America – Cajun Mutt Press

The Pale Horse with the Marble Eye

All things considered
I would take the Gambit of
the pale horse with the marble eye

He slipped silently from the fog
on the periphery of my field

Marking the little time that we have

Thanks for the update you say
As I go about our day
and I’m lost on the on- ramp
Waiting for the excuse to cut in to the line
Of human succession

A blinker should do
But
Is that right?
Or is it left?

Not knowing the weight of the day I put on the hazards
Just to play it safe
And yet
I have managed to go no further than my
Driveway

I am stuck
along with the oil stains
wishing to be

Gone
without a trace

no spark

No idea
As to what makes us human
Makes us move forward

We are the generation of promises
The generation of easy
The first family of peace

And
We suffer for it

We are not defined for defending
We are not defined for freedom
We can not see the absence of war
Entirely connected

And yet
Lacking the ability to say “Hello”

NO,
We are the ones that know how often death can be

And yet,
fail to grasp the consciousness of the day
We are your parents lost generation

There is no denying it

The truth is
We can have no authority to what America is

We have landed in a reality that betrays the word

And we can not unite
And we can not understand the truth
Only the differences that we are

We have lost the Great Dream
The Great Experience

And we are too scared to do anything about it.
Forever the in between

So give me the Gambit of the Pale Horse
with the marble eye

And we will slip silently back

into the fog.

**Brother Holland reading “Johnny Depp is Not Coming” at Gonzofest 2023**

The new face of the seeker in the crowd, Ben Holland has traversed the globe in search of many things – mostly himself. To now reside in Kentucky after having been chased out of Camelot (some may call it Connecticut), surviving tours of duty in as far away and exotic places as Iraq and Kuwait, is what could be called a small miracle. Belonging now to tribe of transplants that is Louisville, he finds himself square amid a life that is once again evolving into something more fit for his creative spirit. At the urging of his lovely wife, he is finally pursuing an active writing career, and it starts now!

Glialless

They may as well start playing the following on a loop. Broken record style. It’s scientifically proven that if you lie to someone for long enough they’ll eventually begin to believe the lie. How do you think meditation works? Unfortunately, the following is not a lie but has still found a nice and cozy home within the heads of the herd.

Don’t forget! This is America and you are free
to do as you are told!

I repeat! This is America and you are free
to do as you are told!

Heath Brougher is the Editor-in-Chief of Concrete Mist Press as well as poetry editor of Into the Void, winner of the 2017 and 2018 Saboteur Awards for Best Magazine. A multiple Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net Nominee, he was the recipient of Taj Mahal Review’s Poet of the Year Award in 2018. He is the recent winner of the 2020 Wakefield Prize for Poetry and is slowly starting to wade back into focusing on his own work, with his 11th book “Where Hammers Dwell” due out later this year.

Tag: America

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The Pale Horse with the Marble Eye

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