by Joan Gelfand
Now that the buck has stopped
The jig is up
The well done run
Dry your eyes. You’re done.
The party’s over the game is played
The bad boys took off
With the cache.
Now that the buck has stopped
Where are you?
I mean not in time, as in ‘where can you be found,’
I mean, what’s your place?
Minus the accoutrements, the overflow
The excess? What’s really on your mind?
Once the future planning stops
The next distraction plummets
The cold hard facts can’t hide
Do you really like, can you face
Yourself? The one in your bed?
Can you remember anything she said?
Now that the buck has stopped
Did you make the right choices
Sacrifice the best of times?
Can you remember your kid’s last season?
Who won, who lost, who’s behind?
Did you forget the name of her favorite actor?
Did you catch the school play?
Did you have anything to say?
Good morning America.
The drug of distraction has worn off
The cocaine high of overvalued
Done gone good-bye.
Now that the buck has stopped
The well has dried
Are you filled with dread?
Not that you won’t survive -
Worse has happened.
Than losing a million
You never earned in the first
Place. It’s more about not hiding
Behind it all.
You’re not really that tall.
And this downturn, this turn down,
This big big disappointment, bummer slump
Is just nature’s way of cooling us off
Cooling us down - all that dough
Rising and rising making us feel
Super
Natural but you know she’s the boss
Even if you think that dough made you
Hot hot shit you were taking out chicks
Who wouldn’t have looked twice if you
Were working in the P.O.
You were getting blow
Jobs from girls who
Never gave bj’s before but for three carats
And some Charles Jourdan shoes
They were going down.
Yeah nature had to cool that shit off
Man she was feeling the heat
Feeling your four by four feeling you
Feeling like you’re feeling like the boss of
Things.
You have lost and
I feel for you
All that hard work and
Faith in the street
Or was that greed
I heard knocking
Your knees
Back there?
An award winning poet and writer, Joan Gelfand’s work is published in national magazines and literary journals. A graduate of Mills College Masters in Writing, Joan currently serves as President of the Women’s National Book Association, a national organization of publishing industry professions with 10 chapters and over 700 members. Her two full length collections are: Seeking Center published in 2006 by Two Bridges Press and A Dreamer’s Guide to Cities and Streams published in January 2009 by San Francisco Bay Press.
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