The Raven

The Raven waits

My answer’s no

Then leaves me with

His knowledge

Completely defeated

Even dulling my senses

doesn’t do the trick

when the truth

is knocking at the door

in fact it’s already inside

warming it’s feet by the fire

smiling in my direction

while I bring it tea

because it asked

and knows

I’m completely defeated.

I know I couldn’t have seen what I saw,

but I know I saw it anyway.

An old man, waving, his hair as gray as ash,

his beard trimmed short, a weathered Yankee cap,

his eyes like magic eight balls, googling my senses

causing me to stop and turn, knowing

I’d imagined what couldn’t be. But the mind

doesn’t have to play by any rules

that aren’t of its own creator,

like those magic eight balls whose advice

never really did make much sense,

whose questions we never truly sought to answer.