ODE TO ABSURDITY

Consider this, O Muse,
My heart is ill,
My seriousness has gone into the Void
That has devoured my poetic mind,
And all along my head is filled
With flies, with inessential
And trifling things--
Cigars and bottles, canned sardines and bricks,
Cheap whiskey, naughty negligee
And television,
And love is like a scalpel at my throat,
Cutting my jugular at every faint try
To recreate a vision of my darling
Gone in the sweet oblivion of alcohol...

So here I am--the Poet Laureate drunk
In front of all the everyday clichés--
I want a cigarette but I don't smoke,
And matches can't ignite my lonely heart,
I see young fellows hitting on some hussy--
She's like Snow-White
Amidst the seven horny dwarfs,
And their vacant eyes wink at the prospect
Of entering the lonely space
Between her thighs...

Consider this, O Muse,
My body's tired, my wit is gone,
I have no job, nor goal,
I look inside me and all I find is noise--
Somebody sings: "I'm a creep" inside me,
Somebody laughs: "Your girlfriend is a whore.
I slept with her one thousand times before
Without a condom, sorry...it's been real."
While from above the Economy
Is trickling into my mouth
Burning up my tongue,
And I imagine that I've gone to Heaven
Where someone shouts:
"You're a winner and well-hung!"

                                            August 15, 1993
                                         --Alexander Shaumyan