In the great withered dugs
Of Holy Mother Church
I was taught to beg God’s forgiveness
For my transgressions
Real, imagined, or only aspired to
But really, I thought,
For the sheer gall of living
For the audacity of human-ness
For the clear inexcusable lack
Of appreciation for the
Perversity of existence
As humanity
Of which I was but one
Paltry example
Now I know it’s
Not God who can forgive
But only I
For the willfulness
Of falling for that
I’ve been feeling like I need to expand my horizons lately. I mostly write autobiographical, not to say confessional, poems. I’m a great admirer of other people’s narrative poems, and I like the idea of the freedom a fictional setting can afford. So, here’s an attempt.
A tavern, so right, so clean, every chair in its place,
every light bulb unflickering bright,
every floor swept relentlessly:
This is where he comes
every day,
tie straight, collar clean,
shoes shined to piercing,
until every crumb has been consumed,
every glass empty,
and he stands, checks his trousers,
and walks, stately,
to the mens room,
slides the lock to,
and dances wildly to the mirror,
his best and only lover.
Through the train window
Flashing eternity
Rolling, rolling, rolling
The hillsides by.
Later, I’ll say
I’ve been there,
Traveled through that place
Convinced and mystified.
Later still, I’ll return
And say
That’s not how it was
All skewed and modified
By isolation from memory
Disappointed
By lack of congruity
Deflated
By the irrefutable
I know you might say
Upon glancing my way,
“If you’re such a poet,
Why don’t you show it?
There’s not a rhyme anywhere
In your usual fare,”
And for this I extend my apology.
I offer this sop
To prove I’m no fop
In the hope you’ll accept
That at rhyme I’m adept.
To ensure that you’ll like it,
With humor I’ll spike it,
And fill it with gosh and oh, golly, gee.
Burma Shave
I
You are meaningless, it is said,
without those who went before
in whose long shadows you strive,
in whose helix you twine
inextricably.
Ghosts, you call them,
wraiths with no claim to substance,
until, in a mirror,
you see them bounding through
your fate,
great feet tramping up the path
you thought was yours alone.
How can you be so like them?
How can it have gone unnoticed
so long?
Is nothing left to separate you?
II
Fine, let’s have it, then.
I’ll be the last witness
to poll the seasons.
But you’ve lost your will
to power, haven’t you?
Would you think your
reflection grotesque, off-putting,
if you saw me now?
Would you see an empty mask,
devoid of all you held dear?
As you wish.
We are both powerless
to divine our true meaning.
exiles child 