God Am... (A Verbal Tryptich)

God Am…(A Verbal Triptych)

God, am

I…

Homeless?

I ask the man tiptoeing by

Steeling his jaw, avoiding my eye -

Does that sound like “hopeless” to you?

Do your roofs and your walls and your stark white halls

Lead to bedrooms and bathrooms and centralized heat?

Am I incomplete?

Am I to be disregar-dead?

Discar-dead?

Dead?

Would it be better for you if I were locked in a zoo

For you to see and feed and gape

Whenever your mushroom-cloud religion

Blew enough shit off the walls of your

Texaco bathroom heart

To see that

Although I have no house

I still have a smile, a mother, an opinion…

Goddamn!

God, am

I…

Gay?

Will I be beaten to a pulp for wanting sex on a rope

For fitting X’s with X’s against their dark sexes

And not the lascivious brand the magazines tell me to

Fuck?

Am I outta luck?
Am I doomed to perform-

A smiling monkey by the organ grinder

That plays its part to earn its hollow bread

But the bread-giver locks me away

From the light of day

And wills me to stay

Til I can behave

Must I scream rage in their eyes

While their arrogance dies

And make them realize

That it’s not for them to decide

Who I love?

Goddamn!

 

God, am

I…

Alone?

When the door shut this time

There was no slam

Just a resigned click, a sigh, a cell-door goodbye

Shutting me inside

With no place to hide

Covers up to my eyes

As I watch the closet door slide

Slowly

Open

Exposing the only place in the house

Darker than this room

Where monsters that look like me hide

Where I alone reside

Did I send you outside?

Goddamn.

--Eric Marley

November 2010