Introducing Tobey Mathews, Poet

Tobey Mathews is a new, emerging San Francisco Bay Area poet. Today, on a pleasant Saturday morning, Tobey, his mother Vickie, and I met for brunch at Hobee's Restaurant in Mountain View. It was a great conversation that roved from poetry to business, the Internet, publishing, education and intellectual property law, to rap music and personal ethics. Tobey and I are going to work together over the coming months on a number of different projects, not least of which is getting his poetry published. For now, here's a poem from his own imagination. He wrote it as we sat and waited for our breakfast.

— Peter Corless, 4 March 2006

Crooked<sub>Sidewalks

Cold, dry, traffic
Running through your cranium.
Sleepless, aware, lost
Wandering through the dark.
You're thinking about
That last resort.
About the consequences.
"Don't die tonight."

Pray up to heaven sky,
You're living dead.
You needed the spirit to
Walk with you,
Walk you through,
Caught in the middle of confusion.
Feels like the devil is doing
nothing but stalking you.

Outside it's cold
but pay no mind.
It's evil inside of
a man's mind.
Overcome my fear,
Overcome yourself,
Overcome his spear.

Champions envision victory
when others see defeat?
You dropped to the floor
soon as the cannon took you off your feet.

Head down tears falling
So scary so startling.
Throughout the whole demented nation
Your practice your indignation.

You threaten God with your
Questions about the situations?
It's all for a reason,
It's all for a reason.

Why?

"Lord, insanity is all that's come over me.
I spend my time premeditating
Demons in my sleep.
They keep a hold of me.
Protect my soul,
Protect my vicinity."

All in mind that this place is breaking me
So close to taking another's life for survival
101 enemies
200-something rivals.
Seems like that's how it is but
You're a champion
Living through the fire.

Copyright © 2006 Tarik "Tobey" Mathews</sub>