The Advent of Personality

Contact with the outer world, such as insects caught in the midst

Of metamorphoses or pollywogs discovering their legs,

May lead to embarrassments, if you haven’t kept a list

Of all your own accomplishments hanging from some pegs.

You ought also to consider inner worlds,

For instance, little bubbles of dream in the early dawn,

When you want to crawl away before the hungry worms

Lie down to copulate, and linger on the sunny lawn

Of your own childishness, or streaks of aspiration

Spewed across your rationality

You cannot hide from consciousness, and shun

The stains with blushing disavowals. So we

Engage with our own selves behind our public faces,

Furtively as adolescents tying up their laces.

Denuded of your Dignity

In the middle of the night, when the blankets twist up on one side or another,

And the dreams of distant holidays fall to the floor, while our arms ache

With so much exercise, a little voice keeps calling us: Make

A wish, my friends, forget the inconveniences that smother

Optimism and opportunity. But then, as you would expect,

Your partner pulls the covers over, without respect,

And you are left denuded of your dignity. Thus the other

In all things gains dominance, and you must shiver.

By the morning’s tepid advent, when your dreams dissolve

Into repeated calumnies, like a frozen river

Exploding into chunks of ice, to solve

The mystery of hesitation, jump like Eliza,

Hold on to the last shard of hope, a hopeless miser.