Friendless Center - edit3

[dukealien]

edit3;


I yearn for characters to orbit me
as sycophants revolve around their kings
portraying duty jeweled with repartee
as Jove has Ganymede, Saturn his rings.

I cling to things which can’t return my love–
old toys I grasp with misplaced sympathy–
and sadly sigh at smiles which never move,
projecting mindless, endless empathy.

Disloyal, things I own!  You will not be
grave-goods to burn or bury in a tomb;
mute matter, you cannot accompany
my dissolution, so disdain my doom.

But meanwhile, toys I value more than friends,
help me forget what smiles, and who pretends.

---

Thanks to all critics, particularly @brynwawr1 but also @Mark.  In terms of losing the rhyme scheme, best I could manage was one eye-rhyme 

To @brynwawr1 specifically, I think the narrator has evolved (over edits) into more of a sometimes self-analytical schizophrenic who bounces between understanding his situation and merely dramatizing it.  Hence the required two turns.  I've met some prize narcissists, and they run *toward* other people, not away from them!