All I want
Is to be acknowledged
In the ways
Sincerity dictates
Through thoughtfulness
Shown by discretion
To discern
My words as true –

These vestiges
Learned by mistake,
Hearing ghosts speak
Intimate wisdoms,

Leaving trails
Along crumpled up pages
Beneath desks
Where agony sits

And takes this form
Given flesh
By inadequate means
Always dreaming
For better release
They’ve inspired
Till escape seems real
When it fails.

Each triumph
Besides that wish
Leaves lingering fears
Never questioned,

Only doubts
Now fostered entirely,

Trading stares
Between faces grown old.

How success
Will never prove earned
While boredom builds
Over decades
Spending idle time
Watching reruns
Of another day
Lived so wrong,

Not maturing
Despite those wills
Or protests stood
Writing brashly
But playing fate
Chasing muses
No God worth love
Would employ.

Let’s admit
Such dangerous expressions
Are an excess gift
Best kept secret,

Hiding shyly
Behind closed bindings
Within studies
Souls never see –

Hidden tomes
Amid libraries lost,
Merely begging
Those eyes which wander

Like lines whose phrases
Sit there

Praying soon
Validation comes.

• J. Pigno