Regret In Five Part Harmony Poem by Roy Blokker

I.
When I was a kid
Mister Black
Was the perfect name
For a bad guy.
The Fifties saw things
In clearer dichotomies,
Black and white, yin and yang,
Peace brother
Still on the horizon,
Social awareness not in
The Unabridged,
Politically correct
A bullshit future.
The good guys were the Peppers,
August and Charles,
Both sergeants in the war, of course.
The Civil War.
There were few words spoken.
These men let their guns
Be their eloquence.

II.
Heroes scream at the inferno's edge,
Gaping at the twisted jaws of hell,
Trying to raise hope, raise life,
Trying to raise the phoenix
In air so thick with smoke and dust,
They cannot breathe, they cannot see,
They cannot work and yet
They do.

III.
I saw God there, walking,
Wearing many faces,
In turbans, yarmulkes and Yankee caps,
In shades of blue so deep
They pierced through the air
With their tears.
Their eyes, cobalt blue,
Obsidian black, nephrite green,
Shone uniform.

IV.
The rider slid across the water
On a road of fog,
Merlin made the dragon's breath
So Uther could seduce Gewain
And Arthur would be born
And out of trickery,
Murder and deceit
Legends might evolve.

V.
Weeks later now, fires still burn,
Small sunspots in New York,
And workers toil incessantly
Like ants in a hurricane
To clean away the ruins.
Trick or treaters walk with care
In police and fireman uniforms,
Singing to and pushing back
The dragon's breath.
Amid it all you can see
Mister Black storm Congress
And hear
The phoenix' feathers
Rustling.