Laughter

Finally, I’m losing touch
with my laughter.
Often it is missing in the right places,
or it explodes in the wrong ones,
as if right and wrong were all the same thing,
as if my laughter were not mine, but had a will of its own,
roughly sketched in,
not signifying happiness,
just a part played by a clown in a silly play.

Sometimes semi-laughter,
or pseudo-laughter,
or mad laughter
contorts the intricate moulding
that flakes from the face . . .
Only the eyes laugh,
Or the lips.
The rest’s half-submerged in tranquil depths,
glimmering like a rock
that lifts up its face,
shaped by millennia of pounding waves
into a human semblance.

LAUGHTER