Ode to My Heart

I treat you poorly.
Between Pall Malls,
and cortisol,
I've treated you like a punching bag.
I expect each day
for you to leap from my chest,
to doom and divest   me
of the meat-bound metronome
that keeps me from death.
But you keep faith,
like a beaten dog
that doesn't know what trauma is,
rhythmically smiling at a Shakespearean drama kiss,
You stay despite wounds that metaphorically drain liters,
still singing out rhyme,
fluttering out meter
--- filling little black books,
In quiet coffee nooks,
making leather-bound music
like they were bardic hymns
rising from the marrow they were resting in.
I thank you for the organ you purport to be,
for making me the man I want to be.