Poem - Two Thousand

I had a dream about being invited to a dinner celebration in a town I had never seen before. By the end the dream I was riding a cow across a field in order to escape from a probable massacre. Does this sound familiar? The cow part aside, it is very roughly the plot to “Two Thousand Maniacs!”. A latter dream that night had a strange twist. The main host for the dinner called and said he was upset that I left early. I told him that I had freaked out and left out of fear. I don't know if he accepted my apology, but I would have done it again.


Two Thousand

Please don't invite me to the picnic
the one with the smiling faces and long knives
tables piled high high with festive fare
my friends and I served as main course.

The day started out simple enough
stranded in the country with broken ride
with locals eager for some company
at annual celebration of comradery.

So much time had been spent
making the town ready for the festival
a gala of decadence by simple people
a sign of their observance of greater purpose.

Sabbath or funeral clothes were worn
the former we assumed to our error
surely they did not dress handsome for visitors
even if they said they did it only once a year.

Through a twisted path we were led
past halls set waiting banquet
at these we did not tarry long
until we arrived at a hall for our sup.

Potato salad stood by deviled egg
fried chicken next to candy ham.
Strangely our hosts paid more attention
to us than the spread made for them.

I separated from the group
did not eat any of the offered food
suspecting that I would sleep
too soon after eating the cole slaw.

Out the back door I escaped
down alleys until I reached the woods
through the rows of planted trees
I made my way to far safety.

The day started out simple enough
I did not realize in the end
I'd ride a cow to not be a meal
but that's a poem for another time.

© 2016, Sean Green. All Rights Reserved, 20160417.

Poem - Poet's Triage

The poem “Poet's Triage” is about the place of poetry in one person's life. It was triggered when I commented the following to an online friend:

“File these (bad events) away as future poem ideas. I don't know if I could do what I do if it were not for all the sh*t I've been through. The joy too, yeah, there's that, but I am beginning to believe that people who know only joy don't write poetry. They don't have to. ”


Poet's Triage

I once thought I was quite mad
this thought is still resonates
my point to make is about writing
those things I suffer through.
To come out and speak my mind
would be the bludgeon misapplied
on kind readers with same struggles
not wanting reminder of a cruel world.

I blogged once a day in an effort
to force the inner to find ease
with a world both loved for beauty
and hated for the self-existence.
The angst was skirted in attempts
to share the lunacy within
with vanilla revelations so shallow
as to make wonder bread delicious.

A day years later I was rescued
by the hand of an old friend
poetry had come and gone
from my pen to spilled ink.
Now avenue for revelation was given
to the voices raw with rage
turned against the owner's self
in desire to end existence.

Distance given to bloody tales
denial is the artist's prerogative
even as the guts are spilled
of a tableau of a life exposed.
Uncertainty is the masque
of poet's sharing to the masses
when the wordsmith does proclaim
for themselves or other men.

Larger forces are at here at hand
with tidal forces of humanity
their capacity for joy sometimes outdone
by the longing for something more.
My story was more dire than most
with the tinge of endings wished
though the source is too common
to the expanse of my fellow men.

In the end the dungeons expel
the worst of corpses kept within
through the rhyme of lyrical
wrapped in muse's license to reveal.
Don't imagine confessions tell
that the vampires were mine this day
brought to life to be expunged
witnessed by you fair reader most kind.

© 2016, Sean Green. All Rights Reserved, 20160417.