Spent Balloons

the best of it says there’s even more yet, and not
intentionally the same, however irony rests muted
between balloon-pops in a transience of silence –
somewhat like cartoon incongruities-ahead on the
furthest banks of an oxymoron

you’d like to believe no difference existed before
or now, suggesting balloon-pops punctuate each
moment of truth – reminders we’re here and we
blew the air of life into them, hung them festively
where strings strayed into harsher sunlight

it’s a shape of normality they claim to vend, yours
for the giving on any birthday celebrated gladly –
we’re still doing it today, the spa bubbles with its
childishly unstinting laughter while limp balloons
hang spent on a veranda clothesline
© 19 November 2012, I. D. Carswell