I'm Tired

I'm tired of pompous poets who pontificate,
impalatable pap from palatial perches on high.
Who's rhythms roll with righteous regret,
and ramble reckless all featherlight
Their voices soft like marshmallow fields,
bouncing an airy blight
Acid cotton candy and reflex smoked joints sing,
"Duh-duh dee, duh-duh dee, duh-duh die"

I'm tired of courageous erudite,
who speak boldly of racial indigestion
Then turn to prescribe moral fiber
and a dose of gender laxation
Discordant dichotomies dictating differences,
distancing man and wife
Horrendous harmonies that bay and howl,
as a piano played childlike with fork and knife

I'm tired of muddled metaphors,
so mythic and magical mists
Understood by scrivening scholars,
who's screws slipped out a few twists
Tediously typing totemic tokens,
as talismans of titillating delight
Lip service letters levied for lauded lates,
with little depth or luscious insight

I'm tired of searching for beauty
and finding when I close my eyes
That the beauty that's right here before me,
is simply too hard to describe
For when I try to behold it,
with gentle touch or earnest replies
It simply melts into nothing,
but endless mem'ries and goodbyes.

So I put on my pastoral pretext,
and ring with a gingerbread beat
Take a big swig of politic correctol,
and graft simile wings to my feet
Then stand with flare-blinded companions,
staring into the darkness of night
Trying to describe what we have seen there,
without being immodest or trite

And when the last lyric has faded,
from the edge of our fever-cracked lips
I cry with rage at our failure
then laugh when the last circuit trips

by Jeff Couch 1995