Tale of Another Poet

I hardly can craft a poem new
For I am bound to my constant form,
The perfect lines are not mine, it’s true,
Stolen and kept without alarm;

And how hard it is to speak of days
That march along in dull parade,
To paint the tedium with strokes ablaze;
Describing the mundane, in truth, betrays.

We never learned a trade to ply,
For Grandma urged the college path,
Yet she clung to the war, and Battiato’s cry,
And I, in study, still lack the craft.

So many of us, with knowledge slight,
Enough to cast a vote, or maybe not,
For though we were many in that fight,
We end with ministers of retro thought.

And I once vowed, “Now, things will change,”
But where Guevara’s bandana is, I know not,
The punk and goth posters, once not so strange,
Lie buried in a chest of coffee-stained plot.

We have yet to grasp revolution’s hand,
Or maybe it’s not our place to win,
For pensions don’t knock at the stand,
Perhaps it’s better to sail and sin.

But Grandma would say, “Don’t venture far,”
Though the world around her spoke otherwise,
I had just enough for a smoking cigar,
Yet from France, the descent seemed wise.

But I can’t pen songs worth a tune,
Not of pain that loving a girl can weave,
When wealth was promised under the moon,
In inheritances I’d never believe.

So, I left without a farewell call,
When Grandma forgot how to sing,
And still, I write in rhyme, for a bride or thrall
That might arrive with the coming spring.

I pen books I never read nor heed,
But children, they do not eat the scroll,
At the thirtieth interview, I plead,
Talking to walls that heed my soul.

For still, I know not how to live right,
Weighing barely a bag of flour now,
Ever weaker, I stand to fight
With too much and nothing upon my brow.

What if I’d taken those exams,
What if I’d boarded that train on time?
How much bread would diplomas grant,
And how much in empty thoughts I’d rhyme?

My friends now smile only in frames,
Though perhaps I never had them near,
No clothes, no women, no roaring flames,
Just half a can of lager in Sprite’s veneer.

And I know I shouldn’t dare complain,
Considering the world and all its woes,
But come month’s end, with no savings to gain,
I indulge in foolishness, where luxury goes.

And Grandma, still she says today,
That times do change, but people do not,
We gaze upon the bust, in plaster gray,
Of her husband she kept in the dresser’s spot.

And perhaps I wished to stand with you,
In the sixties, loading trucks for the road,
Unaware of calculators and U2,
Collecting horrid souvenirs, as life flowed.

For I could never write as I should,
For you, verses never served a need,
No poetry’s needed to slay the wolves,
Nor psalms for the devil’s creed.

Had you two decades less, it’s true,
I’d have weeks of questions to share,
Asking, through the long night’s view,
How you lived without a shirt to wear.

I can’t even write a novel’s tale
Beyond a prologue, maybe a chapter or two,
For the mere thought makes me frail,
And a book dies in frivolous rues.

How much I’d say when dreams embrace,
But morning strikes with stones in hand,
Then work, children, bank, taxes chase,
And politics of shadows and shifting sand.

I needn’t name the fools by face,
To make you see who deserves no song,
And if I contradict, citing Matteo’s case,
It’s for lack of paper, B’s name’s too long.

But Grandpa voted with a grin so wide,
And never did I tell him why,
That his heart failed not by trousers’ pride,
Nor rap, nor Wi-Fi, but politics’ lie.

If we had seasons to waste away,
In talks about how wrong I’ve been,
I’d be the last to leave the fray,
For another deserves death, not kin.

And how much I’ve left unsaid to those
To whom I owed words most of all,
And how much I still say to those
Who deserve no words, and never will call.

From confessing falsehoods in the booth,
To now, knowing Dante’s tongue, and sober too,
It may be we can’t grow into truth,
For it’s simpler to be small, not new.

Perhaps we were raised by saints of old,
But it might have been better with Guccini’s voice,
At least we’d grasp the signs, bold and cold,
Facing them with our minds, not by choice.

Now, I speak in ancient ways,
Of a life I never lived in Provence,
Yet I know not French nor its phrases,
And wonder if there, they’ve lost their trance.

But at least I’d dine with lights aglow,
Without bills that climb to sky-high heights,
At least I’d write in rhyme and flow,
Without shame in words, or festive lights.

It could be the writers who raised me thus,
Those books not meant for study’s drill,
Or bullies, or slaps that came to us,
To know would save a bitter pill.

Yet still, I laugh, far too much at times,
At things one ought never to do,
Though gazing back on these ancient lines,
Perhaps I’ve loved civilization too.

No statue’s carved without a chisel’s bite,
Perhaps I should cease this endless script,
For like all, at the peak of life’s height,
I’ll forget it all, even life’s sweet trip.