Bagatelle

Watch me spin and collide, tumbling
through the bagatelle of life,
sometimes floating serenely
my generosity lavishly dispensed,
before stumbling, without
the advantage a blind man enjoys
thrust into the suffocating darkness.
I perform with the casual urgency
of a ringmaster’s clown
flapping gamely,
an urgent paper message
lost, unnoticed between
the hungry spines of a drain.
So inevitably I plummet,
to land heavily upon the welcoming
silt of insignificance,
destined to stare back at the pinprick stars
named hope and ambition
and wonder why?

© Graham Sherwood 02/2017