Michael Lee Johnson lived ten years in Canada, the Vietnam era. Today he is a poet in the greater Chicagoland area, IL.  He has 262 YouTube poetry videos. Michael Lee Johnson is an internationally published poet in 44 countries, several published poetry books, nominated for 4 Pushcart Prize awards and 5 Best of the Net nominations. He is editor-in-chief of 3 poetry anthologies, all available on Amazon, and has several poetry books and chapbooks. He has over 443 published poems. Michael is the administrator of 6 Facebook Poetry groups. Member Illinois State Poetry Society: http://www.illinoispoets.org/. Do not forget to consider me for Best of the Net or Pushcart nomination!

My Life

My life began with a skeleton 
with a smile and bubbling eyes
in my garden of dandelions.
Everything else fell off the edge,
a jigsaw puzzle piece cut in half.
When young, I pressed
against my mother’s breast,
but youthful memories fell short.
I tried at 8 to kiss my father, 
but he was a welder, fox hunter,
coon hunter, and voyeuristic man.
My young life was a mixture
of black, white, dark dreams,
and mellow yellow sun bright hopes.
Rewind, sunshine was a stranger
in dandelion fields,
shadows in my eyes.
I grabbed my injured legs
leap forward into the future.
I’m now a vitamin C boy
it keeps me immured
from catching colds or Covid-19.
Everything now still leaks, in parts,
but I press forward.

Most Poems

Most poems are pounded out
in emotional flesh, sometimes
physical skin scalped feelings.
It’s a Jesus hanging on a cross
a Mary kneeling at the bottom
not knotted in love but roped,
a blade of a bowie knife 
heavenward.
I look for the kicker line
the close at the bottom
seek a public poetry forum
to cheer my aspirations on.
I hear those far away voices
carrying my life away-
a retreat into insanity.

Poets in the Rain(V4)

All poets are crazy. Listen to them soak
sponge in early rain medley notes sounding off.
Crazy, suicidal, we know who they are:
Edgar Allan Poe, Sylvia Plath, Dylan Thomas
the drunk, Anne Sexton, Teasdale
this group grows a Pinocchio nose.
At times I capture you here under control.
I want to inspect you.
All can be found in faith once
now gone in time.
With all your concerns, I see
your eyes layered in shades of green
confused within you about me.
Forgive me; I’m just a touch
of wild pepper, dry Screaming Eagle
Cabernet Sauvignon, and dying selfishly.  
We don’t know if it is all worth it.
I have refined my image, and my taste
continues to thrust inside your crevices.
Templates of hell break loose thunder, belches, and anomie.
Asteroid Ceres looks like you passing gas,
exposes her buttocks, and moves on just like ice
on a balmy rock just like yours.
I will wait centuries, like critics, to review
this fecund body of yours-
soiled, then poppies,
poetry in the rain.