ORDINARY

                    It begins with your family
                    but soon it comes around to your soul.
                         – Leonard Cohen (“Sisters of Mercy”)

Bring on the sad songs hidden in my belfry,
free muffled desperation’s uncommon tone
to play beneath the trumpet’s discordant blasts

that lack melody or empathy for humanity.
Pilgrim in time, I crave moments with a moan—
minutes to reflect upon what my mind asks.

I need no enemy nor bugle’s call for reveille
to measure muscle, heart or brittle bone—
just a sad song to hum to the ordinary tasks.