So Often Poem by RIC BASTASA

we are caught empty handed
and time laughs and then asks: what have you done to your collar?
it is destructive of your neck
it is choking you and you still say you like the color of the buttons

we are caught so afraid and we are silent about this
and time begins to frown
and leaves us all
askance, and we ask what fraudulent creeping scorpion
has time become

it bites and takes a portion of our limbs
but then
we also learn this kind of game and time confronts us

we know what it will say
and we are ready with our silence too
after all
time was never a friend
all along it has always been a foe
giving us that feeling of slippery eels
those thorny porcupines
those roses that enthuses us only for a while

then we are again reminded of the wilting
and the passing away
of what we think belongs to us