By John Grey
Poetry disturbs homeless man
who finds coffee-stained magazine in trash barrel,
while his comrades in the alley
pass a bottle from hand to hand,
catch a drop or two of liquid on the tongue,
a holy elixir for the wildwood state
of no comprehension required.
He huddles in a corner
as words bite him like snakes,
melt into his skin like weevils..
And all this because of someone’s passion
to get down what life is really like.
The others laugh until their heads leave the room.
Meanwhile, a beautiful thing dies,
the quest for something unobtainable
ends unhappily,
even a bird is shot down in flight
and a rose crumpled in a hand.
Everyone else can just sleep it off.
The law of the homeless
is the first rule of poetry:
a man finds shelter
where there is none.
John Grey is an Australian poet, U.S. resident. Recently published in Examined Life Journal, Evening Street Review and Columbia Review with work upcoming in Harpur Palate, Poetry East and Midwest Quarterly.
Academy of the Heart And Mind 