Paul decides
he is more dust than ash.
Even with this declaration,
he remains mostly ocean.
Some days he is intimidated
by absences.
He places those voids
in a closed-off room
behind a red door
with a Gone Fishing sign.
This past week the world
scrutinized Paul for one news cycle
via more social and mass media
than he was accustomed to.
Because, in a poem he posted to a blog
Paul took on all the blame
for the third of the four years
of the Trump Administration.
It is so raucous under the microscope!
Their pens scratch baseline notes.
Arising, Paul bumps his head
on its glass ceiling.
See! Dust. Just like the dry scrapings
of an archeologist
around an uncovered artifact,
a carved figure of unknown origin.
copyright © 2021 Kenneth P. Gurney
Umflop 