1: 00 Am Death & Other Things Poem by Windsor Guadalupe Jr

Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick, tock - The clock sounded like a whole cavalry
Of trampling soldiers, and the people transcend to better things.
Christmas charades, snowflake roads and marveling at the identical traits,
Carols billowing everywhere, icy wind bellowing, the children scouring
From house to house with chipped teeth out of saccharine smiles.

They were alive in this foolish travail.
If I were to transmute the dead branches into supple bodies,
I am not to die every minute.

It is dying in these hours that makes life
Meaningful - To find life in a box where a ballerina asphyxiates
Herself in an endless dance with no symphony.
To find rue in the great distaste of the moon’s luminosity
As I battle the words in front of this machine,
The machine swallows all of me,
1: 00 AM - I am dead,
Only to give life to this.

I fell asleep in front of the machine, and my mother
Gave me subtle blows to the shoulder - I am startled
And she bombarded me with, “Young man, stop writing, now! ”
“Young man, there is nothing in this for you! ”

I found nothing in life.
In living with the people
That promised life and exuberance in between.
Among other things,
I falter,
But not famished over the loss of contact
With the people, the world, and their penchants.

I am alone,
And I am doing great, for there is a life promised
In the life of a hermit, a deaf-mute or even
A lifeless stone shaped like a sword by the seashore.

It is past 1: 00 AM and you can smell
The gift wrappers,
The succulent feasts,
The new paper bills
From worlds away.

I still despise all of them,
For they have left
Me here
In front of a machine,
Letting my blood out
Like never before
Just to make something that infinitely
Recedes through time,
Place,
And mirth.

Still,

There’s life in this.
In between 1: 00 AM deaths
And other things.