TOO QUIET

(ODE TO SILENT AMERICAN NIGHT)

“…for death is not an adventure to those who stand face to face with it…”
--Erich Maria Remarque All Quiet on the Western Front (1930)

by Robert Emmett


it’s a little too quiet on the western front
all festooned with swag
while over there
it’s just another scene

the fervor of our handiwork
is enough to make you gag
stamp no return
on the invoice for the keen

the waking nightmare
seems so real
except they speak in tongues
and hot-spun cotton
makes it hard to breathe
a smirking cheek
a winking eye
all stuffed with glee
casts you aside
wipes bible spit
across a silken sleeve

somnambulists tote glitter in
the desperate bleed their poor hearts out
and strew forsaken children
in the street
don’t bother to give it another thought
the mindless chatter is already bought
your boundless bounty
puts fleece
on fortune’s feet

so tiptoe to the goody bag
you can have your choice
polish the pater’s pate
until it gleams
his pugnacious noggin’s noddin’ now
but you have lost your voice
you traded it on the cheap
for sugarplum dreams


Robert Emmett sifts dreams from waking nightmares under a blanket of heavy snow in the silent woods of Michigan.