My skin is too tight.
I was issued a medium
and now I am an extra- large.
Like my pants,
I have outgrown my skin.
The skin on my arms is stretched so thin
that I can see red corpuscles
running through my veins.
They look, for all the world,
like Cleopatra's red -sailed barge
going up the Nile.
My skin is so thin that I bleed
just walking past a rose bush.
The slightest swipe of the cat's tail
and I am bruised purple and brown
for a week.
I don't own a white shirt that
does not look as if it was worn
by a bloody hero of The Alamo.
I buy bandaids by the case.
Now to make matters worse,
I have the 81-year itch.
From top of my head
to the bottom of my feet,
my skin itches.
You can tell my doctor has
never had the 81-year itch.
He tells me not to scratch.
Now come on, what to do with an itch
other than scratch?
Diagnosis is that I am too clean.
What a kick my mother
would have gotten from that.
Sure not like the old days.
Skin dry from too many showers.
Maybe the skin suit shrank.
Prescription: slather with smell- good creams.
Greasy old man I now am.
From my breathtaking walks,
frequent trips to the john
and abused liver,
I am sure I could use a few transplants.
But first, if I had my choice, I would take
a new skin, size extra -large.
August 2009