Josh grew up in and all around the Capital District, and currently resides in Ballston Spa. He has been writing poetry for nearly a decade now. He writes poetry because he cannot sing. Also, he thought it would help him escape the rigors of grammar he associated with prose writing. He was wrong. But he still cannot sing, so he has worked to improve his craft, taken up reading poetry where he can, and sought out what publishing might be available to him. Josh’s work has been published in Metroland, Screed, and Modern Drunkard Magazine (sorry, Mom). Josh is now tired of referring to himself in the third person – so, thank you for clicking on my name, and I hope you enjoy my work.
POEMS
AMBITION
Some Jones tossed babes
Into the furnace
And each one let out such cries
Like a wailing Greek Chorus.
They shared this news flash on world affairs
In case we had not noticed
In case we did not care.
The blaze belched and stank,
And the Chorus dulled to mumbles
And men still sought such rank
To never be brought to their troubles.
PLEDGING MY TIME
Are you out here somewhere Christine?
Out where the jungles sing
and toss off the flesh of has-beens?
Are you marching ahead of that fling?
Do the truths you seek speak anything
Of me, or of our ever brief scenes?
Perhaps this is one of those tests,
The sort Mother’s God would bless,
Axes raised, bushes ablaze,
Wine and bread to pitch at the crazed.
All before we can find one another again
In ragged passage along the forest edge.
Each of us now a thin skinned mess
And me grinning a Jolly Roger pledge:
To hold for one last forever
My bony wristed temptress.
IGNORANT WAS BLISS
It was easier when despair was vague
When I had no one to think of
When I had no thought to beg.
Now the first face in every fantasy,
The lone form I plainly see,
Is of the woman who shared with me
a moment of her time, just our single date,
Which turned my lonely life
Into something I hate.
POET BENEATH A MEMORY
Beaten, I find some reason
To work through these cold seasons
To speak of wind as the voice of treason
To forge in scribble for the time being,
While just the thought of her name is easing.
ORAL TRADITION
My tongue bristled through the drought
(so hopeless, there was not even waiting)
Until you stole my horizon,
Exposed without doubt
My need to breath in the elegant seem
You now offered to soothe my long muted shout.
