it’s not that you cannot keep a secret
it’s more you cannot stop talking
the words flow forth like ropes
uncoiling from a ship’s deck
hands quickly linking her to shore
you use words to tie people to you
you take strands and weave through
innuendo and guile what was confided
in confidence to you because I expected
a level of trust to be enough to seal
my words between us but you insist
on glibly dropping what to you must be
bon mots of someone in the know
throughout the conversation like small
barbs tossed after fish darting away
it is tiresome to listen to your misplaced
faith in what you have the need to say
and your belief that your smarmy words
resonate somehow with me other than
through distracted ire like a slow moving
cow contemplating her cud swatting a fly
(July 29,2013)
subtext 