Proverbial Heart

My
proverbial heart
is a papier mache
crumbling inside your palm
and the color is running around your wrists
like blood I have lost
without knowing.
My thoughts are trapped
in a little roach motel with your face at every corner.
I would give my right arm
and both legs
just to escape
you
but, I am pulling myself apart
for an inch of space
that has made me more retractable than a wire spring
and I think
I’ve just sprained something or lost an antennae.
I’m going out of my head
just trying to pretend
this is something I can undo
with wite-out
and disassociation.
After all,
it’s just psychological.
The heart is an organ
not a seat of emotion
you can’t touch me without a scalpel
and two latex gloves.
You can’t break my heart
because it’s proverbial
and I can take it back like a word.

My heart is not your piñata
and does not belong in the company of dust mites
at the bottom on your denim jean pocket.
Let me dispel the myth
before you clench your fist or drag the soles of your shoe
over the sidewalk
holding the idea of retribution
like an act.
Cause I can’t feel a thing, so
HA!

My heart is proverbial
and perfectly intangible.
You can’t hurt me
without breaking the skin
and fishing through my stomach.
You can’t hurt me
without a PhD
and a license to operate.
You can’t hurt me
because it’s all psychological.
It’s a lack of seratonin
in my brain
and you are just a broken record
I play.
It doesn’t mean anything
because it’s proverbial
and subject to misinterpretation.
And that’s just what this is,
A mistake,
A misdiagnosis,
A
crock of shhhh..
but, what else can I make it?
If the heart is something other than an organ,
mine is a papier mache crumbling inside your hand
and you are hurting me
without giving a d#*n.