Life on the Line

Life on the Line

The Tuesday sun

set and carried with it,

the lies of New York and

a thousand broken dreams.

The broken pieces fell

together in the bars

and bedrooms of the city:

Glue is another fairytale.

I let the sorrow wash

over me like fine whiskey

across my tongue and stared

out the window at the passing city.

The train car couplers creaked

and groaned in a sad staccato.

A preview of the death rattle

waiting in the distance.

SMG

Solstice to Equinox

 

Solstice to Equinox

Anais, Anais

Litha has passed

and we are left

to mourn the coming

autumnal balance,

for creatures such as we

crave the severe

and eschew

This Gentile World.

Travel with me to

The Tropic of Capricorn

and leave behind

the ever shrinking 

days of Cancer.

There we can live

in eternal summer

and Black Spring.

Grieve not my love,

for with the arrival

of Yoole's long nights, 

Sirius shall align

with Orion's belt

and point us back 

to the elliptical

apex, and June.

SMG 

Break Glass in Case of Emergency

 

Break Glass in Case of Emergency

I feel like a ship in a bottle,

various pieces of me, over time,

tweezed and squeezed into

an attractive unnatural display.

 

Assembled slowly in this

new environment, the bottle

feels like home, like where I belong.

 

Upon completion, I’ve become a prisoner.

As a fully formed being, I may never leave

as long as the bottle and I are intact.

 

To escape, breakage will be required.

The bottle does not know it is a prison,

while I fail to recognize my own captivity.

 

Only a force outside the symbiotic delusion

can break the bond that neither of us comprehends. 

That force also gets to pick sides in the separation.

 

Smash the bottle, and I can be free, unless

too much force is applied. Shake the contents,

and what’s left are little broken pieces of me.

 

Perhaps my remains can be poured out

onto a countertop and with attention,

care and reassembly, I may sail again

and be free.

 

SMG   

These Rooms

 

These Rooms

 

Hello, my name is

ultimately unimportant.

In here we are legion

occupying one seat at a time.

These rooms,

unassuming and sterile,

yet full of pain and regret.

Heartaches and hopes,

spill from our mouths

in equal measure.

We speak of higher powers

but know what powerlessness

tastes like. There is talk of steps

and serenity, but debauchery

is always within arm’s reach.

We are black and white, adrift

in the grey outside these walls.

Compulsion is a frequent visitor,

and habit is a way of life.

These rooms,

unassuming and sterile,

yet a light in the darkness.

We will know no finish line,

only days to count, time to mark,

while collecting coins

from the inmates and gods

that inhabit these rooms.

SMG

A Journey of a Thousand Miles

 

A Journey of a Thousand Miles

The isolation

is only the beginning.

Alone in a room,

the stillness disturbed,

intermittently, by shivers.

A cage-match

with demons ensues.

Sleep is fleeting and fitful.

Dreams an unsolvable puzzle,

disparate pieces out of order

and just out of reach.

Time crawls as shadows

and hints of sunlight

denote day versus night.

There is no escape,

the only option is through.

Through the abyss

of broken promises,

missed opportunities,

and failure. Your end,

the beginning, the first step.

SMG

A Guilt You Would Not Understand

A Guilt You Would Not Understand

A knock on the door

that echoed in

the unreachable distance.

The last indelible image

of my love as you faded

in the darkness

of a back bedroom.

The foreboding

that swarmed me

ignored, in favor of

an agenda long forgotten.

The immediacy of the day

superseding the years

of sacrifice in my favor.

The hours spent

playing catch in the absence

of a grandfather or father

not otherwise engaged.

You were love and acceptance

in my eyes and when you passed

I was passive and afraid.

Betrayed by a single weak vessel

in that brain that I so admired,

you lay helpless, a state

that was an anathema

to everything I knew you to be.

Forgive me

for not kicking

that goddamn door down

and carrying you to the help

that might have saved you

and all that you were to me.

SMG

Break Glass in Case of Emergency

Break Glass in Case of Emergency

Assembling a ship in a bottle,

piece by piece, with attention

and care, is a fascinating exercise.

I can relate to that ship and its plight.

Having its component parts tweezed

and squeezed into an unnatural environment.

Upon completion the ship is a prisoner.

As a fully formed vessel, it will never leave

as long as the ship and bottle are intact.

To escape, breakage will be required.

The bottle does not know it is a prison.

The ship does not recognize its captivity.

Only a force outside the symbiotic delusion

can break the bond that neither understands.

That force also gets to pick sides in the separation.

Smash the bottle, and the ship is free unless

too much force is applied. Shake the bottle

and the ship is reduced to little broken pieces.

What’s left can be poured onto a countertop.

Some reassembly required if the ship is ever

expected to sail again and be free.

SMG

Absolution

Absolution

The cap breaks

to the left and spins

loose on the table

like a drunken top.

Is the rush in the ritual

or in the result?

Three cubes,

no more, no less,

dropped one at a time

with bombardier

precision from above.

There follows the muted

plock-plock-plock

as the amber liquid

escapes the bottle,

and the pressure pop

of the ice as it welcomes

the whiskey.

Pavlov is affirmed

as the scent of Speyside

malt and smoke fills the senses

and light dances and refracts

through the diamonds

and gold in the glass.

The familiar bite

against the lips wakes me,

and I emerge like a penitent man

from the confessional,

absolved and ready

to sin again.  

SMG

The Challenge of Kneeling

Kneel: Be in or assume a position

in which the body is supported

by a knee or the knees, as when

praying or showing submission.

The metaphor is illusive, changing

like a chameleon adapting to new surroundings.

Is this a poem of brokenness, sorrow, or abuse?

The metaphor is Phoenixian. The imagery,

a bird fallen from its nest, rescued by a passing stranger,

a kitten pawing the corpse of its mother

or a starving dog in a cage long neglected and alone.

The simile seeks like or as comparison,

while shopping in a store it’s never been to. 

The stanza needs to implore supplication from the arrogant,

selfish, or disbelieving.  A fighter staring down his opponent

or a man so sure of own strength of will, there is no need for others

nor the possibility of something greater than himself.  

The imagery is difficult to find

regardless of the search engine employed.

Find a painting of the strength of surrender, of admitting helplessness.

A picture that explains what it takes to wake up in a fetal position, on a

sidewalk, and ask for help getting to your knees or a mural that spans

a lifelong journey that begins anew, every day, with the rising sun. 

Kneeling is redemption.

Kneeling is humility.

And kneeling is strength,

no metaphor required.

SMG

Agency

 

Agency

Control is

ephemeral,

imagined, and

when the illusion

is shattered,

there is little remaining

to hold you upright.

We are mere observers,

an audience,

as the play unfolds.

There are actors on stage,

and directors behind the curtain

that move the story forward

as we sit in the dark,

and plead for a happy ending.

Every life is a roll of the dice,

a hand dealt by someone else.

We win by the kindness of strangers,

lose as a car drifts across the median.

The bottle, the needle and the pipe

might feel like agency

but are just different masters.

Bosses, we hope, will pay us on time

as we toil under the weight

of the load we are forced to carry.

SMG