Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada during the Vietnam era. Today he is a poet in the greater Chicagoland area, IL. He has 272 YouTube poetry videos. Michael Lee Johnson is an internationally published poet in 44 countries, has several published poetry books, has been nominated for 5 Pushcart Prize awards, and 6 Best of the Net nominations. He is editor-in-chief of 3 poetry anthologies, all available on Amazon, and has several poetry books and chapbooks. He has over 443 published poems. Michael is the administrator of 6 Facebook Poetry groups. Member Illinois State Poetry Society: http://www.illinoispoets.org/.
My Life
My life began with a skeleton with a smile and bubbling eyes in my garden of dandelions. Everything else fell off the edge, a jigsaw puzzle piece cut in half. When young, I pressed against my mother’s breast, but youthful memories fell short. I tried at 8 to kiss my father, but he was a welder, fox hunter, coon hunter, and voyeuristic man. My young life was a mixture of black, white, dark dreams, and mellow yellow sun bright hopes. Rewind, sunshine was a stranger in dandelion fields, shadows in my eyes. I grabbed my injured legs leap forward into the future. I’m now a vitamin C boy it keeps me immured from catching colds or Covid-19. Everything now still leaks, in parts, but I press forward. Jesus and How He Must Have Felt (v3) Staggering out Wee-Willy's dumpy dive bar, droopy eyes, my feelings desensitizing, confusing my avocado fart, at 3:20 a.m., with last night splash on Brut aftershave. Whispering to my outcast self-sounding is more like pending death. My body detaching from myself, numbed by winter's fingers. I creak up these outside stairs to my apartment after an all-night drunk, cheap Tesco's Windsor Castle London Dry Gin—on the rocks. I thought of Jesus how He must have felt during His resurrection dragging His holy body up that endless stairwell spiraling toward heaven. Most Poems Most poems are pounded out in emotional flesh, sometimes physical skin scalped feelings. It’s a Jesus hanging on a cross a Mary kneeling at the bottom not knotted in love but roped, a blade of a bowie knife heavenward. I look for the kicker line the close at the bottom seek a public poetry forum to cheer my aspirations on. I hear those faraway voices carrying my life away- a retreat into insanity. Poets in the Rain (V4) All poets are crazy. Listen to them soak sponge in early rain medley notes sounding off. Crazy, and suicidal, we know who they are: Edgar Allan Poe, Sylvia Plath, Dylan Thomas the drunk, Anne Sexton, Teasdale. This group grows a Pinocchio nose. At times I capture you here under control. I want to inspect you. All can be found in faith once now gone in time. With all your concerns, I see your eyes layered in shades of green, confused within you about me. Forgive me; I’m just a touch of wild pepper, dry Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon, and dying selfishly. We don’t know if it is all worth it. I have refined my image, and my taste continues to thrust inside your crevices. Templates of hell break loose thunder, belches, and anomie. Asteroid Ceres looks like you are passing gas, exposes her buttocks, and moves on just like ice on a balmy rock just like yours. I will wait centuries, like critics, to review this fecund body of yours- soiled, then poppies, poetry in the rain.
I Age (v2)
Arthritis and aging make it hard,
I walk gingerly, with a cane, and walk
slow, bent forward, fear threats,
falls, fear denouement─
I turn pages, my family albums
become a task.
But I can still bake and shake,
sugar cookies, sweet potato,
lemon meringue pies.
Alone, most of my time,
but never on Sundays,
friends and communion,
United Church of Canada.
I chug a few down,
love my Blonde Canadian Pale Ale,
Copenhagen long cut a pinch of snuff.
I can still dance the Boogie-woogie,
Lindy Hop in my living room,
with my nursing care home partner.
Aging has left me with youthful dimples,
but few long-term promises.
Crypt in the Sky (v2)
Order me up,
no one knows
where this crypt in the sky
like a condo on the 5th floor
suite don’t sell me out
over the years;
please don’t bury me beneath
this ground, don’t let me decay
inside my time pine casket.
Don’t let me burn to cremate
skull last to turn to ashes.
Treasure me high where no one goes,
no arms reach, stretch.
Building for the Centuries
then just let it fall.
These few precious dry bones
preserved for you, sealed in the cloud
no relocation is necessary,
no flowers need to be planted,
no dusting off that dust each year,
no sinners can reach this high.
Jesus’ heaven, Jesus’ sky.
Note: Dedicated to the passing of beloved Katie Balaskas.
Priscilla, Let’s Dance
Priscilla, Puerto Rican songbird,
an island jungle dancer, Cuban heritage,
rare parrot, a singer survivor near extinction.
She sounds off on notes, music her
vocals hearing background bongos,
piano keys, Cuban horns.
Quote the verse patterns,
quilt the pieces skirt bleeds,
then blend colors to light a tropical prism.
Steamy Salsa, a little twist, cha-cha-cha
dancing rhythms of passions, sacred these islands.
Everything she has is movement
tucked nice and tight but explosive.
She mimics these ancient sounds
showing her ribs, her naked body.
Her ex-lovers remain nightmares
pointed daggers, so criminal, so stereotyped.
Priscilla purifies her dreams with repentance.
She pours her heart out, everything
condensed to the bone, petite boobies,
cheap bras, flamboyant Gi strings.
Her vocabulary is that of sin and Catholicism.
Island hurricanes form her own Jesus
slants of hail, detonate thunder,
the collapse of hell in her hands after midnight.
Priscilla remains a background rabble-rouser,
almost remorseful, no apologies
to the counsel of Judas
wherever he hangs.
Willow Tree Poem (v2)
Wind dancers
dancing to the
willow wind,
lance-shaped leaves
swaying right to left
all day long.
I’m depressed.
Birds hanging on-
bleaching feathers
out into
the sun.
Fevers of the Mind 
Reblogged this on The Wombwell Rainbow.
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