Poetry

Most poetry is sitting in plain sight—

a cigarette on the lips of a line cook, 

skateboarders rattling on the bricks as they glide past Seattle Central,

shepherds’ purse and kale growing in the sidewalk seams

In spite of this abundance 

my eyes turned milky,

cataracts shielding me from the beauty of the world:

a nursing mother bent over her baby hidden by a blanket,

sticky beer rings on an amber table,

driver of bus #358, ever treating drunks with dignity 

now even the most poetic image doesn’t stir me

I’m a dead man sleepwalking through the living

I want and take and have and want again

ears stopped against the cries of the hurting

But I ran through fields with burrs on my hem

Slept with my arms cradling mastiffs

Saw the glowing algae by moonlight

Swam naked

Was robbed, drunk, robbed again

Possessed of an urgent question 

and a delicate flower of pain 

all that was a long time ago, I remember,

when I used to memorize Eliot and Keats…

but don’t worry too much about any of this

 

I’ll just reach for my phone 

one more time

before I fall asleep