Seeing the Light for What It Is

Eagerly pulling my hand toward the fairground,
My young son's mind was already lassoed
By its thumping music, the tastebud teasing smells
Of cotton candy, funnel cakes and corn dogs,
And the lights.  his eyes were captivated
By their bright cacaphony of cavorting colors.
My memories of having been conned by carneys;
And of watching one bashing his battered wife
Against their trailer door when I once cut through
A fair's dark parking lot, kept my pace at a walk.

The spinning lights and the soul-snaring rhythm
Of the club scene held me in its grasp for awhile.
How I longed to possess the grace and confidence
To give myself to the music.  The only moves I knew
Though were the clumsy locksteps of loneliness.
How I envied the smooth men their lovely partners.
The times the band would take a break, the lights
Would cease to dazzle, and I'd glimpse on other faces
The same isolation I felt.  We drank to drown shyness
While yearning desperately to belong, to be loved.

Mammon's Temple is ablaze with colored lights.
It's ads say "you can't be a winner if you don't play."
The jangling bells whistles and the thrill of a jackpot
May change your life.  After all, don't you deserve it?
Games of chance use lights to promote instant riches
That beckon seductively as sirens ships to ruin.
The faces of the players are taut with an intensity
That takes hold of them as firmly as sexual desire.
The unbridled greed, the desperate need...to win
Enough to buy status, respect, freedom and love.

"I am the Light and the Lamp of the World,"
Asserts The Christ; yet I've seen how light is used
To seduce, cajole, scam and delude us.  Deceptive
Practices more worthy of the Prince of Darkness.
We come into being in the blindness of the womb;
Lovers slip into the evening shadows to embrace,
Or turn out the lights before they make love...or dream.
We rest and rejuvenate our body in darkness.
We hide our tears at night or use its cloak to dry them.
I've seen the light for what it is.  Draw the shades.