Downriver

Buggy, humid night Passing shores so close. Reality left upriver Facing the long journey down Afforded a view of infinity's blutopia Vibrantly heckled as the men drink coffee, eat their beans Where am I within this team? Small fish in the stream, deckhand on a barge Smug and penitent, affected, uncertain As literate prodding conflagrates. Rat trap in a drain ditch, forwarding Communiqués of perilous merit To an upturned nose of aristocracy beguiled By toothless incantations of expedient lineage A democratic image, painfully just, trying to loosen The grip, fighting with remote fury, unhassled But for the brindled bureaucracy of inward negotiation Petrified by inaction, losing daylight schemes And access to gentling hues, a sense of Worthiness in some direction Floating down Tainted towards the steeping stew Guided by a robust stout, ain't nothing new Its been this way for lifetimes now, just a Ripple in the effervescent unfolding of largeness Overshadowing devilish details of the cause Passionate, resilient, nobly focused Narrowly towards where Old Man River meets the gulf. The men engage banter and warfare with women too Tangled up in body fluids and isolation Fused Thrones and burdensome futures Tending bones and organs with affectionate irreverence Attitudes and prejudice Longing and compromise. Whims of the river suck daylight Dreams bludgeon easy convention Hound respectable goals Making bearded trolls of Target shoppers Desperate divas foreign to a foothold Fighting the haphazard nature of falling in line Where the team huddles and games are played A scant distance from more universal logic. The scent of a passing forest Ceremoniously savored For a dance with the cosmos Coming out To romance A truer circumstance While below deck, men drink coffee, eat the beans,= Catch the meat, cook the stew Nothing new Slow evolution If you wanna be starting something Blessed be, give yourself up To the universe drifting Indifferent, unpredictable No sense in not trying Glory eludes the undignified Seeking comfort in exhaustion Concentration fractured by the bungling Fighting for a name, a lone flag posted To stand in an eternity of nothing much But spitfire aloofness Trite ambition A garden to tend In wake of the weight drifting down A penetrating hyperbole accompanying Dixieland Safely entombed in a shining star, illuminating the Impossibility of perfection, contained by smiles known Shading unique features compromised Bonding innuendoes and frayed footprints Towards replacement of identity Buried in a slough of reasoning Faintly holding on to promise and regret As the river swells miraculously Sweet rain brings another dawn Deliciously underrated and dwarfed By illusionary sonnets and Sharp, narrow focus, making The familiar host a ghost While roasting the exotic and new On the broken back of dedication.