© 2005 Alice Parris

SHOULD I HAVE BEEN HORRIFIED?

When your eyes rolled back into your head

and you drooled for several minutes?

When you cupped your head in pain

and fell backwards into the glass wall?

When you insisted that you were alright

but not by most legal standards?

Should I have reminded myself that

musicians have their own drum-beat?

Should I have assured myself that it

would all be worth it when your genius

was revealed?  Should I have told you

that you were screwed up and needed

a shrink's couch-for a long time?

Should I have told you that the warm

and fuzzy memories of your child-hood

must have been interpreted by a publicist?

What good would it have done, then?

Why was I not horrified into self-survival?

BLUE-HALCYON REVERIES

Weighty issues of politics

Are debated in dark corners.

As blue, halcyon lights move in

straight lines making even rats scurry.

My mind melts at medication time.

Until then, there is no sleep.

I engage in obsessive-compulsive

behavior until the very end.

I am a desert rat upon a wheel.

Icicles become shards when

irreverent, careless banter reaches

the level that breaks them off as--

projectile objects of violence.

Man thought that God was mute.

Now, He speaks through nature;

penetrating wind, deafening thunder

and  breath-taking lightning!

All work is copyrighted property of Alice Parris.

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