Underground Blues Poem by Kamiel Choi

I sing of happiness in little things
a daughter who puts lipstick on my face
the smile of a stranger when she sees my hat
the dream of reading a poem to you one day
the quiet jazz music they play in my café
the traces of other minds on my computer screen
the taste of hot coffee from a paper cup
the tranquil fantasy of a world that could have been
the clock's nostalgic design from another land
and how the minutes kiss the hour hand
the sound of conversations in a foreign tongue
my own longing for candid talk, subdued in a song
that revels forever in all of the above,
and how I wish to succumb to absent-minded love
to sing the underground blues with all my force
to eat the sweet fruit in our garden of metaphors
I hum yesterday's sadness in tomorrow's drunken ears
ears that stand on fearless heads, and I dream
of sweet visions, of high words in the skies
I am driving through a tunnel with the voltage in my thighs
happiness is in little things, and that is alright:
At the end of the tunnel, there is no light
but the tunnel, my friends, is electrified