FABRICATION (A Poem)
FABRICATION by Jeff Mallinson
It was as soggy as ever
That evening I wandered down
Failing Street.
I was not feeling like a winner.
I was trying to imagine the melody
My late son might have draped
Over his unfinished lyrics
About God pissing on his face.
My friend whose stuck in Tehran,
Uses a Farsi version of that metaphor
When he is held back
from his living children
By religious zealots
Who misread Rumi.
Not like us.
We get him just fine,
But we’ve lost the recipe
For his wine.
Now back in Portland
I was smoking from a pack
I could no longer afford,
Fighting the sickness unto death:
A despair that’s more frightening
Than lung disease.
Just then, a pickup truck
Drove by.
It’s logo read:
JEFF MADE
It’s subheading said:
FABRICATION
Was this stroll down Failing street
My predestined path?
My karmic destiny?
My pain that refuses to let me die
But promises I’ll become stronger?
Did I sign up for this madness
Before the world was born?
Or are such thoughts
Just pious torments
From the ghost of Ram Das?
Is this last spiritual bypass
The last great temptation
Faced by pilgrims on avenues
Without bodhi trees?
Did I escape the shadow of Jonathan Edwards’ angry Calvinist God
Only to find out
That the demiurge with fatalistic intent
Was me all along?
Am I the architect of this living hell?
Did I decree my own reprobation?
Am I in a fabricated Gehenna
JEFF MADE?
If so, I’ve got a nasty Yelp review
Coming for this Jeff guy.
I think I’ll entitle it:
That bastard’s ego must die.