The Blurt

The man across the table waiting

for my take is not unkind. In fact,

his hair stands up sweetly like a boy’s

as he offers me some praise I must

deflect. A little jewel lobbed my way

and throwing beams from all its facets,

the kudo rides the charge of light

between our sturdy roles. Of course, I want

to catch it, enjoy the way it cools

the palm and will later weight

the paper on my desk, but even

as it lofts my open ego, I’m sure

others are more worthy, or worse,

that if I take it I’ll be jinxed

and never see its like again. Maybe

it’s just midwestern diffidence

that leaps to intercept the gem

and save it for the velvet drawer.

All this action happens over plates

of greens with tangled stems,

seeds and spices that tease

and sting the troubled tongue,

so when I down it all and open

for response, the blurt

who lives somewhere deep

in what might be raw gut

or lizard brain, sneaks up,

looks around with those

comic mobile eyes, and speaks,

oh God, that thing crouched

inside. I know there are those

to whom this ordinary shame

never comes, but mine’s alive

even in the kindest company.

It clicks its claws and likes to bare

ferocious little teeth, but it’s not,

like a cat, immune to what you think.

Sometimes it hangs around all night

when the encounter’s long forgotten

by the man across the table. The blurt

assigned to him a power and feeds

it in the dark with oily possibilities

that agitate toward dream.

Even when the worst has already

passed, and I’m no one again—

like a child, but without

a future’s magic wand,

the blurt knows how to hurt

by simply sticking to its source.