PESSIMISM 1  

Where the man met the modern world,
Sinking down in his isolation, on the bus;
Looming black man on the corner
Disabled and diseased in the doorway;

Standing, in March, at the steps of the library,
Gibbous and fading orange like a moon
That had stayed around too long;
Noise drove into his body like ice
Noise conquered the world and turned cities
Into idiots: the idiots ruled the idiots.

And nude women talked to lonely men for a dollar
The minds rebellion turned around in a panic;

Fumes killing the people, rushed into houses
As the Holy Ghost once did and babies were taken
And left for wolves who rampaged in the flatland.

The killers rule. And they kill
With impunity with only slight protest. The books collect dust,

Are useless against the onslaught of stimulation
So, everything is lost.

The woman scorns the Virgin and praises the Prostitute
The man loses discrimination  and babbles helplessly 
As his world perishes.

The thread of civility is cut by an avenger
Who arrives seeking gods to kill; there are no gods, 
He says, only men and women.