Old Hat

by Darryl Price

Sent you a hat. I thought it might keep you
warm in the middle of a snow storm,or couch.
As you'll see my words right now are all acting
out like a good many glassy-eyed marbles. They'll oh so
coldly clank in my case that is against one another's
bulky light bulb heads constantly or else like to sit
quietly in a small bark Indian satchel I might sometimes
keep in a desk drawer, with the staples, waiting to
be played with. Like I said. The next unlikely story
of a long time lonely volcano of my type finally

getting to go off gets told in this book with
a thousand cheering voices shouting in my veins. Hooray for
beer! I suppose it's hard to actually hear what's being
said in there sideways. You might not even like this
art game being played over you in that particular library.
We're all anxiously holding our cards and our pistols at
arm's length. Those young guys all look pretty finger happy
to me. I must admit I don't really have much
else to send you in the way of cool greetings
from this here saloon from my rickety exile's chair, because

that's what life is, compared to being around you all
the time. Sorry, but my bum's just a little sore
from all the hours of thought given over so far
to this bit of hat. And as if you're some
kind of living planet up there alone in the sky,
and everyone else is a moon like chunk of mush,
instead of some kind of living song we can't stop
humming. What a jackass I am. That sounds silly, but
I'm prone to leave it in simply because it came
prancing out at you that way. Perhaps there's some truth

to the practice since it began to shake its sad
little riderless shape after the very thought of you, as
they say. 'Bout the only thing they've said that I
do agree with. If I could I'd want to be
fully living and dying present in your lovely presence. That's
what I meant to say. Yeah I know how much
it sounds like a broken record. Pretty stupid. Used up
to all gone again,brother. Old hat. That's what I'm
talking about here anyway. I need to shift it on
over into something a lot more interesting, more to the

feel than that blubbering slow beat of a goofy sound.
Believe me I would if I could, wouldn't I? So
here's just another, for whatever reason you want to imagine
it, kind of sentence for you. Yeah you've already got
several of those in today's mail. I'll bet it's a
daily thing too. At least by now you'd think. You
are at your perfect point of self. And your game
is all about the choosing. Oh this one and maybe
that one. How could it ever be a me, that
poetry guy, when I'm a million emotional miles away, stuck

like a rock between a word and a sentence, like
a comma or one of those brake stomping periods? That's
not much to look at, even on a page like
this one, or to bank your only happiness wish on.
I know. I only want it to be more like
a perfect day landing softly on your brown skin like
a barely felt set of butterfly feet, or a cool,
cool breeze swiping its long fuzzy tail across your sky
opening smile, or an ocean, any ocean will do as
long as it's morning,like a cup of delicious blue

and green and white striped dreams, lifting sweetly into the
bluest blue on your horizon, just waiting to happen for
you, and with you. And me. At least that's the
dumb founding hope I seem to be holding onto like
a man who lives in a lighthouse walking around and
around the rocks for the umpteenth time still looking to
find his lost set of keys. So, Universe, do you
think you could see fit to give her this note
for me in one of your amazingly synchronising ways? I'd
like there to be birds involved, maybe a new dolphin.