Casino Thoughts

casino thoughts

Sitting in a casino of the damned
Somewhere on the Las Vegas Strip
Playing the slots
Watching the crowd go wild
Watching the machines watching me

Drinking the free drinks of the damned
20 drinks too sober

And the gamblers on the gaming tables
Gambling away their fortune
Throwing money away
In hopes of the payoff
That somehow never comes

The pure decadent spectacle
The fake this and fake that
Phony this phony that

False New York
Paris in Vegas
Venetian canals, Roman forum
MGM Grand Lions

All fake, all phony
All deliciously decadent

The noise
The scantily clad waitresses
The men ogling the women

The women ogling back at them
The scent of wild decadence
Bad craziness in the air
The music – the lounge music from hell
The constant sound
Of money exchanging hands

It all overwhelms me
And I must sit down
And drink my reality drink
Drink it down and dirty

As I continue
To feed the hungry, greedy machines

Made in a workshop in hell
No doubt with child or slave labor
Imported from the third world 

All my money 
Is sucked into it
These machines from hell 

The beast from revelation appears
Stands revealed in his hideous glorious beauty
Conducting this mad scene

And I am consumed by the greed
And the frenzy takes over me
All I want
All I need
All I desire

Is one more chance
One more shot

I scream 
At the utterly unfeeling monsters
That ate my money
And chewed up my soul

And I know
The worst drug of all
Is the gambling fever
The gold bugs

I would sell my soul
If I had one left
For a chance
At the jackpot of life

Instead, I am reduced
To a pathetic broken down loser
Watching the world and Elvis
Pass him by

Viva Las Vegas
Imperial God of the American Dream
 Goddess of the American Nightmare

Published in former people journal
Copyright © | Year Posted 2020

Poem

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