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A Journeyman's Plea
The great poets begged for muse and not for moments stolen.
We lesser mortals cup in hand beg, not for attentions’ span nor
cause to celebrate, but Time; a worthy goal.
Seconds spent pondering half-held slow bled moments
shuffling by, and boy oh boy do we try
to steal them, guide them, horde them and mishandle;
to shape the moment in the mood and finally use the mortal for the good,
Mismatching much of what we do identify we silly clown-like substitutes for life
hurry by in sad and sordid disarrangement tangled feet a scurrying
minds half dangled and dangerously driven to some intended perfection
stopped and sadly disillusioned by the panhandling tin cup ragamuffin
precursor of the moment. Interrupted by life. The slicing knife of distraction.
Not being afforded the luxury of languishing longingly by gentle streams
Lying in clover fields, head back, words tumbling out in torrents of idle persuasion.
No tick No tock No problem with inspiration or writers block.
The words have not yet been said and the stillness of a lifetime waits
as life disposed to give you guided choice, you miscreant and envied servant past.
Your step my troubled troupe can barely raise your voice my deafened ears assault
with infamous abilities fame with perchance immortality.
Take your time beast. My moments are the least of your concern.
Your words and works still burn in their charismatic charm
Oh they bring more harm than you could ever know.
Your feminine hand and tongue so slow relinquish and refute.
Your feathered quill a brute.
You still reside upon your famous mountaintop sustained by only breeze.
Rumors carried aloft by every poor man’s sneeze.
You cannot capitulate still, your voice forever shrill
Your voice is never still inside my head.
I follow where you lead and never head a camp.
There is no newness to the ground, however damp.
I sleep alone my wordy blanket borrowed, tattered and torn.
I feel the heat of all the eyes of every dawn a breaking scorn.
I know the nakedness of my own thought.
You gave to me a trumpet and the crumbs of every crumpet ever caught,
for sightless sound and you who glory be and glory bound did trail ever light
and I who stand in pig sty mud unhealed and later wheeled beyond repair.
I who sit and write the words that stare. There is no dare, there is no care.
There is no one to cane the porridge dry or whittle the brown bush bare
while mothers cry. There is nothing at the bottom of the upturned empty bucket
so un-borne. Nothing that cannot be crushed and rotted and torn.
This metaphoric ship and meteoric ride aside
You might perchance to glance an inside wink and tell me
Through your golden veil all that you might think
if I allow, If you are not too busy by the bead upon your brow to take your bow
Your sweet eternal bow. I see it all so clearly now.
So unclean uncluttered and holier than thou.
Sail the leaf, the homemade handkerchief parachute dangling over the wire
stand a little closer to the fire as we age. What’s written here is written on a different page
we all look back with fondness and longing tick tock sing song-ing moments dripping down. Can you remember the day you considered yourself grown?
Copyright ©
Vernon Witmer
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