47. I like to party

I like to party.
The alleys of the mind
ignite,
corridors crammed with
Cirque de Soleil.
Dancers set ablaze
the brainstem;
Acrobats paint
this Carnival.

I like to party:
as do you;
together, we in fantasies
could speak in tongues,
but you:
in banal stupor,
drenched in booze
and music BLARING
escape
in your own prosaic
way:

but – I rather think,
I fly higher:
the trapeze is not enough for
me –

Special Note: This origins of this poem has a unique and strange origin.  I am a biomedical science student, forced to take a non-specialist English course for an elective.  The irony is that I actively write poetry on a daily to weekly basis.  Our professor introduced us to poetry on Monday, asking everyone to write a line of poetry on a scrap piece of paper.  He asked selected individuals to read their lines...my fellow classmates came up with the predicted horrendous things, such as: "Roses are red, violets are blue", "I am not good at poetry", etc. The line that stuck with our professor turned out to be the seemingly silly "I like to party."  He sent us an e-mail later that night, claiming to give someone a cash prize for transforming the first line "I like to party" into a poem.  Was it cheating that I accept?  Undeniably, yes.  Hence...I wrote this poem on Tuesday and e-mailed it to him.  On Wednesday's class, he noted that someone went "above and beyond" his expectations and that from now on, whenever this person was seen, they were to be referred to as "the first winner of the first annual English 1--- poetry competition".  He put a print-out of my e-mail on the document camera and it blew it up on two ginormous screens in front of the entire class.  To my horror, he then proceeded to spend a full 30 minutes of our 50 minute class praising and analyzing the poem word for word in front of the entire class.  And at the end of the dissection, the entire class applauded and I sank into my chair, exhilarated and thrilled, but mostly emotionally exhausted, thoroughly embarrassed, and overwhelmed.  The entire time I felt cold and I was shaking involuntarily...it was the strangest thing, like watching people trampling over my dead body or witnessing a live dissection of myself while still alive...fascinating, and really weird.  This is the first time, really, that my poetry was taken out from my personal quarters and disseminated with the real, living, breathing "public" - face to face (instead of through the impersonal Internet).  By the end of the class, I had the feeling that no one had read the poem the way I intended it to be read, but that it had taken on a new immortal life of its own, running rampant in a thousand different directions...I think the strangest thing is that I have never experienced any of the things mentioned in the poem - booze, parties, Cirque de Soleil, etc.  And now everyone thinks I'm some schizophrenic alcoholic.

46. Houseplant

I am watering you enough,
I think.
But you keep dying -
your leaves are crispy
and golden,
falling to the
ground.

You are unhappy here.
I play you Bach,
but I don't think you like it.
People say
it will help you
grow.

Is it too much sun?

I rotate you,
by degrees
everyday,
hoping some slant of light
will eventually feed you right.

Do you think
I like watching you die?
I am suffering too:
you are,
day in, day out,
reminding me
of our failed relationship,
of our vernal hopes.
Houseplant,
please live.

45. The Simple Golfer

Your polo shirt in hunter green,
a mochachino in your hand -
relief: a gratefulness descends.
These years of callous bargaining
end here, in mute, indulgent joy.
As sunrise dawns upon the world,
you are the first - you always were -
the green before your eager arms.
And after two divorces rests
the latest conquest in your bed,
in lazy luxury, till noon.
But as you raise the primal swing,
reflect upon the bitter words,
the small regrets, the heartlessness -
but what of that? It all is past.
Oh simple golfer, full of pride,
does such completion satisfy,
this strange avoidance of the truth?
Oh, as you gaze upon the hills,
this just begins the questioning
that haunts the heart, that probes the mind;
but as your stoic, placid mind
alights upon the blazing sun
as if like foam upon your drink -
it rests, forever beckoning
yet too aloof for blinded Men -

44. From the Ruins

The progeny of artisans
Is carefully reviewed
Before the goods are shipped before
The future's eager eyes.
Such ancient architecture bears
The toils of their craft;
The remnants were preserved with care
And visit, vividly.
Though packaged in the finest silks
The ravages of time
Prove coldly ever-damaging -
The fragments tantalize;
We die, the secret on our lips -
The guess is yours to take.
Forever coy, forever mute,
The sleeping artist smiles.

43. Rasputin

Eyes of the strange and the solemnest
stared at me; stirred in me mystery:
wonderfully, tenderly, pensively;

Searching, imploring you silently,
mounting obsession enraptures me:
steadfastly, easily, purposely;

Cold and unseeing, discarding me,
glanced at my longing and loneliness
fleetingly, vacantly, terribly.