In afterthought, post a little visit to my doorside:
Peppermints do little but mask an offensive act
And worse they even add newborn suspicion
To officers who expect a medley of organica —
The fumes of leftover food in age old saliva
To take prominence over a mint based white wash
If the displayer of the breath is innocent.
People date but to cops that’s irrelevant is my summation.
People just hate bad breath but to cops
that’s as well irrelevant is also my summation.
People chew mints to hide crimes, cops believe,
and for no other reason might they do that
is my total summation.
“You smell like a jar of wintergreen oil.” He said.
Schnapps as it were but he was close.
I then chomped the gum I was chewing extra obnoxiously
to reinforce his own false assumption.
Just the fact that he would say that, though,
inspired the spirit of civil disobedience deep inside me
despite the obvious irony of my situational ignobility.
As if to him the observance would seem peculiar.
A likely story but I invest in him no confidence.
As if he were a man with a mission is more like it.
Preconceived notions of my guilt
bled from his forehead like beads of sweat.