4:58 by Gary Glauber (I Am Waiting Poetry Series)

4:58
by Gary Glauber

My body wakes
minutes before the alarm sounds,
waiting for this new day,
the chances it brings
for redemption, vindication,
breaking from the same old same,
alive with possibility,
the excitement of nature’s do-over,
a rebirth and delivery
from the tired and staid,
the rest of everything
clichéd and stale,
life’s disappointments
to this point in time.

America’s restless disenchantment
pours forth from the radio
in headline and loud advertisement
rife with greed, racism, misogyny,
offshoots of capitalism, hatred envisioned
as violent rage expressions,
punctuated by traffic reports
and a concise five-day forecast.
The nation is waiting
for new financial data,
for statistical evidence,
market movement,
for a chance to regain lost spirit,
take positive action
to counteract warring factions
on several international fronts.

Government agents convene
in partisan gridlock,
spewing rhetoric without compromise
as big corporate interests
embody the Second Coming
no one ever predicted.
Prophets of profit and doom
are waiting for wider bandwidth,
greater storage, a means by
which to stream the sermons
to guide them, hide them,
behind entertainment
and countless videos
to distract a world from its problems.

We all wait
for such days to play out,
expired calendar pages
leaving new memes and memos
in hopes of taming chaos
into some kinder posterity.
Society waits,
driven by material gains,
poisons that drive
this glutted stalemate
into a reconstructed state
of some day’s hopeful elation.

At 4:58, I wait
and in a few minutes,
as last night’s dreams dissipate
into mist of morning,
daylight breaks
over what is broken,
yet the past drives me forward
and music and words
charm me forth into
an ever brand new universe,
a perpetual play
of grace, mystery, and wonder.

IMAGE: “I Recall The Time When My Feet Lifted Off The Ground, Ever So Slightly” by Takashi Murakami (2009).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Gary Glauber is a poet, fiction writer, and teacher. His works have been nominated for the Pushcart Prize as well as “Best of the Net.” He is a champion of the underdog who often composes to an obscure power poP soundtrack. His first collection, Small Consolations, will be published in 2015 by The Aldrich Press.