Contract Law

Posted on the doors
of my chest
and the footpaths of my arms
are mottoes
I don’t believe in anymore
but now I’m stuck with them
and I should learn
to live up to them hoping that even if
the act is not backed with faith
at the start, faith will grow with
the results.

There are mountains,
tall for a geological moment
and unconcerned with their eventual erosion,
that know more
about how to be a man
than I do. Butterflies float,
mosquitoes leave marks that sting
and disappear, the next door sparrows
shit on my car without concern for their image
because they know they can fly, and none of them
ever feel the need
for ink to explain these things.

I know I could find some doctor
to do the job, buy long sleeves and double up
on T-shirts until I’m too dead to care —

but none of those are things
I can do myself, and I have sworn to be
the one who does that, my fatty chest
screams for that duty to be fulfilled,
so I will buck up. I’ll do it myself,
make a go of the dooms I’ve claimed
until there’s nothing left to fail,

until the waters wear me down
and wash me into
the next person I will become.