Bridges to Nowhere (Tidewater)
I’ll tunnel to you from my outcrop,
funded by some sweaty s&p fortunates;
you can watch as we construct 1,000 bridges,
all on the road to nowhere, transient,
the end in mind at all times: milked.
I can play the fool—I’m all around town—
I’ve got an X and Y chromosome and half a heart.
My rolodex of expertise is abounding
with sociopathy, waiting to be shot to hell
by my do-gooderism. It’s amazing one question can
accomplish such diminishing. Does no one like them?
Why should the barista know their western name?
Anything to get rid of thinking; but can we?
Really? We can take a drive down kid pan alley—
reading has given me a view of my problem
and no remedies: modern man is a head taller.
Families gained the foot through syringes,
queen beds, fewer hours in the mines. And yet,
we lost facts in the final act. To be alive means:
you almost die every day by the same threats.
I have no references, no accolades on a scroll,
only 1000 whispered testimonies. Say something,
anything at all. I need some sort of balm.
Quiet my mind with a blanket of silence,
something deafening please. Perhaps a pillow fort
to hide my head and breath deeply for a while?
I know, God loves me; please, stop telling me.
I need to see an abandoned lot with growth outside.
I need to watch another living thing succumb to nature’s violence
while my universe collapses into to a chair,
a mind atrophies upon the bed, voided,
still. Please, can you tell me why you still live there?
Was the road to nowhere just jutting
from the center? Not some grand path forward
but a way home to our seat in the theater,
where we can compliment the writing and inferred
absurdity of it all to those we love before the curtain drops.
Comments