One Poem by Gary D. Maxwell

 

Rubaiyat

 

I

My Muse's bar bill grows. The barkeep knows I'll pay.

Drink up, sweet sister! Anything to make you stay

and teach me all the names you know of nasty stars.

I know I'll stagger home alone come break of day.

 

My friends call me a fool. They say she's using me

by dropping in all hours unexpectedly.

I just can't help myself! I swear, I've tried before

whenever friends were saying "act responsibly!"

 

A poet's not some damned domesticated soul.

He's not the sort to sit and let his veins run cold.

Fire is the wine he drinks - his only song.

Wrapped up in beggars rags the song alone consoles.

 

 

II

I saw you once, sweet candle glow, from far away

when I was young - I had no choice except obey

your call and wing my way to you through choking night

even if my end was writhing in your flame.

 

Some laugh at all we tiny ones who come to sing

and throw away our lives in one ecstatic fling.

They build their walls of stone to keep the world at bay,

we live and dance and die to taste Love's utmost sting.

 

Don't weep for me! I bore Love's torch a little space,

falling singed and silent to my resting place.

If cold and stone are all your heart has ever known,

don't pity us who've lived to taste the flame's embrace!

 

 

III

I'll doubtless die, be buried, where my name's unknown.

That's easy in the valley of the dust-dry bones

where one more soul's one soul too many - wasting air,

my hours squandered singing to these lifeless stones -

 

How blessed are the panderers to people's whims,

the latest catchy jingle's now their holy hymn.

I guess a change of tune could change my fortunes, too,

but how, once stars appeared, could I dare look at them?

 

So come, sweet anonymity, and eat my name.

A thousand years from now I guess it's all the same!

Since moths eat books, the poets words return to dust.

Don't let 'em kid ya, son, there's no "eternal fame!"

Gary D. Maxwell is a poet currently residing north of Boston. After shoveling roadkill on the Information Superhighway for forty years, Gary now devotes his time to writing. You can find his poetry at Amazon.com