It's television eve in
Tel Aviv
You don't even have to ask us
about Damascus
There's a new deli in
New Delhi, a new
girl in
Berlin, and
an old
pair of dragoned
queens
In New
Orleans, ripping
wormholes
in
their jeans
To the sound
of Shostakovich,
singing
Like
a [REDACTED]*
an old
Soviet hole-
Dova,
aging quite disgracefully
in chauvinist
Moldova
And you can elope into
the Soviet
desert sands by car
in Ulaan'telope
Baatar,
Extinguish
both your conscience
and your god
in the fires
of Riyadh,
Smother
your unsuspecting
dates
in deadly Ethiopiates,
Describe
the phenomenon in
pen,
again,
from a hotel
in Phnom
Penh...
You can even try to pay
for your soul
on a flight from Tai
Pei
to the lost
City of Seoul,
But I will never not
remember
the trials of Nur'ember
G'or the hamster fam
of Amsterdam,
celeb
Rating television
eve
from the bum shelters
of Televangelist
Aviv,
ritualistic
Grievances,
hidden up our sleeves,
And if anybody
asks if we're okay,
tellem we're not
here,
and say,
Go away...
[REDACTED]*
©2024 Nathan Payne
*Note on the redacted segments: Ephesians 4:29 and Matthew 12:36. I've written hundreds of songs, and am long past the point of being "forced" by the song or poem to use a bad word (or a word that implies a bad word) because there are no other options. Even if there actually are no other options. It doesn't matter. It's just a poem, just a song. It isn't sacred. I'm not grieving the Holy Spirit for the structural integrity of a silly writing exercise like this. God is more important. Jesus sacrificed His life so I wouldn't have to pay for my sins, and that's all there is to it. Keeping words that suggest bad words out of a silly poem is the least I can do to show my gratitude to Him.
Thanks for listening.
“Let no corrupt communication proceed out of your
mouth, but that which is good to the use of edifying,
that it may minister grace unto the hearers.”
Ephesians 4:29
“But I say unto you, That every idle word that
men shall speak, they shall give account
thereof in the day of judgment.”
Matthew 12:36
