Friday, July 23, 2021

SAFE DISTANCE EDITION - Stone Soup Croutons, 7-21-21: They Suggest Meditation


Stone Soup Croutons is a weekly poem I write using lines and impressions picked from Stone Soup Poetry's open mic readers and features. I figure out a title (and sometimes the rest of the poem) later. You can read the other ones I've done since 2015 here.

I also have a book out now collecting the best of my first year of poems. Click here to purchase it.

A short open mic begets a short poem. I needed a low stress night after all the work I did this week. We got James Van Looy back though his partner Jan took a breather. Probably too wiped out from all the tech work done to get their connection back. 
 
Given the politics on display this week, I'm surprised I didn't go darker. Thanks for reading.


They Suggest Meditation

Secret to freedom
not in YouTube speech
or prescriptions,
 
or waiting for death,
it's breath to snuff out
your giant bear heart,
 
bloated body
not even allowed
in flooded streets 
 
Hold your cards 
as if they were 
your own choice
 
while the dealer polls
onlookers on how
to kill you. Hot coal
 
gets more and more votes
each time, banana pies
less than one percent.

What small nowhere
have you chosen to
hide your failed body,
 
your will to just be
bringing you only so far,
the good and bad yous
 
left for all to view 
on the shelf, no memory
of which came first.
 
 
Miss you, Jan.


Special thanks to John Sturm, John Wesick, Carol Weston, C.C. ARshagra, Chris Fitzgerald and James Van Looy.


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