Civilized World
There are no executions in the square.
Just look at this town center.
Not a gibbet in sight.
No bodies pierced by poles
like in the days of Vlad the Impaler.
There’s even public toilets.
Take that crucifixions.
And the businessman
in double-breasted suit
eats his lunch on the park bench
without fear of soldiers interrupting,
or priests, or lawyers,
or the Grand Inquisitor.
He even feeds crumbs to the pigeons.
And out of the goodness of his heart.
Not so he can draw them near
then club them.
Not that everybody’s happy
but those grimaces aren’t the nasty work
of rat-borne plague
or suspecting their neighbor is a witch,
Mostly upset stomachs
but what’s to be upset about.
There’s even an orator on his soap-box
threatening the unbelievers with hell and damnation.
And what’s “Hell and Damnation”
but the name of the latest trendy disco.
Hard to believe the country is at war.
Where are the war-like faces?
There’s just an old soldier
burrowed in a tenement stoop
with his gin bottle.
He’d be homeless
if America weren’t his home.
Failure
She failed the exam.
Considering how smart she is,
that’s a failure within a failure.
And she’s depressed.
Even her new shoes can’t cheer her
nor the stereo.
Her favorite songs
are her depression’s favorite songs now.
She considers her choices.
Drink. Smoke. Commit suicide.
Have sex with the first guy who asks.
Or study harder.
Sit for the damn exam again in six months’ time.
She watches television.
Oprah. A woman who has it worse than she does
and with a double chin as well.
And yet that woman didn’t sit for the exam
so the comparison doesn’t count.
She goes for walk,
passes out of her neighborhood
and into the woods.
She can’t put a name to the bird-songs.
Another examination. Another failure.
And she knows the maples
by the shape of the leaves
but what’s an elm, what’s an oak.
This is useless, she decides.
So she sleeps on the couch. She dreams.
Another exam and, this time,
she’s dressed in nothing but her underwear.
No wonder I didn’t pass, she says.
I was almost naked.
I was cold. Shivering. All eyes were upon me.
Some laughed. Some snickered.
Maybe even some guy even said to himself,
“Not bad.”
But “not bad” is a passing remark
not a passing mark.
John Grey is an Australian born poet. Recently published in Paterson Literary Review, Southern California Review and Natural Bridge with work upcoming in the Kerf, Leading Edge and Louisiana Literature.
