Snip

In the bud a looming spectre of strain:
of tendons knotting round the clavicle,
like chest roots pulling the body back
to be by the clod, as if from whence it came.

It seems unkind to paraphrase the last two years.
If, as you say, you feel faculties diminished,
you have a new tool now:
a train of thought, a recycled argument,
the curt consonant on the back end of a name,
and the hiss of its front.

The well worn path to point scoring is good practise,
the mission now, to maintain your right mind,
know it for what it is
a small step to the varying degrees of which any of it is truthful,
a point scored should be a letting
of what was once August overripe.