by shaun lawton
Beau's Afraid
A Real Nightmare
review in form of poem
This movie carves out its story
with a knife winking a bright
flare from its niche in a flash.
With a practiced flicker
of sudden certain moments
splashed upon the screen,
the director deftly
weaves his tale.
Presenting a superimposed,
flash-cut shuffled deck
of multilayered casino card scenes
spread out in full garish view
before our protagonist,
reflected off a chrome rim
circling the barstool
like a spectrum of bandwidth
where the film transmutes into
a stunning and lucid view of
our dazzling mirror neurons
of paranoid awareness.
(Nevermind the definition
of mind, mind you)
From across these generational divides
comes severance on waves of prejudice
of which the mutually fueled disdain
of mirrored faces puppet-master
each other into hysterics
jerking the strings only to
have it mistaken for loss
of connection.
Electricity can't complete
the circle if its cut.
The strings aren't even snipped
yet the puppet suddenly relaxes
it's grip on objective reality.
It may be glimpsed quick
in the sudden dilation of its pupils
cast aside at an oblique angle
or it might be missed entirely.
The price of being unassuming
while holding out, can be low
with a high yield net reward.
Patience is priceless because
the trick to get through it
lies in doing nothing.
Beau is short for "beauty"
(but we can't know that
because our egos
stole his identity)
Anyone's life might
as well be beautiful
when the front door
sprouts in blossom.
Each unique sharp
human edged life
stays a flower
in a field soaking up
a shared experience
Little radar dishes
reflect so bright
tingly taste buds
from one split tongue
flaming human
candle prism.
What's happening
never becomes evident
This is not a dream
or hallucination.
Stripped down
to its raw element
the quintessential
everyman story lies
in the technicularity.
Shining from
a multitude of eyes
