Base Metal - Oct 21 2022

 

Base Metal

Oct 21 2022

What if you could really change your mind?

Not a second helping

or a different shade of blue

but transformational change,

like the transubstantiation

of lead into gold.

Who — or what — would you become?

I imagine more sure of yourself,

smarter

more charming

a determined self-starter;

and, of course

disarming to the opposite sex.

Because, in the end

Darwin was right;

it all comes down

to reproduction and survival  —

finding a mate

and staying alive.

But change is hard.

Even changing minds

a change of heart,

let alone

who you are.

After all, it's taken me most of a lifetime

to simply know myself,

and now you’re asking me to learn

how to be somebody else?

And just as long to realize

that though other lives look brilliant

from the outside looking in

hardly makes them so.

The corrosive sin of envy

that not only eats at your soul

but isn't worth the bother.

Not to mention

that the alchemy of personal reinvention

is beyond me,

as esoteric

as particle physics

and living forever,

the conspiracy theories

of true believers

and confidence men.

Hard enough, after all

to change an opinion

break a hundred dollar bill.

The best I can hope for

is to stay curious

keep an open mind

and accept my imperfections;

base metal

with a dusting of gold.

I was listening to a podcast about changing minds, and the way my brain processed that word, “change” took on a whole other valence. I thought this would be fun to play with.

(Conspiracy theory did, btw, come up in the podcast as well: it centred on a “truther“ who believed Sept 11 was a government plot — there were no planes or hijackers — and who turned out to be one of the very rare ones who actually was converted from delusion to reality. https://www.pushkin.fm/podcasts/cautionary-tales/cautionary-conversation-the-conspiracy-theorist-who-changed-his-mind)

I suppose alchemy came so easily to mind was because I used it in the last poem I wrote, and quite enjoyed its arcane connotation.

Is it politically incorrect these days, when we've come to recognize gender fluidity, and accept (some of us, anyway!) transgender identity, to refer to the “opposite” sex? After all, sex and gender are hardly seen as binary anymore. Unfortunately, there are space constraints in poetry; no room for much elaboration, explanation, or tangential lines of thought. So I felt the shorthand of “opposite sex” was acceptable, even if it does represent old school thinking.