Decisions, decisions...!


Decisions, decisions!
If only my mutinous decisions
would fall in line
and parade in disciplined and serried ranks
before me.

Then I would direct them
to a worthy cause or two,
marshalled and constrained
by my strategic will
and oversight.

If only my decisions
obeyed the rules,
I may then claim
some minor victories
-- or fewer defeats.



© Karel Reus

If only...


I'm sorry...!

If only I had walked a different path,
with clearer eyes.

If only...

Then, maybe, my journey
would have been less marred
and more worth marking
and remarking.

If only I had held my tongue.
If only I had valued truth.
If only I had shone a light.
If only I had loved a little more.

If only...

Excuses, excuses, excuses!
My penitence is paper-thin.
If only...

I'm sorry...!


© Karel Reus

Celebrating liminality

Rejoicing in elderhood

As my rapidly accelerating life moves into overdrive,
and as it r
eaches and passes the speed of eighty years per hour
I find myself entering a liminal landscape
where all caution can be thrown to the wind,
and where the approaching precipice
is not a threat but an invitation. 

At last, at last,
I can allow my captive spirit a chance to roam;
to think what it may and to say what it will.
The guardians of correctness no longer have a hold on me.
Rejoicing in my elder-hood, I am free.
In this new land-on-the-edge I am both king and subject; ruler and ruled. 

Since I am defined by the world as irrelevant,
I will celebrate irrelevance in final acts of resistance and rebellion,
and as for the censure of my younger betters,
well frankly, my dears, I don't give a damn.
I will leave traces of my errant thought
like so much scat in the undergrowth. 

You have been warned.
Be careful where you walk!

© Karel Reus