MIDDLE GROUND

The walls are decorated with people,
but we only see the flaws. There must be
something wrong, even if we can’t see it right away.
That’s the talk that probably went on.

And a pattern develops, a loss
of middle ground in the space between
free expression and perfecting a craft—
our mutual lives are lost.

And what’s inside us may go to sleep for years,
decades even. If I only turn to create
a person of my own, I can already sense what will
be wrong with it, and I say, “Save it for another day.”

(November 21, 2007)