Another Birthday Poem by Laurence Overmire

Another birthday leapt across the road today
Nearly scared me half to death
A mangy-looking creature
Like nothing I’d expect
Its eyes dark and forbidding
Accusing me of cowardice
Indifference and fear
Of hiding from my fellow man
And castrating my heart
Of feeding on self-pity
Indulging in defeat
And with a horrifying shriek
It spat at me
In mockery
Then vanished out-of-sight...

I picked up a piece of a dream I had dropped
A pebble stone for luck
Tucked a little bit of wisdom up under my hat
And set out once more
The road far ahead of me
The sun high in the sky.


(Previously published in The Short North Gazette, Sept. '99; Poems Md, March '08)