Originally posted 7/25/2010.

Definition: an oil,
a thin clear oil,
that gets on everything.
When it clumps in dark corners
it is obvious
if you put a light on it,
but
when spread around
it becomes invisible,
intangible
until you try to grip something.

If you’re born coated with it
the ones who came before you
teach you how
to work with it,
how to forget about it
as you make it stick
where you want it to stick.

No wonder you’re insulted
when people
calls you “slick”
as they try
to make you see how
it shines so evenly on your skin
while on their own
it’s just a mess of smears and blotches.
No wonder that when you try to touch
those exposed patches,
it comes between you.  

The wells that pump it
are deep.  Pulling up the pipes
is not like pulling teeth.
More like pulling roots,
long roots, nearly infinite roots
that cross lawns, 
that have spread under roads;
pull them and the world splits above them.

The depth of their reservoirs is like unto
the Hell you’ve heard so much about:
there is fire, there is ice, there is
the Adversary who rules it

and oh, he says he loves you, his slick
bastard.  How could you hurt him so
by rejecting his slippery gifts?

If in spite of that
you start scrubbing and pulling
because that is what Hope requires of us,
you should know the truth:
no one really knows what a dry world
would be like, but at least
we would be able to touch and not slide apart,

and could hold on to each other as we are learning.