Taste

A Poem

Photo by Helena Lopes on Unsplash

Can you taste the toxicity
inside of my mouth?
It’s kind of like a metal flavor
because even my taste
is made of armor

I taste each day
like a bad hangover
from left-out mackerel
and those drinks
that made me
taste my own despair

Can you taste the irony
of the situation we are in?
A smoky hellscape
of misplaced values
rotting on a banana vine
and hoping for
a bowl of vanilla ice cream

I taste bad things
because that’s all there is
and even when I try
for something different
the metallic tinge
takes over and
subtly drowns all flavor
and, in turn, me

So I taste the water
going down, as I do,
beneath the surface
until my mouth is open
and my body is waterlogged
and I can no longer
taste

© Jonathan Greene 2021

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