Sunday Night Poetry

The Problem With Meaning 

Meaning is an old shoe laboring on Mondays 
to blister your walk on pathless grass. 
A low-watt bulb tires of the news, but opens  

an eye each time a paradigm shifts into view 
and faith launches examinations, 
accurate as heat-seeking missiles. 

You recall everything, fall into a trap 
of details. The best you can do is qualify facts. 
Each word becomes a symbol for poultry, petals 

or diamonds. Nothing is pinned to corkboard. 
Tomorrow the papers get thrown out. Despair 
solves one part of this agony as you see possibilities 

when a look over the shoulder divines 
a bloated construction, approaching ripe as a fig. 
Being is not doing as the philosopher suggests. 

Sit for a time in the salon of interpretations, 
try to secure the perimeters of wind. 
Qualm forms a sheltering impass 

for hinge and proviso, points its wet finger 
at the enigmatic apple. It won't be long 
before your lamb is brought to the stone, 

 before you wipe away the allegations 
 you find on your shoes.

                                      --S.K.