he worries over each exchange
like an entrepreneur counting
the initial stock option in his plan
as if what might be said will
be said instead of rehearsed
in all its manifestations until
he screams out his botched lies
and when he steps from the minutia
of these possibilities the essence
of his rage trails after him
like smoke from a firebrand driving
him ever deeper into the tissue of doubt
which spasms like disembodied frog legs
at each jolt of his unrelenting memory
(july 2012)
subtext 