What do you know?
My name.
Your name?
My name.
Do you suppose Eric
Is stamped on your soul
In indelible hand?
Or did Dickie and Sue
Pluck randomly from
A blue boys’ book of names?
The latter.
Is Eric then the germ
Of each thought, word and act
That Eric — yourself — enacts?
Unlikely.
Unlikely.
Maybe though I have a better name?
One that spoken explains my borders
And maps out my life to the last.
Without a doubt.
But tracing that name is like damming
Time’s meander:
Hopeless, hopeless,
But what else can you do?
Shorter Poems 