Category: Poetry

People] Can’t Tell Me

Bleak entertainers’ glee
leaks all over the stage

as the freaks peak
in their social development

and the geeks tweak
while the Greeks seek.

You robber baron bandits
have nothing on our scheme!

You lack significance
in a most crucial way

and you make up for it
by burying that invisible hatchet

you claimed was a mile away
at the time. Now you

[you of all people] can’t tell me
I’m just being paranoid this time.

You know damn well
that I’m your equal

and there’s nothing stopping me
from declaring mutiny

and shipping your saviors overseas,
never to be seen again by Western eyes

(good riddance). We all take a sauna
and throw down tequila,

as is the style at the time.
Our cultural awareness steps forward

and mocks itself ruthlessly,
as I’m sure you know.

Oh, come now.

You can’t say
you didn’t already know

the state of our adolescent trek
through the Everglades of public opinion.

We’ve all known this for years at this point,
and it’s time you come back to reality.

Clean Up Your Act

How many times now have I seen a mirror just sticking out of the side of the garage? I told you that the garage was not the place for a mirror to just go sticking out in broad daylight. There’s a sun out there, mister. That sun can reflect off this mirror and reflect a beam of fiery wrath back at that dead tree over there and toast that puppy. I will not have you just putting up mirrors all willy nilly, as though you’ve never been trained in the fine art of mirror hanging. I will not stand the disgrace to our craft, and I sure as hell will not pay for the damages caused by that fire to the property. Our insurance coverage isn’t half as good as I thought it would be when we signed up, so I’m pretty sure this family would end up in financial ruin. Your brazen attitude is just what we don’t need to see in this world, and I would like you to clean up your act.

On Macroscale

There’s nothing here
for me,
and I really can’t quite stand it.

It’s as though my skin
is tearing itself
apart at a subatomic level

and I’m sitting here
on macroscale
just wondering when all my atoms
are going to pop away into oblivion.

Chopping and Carving

I can at least say that I’m trying to understand your situation, can’t I? It’s not like I’m just throwing a life preserver from the edge of the dock and telling you to swim in its general direction. I mean, I’m practically carving a canoe from a tree I just chopped down and hauled to shore.

Oh, by the way, all I could find for chopping and carving was a crappy old serrated kitchen knife. I hope you’re happy. Look how miserable you’ve just made me and tell me that you don’t find any satisfaction in that.

Distraught and Laughing

Theirs
is a sense
of foreboding pain,

nothing I can describe
without beginning
to seize uncontrollably
until the dogs find me,

distraught and laughing,

rolling in the gutter,
where I don’t remember winding up.

Different Chords (Audibly Restless

I leapt through a series of otherwise meaningless hoops (bald, scorpion, mating ritual-oriented, etc.) before I could contextualize what the hell my actions even meant to me and to those within my immediate surroundings. And do you know what I discovered? You’ll be surprised to learn that absolutely nothing could have been derived from those actions aside from pain and rather tedious boredom! No matter how many labels I ascribed to my life, I still longed for the time where everything was laid out before me in ribbons, streaking across the sky and peppering my vision like pigeons flying above the public library (only pooping periodically, and never on the periodicals), laying my track before me. I had once been content to wander and follow the striped ground, but then the stripes grew apart and I could no longer passively traipse through my existence. It had become clear that I needed to select a distinct path, and I splintered my psyche into several different chords (audibly restless, confused and frustrated). My body grew apart from my mind and I lost that once common-sense connection that allowed me to exist in the same space as others of my species.

And now I wait for my paths to converge once more, so I may mend my fragmented soul and take part in that wholesale charade that most humans call real life.

Up River, Looking

Left by the wayside with a pincushion in my mouth and an unwavering desire to turn into a penguin of some sort, I ripped a stitch from a feathered cap and unraveled the entirety of my surroundings one garment at a time. I went up to a gentleman (at least a man who appeared to exhibit gentle qualities) and ripped the chapeau from his head, forgetting that I’d already altered a head-covering. I then apologized for my amateur mistake and replaced the hat (though not without feeling the material and guessing where it was made (before reading the tag: Sri Lanka). I looked around for a scarf, but there were no ladies of suitable standing from whom I could steal such a regal accoutrement. I was puzzled, and decided that I hadn’t quite reached shirt territory without at least finding my first scarf. I then began to wander aimlessly across the plaza, wondering if I would ever find a scarf (considering the blistering summer heat). I grew weary (considering the blistering summer heat) and sought a resting place. The first patch of shade I found was located six hundred and forty-seven yards away from my initial realization of fatigue, and it sure took me a long time to reach it (a lone willow tree by a dried up river, looking rather droopy and not at all in the mood to shelter a tired traveler). I took a seat under the boughs and noticed a fine lady of royal standing resting just two meters to my right, scarf and all. Taking the situation into account, I made a snap judgment and grabbed the fabled garment. My grabbing was quite forceful and I awoke her from her light sleep. She gurgled and rolled her eyes while appearing to doubt my very existence. She seemed to accept her position as the victim in this position, letting me gradually unwrap this intricate (and obviously valuable) scarf. It took me four minutes to remove the garment, which measured seventeen feet (give or take a yard). I said a quick “thank you” and scurried off, not rested after my arduous journey, but nevertheless energized by this encounter.