Shedding

The measure of depth in the season
is how low the morning shadows
are upon my neighbor's wall when I wake.

Even this far past sunrise the angles are low,
slanted, seemingly sharp. They remind me
of the sometimes sharp lines made by

light and shade cutting into Scottish fog
in early winter. The visuals take me
to another place; momentarily,

I escape the scraping feeling in my chest
(like a stingray's tail being removed).
I am still here and the angles are changing,

the day's light transforms as I am transformed.
bit by bit, the fleshy parts of memory
are removed and when I turn to the mirror

I begin to recognize myself less and less.
Soon, all those live cells with living memory
will fade and like a serpent I will have shed

my skin and be fresh to inherit another set
of this experience in each and every
moment of beauty, madness, joy and pain.

October 14, 2007