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Callie Greene Jul 2015
I tried so **** hard to forget you, so hard.  But you telling me how long you've been here waiting just shows me why I held on so long.  
It just shows why I scavenged ever piece of the shipwreck that floated up to the top.  Those were the enjoyable memories, but the anchor is still at the bottom of the ocean.  
And that is why we can't fight this any longer.  face it, neither of us can pull the anchor out of the water anymore.
Terry Collett Aug 2012
At the back
of the coal wharf
you and Fay
picked up coal pieces

that fell through
the iron railings
and put them
in an ******* from home

Fay looked
at her blackened fingers
and said
if my daddy sees

these fingers
and finds out
what I’ve been doing
he’ll spank me

for sure
you gazed at her
beside you
and said

you can wash your hands
at my place
she looked around
at the bombsite behind you

the evening sun
slowly going down
behind the railway bridge
and nearby buildings

what if someone sees you
she asked
picking up these pieces?
no one worries about this

all the kids do it
you replied
my daddy says
it is evil to steal

she said
you put a black piece
of coal in the bag
and lifted it

to feel the weight
that’s enough
you said
too much

and I won’t be able
to carry it
Fay stood up
and looked around

at the darkening sky
you held the bag
in one hand
and scanned

the area around you
let’s go
you said
and so you both

walked away
from the coal wharf
into Meadow Row
by the public house

where piano music played
and down towards
the flats
where you lived

and after climbing
the concrete stairs
to your landing
you opened the door

and put the bag
by the indoor
coal bunker
and showed Fay

where to wash her hands
turning on
the cold water tap
you both washed

your hands
with the red
Life Buoy soap
her hands near yours

her wet flesh
touching yours
the black water
running away

and another adventure
and another day.
Hell with Manu! Manu go to hell!
The wrath of your interpretation,
Put us under an inhuman subjugation.

You turned a group,
Dictators of a merciless culture,
Transformed us worse,
Than a scavenging vulture.

You gifted us the psychology of the worst slaves,
And robbed our culture, worship and God,
Who is there to get us out from these graves?

For centuries till now continue our struggle,
We are forced to live with worst strangles
In the poisonous jungle,

We the humans treated much worse,
Than dogs insects and poo eating pig,
Our scars wounds and blows,
Still remain untouchable and big.

Poisonous **** declared the crops untouchable,
Proclaimed itself the most unconquerable,
Less than a second it takes,
To **** the poisonous weeds with a cutter,
Throw them into the useless gutter.

Landlords, who rule the land and hill,
Put the lives of untouchable crops to a standstill,
Multiplied the existence of poisonous ****,
At the expense of the healthy crop seed.

Our journey in the doors of
Movements, struggle and legal
Was quite a win,
That proved out to be absolutely lethal.

We won successfully in the battle of right,
Till the end of the topmost administrative fight,
We lost to erase your caste ridden thought,
That is useless rigid and tight.

With your caste names,
You remind and hurt us, with useless exhibition
In hearts, we created die hard flames,
To take up the long term ambitions,
And get us out from these addicted inhibitions.

From mother's womb to a cemetery,
We have a same human life,
But when it comes to temple sanctum,
You **** us with a political double edged knife.

We built the temples,
You played a gamble and created troubles,
Pushed us to convert,
Got our identities to subvert.

World belongs to everyone,
Our life does not hold value.

Nature belongs to everyone,
We do not have access to water by Vedas virtue.

God is equal to everyone,
But we are restricted entry, as an oppressed queue.

There is no use to argue,
Of course it is untrue,
Let's put ourselves to the rescue.

What's next? What's next?
Let's create a new humanity societal text,
Let's create for ourselves new religions,
Let's begin to reach out to the next generation,
Work with them to build new revolution.

Let's create a new religion,
In nooks and corners, all areas, rural and urban,
That treats humans as humans,
And give life to the humanity slogan.

Change the rules! Yeah change the rules!
Throw into gutters all these useless fools,
For human lives, there can be nothing to tally,
Human life remains invaluable and holy

Being human is my true breed,
Crows and cuckoo belong to our creed,
Mountains and sea belong to our human group
Be proud, you will belong to this peaceful troop.

Let us get up, where we fell
And put this curse to the hell.
India suffers from the world's toughest disease named caste and untouchability. When we rewind through the history, we can understand that Manu’s interpretation of Veda, as Manu dharma created the evil ground for castes to hit its foundation strong. The person from the oppressed and suppressed class sings the poem. In the midst of the poem, the poisonous weeds are those inflicted with caste ridden superior thinking. Landlords are the rulers of the land or present politicians in India. Healthy crops are the oppressed class. Till today the pain of those in the oppressed classes had been unremoved. Caste ridden superior thinking is a psychological thought instilled through generations. From drinking water to honor killings, caste has taken its never reached big form. It's time we respond to it and work towards creating a world without any discrimination. I dedicate this poem to all caste warriors in India like Dr B.R Ambedkar, Bharathiyar, and Periyar, Jyotibhai phoole, vallalaar, vaikundar, and Rettamalai srinivasan and ayoddhidhasa pandith. It's time we reach out to the next generations and first teach them to treat humans as humans. It's time India wakes up to this human crisis.
Aaron McDaniel Oct 2012
Vibrations of steel block engines have been lulling me to sleep lately
Eyelids swaying up and down like the back and forth of seaweed on the ocean floor
I count yellow dashed lines like others count sheep
Feeling my consciousness slip away, I’m drowsy, I’m dreaming
I dream of a golden city
A golden bay along golden grass rooted in golden soil
Golden streets with golden stop lights
Golden cars parked in golden parking buildings
Gold Telephone towers powered by gold electrical cables
I begin noticing something strange about this city, as it shone so brightly with a golden sun setting as the city’s own back drop.
There were no inhabitants.
No pigeons.
No stray cats.
No dogs scavenging for spare scraps on starving stomachs
Business Men in suits are found littering streets all around the globe. These streets lay barren
Little girls playing hopscotch and jump-rope gone as if the city misplaced them all.
My stomach dropping as I drop to my knees
Panic attacks bring back memories of family and friends
The beautiful faces of girls I once loved, and ones I may never be able to
Questioning if reality was the dream
I am alone in a wonderful Jungle
It’s not easy to be alone in a City of Gold
Michael W Noland Sep 2012
I don't know what to think
when i'm staring in your eyes
more akin to speak
in blind lullabies.
than logistify
my heightened
surmise
in flight
to somewhere nice
if only for tonight
come with me this night
ignite
the cindered fires
of our desires
and incite
the throws of light
in **** obscurity
moaning through the sincerity
of our oddities
gleaming in the rarity
of our academy of lust
all or bust
entrust the accounting
of blaspheme
to the enemies
of poverty
and shove me
all the way down your throat
fill you
instill you
with the hope
of a million
grinning in *******
of the tangled mental merchants
of pretty lights and custom curtains
drawn at first light
dispersing
amongst cursing pedestrians
prior to *******
of forceful *******
with an another human
lightened strikes the truant
in 9 months of fluent
agony
just imagining little Timmy
has me scavenging for a shimmy
to escape
its social ****
to a blind ape
still patting his head
don't be mislead
by ***** carriers
pack your own barriers
and prepare for the scarier
side of a mans mind
Prateek Jain  Jan 2014
Let it be
Prateek Jain Jan 2014
Inequality is something that should be preserved.
Else who will wash my clothes
and who will wash the sink full of utensils?
What if we all got the same number
of eyes and hands?
We have created inequality with wealth and education.
I cherish this inequality as I am above of some millions,
else I would have been standing in queues and footpaths, begging, sleeping and scavenging.
Inequality, education, wealth
Graff1980  Jan 2015
Cassandra
Graff1980 Jan 2015
It never ends, fragments of visions collapsing upon themselves painfully. Her swollen eyes opening, and bursting with orange fire. Then closing just as fast. In between those agonizing seconds she sees everything. Thousands of years cycling over and over. Visions of visions within visions.


Cassandra saw her city razed to the ground. The wall which once stood firm against the onslaught of enemies crumbling with the ravages of time. She closed her eyes. When she opened them again she saw her own grief. Her cousin had fallen in battle. She closed her eyes again, and scratched at her itchy eyelids.



Ten weeks passed without a blink, not even a fraction of an opening. She was disciplined, but the longer she fought the more her eyelids would burn. One blink to ease the agony and she was forced to see her father’s skin. A purple mass of dead flesh bubbling swelling, exploding, and rotting, with maggots squirming in out and around till flies formed and flew away. Another corpse left out in a burning city. One among many denied a peaceful death. Buildings crumbled to dust, the bodies became one with the earth. Cassandra cried without opening her eyes. Her father stroked her long soft curls, whispering reassurances. “It’s all right my child.”


Another three or four weeks passed. She had become blinder than Tiresias the blind prophet. Unable to recall if that was a story she had heard, or would hear in the future.  She sobbed spilling each and every sorrow she could. Every tragedy yet to come. Her father smiled gently placing a warm cloth upon her brow. “Shush my child these nightmares will fade soon enough.”


The young girl opened her eyes again. This time a years’ worth of history unfolded. She saw soldiers gathering arms. Battlements born of the Bronze Age burning with righteous rage. Steel blades clanging against bronze shields in preparation for war. Boats fully loaded departed.


She closed her eyes once more. It would be another two months before she opened them. In the meantime she pleaded with her father to leave the city. Day in and day out begging, sobbing, and screaming until she was sent away.


It was becoming harder and harder to keep her eyes closed. There was a burning force aching to escape. She managed five more weeks until she could bare the pain no longer. As her new sisters bathed her pale dry skin with the sweetest scented oils the young girl recited all that she saw and felt.


The first footfalls of the first soldier’s feet to touch the beach. The feel of the sand as it swirled in, out and around the soldier’s sandals. The general howling commands. The green eyes hungry for battle. The faces contorted in controlled rage. All that intensity burning under the once civilized façade. She closed her eyes again.


Cassandra sat silently in exhaustion, as the sisters slowly brushed the knots out of her long brown hair. They brought her a blindfold, which allowed only a small comfort. This time she only managed to resist for two weeks. The vision came upon her with such force that she cried out and collapsed.


Now the city was burning. Citizen screamed as they ran in terror. Brave men rushed forwards to be impaled on the spears of other brave men. Arrows swallowed the moonlight picking at the earth and scavenging for some bare flesh to devour. Blood ran like red rainwater. Streets streamed thin crimson pools diluted by warm summer showers. The stench oh, the stench, it made Cassandra ***** up chunks of soggy bread and half-digested beef mixed with red wine and stomach acid, while she tried to force her eyes to close.


Finally, she closed her eyes again. The sisters tried to sooth her sorrows, to no avail. Within a years’ time the young girl lost the ability to close her eyes. Cassandra eyeballs slowly burnt out until there was nothing left but charcoaled eye sockets. By the next year she could no longer speak. Cassandra became paralyzed by the futility of her existence.


In her mind the war had come and gone. The sieges were no longer an issue. She no longer felt the urge to cry for the dead. What was, will be, and what will be cannot be undone. What cannot be undone has already happened. Apollo had cursed her. Her beauty had enraptured him, her wit had charmed him, but her will had enraged him.


She was only thirteen with brown eyes and long hair of rare quality, soul so powerful that almost anyone who met her could feel its energy. She shamed the gods with her purity, and unwillingly ensnared their affection.


At first Apollo came with strong arms and tender words. Wooing to the point of painful pleasure. Her eyes could not handle such radiance. His skin burned as his chariot burned. Hair golden flames, skin solar yellow, eye orange as the sun. Each kiss burnt like the worse fever, taking her against her will, savaging her sanity. As if, as if being a god gave him the right to take such liberties.


Apollo viewed her early rejections with whimsy, believing them to be some cute token of her modesty. A god can afford to wait, after all eternity was on his side. After the first hundred no’s his affection gave way to anger. Until his desire could not bear rejection any longer.


At last he cried out to Cassandra. “I will have you or else.”


With a firm but fiery hand he swept her up.  Forcing his mouth against hers. Parting her pursed lip with his powerful tongue.  He shoved his tongue into her mouth, until tears streamed down her cheeks. She could not resist with words, because her mouth was occupied, so she took the only action she knew available to her.


She bit down as hard she could. Lava spewed from Apollo’s lips, roughly singing the inside of her mouth. Without realizing what was happening she swallowed. Her skin began to glow, tiny childlike limbs lengthened and tightened. From her eyes radiated the most powerful light ever seen by man or god. For a moment Apollo cowered beneath the awe of her power, stumbling backwards to the ground dumbfounded.


Regaining his composure he slapped her aside. Scowling in rage “How dare you. You. You worthless *****.”


Her lips parted now of her own volition. Her voice raged with a deep and powerful resonance. “How dare you, you whimpering fool.” The power still flowing inwards filled her with confidence. “I see you for what you are. A tool, a man made invention.” The radiance of her skin was slowly fading. “I see too much now.” She cried out in an ******* fury. A smile crossed her lips. “I see what will become of you and your ilk.”


With strength previously unimagined the young girl thrusted her small hands out throttling Apollo’s throat. He trembled in fear. “You cannot hope to contain the power of me. I am generations incarnated. Passing power from one age to the next. I will not be enslaved.” Her skin began to blink, her voice loss much of its force. “I am Cassandra, and you a merely a passing phase. I will tell the world of all I have seen.”


The last bit of godly energy faded from her skin. Cassandra collapsed. “I still see it all, and you will never touch me again.”


Apollo brushed bits of earth off his person. “See all you want, I care not.” He lunged for her. A flash of thin white light flung him back.

Confused, Apollo rose. Glaring he screamed “You may see all now. It is a gift my blood has given you, but soon it will become a curse. For no mortal wishes to believe that the fates have already written their story. They will ignore you, and in doing so you will find that this power you have gained will be for naught. Thus will be your curse to see all, with no power to stop it.”


Cassandra’s eyes opened wide, seconds split into eternity. She felt the passing of all those around her. She felts time’s stench and rot all around her. Her skin would wrinkle to a certain degree but she would be eternal. She saw cities rise and fall. Some to rise again others to be forgotten. She saw herself seeing each of these visions again and again. She lived her immortal life over and over, events unchanged be anything she said.


The only real comfort was that she saw Apollo wither away. As the old gods fell to ruins weakened by the rationality of new gods, then the rationality of structured reason. Then came the rise of something new and better. Reason with abstraction, abstraction with order, a cycle of energy which emboldened and empowered man. She chuckled.
“Go away little godling.”
And like the little thing he was, Apollo ran.
Her father shushed her, wiping the tears from her face.
The sisters bathed her; singing songs of love and adoration.
Troy fell under the onslaught.
Apollo came and went again.


Cassandra’s eyes opened wide closed and open wide once more, seconds split into eternity. She felt the passing of all those around her. She felts time’s stench and rot all around her. Her skin would wrinkle to a certain degree but she would be eternal. She saw cities rise and fall. Some to rise again others to be forgotten. She saw herself seeing each of these visions again and again. She lived her immortal life over and over, events unchanged be anything she said.


The only one real comfort was that she saw Apollo wither away. As the old gods fell to ruins weakened by the rationality of new gods, then the rationality of structured reason. Then came the rise of something new and better. Reason with abstraction, abstraction with order, a cycle of energy which emboldened and empowered man. She chuckled.
“Go away little godling.”
And like the little thing he was, Apollo ran.
Her father shushed her, wiping the tears from her face.
The sisters bathed her; singing songs of love and adoration.
Troy fell under the onslaught.
Apollo came and went again.
Irene X Chen May 2010
There’s a dark grotto
Under the sea
With shelves and shelves
Of bottles
Clear, glass bottles
All of my secrets

A carefully watched castle
The middle of a concentric series of impassable walls
Surrounded by a forest of kelp
With razor-sharp teeth
And then the narwhals
The narwhal guards
Armed to the teeth with halibut-slicing knives
Their three-meter horns
Gleaming in the moonlight
Guarding
All of my secrets

Skeletons, trespassers of yore,
Strewn about the seafloor
Bones picked clean
By the scavenging *****
No one can enter
No one can leave
The grotto with the shelves
Shelves and shelves of clear, glass bottles
All of my secrets

But as for the *****
For the first time in centuries
The sunlight warms the waters
Melts the kelp
Kisses the narwhals
Buries the bones and torments the scavengers
Clearing away the darkness
A nonstop route through the castle
Protecting
All of my secrets

The tendrils of photons creep along
Wary
Ready for a fight
The grotto growls menacingly
Unguarded
For the first time in centuries
But upon the first touch -
Light meets stone -
The sea shudders
Ecstasy
And in repayment for salvation
Out come the bottles
Floating to the surface
Bathing in the light
All of my secrets
LN  May 2014
Drones - Chaos
LN May 2014
Children awake to sizzling butter and fresh eggs
Birds chirp and settle on their windowsills
Greeting them with the sound of nature.
How lovely it must be!

Childhood is all about the games and the play, they said.
Buttons are pressed,
Video games begin,
because violence is but a pixelated projection for them.

Two extremities of this earth are facing each other now.
Darkness lies on the opposite side.
What a shame!
Home now bleeds images of destruction.

Childhood is non-existent there.
Children awake to the nauseating scent of gunpowder,
Anxiety has filled their minds,
The future remains vague
Lives hanging on a thread
The drones set off missiles to cut it.

They are worth the entire world to their mothers
Young souls who are the lens from which their parents see happiness
but sadly,
survivors scrape the rubble off their ****** feet
scavenging for the roots they once tried to protect
wetting the ground with utter despair.

Home now bleeds destruction
and constant chaos.
Natasha Monica  Nov 2020
Morpheus
Natasha Monica Nov 2020
We meet again in
the last hour of dawn
deathbed creaking;
ravens croaking;
I said:
not yet, not yet!
my candle flickers -
not yet, not yet!
free your words-
You said:
it’s the eleventh hour;
your pen will bleed-
tear and anger;
your melody will be-
forgotten in the rain;
your scent will linger-
six feet under;
your wisdom will be-
trapped in the quicksand-
of your dear Sisyphus;
your beauty will be-
fed to scavenging worms;

you could have been
a phenomenal maiden.

it’s the eleventh hour
deathbed creaking;
ravens croaking;
too late, too late.
Don't let your dreams die with you.

— The End —