Psychic
Psychic
by angela vogel
There was this bum living at the bottom of a lake
who kept talking my ear off about things.
I pretended not to hear but he recognized the lie.
On and on, he had the answers to everything.
He didn’t like me much, he said. His
was a combination of excess and reserve, a life
which wound him at the bottom of a wave.
He had an endless supply of characters who could
shoulder the blame for his misshapen life, yet
somehow my name sequentially made the list.
I tried adjusting my tympanic membrane
like a backwoods radio to filter the noise.
Men wait lives to get revenge on guys like this,
I’d think, glad for once he’d not hear back.
Most times he lead me nowhere by the ring.
Then a buildup of gladiolus, heartache
and the prize.
I could easily turn to the darkside and become this bum. ‘Cept the only thing i truly know is i know nothing. I’ve met some people who think they have the answers to everything…confidence is too overrated and keeps you from the truth, yet no confidence whatsoever leaves one incapacitated crawling on the ground.
For some odd reason reading this poem reminds me of Beatles’ ‘Yellow Submarine’ animation movie…ahh, ‘He’s a real nowhere man, sitting in his nowhere land’. Heather Mills die! ‘charity this, charity that..’ ahem, sorry.
Is gladiolus flowers? It sounds like flowers and/or a medical term.
Super Creation! The revenge is having this poem published and our reading it.
i really enjoyed this piece.
nice characterization.