Ontology Kissed

 

I have not wasted my life.  The subtle

Interference, filled with risk and bad

Feelings, was made to sail across.

It is a weird admixture, the pretense

 

Of valor, oh, should I call it mechanical,

Or should I wait here, the skin over

My being now healed?  The world is

Angular.  The world is covered in a

 

Softness.  The dark soil is lit by a

Nine-light chandelier.  I have planted

My suffering and left it.  I trade my hope

For an expression of stars.  The plants

 

Sing a ballad in the mud after a snow.

One piano teaches something to another.  

Generation X

 

I don't care what you think,

And if you think

The way I live my life

Is a travesty.

I don't care if my rebellion

Takes its form

Alive in the sprouting grass.

I don't care

If my prayers go unanswered,

I really don't,

And it's up to me to pray them

Anyway.

I don't care much for glitter

Anymore, or for arrogance,

Or for anything that isn't

A middle ground.

So sue me!  You won't get

Much, but I'll pay you

Anyway, and you can use

The money to buy the cigarettes

I can no longer afford,

Crawl off somewhere,

Where I'll be waiting for you

With a cup of powdered soup

That we both can share

And laugh about how this

All was so stupid,

Pointless, and how in the end,

No one is an enemy

And only the forces around us are.

________________________________________

Noelle Kocot is the author of five books of poetry, two from Four Way Books, and three from Wave Books, most recently, The Bigger World. She is also the author of a discography, Damon's Room, from Wave. A book of her translations of the poet Tristan Corbiere will be out October 1 from Wave as well. She has won numerous awards for her work, including those from The American Poetry Review, The Academy of American Poets, The Fund for Poetry and The National Endowment for the Arts. Born and raised in Brooklyn, she now lives in New Jersey.