Soul Starving In the Midst of Plenty

Soul Starving in the Midst of Plenty By Sy Roth Just a slit where air, Some air can find a way to creep in Replenish the foul exhalations of the horde Crammed to the rafters Airless beings Dazed by the machinations of others Deus ex machina To starve them of what is fresh to others. Clickety clack fly the miles Unasssuming chorus of the rails In tandem with their moans And groans, seeking some small blast of air To mollify a condition That binds the soulless traveler to a fate Yet unknown. Little blink of light And the hungry molecules Bits of flotsam Find ways to crawl to it, To beat a path toward the light Which may bring air to starved lungs. Alveoli beg sustenance But their cries rain down emptily, Empty against the clicking and clacking from below And the miles of breathless wonder At their condition. Too heady to begrudge the snakes that found A way to slither to the errant light, And for brief moments To catch wisps of smoky air that cleanse For an augenblink, A soul starving in the midst of plenty.