A Poem by Sy Roth

Join Hermes in a Sad Song

Like a busy street--
cars dash by
unaffected by you,
a blur,
walking shade
trapped in a moment
a captured malaise,
snapshot--a nose pressed to a window
Bill Haley and the Comets play
in the background
taking them to a non-place
and you to underworld palaces
where creeping darkness
lurks in shadows.

Like a busy riverway
where Hermes dons a captain's hat
readies for another midnight cruise
in a leaky boat,
you sit pressed to the window
of the wheelhouse
imagining the third ring
where Olympic heroes fell.

Like a wrecking ball
smashing the side of your building,
it crumbles into bits of dust;
the shadow of yourself sits
by the tenth-floor window
nose pressed to the leaden glass
gut-ready to plummet
burrow beneath the earth.

Like Hermes who hums an ancient tune--
familiar,
you hum along with him in Coldplay harmony,
you breathe a foggy inscription on the window,
eyes stare back sadly
undone by the mysteries
hidden in the song.

Sy Roth comes riding in and then canters out.  Oftentimes, head is bowed by reality; other times, he proud to have said something noteworthy.  Retired after forty-two years as teacher/school administrator, he now resides in Mount Sinai, far from Moses and the tablets.  This has led him to find words for solace.  He spends his time writing and playing his guitar.  He has published in Visceral Uterus, Amulet, BlogNostics, Every Day Poets, Barefoot Review, Haggard and Halloo, Misfits Miscellany, Larks Fiction Magazine, Danse Macabre, Bitchin' Kitsch, Bong is Bard, Humber Pie, Poetry Super Highway, Penwood Review, Masque Publications, Foliate Oak, Miller's Pond Poetry, The Artistic Muse, Word Riot, Samizdat Literary Journal, Right Hand Pointing, The Screech Owl, Epiphany, Red Poppy Review, Big River, Poehemians, Nostrovia Poetry's Milk and Honey, Siren, Palimpset, Dead Snakes, Euphemism, Humanimalz Literary Journal, Ascent Aspirations, Fowl Feathered Review, Vayavya, Wilderness House Journal, Aberration Labyrinth, Mind[less] Muse, Em Dash and Kerouac's Dog.