Lethe

I was a terrible hippie. I hated drugs and had no use for them. Yes, I was around marijuana in college days, and even when I inhaled, I was not impressed. Drugs are a curse on the poor, and an arrogant toy for the rich. No one I knew ever had a better life, or accomplished more, because of drugs, and a vast number are dead, or killed themselves. This is an old poem, a catch-all tirade against drugs in general. The image of the horse is a word-play on one of the street-names for heroin. The Juggernaut is from India, a huge stone wheel like a steamroller, and devotees would hurl themselves in front of it to be crushed to death. I was so sad and horrified at the death of River Phoenix, a pointless death of a wonderful young genius actor, that I revised and expanded the poem to include the drug-addled celebrities. Every one of these deaths is a crime against life, and against the living.

Deliver the fruit of the garden of Lethe!
The white horse of sleep is at home in his stable,
mane twined with coca and hemp leaves,
neck wreathed in poppies, his breath a cloud
of Hypnos’ hashish. He feeds on hay,
mixed rich with ergot and mushrooms.

The white horse of sleep goes forth,
draws a black coach through city streets,
pauses in alleyways,
lingers at school-yards.
A dark hand hurls cigarettes,
bags and vials, syringes and pipes
toys scattered with whispered promises
of power and wealth and instant joy.
Boys fight for the poisoned apples.

Mothers shake fists from fire escapes
as the white horse passes.
On curbs, on broken bench,
in frame of rotted door,
the sleepers have fallen.

Others fan out to sell their treasures.
There is never enough.
Someone must always pay —
even here where no one has money —
or someone must die.

Some days the white horse pulls
a great stone Juggernaut.
The children run to greet it,
and one by one are pulled beneath.
Iron wheels burr
with shattered bones,
grindstone steam roller
makes lithography of skin,
cheekbones and brows,
limb and arm and ribcage
spread out like a map,
dreamers’ lives snuffed
into a red-brown inkblot.

The mothers’ sons
are crimson smears on the sidewalk.
Mica glints mockingly
as blood dries to flaking rust.
Silence, then choked weeping,
and then the sound of Juggernaut
rumble-crush rolling
on distant streets, the muted screams
diminuendo to deathly quiet.

Uptown, at the fashionable clubs,
no horse-drawn carriage comes.
Instead, the white stretch limos
arrive and depart,
arrive and depart.
A movie star falls to the pavement,
dead of an overdose
at twenty-two.

Inside, the revelers
compare the merits
of various white powders.
No Juggernaut comes for them:
the white limo doubles
as a hearse when necessary.

They are politically correct,
vegetarian, even.
They are supporting
the produce
of the endangered rain forest.
Nothing could possibly hurt them.