Poem for Sunday, September 13, 2009

I think this might be the final portion of "Coming Down", and I've had a lot of fun with this. It's the longest poem I've ever written (I'll write one longer someday, hopefully). I'm stoked.


"Coming Down" (continued)

X.

Almost down, I tried one last means of
pick-me-up: nitrous oxide in frigid mini-metallic
cannisters. Forty seconds of pure happiness and
             cheek numbing.

If you make a buck and want to squander it on an
ultra-ephemeral escape, go with the         cannisters.
             But, I'm beyond that.

Who am I?
Who am I now, father, mother, brother, grandmother?

The tarnished golden child, perhaps.
     My beautiful Au element has been reduced to what?
          Who cares!

          Who cares?!

Coming down, totally, righteously, I prepare to head
into the concert past you, girl on the concrete steps,
and enjoy my vigil out of 

                        agrarian suburbia.

Icarus's wings caught aflame,
Dionysus got too drunk,
Socrates warned us all (that impious fuck).

The moon still exists, and it's cold, so
never mind that.                   Enough about
                                               celestial bodies!

Under the saline sea, an octopus
reproduces, multitudes of new tentacles and
          opaque defensive ink.

I think of The Beatles first. 

  I think of the Beats second.

When do I think of you and I? Never 

         (it would only
          kill us).

I am a poet.
I am a linguist.
I
want
what's best for humankind.

In         the United States, Canada, Mexico,
            Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay,
            Suriname, Iceland, England,
Ireland, Sweden, Finland,
Norway, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands,
Poland, Austria, Albania, Romania,
            Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Turkey,
            Russia, the Caucuses, India, Saudi
            Arabia, Egypt, Kenya, Sudan, Tanzania,
Nigeria, Congo, Rwanda, South Africa,
Madagascar, Indonesia, Malaysia,
Pakistan, Iraq, Iran, North Korea, South
            Korea, Mongolia, China, Japan, Australia,
            and any other nation or principality
I neglected to mention--
there exists a human struggle.
POETIC struggle.

My function, my sole purpose (according
to the refracting light that I see
behind my blue-green irises) in the name
of               breath, knowledge, and sacredness:
      to represent humanity and poetry. 

I love you all,
      and that's my curse.

I'm still coming down.
I'm still witnessing visions and blunt reality.

Local people, foreign cities, preposterous
dreams, cruel circumstances, love.
I'll consume all of these entities in the
ultimate smoothie of existence (a semi-
Bohemian method)!

Let me drink!
Let me eat!
Let me live!

The Beats would be laughing, telling me to
           go on.

My relatives would be lock-jawed, telling me to
           go on.

I, I, I, I, I!
I, I, I, I, me!

The Athenians still weep over the fires
consuming their land (I haven't
forgotten you).

Olive oil and balsamic vinegar can only go so far.

Here is as far as I'll go, forever:

LOVE stings and burns, but
endure it; it's nothing more than
missing the Greyhound at a mediocre
bus station, after all. 

                              Book your next
                              ticket. Make
                              your next escape.

Breathe glorious, glorious oxygen in the lungs of
EVERYTHING
you want to be 

                        alive.

I
am
down (sober, 

                  reluctant, 

                                 listen).