The Modern Day Poet

By Daniel B. Hunt

The Modern Day Poet is a collection of poetry that attempts to define the poet in relation to modern society. The poetry is heavy with imagery for the more serious reader, but is presented in a format of story telling that is easy and entertaining for the casual reader. To begin the poet invites you to share in his dreams with a simple poetic wish. Then follow the birth of the poetic mind as the poet explores the modern world, an exploration that ultimately ends in a crescendo of defiant hope. The poems in this collection are rhythmic and are best read aloud.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Apr 25, 2002
• ISBN: 9780595728947

Daniel B. Hunt

Daniel B. Hunt grew up in eastern Kansas. He graduated from the University of Kansas with a degree in creative writing. Daniel now resides in Fairview Heights, Illinois. Okuda! is his seventh book.

Book preview

Rise of the Zombie

(Birth of a Poet) 

Seen through a Mirror:¹

Ah, does he wake?

Well then let him rise,

rise from the moss and dirt,

rise with hollow eyes

that see all and nothing.

Speak. Could he but speak

his breath would slay all illusions,

and though like a vile smoke from hell,

it shall be precious

to me.

And it all crumbles off

and flecks and peels and falls,

as the richness rolls in tiny balls-

The sweet, refreshed, final decomposer.

Sitting will he reach his hand

through my chest and touch my heart,

and grasp it in his mighty bones

and rip, stifle, destroy?

What crimes he judges with his eyeless sight,

what evil with a rotten mind,

and is that music a chorus of wails

or a wind with no direction?

"Did you see that bird in flight,

Did you hear him in the night,

Did you see the blood it bore,

Were you laughing behind the door?

Did you read the tyger bright,²

Did you blow the spark of light

Did you curse the rising day,

Was it you who made him pay?"

In the jungle where he slept

as statues changed but can’t forget

where once there stood a castle tall,

a garden child—first a mountain’s wall.³

Upon a stone⁴ where sat a bird

Inscripted there, I am lost on earth.

Written in a lonely hand—

Where this dead creature stands.

The mother moon no longer red

but black as soot as prophesy said

rises up to survey the day

where in a past his soul was made.

Now slowly rising from those lips,

as trickles down a water drop,⁵

turned to crystal before it falls

from the hollows of his soul,

comes a guttural wailing sound

as flesh blows off it to the ground,

and though the jungle⁶ stands to listen

nothing can understand the wisdom.

As crystal cracks upon the mound

the unearthly music rises on

to echo in his empty mind

left unanswered for all time.⁷

"Did you know it in the dawn,

Did you burn the blackbird’s song⁸

Did you cry to always sleep,

Were you drowning in the deeps?

Did they nail you to a tree,

Did they beg you to set them free,

Did they know you had no soul,

Was it etched upon your mold?"⁹

Somewhere off, the ocean beats

the answer¹⁰ was, "No glowing feats

could you show and damned to walk

are you as hideous as your lot,

forever till you find your way

and loose your names as history sways

its’ rotten heart which fell at his feet

and turned to dust as Velta¹¹ sleeps,

till time unturns a careless world

and wings once more like banners unfurled

rise just like that sleeping thing

over the jungle of your being."

There within the widening pool¹²

an image forms, the rose blooms,

and the creature gurgles on

as its’ picture forms unformed.

Through this mirror I see this all.

My thoughts like the crystals fall,

to the image in the pool

as above the creature drools.

I hold my breath to view this sight

Given me in unholy light;

His image is a child and walls

a desert home—’tis I!

Cry!

Wail the sorrows of the day

as all the crystals drop, feed the blood

which starts to steam as the moon makes hot

and what despair could make me rot?¹³

Over the jungle ring and rise,

Trapped on the spot—rise!

"Who will take my thoughts from me,

Who can hide them in the sea,

Who can burn me pure and numb

Who let me rise?

Who made me burn?"¹⁴

Glimmer

(The Modern Day Poet) 

Over Mother Earth shinning

the yellow sun unbinding

fears and woes from the heart

of ordinary man.¹⁵ I start

often when I view this light

lashing down from such great heights

yet all the cattle stand and wonder

happily at such simple plunder.

People search the evening sky¹⁶

finding beauty for sad eyes

or stare at grass and rolling hill

all their sorrows such scenes kill

where flowers fly with the breath of winds

or hearts leap at spying twin

redbirds sitting on a tree¹⁷

who sing in