Ain’t It Though?

Look, here is
a human heart.
A fist-sized ball of thick meat
on stunted but strong legs,
trying to look sharp as it runs.

Larger and weaker than this
is its dimly connected brain.
Somewhere in the wet noose
of its thinking, 
buried in its ropes and curls,
is the map the heart was meant to follow

but it’s inaccurate,
or so the brain fears
without knowing for sure.

In spite of that
this heart often outruns its brain,
gets to destinations early if untidily.
Perhaps, in fact,
it wins because it is lost.
Does any heart run 
so fast or strong
when it knows
where it is supposed
to be going?

It’s off again now
after a lovely something, or at least
in a direction
that will make it pump hard enough
to shake the brain like pudding
or Jello, but the map never
comes loose or breaks free.

Blind little
stubborn heart,
jealous careful brain
tagging behind —

gee, the word
we use to describe this
sure is grand.