in parentheses

Poems by Samuel Mesiti

Author’s Note: I have been a student of poetry for several years and also fortunate enough to both learn and participate in this creative process with Rich Murphy. Some of the writers I follow include A.R. Ammons, Charles Simic, Rita Dove and James Tate. I appreciate the opportunity to share my work with In Parentheses.

An Urban Landscape

Developers… profiting groups et al
will return to self-nourish feeding pet cause,
gloss-coat the masterwork of ownership,
governing bodies and pat their own backs.
Homeless and poor yield to tightened belts, jaws
still spared change
and grind at enamels on-scene.
Stray bullets split heirs in a neighborhood
slated for more than its share of chalk lines as
any new foundation for lives in the balance
remains anything but concrete.
Designers of the original plot revision
cloud critical judgment with
strokes of unity amenities
and the silver lining is found by planners
from the drawing board that owns them.
Pro-commercial skyscraper arguments
in part frame the moon
when wish for housing plan costs claimed
easy to overshoot, promise fewer returns.
Frightened on terra firma just as remote
may gasp at the dawning as those dotted i’s
insure benefits remain
suspended out of reach, in a heaven, somewhere
feathered-in for safe keeping.

Cultural Falls

Profit in empathy loss
shifts question of constructive livelihood
to the background
as those neglects help feed hunger
for personal gains amid the artist-starved.
Working stiff and road warrior
might have read volumes
for a single meaningful sustenance
if that provided what growing a family needs.
C-level bread winners speed home
in overdrive to suburbs
and connection with any also-rans
or emotional challenge is happily traded
for ignorance in the name of relaxation
on a Victory Lane.
Like minded remain occupied with themselves
gathering for block parties:
the unceasing ware-out welcomes mock shares
and hope with those buying in
happy, less understanding from relationship.

Captives Collective

From the footholds
of their monument valley
to the height of urban
sky-shaper grasps
owners of industry and finance
have made a business model
anchoring independent movements
to their sense of purchase.
Thought leaders and architects of another’s least and famine
lead goal miners with few prospects
to a pursuit of happiness where credit is due or bust
when an economy collapses around them.
Finding just enough in a boot strap
any suspended disbelief
often meets hitting a sidewalk aftermath
when a payback school calls roll
among the unemployment lines.
Next group of stepping stones are cast
and set up to suffer overwhelm by needs then obligation
and the business side of hammer-shaping
may form pockets for empty fits in captivity
wherever the larger end might have met a need.

Same Old Lands

More native plots have been called home
by way of a culture’s burial
than any manifest destiny celebrant
would care to remember.
“New World” explorers continue to arrive
just in time to flag borders
for gentrification and next landfill
as tenderfoot parties rule from seats of
a machination writ sacred to
move heads where unchallenged.
Today a follow up lame namesake
puts best foot forward
wherever a revisionist glory
protecting past and future liberties waves on:
to stare vacuous at
vistas; the token settlements renamed,
spoiling to upturn another history.