Questions for a Doppelgänger

Random Acts of Poetry

Questions for a Doppelgänger

Are you sincere?
Do you mean it when you say,
"This time, this is the real me,
sitting on a rock"?

Are you sincere?
Do you think
wisdom falls like water from your lips,
making no mess upon the floor?

Are you sincere?
Have you ever
been naked in a mirror,
seen your self evaporate?

Are you sincere?
Is that you in the photograph
grinning like a chimpanzee,
or the ghost of some other hominid?

Are you sincere?
Could that really be you
singing on the radio, up on a screen?
You know the words so well.

Are you sincere?
How often have you thought,
"I didn't mean to be a bastard,
forgive me, forgive me"?

Are you sincere?
Is it ever really you
squinting in the sunlight,
tripping in the dark?

Or is it me,
dropping stones into a pond,
seeing my face dissolve
in the blossoming of circles?
_