Poetry Magazine Frank S. Palmisano III

Frank S. Palmisano III

U.S.A.

AN EGRESS TO THE PAST,
A ZEAL TOWARDS THE PRESENT

I am as one born out of my time,
a wanderer estranged by time,
and its gradual progression forward,
which leaves no ground to retreat
backwards.

I wander how, if I embrace my time,
a future generation might revere
the nothingness of this current paralysis
and call it timeless, a masterpiece of
social intrigue.
While it compromises
my Romantic nostalgia to think that the
past was as much a burden for its keepers
as this time now appears to be.

THE PARASYTIC SURGE

When you see the rain pelting the ground,
refrain from provoking it.
When did it ask for your creative imagery?
When it inspired your muse
did it asked to be appraised
like fine diamonds
encrusted with superlatives,
Did it shower epiphanies
in its emblematic surge?
When did it aggravate your contempt?
When did its delicate brand seer
your mind with thoughts of pining
women and fearsome men?
When you see the rain pelting the ground,
refrain from provoking it.

THE INTERNET'S "GOD CAPACITY"

I located a People Finder
on the web the other day.
A catagory entitled
"Find Ancestors," inspired
me with hope, although I
knew they must be long
gone by now.

THE RETAIL MARATHON

Shoppers invade the citadel like
angry Spartans, entering through
a puncture wound in the impregnable
edifice, abandoned by its peaceable
occupants.

The associates, senators, and centurions
stand petrified behind a quartered counter,
jaded by the endless wave of
transactions, exchanging style
for sanity.

Programmed by the shot of a gun,
signaling "regular hours of operation,"
the barbarous platoon converges upon
the merchandise with callused hands
and greedy hearts.

Purchase confirmed, the price it
takes to feed a small child in
some African town for a month,
they exert every last ounce of strength,
finding the finish-line circumscribed
with registers and stoic faces,
congratulating the weary victors
with discounted bliss.