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                           _________________________________

John Amen
John Amen's debut poetry collection, Christening the Dancer, was released by Uccelli Press in February 2003. He has published poetry and fiction in various magazines and journals, including 2River View, The Melic Review, Samsara Quarterly, Poetrybay, Three Candles, and Drunken Boat. He was recently nominated for a Pushcart Prize. He has traveled extensively as a performing musician, both with a band and as a solo act, and has released three full-length recordings. His fourth recording will be released in 2003. He is also an artist, working primarily with acrylics on canvas. Further information is available on his website. Amen founded and continues to edit the online literary bimonthly, The Pedestal Magazine. He has lived in New Orleans and New York, and currently resides in Charlotte, North Carolina.



     WHAT I SAID TO MYSELF 
    by John Amen

                   _________________________________


Choose the butterfly over the cocoon.
Choose light, the ballroom, the well-lit restaurant.

You have for lifetimes strummed minor chords
on the coast of a dead sea. Think major, spindrift.

The sex between you and grief is becoming mechanical.

Despite your vestigial sentiments to the contrary,
a scab's story is much greater than that of a scar.

Your cock is not an umbilical cord, it is your
heart's mouthpiece. Choose sunrise, please.

It is time to do something that might cause
embarrassment. Let emptiness mother your child.

Put away the map, where we're going won't be on it.

There is nothing particularly inspiring about a death wish.

You have learned all there is to learn from the woman in black.

It is time to stop insulting ecstasy. Masochism
is an empty udder. What was is a cipher. Pick
the rose over the injured dove. Pick warm waters.

Attend a circus. Go for the comic. There is nothing
more mediocre than the association of dysfunction with genius.

Indulge in color. Believe me, there is not a problem.
Plumb bright places for new symbols.

Recommendation: study evergreens.
Find me. We have much to talk about.