Putting my best foot forward
shoulder to the wheel
nose to the grindstone
my Achilles heel
while sticking my neck out
I soon found
as
with my eye on the ball
ear to the ground
when I put my back into it
not with tongue in cheek
but to keep my chin up
heard joints creak
the onset of old age memory loss
an early taste
for in the end I forgot to bend
at the knees and not the waist
this boy -
he is mythology
he is the pomegranate sitting in persephone's
palm -
(looks can be deceiving)
this boy -
he is a mirror
can show medusa what heaven really is -
how pain really feels
but medusa never looks
this boy in the sun -
he is the smoking gun
in the death of icarus;
he is the crime scene in the middle of the ocean
this boy -
this boy is murder
he is cain holding a blade to abel's throat,
holding a mirror up to medusa,
force-feeding a pomegranate to persephone
this boy cuts the snakes off medusa's head
and makes snake-skin boots;
plucks the melted feathers from icarus'
cold hands and makes a throw pillow
this boy is murder when he wants to be;
this boy is murder when he needs to be
Superman’s Other Achilles’ Heel
By Elton Camp
Truth, justice and the American way
Superman pursued every single day
Bullets bounced right off his chest
Everything that he did was the best
A locomotive was weaker than he
Steel he bent with hands, you see
Able to leap tall buildings at a bound
He was the strongest fellow around
Only time he got into a tight
Was in contact with kryptonite
At least that the way the story’s told
But all forgot that he would grow old
For now his hair has grown thin
He has developed a double chin
X-ray vision won’t work with glasses
His reflexes are now slow as molasses
Firm muscles have turned to jelly
And Kal-El now has a beer belly
No matter how hard he may try
He’s now far too obese to fly
This little story may be hard to believe
An elderly Superman’s hard to conceive
We are gifted life
for later to be taken
so why emotion
that used to manipulate,
strength built on the fear of it.
© Harry J Horsman 2014
In my armor instead he wore
Now lays dead, my friend of honor
Petroclus, Oh! The grief I bear
Cannot be wiped away like tears.
Long will I suffer his demise;
Lost forever, our mortal ties.
***************************
My lifelong friend lies before me
His emaciated body
Dressed in his “Best Mans” tuxedo
He wore so many years ago
as my best man in our wedding
bearing our golden wedding rings.
Oh! This human weakness: sorrow
What claim you, all my tomorrows?
To lament the lion hearted
to cowering in trembled skin
befits the bottom dwelling things
the silt under wool of society's rug
While bravery is steel in stance
and oils the jaws of recovery
the bite of poison from burnt mouths
will hit the heel every time.
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