My teenage sons declare I sometimes act
so stupid I look cool. It’s often going
all out on some minor theme: raking
leaves like snakes or rhapsodizing
films I’ve seen. My skip-dance passions
shatter their glass pails of prudence,
whump spades on their nonchalant souffles.
When I respond to nods
from several caffeine gods
I waltz through minefields
of their God-is-he-weird fears.
It could be a riff on words I wouldn’t...
they’d say couldn‘t... stop:
Whence or whither go your withers?
Or fastballs hurled before they raise a glove:
What is so good as a poop in the wood?
followed by my anguished sigh...
‘Zounds... I think I dumped so much
I’m in post-partum depression!
When I become too much to dwell
inside their finite circus of diversity
they smile, wheel with gentle grandeur,
slide their rigid torsos out the door.