Death and The Man after Dickinson

Because I could not stop for Death
He carjacked my Mercedes.
I did not fear his epithets,
Nor crave his white-gowned lady.

I’d buried myself — long — ago
Death wasn’t — even — spooky.
Languid — dark — and hop-head slow —
He seemed less grim than kooky.

I sold my — soul — long time — before
Death — purchased his — black — Lugar.
I am The Man — Death is my whore,
My cheap-by-the-pound-of-flesh loser.

Oh, yes. That “freedom thing.” Of course.
Can’t tell. Classified. Guarded secret — of the stage.
Behave — like Death — be a good horse —
I pay a living wage….

Adam Engel lived for your sins -- and he lived well! -- in Fear-and-Trembling, Brooklyn, one of the last gangrenous toes of NYC not yet severed and replaced with a prosthetic gentrification device. Engel has traveled the farthest regions of cyberspace, where Dark-matter meets Doesn't-matter; and Anti-matter, despite its negative connotation and dour point-of-view, excercises rights of expression protected by Richard Stallman's GNU/Free Software Foundation and CopyLeft agreement, if nobody and nothing else. Having spent many years studying Boobus Americanus (Summum Ignoramus), allegedly the most intelligent mammal on earth -- after its distant relative, Homo Sapiens -- in various natural habitats (couch, cubicle, bar-stool, ball-game -- televised or 'real-time') -- Engel has thus far related his observations of and experiences with this most dangerous of predators in three books -- Topiary, Cella Fantastik, and I Hope My Corpse Gives You the Plague (the combined international sales of which have reached literally dozens, perhaps as many as seventy, with projected revenue to top three digits by decade's end! Truly a publishing phenomenon). Engel is Associate Editor of Time Capsule Books, a division of Oliver Arts & Open Press, published in limited editions for a tiny, highly specified, though eclectic, target-audience: people who actually read books. He can be reached at adam@new.dissidentvoice.org Read other articles by Adam, or visit Adam's website.