The Exit Door

 

The dim bar light crystallizes your former friends
as you fiddle with the phone in your front right pocket.
Your smile fools no one, nor does it remove you 
from your foul mood.  

Perhaps you've outgrown them.  Perhaps they
are beneath you.  The mirrors reflect differently,
and past the half-empty bottles of bourbon, their smiles
and yours
are as cheap as the beer in your hands.

The sound of a pool cue smashing the eight ball 
racks your brain, like a failed chemistry test.  The roar
of drunk drones plays out like elevator music,
as you stand and wait for a door to open.

But it never does.  Perhaps this is heaven.  A revolving door 
of deadbeats padding the floor of your life 
like a blood-stained rug.  Perhaps death 
comes before awakening.  

The exit sign above the door always seems 
so visible, after the warmth of a bar seat
reminds you of your place.  

So there you sit, with dark set so deep 
you can barely see yourself

but you're starting to.

Because after you've laughed at the same joke twice, 
and lived the life of pretentiousness (and pretending), 
the fancy clothes and friends fall off 
like the sleep from your eyes.  
And you find yourself again.

 

 

Reviews

[Glen Yumang Manese]

THE REALITY SINKS IN THIS VERSE...I LIKE THE IMAGERY YOU PORTRAY IN THE BAR SCENE...THAT THERE'S LIFE AFTER DEATH...AFTER YOU LEARN THE WAYS OF THOSE AROUND YOU...DOWN TO THE TEE OF THEIR EXISTENCE...YOU CAN FINALLY LEAVE AND GO PASS THE EXIT SIGN...