Also appears in Virtual Library.
When I was a selfish little runt,
it was all about me.
It didn’t matter who I insulted,
what person I bothered.
Because I denied the fact
that I could make people cry.
I denied that I could do
an innocent person harm.
Now looking back,
those hurtful memories
return to me
like a smack in the face,
a boot in the ass.
It is my turn to feel the pain
from a selfish little runt
whose words burn in time.
©️mft
A humorous video poem about a not so magical suit. Although it got me through my Bar Mitzvah unscathed.
Also, check out my HubPages blog for the poem and commentary. The Glen Plaid Suit.
My mother threw out my poetry
when I was fifteen,
just like that,
no apologies
given.
She made sure
that the trash truck
ground-up all my emotions
in all those lined pages
of a marble composition notebook.
She wanted to prevent me
from writing down
all my romantic notions
and teenage secrets.
She believed nothing good
could come of telling the truth,
and that expressing pain
and vulnerability
were dangerous.
It’s better to contain
misery and disdain
in private, she said.
Then you won’t get hurt.
That was when I lived at home,
now I don’t have to suppress
what I feel anymore
or be so overly protected.
I’m free to fill up as many
marble bound notebooks
with poems of blood and tears
without being taken
from a mother in fear.
©️mft
Another version of this poem at Mark Tulin on Letterpile.
Buttered popcorn, milk chocolate Goobers
and launching fresh spitballs,
wads of wet toilet paper
sliding down the silver screen
as confused and dazed ushers
chase children misbehaving.
We clap, hoot and holler
for the possessed little blond-haired boys,
flashing their strobe-light eyes,
ice-cold water in their veins,
infiltrating a celluloid English town.
They rise from the grave of affluent families,
putting their mommies to sleep,
melting their poor daddies
into pools of Silly Putty.
I wished that I had their power
to reduce adults to pint size humans,
to make teachers, neighbors, and bullies
feel the wrath of a teenage boy.
Casting the last Pixie Stick onto my tongue,
I suck feverishly on a caramel Sugar Daddy
with a handful of red licorice in my hands,
I finally feel content in my sugar high.
It was just another Saturday matinee
flipping our friends and enemies the bird,
teasing the girls in the front row.
Next week another horror film:
the Creature from the Black Lagoon.
At your graduation,
I clapped
when your name
was called.
I remembered
how proud I was to
receive that rolled-up
diploma written in Gothic font.
I collected
a family of sheepskins,
thought it would bring happiness,
all it got me were
luxury cars,
tacky designer clothes
and a bigger and bigger house
to store all my vanity in.
It was all a vicious delusion,
society’s definition of success,
a hamster’s spinning wheel.
I was tired of the endless grind,
the need to impress, to sell myself,
so I stopped appeasing it.
I began a journey of humility
and simplified my life.
I re-evaluated adulthood
and where I wanted to go.
I found it without searching,
without the need to acquire more.
©️mft
is it the only path
to walk
and see what
you see,
burdened by your
sins
and judgments
or could I venture
on my own,
even if it is a lonely
pilgrimage,
or if I read the wrong
book
and meet
the wrong people,
lost souls who don’t
bare the cross or
the star or the hammer
and sickle or the crescent
moon
perhaps I’ll find my way,
a misguided dreamer
taking a road of less shame,
feet and hands unbound,
a journey without all those
harsh rules.
©️mft
No dreams
No restless legs
No Jiminy Cricket chattering
in my ear to keep me awake.
Just a deep sleep
with a train of Zzzz’s
that seemed to serpentine
above me
into the celestial night.
A pleasant, restful slumber
as if a fairy godmother had tucked me in.
As if she read my favorite story
in her soothing, sleepytime voice.
Nighty-night, my little son,
the fairy with fluttering wings said,
as she waved her magic wand
that glittered over my somnolent head.
©️mft
