Ph: Poetry Writing: In Praise Of The Naked Truth Poem by Brian Johnston

I'm up to my eyeballs in tawdry disguises -
let women wear auras or no clothes at all!
Let men naked roam too! Dark skin, white, sans tattoo,
and the light of day see just what's bought and what's me!
Should my poems more suit you or dress down all sizes,
Conflate cows deemed sacred with pigs that appall?

Do metaphors obfuscate, or catch one napping -
do meter and rhyme feed or threaten belief?
Is a Lotus one drives, just a bloom one contrives
to take focus away from crass things one might say?
Is a plunging neckline more release or a trapping,
(gill net) for unschooled? There's allure, but no beef?

God's truth can't be mine though my head's a humdinger -
all-natural, unswollen, upstart in art!
I'm a retrograde poet, who feels more a butt
for colliding with free verse, that others traverse
as if skiing downhill. But for me, rhyme's the bringer
of what's in the pipe! My brain plays a bit part!


Brian Johnston
25th of June in 2020