Others

This life I live, I’m told, is not my own,
but a gift to be spent on others
and there is much
for which I must atone.

Convictions I express may be my own,
but usually are attributed to others.
This life I live,
it seems, is not my own.

Such doubts have become a fever in my bones;
chills come and go that quilts
and quinine cannot cover.
Convictions I express are still my own,

My inner self’s a desert spread with stones
and there, each day,
my doubt like vultures hover.
My doubts are surely a fever within my bones.

I know that there are others I can telephone
and one or two at some time
were my lovers.
My inner self’s a desert spread with stones;

and, lately, it seems my body is not my own.
It, too, has become an “other.”
there are no others it can phone
to confess sins it embodies. 

It is alone.