Retrograde

I don’t believe you,
sky; I don’t believe you,
stars, moon, and most certainly

I do not believe you,
Mercury,
you fleet hot liar.  

For some of us, “Mercury
retrograde” is code for
“this stuff happens everyday

but sometimes
people pay more attention to it
than others.”  For others,

it means “my whole life
is retrograde and 
I can never tell the difference.”

“Retrograde” screams a question:
who made the sky-pictures
of the West supreme?  Who chose

these myths to exalt
when every culture’s
that’s done the same

has drawn
such different
conclusions?

I’ve let myself become
so sour about all this 
I don’t even trust sunrise

to lift this weight
off my chest.
I’m so sick of all this

I want
to stop speaking
to people for days.

I’m so tired of all this
I might be ready
to believe.