turns their back on you,

breaking words that ring true,

I’ll hold your hand.

I’ll go with you.

When the rest of them

pretend again

to be a-kin,

I’ll go with you; when

being itself is yet a sin

I’ll go with you

be a constant friend.

Lay your head on me,

from the inside out.

I’ll be a pillow;

you be the freight.

Stay with me as you

hit the ground, while they say

gravity’s just a habit

you should break

Down. I’ll be with you —

Always, and again.

I’ll stay the night,

and act the gin.

Give to you, another

expression to read aloud,

thinking maybe — maybe

they’ll connect with your face.

But if they don’t

I’ll be around.  I never

left.  I’m by your side.

I’ll remind you again —

Depression

— 

Depression 2

You see honey, I am not

a broken thing,

laying in the dark

waiting for the green.

You see the cage it calls.

It says, “come on in.”

And I walked therein

wearing that stupid grin.

It felt like love, but

a burning thing,

didn’t know how I

had got here singing.

Then you all stand there

behind the glass

smiling at me, but my

heart is steel

And my teeth are mean.

I could kill this

with my bare hands

if they were clean.

You see I laid my face

to the fire, willed

my mind to be cleaned.

I may fall, but I’ll be laughing.

Depression 3

They said it would all get better
as I cried out to the thin world
in a voice so hoarse that it could not
even pierce your tough Mechlin heart

I dug my own grave without hands —
they said it would all get better
in words decked out in fine prosy.
It didn’t and I didn’t, and —

Sleep does not obey the morning:
no matter how loudly it crows.
They said it would all get better,
yet I whittle the hours away.

I’ll tell you how the sad sun fell
a ribbon at a time.  Yet I
dared look for the dusk only ‘cause
they said it would all get better.

Depression 4

Oh, I know how to obviate, deprecate, not appreciate —

how to come down, sit down, fall down,

be down —

I know I shouldn’t say this,

but all I want to do is

give up right now.

I’ll even put a refrain in this poem: the only sane response to

an insane world

is insanity I bemoan –

O, I know how to

put on a spot-on run-on

sentence for penance —

couldn’t manage hate, too late, fate

couldn’t ever take what you make

of all this

overexposure; prosers got to keep me from

freefalling, staling, walling up my emotions

in portions, potions, situations and motions —

I’ll even put a refrain in this poem: the only sane response to

an insane world

is insanity I bemoan –

excess, recess – in the corner of my mind

‘bout time to find; I

put a wedge under the door to your mind

in kind, sighed to find

my voice is an id

to kid what I did in my

nimiety

not free, sans fee, a felon rebelling and selling

lies pried and signed until we die —

I’ll even put a refrain in this poem: the only sane response to

an insane world

is insanity I bemoan…

About the Poet

Michael T. Smith is an Assistant Professor of English who teaches both writing and film courses.  He has published over 100 pieces (poetry and prose) in over 50 different journals.  He loves to travel.

The post Poems by Michael T. Smith first appeared on Prachya Review.