Mortal Sins & Other Myths

By Al Ferber

Gus has been on hiatus for several years. He remained silent during that time. However, in the past year, he has made a thunderous comeback, producing enough material from his adventures, misadventures, thoughts, dreams, musings, nightmares, observations, recollections, and the various other sundry things that he does for four full volumes of poetry. Come jump in for the swimsome youll like, others, not so much, and some youll love. But one way or another, youll be shocked.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Nov 22, 2016
• ISBN: 9781524559816

Al Ferber

Al Ferber a septuagenerian going on 13. Born. Regrettably… A North Philly kid. Survived education at Temple U., Penn State, Villanova U. Alcoholic 30 years. Sober 23 years. Indenture servant to Catherine the Great 34 years. Learned to love and appreciate cats and one dog. Authored 30 books of poems, 2 novels, 3 chap books. Poems in Magazines in U.S., England, Scotland, France. Still alive, on the downward path of the sliding board, as of this writing. An undocumented alien in the world. Resides Ocean City, NJ surrounded by water with Cathi, Luna, Mitzi, and Opal. So there.

Book preview

Copyright © 2016 by Al Ferber.

ISBN:   Softcover   978-1-5245-5980-9

           eBook       978-1-5245-5981-6

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Rev. date: 11/22/2016

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Contents

5 1/2 Years Behind Bars

Adjudicator

Always Thought

Backfire

Bait & Switch

Beat Down

Big Tent

Bring It On

Burns & Allen

Concentration Camps

Dangerous Neighborhood

Dark Seas

Death Rattle

Deep Purple

Disagreeable Intolerant Old Man

Fault Line

Gulag

Hiding In The Shadows

How Many Times

I Won’t Fight

Implosion

Inside the Looking Glass

Just Standing

Knock On Wood

Last Gasp of Fury

Loads

Looming

Loud Mouthed Bass

Loud Winter

Love & the Aged

Low Cloud Cover

Lucille

Lunar Eclipse

Lurking In The Shadows

Mad Hatter

Magic Mushrooms

Majorette

Malcolm

Malcontent

Mea Culpa

Mean Spirited

Meaningless Figment

Mechanical Drawing

Mechanism

Meditation

Memory Horse

Menu

Methods

Mexico City Booze

Michael

Mickey’s Monkey

Mickey’s Monkey Copy

Micro Mini Stroke

Midnight

Miles of the Streets

National Geographic

Strange Flip At Midnight

Military Experience

Milky Brown

Minority of One

Missing Cymbal

Missing Persons

Misty Night

Misuse of Funds

Mongrel

Monkey In The Middle

Moo Cow

Moon Shot

Movie Star

Fabled & Mythed Apart

Muscle

Music

Musical Homicide

My Billiard Game

My History My History

The Myth of Excitement

Mythology

Neon Jungle

Neon Windows

Nervous Twitch

Never Together

New Moon

New Neighbor

Night Fell

A Little Night Music

Night Ocean

Ninny Capoola

No Exit

No Matter

No Sense

Not Extraordinary

Not The Least

Not Up For Discussion

Note To The Electorate

Notes

Notes To Myself

Nothing

Nothing New

NRA Alert

Nurses

Odd Case

Pop Ups Drop Downs

Rare Bird

Recruitment

Ride

Second Series

Shake A Hand

Shallow Grave

Shattered

Shifting Shelving

The Common Herd

The Red Zone

Old Folks Home

Old Men

Omens

On Having Children

On The Junk

On The Radio

On The Scene

Back On The Street Again

On This Night

One Against The Rest

One Great Thing

One in the Loss Column

One Step

Open Letter To A Jerk Off

Oppressive

Optimist

Out of Nothing

Steppin’ Outa’ The Rain

Outland

Outside

Over

Over The Edge

Over a Steep Cliff Slowly

Overcast

Overrun

Packing Heat

Pagan Babies

Pain

Pain and Euphoria

Painted Sky

Pandora’s Box

Parade On The Water

Parallel Tracks

Parenthetical

Park Bench

Parrot Shop

Peace

People Are Dying

People Of Industry

Phases

Pillar To Post

Pink Cloud

Poetry Slam

Point

Point Zero

Pole Dancing

Politics & Polemics

Politics & Polemics

Polluted

Pop Pop Pop

Pornography

Pot Of Gold

Power Lines

PR Man

Praise Be

Preconceptions

Prince Of Fools

Prison Papers

Prison Papers # 2

Prison Papers # 3

Prison Papers # 4

Prison Papers # 5

Prison Papers # 6

Prison Papers # 7

Prison Papers # 8

Prison Papers # 9

Prison Papers # 10

Prison Papers # 11

Prison Yard

Professors

Progression

Proselytize

Psychedelia

Public Enemy

Purple Haze

Push Back

Pushing Back

Purple Sky

The Last Question/The Last Answer

Quick Change

Quick Shift

Quiet

Quiet Spot

Rallying The Troops

Rap Sheet

Rare Condition

Rat City

Rat Race

Razing An Age

Reading List

Reading To The Walls

Rear View Mirror

Recent Eruption

Recurring Dream

Red Alert

Reed Music

Reflection

Refraction

Remains of the Day

Remembering

Repatriation

Resolve

Retirement

Revelation

Reversal of Fortune

Reversal Of Moral Standing

Ribs

Riding The Bear

Rimbaud

Trouble In River City

Roads Not Taken

Roaring Thunder

Rock The Ages

Rocket

Rockin’ Pneumonia

Rogue Guards

Role Reversal

Roller Ball

Rollercoaster

Rosa

Rough Edges

Rough Patch

Round And Round

Ruins

Rules & Restrictions

Run Run Run

Rush

Rushing In The Wrong Direction

Russian Roulette

Same As It Ever Was

San Francisco

San Francisco Balloon Theory

School Of Pain

Scraping Colors

Scraping Paint

Scraping The Depths

Screaming Bitch

Scythe

Sea Gulls

Searching

Seasonal Discord

Security Force

Seduction

Seeing Beauty

Seeing Jazz

Self Medication

Serial Note # 5

Serial Note # 3

Serial Note # 4

Serial Note # 6

Serial Note # 7

Serial Notes

Serial Notes # 2

When He Was Seventy

Shadow Man

Walking The Dog

Under The Bridge

5 1/2 Years Behind Bars

Gus said he’s a 30yr. career

drunk he’s an alcohol addict

he became a 15 year drug &

alcohol addictions Therapist

with a specialty in co-occurring

disorders chemical addiction

and mental illness knew what

it was like to have all of it and

promised himself to give these

people the inmates male and

female at the Bucks County

Correctional Facility

the very best that he had

for a long as he had it then quit

before he short changed

a single one of them and he did

quit before it felt like a job

Adjudicator

Gus said he or she might

be wearing black robes

whilst deciding the guilt

the punishment or innocence

of your or his purported actions

judgements influenced by

their own dark dreams and

secret sleep walking encounters

guikty like without parole

for putting his own hand up

the accused mother’s dress

six months in prison and

ten years on the street corners

of New York with all proceeds

going to the judge for sticking

her hand down the front

of a tailor’s britches a car thief

sentenced to live for five years

in the back seat of a rusted

out Hudson a cocaine dealer

sentenced ten years of delivering

an ounce a week to the judge gratis

Always Thought

Gus said he always

thought this was the

Disneyland of the planet

a nation of psychotics

and now we have P.T.Barnum

(there’s a sucker born

every minute) as President

the used car salesman

of the century have I got

a deal for you and no

there is no warranty and

tires and brakes are extra

Backfire

Gus said the whole thing

backfired on him

not that the odds were for

any of it working out

to begin with

he was in list with three sisters

at the same time

P, B, and R in order of preference

to make an incredibly long

and complicated story

somewhat less long and complicated

he wound up settling for R

his third choice so he concentrated

all the love and lust for all three

on R and she reciprocated in kind

but after a time he grew weary

and walked away and she waited

for him but then grew weary found

someone else got married had a baby

and lived happily ever