Whatever games are played with us, we must play no games with ourselves, but deal in our privacy with the last honesty and truth. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

No games with ourselves? No spider sol,
sudoku, shisen? Well, there is the obsession
inherent in those for me, but the games I play
with me bypass those, surpass them in perversity.
The games I play with me are make-believe…
pretending I’m doing what to the world appears true —
hide and seek… hiding what I need to use when I choose,
seeking only when the desperation makes me long
for the taste of recovery I’d found before the game —
Instead of games, I must find the courage, the faith,
the hope to deal in solitude with the last honesty
and truth.