misunderstandings

I was always opening

the wrong end of the package.

wrestling with the bottom

when clearly,

it should have been the top,

inserting the wrong key

into the wrong lock,

showing up at eight

when the date agreed on

had been for seven o'clock.

if not for the sincerity

of my mistake,

I'd've been shit out of luck.

and on the bus

back across the bridge

by nine for years to come.

until I messed it up again.

woke up to find myself become

an accidental spider,

spinning silken threads of poetry

on the electronic planetary web

and discovered that

I still possessed

an appetite for butterflies

who in turn preferred

the verbs I wrote or spoke

to the ones I wished to act.

she wanted gossamer metaphors

of gardens and gunsights,

ruins smothered under blossoms,

words more than flesh.

or so it seemed to me,

the wrong-end-of-the-package

wrong-key-for-the-lock guy.

am I mistaken to think that

bodies are more truthful

than words that can beguile

before they cut?