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Poetry is Pretentious, Melodramatic Junk
Goulet
Posts: 918
Down at the whiskey house, the devil burning my lips,
I coughed a little
and Alvin and Greg tapped my shoulder, as the bartender droned on.
IN FIVE MINUTES TEA TIME.
Greg had got enough heroin
and Alvin had had enough of watching it and they wanted to go.
They did, and to an omniscient narrator I am part of they,
which always upset me.
So all through the whiskey house we rambled looking for a door
or a window or a hole in the wall.
Outside, on 3rd Avenue, I unclenched my buttocks
and thought that if I made it to my apartment tonight I’d write some kind of epic poem.
Some meditation on life,
and wasting life,
and what I thought about death,
and what I thought about God,
and what God thought of me,
and about my parents.
But of course it’s been six years since I’ve written any epic poetry.
I always forget what I wanted to write about
and never know where to put any semi-colons
to break up my thoughts.
Anyways poems, and literature, and books, and fiction, and movies, and television are for fools.
IN FIVE MINUTES TEA TIME.
Greg and Alvin somersault into a taxicab in the gutter,
and I wave goodbye to those two.
Their shadows in the rear window – hand-in-hand,
arm-in-arm, mouth-on-mouth – going on down the lane.
Here again rustling down the sidewalk
in the night,
all the bums telling me to, “Shake it down Chunky.” I give them
all five dollar bills so they can hook up on some crack,
or get turned on by a whore down on Beedling Street.
A man is a man is a man, and there are only ten thousand things to represent life and everything.
So up there,
sitting in your comfortable chair,
does any of this make sense?
I’m walking down some imaginary street,
high on a mix
of drugs and alcohol. I see all this concrete, and cement, and dead grass,
and these snow drifts, and barbershops, and orange rinds, and wedding dress boutiques
beside, under, and near me,
and I can only blink my eyes and in my chest
feel the cadence and beat of the whiskey house jazz.
IN FIVE MINUTES TEA TIME.
I just feel dumb when other people talk and suffocate me
with some kind of fact or figure or insane comment
about how politics are like apples and oranges. This is all in my head,
and when the mosquitoes and hornets fly on by,
and when the wind pushes my hair all over,
and when I asked my father, “Daddy, is the Devil down, and does He wear clothes or dirt?”
and when I trip and fall and skin my knee on the pavement,
and when I eat hamburgers for dinner, it’s all just ten thousand, ten thousand, ten thousand.
I coughed a little
and Alvin and Greg tapped my shoulder, as the bartender droned on.
IN FIVE MINUTES TEA TIME.
Greg had got enough heroin
and Alvin had had enough of watching it and they wanted to go.
They did, and to an omniscient narrator I am part of they,
which always upset me.
So all through the whiskey house we rambled looking for a door
or a window or a hole in the wall.
Outside, on 3rd Avenue, I unclenched my buttocks
and thought that if I made it to my apartment tonight I’d write some kind of epic poem.
Some meditation on life,
and wasting life,
and what I thought about death,
and what I thought about God,
and what God thought of me,
and about my parents.
But of course it’s been six years since I’ve written any epic poetry.
I always forget what I wanted to write about
and never know where to put any semi-colons
to break up my thoughts.
Anyways poems, and literature, and books, and fiction, and movies, and television are for fools.
IN FIVE MINUTES TEA TIME.
Greg and Alvin somersault into a taxicab in the gutter,
and I wave goodbye to those two.
Their shadows in the rear window – hand-in-hand,
arm-in-arm, mouth-on-mouth – going on down the lane.
Here again rustling down the sidewalk
in the night,
all the bums telling me to, “Shake it down Chunky.” I give them
all five dollar bills so they can hook up on some crack,
or get turned on by a whore down on Beedling Street.
A man is a man is a man, and there are only ten thousand things to represent life and everything.
So up there,
sitting in your comfortable chair,
does any of this make sense?
I’m walking down some imaginary street,
high on a mix
of drugs and alcohol. I see all this concrete, and cement, and dead grass,
and these snow drifts, and barbershops, and orange rinds, and wedding dress boutiques
beside, under, and near me,
and I can only blink my eyes and in my chest
feel the cadence and beat of the whiskey house jazz.
IN FIVE MINUTES TEA TIME.
I just feel dumb when other people talk and suffocate me
with some kind of fact or figure or insane comment
about how politics are like apples and oranges. This is all in my head,
and when the mosquitoes and hornets fly on by,
and when the wind pushes my hair all over,
and when I asked my father, “Daddy, is the Devil down, and does He wear clothes or dirt?”
and when I trip and fall and skin my knee on the pavement,
and when I eat hamburgers for dinner, it’s all just ten thousand, ten thousand, ten thousand.
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Comments
Thanks for inviting us, G.