Purely Random
A flaming eye of the creator shoots a spear of fire into the chaos.
Heaven and earth are zapped into place.
A very special spark ignites some lumps of clay into humanity.
Imagine that as you lie in bed, reading the newspaper
as best you can, what with one arm attached to an endless drip,
oxygen force-feeding your lungs
and a monitor behind your right ear
converting your life into beeps.
Some accidents acquire such impossible dimensions. A car drifting over the center lane, a meteor zooming through space. It's all part of the same randomness though of course, it's no help.
The priest has been by
for your daily dose of eternity.
He's as useless as the pills that the nurses
pop into your drowsy mouth.
Or the doctor
as he peruses your chart,
knows as well as you do
that your molecules are done for.
Forget medicine.
To perpetuate life,
minuscule triggers float in the air,
are sprinkled across the earth's surface
or are finely circulated in the belly of dark water.
They're not fussy.
They're not you.
A Young Girl Dancing In The Rain
The sun's warmth is caught in rain's crossfire.
An innocence blossoms
like a flower
lapping up the falling liquid,
holding on
with gentle floating petals,
every now and then
pinioning on one foot
and tasting.
Mother nature doesn't
achieve its expected results.
It drove some in
but this one stayed.
Her big eyes keep pace
with the trickle down her cheeks.
Clouds lift
and a drying smile shines through
The swaying bridge,
the leaden barges of the river,
and a young girl
throwing off her shoes
and dancing -
like a beat writer
coming upon an unexpected story,
I cover this for poetry.
The Drugs!
She misses being sick
because of those drugs the doctor prescribed.
They took her out of how bad she felt,
and then barely paused on regular
before they shot her out into
the stratosphere like a cannonball,
where she could brighten and prosper
in the clouds that hugged the stars.
Rumor has it she was near death
before she roared back beyond life,
into the realm of chemicals
that reconvene the senses
in some far corner of the universe,
for spa treatment, rave party
and thrill-a-minute tour of the milky way.
She says she never felt so good
as when she never felt so bad.
Now she’s back to normal.
She’s slowly adjusting to it.
Too bad there is no cure.
My Territory
Whatever’s flying could be bird or bat.
Or an insect. Or a ghost bearing a phantom candle.
I’m stuck in the same spot like a limpet.
On a cobblestone street, I reach down for
half of a water-stained letter and read on.
An exhausted female, not so young.
A man with flat feet and hopeless.
They reach out for each other through me.
But their message lodges in my duodenum
and there it stays.
This is nothing that is not in my nature.
I am terrestrial. I don’t move from my latitude.
On this spot, amid these weeds, I am Lord.
So, if you want me, come into my house.
Or my castle. Share these weeds with me.
Whatever’s flying could be the good sister.
Or the fellowship of man. Or a rumor.
Or a memory. Effecto secuto.
I am here filling my cups. Or smashing
a wall with my fist. Waxing and waning.
There are cracks in the pavement of course.
But not large enough for me to fall into.
And there is bitterness. And spikes through
some body parts. Apoplexy without apology.
And beer cans to be emptied and crushed.
Come see me, the guy with his ass in the chair,
his feet up on the table. I’m am a sporting gentlemen
if crushing ants can be considered a sport.
I don’t value myself as much as recognize my situation.
And there are sins, heavy enough to keep me grounded.
From Yesteryear
You retain your eyes
quaking in white sun
as a honey-colored butterfly,
wind under wing,
quivers on a purple petal.
You savor your childhood
in a flit from bud to bud,
a memory landscape
recreated in the now,
with the addition of goldenrods
and distant mountains.
From your veranda,
you overhear many images
speaking at once,
from swallow swoop
to half dreams of fading light.
Your day is a burnishing of
converging times, fragrant
and nostalgic, long ago and
within reach, a flagrant case
of reverse myopia.
ABOUT THE POET
John Grey is an Australian poet, US resident, recently published in New World Writing, North Dakota Quarterly and Tenth Muse. Latest books: Between Two Fires, Covert and Memory Outside The Head are available through Amazon. Work upcoming in Haight-Ashbury Literary Journal, Birmingham Arts Journal, La Presa and Shot Glass Journal.
About the Author
