Amongst the Crowd - a reading (on YouTube)
We don our disguises and pretend to be someone genuine and new,
Lurkers at the threshold peering in with the eyes of a
predator.
Our razor-cut, Sokka-styled host greets us at the door
Beside a pile of shoes like a Holocaust sorting station.
High-heeled pretense lies abandoned poolside.
A brief, surficial stillness reflects the evening sky.
Bowed notes glide effortlessly along the water
The caress of cat-silk across the bridged body of a doll.
Screens of bamboo, brown, bound and horizontal,
Vibrant, vertical and green, whisper susurrant secrets
That send chimes of iridescent laughter twinkling on the twilight
breeze.
Fireworks of orchids burst beneath the nightshade of an
arbor.
There is chemistry to these gatherings, a primal alchemy,
An iron cauldron stirred by a trio of green-skinned Kalis
Smiling Mona Lisa seductions to reveal too much
Or be forever shunned in silence.
Connections, brief and enduring, form in the universal
solvent of alcohol,
The swell and lull conversations stirred by the aqua blue
catalyst of the pool.
Marital bonds dissolve for the preferred valence of male to
male, female to female.
Pairings reconfigure as exchanges are interrupted by
commingling Brownian motion.
Eyed by long-faced masks that peer from every dark and
tribal palm,
I am an unstable isotope that drifts through the night alone.
While from his secret alcove buried deep within the garden,
A smiling, torch-lit Buddha reminds me who I am.
© 2013 Edward P. Morgan III
© 2013 Edward P. Morgan III
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ReplyDeleteNotes and asides:
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The inspiration for this piece came from various gatherings over the course of the last year, most at a couple friends’ place along with at least one line from our own. Several lines have been lingering more than a year. I don’t think I’ve attended or hosted as many parties in my life as within the past sixteen months.
People around me at these gatherings regularly notice that I spend a great deal more time alone jotting lines and observations than they would like. I think my notepad makes them uncomfortable. I know a few of them secretly fear I’m writing something poisonous about them, though I doubt they ever read the finished pieces. In fact, I’m just trying to capture the odd lines that sometimes bubble up while I’m relaxed and comfortable. Though I have to admit, small talk bores me pretty quickly.
As an aside, I remember someone famous offering advice for throwing a successful party (Truman Capote, maybe?): You don’t have to like the people you invite; they just have to be interesting, alone or in combination. I suppose occasionally shocking doesn’t hurt either as it gives people something to talk about and remember. Though better, I suppose, that those moments are captured beneath a pen than forever enshrined on photographic paper.
Oh, and if there is one thing I dislike in posting poetry, it’s that I am unable to configure these lines the way I intend them to appear.
Picture Notes:
ReplyDeleteThis started from a picture of our friends' Buddha. The statue sits in a very peaceful corner of their yard, gazing out over the pool. Edward needed a torch lit Buddha. Rather then try to edit the picture, I sketched the statue and started adding color, light and shadow. It took almost 2 hours to get it the way I liked, a convincing rendering of the statue being lit from one side.