Dandelions Bloom

This is when I catch a glimpse of me passing by flickered wavy reflected in the auto-open doors snapping back of a WalMart on a bustling breezy day. Windblown nose and cheeks red from the chill what little hair tossed and laid barren dried seaweed abandoned on the shores of a drought-ridden Galilee. My clothes a hurried layered attempt to cover my aching rapidly withering frame just to insulate it from the constant cold. Mismatched.

I am mismatched. A walking antithesis of every ambition I spent my life like a kid with endless pennies feeding and twisting the great bubble gum machine in the sky hoping praying to land the one black ball with the pure gold gooey center so often told and retold in movie myths. Cheeks bulging with expectant desire grown fat stretched thin deemed stupid now hollow stubby grey sunken defeated.

I'm the mess my mother always told me I'd make of my life. This day alone just looking to purchase a loaf of bread and grape jelly to help fill the gnawing always in my gut as I fumble with with the self checkout technology hands covered in liver spots bulging blue veins chewed to the quick finger nails. Smirks and subtle avoidance surrounds me like a stinking shield. I am that old debris crumpled filth that blows into ditches with the seasons only to be stabbed and bagged by chain gangs when dandelions bloom.