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It is only a big fool that marries from a matriarchal family
And a heavy-weight duffer marrying from the matriarchal clan
There is always a poisonous cobra, mamba and adder in the matriarchal
Beauty. Snaring like calypso to thrash the callow ridden odyssey in the lover
As it went for the stooges in Kenya blind to the colubrine station falling in love
With daughters, spinsters, wenches, damsels and brunetes of matriarchal heritage
They were swallowed by the inherent colubrine queen at the bottom of matriarchy
It swallowed them all, lawyers, warriors, merchants, politicians, beggars, billionaires,
Lordships of top-notch corporations, gurus of research, legends of foot-ball, din magnates
Negroes, Asians, Britons, Teutonic, Luos, Mulmbe men, Mijikenda and all that had money,
Their kinsmen and tribes now grieve in a song,
Chanting the song of loss in my mother tongue;
Sialile papa!sialile papa! Sicha esirove!
Sialile yaya!sialile yaya! Sicha esirove!
Wanangali wa wabaseve,Niiye wamulile!
Emenyele buli abira! yakhaba mukisumu!
Ese beve! ese beve! ese beve!ese beve!

By-Alexander Opicho
(From Lodwar, Kenya)
Mail-opichoalexander@gmail.com
Raj Arumugam Nov 2014
it's woman power here
in the clans of the spotted hyenas -
the women are bigger and the males fear;
fathers are kind to daughters
so at least the daughters will be nice to them

so women really just give orders
and the male hyenas obey
with mirth and laughter

Did you take the garbage out?
yeah, ha, ha, ha, yeah, yeah, yeah
Did you put the toilet seat cover down?
yeah, ha, ha, ha, yeah, yeah, yeah
Have you mopped the floor?
yeah, ha, ha, ha, yeah, yeah, yeah
Is dinner ready on the ground?
*yeah, ha, ha, ha, yeah, yeah, yeah
information in first stanza on spotted hyenas from wikipedia
Merry Dec 2018
In the smoke and haze
I could lie for days
Bound by dreams
Of vivacious scenes

A matriarchal mistress
From Sacher-Madoche novella
Gleaming eyes; a cruel smile
Courtesy could not last for a mile

Spank and strike,
Dearest love and goddess
Do not shirk from such duty
****** and tantalising

Bask in decadent moonlight
By the wisp of cold wind
Cure your sadism
And sate your masochism

Within piquant smell of leather
Find your balance
Between lust and love
Dealt with swift blows so keen and easy

All whilst recounting your ****** burden
Unto lovely Aphrodite
She is taken with vile passion
And laden with fur and velvet
Inspired by Venus in Furs
Dorothy A Feb 2015
She yelled out her back porch and into the alley as if one calling home the hogs. “Johnny! Johnny! You get home for supper! John—nyyy! You spend all day in that godforsaken tree that you’re gonna grow branches! Johnny, get home now!”

Up in his friend’s tree house, Johnny slammed his card down from his good hand that he was planning to win from. “****! She always does that to me”, he complained. “Just when I’m right in the middle of—“

Zack laughed. “Your ma’s voice carries down the whole neighborhood—practically to China!”

Everyone laughed. Iris’s daughter, Violet, said to her mom. “Grandma and Dad always butted heads.” She loved when her mom told stories of her childhood, especially when it was amusing.  

Iris’s good friend and neighbor, Bree, asked Iris, “I bet you never thought in a million years that she’d eventually be your mother-in-law”

“No, I sure didn’t”, Iris answered. “I am just glad that she liked me!”

Everyone laughed. Telling that small tale took her back to 1961 when her and her twin brother Isaac—known as Zack to most everyone—would hang out together with his best friend, Johnny Lindstrom. Because Iris was like one of the boys, she fit perfectly in the mix. Zach and she were fifteen and were referred to in good humor by their father as “double trouble”. It was that summer that they lost their dear dad, Ray Collier, and memories of him became as precious as gold. If it wasn’t for her brother and his friend, Iris be lost. Hanging out all day—from dawn til dusk—with Zack and Johnny was her saving grace.  Her mother was glad to have them out of her hair, not enforcing their chores very much.

“I was a tomboy to the fullest”, Iris told everyone. “I had long, beautiful blonde hair that I put back in a pony tail, and the cutest bangs, but I didn’t want to be seen as girly. I wore rolled up jeans and boat shoes with bobby socks, tied the bottom of my boyish shirt in a knot—but I guess I could still get the boys to whistle at me. I think it was my blonde hair that did it.”

“Oh, Mom”, Violet said, “You were beautiful and you know it! Such a gorgeous face!” She’d seen plenty of pictures of her mother when she was younger. Both Iris and Zack were tall and blonde. Zack’s hair could almost turn white in the summertime.

“Were beautiful?” Iris asked, giving Violet a concerned look, her hands on her hips in a playful display of alarm at her daughter’s use of the past tense. She may have been an older woman now, but she didn’t think she has aged too badly.

“Are beautiful”, Violet corrected herself. She leaned over and kissed her mom on the cheek. Iris was nearly seventy, and she aged pretty gracefully, and she was content with herself.  

They all sat in the living room sipping wine or tea and eating finger food. It was a celebration, after all—or just an excuse to get together and have a ladies night out. Not only had Iris had invited her daughter and friend, she had her sister-in-law—Zach’s wife, Franci—and her daughter-in-law, Rowan, married to her youngest son, Adam.

“Weren’t you going to marry someone else?” Bree asked Iris.

“Yes”, Iris responded. “We all wouldn’t be sitting here right now if I did. My life would have been very different.”

“A guy named Frank”, Violet stated. “I used to joke that he was almost my dad.”

Iris said to Violet, “Ha…ha. You know it took both your father and I to make you you. Everyone laughed at how cute that this mother-daughter duo talked. Iris went on, “I actually went on a couple of dates with your dad when I was seventeen. I was starting to get used skirts and dresses and went out of my way to look really nice for guys, but it was just high school stuff. After I graduated, I met a guy named Frank Hautmann, and we were engaged within several months.”

“What happened to him?” Rowan asked.

Iris sipped her tea and seemed a bit melancholy. “We did love each other, but it just didn’t work out. I know he eventually married and moved out of state. I ran into John about two or three years later, and everything just clicked. His family moved several miles away once we all graduated, so being best friends with Zack kind of faded away for him. But once I saw him again, we were really into each other. We took off in our dating as if no time ever lapsed. Soon we were married, and that was that.” There was an expression of “aww” going around the room in unison.  

Bree stood up and raised her wine glass. She announced, “Here’s to true love!” Everyone lifted their glass or cup in response.

Franci stood up next to have her own toast. She said, “Here’s to my husband and father of my three, handsome sons being declared officially cancer free, to Violet’s little bun in the oven soon to be born and also to my *****-in-law, Iris, for finally finding that pink pearl necklace that she thought was hopelessly gone forever! Cheers!”

“Cheers” everyone echoed and sipped on their wine or tea. “That’s some toast and makes this get together even more meaningful”, Iris complemented Franci.

Almost eight months pregnant, Violet restricted her drinking to tea. Her mother was so thrilled that she found out Violet was having a girl. It was equally wonderful that Iris’s beloved brother had recovered from his prostrate cancer, for throat cancer had taken their father’s life when they were young. So really finding the necklace that her mother gave her many years ago—that was misplaced while moving seven years ago—was just the icing on the cake to all the other news.    

Iris said, “My brother being in good health and my daughter having her baby girl is music to my ears. It trumps finding that necklace that I never thought I’d ever see again—even though it was the most precious gift my mother ever gave me.”  

At age thirty-five, Violet had suffered two miscarriages, so having a full-term baby in her womb was such a relief. It would be the first child to her and her husband, Paul, and the first granddaughter to her parents. Iris had three children altogether. Ray was named after her father, and then there was Adam and Violet. Only Adam and Rowan had any children—two sons, Adam Jr. and Jimmy. Ray and his wife, Lorene, lived abroad in London because of his job, and they had never wanted any children.  

“What name have you decided on?” Rowan asked Violet.

All eyes were on Violet who had quite a full belly. “Paul and I have agreed on a few names, but we still aren’t sure.” She turned to her mom and said, “Sorry, Mom, we won’t be keeping up the tradition.”

Iris was puzzled. “What tradition?” she asked.

Violet smiled. “I know it’s not really a tradition”, she admitted, “but didn’t you realize that your mother, you and I all have flower names?”

Everyone laughed at that observation. “That’s hysterical!” Bree noted. “Flower names?”

“That’s news to me” Iris said, not getting it.

“Me, too”, Franci agreed.

“Okay”, Violet explained to her mother “Grandma was Aster, you are Iris and I am Violet. Get my drift?”

The others started laughing, but Iris never even thought of this connection. She responded, “Well, my dad’s nickname out of Aster for my mom was Star.  I never thought of her name as something flowery but more heavenly…I guess. And I never thought of Iris as the flower—more like the colored part of the eye comes to mind. And Violet was my favorite name for a girl and also my favorite color—purple—but you can’t really name your daughter, Purple.”

The others laughed again. Everyone began to get more to eat, mingling by the food.  The gathering lasted for almost two hours, and eventually lost its momentum. Meanwhile, everyone took turns passing around the strand of beautiful, light pink pearls that Iris displayed so proudly in its rediscovery. It was a wedding gift from her mother in 1971, and Iris was painstakingly careful with it, swearing she’d never lose it again. She’d make sure of it. She prized it above anything else she owned, for she had no other special possession from her mother. Her sister got all of their mother’s items of jewelry, for Aster always felt it was the oldest girl’s right to it and this other sister gladly agreed.  Aster was never flashy or showy, and didn’t desire much. Her mother’s wedding ring, silver pendant necklace and an antique emerald ring from generations ago in England was all she wanted. Anything else was up for the grabbing by her two younger sisters.  

Iris learned the hard way to be mindful and not careless about her jewelry. An occasional earring would fall off and be lost, but any other woman could say the same thing. There was only one other incident that happened when she was a teenager that she never shared with anyone other than Zack. If she would confide in anyone, it would be him. Not even her husband knew, and she wasn’t going to tell anyone now. It was too embarrassing to share in the group, especially after tale of the pink pearl necklace that went missing.  

Bree told her, “Keep that in a safe or a safety deposit box—somewhere you know it won’t form legs and walk away.”

“Oh, ha, ha”, Iris remarked, flatly. “I don’t know how it ended up boxed up in the attic with my wedding dress. I sewed that dress myself, by the way. I guess too many hands were involved packing up things, and I am sure I did not put it in that box. Tore this house apart while it was stuck in the attic. Tore that apart, too.”
  
“And yet you didn’t find it until now”, Rowan stated. “It is as if it was hiding on you”.

“Well, I wasn’t even really looking for it when I found it, Iris said. “I was just trying to gather things for my garage sale, and thought of storing my old dress back in the closet. Luck was on my side. It’s odd that I didn’t find it earlier… but it sure did a good job of hiding on me.”

“Like it had a mind of its own”, Franci said, winking, “and didn’t want to be found.”

“Yeah”, Iris agreed. “It was just pure torture for me thinking I may never lay eyes on it ever again. All I had were a few pictures of me wearing it. I was convinced it was gone. ”

After a while, Iris’s friend, sister-in-law and daughter-in-law left one by one, but Violet remained with her mom.  They went in her bedroom to put the necklace back in its original case and in a dresser drawer —or at least that is what Violet had thought.

Iris placed the necklace into the case and handed it to her daughter. She told her, “I’m sure you’ll take good care of it.”

Violet’s jaw dropped as she sat on her parent’s king-sized bed. “Oh, Mom—no!” she exclaimed. “You can’t do that! You just found it, so why? Grandma gave it to you!”

Iris sat down beside her daughter. “I can give it to you, and I just did”, she insisted. “Anyway, it is a tradition to pass down jewelry from a mother to her firstborn daughter. And since you’re my only one, it goes to you. Someday, it can go to your daughter.”

Violet had tears in her eyes. She opened the box and smoothed her fingers over the pearls.
“Mom, you won’t lose it again. I am sure you won’t!”

“Because I’m giving it to you, dear. I know I can see it again so don’t look so guilty!” Violet gave her mom a huge hug, her growing belly pressing against her. The deed was done, for Violet knew that she couldn’t talk her mother out of things once her mind was set.

Iris shared with her, “You know that when I was born—Uncle Zack, too—my parents thought they were done with having children. My sister and brother were about the same level to each other as me and Zack were. It was like two, different families.”

Iris’s sister, Miriam, known to everyone as Mimi, was fifteen years older than the twins, and Ray Jr. was almost thirteen years older. Being nearly grown, Mimi and Ray were out on their own in a few years after the twins were born. Mimi married at nineteen and had three sons and two daughters, very much content in her role as a homemaker. Ray went into the army and remained a bachelor for the rest of his life.

“I never knew I was any different from Mimi or Ray until I overheard my Aunt Gerty talking to my mother”, she told Violet. “I mean I knew they were much older, but that was normal to me.”

“What did she say?” Violet had wondered.

“Well”, Iris explained, “I was going into the kitchen when I stopped to listen to something I had a feeling that I shouldn’t be hearing.”

Her mother was washing dishes, and Aunt Gerty was drying them with a towel and putting them away. Gerty said in her judgmental tone, “You’ve ended up just like Mother. You entered your forties and got stuck with more children to care for. How you got yourself in this mess…well…nothing you can do about it now. Those children are going to wear you down!”

Gerty was two years younger than Aster, and considered the family old maid, never walking down the aisle, herself.  She prided having her own freedom, unrestricted from a husband’s demands or the constant needs of crying or whiny children.

Aster replied to her sister, with defensive sternness, “Yes, I’ve made my bed and I’m lying in it! Do you have to be so high and mighty about it?”

“I couldn’t even move”, Iris told Violet. “I was frozen in my tracks. Probably was about eight or nine—no older than ten. I heard it loud and clear. For the first time in my life, I felt unwanted. It just never occurred to me before that my mother ever felt this way. Now I heard her admit to it. She didn’t say to my aunt that she was dead wrong.”

Iris’s mother came from a big family—the third of eight children and the oldest daughter—so she saw her mother having to bring up children well into her forties and older, and it wasn’t very appealing. Her mother never acted burdened by it, but Aster probably viewed her mother as stuck.

“That’s terrible. I don’t have to ask if that hurt.  I can see how hurt you are just in telling me”, Violet told her with sadness and compassion. “I don’t remember Aunt Gerty. I barely remember Grandma. She wasn’t ever mean to me, but she seemed like a very strict, no-nonsense woman.”  

“Oh, she was, Iris admitted. “I don’t even know how her and my father ever connected—complete opposites. Unless she changed from a young, happy lady to hard, bitter one. I don’t know. You would have loved your grandfather, though, Violet. He liked to crack jokes and was fun to be around. My mother was so stern that she never knew how to tell a joke or a funny story. Dutiful—that’s how I’d describe her. She was dutiful in her role—she did her job right—but I began to realize that she wasn’t affectionate. Except for your Aunt Mimi—their bond was there and wished I had it. Mimi was more ladylike and more like a mother’s shadow. Their personalities suited each other, I suppose.”  

Iris pulled out an old photo album out of a drawer. There was a black and white, head and shoulders portrait of her mother in her most typical look in Iris’s childhood. She had a short, stiff 1950s style bob of silvery gray hair and wore cat eye glasses. Not a hint of a smile was upon her lips—like she never knew how.

“Do you really think Grandma resented you and Uncle Zack?” Violet asked.

Iris responded, “Well, I’m sure my mother preferred having one child of each and didn’t wake up one day and say, ‘I’d like to have twins now’. I mean, she had a perfect set and my mom liked perfection. That’s all it was going to be—at least she thought. Nobody waits over a dozen years to have more. If my mother really resented getting pregnant again, now she had to deal with two screaming babies instead of one.  Must have come as quite a shock and she was about to turn forty.”

“It’s a shame, but woman have children past that age”, Violet pointed out.

“Sure, and some wait to start families until they have done some of the things they always wanted to do. But if I was to ask my mother if she wanted children that time in her life—which I never dared to—I think she’d have wanted to say, ‘not at all.’”

“It’s a shame”, Violet repeated. “Grandma should never have treated you two any differently.” Iris wasn’t trying to knock her mother, but Violet felt the need to be very protective for her against this grandmother that she barely remembered. Aster has been dead since Violet was six-years-old, and she had a foggy memory of her in her coffin, cold to the touch and very matriarchal in her navy blue dress.

Iris admitted, “I knew Mimi was her favorite, and I was my father’s favorite because I was the youngest girl. Zack and I we
ConnectHook Sep 2015
Sustenance for friends and clients;
state your case – come one, come all.
The matron arms of Social Service
will not let you fall.

Food stamps make our nation stronger,
licked, then stuck on the public roll.
Social programs last much longer
adding recipients on the dole…

Like the Ephesian Diana
many are my benefits!
Mine the matriarchal manna;
latch and suckle at my teats.

Yours the client’s right to nurture.
Mother will supply your need;
Child, you must not fear the future –
feed, my baby, feed.

Call me nanny, call me Lord
just make sure you’re calling on me.
Mine are the gifts you can afford
they’re taxpayer-funded, worry-free!

Once you are latched I’ll keep it flowing
like an intravenous habit.
Keep that ****** situated
where your will can never grab it

Let it never cross your mind
that there’s an end to all lactation.
Cloward-Piven have refined
this titillation.

Love me.  Need me.  I’m the State.
Your well-being is my affair.
With your consent I’ll dominate,
because I care.
Check da grafix:  http://tinyurl.com/pxafq9s
Reece Feb 2013
Purple velvet curtains mimicked purple proses of long dead authors
Auteurs and Anglophiles expressing desire, the desire for Desiree
and she danced, she danced.

Christie too, she danced, she danced
Kick, snare, kick kick, snare, she danced rhythmic hypnosis
Daddy watched from the bar, banal dance of the bandits

And Katzarina, baby in the back, dances for love
Fatherless child begging attention
Dance no more my dear soul, for you deserve more

Lecherous lounge acts, the men in ties
Order another round, girls gather around
Please me, dance for me, ****** and bashful
The purple velvet reminds them of mother

Cruel institutions that decay our psyche
Patriarchal pesticides in pasta and porridge
On the side of the mango, matriarchal monotony
Oh stop this pretentious pillaging of poor prostitutes
You are but a boy at the gates of existence, fear not, for the father and the mother shall hold your hand in the heavenly harem.
Dear sweet Katzarina, stay pure of heart for the motherland beckons and we shall lay between rocks of tumescent idols and leaf through pages of grass while our child sings songs of the sirens for Saint Petersburg.
Reece Jan 2013
FIRE! FIRE! BE GONE ****** FIRE, I HATE...

O heavens, I'm sorry... I- hmm. Look, it was only four years and a handful of months ago that we met first. Me taking a thoughtful step from the step of my back door.
That face so delectable and now so distasteful. You broke me, woman, you broke me.
I pondered for so long, the demise of our world. The inevitable freezing of a seemingly indestructible cosmos. The cascade of hellfire from heavens unknown. Oh and the uncivilized beasts from the sky. Wise beyond our years, dangerous in theirs.
You broke me you broke me, ***** of my dreams, you broke me.
Step away from mine, the ****** hands of murderers and devils. Take in yours the safety you dreamed.
For I am but a tyrant in your ethereal presence.
                                                        
These walls close too fast for such a man... I'm no such thing though.
Brother, oh brother quit being dead, incorrigible fool. Rise from your own heaven of concrete and leaden death. Stupid man.
She. She did this. Taking to your arms each night, returning with your scent. WE ARE ANIMALS YOU FOOL! Did you assume..? Never mind.
But still you lay, dead, foolish.
Gasoline, oh gee golly gosh the smell of gasoline. Sweet petroleum of these masters of ours. ExxonMobil, Shell Oil, BP (oh BP you fastidious harlot), BG, Premier and Chevron. I pray you all burn like my dear poor friend/fiend here. I pray to a non-existent God, of course.
Oh sweet embers, the fire, thee fire. *******, the fire. I hate what you have made of me.

A beastly man, bearded and uncouth. My tooth, my tooth.
My tooth it pains me on a daily basis. My gums are that of a ninety year old **** smoker. Black, rotting, stinking. Parallels of my life, I suppose. Teeth,  dreadful, dying, dead, deathlike, decaying, Dickensian, dark, damp, d... d- **** it. Years of poor hygiene, years I focused my full attention on my love, my life, my sweet innocent beautiful flower of the wild world and the wooded wonderland of Whinfell.

Now you have gone, I feel empty. No, I shall cease to make such mistakes in my off handed ramblings. I shall seek my thesaurus...
My dear love, now that you have deserted my soul and destroyed my world and very reason for living. I feel ever so depleted, hollow, cavernous and wanting. Sweet sweet child, I pray to my non-conformist God, that of imagination and speculation. The veritable Frankenstein of philosophical and spiritual distortion; I pray he guides you safely through these stormy nights and past the cliffs of disturbed memories. I pray he holds you close to his chest and reveres your silken thighs without touch.

**** ME, PLEASE GOD ****. ME.
The embers of my kin simmer to a pedestrian crackle. The cackle the cackle, my voice is a cackle and I hate it. Dried remnants and burned ones too. I can't help but smile as I remember running through the fields behind my home, where the thieves and the addicts roamed. Child like fascination of the lurid creatures dwelling within the brothel I called home. Whorish women, my curse, the bane of my something or other. Feeble mind of mine, it continues to let me down. Not too dissimilar to the bunches of balloons that decorated the cars of the local garage, waiting to be sold to prospective family-men and business men and men and men and men. Sweet men. The balloons, of course! I would sit on the deserted field and from a  distance observe the close of trading and the ceremonial cutting of ******* strings that freed the multicolored harlots of the sky, back into the sky. Only to be destroyed by winds, birds, planes, storms and the pressures of the atmosphere. Weak willed *******, the lot of them.

But you dear brother, of no relation. You were kind hearted and I point to where your charred heart lay.
You held me close and called me Elizabeth. Matriarchal dream of mine. You broke the seal of new technology, purchased from store upon the corner.  Multiple windows on my windows, each one a prospective client. You lucky friend, I choose you.
We were madly in lust. Madly in... lust. I cannot bear to bring the 'L' word from my cowardice lips. Lips that pleasure, lips that weave, oh lips you kissed daily. Masculine frame, strong father figure of which I am vacant. Let me lay with you once more, in my pretty dress and high heels. Let me pretend for a day that I am no man. That I, that I am your lady. Let me, let me, please let me sit with my legs crossed and hair dancing in the cool breeze and breath of yours.
Too many years I herd the pleasure through papyrus walls. Mother wailing and cheering for the lord. Grunting and creaking with the pleasure she felt. I enjoyed it so much. For that reason and many others beside, I chose a life.

Life so frail, life so pure
Stepping slowly
From the step of my back door
Closing behind me
and turning the key
I shall be home to you
As your lady.

Please do not govern for I am impure of mind.
Life's little scar ingrained in my skull.
Each and every maddening creature has led me, the narcissist, to this here concrete hell.
In which I shall say my final words,
and breath my final wheezing breath
For I have killed two men and a perfect woman today
And Long may they rest.
OUR    POVERTY   HAS   COLOUR

Alexander K Opicho
(Eldoret, Kenya; aopicho@yahoo.com)

Most illusive and elusive
Like the devils of Congo forest
Is the impish poverty
Permeating all seals with vicious wily
Into the midst of callous humanity
Biting country men and country women
With carnivorous dentalities so ruthless
Putting man to a forlorn shame
As the wife looks in desperate flaggerbastation
Putting matriarchal womenfolk to humiliation
As the expectant sire wallow in the askance of looks
Condemning communities to status ad absurdum initio
Thinning man from man, culling woman from woman
Eating flesh by flesh social koprpers of man
Eating the native flesh in the farms of Brazil
Tearing the ***** steak into ghetto lacerations of Chicago
Whizzling sombre morning tunes to the Zulus in the black tundra
Cementing pale casted clusters for the Patels of India
Commanding suave drills to poor (wo) menfolk; left! Left! Left! –abouuuuturn!
With its accomplice Mr. Hunger son of starvation, they both command drills
For black factory workers, Maids and gravediggers to dance
Watchmen, thieves and prostitutes to match
In the hinterland of Africa all the riff-raff in deep despair
Dance in a tandem to the irritating drills of the duo;
You come on! Left! Right! Left! Right!—fowaaard match!
Backward match! Left! Right! Left! Right! Sharpp uuuuuuuturn!
The duo communiqué; Go home and wait for your pay announcement.

Surely; what colour is our poverty?
Shane Dec 2012
10 sacrificial exhales
9 regret scented fingertips
8 matriarchal castigations
7 breathes corrupted
6 bummed ember tips
5 second hand coughs
4 derisive stares
3 relapses
2 lungs
1 heart

Parasitic paradise with death in hand
A gift to me,
self receiving
Toxicity imbalanced
*This is worse than bleeding
K Balachandran Sep 2013
Slightly built, yet robust,
not frail, a daily jogger by choice,
shape conscious, proud-
about keeping the weight
in check, all these years,
articulates her feelings well
but, not the argumentative type,
this facet endears her to all,
keeps her Indian mind agile,
which reflects in her awareness
of eternity than here and now.
Takes oil bath twice a day, in keeping with
the true Malayalee spirit,
never a river in spate, yet
forceful and gushing in making heard
her opinions for others to consider,
from the first day of marriage,
unlike the demure Indian women.

None would doubt her might
that transcends the limits of material and physical,
hidden power sources are tapped at will,
cites her matrilineal heritage, that
stems form a long line of matriarchal grandmothers.

I can't imagine a day passing our premises
without she giving permission,
putting her signature,
all over each passing hour,
though we never keep a formal register for that.
Aren't we three, auxiliaries, the boys and I
in the orchestra named after this inveterate conductor?
Sweet to the core, but if needed
could be pungent, never erupts or go wild,
Smile is disarmingly gentle, yet
that firm answer, needed at the right time,
is never delayed.

Two adoring eyes flutter,
pledging support,
they never let me down, day or night.
a hand that gently touches, me
with the  fingers of reality.
when I dream in day or night.
Malayalee    - A person belonging to the southern most Indian State, Kerala, whose mother tongue is "MALAYALAM"(note the palindrome).As water is plenty here,  cleanliness is a near obsession for denizens of this land.
Spirk Burkham Mar 2014
Ponies are cool.
they can have wings
and soar through the air,
or they can have horns
and use magic.
Or they can be plain
and still be just as important.
There are a lot of good things
about being a pony.

but ponies don't have hands
or feet
and they live in a matriarchal society.

I like being human
because we have hands
and feet
and live in an equal society (sort of)

we don't have wings
so we make them.
we don't have horns
so we make best with what we have.
all of us are more or less plain
and that makes us equal.

there are a lot of good things
about being a human.
and I am glad to be one.
I know, I know - "blow away, windbag"
My naivety died with my father
at the bottom of Lake Shelbyville
when I was seven years old
and still losing little teeth.
-
I turn twenty-four next week;
January the fifteenth.
I can still sense the difference between you and I
by the long pauses in between weather talks.
-
I find solace in solitude
and that will never change.
Too many years of misunderstandings,
dope addled family, and conflict avoidance.
-
My mother has an addictive personality
which she tries to superimpose onto me
as a way to keep me away from the ****.
She wants me to be her negative film; her opposite.
-
I wish my grandma had leveled with her
instead of surrounding drugs with the mystique
and the danger of a loaded weapon
in a teenager's back pocket; denim daredevil.
-
Grandma.
Now that is a name I miss saying.
She was the stern force that matured me
and my protector in time of matriarchal absence.
-
Her mind started to die years before her body did
and I had to sit and watch it happen, helpless,
with my mother; her daughter.
Alzheimer's, falls, strokes, and in a flash she wasn't there.
-
I don't find myself rooting for the cause these days.
I just want to escape where I came from;
who I am, but the path is circular.
I'm accepting the fate, bathing in lust, and waiting for summer.
Tommy Johnson Sep 2014
Greetings from your Christmas cards
Your perfect lawn and two car garage
Aren't you all such a perfect family?
Thinking no one can see underneath

Father would you like to tell
Us all about the girl you sometimes see
Your juvenile adultery

Go look back the photo albums  
You will see happy time smiles
Of people trying to keep it together
But falling apart all the while

Now am I right or am I right?
So am I right or am I right?
About the daughter who sleeps around
And the one tracked minded boys she goes down on

Go to the house
Don't call it home, with a camera
And take snap shots of behind the scenes
And see sadden home that cannot get sadder

Lets go to the beach on a sunny day
And unwind for a bit
Forget your ***** up son
And all the drugs he's done

Lets go to the park for some fresh air
And relax for a second
Let go of the hate you have for your wife
And her matriarchal grip she has on your life

Lets go for a drive take the top down
And enjoy the moment
Continue to deny and repress
Your parent's deaths and your lack of success

Just drink your whiskey and muddle through
Pray to your God, if he's even listening to you
Broken and divided
They're a happy family

Just pour out a few more "I love you's"
And regret ever saying "I do"
Broken and divided
They're a happy family

Blood is thicker than water but you're thirsty
Blood is thicker than water but you're thirsty
Blood is thicker than water but you're thirsty
Blood is thicker than water but you're thirsty
NeroameeAlucard Feb 2015
Now this topic has ground on my brain lately
but I feel I should discuss it at least once, and hopefully not lengthy.
See, I agree with feminism and I do my best to treat everyone equally,
black, white, whatever it's all the same to me.
So Tumblr feminists, I'm calling you out because being extreme behind a keyboard seems to be your specialty.
You spend days with square eyes
Filling Tumblr and discovering lies
Women this women that
Telling all of your little facts
Now Let's get back on track,
First of all demonizing straight guys won't solve **** and most likely will get you nothing but flak but I guess you can think that all guys are complete ***** I'll give you a pass to that,

Second of all who made up that free bleed thing?
I mean I know that time is unpleasant but allowing yourself to bleed in say a public pool I'm almost positive isn't hygienic

Now before you think I'm some chauvinistic pig,
I do think that the pay gap shouldn't exist, and I do think oversexualization of our daughters isn't anything positive

However I will say that I'm for equality, not matriarchal or patriarchal or giving someone with different parts between their legs special treatment

So stop overreacting on this
Just because you are different then boys on the way you ****
Love your soul and not your gender
Stop making every guy a *** offender
This was a collaborative effort with my little sister Joana A.k.A ducky :)
Sharleen Boaden Jun 2012
I choose to ignore my aching heart
Carrying it in secret behind my shadow smile
Heavy legs take me around this cold dance floor
Waltzing as words beat on my sensitive brain

I’m Alice in Wonderland!
Drowning in abnormality
Forcing myself bigger in a shrunken surround…

One two three,
One two three,
Keep it in har mo ny

Round and round I continue to go
Rising on tip toes in my mental capped boots
Dancing small steps to the matriarchal tune
While turning my blind eye away.
Luke R E Webster Dec 2014
I've seen...
Many an egg dropped by the proverbial hen
then egg becomes number through paper and pen
then greed facilitates the perpetrators of this
with ample incentive to young girls a kiss.

Then kiss unexpectedly leads to *******
and the greedy ******* end with a non-legit son
many of the girlies will attempt abortion
but a few will not do as the ******* tell them.

So the son soon and swiftly becomes an anomaly
while it's elder brother says to daddy "are you proud of me"
the oxbridge acceptance letter filled him up with glee
but the dad knows secretly it's all to do with money.

So the half witted son takes up the mantle of the father
as senility and guilt have finally gripped the latter
the son through drugs and experimentation is madder
his social status dictates,
he'll always climb the ladder.

A few years pass, we're in different situation
the son of senility has got grip o' the nation
shaking wretched and archaic crumbling foundations,
he's shaking the **** all over his poorer realtion.

But the overgrown man-child doesn't know,
that since he took power his brother sits in the cold,
that with all the food he eats, he chews it real slow,
so he can have food for longer, fill that hole.

But does it make it all right at once,
cuz he claims ignorance
or should the people at the top
be people from the bottom,
the ones who looked up,
but got nothing but trod on.

It's impossible to relate,
when you all dissipate,
when your middle class darling,
has a working class date.

So the ******* child doesn't vote,
through bedroom tax lost his home,
Senile son?  Victory of note
fake promises in the matriarchal dome.

Apathy strikes again,
this ****'s impossible to defend,
how can we justify not getting off our *****?
not doing something about all this in the masses?
oh yeah, that's right
although barely know the people at the top,
We've all seen their soles as they've trod on our lots
Mackenzie Leigh Oct 2011
I still feel your breath on my neck sometimes
With that stiff, clinical hand that you placed upon my spine
Examining my face for harsh, worrisome lines
As I walked the chemical tightrope that exists only in mind

Now, still precariously balanced, still unanimously blamed
I'm holding out for your smile in each passing face
Though it's been years since they burned you in cold Virginian flames
I can still see you watching me through the windowpane

My name displaced in your mouth like some placid stone
The weight on your tongue silencing thoughts unknown
As your fingers nimble upon needles, weaving our winter clothes
Once slept in a box where your ashes now are stowed

You held no Catholic reservations, nor illusions implausibly sweet
And left me with no bullets to deliver from stolen grief
But sometimes, in my dreaming, you offer me reprieve
With skin so milky white, loose and starch like a sheet

I watched you behind that curtain, with satin on your back
In the flickering light of candles, where shadows often pass
And criss-cross in patterns, over blue eyes watery and vast
To ignite a glowing smirk, whose teeth do shimmer like glass

Your hair still wispy and short, the color of strawberries faint
Fallen in a gossamer crown, to covet your wrinkled face
You would take to me like a feather, and swath me in your immortal embrace
Speaking divinely of Heaven, and all your ghostly grace

With that kind, melodious laugh I have so terribly missed
Pressing rosebuds to my temple in a matriarchal kiss
A dream we were in, your wings reverently clipped
For a time, if only, I felt within your loving grip

You warned me not to be fooled, to make no mistake
You would have returned to your grave by the time that I should wake
With trembling fingers clinging tightly to your remains
Standing in your old room, the bed forever made

I remembered whispering in your ear, as your conscious mind wore thin
Life support wailing, the color drained from your lips
My fingers searching desperately for the pulse that was buried in your wrist
I told you I would never forget you: my precious, parting gift
Deigh Walker Nov 2012
Before we read or speak or rest further,
you owe promise to a favor–

I want you to walk directly out of your door
during the most lucid scene of day,
or the most haunting moment of inner-night
Walk until your feet come to a
                        sudden
                        instinctive
                        halt
Listen to clamor, or
whatever surrounds you
Lift all volumes of your
                        puja
                        quietude
                        as a psalm
Focus on humanities scrapings
or the long graceful stroke of
matriarchal firman in her most
                        peculiar
                        stage
                        of cankered innocence
Lecture the calamity of her fictionless plot and
digest what the spiritually deaf cannot, and allow it to
find what triggers you the hardest
                        what
                        gouges
                        the prompts threadbare
It may be the indifferent hiss of cars passing
and it may be the expression plastering the jaw
of all of that unprocessed energy
                        ambling
                        on
                        by
It may even be the weather spilt
from her majesties
archaic entrails
Something will eventually do you in
but it ultimately
takes practice at varying degrees

I've done it when I was awake
I've done it in dreams
Either way
there's more mirrored in fragmented cohesion
                        than it
                        quite often
                        seems
Nat Lipstadt Apr 2018
good god a gaggle of girls

read the dispatch thrice; the hierarchical lines some straight and some dotted but all I know they got a genealogical baseball team femi-nine
and maybe an NFL eleven when the twins get older

(husbands and sons ride the motorcycle bench and
back up if necessary, and good for musical accompaniment)

~oh yeah,
for Medusa~

this megillah message team meant for  me to assauge my
mother hubbard accusations  only partial reveals the player’s names:
but if you google a
gaggle of strong women you become informed there is a:

Queens Esther, Miriam, an Eve, four matriarchal outfielders, Batsheva pitching and only Ruth, can catch her **** curveball

in between an occasional poem gig whose costs are covered
under the mental health clause of a health care plan
but only in
California  

too cavalier, get it, you prefer this perhaps

sinewed strength in arms that can
carry three children at once,
age is not a factual issue,
for there is an army of
women soldiers who are a troop contingent,
everyone’s back is covered always-full stop-
they curve like the Earth’s crust,
magma formed strong and mineral rich,
curved to better resist
the comets the heavens cannot resist
to send & test the mettle
of a gaggle of stronger women sinewy arms entwined
reenforced

alas

the grandpa must here resist and rest,
lunch prep before Sgt. Stubby movie at noon,
in reclining chairs they ride like wild horses
and all our shushing noisier than their giggles
just google a gaggle of strong kids,
you’ll see what I mean
in this, we do possess a giggle of expertise




sunday 10:15am
written to the 1812 overture
girl diffused Oct 2017
Sleek dark hair
Highlights of auburn, color of fall
Stern lips
A look of austerity in the dark russet eye
Skin lighter than my own
The smaller wrist
Large eyes
Faint deepening crow's feet
Nursing knowledge
Small, short, slight, petite, and strong
Maternal vanguard
Matriarchal
Beautiful and earthly
Scorpionic elusiveness
Her unused canvas
Frequent Homegoods purchased
Shifts decor in the livingroom like a Feng Shui practitioner
Laughs at the absurdity of modern horror movies
Smells like bath wash and too much perfume
Smells of my childhood
Smells of my innocence
Paperbacks of Hugo and Austen in boxes in the basement
Paperbacks of The Symposium and a biography of Marx in the basement
Secretly likes to cook
Culinary explorer
Gastronomically open
Culinary door opener
Very little circle of friends
Outspoken
Austerity on the small mouth
Austerity in the small mouth
Conviction in her voice
Soft graphite in her voice
Has a lisp sometimes
The slight overbite(?)
Immigrant parent
Unnaturalized citizen
Reminds me of fall
Reminds me of everything
Reminds me of very little at once
Life-teacher, one of many
Protective
Over-protective
Pushy
The way her hand moves on her tablet
The way her voice sounded during a lecture when I was a child
The way she used to hug
Closet full of shoes and clothes she rummages through when she's going out
Meticulous cleaner
The way her voice sounded when she tried to make sense of me
The way her voice sounds
...
List poetry. An experiment in profiling a close loved one.
Marieta Maglas Jul 2015
(Chiara, Francesca, Rosa and Pedra remained on the beach.)

Chiara and Pedra decided to take a look along
The coast to search some food; Francesca and Rosa carried
The boat across the beach to hide it; 'How can you be so strong? ''
Asked Rosa; ''I listened to Chiara when I got married.



We depleted a fortune and Lucca was very rich.''
''So, this strength of yours comes from your tristesse, '' replied Rosa.
''My inner emptiness became affection.'' 'She's a witch.''
'She's a good soul, but inside her, she keeps thorns of mimosa.''


They had to undergo that difficult time and to
Organize their lunch; Rosa stopped to sip some drops of water
From the canteen she carried, '' it's entirely up to you
To leave him now.' ''My father is ill; I'm his only daughter.''


They were tired after the grim events of the previous
Hours; meanwhile, Chiara and Pedra were sifting through the salty
Air of the beach. Chiara said, '' I don't trust Fargo, he's devious.''
''We have no other chance, '' replied Pedra. ''His logic is faulty, ''


Continued Chiara, ''they should remain here with us.''
Pedra stayed for a few minutes being caught by the sparkle
Of the broken waves; she said, ''we have something to discuss.
Don't you think that your ideas are too matriarchal? ''


They enjoyed the salty stink of the seaweeds and the clicking
Of the living shells that they had tossed together for the meal.
While eating, they cut off the mollusks from their sticking
Shells; dozens of gulls were wheeling over the waves. ''Pleasant peal, ''


Said Francesca, '' the chance of meeting another one while
Staying here is very slim.'' '' I really grasp the scale of our
Surroundings, '' said Chiara while giving her seaweeds with a smile.
Rosa said, '' eat some kumquats, figs, and pears; you need power.''

(Rosa brought some fruits to complete the meal.)


(To be continued…)

Poem by Marieta Maglas
Scar Jan 2017
A barback slid you out
A generation early, in
The shape of your father.
He who befriended the
Blondest girl in town -
Elf-sheen baby, eternally mortal,
Entangled in bedsheets, or,
Everyone's Fantasy ****.
So she gifted you lawn rakes
And snack cakes, and you
We're raised in the bar on
Highway 51. Far from the
Vinyl static emitted from your
Mother's breast. She warned you
About The Suburbs. Always
Whispering tiny prayers -
Grab the keys, we're leaving.

And they keep dying on you -
Your matriarchal mirrors.
Leaving you in the hands
Of workmen scientists,
All waiting for the explosion,
The bomb to drop,
The neighborhood burn.

Grab the keys, we're leaving.
To lay my head upon the tawny cover of softwood pines once more
as I pry the manifest question of youthful travail and insecurity ,
to garner the earthen tier beside natures vested , rippling waters ..
Churning runnels lending delicate directions , whirlpool portrayals that countersink their matriarchal beginnings , only to gradually disappear ....
To wander the carpeted trail with arbitrary resolve , free of pious
intimidations .. Fixated with superb creativity  .. With the eyes of an eagle .. Determined . Pithiest .. Invincible ..
As heat obscures the blacktop ahead , the shade of home is but a dot in the humid distance , tar laced Georgia roads in the month of August are quite dangerous to young , bare feet ...
Sorghum fields , hog wire boundaries , darkening skies ..The unbounded Sun dragging each step , briar patches line the road shoulder , painful reminders of lonely boots foolishly left unkept ...
Fire ant mounds hide in tall grass , Cow Killers forage alone in Summer swelter , brown scorpions , cottonmouths and the list goes on virtually
forever during Dog Days , legends of wounds refusing to heal , double headed rattlers and rabid foxes , Longhorn bulls turning wild , growing bloodthirsty , hunting down unwary farm hands .. Men turned lunatic
from tainted moonshine , waiting at the wood line for clumsy boys and girls , well water made septic from lack of rain .. Bobcats running in packs for any food easily obtained , including boys that refused to listen
to mother , leaving their cowboy boots when warned not to do so ... This will be the last time I'm caught barefooted , all alone , left to my own wit and minds reserve , Mom and Dad can be sure of it !
Copyright February 18 , 2016 by Randolph L Wilson * All Rights Reserved

I remember leaving the house early one morning to go fishing ..It was still cool so I decided not to take shoes ..  The trip home turned out to be a real lesson  !
girl diffused Nov 2023
The workman told you to bury a curled dark lock

Of your dead baby’s hair in the earth,

A quiet offering to a quieter god

You spent several months weeping to the sky

Your small hands curled into your white frock



Work was left unattended in your colorful house

No food on the stove,

No boiling salt fish, or softened dumplings in murky white water

The pungent smell of cured fish filling the quieter home

The home, austere and shrinking into the long street

Your helper comes to do all this

Your children understand in their small ways



You covered the lock of dark hair with fresh dark soil

Palm fronds wave in the wind

Salty sea air kisses your wet skin

Tears make tracks on your cheeks like a map pointing to

Nothingness, like a page of a book with words of moroseness



Once you had my mother, birthed her into a world of noise

The sure and strong hands of the matriarchal mother,

Your mother, who’d delivered more babies than she’d had her numerous children

Then you cooked, you toiled, swept the veranda with your broom

Left the buried lock of hair in the locked cabinet of your mind



Now, when I make the saltfish, I do it with stilted preparation

My hands form lumpy misshapen cornmeal dumplings

I fry the little ***** of dough for too long, they come out dry

I pop one into my mouth and chew

There, the fragrant smell of your perfume,

Sweet lull of your voice, your birdlike hands.
A/n: A rejected submission to a poetry magazine. Hopefully it finds its home here. Thank you for reading in advance everyone.
Edward Coles Feb 2014
My old teacher, she taught me of sunlight.

She taught me
of the energy waves,
crashing through the window.

She browsed
over distorted polygraphs
bleached in daylight;

oh, crashing black mark.

She wandered
through the courtyards at break,
eyes off and into the distance,

and always she,
the bleak reminder,
of memories turned to black.

She read in down-turned whisper,

lips twitching
the words, all for herself;
making sense of life

through ornamental verse.
A rapture of cerulean eyes,
she took my teenage heart

to town, just to pay the fare.

She taught me
of impossible love,
of all beyond the walls.

She taught me
of the paradise-life,
where memory unfurls.

She taught me
of matriarchal health,
in the strength of her stare,

explaining in her youth
eternal, that is etched
into my mind;

that not all that is loved, is fair,
and not all that is valued, is mined.
©
A mix of many teachers over the course of my life. Both academical and aspirational.
Mateuš Conrad Mar 2017
this day made no sense apart from
   being polite to a surgery
receptionist  and downing a bottle of whiskey...
  birds? spring? colours? can i just go back
to england imitating alaska? the more i age the more
i realised: **** day! bring on night!
   and it's not like some horror movie scenario...
i'm not even conjuring vampire
to sell them to you...
   i just think my eyes are sort of: too distracted
                   by the light?
a bit like: am i serious about
buying this vacuum cleaner?
should i be serious about
buying this vacuum cleaner?
   i'd love to live in a matriarchal society,
turn all cannibal and ****,
go shrimp! go!
          swing *******! bite the railings
while you're at it!
            let's see if a gypsy tooth plops out
of your jaw, so we can cast a magic spell
turning the lead into gold!
the ****?!
             oh **** me, i'd love to live in a matriarchy...
it would mean that i wouldn't have to be a man
and have this social construct of
pampering to women... i'd be a lion
with a harem of females hunting...
             need a fridge? go **** yourself...
need a toilet? go **** yourself...
           need a blender? go **** yourself:
chew on a terminte mound...
                to be honest i have a fetish for the chance
to live in a matriarchy... it's almost like what islam
concerns itself with theocracy...
      i'd love to live in this wendol society...
    look how much less you need in a matriarchy!
i'm watching it going: giva'h more giva'h more!
            tazmanian bush-wacker aussie...
   god... i'd love to experience a matriarchy more than
i'd care to support a theocracy...
that's like patriarchy: or what's called
                                              second generation...
islam has nothing on me, i want to
experience a matriarchy... the amazonian
    queens 30ft women doing the new zealand
rugby team's haka!
   oh please let them have it! let them have
women football teams... i'll really want to ****
them afterwards!
                              what is man is what
allows man to internilise his emotions up to
the point that he's playing poker...
               what allows women to be women is
volcanic outbursts of unsolicited emotion...
                 funny how the genitals play a part in
the whole affair... or don't... whatever...
i woke up early today and thought to myself:
****! not enough whiskey!
        theocracy is just second / third generation
patriarchy...
                      there's nothing else to it...
imagine islam as it was originally...
     a matriarchy under the guidance of mohammad's
first wife... who was much older than
him and wrote the first koranic verses...
Khadijah...
                      mohammad is a ***** compared
to Khadijah, the matriarch;
mohammad is just a ***** teenager compared
to her...
               well... her stock did come from the myth
of the origin of the Arab race... namely from
Abraham's concubine...
                    hence the weaving of the walking
h
          arem...
                   oh forget it! the west does something
similar to a niqab... when was the last time you
spotted a beauty that fills the pages of a style
magazine on the street?
                             last time i spotted one?
i wanted to **** a donkey.
                               the end.
        the niqab is like a mobility scooter for women
who won't be stolen in the light of day
by some rich patron who suddenly forgot his
fetish for ******* choir boys...
                   let's level it out!
                     she was the literate cougar that wrote
the better pieces of the koran...
          after she died... the koran started shrinking...
i actually think that
  the last surah was written by Aisha...
                         so who wrote it, if not women?
this is a classical example of a matriarchy -
muhammad was just a useful idiot...
                well apparently he was illiterate, he couldn't
read and he couldn't write...
  like that joke about the police in england:
one can read, but can't write, the other can't read,
but can write...
                                     we have plenty of useful
idiots around here, what does the left mean in
western society when there is no economic policy
to support it? i come from the east,
                     what does the left mean in western
lands mean these days?
               well... if theocracy is only a second / third
generation patriarchy
then second / third generation matriarchy clings
to theosophy... a sort of oops-e-daisy: just one step
away from turning the whole thing into an aleister crowley
inspired movement... and where does that lead?
pi zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz ah!
Graff1980 Oct 2015
As a little child I prayed for the pain to stop
for a my heart to burst, becoming
A ****** bloom under a corn red moon
No answer came just silence
Leaving me to stew in my room
Under the doom and gloom
Of the oncoming matriarchal storm
Mateuš Conrad Mar 2016
when they're together,
a girl always seems to try and remember
and recount her past loves,
a boy always seem to try and forget
to recount his past loves;
one always tries to love,
one always tries to make the other jealous,
it's hard to love something
that tries to make you jealous
of the past you were not part of
and asks to be awarded a leash
of safekeeping, to not venture outside
the zoo of feeling;
why do girls always wish to recount
their past loves to incite feelings of
jealousy and further jealousy into
impotence? oh right,
so men can slave away, and the household
can be abundant in triviality of possessions
they cannot internalise;
in terms of matriarchal politics,
if i'm not one of her own, i'm disposable...
not even an extension of being in glorification
later as disposable... if i'm not one of her own,
i'm nothing... if fathering mankind
gave us the history we know so far...
i wonder what mothering mankind will
give us, as years come to date,
and be dated in the reliquary of cannibalising saints
for the artefact of the self-serving entitlement of mr. or dr.
wordvango Apr 2018
I dreamed I
Saw fields of straw
Hallucinated the waves
Coming to me

I begged on
That little
Self inside me
To prove

His realness
And he said
I just am
And I

Answered
But the field was
Real to me all
Waving

Standing
Applauding
A festivity
Of me

And you are who
A homonculus
A being
Inside me
Have you

I questioned him
Myself me
My being
Mine ID

Have you
Little my
Senses of self
Monitor

My matriarchal
Patrician
Overseer
Have you

One too?
A little you
Inside you talk
To question

Go to in stress
For advice
And if so
Does he too?

On and and and and

Ononon
We went
Late


Into the night into day
I went

Back
To
The
Field
Lawrence Hall Mar 2021
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                       Robin Hood and Jacques Derrida

As the first stars came out above the leaves
Of Merry Sherwood, the lads in peaceful repose
Put away their after-supper mending of gear
And idled over their ale of October brewing

Then Robin Hood spoke to Allan-a-Dale:

Don’t sing to us of Neo-Post-Colonial White Supremacist Patriarchal People-of-Color Matriarchal LGBTQTY Non-Binary Feminist Chomskian Existentialist (existentialist – how quaint) Hegelian Post-Structuralist Logocentric Sausurian Psychoanalytical Post-Modern Marxist Jungian New Critical Cognitive Scientific Neo-Anarchic Canon-Repudiationist Neo-Informalist Catarrhic De-Constructionism.

Sing to us
                                                       a story.
A poem is itself.
dianne galande Jun 2018
Today
What comes to mind when ‘gender’ is heard?
Male, female, and queer.
Gender issues; gender inequality.
“According to millennials”
One of the world’s most serious problem.
I admit to know not much about discrimination,
But I have a say according to my perception.

Adam is superior, Eve is submissive
Patriarchal than matriarchal.
“Women” receive and are perceived lower.
Why is that?
It’s pointless to throw discrimination back and forth
Physical capabilities.
All are unique to body structures,
Both can either be short or tall,
And both can either be weak or strong.
But both can’t have the same genitals;
One can bear, the other cannot.
But he can’t be she and she can’t be he?
That’s a different story.

Talk about stereotypes
She are *** symbols and he are not
He are rapists and she are not
Focused too much on two gender distinctions.
Talk about rights
All are humans who can walk and talk
All are humans who can eat and breathe
All are humans who can think and feel.

What’s it about?
Just gender identity.
He who is a she
Can think and act as a she
She who is a he
Can think and act as a he
He or she who is both or questioning
Can think and act as they please
All are still humans.
What’s wrong? Society.

But we can’t impose
Some are against
Some support
Some are neutral
Some don’t know.
What can we do? It’s up to you.
But you’re in no position
To give such decision.
The society
Today
A poem requirement for my Literature. I honestly don't know much about gender equality, so I apologize if this poem ******.
Mateuš Conrad May 2022
i lied... i must have the dates mixed up...
the last exhibition i saw wasn't From Russia
at the Royal Academy of Arts...

it was either Edward Munch at Tate Modern
or the Pre-Raphaelites at Tate Britain...

but i found it impossible to not cycle into London
today... i finished some whiskey at about
1pm... got on my bicycle... stuffed about 10 empty
bottles from various liquids:
*****, whiskey... cider into my rucksack:
dropped them at the recycling bins by the supermarket:
because i'm green and all:
i just have a fetish for recycling...

   my god... this writing is terrible: i haven't drunk
enough... sober writing is dishonest writing:
unless you're old... then sober is probably honest:
age does the trick... but when you're a little bit younger:
nothing like a little bit of ***** to make
you speak the truth...

obviously i was going to do exactly what i wrote...
and some Plato (taking off a mask)
was almost a thought experiment:
was i going to write fiction? or was i going to write
poetry? was i going to cycle from Romford
to Tate Britain and watch the Walter Sickert
exhibition?

             i got there... smoked a cigarette...
sweating like a pig being chased...
how i love to punish myself on the bicycle...
i'm like a remora when it comes to traffic...
the shark? oh... a bus...
                 a truck... a heavy-duty truck with a skip...
i'm the remora sort of using it as momentum
generator...
because i never cycle in the blind spot...
a wise remora is the cyclist that keeps to the outside
of the shark...
since i've started cycling around London i haven't
heard of any cyclist deaths...
   well no: i'm not saying it's because of me...
but i'm not exactly invisible...
like today i spotted someone imitating the way
i give direction...
  *******-pencil pusher type stretch out their hand
wide like they're about to do a horizontal
seigl heil!

    me? i laconically lift my hand and indicate
with my wrist / hand a blinking motion of a car's
indicator: up and down... up and down...
i'm turning... but usually it's me: the remora
and the big *** shark of a bus or a truck helping me
cycle past... Sunday drivers... it's Tuesday!
stay awake! focused! you're not walking!

i love getting bicycle rage... oh rarely with pedestrians...
what i do with pedestrians is that i cycle
really close to them when they have
crossed their allowance of road...
they usually jump back: startled...

    because in an urban environment:
i punish myself... unconscious spatial coordination...
i love that there are so many objects moving around
me... big objects... small objects...

i hate cars... not that i've ever driven one...
i tried... once... eh... this exoskeleton doesn't suit me...
it's different in a bus... because hey...
Cliff Richard and ****...
                   walking... the bicycle... or a horse...
either one...
hell: even "god" can't beat the bicycle with his
donkey or a horse...

it took me less time to get from Romford to Tate
Britain than if i had to use public transport...
plus: what do you get to see on the tube
beside quasi-autistic faces with the taboo
of no-eye-contact...
**** that... i'm going to punish myself: 101kg...
not good enough... i can feel my spine...
plus i just might find some fury to swear
in my native language... because English is just
too soft...

i have to write the following sentence in Deutsche
(obviously i'll translate it)
ein radfahrer ist ein verkehrschäfer -
a cyclist is a traffic-shepherd...
countless times i've seen this at work...
we're not sacred cows...
i know my place in the "gutter" of either
the double yellow or the single red
or the double red or the single yellow...
but i know my place... i can orientate myself
around pedestrians blah blah etc.
only someone solipsistic enough will get themselves
killed when using the roads:
pristine inventions!
  even the English flow of traffic is logic-proof...
entertain the roundabout...
it works like a clock... how does "time" move
on the clock... at some point prior to 12am or
12pm... from left... to right...
that's how the hands move...
the rest of the world is wrong: wong! wong!
they drive on the wrong-wong side of the street...
traffic flows up on the right side...
but down on the left-side of the road:
no! traffic should flow up the road on the left...
and traffic should flow down: on the right!

- i was supposed to get a birthday present...
opera? eh... ballet? i'm getting bored of sitting
and having to applaud...
      i'm just bored of hearing applause...
i've heard enough over the past few months
at football matches... translating that to opera
or ballet is... i don't even have a word for it...
there might be a word: but i'm not too bothered about
finding the 1cm in 100m: designated pin-point.

i'm suspicious that women are looking for artists (men)
once they reach old age... decrepit "fools":
senile buggers... life experience and all...
where's the fun in that?
   the youthful artist: or rather: entertainer in his youth...
but no, oh no... the artist needs to be old...
to hell with that... when's my next shift?!
Saturday... Sunday...
tomorrow's Wednesday... vet appointment...
maybe tomorrow... maybe Thursday...
i'll need to punish myself some more
and drink plenty of white wine... then off to Khedra...
to hell with painting nudes...
**** the nudes: literally...

who was that English poet that came home crying
after seeing Liszt play: jealous...
about how many women swooned over his performance?
Matthew Arnold?! yeah... it was him...
hell...
  poets and musicians don't mix...
                  achtung zu d'eh-tile... detail...
verdrehen auf gestalt: verschmieren auf farbe...

poets and painters?! ooh... that's another topic altogether...
i walk into an art gallery: i'm home...
i'm happy that i didn't opt for the opera tickets...
i had this arts review from the 8th of May...
i knew i was going to see this exhibition...

not since Edward Hopper...
   then again: i haven't heard anything about Francis Bacon
being showcased... i'd give a toe of mine
to see him being showcased...
who else could compete:
i've only recently become acquainted with Walter
Sickert...
disappointed? no... not that i can think of...
should i have swapped the exhibition ticket
for a concert ticket?
no... not that i think it would have been necessary...

it's a completely different experience...
i'm my own best and worst DJ in private...
i've been in mosh-pits at Slipknot concerts...
i've been to the best Tool concert: to the best concert
i've ever been to in Glasgow...
wrapped my arms around with German girl:
protected her from being squashed...
shared water... have her water...
came back with snogging...
   snogging a random girl at a Tool concert...
well: that's life...
   but i do remember seeing her standing all alone...
lonesome as the crowd was dispersing...
trying to look for me... i walked past her...
oh right: the man is supposed to instigate the chance-lance:
charge...
   regrets that i didn't?
i was going back to Edinburgh talking to this
teacher / pub Celtic band... what did he play?
flute? banjo? i do remember telling him:
the quintessential pop song? Material Girl... by Madonna...

eh... friendly conversation...
but if i were to approach that German girl...
and say: let's go back to your and ****...
and i'll leave you the next morning and never talk to you?
i think the snogging in the crowd...
sharing water...
  it was one of those splendid moments that
ought to have been only a moment...
    i can't imagine the alternative from that...

why?
only today... while i was smoking a cigarette i noticed
these flock of "seagulls": about three elderly matriarchs
and two birds readied for the slaughter...
as i walked into the gallery they kept hovering around
me... is he interested? isn't he interested...
to be fair: i was there for the art... not for some hook-up:
so libido stirring...
that's the "problem" when you're already paid
the devil for one of his concubines...
devotee women of "god" / "culture" stop interesting you...
not that i'm shy: i'm calculative...
but once you've paid for a *******:
so what, WILL i be paying for?
dinner and a maybe-****?!
  
   let's just skip dinner and get into the *******...
people are already making that horrendous
faux pas of profiling themselves...
so at a dinner date: i know what she likes,
i know what she dislikes... what the **** is there
to talk about? **** it: call the butcher in: let's cut up
some meat!

for a minute i took my gaze away from
the paintings: hook-up culture not working?
dating-apps the bane of your existence?
too bad... i never used them...
thank **** for that...
i don't know how or why i was ****** into
this social media frenzy...
validation? oh no no... bypassing the sloth
of the editorial process:
the: first appeal to the selective elect:
who then... make appeals to the rest of the public:
public first... the editors like ancient Greek
sophists can shove it up their *****!

wait wait: yeah: wait and i'll be dead!
to hell with it... this is open season!

is this one of those regret moments or memorable
moments? i think it's a memorable moment...
why would i regret some "hunt":
some classically inspired heterosexual finicky game
off a rom-com inspired:
reality is something that moulds us...
temporal creatures trying to figure out a way
around a "claustrophobia" of genetic inheritance...

to hell with that too! genetics-blah-blah...
if we were not such "god-fearing" people:
secular as they come... but also phobic prone
regarding the full extent of science...
we'd be doing gene revisions like the Chinese
are doing... hey... all the toys are in the sandbox...
why not play with them?
to avert the chance of having your limbs
aputated because of diabetes?!
Western civilization has become: Ssssss-LOW...

it's almost somewhat ******* but at the same time:
i don't even know...
backward moral superiority
over... something it originally instigated...
or broke rules for the existence of...

i can't imagine myself waking up one day and...
having regrets: instead of memories...
i won't allow it!

funny that... i'm still to write about the actual Walter
Sickert exhibition...
i think i'm about to write about it now...
"i think": well: that's always been synonymous with
"i doubt": the plethora of emotions that comes
with think that verges on doubt... it's almost akin
to being in love...
           i am: regardless...

oh my god... i only spent about 40 minutes in
the exhibition: do you need more?
i spend £120 for an hour with a *******...
so what's £20 for 40 minutes spent with a dead
artist? peanut... whenever i go to an exhibition
i have a tendency to: not want to: overstay my welcome...

the ******* lighting was all wrong!
who curated this!
who curated this! the lighting is all wrong!
i was actually bound to looking
at a painting... ballerina in me:
shuffling... left... right... forwards... backwards...
the heavily oiled: layered paintings can't
have this sort of lighting...

it's like my argument for subtitled movies...
why... why why why! why!
are the subtitles running at the bottom
of the scrreen?
don't people know how difficult it is to read down
and then look up?!
what horrible "thing" could possible happen
if you ran the subtitles on the top of the screen?!
you know how much easier it is to read at the top
and focus on something down below!
it's as simple as: why no culture on this earth
wrote like: it might be an imitation of a tree growing?!
from down toward up?!
even the logicians of Mandarin wrote:
up to down...
they didn't write down to up...
****'s sake!

couldn't you try... moving those lights...
"downstairs": to illuminate the paintings from down-below
rather than from the top?
who the hell walks into an art exhibition and in
his cognitive "seance" think:
oh this looks pretty... no... this is not still-life...
the lighting is all wrong...

i seriously had to look at some paintings from
the side...
some had mirror protections on them...
so there was clearly some distorting reflection...
me or some object...
this lighting is ****! who curated this?!

i wasted £20 of a worth of a birthday present, on this?!
****** lighting!
   couldn't you have lighting coming from
the side... or from the floor?
why from the ceiling: all the ****** time!
no imagination: nada... zilch!

it would have been better not buying
a ticket and instead buying the book for £40
than £35 with the ticket...

first room i entered: always the best stuff:
the portrait of an artist as a young men...
self-portraits...
i had a smile on my face...
i was mesmerized by:

- self-portrait (circa 1896)
- self-portrait, the painter in his studio 1907
- self-portrait: the bust of tom sayers 1913

i don't care what anyone says...
the last reference? it looks better in real life than
it does in print... those hollowed out eyes...
was the skull to ever have
the capacity for eyes?!
worm by the eye... worm by the mouth...
by the ear... nose..
you need to see it: in this! ****** Tate Britain lighting!
who curated this?!
this is the first time i thirsted for excellence!
came short... not the artist: the curator...

first room: beginnings... self-portraits...
ha ha... "Lazarus": slurping oat-meals...
the servant of Abraham: another good one...

one of my ultimate favourites becomes
this Mona Lisa... tiny little thing...
Venice: the little lagoon...
circa. 1884...

architectural interests... crap... crap... crap...
well: good... but... thank god some of the stuff
is still there... but i don't need to paint
what i can blink at... against...

then the nudes...
oh the nudes...
   each artist and his ******* nudes...
Picasso had at least some imagination
to contort the **** beyond recognition:
to try to get a proper hard-on...
Freudian hammers and sickles...
or as i like to call them:
swastikas and scythes...

what?! aren't we to not inherit the horrors
and make jokes of them?!
terrible lighting... absolutely terrible...

the sea paintings drew my attention...
where: the: ****: is: Dieppe?!
la saisons des bains...
               seascape circa 1887...
    
ah! there she sits pretty!
   Cicely Hey 1923...
      you just want to **** her nostrils off!

Off to the pub 1911: Freddy ******* Kruger!
ah... that's why...
that's why... an artist... **** it: painter...
might compromise with a poet
for something... someone...
images are yet to be born from the images
that are to come...

that makes no sense...
images are yet to be born from the already
born words...
yeah... that makes sense...

i wasn't exactly moved by the nudes...
i had a poker mask on...
i've seen enough: plenty...
the the architectural stuff bored me...
i know boredom: unlike any other boredom:
the habitual need to continue
the mechanisation of replicas...
but the subject matter isn't there...
a sort of a writer's block...
you persist... writing about the most banal things...
painting the most banal things:
in order to keep up with
your own: well established technique...
but it's unimportant crap...

can't be fascinated by **** paintings...
Narcissus ate all my nudes....
i **** before the altar of mirrors...
i know when a mirror eats the contorted expression
of a prostitutes face....
i'm no jack the ripper...
      
surprise me with: horror ****...
not *******...
  surprise me with...
    people imitating... from the last movie i saw?
that wasn't imitation...
that was *******: readily available...
******... handcuffs... lubricants...
cucumbers... shame-tactics...
at least with men pain came with war...
women at nut-job crazy:
***-warfare...
   shaming tactics... no wonder i get
a limp **** with a woman that isn't
a *******...

   no wonder i go to art exhibitions:
perhaps... just perhaps the fairer ***...
but most certainly the uglier *** should
the inverted become extroverted
and: likewise... the antonym... compound...

the days of Jack the Ripper are gone...
i still don't know how someone like Samuel Little...
did what he did?
no *******: casually...
a proper ******* with a *******...
come on... at least they're giving it up for an asking
price! there's no *******: nuance!
there's no dating involved!
  these days, can you imagine?
going on a date... you match profiles...
what's there's to talk about?
she already mentioned all her interests...
all her dislikes... her likes...
what's left?
you order steak...
    chips blah blah...
does your steak taste like beef?
do your chips taste like: potatoes?!

then again: we're supposed to be switching diet
to synthetic "meat": bean born alternatives...
whatever... that's why i figured out:
focus on art... don't bother with gene replication...

and as i cycled home like a demon...
now i'm sitting down...
listening to "pleb" culture...
fat boy slim's: right here, right now...

i don't want to wake up one day and have
regrets.... instead of memories...

this exhibitions was a revelation... Plato's
false beliefs? not in bad faith...
those three old women and those two young girls...
psychologists?!
oh sure sure... they were really gearing up to
talk to me... i was more than willing to
destroy my inner-boundaries...
for some love with narrative:
than *** without it...

    clearly i'm out of touch!
   what appeals to the masses can never appeal
to the individual... why didn't i choose
a ticket to see an opera? i read about this exhibition
come May 8th... gusto... Waldemar Januszczak...
he has good taste....
i wanted to fizz out... to zone-out...
at the FA cup final i was hearing a crowd...
but also church bells... i was fizzing with sound
in my ears...

painter! painter! get me a painter!
i need to relax!
that's what it felt like... cheap *** pseudo-*******
potentials... three matriarchal psychologist
types... two lambs for a slaughter...
you want to catch me, now?
should have tried to catch me
ten years ago:
then you could have pharmacologically
strapped me in!
        now?! fwee-byrd!

               angry at the traffic...
the world has moved on! get with it!
i was told to get "with it" once, or twice...
times change: things: move...

none of these women will ever be regrets...
the women i paid for are never regrets...
they're women i paid for...
i'm reluctant for enforce a switch of the power
dynamic from man to woman...
woman offers ***... man pays for ***...
women doesn't offer ***:
man... becomes: self-sufficient....

it's almost like that brainstorm moment...
which arrives... in a football stadium...
before the crowd arrives and gets all hot & bothered...
listening to: fat-boy slims' song: right here:
right now...

there's a greater silence:
allocated to an art exhibition...
   oh: but i can find it..
i have found it...
most of the people: simple are...
there's no to be or not be
concerning them...
they're like mountains... like trees...
they simply are... replicas...
****** cues...
        
   to hell with thinking that i might be
high-brow... some people are just ******!
if that's an insult for someone being
******: while someone intelligent
is getting bashed... to hell with the ******
fetishist!

no! you ****-beard-funkies don't
get away with it that easy: who... these days...
allows a 14 year old daughter to become
pregnant?!

when life was: ah... ha... ah...
                           when you wanted to paint life...
rather than discard it as a photograph...
once upon a time... a time: that never was.

— The End —