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UNDERGROUND VOICES: POETRY
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DAN PROVOST
Words from a Disgruntled Human Service Worker I’m holding a kid who’s trying to cut himself… He is in the large isolation room, angry that he was kicked out of Mr. Smith’s Encounter Group… As I grab his arms and push him against the wall—trying to assure him that he is safe and everything is all right, I rest my head against the bricks that are sprawled with graffiti: Writings that remind me of how much I suck… Drawings of my mother being sliced and murdered by the angry minority… I drift into daydreams—while the kid screams details of how he’s going to kill my parents with a knife… He will cut out their hearts—then stab himself with the murder weapon… He is screaming… I am dreaming… Dreaming of Ginsburg and his words of disillusionment… Dreams of Kerouac and his journeys into L’america… Morrison, Rimbaud…all troubled icons… I think of their mind-altering vices… Booze, Drugs…Slow death… Staying in a constant haze because they saw the truth on the wall… What truth? What wall? Christ, what truth did they see…They were upset with ideals… I am upset with reality… My truth is right in front of me, a kid trying to mutilate himself-- someone who has been spit out and chewed out by life… Parents who raped and beat him…Society that scorned him… School systems that ignored him… Yes, I will give my best effort in calming down this kid… This victim… I will then get into my crap-mobile, drive home and type this mechanical poem…about a mechanical life… I will drink beer till I cannot stand Until I forget—What truth is For me… My Fall Season 2008 I.) i felt like i have tiptoed through a shooting gallery these past few months… fighting the reaper face to face… punch per punch… so many times i held a pistol to my head…wishing for a phone call one just one with a “how’s it going” or “where have you been” tearing every moment while my hands were shaking holding that .38 snub nose i stole from my father’s dresser. saying good bye to nobody and everybody II.) blowing off work walking through the city angered, crying…looking for the ghost of Van Zant or Lombardi to help get through another hour i was the madness…it seeped into my eyes then widened the bottomless pit that existed in my soul. each person whisking by me… i was not there…I had already fallen; yes, I was still breathing… but in reality…I was dead a mannequin going through robotic motions of existing. III.) i would come home sort out half written wills and suicide notes love letters addressed to no one thinking i was a victim of want? of unreturned love? of exhausted worship? these are cruel beliefs for someone who tried to be morally right most of the time. IV.) my being was a blind stare into a catacomb of shame… a bleeding animal, wounded beyond a couple of scars; i wrecked cars…hit people became comfortable with screams that never were shouted… only in private only in private V.) i now sit in a living grave lonely, somewhat defeated Dan Provost is 44 years old and reads a lot of poetry. Some of his favorites include: Bukowski, Lyn Lyfshin, RC Edrington, JJ Campbell, and Arthur Rimbald. He has been published in numerous poetry e-zines and small print magazines. |
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