Devolving

This first poem I'm posting is actually one that I originally wrote in 2000.   One of my favorite things to do with a poem I've written is to go back over it about a gazillion times and remove as many words I can, so this is it's final incarnation, (unless a future reading inspires even more editing).  My inspiration for that, of course comes from William Carlos Williams' The Red Wheelbarrow.  /it is so spare, and yet the imagery is so crisp, and his word choice is genius. My work is nowhere is as brilliant obviously, but this style is inspired by that.


Devolving

i never asked you
if you could love me
took for granted
that you couldn't
perhaps you wouldn't
which didn't bother me
not really
i liked how things were
fixed
unchanging
didn't want the truth from you
never asked to hear it
still
you told me
now things are changing
evolving
perhaps devolving
as i ponder the man
who said that
ignorance is bliss
i assume he must
have had someone
like you
in his heart
and in his head