Proverbial Heart
My proverbial heart
is a papier mache crumbling inside your palm
and the color is running around your wrists
like blood I have lost without knowing.
My thoughts are trapped in a little roach motel
with your face at every corner like a patch of glue.
I would give my right arm and both legs
just to escape you
but I am pulling myself apart for an inch of space
that isn’t looking good.
I’m going out of my head
just trying to pretend this is something I can undo
with Wite-out and disassociation.
After all, it’s just psychological.
The heart is an organ, not a seat of emotion.
You can’t touch it without a scalpel and two latex gloves.
You can’t break my heart because it’s proverbial and I can take it back in a word.
My heart is not your piñata
and does not belong in the company of dust mites
at the bottom of your denim jean pocket
like something too small to regard.
Let me dispel the myth
before you clench your fist or drag the sole of your shoe
over the sidewalk, holding the idea of retribution like an act.
I can’t feel a thing, so HA!
My heart is proverbial and perfectly intangible
as the feelings you don’t have.
You can’t hurt me without breaking the skin
and fishing through my chest.
You can’t touch me with a PhD and license to operate.
You can’t hurt me because it’s all in my head.
It’s a lack of serotonin in my brain
and you are just a broken record I play.
It doesn’t mean anything
because it’s proverbial and subject to misinterpretation.
And that’s just what this is, a mistake,
a misdiagnosis, a……….crock of shit.
But what else can I make it?
If the heart is something more than an organ,
mine is a papier mache crumbling inside your hand
and you are hurting me, without giving a damn.
