“Free verse poem about cognitive dissonance”

I stand in the kitchen at dusk,  
the faucet leaking its small gravity  
of contradiction—drip, drip.  
I hold two ideas as if they are mismatched teaspoons,  
cold metal pressing against my palms:  
the self I say I am, and the self I am—  
elusive, flickering, refracted in water on tile.

A clock ticks, misguidedly regular;  
my heart skips—a half-beat stutter—  
as memory argues with desire,  
and shame sits stubbornly between the bread and the butter.  
Outside, night grows deliberate,  
layering shadow over flowering dogwood,  
the petals pressed flat as the voice in my head  
smooths jagged, rationalizing edges.

I nod yes to compromise, no to surrender;  
my reflection fragments in the window glass—  
one part conviction, two parts doubt.  
Even the air breathes uneven,  
tidal, almost apologetic  
as I gather my contradictions close—  
like mismatched socks,  
like saved receipts,  
like truths I swear I can change  
if only I keep rehearsing the lines,  
one foot in honesty,  
one in comfort,  
balancing endlessly at the threshold  
of my own uncertain door.

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