man...

i must fill my days with dreams and fantasies;
nothing has meaning except these moments
of pure escapism penetrating edges of my sanity,
skirting reason and defying rational thought…
finally only perception and memory matter…
as the world grows bestial and barren.
belying the truth of stated hypocrisies that
we were created equal…

there is a vile stench of cynicism wafting through
corridors of corruption as
i face your dour expression daily
and hear the denigration spew from you;
for i am not required to perform, only to endure…
that makes me insignificant in your eyes…

i am only a vessel to be filled by you…
pursued, shot and stuffed and
mounted on a broad altar where you sweat and toil
posed in bas relief within your phallic dreamscape…
you discount my humanity as scalable against my worth…
you view my tears as liabilities against power;
you insist upon beauty and youth and innocence…
without which I become indentured to indifference…
against the backdrop of your subjective memory
i cease to exist…

as i slip underneath the glass surface where the view
fragments and closes in myopic splendor…
i am lost inside an aging body whose youth fades with
each step down toward the bottom;
the inversion cannot lift my spirit to meet your omnipotent
disdain of me and my wretched grasp
upon your reality—your vision of the state of man
and his subject—woman…
so if you deign to tolerate my presence,
you will only dream of long-legged beauties
whose loveliness inspires you to write lyrics
or soft lines of sweet poetry…
while you ignore the richness of me who has
lived and loved
and who knows exactly what you need to make you whole…

man
prism gates
ja allen