office space.

The blinds sway

in manufactured warm, dry, air.

A hard drive echoes out an existence

through its motorized hum

of gears and circuitry..

          

It pitches then it falls.

Car alarms being heard

from a great far off distance,

ringing menacingly in a whisper

as an insulated call from the outside.

     

It’s beginning to rain again.

Drip, drip, drip, goes the window pain.

Frequently pacing,

methodically counting each and every step,

pausing when some pair

of counter steps walks past.  

I was intimately aware

of the people around me.

          

They are the inheritors

of the Magic Kingdom,

on an open road oblivion

that’s calling its disciples home.

               

The heat from our bodies creeps

 through vents in the ceiling,

 mingling with stars in the sky.

                    

I think I hear them falling.

dead letters for living people

centerfold.

We had settled on riding the city limits.

Passing the old playground

where we first

saw a picture of a naked lady.

We were content

with the silent treatment

until we got home.

This whole experience should have been better.

“Remember that song?

Remember this?

Remember that?

Remember when we all

went to the end of the year dance

and we all got drunk and

Amy and Mark got lost in the woods

behind the gymnasium?”

Memory lane carries a toll, and some of us have over paid.

I remember that picture of a naked girl,

how Mark swiped it

from his brother’s collection

of flesh colored treasures

that was kept in secret places in his brother’s room.

We once got yelled at for sneaking about 

looking for his also secret collection of baseball cards.

Hiding away the past is a learned behavior.

I remember being unsure how to react

and the look on most of our faces

told me, I wasn’t alone.

We hooted and hollered,

mimicking the reactions

we’d seen on television.

Her pose

persuading flaccid penises

and the hidden ejaculations

accomplished only

fragile embarrassment

and the act of

rivaled excitement

that told nothing

of her talents.

Children caught in the act of pre-designed lust.

dead letters for living people

josephmcabral.com

beach day moments.

Papier-mâché houses 

built at the water’s edge.

    

Painted structures

in nostalgic colors                                                                                                                                   to remind their dwellers

of youthful summers on

visions of historical postcards.

Those who carry crosses are gathering

to wash their savior’s blood from their hands.

Like children playing at the water’s edge,

the water pools around their feet.

          

Mother of us all

washes away their tainted selves.

The sound of the tide

echoes the laughter

of the gulls.

Envious creatures protesting to a broken man.

He hears their complaints,

taunts;

he attempts

to answer them, properly.

They cannot understand his prophetic words.

He expels the air

from within him               

tiny rivers

ripples within his eyes.

The hecklers don’t understand him,

protesting louder,

with deeper convictions.

     

He tosses pieces of bread

in a defeated gesture,   

accepting his own fate.

The heckling clowns

gobble up the old man’s offering

of peace and reconciliation

still laughing

as they fill their bellies.

dead letters for living people

past present all over again.

Romantic type portraits

painted upon

faces of those gathering

and those that have been recreated.

Lovers and parents sitting,

watching

fires burning.

All have been warned.

The outcome, the ending,

has already been planned.

Yet, painted faces watch it play out before them.

               

The show begins once more.

The fires are growing hotter.

 The sky is burning.

Fragments of our yesteryear

are sold and bought on a black-market

of self-created romantic visions.

     

The  organs of our ancestors

are bathed in new blood.

New faces are being passed around

for the gathering to partake of.

     

Sheltering the guilt for silence.

The fires begin to burn brighter,

the smell of poison sweetens the air.

The lights go dim,

the curtains rise.

Forgotten celebritarian names recite angry prose

that gets tossed on pyres

where  nothing is learned 

and everything gained

 is not enough to pay the expense.

dead letters for living people