The Show

It’s standard here—the goal’s uncertain,
Yet every eye is on the prize,
Each day they come to raise the curtains,
Performing their vapid lies.

The stage is filled with vain performers,
Whose voices creak with assonance,
Their mush-filled intellects are dormant
In their orgiastic dance.

There is no fire, no passion,
Just words alone dull and dead—
Like some pop melody in fashion
That fills the crowd of vacant heads.

They talk of love, they talk of soul,
Of astral beings, mystic dreams,
Yet you can feel a big black hole—
The giant void that sucks you in.

Their wisdom’s like a fortune cookie
In some Chinese take-out place,
Yet to the ignorant onlookers
They look like prophets full of grace.

I’ve heard their noise and still remember
The truth of what a poet sees
In rainy days of cold November,
In empty streets and barren trees.

The winter’s coming, days grow shorter
Amidst the chatter and the lies—
The poet like a news reporter
Records the truth with distant eyes.


    November 6, 2003 
 --Alexander Shaumyan