Shutdown

Poesy

While I am alive

And after I am dead,

I only have my poesy,

To write and to be read.

The cats are very small

And gently soft to touch,

And usually asleep.

But is this very much?

The house is very hot.

The curtains are apart.

I only ever wanted

To write like Larry Hart.

I was betrothed to Keats,

But now the wedding's off.

The Poet Prince of England

Who made the critics scoff.

Edna is a gem

To wear upon a chain.

Edna disappeared.

What other bards remain?

11-13-13

 

The Tempest

What is the word -

Where is the pill -

To calm the tempest?

Be still. Be still.

Soothed by a kitten,

The sea, a shell -

Life is too long

To live in hell.

Love is more

Than a game of chance.

There's no spell.

There's no trance.

My mother prayed,

But she could not sing.

Like Cordelia,

I love the king.

11-14-12

The Tattooed Man

Sitting in Denny's

Covertly I scan

A man in colors,

A tattooed man.

He seems contented.

He seems at peace.

A happy spirit

Has found release.

11-14-13

 

Shutdown

This is the morning

Of the day

Congress intended

To find a way

To stay in business

And circumvent

A shutdown of

The government.

In a hour

There'll be news

Whether the sick

And old will lose.

11-14-13

 

The Music In Denny's

It seems that every night I come

To Denny's where the music's dumb,

Less than stupid, abrasive sh-t.

My brain is not inured to it.

Shut it off! Have peace! Be damned!

A thousand years won't make me numb.

And others talk and smile and find

Happiness, and do not mind.

11-14-13

 

Bad Memories

Here's to him who cannot relate

Met by those who humiliate,

Aimed at shrinks and mixed with hate,

Hatred inarticulate.

At a bus stop long ago,

I met a man I did not know.

I was totally mad, and so

He struck me hard, and every blow

He was capable to throw

Left me by the road. And when

I woke up, I phoned in woe

To let me in, please let me in.

The mental hospital said “no”.

11-14-13

 

A Song

He told me I'm ignorant.

Why was he right?

My father once called me naïve.

In all of the world

Understanding's a blight

Because of the things they believe.

I've gone to the doctors

And told them my tale.

And I was considered an ass.

I'd rather be loved

Seven times without fail

Before I lie under the grass.

People know people,

The world and its ways.

I really know nothing at all.

I sit in my loneliness

Conjuring lays.

I'm better than I can recall.

He told me it soothes him

To hear in his sleep

The sound of me typing beside him.

It comforts me also

To hear him breath deep,

Asleep in the shadows that hide him.

11-14-13