Wednesday, July 13, 2011

Plight of the Poet

Plight of the Poet
By: C. Hemphill

Pen to paper and out falls brain matter
Mop the page with your mind
Trying to find the right simile for your life
Talk about how daddy never loved you
And Mommy never cared
Psychoanalyze
Under the glow of a computer screen
Vomit words and sounds onto a canvas
Paint them into a masterpiece with your hands
Spill your soul like ink
Stain the page with your life
And with your heart realize
That you’re the only person that will understand it all
Anyway


Milwaukee Street

Milwaukee Street
By: C. Hemphill

I’ve traveled down your road
Eyes closed
Hands tied behind my back.
Always you called to me
Like the naked moon that we laid under
Pulling dreams from my slumber,
You laid them at your doorstep.
Dust settled on them
Like my kisses that stained your skin.

At night I watched the rain caress your window,
Watched the world melt away
And you melt into me
And I melt into nothing.
I’ve scratched your back a thousand times
Grasping for something that was never there,
Waiting for your skin to bleed
To prove that you were human too.

In the glow of the sun that eavesdropped
Through the cracks of your blinds,
The still of the moment blotted all regret,
Smoothed it away like your hair
That my fingers took care of so well.
You were mine, if only for that time.
And down from Heaven I’d fall,
And crash into reality
And crash into you.
I saw myself in a world turned upside down
In the drops of water
That fell from your faucet.
And in a moment it was all washed away.

As I tiptoe on the creaking floor,
Smell the gas as natural as we seem to be
I can’t seem to get outside of you,
Or me, though it’s as clear as the writing on my face.
Though I’ve dragged my feet through your pavement,
Though I’ve laid my head on your heart,

I never loved you.