I wish my life existed in straight lines
like in reporter’s notebooks,
graph paper,
plaid pants—
instead of left up to chance,
an unpredictability in irregular shapes and spirals,
paisley patterns run amok
on a very unseemly set of bell bottoms.
But there’s some comfort in curvature, of uncountable angles;
perhaps, in the idea that there is some semblance of variation
within the greater design,
that the pattern will reveal itself in time,
and that the life, once straight and forthright
will get so wasted it stumbles drunkenly,
finger on tip of nose,
ungracefully forward.
But despite the hangover it’ll feel tomorrow,
it’ll know it came from freedom,
the soul liberated from horizontal or vertical consistency
in quadrant or graph or diagram.
The need to be released from the 180 degree angle
so desirous,
that life becomes alcoholic
in its need for inconsistency and zigzags,
a real drunkard for unusual,
a true lush for radii:
A sober line is never fun.