Me

The child in me is by now
a monkey on my back.
Its self-amusement
generates a darker shade
of ugliness in people.
The teenager inside,
crouching but defiant
has been locked up in an
abandoned toilet
where lumps of reality
crawl and sting.
The mellow middle-aged man
in me lies inert
inside a gulag where devils
would fear to tread.
Cerebral dazzle transcribes
sense in an invisible ink.
Now I'm accosted by fatigue,
aches and heartbreaks,
touts out for petty blackmail.

- Max