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Best Poems From
LAURENCE OVERMIRE
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105.
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Castor Oil
Art has to be foisted on people
Pushed through the doors of indifference
Stuck on billboards of vacant mind
Paid for in guilt, tax-free
Conscience of the inhospitable State
Otherwise
There will be no Art
Only the creativity of the void of
Cornering Markets.
(Previously published in SubtleTea, Oct.2003)
Laurence Overmire
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106.
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Cave Dweller
He wielded his religion like a mallet
Thwacked us over the head with it
Whenever he felt
The Need
To bolster his own Ego
Make him feel Superior to the rest of us
Lower life forms.
(Previously published in Panic! Brixton Poetry, Oct 2000)
Laurence Overmire
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107.
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Chances
1 a.m. in Brooklyn
Out of the subways cold, enveloping dark
The man emerges
Briefcase in hand, hurrying to get
Home
Wary eyes watching, glance in all directions.
The streets deserted, foreboding in the stillness
The light of lamps unable to spell the lingering dread
Shadows creeping across the brick
Inside vestibules where doors are locked.
Walking faster
Past shops barricaded with steel curtains
Fortification against the night
While somewhere in the deepening fog
A siren bleeds.
At the end of one long block
Another two to go
Just outside a closed cafι
Something on the sidewalk
By the sewer grate
Large andwhat?
A body.
Lies unmoving.
Alive or dead? What to do?
Finger nails polished, red on pale white skin
Female.
Face down, tucked and covered in dark hair.
What to do? To get involved in what?
In Brooklyn 1 a.m.
Not my business, not to know
He thought
Move on, she must be sleeping
Drugged or drunk
Someone else will stop.
The hour is late
A mornings rise at 6 a.m.
Meetings to be deadlined
No time to waste
She must be sleeping.
Someone else behind me
Someone else will
Stop.
Move on.
In the slanting rays of the rising sun
The bustling of a new and proper day
Keepers opening windows, shops
He walks past quickly
A bright cafe
An empty sidewalk
Nothing by the sewer grate
But stuck in his head forever
The nagging not knowing
Alive or dead? He didnt stop.
(Previously published in Kookamonga Square, Feb.2003)
Laurence Overmire
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108.
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Chasing a Tail
The serpent slides through the birth canal
...and out into the fullness of a life
writhing its way around the spiral of the years
...until at last it twists its head
through the portal and into the black tunnel
...of another awakening.
(Previously published in Pegasus, Winter 1999)
Laurence Overmire
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