In the pond

by Joe Farley

you could have
grabbed hold
of my arm
and pulled me out
when you saw
me floundering,
instead, you pushed
me under the water
held me there,
and watched me drown
while laughing,
sipping wine,
and singing arias,
with your lovers,
beauty I could not hear
with my ears
stuffed with frogs.

Why Daniel Gave Up Painting And Took Up The Blues

by Joe Farley

When the dandelion wine,
farm fermented, ran out
you turned to whiskey,
and married yourself to a bottle,
adapted the drinking man's diet
and shed forty pounds
and with it all thoughts
of the lover who left you
for a woman and not a man.

You still saw her naked
when another model posed
for your brushes to dance
colors across a canvas.
The shapes came out
broken and tormented,
so you left the studio
and bought a slide guitar
and learned to paint music,
with blue the only pigment
left on your palette.

Voyeur

by Joe Farley

looking in windows at other people’s lives
you wonder why yours is not like theirs,
such simplicity and joy seems to exist
within those stone walls
while your life is fire and tempest.

what you do not see are the facts
hidden behind those perfect smiles.
the father has a mistress he meets
every Saturday in Delaware
when he goes to supervise repairs
at his rental units in Wilmington.

his wife drinks in secret and has affairs
to chase away the ice from a cold marriage.
their son sniffs turpentine and longs to be a woman,
while their daughter reeks of semen
returning home from dances at fifteen.
the bond that holds them together is money
and the desire to keep what they have
and gain more.

more is what they will get,
more and more pleasure and pain.
those without fear or heart or belief
will press on without pausing,
while the others will falter
under the burden of accumulated life.
there is no need to mention evil
it may not be the right thing to say.
they are just participants in a world
full of desires and choices,
nothing moralistic about it.
it just is what it is.
people do what they do.
they always have.

Try to shield your eyes with God
the best you can,
real life will still creep through.
you can not get away from it.
you also are part of this world,
and as part of it have needs
just as strong as the bodies
at the dinner table.
why you do not act
to fulfill your wants
may be a holdover from childhood,
a fault in your self,
a weakness or an ailment
that holds you back
from being the same
as that family that you envy.

Suckers

by Joe Farley

Deception requires assistance
from those who are deceived,
that conscious choice
to add up the facts
in one way and not another,
overlooking obvious signs
and trails that lead to pain,
content to hide your head
and look the other way
until there is no escape from facts,
or what is most likely true,
and then, oh then, pity the world
and pity you.

Buggers and bastards and bedbugs

by Joe Farley

watch’em grab,
watch’em take,
watch them lie,
they’ll find a way
to throw the blame
on someone else.

they have no shame.
watch them cut
and watch them drill,
watch them turn
your parks to oil spills,
watch them move
your job over seas,
and make your water
kill the trees.

watch them laugh,
watch them brag,
watch them buy
state senators
and congressmen.
watch them toast
champagne on yachts
while the poor
and displaced
trade their blood
for shots.

The Bridge

by Joe Farley

“The whole world is a narrow bridge,
and the main thing is not to be
consumed with fear.”
Rebbe Nachuman of Bratslav


In our late teens or early twenties
my friends and I went hiking
in the woods near Mau Chunk,
Pennsylvania.

We came upon a trestle bridge
that crossed a river a hundred feet
below where we stood.
We stared at the drop,
but decided to cross.

There were gaps between
the railroad ties,
empty air
stretching down
to the river below.

The tallest had no problem,
long strides
easily covering the distance.
The rest had a harder time
grappling with squat legs
and the fear of falling.

One trip,
one frightening moment
and the stragglers
refused
to go another step
except backwards.

“There is no turning back”
said the one
who was farthest from
our starting point.

No one else agreed.
He wound up crossing alone.
We watched his figure
disappear on the far shore
and wondered
if we would see him again.

It took less than three days,
but he returned,
angry, not triumphant,
bitter at having to cross
the bridge twice
all on his own,
curbing the exhilaration
of his hike.

I have crossed
one bridge alone
to reach this shore
and must prepare
to cross another
without companions.

I feel the bitterness
that he felt
and the fear
I felt then
and he may have concealed.

Evolution of Capitalism

by Joe Farley

Darwin and Wallace
created the universe.
It took longer than seven days,
and there was no time off.
The successful exterminated
the less well off,
climbing up the social scale,
buying yachts and houses
in the trendier suburbs.
The lesser creatures
had yet to evolve
unions and class action
riots and lawsuits,
but the hand of the devil
could still lift up
a pretty thing
from the muck
if it had the right qualities
to fuck or be fucked.