Take Your Own Advice, Descartes

There are many women
I've met already
whom I could've held
for a long time;
maybe not forever
since that's not realistic
and they always find the ogre
but for a fair share of birthdays
and an album of drunken walks home.
To love is a noble aspiration
and anything worth your blood
takes work. It's an effort to trust
another beautifully flawed
collection of cells. Anyone
who says that God's greatest gift
falls in your lap is a fool
who should be silenced
with a muzzle or a smack
or a crippling case of the clap.
Liquor's not free or He would've
made rivers of whiskey. Love
along the same lines, takes
a conscious effort.

But where does one draw
that holiest of lines?
How far are we to go
on our quests to find
the partners whose eyes
reflect our souls?
That's the rub
that faces us
and for an addict
or a hermit
or an only child
with daddy issues
it's exponentially harder.
There must be some retention
of clarity, focus, patience
but don't trouble yourself
with dignity. A lot of proud men
have died alone amongst
a pile of spent shells and with
a long list of regrets
most of them being
things they didn't do
for the sake of an image.
One wastes time with
too much fear of losing
that which can be stripped
by an opened closet door.
We've all got enough
skeletons to make
our closest friends cringe.

Be more concerned with
the person who knows
what you look like
when you're not
sucking it in, that your
worst morning breath
may kill some small insects
and that you never really got over
the time your best friend
stole your high school
sweetheart. They're out there;
hundreds of thousands, in fact.
The Law of Averages is on your side.
Keep treading. There's no rush.
If you get stuck late at work
I'll leave the light on for you.