Poems: 220921 - September 22nd, 2021

[Robert Morpheal]

160921A

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Misery of flesh 

and misery of water 

if she were here

her beauty 

could turn it to wine. 

She was a miracle

with a high price tag

constructed from pieces

of whatever it was

that was now popular. 

Can't find anything 

of the old religion

don't understand 

any of the new 

don't want the truth. 

Had that before 

and it was the truth

that wasn't really true 

but everyone believed it

served their purpose. 

Too many brushes

with too much death 

been so hard to wash

the war paint off 

streaked rainbow shades. 

Only another category 

pretends at wanted 

but never really in 

on that competition 

of segregated shades. 

Colour never matters

it is all black and white 

when it goes into print 

adding a few stories

to a comic book life. 

Nothing really exists 

that you don't have to fight

for or against 

but everyone wants to win

at something or other. 

It isn't anything 

anyone ever said 

but it always goes

without the saying 

to another sort of alone. 

This isn't happiness 

this isn't death 

not knowing anything 

that the others know 

when it gets pulled down. 

Down it all goes

and you fall away 

not wanting any more

of nothing happening 

and nothing left to say. 

---------------------------- 

170921A

------------ 

Just another piece 

that can play no part

in the big puzzle. 

Thought it a wild card

but it doesn't fit 

anywhere, anyhow. 

The misled misdeal  

of all those years 

turned to penny ante. 

No winning hand 

and not in any game 

I wanted to play. 

The swept aside 

and the swept up 

clouded grit and dust. 

I confess I wanted

for some better options

same as anyone else. 

Watching the worst 

get the best

of any estimations. 

It is a different idea 

how some play 

favourite pastimes. 

Strange how it turns

nothing to choose 

sight lines of fancy.  

There is no exchange 

of the right looks

with the right eyes. 

Gaze into void 

travels with you 

whenever, wherever. 

No getting in on it

and no getting away 

from it. 

-------------------------

170921B

------------ 

Don't look to me 

in that cruel blaming way :

I don't want to save you. 

You can go now 

and I won't be keeping you 

from selecting an ending. 

I had nothing to do 

with filling in slots 

in the vending machines. 

You can push a button

and it will dispense 

your personal selection. 

We leave saving worlds

to a few official saviours 

who can then take the blame. 

Don't call on me 

I never could be 

and never was your hero. 

No one really saved anything

of any of the good things 

that have all gone away. 

The ones that I really liked

were never constructed 

to last any length of time. 

Someone else responsible

for burying them 

though I am still weeping. 

I didn't really want 

to be nothing but a part 

of their final ceremonies. 

So much that was fragile 

that I wanted to keep 

before it became broken. 

Perhaps there were pieces

ending gathered up 

by professional saviours. 

Don't blame me 

that I was never really 

any part of that plan. 

------------------------  

180921A

------------  

You walk around 

made as invisible 

as what stands behind 

an illuminated billboard. 

It is that flashy bit 

that gets in the way 

same as a slow motion 

sort of fatality. 

You crash a party 

around the Chalk Circle 

trying to collect and decipher

your own clues. 

Having no control 

over the messages sent

but you can put blame

on a face or a wardrobe. 

How to find any sway

to ransom yourself 

from kidnappers 

who hold you hostage. 

If only you knew how 

to merch yourself out 

the way rock stars do it

into vintage memorabilia. 

You don't really know 

what the right swag is 

or what rules to break 

in order to become famous. 

Same as it ever was 

would be the litany

in an endless succession 

of escalating demands. 

It costs more now

than you ever imagined 

and the skill testing question

has already timed out. 

It isn't your name 

that is in that envelope 

where they draw names

of winning contestants. 

It seems you never won

at anything really 

and the only ones loved

are in fact winners. 

Cannot start a conversation

being left out 

on someone's far margin 

and maybe it is too late. 

Life is that chemistry 

labelled endlessly 

toxic, corrosive, reactive 

and lacking real substance. 

Substance seems everything 

if you happen to have 

the right substances 

you too can be popular. 

We are only chemistry 

unable to formulate 

real chemical bonds 

to keep anything together. 

-------------------------------- 

210921A

------------ 

A hatred of dreaming 

comes from the fact

there is never anyone there

whom one really wants 

to know or make love to. 

Dreams are no longer 

something made for us 

but only discontent 

bringing chagrin 

of dead possibilities. 

No one comes that close  

with their eyes closed 

that it would be anything

more than passes

at street corners. 

Concrete times 

spreads out pages 

slab, post, connected lines

broken thousands 

of repeating spaces.

An ancient compositor 

that laid down the type

face of the universe

before final copy 

went to print. 

Stories of never tell 

and secret show boats

drifting waters  

of the never know 

by invitations only. 

What will anyone think

about the gone over

into the strange 

where the pain dwells 

outside the ending.

Roll up those windows 

lock those doors 

at the junction lights 

avoiding of pan handlers

and sales pitch whores. 

Knee jerk reactions 

evasively usual species

common contaminants 

strategic placements

for maximizing fear. 

Freedoms changed

to terror of something

becoming lost 

never found again 

and never the same. 

Identical ice 

that no one breaks

circulating naughty 

letters to plastic Santas

at the melt away poles.

Rock candy colours 

clown the salty 

sand licks of beached

combing out the long

high tide markers. 

No way to reconcile

with the elements 

and the four quarters

endlessly pulling 

everything apart. 

You stretched me 

until I fractured 

along the vertical 

and the horizontal 

modes of hold. 

--------------------

220921A

-----------

You're another wreck 

that never came in 

from what's gone cold 

and it is all gone cold 

every way it shakes. 

Another tremor 

in another shake up 

makes demands

for too much faith

in losing propositions. 

My eyes are melting 

the way they melt

remnants of icicle 

life loosely passing 

as maybe lived. 

They teach goodbye 

until we forget 

how to say hello 

being only numbers

too easily erased

from consideration. 

Tick mark self 

identifies our confines

into little boxes 

becoming whatever 

we choose to betray. 

Authenticity becomes

another frail pretense 

at scavenging 

some additional means

of attraction. 

Some silly words

no one believes

until shots are fired

and something falls

from a bloodied sky. 

Vestigial wings 

inside a skin bag 

never got as far 

as a pluck of feathers

strewn pillow fight. 

Flutter sticks 

trying for the Moon

find she is gone 

to another slice

another time. 

Friends you thought

looking up

weren't really yours

but you collected them

as contraband. 

Smuggled yourself

through a few doors 

as if belonging 

the way a stunt actor 

plays a star's role. 

Tried to sell 

yourself to anything

black marketing

a lemonade stand 

deranged state of mind. 

Wasn't more real

when you fell out

than when you fell in

catch yourself hooked

lines and sinkers. 

Need various permits

to come and go 

seedy and soured

in that last suit 

from the last tailor. 

Those hollow places

you can never fill 

with the came and went

made impressions

as a footprint does. 

I'm not the sort of face

you tend to remember 

and you're the sort of name 

I very soon forget 

makes up the tune of it. 

---------------------------- 

220921B

------------ 

Ironed myself out

pressing creases 

along the folds 

of a discard flesh. 

Inserted stiffeners 

applying a celluloid 

rigid sort of collar 

button down life. 

A turn for the worse 

and no magic bullet

that can assassinate

any desires. 

Now you tell me

you don't want

a once mechanical

working stiff. 

Various neck ties

serving as tourniquets

stopping fantasies

from bleeding out.  

Pencils were once 

stubby phallic symbols

sharpened in a hole

and needed to be pushed.

Becomes obsolescence 

technically replaced

by rubber toys 

made more efficient. 

Rusted arms 

dangling from sockets

propped up 

in the display case. 

The feelings gone 

from extremities 

due to the duration

of prolonged misuse. 

A museum piece 

labelled frustration

in a controlled climate 

of continual change. 

I wanted to be

the fragile girl 

who only dances 

with the other girls.

The small bulges 

of breasts nippled 

with cravings

for softer promises. 

A  sweet soft 

minded confection

giving up

all the hard moves. 

I wanted to escape 

the cold hard facts

of being a prisoner

to my anatomy. 

-------------------

We live in countless different prisons, of varying sorts, that we can never escape. Some of them we try to build, and even sometimes succeed in building to escape others. Some are more successful at that than others, and some are never really successful at it at all. Most of what we tend to do are escape attempts. The attempts to gain the experience of what we cannot experience. The attempts to know what we cannot really know. The attempts to have a chance to do what we cannot ever really do. Countless different escape attempts all defiant of our horrifying limitations. We even write on our walls the way the Marquis de Sade wrote on his.  Of course we can imagine, using our incredible imaginations, what our own personal freedom could really be like. That too imprisons us because imagining anything is another prison that we then try to break out of, so as to know a reality.  A reality we might never actually have any chance to actually know.