(This was an exercise in five beat blank that turned itself into a sort of poem)

 

Everything around began to change

Not, mind you, immediately – no

But soon enough – yes soon enough.

A hazing round the edges of the sight

Began it all , The keen discerning scent

Lost a little of it`s former stretch,

And soon the strong brisk spring in muscle and bone

Began to ease, the flex and reflex sag.

And we grew sleek and somewhat slower off the ground,

And slowly, grimly, inexorably,

Like the unnoticed lessening of the light

As day fades – all the pleasure dissipated.

Life flattened into two dimensions -,

All still there but curiously opaque -

And we couldn`t break out among it any more.

And all the lusty passionate desire

Diminished into paltry appetite

As the belly (fastidious belly!) brooked no denial,

Endured no sauce of hunger, and slowly we,

Who`d always worn the badge of what we were

Flagrant on our face, became dissemblers,

Became (would you believe it?) affable,

Sought after for advice – much given

To long and lonely walks with lonely hearts –

To letting in the deep, lush glade the comforting arm

Grow stiff, the claw unclip, and the curling lip

Lay bare the fang, Leering contemptuously

As savvy, predicament, then resignation

Panicked through the foolish virgin eyes.

But where was the sufficiency in that?

Where was the recklessness, the disregard?

The only crown I wear is a foxes tail,

As I grind a mangled misery of days.