My mouth is full of words and fragments of ideas
Waiting for the gunfire
That will signal their race to the
Outside world of jumbled conversations
And awkward moments.
And because the words I contain are
A wiley bunch -Bouncing
Off of my tongue as fast
As they can, it is
Often difficult to complete my own thoughts.

Sometimes I am able to clamp my lips shut:
When I am faced with a rude person's rude words,
As arrogance and I have an ongoing fued,
My words load their exclamatory canons,
Trying to continue the fight.
But my lips are a peace treaty:
They will not let the words cross into
Enemy territory.
Because I know how strongly words can hurt.

At other times, my lips are futile guardrails,
Caving to the impact of my excited words,
Bold as a car crash:
When I see that special someone
Walking towards me,
My mind retraces its steps,
Recalling the way I have planned over
And over
And over
To arrange my words in the most
Perfect, precise, charming way.

But you know how excited my words get.
They jump onto their vines and work up
Momentum as my heart beat does the same.
And as I open my mouth,
They swing out, relentless!
...(sigh when read out loud)
And the most eloquent thing they can form is,
"Wow your left leg looks great today!"
And I can only be thankful that sidewalks
Allow people to walk in different directions.