Hotel
I checked into the hotel,
The ocean was spread before me,
Yes, before me as a welcoming friend.
I need friends like that…
Steady, loyal, constant.
The hotel had no friends of that sort.
At reception was found only egos.
The lobby was filled with distrust.
Competition was abounding…
Piped into the terraces was the music;
Yes the rooms, the suites, could not escape it,
It was the music of destruction…
The chords that were struck enlivened misery.
Arms, yes noses, bloodied with self inflicted wounds,
Psyche’s manipulated by backstabbing insolence.
Was there a friend in this building?
Search, grope, bang on all the doors,
Can you find a loyal soul?
Where are all the heroes?
Where are the world beaters?
What happened to that “voice of change”?
To think how I longed to check in,
The songs, the lyrics, how they wooed me…
They drew me in throughout my youth.
As I stood there in the lobby,
I beheld the portraits of the “canyons”,
I saw the blue, the gold, the “city of angels”,
I imagined what I thought of as freedom,
I turned from the reception desk, head bowed,
I fixed my eyes on the marble floor,
It was then that I saw, it was not marble at all…
It was a fabrication, mere construction.
As I slowly turned toward the exit, it was clearly seen,
Art is fabrication, it is concocted;
There never was a hotel,
It was contrived, it was solely art…
Joseph James
8-22-10 © From ' O the Elms'
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