Broken symbols
Align on my walls,
Superstitious charms
Left out to ward evil,
Magic fortune cards
To warn of danger,
Prove useless to me
When depression comes.

No amount of luck,
Can save my skin.
No voodoo magics,
Can change my fate.
I throw salt over my shoulder
To keep foreign demons away.
I clutch my knot and eye
To keep my own monsters down.

They all are false,
These dark beliefs.
Or else, I’d sell my soul
For good things to be.
If I had not lost faith
In these childish things,
I’d pray to the gods
For better luck.

Is this what death is?
I do not move;
I do not stand;
I can not see;
Nor hear, nor taste.
There is only physical sensation.

There is no color,
Not even black or white;
Just space, but maybe not.
What vastness could there be,
In reality or fantasy?
So this place must not exist.

But what was that?
The bump upon my leg.
Could it be another life?
Or is it just simply a touch?
Is anything else alive here?
Can I prove that I am?

What if I am just
Another sensation in the sea ?
Brushing against other "feels”
What if I am just a wind,
A feeling upon a larger thing?
Just a random impulse on some plane.

Can I prove that I am?
What if I am not?
Does it matter at all?
Touch is all there is.
Should I ponder upon these?
Or should I just blend in?

I never sleep well;
Thumping, banging, hammering
Ringing in my head.

Pointless little thoughts,
Rubbing themselves on my brain,
Teasing my conscious.

Dreams float on the wind,
Going in my ears, then out,
Leaving mystic clouds.

Like happy songbirds
Singing on a summer’s day,
They call out my name.

Plain curiosity cries
For fulfillment in the dark,
Making child wander.

Wild dogs, cats and trees
Scratching at the door in play,
Bidding me outside .

There’s a party there,
In the land of the sleepless.
One that’s still awake.

With lights and music.
Ever-flowing drinks and food
Keeps them satisfied.

I can’t go to sleep,
And waste eight hours of life.
I stay up again.

Listening to night,
As it slowly turns to day.
The party runs on.

I can write haikus
Without the least bit trouble,
And with quite some skill.

Couplets are not too hard either for me
They are energetic and flow easy.

It’s not very difficult at all
To bring laughs big and small
With limericks clever
But the reader never
Sees past his mental wall.

Cause everyone wants to see free verse.
***** blank verse and sonnets;
They are much too ancient to give a **** about.

But personally,
I like to write patterns
And pictures,
And various forms galore.
I measure each stanza
With mathematical perfection
And streamlined beauty.
It was with ultimate mechanical accuracy
That I wrote my pieces,
But it seems no one cares to read
poems like that anymore.

So cut rhyme scheme
And syllable counting
And rhythm
And tempo
And iambic meter
And metaphor
And reason
And purpose
And stanzas
And lines
And words

Scratch it all out
Until even a hung-over
Shaking hand
Can write “poetry

Crawling upon the ground,
Black specks like train cars
Fall in line
One by one
Carrying their loads
Of prisoners,
Supplies,
And food.
To feed a thousand mouths,
To support the machine.
Carrying gifts,
And wonders from far lands
To bring before the queen.
The train moves on,
Stretching over vast
Miniscule plains.

Like a conveyer belt,
The black lines
Run their circuits,
Picking up pieces,
And carrying them back .
Day in,
And Day out
Until,
One of them says
“Enough!
I won’t be worm meat
Any more.
I won’t go out in the open
To meet my doom,
To work for the good of others.
I will go out and make my life
Elsewhere.”

A thousand eyes,
Each with a thousand pupils
All turn to look at the
Ignorant
Idealist
From a million perspectives.
Nothing is said,
Just a multitude of blank stares
Until the loner
Mutters a quick
“sorry”,
And joins back in line,
Just as things have always been.

A scuffed black mastiff entered stage left
Grumbling, growling, it pulled on its chain
It wretched and snarled, screaming for release
But it was beaten back by faceless master
It looked upon the watchers with eye of hell
Blood dripped from fresh made cuts and welts
There would be vengeance, the creature thought
As with hate, it looked toward the west

In stage right was a victim of a vicious world
A slave, a prisoner, beaten to the verge of death
A man once noble and just, forced into action
To protect all he had, he stole the bread
To prevent starvation, he fought authority
And now he was sentenced to humiliating decay
He would become the star of a roman play
That would be the last scene he’d perform

An order was given and the hound released
The dog was allowed to fill itself on the feast
Like death rising from below, the mastiff struck
Sinking razors into sweet warm muscled flesh
With back on the ground, the slave did not fight
And the mutt was confused by such a stance
Expecting a fight from his opponent, it waited
It waited with suspicion of the imminent strike

But the last flailing lashes would not fall
The transgressor would not fight one of his own
He saw in the beast, the same eyes as his son
And he understood the frustration of the beaten
The slave would not blame the simple dog
For his own faults, and the evils of the master
And the dog lessened the brutal assault it laid
Knowing that the one on the ground was friend
With dignity, they rose from the dirt together

The senators pondered as they looked on
The reason for the bond seemingly impossible
The lord infuriated ranted to his guards
Over such a refusal to die for the empire
The poor, the hungry, the oppressed rose
They fought back, chanting “We know why”
Why the man went to sleep with the dogs
He went to bed to be rid of the fleas

There’s a piano in the corner;
It’s lonely tonight.
It thinks that it’s worthless,
Sitting there without a player,
And it’s one joy in the world,
Making notes flow
Through open ears and minds,
Making the people dance,
And be merry,
But the music won’t come.

It sits there in the home,
Waiting for a master,
To play through its scales,
To run his hand over its keys,
To make it feel warm,
And precious,
And cherished as is.
But the master is gone,
Leaving it to grow dust.

The master left long ago,
Jumping the train to Chicago
To go where the real talent lies,
Where other pianos play,
Nicer tones and smoother melodies,
Where he can make a new life,
Among the stars and the bars,
Leaving behind all the old.

So the piano sits there,
And out of sympathy,
I go to it,
And play a few notes.
Not like the master would,
But still better than none,
And it says a happy
“Thank you”,
As I run my fingers down the keys