This wine is sour

There is loneliness in this room,
a sinking feeling of drowning
in a bottomless pool of ice water.
Still, I speak to you
in a voice filled with a
shiver of doubt.
I know you hear me, though
you are not really there,
just your shell, an aging
skin encasing your flesh.
“How did we ever arrive here?“
A sigh ripples the morbidity
of the moment,
a whispered breath moving
the useless lint filled air.
“Did life pass us by or did we leave it behind?“
Your lips do not speak and
I do not know the answer.
Our time is locked in the
chains of indifference,
the tireless agitation
of night and day,
our shadows falling
behind us, flat, lifeless.
“Tell me how you feel, please!“
It is a moot question,
where there was light,
the spark has been extinguished.
The passion now soot,
the ashes of love’s fire
doused with complacency.
“This wine is sour, don’t you think?”
I hear no response, for your tongue
is clothed in the darkness
of your guarded thoughts.
It is folly, no grape fills our glass,
only the sour bitter root
of our future,  a toast of hemlock
to all that we were or could have been.

Copyright: 2010, Donald Harbour