by Joy Leftow
The pale dawn light shined on his face
I could tell he wasn’t well trapped in his personal hell
Unable to pick himself up like a child who fell
Once too many times running on rhymes
a psychopathic rant
A flaming fuchsia elephant invades my living space
Parades by with a sycophant riding him
While a hierophant stands nearby
reciting Buddhist mantras Nam Myoho Renge Kyo
Before my eyes behold
a white marble palace
studded with gold and quietly buried
suddenly
beneath black sands of time
He begs admission to another sanatorium
a different mausoleum where the dead struggle
with the living over words written on winds
only ghosts can decipher
coming back to attack they deny the facts
fraught with desire the world’s run amok
a phantasmagoric a little white magic moonlight
dripping on ice laden branches will do me
just right tonight poppy
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ABOUT THE POET ~
Joy Leftow is a writer, poet, performer, and current editor of the Cartier Street Review. Leftow has worked as editor on other magazines, most notably a paper mag titled The New Press Literary Quarterly. She also edits for Augustus Press, a hip hop publishing house in New York City and writes for their magazine. Since the early 90's Leftow has been featured in poetry opens, radio and public access TV shows. She is a double alumna at Columbia University and has a second masters in Creative Writing from the City College Of New York. Leftow calls poetry her first love. She maintains a blog which has over 30, 000 facebook followers and over 180 google followers. For the past 2 years she's been working on a series of bluetry evolving from her love of the the blues. She continues helping others in her community since her retirement as a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and participates in group-work promoting arts with teens.
Last updated May 28, 2011