The Drowning Men

the downtrodden in berkeley and everywhere

A small man, drunk, stumbling like a poesy in gale wind,

sprays hail from his eyes (too cold to flow), bruise of rose-red cheeks, chin,

bends eyelashes into sharp daffodils, stumbling, stumbling, shin scrape.

"Hello, my daughter died, she

died two days ago, I need money

for a funeral give my baby girl a funeral

25c do you have more quarter quarter"

A long and lean volcanic island stands with red pressed into his eyes

waving at strangers with his oceans, streaming out through the tides of his haze,

crashing onto the rocks and asphalt, eroding into dreams of not cement and not vomit.

"My little brother man he needs food

like not mcdonalds, i see the wallet 

in your pocket, in your pocket 

you have the keys to my future, his future, man."

Aimless and faceless with hair flowing back into a blonde scroll, written down, every mistake

every single goddamn mistake. Iron-cast into this wheelchair, bones now load-bearing

and crucial to metal structure, legs entwined to wheels like tree trunks to telephone wires.

"You don’t know anything of 

the second coming, I can see the venom

spilling from the condoms on your teeth

you gargoyle I’m through with you leave leave

its all over tomorrow we all die tomorrow anyway leave."

Reading. Reading ceaseless the novels, the philosophy to stand on flowers without crushing them, escape.

Blue eyes can pierce a page, cut hearts, Thoreau transcendence beyond mere brick,

this stump, this park, let there be a twist into some beyond, some metaphysical starburst treat, oh Jehovah.

"God bless you, son, you are sun

from heaven, beaming through jalousies

oh Apollo, thank you for this penny may god

bless you as god turns his back to me, its okay its okay."

Is it a human body or is it a cartoon preparation for a cross country trip, packing for--no it moved.

So still, so cold into mountain tarn still, no whitecaps, just skeletal machine laying still laying still

into the night and not moving, not even into ebbs. Do you cry? no. Do you cry? no. Do you cry? yes.

"You really don’t understand what this means

to me. The insurance men, they got me good

got hit by a car in 1980, false hip now, still paying

so thank you, and I know your knowing glance

and promise I am off heroin forever into oblivions still indebted."

The one who lifts his arms into beads pendulous, fishes for men with donuts, insane

or perhaps avant garde Kaufmanian art. Walk to study Wordsworth past him whose eyes are

universe, distilled into plastic. He sees everything, or he sees only color, perhaps one and the same.

"We’re all in this solar system, on this planet,

and we’ve built these smaller model solar systems out of

people, with sociality for gravity, and human planets

and a government who is the sun and some pitch-shifted mastermind

behind all of it, who lives in everything and gets to invent the laws of physics.

Tell me that’s fair.

Tell me I’m not drowning in an asteroid belt."

Reviews

[flickering candle]

"Tell me I’m not drowning in an asteroid belt." I love this piece. We live in such a vast and breathtakingly complex universe but humanity has consumed itself with trivial things and has brought many people struggle and destruction and poverty and pain. I feel like this sometimes, like any and all of these people. Great writing.

[Nadia B.]

Phenomenal! "I can see the venom spilling from the condoms on your teeth," just wow! The use of imagery here, keep going! You have such great world knowledge that you add to your poems. Your last stanza is the most powerful, questioning if we are nothing more than repetition. The world does seem hopeless through the eyes of the fallen, but even asteroids which orbit the sun, as they get closer to the light, get a new boost of life. Government and laws of physics do not bind us, merely our beliefs guide us and we are in control of our own beliefs. If what you believe in is the Truth you walk a content life but if what you believe in turns out to be a lie, that's when hardships increase and everything seems so dismal. This poem seems to look at the beliefs and the ways of the fallen and see's a terrible lost end, but actually being a part of something so great, being a part of this solar system gives meaning. Is it not better to be part of something than to wonder around alone aimlessly under our blue skies? It is sad to see drowning men, but not all men drown, and sometimes it is in the falling that we can be lifted up anew again. ...Please keep writing!

[Anthony J]

Thank you so much for your thorough comment!! I liked your analysis of the asteroids. I didn't even think of that myself when I wrote it, and you've brought new meaning to my own piece for me! This is a beautiful review, thank you