Oliver Benjamin
All there was inside was a poem:
SLAPPED SERIOUS
There is nothing new here.
It’s all been done or seen, at least in some primary state,
I’ve tasted sweet, I’ve borne the brunt of both love and hate,
And I’ve felt the little child wonder.
But now there are no more surprises.
What I haven’t done myself I’ve seen on T.V.
And what I still long to do scares me sufficiently.
Yet I am only in my third decade.
I am cold and calculating,
But only to myself—I am warm and false with others.
And I secretly harbor a conviction
That if I had my druthers,
I’d give it all away.
But all I have to give is the monkey on my back
(The one that goes ‘ho hum, ho hum’ all the way home)
Please grant me this one request:
That the spectacle of death be more spectacular
Than the bloated marionette show of living
And that for that moment
I can relieve the strange and perverse misgiving
That shot through me when I emerged from the womb
Only to be slapped silly
And ultimately slapped serious.
At the bottom of the page, a scribble in different colored ink read:
Here’s some more unanswerable questions for you and your
entourage:
Why are feelings and emotions we have in our dreams so much
more powerful and complete than we could ever hope them to be in
real life?
125
 |
 |
 |
 |