There’s No Bridge Over the Styx
I’ve burned many, many bridges in my life,
perfectly sound constructs that never
did anyone any harm.
I drenched them in four-star,
tossed a lighter over my shoulder, movie-style
and strode off without a backwards glance.
If there is a hell, a fiery one, not just other people,
I think mine will be to relive every last immolation,
ad infinitum, ad nauseam.
Likely they’ll provide a bucket: “Here,
for your tears, to douse the flames or
build ash castles afterwards. Your call.”
©2023 Jim Murdoch All rights reserved.
Jim Murdoch has been writing poetry for fifty years and has graced the pages of many now-defunct magazines and a few, like Ink, Sweat and Tears, The Lake and Eclectica, that are still hanging on in there. For ten years he ran the literary blog The Truth About Lies but now lives quietly in Scotland with his wife and (increasingly) next-door’s cat. He has published two books of poetry, a short story collection, and four novels.