Poem: Multiples of Leopold I

Anything beautiful
Is surreal
Except this sentence
And me when I breathe
Loud and obnoxious
In hopes someone will look my way
Say something strange
Like, oh how unexpected
A man who means something
Out of context.

I sing songs and you read books,
And this is the line that links us
If it says anything good.
Drafts of papers reproducing
Industry news and who’s who’s
Are portals Leopold chose to take
Years before we were watching.

He dove like a butterfly
With wet wings; tectonic shifts
Into oblivion and beyond
Lay an off chance Leopold would grow up,
His pleasures co-existing
But never awakening him.
But one life wasn’t enough,
Leo tried a couple at once,
No time for lying in flowerbeds
All day starting fires.
So Leopold was faced with a grave decision:
How best to exterminate someone dear to him.

He rolled the balls of his feet
On his stone lion’s forehead
And attempted metaphysical suicide.
I sing songs and you read books,
And that’s all there was between us.