Lost Poems

As it is my usual custom during retrogrades of planet Mercury, I review some aspect, documentation or record of my past. This last time I perused some tattered, dog eared notebooks of poetry. There were no dates noted and I really have no idea when I wrote any of this except to say that the three poems that follow are at least 15 years old. This was around the time of the deaths of my parents and the birth of my daughter. It was a time when the circle of life was making itself painfully apparent and the skin covering my nerve endings and heart strings was diaphanously thin. I think I can now look back on that guy who wrote these poems and constantly wondered 'What the hell am I supposed to do now?' and say 'Everything is going to be fine, pal. You are stronger than you know. Now pick up that pen and write your fucking heart out.'

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I'm not going to write any poetry today

instead just sit in my silence

while flames ooze from every pore

like an angry God at the height of Hades

casting dispersions down from my realm

onto the unsuspecting heads of passersby

who can't read anyway. 

So I'm not going to write any fucking poetry

as if anyone cares if I implode

and scatter my ashes upon the graves

of a million untold songs

verses adrift in a sea of confusion

and admonishments of a million untold loves

Give me one good reason

to put pen to paper and bleed through the tip

Give me one short sighting

of the difference I could make

by sharing this song

that I have never sung

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Prayer for a Malignant World

In your eyes you see castles

populated with corpses

as stepping stones of the imperial

Cast in mortar fire

screaming your orgasms

and boundaries that stop 

at the human soul

except to tear it from it's home

I pray for your fortitude and realization

to suffice the indecency of your ways

and courage to turn aface

clocking the decades deceased

and need for retribution

that awaits at the end of a climb

stretched out before

that calls for your footsteps

transpiring in ascendancy

while your name

is accursed in hell. 

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There is a cancer

that rests its head

on a plague

content to lie 

dormant and festering

Distant shouting

heard the bystanders

from beyond the parade

were distracted

by the call

away from the tapping

of finite rhythms

Cascades of our revelry

blew in the wind

like streamers tattered

by violence

Protests of glory

ashamed

of our rapture

by the snarling web

of transcendence

Lessons forgotten

from our last indoctrination

destined to be repeated

in the next

Bravado and cowardice

go hand in hand it seems

lighting the path

of the ignorant

Beams of radiance

flicker through tarnish

paling its glory

before time went astray

misplacing its youth

into the hands of a sinner

No one could blame you

for this deposit

in time for cocks crow

Understand

that I died

when I found you

coiled up in this misery

ready to strike

at the demons and darkness

enshrouding your soul

To me

you appear blameless

Crowning this human

beyond your control

in a rabid display

of affection

you lost the courage

to bear your nude skin

Righteous, heartless, deceased and divine

Play this life out

in a full circle

we come back 

to the start

of this malaise

all over again

this time 

I pray

it begins 

with a light

All my love always,

Max