poetry smokes
Posted: May 27th, 2010, 3:42 am
poetry is smoking down by the tracks
the little reasons for being take a drag
the writer of silent words blows on them
this way they take on some slight scant
where was a time when clowns spoke
as they mumble why they can't
and said exactly what they did not mean
and meant mostly what they did not say
poetry is singing to the dead spaces
to the lost faces and the forgotten places
between heaven and hell and forever never
the almost dead leaves sing to wind and rain
the train has been coming since thought cried
between the written things that tried so long
to persuade us to listen to their hollow sounds
so many voices that cancel themselves out
in the din of disaster cast past the railroad signal
there is a sad rhythm that gathers all the mutter
what flutters fluttered and what flaps goes flapping
churns all the utter dregs at the bottom of the sea
that dances down the rut and rudder in curses suck
and grunts ripping rags of rattling rambles dabble
the whole preamble before the thunder tares a door
off the sky the flash of light almost angel almost moon
they clap at the craps and collapse the great pearly gates
and all the while tribulation rings like a staggering gutter
down the dirty little dice of what is not even nice thrice
gambled on the better sides of our other nature's damn
shadow self hidden under garments of gloom and haste
oh the taste of the carnival water left in pools of hobo masks
floating in reflections of blue infinities and eternities night stars
the ripped to shreds devil costumes of all yesterday's parties
smarties thought they had a theater of marvelous madness
and the sad clown poet sweeps up the broken candy hearts
and the tears left by the clouds that once were elephants
and ferrous wheels up above, and the faded crowds below
paradise milk spilled love in the garbage gardens on the edge
of philosopher's town all the grand galleries of that hapless frown
all the empty nowhere stops along the way, a long way from home
and nothing and time never lived there where you call it that
and all the laughter that drifted from secret to secret joke to joke
alley cat to cat alley all the broken little candy hearts swept poet
the little reasons for being take a drag
the writer of silent words blows on them
this way they take on some slight scant
where was a time when clowns spoke
as they mumble why they can't
and said exactly what they did not mean
and meant mostly what they did not say
poetry is singing to the dead spaces
to the lost faces and the forgotten places
between heaven and hell and forever never
the almost dead leaves sing to wind and rain
the train has been coming since thought cried
between the written things that tried so long
to persuade us to listen to their hollow sounds
so many voices that cancel themselves out
in the din of disaster cast past the railroad signal
there is a sad rhythm that gathers all the mutter
what flutters fluttered and what flaps goes flapping
churns all the utter dregs at the bottom of the sea
that dances down the rut and rudder in curses suck
and grunts ripping rags of rattling rambles dabble
the whole preamble before the thunder tares a door
off the sky the flash of light almost angel almost moon
they clap at the craps and collapse the great pearly gates
and all the while tribulation rings like a staggering gutter
down the dirty little dice of what is not even nice thrice
gambled on the better sides of our other nature's damn
shadow self hidden under garments of gloom and haste
oh the taste of the carnival water left in pools of hobo masks
floating in reflections of blue infinities and eternities night stars
the ripped to shreds devil costumes of all yesterday's parties
smarties thought they had a theater of marvelous madness
and the sad clown poet sweeps up the broken candy hearts
and the tears left by the clouds that once were elephants
and ferrous wheels up above, and the faded crowds below
paradise milk spilled love in the garbage gardens on the edge
of philosopher's town all the grand galleries of that hapless frown
all the empty nowhere stops along the way, a long way from home
and nothing and time never lived there where you call it that
and all the laughter that drifted from secret to secret joke to joke
alley cat to cat alley all the broken little candy hearts swept poet