Dream Canto
And then went down, like Odysseus. And Pound,
of course, to neither docks nor hell-chair, captive
in slumber’s vortex, weaponless, spiraling
to a crag-toothed island where one-eyed giants
roam, T.S. Eliot whines, and editors
issue red ink warrants. Wheezing, I struggle
to rise, find myself reeling before a dark
hole, a nothingness symbolizing, well, you
know. The other half. The unsurvivors. The
ill-fated. It has been four months. Hip aching,
I stand, gasping, still alive. Victorious.
Robert Okaji served without distinction in the U.S. Navy and once owned a bookstore. Sixteen months ago, he was diagnosed with late stage metastatic lung cancer. Thanks to the wonders of modern science, he still lives in Indiana with his wife—poet Stephanie L. Harper—stepson, and cat. His first full-length collection, Our Loveliest Bruises, will be published by 3: A Taos Press in fall 2024, and his poetry may be found in Only Poems, Big Windows Review, Verse Daily, Broadkill Review, Vox Populi, Taos Poetry Journal, wildness, and at his blog, O at the Edges, at www.robertokaji.com.