Then you move on, and that’s it.
And she has kids, is with a man
who did kiss her.
He may have been weird, weak
or a nerd in every other way, but
haven’t you heard?
Love breeds love, the accomplishment
on the sports field, in the classroom
or at work, even the one deposited into
the bank in the middle of the night—
breeds more accomplishment.
“It’s great to be great, but it’s greater
to be human,” said Will Rogers
a dumb poet we loved for his smart
humanity and sneak-up charm,
the Shakespearian clown telling the
truth in such a way as to instruct and
inspire the king.
The clown can talk and talk without
being killed, for for every truth talked
he or she fits in a barb that produces
laughter, hits the funny bone, and
disarms.
I should have kissed her, but lacked
the knowhow and the skills to be human.
I should have kissed her at the end of
the date, that time in the hallway,
alone and one on one because I loved
her—she me. She was waiting… We could
have blamed the drink,
but I was a year or two away from overdose
and complete failure, where I needed
to go to end my deathly hopes of death
I never knew I harbored.
You drink a flammable substance young,
fail to look it up, see the impact it
has and will later have.
You can’t tell her “I love you,” wonder
why, but must overdose twice—almost
die, before you admit it:
I am alcoholic.
Bill Watkins, Traveling Poet 