So, that old anger, chomped down from years ago
Some kind of decayed corpse
Drag round again (and again)
Once a stinking albatross but now some bones and feathers, dried sinew, inedible
How they hurt you then (when you were small, when you were standing in that queue so long ago, when the world stopped being your playground, when …)
You squint up from your down place into bright sunlight
Blinded
Pulling that old thing from far ago with your frayed, ratty, furry tramp’s string retied forever a faded parcel blue
More important than anything
Then
Now?
Everybody knows all sorts of things
Everybody knows you should leave the past behind
Everybody knows the stumps of fingers worn away digging for yesterday
Prove me right if I could only change that thing
Fix the unfix
Unthrow that insult, rock, clever remark, eternal regret
That old thing takes your breath one day
Hands hold shimmering dust of what you have, were, would be
Just dust, that old thing, just dust