Three poems by Aedan Cagney

Three poems
by Aedan Cagney

anything but a poem

this isn’t a fucking poem
this is a necessity to survive the night
this isn’t commercial excrement
this is what I’ve chosen to write

this is drowning in a river of thought
this is delving deep down inside
this is concrete slowly creeping
this is taking off in flight

this is the smashing of a soul
this is the slicing of a throat
this is the human condition
this is the abandonment of hope

this is death
this is pain
this is life
this is love

this is lust
this is greed
this is anger
this is pride

this is anything but a poem

this is a dream within a dream

this is the promise of change
this is the realization of reality
this is the vivacity of living
this is the alienation of actuality

this is the smell of trash
this is the brightness of her eyes
this is the holiday in sin
this is the way she smiles wide

this is the wrinkle of the mind
this is the sadness of the city
this is everything considered
this is all things pretty

this is the howling of the dogs
this is the cooked-up heroin
this the Devil’s dandruff
this is the whisper of the wind

this isn’t a goddamn poem
this is the experience of tonight
this is a middle finger to convention
this isn’t textbook type

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4 Jack Micheline

I’ve chosen the
Imaginary throne of
Poetic madness,
Masochistic torture
Over ambrosial bliss

I’ve chosen a
Life of loneliness,
Beauty in place
Of business

I’ve chosen dreams
Over actuality,
A palace of my mind
Over a mansion
On the hill

And since nothing
Is left in a lunatic’s will,
These words are
All I have

Words that write
Of the lynching
Of mediocrity

A manifesto for
A new world order

For the incarcerated
The damned
The killers
And the murdered

For the whores
The junkies
The winos
And the thieves

Beauty speaks
On city streets

Why is no one listening?

====================

I DIDN'T HAVE TO
Flush the antipsychotics
Drop out of college
Become a raging alcoholic
Fall in love with a woman
Who didn’t want me at all

I probably shouldn’t have
Gotten hooked on painkillers
Dropped acid
Twice slit my wrists
Turned to robbery
To pay the rent

I didn’t have to
Do these things
But If I didn’t I’d
Just have an empty page
And what could be
Worse than that?

Author bio:

Aedan Cagney is the pen name of a young writer who would rather remain unknown for now. A scribbler of both sweet and sordid thoughts, he hails from Cleveland, OH, his city of blue-collar ruins. His major poetic influences include: Bukowski, Jim Carroll and, especially, Jack Micheline.