POLTERGEIST
When I first began to shout
I believe
there was an imbalance
in my blood sugar levels.
Shouting along the row houses;
searching faces that appeared;
searching brick patterns
between faces.
If I had dared
set myself free,
I’d have entered every house without knocking
and done my shouting in there,
so’s it would be loud –
the better to see
the antennae lock on the source.
But I envisioned gunplay,
and called from public property.
I called names, suggestions, nouns,
and the time on the quarter hour.
I discussed Darwinism,
the single-bullet theory
and tried to further these faces’ conception
of the ‘victimless crime.’
I like to think that over that period that
I shouted, I changed
some outlooks.
(I called the faces ‘outlooks.’)
I lost all desire to eat.
My throat wore thin
and frayed open.
That’s how it ended.
I still walked along the row houses;
the outlooks kept looking out,
but once they saw
that I was done with the noise
and had no further plans,
they dug in for the winter
that follows loud sounds.
And one night in November 1954,
a shot fired from a passing car
just nicked my aorta
and I died in a short-sleeved shirt
gargling the red sentences.
Find me
in the National Archives,
causing large volumes
to move through the air,
in full view of whoever’s near.
From me to
You, Glenda
Your Mike
July 1982
Ed. Note:
In every city I’ve inhabited, there has been one old man observing the tradition of SHOUTING out The Word. Whether it be rage fueled or Bible inspired, there he will be, rain or shine, getting it On. Now I live again in a city I left in the eighties. Then, there was an old man in a worn suit waving a wooden sword as he shouted. It was the tradition. On arriving back in the city, I find he has moved one block to the East, and has changed ethnicity and dropped the sword. But the suit is the same and the ability to instill guilt Much Intensified. I think his current incarnation is capitalizing on a superior knack for eye contact. I have wondered if the other old geezer got pneumonia and died, or if the current reigning king is the winner of some turf war among the disenfranchised. Reading this poem from Mike was very disconcerting. In places I recognized his observations about the denizens of some of the cities/neighborhoods he visited. Elsewhere in the words, I saw Michael himself, in his lifelong struggle to be heard and to make a difference by pointing out the seldom attended to bits of historical trivia that were his Calling. I know he DID die in a short sleeved shirt, because some internal tubing frayed open, and gargling red words out of a dark blue face. Truly I Have dug in for the winter that follows loud sounds. I am more than a little bit of a mind that he still walks the row houses, however done with the noise. His message board window cropped up with a comment from him last week about how he is attempting to leave messages.