resistance.”

After all, I’ve lived long enough
in this haphazard state, flashing
all kinds of neon signs, like third-rate
motels with no ice machines,
not knowing who I am for the shape
I’m in for the life of me,
or alas,
the eventual death of me.

Nevertheless, with the finesse grace and
elegance of a trapeze artist and
with instrumentations in my hand
for plotting trajectories and right angles,
I disassemble this
bag of bones, skin and blood
called me,
rewrite my history in Krishna-blue
disappearing ink,
a thin red line,
crossing out one atom
at a time,
until I arrive at my destination,
with one caveat to bear in mind:

Confusion is highly uncertain in a cloudless
state of mindfulness
once
the rain washes away
all that is grey.