If Love Had Been my Bread

If Love Had Been My Bread by Anthony Hendrickson If love had been my bread and not my curse, I feasted long – still hungered through the day.

And if it been the drink I now rehearse, How drunk and sunny I would be this May. But love is not a smorgasbord of all the things you’d hope – no strudel à la crème.

It fills you fat – with weighty woe you fall.

And on your knees match scuffles at your hem.

I’ve seen a few get up and brush it off – the mangled dreams that made their shoulders rough.

They’ve hardened now. Their breath is now their cough that’s covered by the stains upon their cuff.

Myself’s met love behind her white-washed cloak.

What’s gold’s now stone, and every fix now broke.