I am an enigma to myself.
B. O’D.




noble wings I grow 
		       when I take meh self out
of meh self  
	      but I find that too hot to handle

	for too long 

		        so I take meh self into
meh self again 		& find there caverns of cold 
eclipsed fears 
		& in there too some romans
catholics probably 
			standing around a grave

come not near meh I cry I have elapsed!
 
(like I'm an offer too good to countenance 
	or a nag whose racing days are done -

				  & so I take
meh self out of meh self again 
				& there you are 
floating in the stillborn air master & I -

guide & follower 
		    rolled into one 

				    chaff bag
            
fit to burst with oats & dried fruits master 

	I ask you to consider now that I
take meh self into the bodies of meh mates 

& they into meh self too

		  consider now meh limbs aka 
mates three of them carring a coffin towards 
a hole in the sky oh fred jim & ted 

				      struggle
with meh profane weight while eva looks on 

it's like a painting you might see reproduced 
in some magazine sent over from London or
your States 

	      the tragedy of it! 

				 at meh own

funeral, completely self-aware, 

				  dead & only 
just twenty four 

		    barely married too

barely alive 

more of a scapegrace than ted 
				oh his light-
	hearted lope I would pay gold 
to have it for meh walking rhythm 

				        now 
the moon looks down 
 
				on the meh self 

I knew 	   

		& the meh 

	that cannot be 

		meh

	self.