Poem: The Man Who Breathed In Lilac

The Man Who Breathed In Lilac

Not a bad existence, really.
He positions his thoughts like chessmen on a board,
always waiting for the elusive "right time"
to move them around for the maximum gasping effect.
He dreams of a modern-day Tir Na Nog
where chivalry comes easy and chicks really dig
the eccentric men with impeccable manners.
The times, they are a-changing, and he moves
like a quicksilver sea through the oceans of progress,
quivering on a bubble when shaken
and sliding between conform-fingers when squeezed.
He likes to stay in the Center,
the center of his Universe which mainly consists of
soft and hard things
where surfaces belie steel
and comfort supports strength
and novelty becomes tradition
in one big, dizzying hypnotica
of the same cardigan world.
This is not where he is supposed to be.
But even if he were to be born 400 years too early
he would be markedly out of place,
out of step and out of time
because the world will never understand
things that it was not built to achieve.
He retreats. Back, and down, to the left,
into the Center of warm, empty contradictions.
Here, he is daring.
Not a bad existence, really.
Not a bad one at all.