“dep sesh,” “sadhu,” and “Missus Oxygen Kisses Mister Dynamite’s Heart”

“dep sesh,” “sadhu,” and “Missus Oxygen Kisses Mister Dynamite’s Heart”

Gerard Sarnat
Image
Photo by Nathan Nichols on Unsplash

dep sesh

–RIP William Hurt (1950-2022), star of 1980 Altered States sensory deprivation tank body horror flick

­­–kudos to Donald Glover’s 10Nov22 final episode of Atlanta’s concluding fifth season, It Was All A Dream

loci of suffering’s

my measly attempt

to lower stress level

a crying need warns

me off phantasmagoric

pathologist’s post-mortem

although do have pocketbook

issues I’ll try to stay course for

Ger being held very capaciously

so that last resort boy can find shelter

warm toasty harbor bred with nada burnt edges

thus durable butter buoyancy ain’t taken for granted

while all of us fellow travelers hopefully float up ‘n forward amen

sadhu

once family

neither needs

nor wants me

any more & so

they open up our cage

set you free with henna

loin cloth + biksa bowl

to go beg for daily meal

til now when grow too old

then wear down on the road

I can’t take care of myself thus

am brought back to rejoin their fold

before gaunt fragile Gerry ferries to another side

Missus Oxygen Kisses Mister Dynamite’s Heart

The country music station plays soft
But there's nothing, really nothing to turn off
Just Louise and her lover so entwined
And these visions of Johanna that conquer my mind
– Bob Dylan, Visions of Johanna

Halfway back down these invisible stairs
high above earth, wizard of spacetime’s
relentless liquid imagination guzzles
helium stoned up there in thin air
before he begins circular descent
into deeper despair to celebrate
around the forgotten families’
wintery solstice hearth kindle
on all Christmas Tree Lanes
where Santa plus rain deer
gather to bless Tiny Tim
Scrooge and me depends
on their mood; whereas
girls decide rightfully
to dump just on moi
one male chauvinist
Chanukkiah bush
unkosher piggy
who does not
accept those
martyr sorta
archetypist
Missy Joan
of Arc-ers
bah hum
bug jeez
can’t find
no knees
etcetera
amend?
amen.

About the Author

Gerard Sarnat

Gerard Sarnat has been nominated for the pending 2022 Science Fiction Poetry Association Dwarf Star Award, won San Francisco Poetry’s 2020 Contest, the Poetry in the Arts First Place Award plus the Dorfman Prize, and has been nominated for handfuls of 2021 and previous Pushcarts plus Best of the Net Awards. Gerry is widely published including in 2022 Awakenings Review, 2022 Arts & Cultural Council of Bucks County Celebration, 2022 Rio Grande Valley International Poetry Festival Anthology, The Font, BigCityLit, HitchLit Review, Lowestoft, Washington Square Review, The Deronda Review, Jewish Writing Project, Hong Kong Review, Tokyo Poetry Journal, Buddhist Poetry Review, Gargoyle, Main Street Rag, New Delta Review, Arkansas Review, Hamilton-Stone Review, Northampton Review, New Haven Poetry Institute, Texas Review, Vonnegut Journal, Brooklyn Review, San Francisco Magazine, Monterey Poetry Review, The Los Angeles Review, and The New York Times as well as by NYU, Slippery Rock, Northwestern, Pomona, Harvard, Stanford, Dartmouth, Penn, Columbia, North Dakota, McMaster, Maine, University of British Columbia and University of Chicago and University of Virginia presses. He is a Harvard College and Medical School-trained physician who’s built and staffed clinics for the marginalized as well as a Stanford professor and healthcare CEO.Currently he is devoting energy/ resources to deal with climate justice, and serves on Climate Action Now’s board. Gerry’s been married since 1969 with progeny consisting of four collections (Homeless Chronicles: From Abraham To Burning Man, Disputes, 17s, Melting the Ice King) plus three kids/ six grandsons — and is looking forward to potential future granddaughters.