I saw when you had two heads;
one would speak while the other
would stare judgingly at the crowd,
face and eyes windows revealing
the judgment you render on yourself;
the crowd a mirror for your own doubt.
The talking head would laugh, smile,
bring everyone else along for the journey;
the silent head would have an imperceptible trembling lip—
each quiver a perfumed May day letter.
M’aidez, signed and sealed by the silent head,
and kissed and sent to anyone who would hear.
Your bravado an inverted pyramid and
the lowest singular foundational stone a soap bubble.
All of the fear, the what-ifs, the stinging shadows,
the pencilled calendar on soggy wet paper,
contained and compressed into an atomic iron point
inside the mouth of the silent head.
Each fear piled high upon the next, heavily.
The word “knife” sharper than the knife itself;
each what-if more agential than harbinger,
bringing the full brunt of the presumtive event
merely thinking of it tearing and wounding
as if already occured.
The talking head invites us in, says that we
are the same, on the same side, we are family,
we trust each other, we belong.
The silent head judges us, judges the crowd,
but mostly it judges the talking head
for daring to speak warmly and softly.
“Please only,” the eyes of the silent head convey,
“please only mock and jab and spit,”
it begs of its talking twin with some hesitation,
“please make them turn their heads away
and make it so that they cannot see me.
They are a mirror for my doubt as I am for theirs.”