A QUIET SHOUT

A Quiet Shout

It’s a bloodless life,

conjuring potential pasts

for some sense of recognition,

looking for anything that might say,

“Yes, I know, I know.”

It’s bloodless,

but it’s necessary,

and that is why we continue,

our bootheels worn to

near non-existence,

but there will always be

something else

floating in the periphery

of our cataracted future.

The sun came up today,

and as everything thaws,

we see what has

always been underneath.

Tell it to the sky;

as it turns out,

the shifting atmosphere

might’ve been listening

all along.

Just Give it the Obvious Name

It’s a shame

to see this life

as casually destroyed

as one might

a discarded wrapper,

or the earthly remains

of a kitten frozen

behind the barn

on an early February sunrise.

It’s a shame

to see these things,

terrible and true,

informing our

perception of reality;

a perspective that grows

darker, more metallic

and unforgiving

seemingly daily.

It’s a shame

to see the huddled masses

clamber for more

of their own destruction,

as someone or something

somewhere far off

feigns the slightest

nudge of civility,

keeping all righteous indignation

at the safest of distances.

It’s a shame,

all of these things,

these moments

and images which

if we didn’t create,

we certainly condoned

in our uproarious silence.

It’s a shame

to see the sun going down,

closing out another day

with absolutely nothing

but a twinge of degradation

to show for it.

It’s Behind You

How many more years?

you think to yourself,

chugging down handfuls of

someone els’s life,

choking on all the sickly sweetness,

gagging on all that bitter medicine.

Chance it, you think,

and why not?

It’s a series of events,

nameless moments,

successes and failures

viewed through the prism of

your perception of

all the others’ perception.

Chuck it to the shoulder;

the world litters your mind,

pour yourself out

among the cigarette butts

and molding fast food cups,

in some symbolic attempt to

even it all out.

That done, you can refill yourself with

anything you want,

anything you can see,

and all those things you can’t.

You think these things,

but the fingers are sugary today,

and the only water is jittery,

if it moves at all.

You stand up and

beg the world for forgiveness,

but you’ve made a life of

flying so far under the radar,

no one’s sure you even exist,

and you think it might be better

to be an abstraction.

How many more years?

you think to yourself,

before you dump it all out

and try again.

How It Goes

Shaking off the dread

that often comes along

with yet another morning,

you can often find yourself

wondering why,

and not why

in the why are we here

kind of way,

but more of a

why is it this and not that

kind of thinking,

and that’s the dangerous ideas,

the ones that can throw you overboard

in a sea that the most

unobservant reports might call,

“a little choppy,”

and it takes nothing to

keep on sinking,

and it takes everything

to stay above the surface,

and even then,

you might not be able

to pull it off,

so you take some of the brine

into your lungs,

just for a taste,

just to see if it’s all that bad,

and before you know it,

you’ve broken into the sunshine again,

and what the hell,

it’s been four hours,

and your half-bare ass

is plastered to the sweaty sheets,

and you’ve got nothing to show for anything,

but wait, there’s more,

because someone’s knocking

on your hollow front door,

and the sound it rattling

the bad tooth on the

passenger side of your skull,

and wouldn’t you know it,

the cat puked on the rug again,

and you’ve got this sinking feeling

the knocker is that bill collector,

and it’s not that you don’t have it,

you just don’t want to give it,

not out of stinginess,

not out of spite,

simply out of the fact that,

a big chunk of the day’s already gone,

might as well fritter away the rest,

yeah, that’s got to be the best way

to shake off the dread.

Existential Streetcorner

You’re standing on the corner

of Now and Eternity,

and somehow Past

always seems to be

gaining ground,

a torturing reminder that

all of this running

is futile in the end,

but as you stand on that

existential streetcorner,

despite the knowing pointlessness,

it appears exceedingly useless,

if not downright amoral

to stand still,

waiting for the lights to change,

though we all know

they never will,

not until we get off our asses

and churn that old-school hand crank

for all it’s worth,

like a beat-to-hell, stubborn old Model T,

and some days it feels like

maybe old Hank was onto something

when he told the masses:

any color,

so long as it’s black,

but the lights at that

cross section of reality,

sometimes they do change,

and even when they don’t,

they’re never black,

and now you can feel

Past’s breath in the little hairs

on the back of your neck,

and Now feels like a storm’s coming,

so you put your first foot forward

and step into Eternity.

James Benger is the author of several books of poetry and prose. He serves on the Board of Directors of the Writers Place and on the Riverfront Readings Committee. He is the founder and Editor in Chief of the 365 Poems in 365 Days online poetry workshop. He lives in Kansas City with his wife and children.