Depressions Half-Life Poem by Patti Masterman

Where regrets ice over,
The disemboweled freedom rings:
Strolling down defunct bridges,
Unseeing by the dismembered dolls, and orphaned house shoes,
Sycophantic candy wrappers boomeranging,
Piano notes tumbling by on dusty wings.
The air current adds a gauzy, cheap thrill.
Detoured and lost again, casting off the surplus as you go;
The rattle and clatter of the dirt raising roads,
Trying to remember what to disown and
What to abandon in the wake of leaves,
And random shimmers from old butterfly trails.
The forgotten hopes pooled, where you once spent a day
In decisive despair, and decrepitude.
The vacant future come tumbling;
Not so much unexpected, as unwelcome
The loose ends dragging
Bird song remnants, cottonwood pollen,
Unspoken dearness, and unintended consequences.
The key glitters its way to the shallow bottom of the river
I watch it going down, with a half smile-
I stopped marking time ages ago, in my half-life.