So much blood run down my brow,
so much November gray
inside veins and outside clouds–
I’ll never change my name.

Keeping you from doing tricks
is like a lion’s playful fist;
watching me listen to sheep
makes the dog cry in his sleep.

Sellout
Tell the critics to wash their hands
and sing the long song,
wash their mouths with carnal-be-gone,
Some Copenhagen, New York, Johannesburg, and Jordan.

Seal the books, anyway, don’t let them near the truth,
for ruthless is, and ruthless will be,
until one by one by two and three
are shattered into a freer country.

Naive
Can’t give up your drug,
can’t live out your dreams,
as you hold onto shiny sorrow,
your “friends” you’re sure to please…

You have coat hanger, wire hanger,
padded, fancy, broken,
carpal tunnel, disability,
all are so well spoken.

Trading in your toys for more drugs today?
Here I am to do your dirty work.
Trading in your dreams for a puffed pride, a buffed ride, and a fist fight?
Here I am to still know nothing.

Denial
Winter slipped off her uncomfortable jeans,
abruptly switched the song to a profanity,
saw a swollen sun through invisible trees,
while naked and nappy, claimed confident and happy.

Summer, the pick, the favorite for dancing and romance,
wears a mask, an expensive fragrance.
You are two fools. An overrated character, a labyrinth map, she deceives.
Yet driving on, still so far, the sun hangs cold,

and still…

Unclear
Finally a clear night, but wish it were another…
anxious, walking at two,
paranoid from lack of view;
but my hope’s in the morning–
I’m foolish but crazy over your returning.

Stephanie Barnes

November Poems is a post from: The Correspondent