The Headless Man (Edited) Poem by RIC BASTASA

there is this
handsome
man in the neighborhood who
begins to
stutter when
death as a topic
enters
in the conversation

an uninvited guest
as he calls it

perhaps even a
shameless
gatecrasher

to him it would be horrible
and to some extent
impolite

he can even summon
the police to
arrest it
and have it charged
for violence
in the blotter
book

holding his glass of red wine
against the
glow of
summer
and munching his greens
as usual

he always feels that life
has so much to offer
and that there must no
space to allow
the dread of sickness and death
in any
talk in order to be
wholesome


i am looking at him with
disbelief
i must be drunk perhaps
because
as i see him
he has no head
at all

i think
he is not real