Poetic Dreams

Climbing into Death’s carriage, I leave
behind the California supermarket
where Ginsberg is stalking Whitman.
We throw watches to virgins as we pass,
calling out warnings of Time’s haste.
People salute the man in a stove pipe
captain’s hat as he lays bleeding on the floor.
A woman leads a group of kidnapped poems
down a trail that wants wear, though
they cast sorrowful syllables
at the clear yellow path unchosen.
As fog slinks in on its feline paws,
I smile at my fatal choice of companionship
and thank him for the new book of verses.