Unpopular Opinions

Rock Star


I wrote a hard rock musical.
It gave me great success.
Then I wrote another,
Which the public rose to bless.
Finally I thought,
I resignedly confess,
I'm done with this unpleasant
And constricting mess.
If they wish their infancy
Again, let them regress.
There's something more then this
To be imagined, to express.
 So I wrote an opera.
Trained to a degree,
It made another genre's
Hero out of me.
And as for all the rock I wrote -
Bury it at sea.


3-23-14

Ten Books


Nine books of poems
And a single book of prose.
These are all I love
Of what I've written,
And some of them from
Very long ago.
I've written poems later
That are good or maybe better,
Scattered throughout over 80 books.
Some of these I love as much as any.
To weed this massive garden,
Pluck the flowers from the thorns,
And gather them together in one book,
And fling the refuse out into the sea
To settle like forgotten mariners.
I write poems now.  I'm almost glib.
But these nine books were
Efforts from the heart.

Thirty Years


Thirty years in prison
For a thing he didn't do.
Thirty years in prison
Only waiting for parole.
Thirty year in prison
With the hatred and the pain
Building up like lava in his soul.
Then the day.  He sat before the panel,
Passive, noncommittal.  He just stared.
Then at last a wise and holy man
Asked him, “Are you sorry for your crime?
When you face your god, will you repent?”
Each question like a shaft sank
Ever deeper in his heart.
Then he spoke.
“You shit, I wasn't guilty!”
The board stood up and left,
And he was taken to his cell.
He would have stayed another 30 years,
Except he died before the time was up.


3-23-14

Shostakovitch


I like Shostakovitch too
Except his louds are deafening,
His softs inaudible,
And he switches back and forth
Without the least suspicion.
I run from seat to stereo
And back again incessantly
To turn the volume up or down,
And never find a satisfying,
Tolerable place.


3-23-14

Unpopular Opinions


Rachmaninoff and Shostakovitch
Are the only great ones
In music since the 19th Century.
Berg was outright odious
And died of syphilis.
Maybe Ives could sell a policy.
Stravinsky wrote “The Rite of Spring”.
Prokofiev PCs.
And that is everybody
Who wrote anything at all.
“Overture on Hebrew Themes.”
“Lt. Kije”.  Two 
Small evergreens
Prokofiev imagined.
If they hadn't tried so to be new.
And Tchaikovsky just before them
Couldn't write an opera.
Nor could Mozart.
Music is a butterfly that lights
Without prediction,
Common sense or justice
Just before it flies away forever.


3-23-14

Money


I wish that I could do
Something with my money
Except just pay my bills
Month to weary month.
A check will come the first -
A happiness short lived.
If I buy a thing,
And I am quite impelled to do it,
I'll be stuck before the month is finished.


3-23-14


Staying Young


My sister said that all the world's the same -
Tattoos that will sag when they are 80.
No one's ever 80 anymore.
They're 25 forever.  And the crap
That keeps them young comes from the radio.
Everyone is pretty.  No one's old,
A fate that's even worse than being dead.
Joints that fail, and brains that cease to think.
It seems that Jesus could have thought of that.


3-23-14

Bad Poems


Over 80 books – well, 83 -
I wish I had in manuscript again,
To rid myself of poems that are bad.
Very bad.  Some thoughts are rough and wrong,
And thoughts can very easily be wrong.
9 books and one of prose that make me happy.
And I worked hard to winnow them from life,
Then dropped the stitch and write them as they come.
I wrote the good ones.  Something in me did.
And what it was wrote all the bad ones too.
But among the other 83
Are some poems better than the best,
Little moments of maturity.
The good ones, if they're ever seen at all,
Are my promise of longevity.
And all the good ones written long ago.
Like Lloyd Webber, I did not die then.


3-23-14

Ego


Incessant fusillade of criticism
Until there is no ego left at all,
Just a lot of impulses that fire
Like fireworks into the midnight sky.


Pejoratives and hateful epithets
Smooth the soul until it has no face,
Like a stone beneath incoming waves
That smooth it, then withdraw, then come again.


The mind is not invulnerable to hate
That wishes it were gone.  It never ends.
It lingers till the haters are defunct,
Then finds a refuge in the soul so hated.


3-23-14  

Desultory Stanzas


I read that schizophrenics are
Bizarre and inappropriate -
Social relativity -
But mostly they're unhappy.


A tune is on the radio
From 1969, a song from
Over 40 years ago.  And music
Weirdly calls me back
To days as I was then.


I have a book of poems here -
Some are good and some are bad -
I will not scrap it for the bad -
Named “What is poetry?”


Writing songs of any theme,
Feeling, thought or attitude
Relieves my pressured soul that's squeezed
Among my aging bones.


3-24-14

Tomorrow


Don't think about tomorrow.  It
Will tear your soul to shreds.
Find solutions for today.
Forget about the future.


But that's ignoring consequences,
Things that will most surely come.
There are no answers and no hope
Except make preparations.
Poesy is futile.


3-24-13

If you like my poems, I have collections on Amazon, both paperbacks and Kindles.  The paperbacks are usually $10, the Kindles usually $1.  You can find them by going to Amazon.com, clicking Books on the drop down, and then typing Joseph Hart Poetry in the search bar.