Mr. Michael Lee Johnson lives in Chicago, IL. after spending 10 years in Edmonton, Alberta Canada during the Viet Nam era. He is a freelance writer and poet. He is heavy influenced by Carl Sandburg, Robert Frost, & William Carlos Williams, Leonard Cohen. He is presently self-employed, with a previous background in social service areas. He has a B.A. degree in sociology, worked on a Masters Program in Correctional Administration, started a pre-Phd program & quit. He took a creative writing course in university on a pass/fail basis-he failed. Mr. Johnson has several poems pending publication March. through Nov. 2007. He has a huge box of "unfinished" poems, dating back to 1965-67 to the present. They are getting published faster than he can revive or revise them. Yellowed papers, wrinkled napkins and all, they wait for the hand of revival. He have not submitted poems, till recently, since the early 70's,- remember, the "old fashioned" way, via mail. In 2006/2007, over 121 poems have been publisher or pending publication by Michael Lee Johnson. He is a member of Poets & Writers, Inc; Directory of American Poets & Fictions Writers: http://www.pw.org/directory/.

Mount Pleasant Cemetery
(the temple of the body)


Gravediggers uprooting caskets
with sharp, steel shovels-
with each slicing step downward
through nerve-rooted earth
cooper pennies jingle in change
purses dangling by their sides.

They chat casually of Jesus,
His painless resurrection
from the sealed tomb,
moneychangers being chased
away from Gods holy temple.

Illinois Trains


Trains, love them, hate them
the way they play sound; songs they sing.
Transformers  switch, vibrate the power
into poetry, shake notes out of the sky.
Short stretch, street to street, long stretches,
Chicago, Elgin, Rockford, though prairie towns of Illinois-
running the same rails over, attached to many places.
Shrill sound of horns dig deep in bowel of urban earth
like backhoes; developers changing passing landscapes
with faint, greed filled faces.
As the trains pass to history, train sounds
fall silent, a minor key.

Last update : 07-06-2007 21:01

Average user rating

   (0 vote)

Display 3 of 3 comments