Dear Readers,

Please enjoy the following poem. I’m happy to announce it is now available in a new book that you may view and purchase if you wish by clicking on The River of Winged Dreams 

“The air is filled with strangely human birds.”

––Guillaume Apollinaire, from The New Spirit and the Poets

1.

Your wife calls. Asks me to take your keys,
make you stay here tonight. She refuses
your refusal to leave the world to its chosen pains.

Long ago I stopped trying to convince you
that your hands are not roadside bombs.
Your tears not rapists. Your arms not starving children.

2.
You say you feel like a woman who can’t stop giving birth.
Like a man just discovering he is worthy of love.
Like heat surfing dream-waves of burning cosmic intention.  

I consider how the syllables of your soul have never hung
my imperfections from a gallows of public scrutiny
while wallowing in the gigglings of neurotic tapeworms.  

3.
Your lines style splendor in cashmere meters.
Your rhymes pulse quasars of quantum compassion.
There is no sacred love your pen will not kiss, pray for, or heal.

Forty-eight thousand friends subscribe to your blog on MySpace.
They are witty with you, get horny too, and sometimes sublime.
But know nothing of the nightmares you puke on my shoes. 

4.
At midnight your wife calls again. Says Happy New Year
and she will still love you sometime tomorrow after lunch.
Tells me I am not a bad poet and an even better friend. 

At the end of “Auld Lang Syne” you open more champagne.
I take a hard deep breath to scold you for your weakness.
We hiccup at the same time, and hum in harmony as if on cue. 
 

By Aberjhani
© 13 January 2007