The Life Unlived

The life unlived is the dream deferred.
It does not resemble a withered piece of fruit
or the gross images of draining sores,
rotting meat, or pent-up postal worker
explosions.  It will never crust over.

The dream deferred is an ordinary man
driving to work, shuttling the kids to school,
who, when he sits alone on the edge of his marriage bed, removes his wedding band and remembers
the boy he used to be and the boy he feared to love.