What You Guard (You Are)

What skin do you shed at night when you sleep?
Snake secret or crabby compulsion?
From hard to soft
As dust mites feast - you are unaware.
Tribute to a small pantheon of arthropod gods.
Your vulnerable flesh
So guarded.
Pain you keep locked up like a prisoner
What you guard.
You Are.

Impression of another person in the vacancy next to you
Pulling back upward for lack of a body to occupy
Its rising pride
You are a vessel of pride
Leaking like a broken faucet
Rusty as a neglected pipe
Affecting weary masculinity
And calling it wisdom
Placing others' lives above your own
And calling it love
Stuff your selflessness in a box
Meant for an engagement ring
Chaste and occasional
Occupy your future
To preserve your dusty destiny
What you guard
You Are.

Cracked oyster of a man
Bottom feeder water filter
Graced by the ever present
Effervescent saline purity bath ring
Of ocean's song
Tribute to a small pantheon of geologic gods
Warmed by volcanoes
Smoothed by the sandpaper sediments' journey
Your smoothness is the byproduct of their dusty destiny
What is your gift back to them?
You cannot offer up the pearl
You guard the pearl
What you guard.
You Are.

Bow bent out of shape
Arrow notched in the embrace of your string
Pulling back upward for abundance
Of a slender body to occupy your rising pride
Pierce the air into a frenzy with your whistling
Suspended in the distance of origin to unfortunate target
To intercept the musical note
Of your economic, ergonomic, aerodynamism conducted perfectly
Tribute to a small pantheon of war gods
Music and violence go hand in hand.
Arrow loosed from one heart to stop another.
Sacrificing innocence to guard innocence
What you guard.
You Are.