Self Portrait
by
Augie Porras
With only so many
hours remaining
Of daylight for staring mindlessly
Dumb at the pulp fiction mirage
Of paper bleached white with
Scribe akin phosphorescence
Burning with magnesium of Aristotle
I turn from the heat now dead tired
With a back ache and head ache
From looking at my reflection affected
By some oft imagined place of
Make believe ýthe sad sack
Of flesh a corpse beaten to hell
Hanging halved as a carcass with
The other cows led to slaughter
So many times that now
I have to look twice
At the figure before critiquing
Myself in the mirror or in the
Five fingers that make my hand
A hand that holds the feather
Said to be quicker than the sward ý
For this I live and this I thrive
The mind filled myth of creation the
Talk of lifeýs exaltation writ
In long hand across the page of
A hand pressed thin sheet of cotton
Applied as craft no more complex
Than the caves of France where boys
Were once scared into men by looking
At themselves as anthropomorphic stick
Figures chasing bison, bird and deer.
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