Attorney-at-law

Common Ground Review

Sure, there’s a certain legal lyricism, an -ese, as it were,

and the oral takes precedence.  I’m an anal-retentive

master of the argument, reciting the theories and 

matching the facts, promising and soliciting.

The rigorous bifurcation of our craft grows a tree of law,

extending into branches that can’t even be seen for 

all the cluttering leaves.  

The language can strangle before it even gets out

the door, clients barreling in without an excuse, this

one caught with someone else’s drugs, that one 

violating probation with an innocent glass of red 

wine the officer glimpsed through the window,

another poor fool breaking the restraining order,

just unable to walk one more time past her house 

without pausing to knock.

I examined the bar, and it was not high enough,

nothing that could prepare me for the life of

everyone else’s pleas, hustling in and out of

court like a fucking shuttlecock when all I really

wanted to do was make some money.  I don’t

want to live in the manner of a pauper.  Because after

awhile even the judge’s chamber is just a room.

You have the body, but you do not have the soul.