Girded With Anger

(Part of the Series:  On The Establishment, Care, and Maintenance of Personal Social Parameters)

Just who do you think you are,
to speak to me like that?
How dare you think that I care
about anything you have to say!
You think you know me?
You believe you “understand” me?
The inhabitants of my reality
have no reference point
in your experience;
they are strange and frightening
(for the most part)
with verbal barbs
to infect and destroy
fragile flesh and feelings.

Leave me alone!
I am trying to protect you from me,
but you keep returning,
pretending that you have a sense
of me, and what I really think.
Acting kind and understanding
will not spare you, should you
dilute my anger, 
and deflect my searing gaze.

Leave me alone!
I have problems with which I must cope:
a moment of quiet, please,
so I may seek resolution.
My anger is my regard for you,
and the desire not to flail out verbally,
hurting you, and scarring the core
of who you can be.
I gird myself in anger
that you may walk in peace.

Rehearsing the Script

(Part of the Series:  On The Establishment, Care, and Maintenance of Personal Social Parameters)



Each of us maintains a book,
with ragged, dog-eared cover,
and read it faithfully every day
with no surprises to discover.

In each of our relationships
the script makes dialogue clear:
no unexpected exposés
to cause us dread, or fear.

Sometimes we have to extemporize,
when a page is smudged or stained,
and we stumble with words and narrative,
until the storyline is regained.

And sad the day when we go out
and leave our script behind,
leaving us to prattle foolishly
forgetting each and every line.

Each of us maintains a book,
with ragged, dog-eared cover,
and read it faithfully every day 
with no surprises to discover.