“Foiled” by Paul Gilmore


I kept bringing oil paints
to the water park.

Walking ahead, behind, abreast –
it didn’t matter.
I slung every color I had, but nothing adhered to your Wellingtons,
or your snug farm jacket.

There was no Bo-Peeping
for the shepherdess and her flock.
In lambing season, you were elbows-deep for breechy prizes.

The newborns called you “ewe,”
as some died in your arms,
without nursery rhyme or reason .

When the wee rams
were banished to the ever after,
I slipped in beside them
and gamboled right along .

When I thought it was safe
to slink back and stalk,
I found you enthroned
at the hair salon.
Your stylist was irate
when my stray spark
arced to the foil in your hair,
too near the volatiles,
and still no flame.

Alchemy, husbandry, cautery
couldn’t conjure a bond,
or suture together devitalized flesh.

I might as well nail butter to ice
on a warm spring day,
bastards a-bleating,
wool over my eyes.


Paul Gilmore is a physician, writer and photographer with a lifetime of impressions and imagery to share in artful ways. Some are too rich to not share.