As I Stumble Into Darkness Poem by David McLansky

As I stumble into darkness
Death has lost its empty starkness,
Just a little dopamine
Has given back its Hippie dreams;
Just a little yellow pill
Has my imagination filled
With characters, harmless freaks
Who talk of love and mumbled peace;
Well meaning guys in a haze
Who backseat chatter as we laze
As if time and space did not matter,
In army coats we climb up ladders
Leading to paisley dreams,
Ardent, sun-kissed, vibrant schemes,
Not caring what it all did mean,
When God was hair in velvet jeans;
When we could leave was uppermost
In some car out for the coast;
We chased the sunset in the West,
How young we were,
How thoughtless blessed.
But in the chaos and illusion,
The garbage piled up in confusion,
How I groped for some order,
Peripheral, along the border;
In the mayhem not content
My lust for meaning given vent
That made me fumble on my knees
Reaching for my Vedic beads;
Searching for that smile of love
Riding naked up above,
Her steaming hair, wet tantric coils
A gift for eyes, my loins a-boil;
The rocking measure primed, enjoined,
The endless pleasure
Then purloined,
She did not smile from up above;
She did look down
But not with love;
What desperate days did I know,
Not knowing which way I should go;
The mad encounters without meaning,
The acts of love that were demeaning;
Until my dear, I found you,
Who cleared my vision and purview,
And now I gently go to sleep;
Your tears drip down,
Oh do not weep.