Check List (Poetry)

Now you kiss me like an uncle would —
had I any uncles left
we talk polite about the weather
while I curse beneath my breath

Passion is an empty bottle
sweetness dried — the glass bereft
we just haunt the past together
in a kind of living-death

I am walled-in with my scriptures
yet the flood of words runs low
I would escape this dismal convent
if I’d some place else to go

Age has kicked away the options
hope is locked inside a vault
I’d invent a dozen lovers
but I lack the speed for sport

I have listed all my longings
in a room that has no eyes
the walls awash with fantasies
dark corners stacked with lies

What is truth opposed to fiction
once time’s wiped the sinner’s slate?
But the house is an inferno
and the fire brigade’s too late