Everywhere you go there you are! Wondering why my life makes no sense! Wondering who, is in charge around here! When there’s nobody home but us chickens! Confusing ourselves, with our own shadows! Screaming like a girl who’s led a sheltered life! Panicking at the drop of a hat like a doormouse! Hunting people like the wicked witch of the west! Judging everyone and everything you can imagine! Beating up everyone like the worst bully you know! Busy attempting to think your way out of each trap! Pecking away at everything just for something to do! Picky picky is just too picky for anyone who is picky! Pretending nothin’ from nothin’ ain’t something to us! Posturing as if we are models and famous movie stars! If no one ever sells it, it can’t possibly be worth buying! If nobody ever buys any they must be selling something! Insanity is for people who never had any common sense! Guilt is a terrible thing to waste upon a guilt ridden world! Words are a waste of time when you go round in circles! Persistence of memory is what matters for any feelings! Positive, you can only buy happiness spending money! Fantasizing about meeting the one and only right one! Fantasizing about stomping your enemy into the dirt! Fantasizing about becoming your own greatest hero! Fantasizing about marrying “Mr Fantasy” himself! Put on my blue suede shoes as I boarded the plane, And touched down in the land of the Delta Blues, Still drenched in the middle of the pouring rain! Yeah, I got a first class ticket, but I'm as blue, As any boy or girl in the world might possibly be! Then I'm walking in Memphis, walking my feet ten feet off of Beale, Walking in Memphis! But do I really feel the way I feel? Saw the ghost of Elvis… On Union Avenue, Followed him up to the gates of Graceland, Then I watched him walk right through. Now, security they did not see him, They just hovered 'round his tomb. But, there's a pretty little thing, Waiting for the King, down in the Jungle Room! Walking in Memphis! But do I really feel the way I feel? Then I'm walking in Memphis, walking my feet ten feet off of Beale! Now Muriel plays piano, every Friday at the Hollywood, And they brought me down to see her, asked me if I would, Do a little number, and I sang with all my might! She said "Tell me are you a Christian child?" And, I said "Ma'am, I am tonight!" (Marc Cohn)
This poem covers a difficult subject with a lot of complex organics and might require work. What it illustrates is how our ego can be considered a "living ghost" that follows us around. The song by Marc Cohn is about an actual experience he had where a complete stranger told him he had to let go, that his mother never wanted to die. That's the kind of synchronicity and "spirits in the material world" that my poetry has to express along with everything else. Sorrow, in particular, is difficult to express with our poetry, making this poem all that much more valuable. Notice that an important aspect of the poem is the feeling it conveys of the individual taking a backseat in their own life, as if their lives have taken on a life of their own.
