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Best Poems Written by Sam Toil

Below are the all-time best Sam Toil poems as chosen by PoetrySoup members

Details | Sam Toil Poem

The Fraud

a hallway.  offices.  tinted sunlight.  
people who have forgotten my name.  
but i am here.  
and then a room.  and a meeting.  
and i am unprepared.  
“you’re up”  says the leader.  
and my lungs fill with heaviness as they all turn towards me.  
my mind screams.  
my throat locks.  

and then a word fights through the scream.  
and i breathe.  and find a voice.  
and then another word.  
and a thought.  
then relevance.  
i am moving.  
and eyes do not wander.  
but the scream fights on:  
they will find out.  

i was connected at one time.  
so the scream would fade.   
but not now.  
these many years later.  
“we could use you again,”  
he had said.  
and i had relented.  
but why?  boredom?  faith?  
the scream of fear vs. the scream of isolation?  
or a familiar voice dragging me back from madness.  
“what have you been up to?”  
he had asked.  
and i had lied.  
and now my mind all scrambled between work and stupor.   

“what on EARTH are you talking about?!” 
demands the one who should have taken over for me.  
and the throat locks again.  
and the scream rises up.  
and he knows it.  
but sympathy has no place here.  
so i struggle with the scream. 
and find the words to hide the Fraud  
as he shakes his head in disgust.   

and i remember why i left.  
so i wade in the scream until i am done and take my seat.  
and the scream that never dies whispers, “what else is there?”

Details | Sam Toil Poem

A Time Between Gods

all Is
in the autumn sky:
red and orange
dark blue and black
and a cool wind 
kissing the sun goodnight.

all Is
in this musty den:
blue and flickering
images and shadows 
dancing 
in the minds of tired women and stooped men.

all Is calm
but for the patter of children
wandering alone
through horrors and tangled brush.

Details | Sam Toil Poem

Conformity

it is complete -- 
protestations of the existentialists notwithstanding --
the end of history.
Science is here. 
slammed over me.

and everywhere
the necessity of Standardization.
in my labor 
and in my thought
Capitalism dictates.

efficiency is the new God,
except for the God-people themselves of course
who experience choice
and embrace the Absurd
as i spectate.

now, hidden by a lifetime of fantasy
or tortured by enlightenment
either way, bound by survival to succumb:
i release my mind to the Average.
where is Meaning?

Details | Sam Toil Poem

A Jading

the smell wafted like a dream.
charred wood and red smoke. 
“benjie!” she yelled
as i ran away down the hall 
raising my arm against the flickering heat.
“benjie, come back!” she pleaded. “leave him alone!”
i stopped 
and coughed.
hot air rushed across my face.
hearing nothing but the roaring smoke 
i froze-up --
torn for the first time
between Comfort and Knowledge.

then slowly 
out of the choking haze
came a whimper 
and a scrape.
and a punch shook the wall.
i peeked inside the sizzling arch.
hot pitch oozed 
from an overhead beam
caught fire 
and dripped tiny flamelets 
onto the hardwood floor.
he was there alright. 
shaking  
and sitting on the floor in the corner.
i whispered:
“what’s the matter daddy?”
he looked up 
through crazed eyes of fire and hate.
“go away boy”.
then he cried
and hugged his knees.

Details | Sam Toil Poem

A City Night-View

out the window a choking night-wind blows through the city.   
rancid and steamy.   
it wraps itself up my building and into my apartment,  
running over the floor,  
and bringing with it the smell of rot and piss-soaked concrete.  
i push the ragged curtains back and gag.
a distant siren wails.

dots of light 
everywhere
and a million people stacked in boxes.
with pipes running like veins
to carry away their filth
to some unspeakable place.

and dreams.
i can never forget the dreams.
of better times
more space
and clean air.
fueled by a machine of unfathomable import.
wiring me together with them all
into a single consciousness:
the camera swivels here and we all laugh,
it swivels there and we all cry.
always, the camera’s titillations run over me. 
my mind twitches to keep up.
and what of the awareness of this mass-consciousness?
suppressed in drink, dope,  and false faith.

two neighbors i do not know 
erupt in passionate-rhythmic moans just behind the wall.
i lay down in my bed and settle in to its years-old imprint of me 
and wait for exhausted sleep
as i fight back the madness of Truth for yet another night.

Details | Sam Toil Poem

Exile

i am lost
in the conflagration of spirit
where no philosophy abounds.
yet i love.

where are the people i crave?
am i a monster?
crafted and bolted
for purposes i can not accept?

there is yet much of God’s beauty left our great country
even in the midst of ever advancing devastation.
and there are so many who see this beauty at all costs.
but i have known so many who have felt the indifferent stare.
for them beauty is stale food
escape from the roaming gangs
a simple drip from the ceiling that stays within its catch-pan
and the eager smile of their precious infant who does not starve today.

God is dead, they say.
but the Invisible Hand thrives.
even in despair
It picks what It needs
toward Grand Assimilation,
to which i will never submit.

yes, i write today.
at least
one more day.
but i join in nothing.
yet i love.

Details | Sam Toil Poem

When a Factory Closes

once again, it is done.
and Dread abounds.
i must re-prepare, they say
and crawl beyond Familiar Words
to make a Home again
for a little while.

and say goodbye 
to just-rooted friendships.
i must re-acquaint, they say
and crawl beyond Familiar People
to make a Home again
for a little while.

always they smile in indifference
and offer up token strategies
as the town shutters-up beneath them
and the graveyards go abandoned.

now, once again, i stand before the world
within the full measure of my Isolation.
a cacophony of Choice.
yet i hear Nothing.

Details | Sam Toil Poem

Noise

i am transformed.  in what i see.   
my eyes can not discern
as shapes melt and swirl
and break into dots --
merging with the Static.

i am transformed. in what i hear.
of overlapping rips of space itself
with the unyielding babel of humanity.
i hear everything and nothing
becoming one with the Hiss.

i am transformed.  in what i touch.  
my insubstantial hands stir turbulence 
passing through scratchy mist.
the Dust drapes over me and through me.  
i am infused with the smell of a million worlds.

i am transformed.  in what i think. 
of snippets of thought
impinging on me.
racing through my awareness
and memories of titillation.
i am arrested by efficiency and classification.
my mind gives over to the Context it can no longer fight.

i have been transformed.
in all my senses and in all my thoughts
i am conjoined with all Things.

i am Undifferentiated.

Details | Sam Toil Poem

Speaking To No

what do i say to No?
when i know what not to do
but i know not what to do.

when Winter dies into Spring
and i must share my space with Strangers
but i don’t know what to say.

has there ever been a place
where all were welcome
and no one was Strange?

i think the Cherokee had it right
before the Trail of Tears
and the Great Usurpation.

but for me, choked-up memories
of a quiet corner of a high school locker room,
a knife at my neck.
“i oughta slit your throat, white boy,” he says. 
and they all laugh -- because i am different.
and later, much later
of a party and more derisive laughter
directed at my accent -- because i am different.
and each time i stutter a smile at it all.
hoping the tension will diffuse.
hoping the voice will not crack.
hoping the tears will not flow.
for what do i say to No?
but kill the lot in my fantasies --
grimacing as i slay
and speaking to Rage.

but Nietzsche got it right:
no one speaks to Power.
but Power speaks to No.

and eventually Summer
and too many Strangers
in places i want to be.

so i stay sequestered  in my basement.
so the tension will diffuse.
so the voice will not crack.
so the tears will not flow.

what can i say to No?
when i don’t know what to do.

Details | Sam Toil Poem

A Horror

i lay searching  
the night-grain nothingness. 
discharged from the world.
still, It comes.

oozing through undefined space
in fire-grinning simplicity.
humming like steel .
It beckons.
and i am ready.

but It has long been in place --
this....dying
as all men die --
slowly,
by suffocation.

yet,
the black streaks 
violet and orange.
you stir.
your untainted eyes open.

hold me 
precious wife
in the world 
a while longer.