People adjacent to you refuse to listen to
your voice for fear that it will burrow into
their souls and excrete reeking turds of contention.
People in your vicinity are afraid to cross
your line of sight, lest the maul of your soul
swallow them and subject them to your constipations.
People around you wish their baleful opinions of you
could club together and contribute substantially to the
accelerated process of your eventual demise.
Starward
[*/+/^]
Author's Notes/Comments:
This metaphorically describes a neighbor of my parents. Although entirely uncredentialed, she had acquired something of an informal authority which she used to discredit the reputtions of several young persons who were classmates and peers of her own offspring, but made those offspring look like the mediocrities that they actually were. She equated---and convinced several of her neighbors (including my parents)---strong interest in a subject, or a body of knowledge, or even a pastime with severe mental illness. The word "obsession" or its variations constantly flitted in and out of her conversations. She also equated an interest in the arts or literature with homosexuality---which she despised. All three of her offspring encountered failures in their professional lives; and her younger son, near the end of his high school experience, admitted that his nature was homosexual.
She died alone in her house, of a massive stroke that felled her to the floor, where she laid until the life processes in her expired. Due to the backup of mail in the box, the postman alerted the authorities, who found her dead and beginning to decompose.
Because of her interference, my early interest in astronomy (from six to about ten years old) was first discouraged, and then fully obstructed, by my parents; and when, during my senior year in high school, I became interested in Poetry, they dreaded the disclosure of this to her, or neighbors who would convey it to her.
