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 313 plus YouTube poetry videos. Michael Lee Johnson is an internationally published poet in 46 countries, a song lyricist, has several published poetry books, has been nominated for 7 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 653 published poems. Michael is the administrator of 6 Facebook Poetry groups. Member Illinois State Poetry Society: http://www.illinoispoets.org/. Remember to consider me for Best of the Net or Pushcart nomination!
Poet
Chicago (V4)
By Michael Lee Johnson
I walk in a pillow of cinder.
Flames apart from this night still ignite.
I am still determining where I live in a yellow mist,
muddled in early morning white fog.
I lost my compass in a manhole, dumped, dazed in thought.
The L trains still flow on decrepit tracks.
I toss ruminating imagination into Lake Michigan.
A loyalist at heart, Chicago will have no mercy, memory of me.
I will decry my passing and die like the local city
Chicago River rats, raccoon divers, and smog.
Mayor Daley hardly remembers his own name, less mine.
I lie to daybreak in shadow grass.
Sins stick on my body like bee honey.
This old Chicago, Chi-town, grungy streets,
elderly brick buildings shagged out.
Apart from the moors stapling down
luxury boats in the harbor,
let’s not be fooled on any night,
Al Capone still rules this town.
Closure
By Michael Lee Johnson
With age, my room
becomes small—
roots gather beneath
my thoughts in bundles—
exits are few.
The purr of romance.
The bark of leaving lovers,
fall leaves in distress.
Animals in the distance
deer’s, wolf calls,
birds of prey,
eyes of barn owls
those coyotes.
I see the bridge,
the cross-over line
not far away.
When this ticker
stops, livor mortis
purple is dominant,
all living quarters of the heart.
From here, the dimmed
of dawn twinkles
takes on a new meaning,
not far.
Anticipation (V4)
By Michael Lee Johnson
I watch out my condo window
this winter, packing up and leaving for spring.
I structure myself in a dream as
Moko Jumbie, masquerader
on stilts. I lean out my balcony
window in anticipation.
Dead branches, snow paper-thin,
brown spots, shared spaces.
A slug of Skol vodka,
a glass of cheap sweet
Carlo Rossi rose red wine.
I wait these last few days out.
That first robin,
The beginning of brilliance—
crack, emerald dark, these colors.
Fevers of the Mind 