Skinny Days, Skinnier Nights
Lonely, one night I watched
a program,
Or should I say
a pogrom?
A cheery little story
about liberating
The concentration camps of Europe.
Images of life on a thread:
Jews and other outcasts clinging
To the belief. What was it?
Love and God...Mankind
That ultimate oxymoron.
The four F’s, friends, family, faith, freedom?
Or, the primitive beast of survival.
I imagine it was all of these reasons.
Looking at the gaunt shadows of suffering
And vacant eyes of both the living
And the dead, I know
I will know some of the pain and loneliness.
Living without, living with,
I wonder which is worse,
Still knowing these are complete.
Only an emaciated self remains
Living through the onanism of one’s
Skinny days and skinnier nights.
Long after that night, I
stand before my mirror
And see the same visage
And bony body of a soul.
Who has lost and still found
A simple belief: the skinniest
Day or night may be
My last chance
…tomorrow.
Steve Heins