What are we waiting for?
Night is a promise.
Sleep is never what we expect.
I don't know.
But wait we will. For morning?
The doves sing their soft coo
and the sun betrays the promise of night.
Who am I?
I don't know. I don't know.
Over and over again
I brew dark roasted coffee,
read the paper,
walk out into the bright morning
and still I don't know.
Anything.
No knowing is a relief.
What am I waiting for?
The trees should be turning brilliant shades of yellow, orange, and red.
But there are no trees in the desert.
So what am I waiting for?
The woman downstairs fries eggs and bacon every morning.
She is not waiting.
The rabbits outside munch on cholla bulbs.
They are not waiting.
So what am I waiting for?
As if waiting will reveal . . . what?
Something? Anything?
The secret?
But who am I?
Is that the secret?
Sleep promises an escape from the torture of thought.
But then I dream of a woman who betrayed me and I am still thinking
in the midst of a dream, wanting morning to swoop in
and save me from my life.
So then the sun slaps me upside the head
and my life is staring back at me.
Why? I don't know.
Not knowing is a relief.
When someone asks me for the time
or says hello
I think for a brief moment that I might exist,
otherwise I am waiting for some kind of confirmation
that never comes.
This mind, a fabrication of thoughts and emotions,
I doubt it is real.
When I had a cat I knew I was real
because he demanded of me my attention.
A violent order is disorder; and
A great disorder is an order. These
Two things are one.
~ Wallace Stevens
Simply one more truth. But what am I waiting for?
The pensive man, that is me,
waiting for something. Waiting
for Godot to appear and show me the way?
The night betrays they who trust in darkness.
So little can be said in favor of light.
When morning arrives I will regret everything,
but as darkness surrounds me
I will swear an oath to night.
I will cease waiting and embrace that which I do know.
Everything. Who am I?
I do not know.
Not knowing is a relief.
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2 comments:
Nice how you broke from "form" -- finding a mode of expression suitable to your message.
A certain stalledness in the way you wrote what you did expressed the waiting in a way that that did not evoke boredom to the reader. A narrow fence to walk, that.
Thanks Tom!
I was reading an anthology of post-modern poetry that I picked up at a used bookstore yesterday. I like the way some of the poets use form to convey meaning, so I thought I'd give it a try. But mostly, it was intuitive and I got lucky.
Peace,
Bill
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