the compulsion

the compulsion to pen poems. as in: illness. obsession.

wait.

for the path.train. three thirty a.m. loathsome like drunkards; count high heels and wonder. what happened. to herman. how he be.came. this way. how old his wife is. if she really curls her bangs like that. and what. kind of conclusions we jump at. when women wear wound hair.

or their husbands. who dis.play. mis.tresses.

where we each fail to perform. necessary duties or responsible personhood. how a fable of accountability could have earned a portrait instead. of this jumble. of words.

we smash together. careful enough to be named: poem.

and wonder. about freud. what he might have said. about any of it.