In a Manner of Speaking
In a manner of speaking, I want to kill you,
said the drunk redneck to his wife,
In a manner of speaking, I don't love you,
said my ex (turned vegan) to me,
as I returned from a psych ward, hoping for
some sort of reconciliation,
And in a manner of speaking, the whole
world has gone to shit, that no mentally
unbalanced poet can improve upon,
In a manner of speaking, I was just a haiku
before I birthed an epic poem in 2008
and it went something like:
In a manner of speaking…
In a manner of speaking, there is plenty of
beer and loose women,
In a manner of speaking, there is plenty of
internet journals with useless information,
In a manner of speaking, there are plenty of
assholes writing about getting laid and anal sex
on MySpace,
In a manner of speaking, my friend got raped
a few years ago and now has occasional herpes
outbreaks, which are quite disturbing
to her husband,
In a manner of speaking, I'm losing faith in humanity
and love at times,
In a manner of speaking, we just go through the motions,
hoping for something to change or something
spectacular to happen.
But I don't really know any more,
trying to make sense of it all, screaming for some sort of
sanity that eludes me,
In a manner of speaking, I feel alone here,
unable to connect to what's around me--
I just told some guy at a bar that I was a Dallas Cowboys
fan and I don't even watch football,
and he told me to come in my "gear" on Sunday,
In a manner of speaking, I feel somewhat liberated
because I have no clue as to what I'm doing,
knowing that there is really no escape.
January 8, 2008
--Alexander Shaumyan
