Grave Act (Under the Influence of John Berryman)

I wrote this for a college assignment.  We had to choose a poet and attempt to write in their style.  John Berryman spoke to me.  My writing isn't for everyone, and I fully understand and accept that, as a great deal of my writing speaks of dark matters that can make people uncomfortable...and this poem is from a dark corner.

Grave Act

(Under the Influence of John Berryman)

A bronze plaque, overgrown with grass and clover

lulls in the shadow of an early moon.

Deep, six feet deep

I often return to a reminder, ever so sober

that I haven’t caught sight of you since June of last year:

the drowning pool leap.

I stomp where a heart would beat

flooded by chlorine martinis in a kidney shaped pool.

Oh poor baby, poor you

Was yours a glass world and you cursed with heavy feet?

To wring the neck of a moody fool.

They’ll dig down amongst the skeleton crew,

where your silver bullet-proof shelter won’t protect,

to see how he’s treating you down there,

in the four star accommodating vault.

Did Death appreciate the Armani effect?

The time has come to seek out Truth:

lurking behind the collected lies in that chilly resting place.

And once lured to the primitive bed,

he’ll be laid out on the slab: bare

and I’ll painstakingly dissect your terrible thought.

E.A. O’Connell