Category Archives: TONY’S POEMS

the bad seeds

when the snake & the sycophant sing
when you feel their bile in your brain
when their gravity well steals your future

their happy song
seeds your anxiety
with more anxiety

when babies become the enemies of god
when laying of hands makes more zombies
when downward dog summons demons

their pious song
seeds your anxiety
with more anxiety

when they lash the journey to your back
when the road outlasts the marathon
when you realise their song will end you

their fascist song
seeds your anxiety
with more anxiety

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024

the mute observer problem

if a deaf guy falls in the forest
& no one’s around to hear it
does he make a sound

probably

he just can’t hear himself
or maybe can’t use his words
like ouch or christ

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024

threshian harvest

it’s alright, it’s okay
you can lay me down now
in that circle poised for decay
or maybe tomorrow
or maybe back then
hell knows when

it’ll always be too soon
to attend such sadness but
it’s alright & it’s okay anyway

i need only as long as i get
& maybe moments more
for my life to matter
for to fill it with you
& the scenes we’ll ne’er keep
when our play is done

it’ll always be too soon
for such sadness to mend but
it’s alright to live & die anyway

you pay your debts with pain
then seek a new currency
& nurse that barb wire heart
but ask what joy would do
even when i’m gone
see, it’s alright, it’s okay

it’ll always be too soon
to pen such sadness but
it’s alright & got a poem anyway

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2024

tumbleweed

i’ve wandered far from the shadow where i fell
‘tween the rotted roots of concrete monuments
& the ever glacial drift of meaning

they call me cottonmouth behind my back but
who among can boast of less complicity
or with forethought exercise restraint
& concede that less could be more

at least i’ll admit i am not here to teach you
so learn for yourselves of the self & its value
in this late stage cage of crumbling margins

they call me cottonmouth behind my back but
who among comprehend the half-life of aeons
or can find wisdom so thoroughly hidden
& concede the point without the question

i’ve wandered far from the shadow where i fell
‘tween the monetised myths & wholesale burnings
& the never-ending grift beyond meaning

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2023

cloudy with a chance of deicide

long may i outlast
all the world’s grey anointing
smog & entropy
let it all float away now
punch the god nose yonder sky

by TONY SINGLE
© All rights reserved 2023