Trial week

Sitting on my buttocks for two hours
Waiting for the one name I recognize
To be announced from the front
My client sitting by my side
Nervously laughing at the comedy
Of the sad, slow legal drama
Or asking questions
Again and again
Answered before, answered like Cysephus
Until the matri di/prosecutor looks toward me
And calls my case
And like an expectant father
I rise to the calling
Only to face the lined, life-weary face
Of the judge, who fights his boredom
To offer me half an ear
And I've known him for so long
And I know he reads the bullshit
And probably suspects more beneath
My slippery, reptilian argument
Which bends and twists and turns away
And often slips from my tongue
To my hands like a handful of snake
And falls to the ground and slithers off
Back into the cool darkness of my brain
From whence it came
Leaving me lost and feigning confidence
Even when the words won't come
And I trudge away to face another trial
Like some antic knight in tarnished armour, beaten in the lists
My open palms held open to my client
Who mistrusts me now also
But probably did before.