Bacchanalia.

Armorial Plate: Silenus on an ass, supported by Bacchic revelers, Nicola da Urbino (Italian), ca. 1520–25, from the MET

The heart always takes a battering

But as long as it's skittering beats,

Lifted strangely

By the oscillating rhythms

Of cicadas before they succumb in June

I know some who take solace in bacchanal

Some turn to the stars and take solace knowing

We're circling the wine glass rim

On the cusp of your Aquarian age

Finding out first-hand, from a palm reading sage

I find myself in hesitation

Not so ready to confront

All the nicks and cuts

I anticipate

Just like bare feet on gravel paths

I'll process the weight of it all, in time

Insights I can't easily verbalize

Will be scrawled out in poorly

Executed slant rhymes and

Free-verse catharsis—

Bacchus and Ariadne, with Silenus, Nymphs and Satyrs, n.d. ,Raymond de Lafage (French, 1656-1690), from the Art Institute of Chicago