Poems

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Assessment

Images are not for me.

They're difficult to do.

My rhythms that seem stable

Much too frequently fall thru -

The problem being I know where

The stresses ought to fall

While strangers to the poem

Are naïve and that is all.

Language that is musical

The inner senses hear.

My poems have no music - my

Poetical tin ear.

It seems my only asset in

The realm of poesy

Is that all words and any words

Seem to work for me.

6-23-13

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In Denny's

Death eradicates the point of feeling,

Society a crumbling artifice,

Bleakly staring into the enigma

Knowing there is nothing to tomorrow.

Gentle love. There is no other kind.

Do I need familiarity?
Why do people want togetherness?

Holding hands. Then they all fall down.

The harpies howl. The banshees take the night.

Nonsense! There is nothing but the air.

And silence like the everlasting tomb.

I don't want to think about that now.

6-23-13

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I just read some verse

I just read some verse by Joseph Hart.

He implies policemen are corrupt.

Doesn't every black man feel the same?

He thinks psychiatry is all a sham

That does more harm than good while getting rich.

That seems to be the common understanding.

He waterboards Republicans

And wishes them to hell.

No one but the rich would disagree.

He doesn't have a decent thing to say

For homophobes and Christians. Gandhi did?

He calls Americans ridiculous,

Philistines who monger violence.

That is the opinion of the world.

If Joe McCarthy hears of this, he's through.

6-24-13

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Awake

I'm too long without sleep.

Has it been a week?

I must go to bed except

Sleeping doesn't help.

Sitting with a poem

Propped between my fingers,

I fall asleep and do not wake

Until the waitress comes.

But as the situation

Relinquishes control,

My verse is more articulate
And I am getting sane.

Edna's little elegies,

Unrequited loves,

And bittersweet romances

Are very gently fragile.

I'm tired of writing poems.

I want to go to sleep.

But verse continues coming.

Don't shut the faucet off.

6-23-13

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Home

I've lived here 30 years.

The day that I moved in

Ushered by my parents

I didn't think it home.

And every year thereafter,

Even with them dead,

It was just a house.

Then tonight you said,

“The kitten is our darling.”
And now it seems a home.

6-23-13

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Routines

Everyone his hamster wheel -

Everyone his rut -

Each of us a Sisyphus -

Republicans just strut -

Particularly Christians

Whose big redundancies

Are hollering for heads and praying

To their deities.

6-23-12

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The Graveyard Waitress

Pleasant, sweet and cheerful,

Distant and polite,

Frequently she waits on me

In Denny's late at night.

I offered her a book I wrote.

And I never heard

If she liked the poems

Or even read a word.

There's a wall between us.

From her forehead to her shoes

Like the ancient mariner

She's covered with tattoos.

6-23-13

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Some Good Men

Some good men are Christian.

Some good men are black.

Some good men are Yankees.

Some good men are gay.

But the ones who play good music

Are snobs upon the hill

Who never come to Denny's

And who'd drive those fools away!

6-23-13

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The Unwelcome Waitress

If that woman smiles at me

Again, I'll strangle her.

I saw her shoot an angry look

Because I won't react.

America's obsession with

All rituals and fads

And mandatory friendliness

To people on the street

Is not the way I look at things.

I'm not here by choice.

And her determination to

Wrest love from total strangers

Is going to be defeated.

I don't like her, and I will

Not yield to her imperative -

A taunt in camouflage.

6-23-13

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The Poetry Machine

Why do I write poesy?
I am a machine -

A poetry machine plugged in

When I was 17.

I continue writing
And have for 50 years,

Sane or psycho, rental paid

To date or in arrears.

It seems that I've destroyed

More verses than I wrote

And kept so very few, and those

Of very little note.

A lover in my blankets

Hesitantly tugged.

“Couldn't you stop writing?”

“No. I haven't been unplugged.”

Hence my lucubration

In each successive night.

I hate my dreary poesy,

And nonetheless I write.

The only time I don't

Loathe it with such spite

Is reading it in Denny's.

It's something in the light.

6-23-13