The Weak Corner Of A Fading Picture Poem by Aaron Graham

The Weak Corner of a Picture's Splintered Frame

Part IV: The Weak Corner of a Fading Picture

Though cigarette burns against my lungs,

I don't mind it. Its caustic plume- memories

Servant- professes to me a supplicant's promise.

That, with due patience,

I'm but among the dead as well.

Just as well, I neither suited nor worthy

To play god to utopist civilizations

Still as a jar, unworthy to play fourth piece

In the quartets.

They were here before I, and will be here after.

The fourth, the weak corner will break.

Failing and disappearing- its rightful place-

Hopefully time's whims will assign some

Permanent brace, for I have but seconds.

Seconds to shoulder my piece of the burden

-in vain-

I wish there were a civilization to live

Where my mind has placed shadows.

Here in my mental fertile crescent, cemented

Only by words.

And only their inevitable suffering would awaken.

Me- to the myriad imperfections I never noticed

In the world

In time.

For this imperfection, never fulfilled,

Only reflects my imperfection;

Which plays like lake-ripples

Across this eternal landscape.