Conflict Resolution

This poem came from April 13th's prompt for NaPoWrimo.


I cannot be sorry
When the words
I must speak
To apologize
Are not my own.

They are an ill-fitting suit.
A dog’s harsh barks to a man lost in soundless reverie.
Noises that erupt from my throat
Like harsh coughs and growling.


The feeling of knife

To a ceramic plate.

The words needed here
Are not words of my own invention.


They belong to another.
They belong with another.

You are not
Able to accept my borrowed
Apologies.

It would require you
To use a feeling


A feeling foreign to you.


We speak in pidgin languages
To get anything done
To move on with our lives.
To step forward
Beyond transgression and acceptance
When neither of us really
Wants anything to do with any part of the situation.


I will say words
You will make faces
Nothing will be genuine,

But in this moment,

We will find closure.

Opening Ceremony

I lit a sparkler in my backyard during the shift change between day and night.
Commemorating something that hardly mattered.

It spat out half-glorious light into the dried leaves.
The leaves were offended by the ways the light
barely singed their crackled, weakened flames.

"What sort of fire doesn't burn what it touches?"
They asked me.

I was not surprised by this question; it is one that
had also crossed my mind.

I did not answer because it would look strange to talk to a bunch of dried leaves.

The sparkler's faded brilliance dimmed even further.
Exerted itself in a pathetic display of broken fits of excitement.
Wore itself out.
I stood
with the leaves
felt the new night's air
found myself wishing for a fire
that would leave some sort of lasting impact
to mark this occasion.