Jose Montano: Silence Has Aged With Me
VISIONS OF COMPLACENCY
i
Every time I look out the window
it’s a constant reminder
of how I don’t belong in this world
The green looks fake
planting families in
the grass of normality
Do I really want to lose my parents to time
and become one myself with that same time?
Society’s importunity nods a definite yes!
So I draw the blinds
and wait for my mother to come in and ask
“Cuando?”
ii
The cheap blue paint in the wall's silence has aged with me.
This cheap light bulb is the only sun I've seen in weeks.
Am I introverted or lazy?
My migraines grow like weeds in the lawns of comfort
I’ll never leave the stale city of alienation
though I’m too depressed to wanna stay
I’m just too anxious to try to leave
trapped-isolated and weird.
iii
The mocking bird's song is stirring hot
in the night's belly
as the image of a sweet former lover
eclipses the moon of my iris
and I'm blinded
through new nights
of dusty heart remembrances
I’m alone and absolutely comfortable
but melancholy is a sick knife into the lungs of happiness
I lost my breath thinking of friends
that were only photos of pastness
in the worn-out pockets of futurity.
iv
Being a poet means sounding exactly the same as your contemporaries
Cut the verbs in their gut
Make adjectives swell the eyeballs full of tears
I get plastic surgery to look just like Rupi Kaur
My anaplastic nouns are read by a goth girl
who says “I hate Rupi Kaur”
Every poet wants to be a motivational speaker
Which liberal arts school inspired the adverbs of supposed enlightenment?
I am what the publishers are not looking for
more 5 line poems! less ambition!! more//////////////////////
v
It’s exhausting
to carry the world up against my forehead
and my visions through the window of aberrancy
that keep me odd//Complacent//Frustrated//Content?
when I’m dead-in the graveyard of literature
of unknown poets.
Jose Montano is a Chicano poet/writer from Southern California. Jose has self-published three poetry chapbooks, Enouement, Amateurishly, and Karmic Futurity. Jose’s poetry has also been featured in Idle Eyes Zine. Jose doesn’t enjoy long walks on the beach but he does enjoy long drives off a cliff.
