Contributor: Brian Rihlmann

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Among many other things
I’ve lost as I’ve gotten older,
is the ability to look back
on a particular time in my life:

an ugly breakup,
a ruined friendship,
getting fired from a job

and say,
“This is how it really happened”
with a young man’s strut
in my speech,
the inner scales of blame
tipped confidently,

the monstrous black boulder
of your misdeeds
resting comfortably
upon one side,
the white feather of my innocence
quivering on the other.

Or vice-versa.


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