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BlakOps Feb 2012
Stand up
Stand up
Stand up proud on the soapbox
U got something to say?
Say it
Say it
Say it proud on the soapbox
U ready now?
Get up
Get up
Get up on that soapbox
(Speaker crackles)

Hi.
Crowd: hi!

My name is Prince L and I'm here to offend you.

Crowd: gasp!!!(Murmurs)

so settle down. it seems I can't reach your standards of presentation. is my hair to *****? are my clothes to cheap, hell anyone can see, I wear my **** proudly,

Crowd: gasp harder!!! He did not!

I did, oh **** I forgot I'm not supposed to cuss, o well too late, watch it unfold, my fate. this is my first time on the soapbox, let's talk about that, the box, is it needed? People use it as a trough to feed these stagnant ideas of life and how to live it. Why does everyone need to be categorized and seeded?

Crowd: hmmmmm....

The disparities between race in class are magnified cause we are gentrified, so we all feel polar to the other, opposite the fact we are born from another, check me I have love for you because you are you no matter your crew. O you have a conflict of view, don't matter unless u mad hatter tryin to riddle your way through the middle, cause in reality most of us are in this middle group, are you following? You're a regular sleuth.

Crowd: huh? We want truth.

Try this on for size. I think you might find, the separation between elite and u is a lot, spot the differences?  if you were part of the one you wouldn't be arguin with everyone. They got lawyers for that, they mouths stay strapped ready to ****** from you, so don't worry boo keep jaw jackin while the keep straight jackin, stealin, thievin, everything you see, reapin, the earth of its resources slowly turning it to hell. Its not a perception its a perpetual. why you think they always gathering, resources, yea they planning it, to own the world, don't be a fool.
Crowd: no way!!

I'm tellin you pray.  Appreciate the ppl who stand upon the soapbox, why? Cause they be fightin for every ones freedom. No matter the cause, no matter the fight,
Accepting thoughts and criticism
mark john junor Aug 2013
soapbox man has
measured the moments
in the the small wood floor room
she dose a wet step soft shoe little hip swing dance
to music only she and god can hear
and to her soapbox man is god
as she slides slowly thru the dense air of his self contained contentions
in the the small wood floor room
its freedom to her
soapbox man has come and she is here
to get her fix
of his brand of guns to subjugate the dead
and iron fist rusting in a vacant lot brand of rule
its freedom to her

echoes down the bridge road between realitys
a woman laughing in slow motion
the tread of boots on marble
oddly distorted pieces of conversation
that are appended to soapbox heroes
who preach
that those not with us are against us
and should be punished for their cruel foolishness
this is not heaven
its a place that wears the face of grace on earth
it wears the mask of memories warm and kind
its peace and freedom to her
its a lie
this is the nature of the human beast
what reality we dream is pleasing
no matter how toxic

in the the small wood floor room
she dose a wet step soft shoe little hip swing dance
to music only she and god can hear
and as time passes
and it eats from within
she falls to the floor
and crumbles to dust
a fragment of humanity
on a pergo floor
and its freedom to her
for the guy i met in florida named freedom...nice guy
Kara Rose Trojan Dec 2014
My Second Letter to Allen Ginsberg
Dear Allen,
Almost five years ago, I wrote you a letter, and in
That letter, I purged my drunkenly woeful cries
That seem so first-world now and naïve –
The things I grimed over with luxuries I didn’t
Realize that rubbed against my plump limbs
Like millions of felines poised at the
Tombs of pharaohs.

Oh, Allen, I’m so tired –
These politics, and poly ticks, so many ticks that
Annoy my tics. Allen! I smear your name so liberally
Against this paper like primer because the easiest way
To coerce someone into listening to you like
A mother
or predator
tugging or nibbling on your ear –
Swatches of velvet scalped from a ****’s coat
Are you and I talking to ourselves again?
Candid insanity : Smoky hesitance.

Dear Allen, I’m so tired –
Yes, I love wearing my ovaries on the outside like
Some Amazonian soapbox gem glistening from beneath
The iron boots of what the newspapers tell me while
I cough at them with the hurdled delicacies of alphabet soup.
Give vegetables a gender and call them onions, Allen.
Sullied scratch-hicks pinioned feet from slapping
Society’s last rung on the ladder.
Ignore the swerve of small-town eyes.
Scapulas, stirrups, pap smears, and cervical mucus – now do you know who we are?

That fingernail clipped too short, Allen. We’ve all got AIDs
And AIDs babies, haven’t you heard? Hemorrhaging from the political
****** and out – they haven’t reached the heart.  
Since when have old white men given a **** about some
13 year old’s birth control? I’m riding on the waves of the
Parachute game and I swear this abortion-issue is just a veil outside Tuskegee University
Being further shove over plaintive eyes, swollen and black.
Pay up and
shut up.

I still remember my first broken *****, Allen.
Can you tell me all about your first time?
The vasodilatation that made veins rub against skin,
Delirious brilliance : unfathomable electricity.
I made love during an LSD experience, Allen,
And I am not sorry. I see cosmic visions and
Manifest universal vibrations as if this entire world is
A dish reverberating with textiles and marbles, and
All are plundering the depths of the finished wine
Bottle roasting in the sink like Thanksgiving Turkey.
The patience is in the living. Time opens out to you.
The opening, between you and you, occupied,
zoned for an encounter,
given the histories of you and you—
And always, who is this you?
The start of you, each day,
a presence already—
Hey, you!

Ah, Allen, if you are not safe, then I am not safe.
And where is the safest place when that place
Must be someplace other than in the body?
Am I talking to myself again?
You are not sick, you are injured—
you ache for the rest of life.

Why is it that I have to explain to my students that
sometimes what I'm spouting is prescribed by a pedagogical pharmacy --
but all they want to know is "what do the symbols on the television mean?"
I am completely aghast against the ghosts of future goners --
I am legitimately licensed to speak, write, listen like some mothers --
I am constantly cajoling the complex creations blamed on burned-out educators --
I am following the flagrant, fired-up "*******"s tagging lockers --
Pay up and
shut up.

Yes, and it’s Hopeless. Allen.
Where did we get off leaping and bounding into
The dogpile for chump change jurisdiction, policing
The right and the left for inherent hypocrisies when
Poets are so frightful to turn that introspective judgment
Upon ourselves?
We didn’t see it coming and I heard the flies, Allen.
Mean crocodile tears. Flamingo mascara tracks
Up and down : up and down: bow – bow – bow – bow
Buoyant amongst the misguided ******* floating around
In the swirlpool of lackadaisical introspection.
What good is vague vocab within poetry?
Absolutely none.
Would you leave the porchlight on tonight?
Absolutely, baby.

Dear Allen, would you grow amongst the roots and dirt
At the knuckles of a slackjawed brush of Ever-Pondering Questions
Only to ask them time-and-time-and-time-and-time-again.
Or pinch your forehead with burrowed, furrowed concentration upon those
Feeble branches of progression towards something that recedes further
And further with as much promise as the loving hand
Attempts to guide a lover to the bed?

Allen, I wish to see this world feelingly through the vibrations of billions of bodies, rocking and sobbing, plotting and gnashing like the movement of a million snakes, like the curves collecting and riding the parachute-veil.

Ah, Allen! Say it ain’t so! Sanctified swerve town eyes.
And everything is melting while poets take the weather
Too personally
And all the Holden Caulfields of the world read all the
*******’s written on the walls and all the Invisible Men
Eat Yams and all the Zampanos are blind and blind
And blind and blind and blind and blind
Yet see as much as Gloucester, as much as Homer,
As much as Oedipus.

Oh, Allen, do you see this world feelingly
and wander around the desert?
Colored marbles vibrating on the curtailed parachute paradox.
Lamentation of a small town’s onion. Little do we know, Allen,
That what you cannot see, we cannot see, and we are bubbling
Over in the animal soup of the proud yet weary. I can see,
However, how the peeled back skulls of a million
Workboots and paystubs may never sully the burden
Of an existential angst in miniscule amounts.
Pay up and
shut up.  

My dearest Allen, there is always a question of how
The cigarettes became besmirched with wax to complement
What was once grass, and
What was once a garish night drenching doorknobs.
The night's yawn absorbs you as you lie down at the wrong angle
To the sun ready already to let go of your hand
As you stepped, quivering, on to
The shores of Lethe.
JV Beaupre May 2016
"So why are you painting a woman in a bottle?"
The challenge. Handling all those quirky reflections and layers of transparency.

"She has phantom arms and legs, what about that?"
Yes, pretty cool. A Vitruvian woman in a bottle.

"I'm looking for Meaning: Don't paintings look under the surface?"
You mean, what does it mean, really mean? It's just a way to test my skill.

"But what are you saying with that?"
It's not feminist nor anti, it's just an exercise. Besides, there's a rope.

"But aren't you, as an artist, exposing reality, presenting emotions and feelings, seeing the soul?"
I'm not on a soapbox-- I'm testing my skill-- I paint and don't think about it too much. After all, 'Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar' or is it 'just a smoke'? *

"I don't like your message."
OK, I'll paint you in a bottle...
As a shrunken head.
On the other hand, I once painted an agricultural scene based on a photo from the 1930s that I thought carried a social message. Most people wanted to know what kind of tractor it was.
Tea Dec 2012
Stand up on your soapbox
Say the words you think
Study what you believe in
Hear what’s being said
So maybe you’re opinionated
But no one cares what you post
You believe in something
Say it with a voice    
Get up early morning
Sacrifice the time
To protest or make a noise
In reality and time
Step outside a tweet to
Really speak your mind
To sing a song
All along together
Stand up on a soapbox
Really speak your mind.
kenny day Aug 2013
soapbox man has
measured the moments
in the the small wood floor room
she dose a wet step soft shoe little hip swing dance
to music only she and god can hear
and to her soapbox man is god
as she slides slowly thru the dense air of his self contained contentions
in the the small wood floor room
its freedom to her
soapbox man has come and she is here
to get her fix
of his brand of guns to subjugate the dead
and iron fist rusting in a vacant lot brand of rule
its freedom to her

echoes down the bridge road between realitys
a woman laughing in slow motion
the tread of boots on marble
oddly distorted pieces of conversation
that are appended to soapbox heroes
who preach
that those not with us are against us
and should be punished for their cruel foolishness
this is not heaven
its a place that wears the face of grace on earth
it wears the mask of memories warm and kind
its peace and freedom to her
its a lie
this is the nature of the human beast
what reality we dream is pleasing
no matter how toxic

in the the small wood floor room
she dose a wet step soft shoe little hip swing dance
to music only she and god can hear
and as time passes
and it eats from within
she falls to the floor
and crumbles to dust
a fragment of humanity
on a pergo floor
and its freedom to her
Brent Kincaid Sep 2015
The man stood on a box
In the middle of the park,
When people walked by
The old boy would bark
“It’s in the Bible,” he cried.
And some people would ask
What is in the Bible, sir?”
Prepared to take him to task.

“Everything’s in there, friend!”
He answered with a smile
Feeling the people there
Would stay and listen a while.
“Well, that’s an easy answer!”
One of the onlookers said.
“You have left nothing out!”
The orator nodded his head.

“The Bible has answers for you
To any question you can say.
It will be your salvation, sir
No waiting until Judgment Day.
It tells you what to eat and then
Tells you how to choose a wife.
It tells you how to go to heaven
When you reach the end of life.”

The questioner replied, “Yes, sir,
And it tells of women made of salt,
And a fellow who walked on water
Another brought the sun to a halt.
It tells of a boat quite big enough
To have two each of every animal.
And people floating up to the sky.
Don’t you find these things incredible?”

“Not all,” the soapbox man said,
“God can do any holy thing at all.
He has made the planets, the sky,
The heavens and the waterfalls.
God knows everything and he is
Who speaks to you in your heart.”
The onlooker shook his head, said
“So, when does that stuff start?”

“What stuff, sir?” the orator asked.
“The part where God speaks to me.
I haven’t heard a word from God
And I have been listening, you see.
That would be a truly wondrous thing
For this God person to finally do.
But, if God speaks to all of us
Why the hell do we need you?
Izzy Stoner Oct 2013
If this is all there is
If everything I've seen so far in life  
Is all there is to live,
And you are never ever coming back
Then let me be happy with it.
Because I so desperately want to be happy.
Let me see every new new day like
A mother sees her child, eyes open wide
Staring at something I had a hand in making
That could just as easily go wrong as it could right.
Let me hear every seven AM wake up call as
The bells of St Peters to the ear of a choir boy
Calling me to worship with unquestionable faith.
Let me eat every burnt slice of toast like
A convicted criminal ensconced in solitary
Devours his last meal on death row.
Let me feel laughter as something other,
Than just the vibration of vocal chords.
Let me always speak with the conviction
Of a dreamer, a believer, an activist
Shouting every syllable
From the pinnacle of an overturned soapbox
And treating every street corner like a stage.
Let me stop trying to predict rain
And accept that if there are going to be downpours
There are certain seeds I need to sow.
Let me stop watching the television screen
As though all of life's mysteries
Can be answered by documentaries.
And that I can finally tune in, by connecting with fictional shows.
Let me see wonder
Because for a long time now I've been dreaming in colour
Its real life that seems trapped in monochrome.
If this is all there is
If everything I've lived in life has taken all I have to give
And you are never ever coming back.
Then lets get it over with.
Because I so desperately want this to be over.
Let me breathe in smoke for the rest of my days
Until tar spills from my lungs, to my heart
And burns my capillaries with that nicotine flame
Let me make heartbreak an art.

Because it reminds me of you
And I don't deserve any better.
Let me walk like I'm walking on eggshells
How I always used to do for you.
Abbie Crawford Jul 2015
My voice is louder than the amphetamines that pump through my system,
Like a myriad of violins,
preaching on a soapbox.
Surrounded by self-proclaimed writers,
who control their mindless devotions with their pen to paper.
They believe,
not only in themselves,
but in the system.
They don't challenge what's really happening,
and is instead,
hazed by propaganda.

I am told that confidence is one thing,
and being self sufficient is another.
But i think they amalgamate to each other,
like the rivers do in my head.

We wonder,
what if the dust on the moon really is acidic?
what do we do then?

I give my money to my hierarchy above,
and I challenge what really is happening.
Lou Apr 2018
Simplest of names,
So plain, But how I love to say it
A promise for warmth in igloo block prison eyes
And tone of Daria,
just whelmed enough to respond
A chance of sarcasm is air
Venom in plain daylight.

Plain tone.
Plain mood.
Plain old abuse.
And most would take it from her.
As she would and certainly has taken it from us.

Petit feminine fighter with no haymakers or KO records.
****** face, that rested war and peace between chin and brow.
Baroness of motherhood or is it the queen of hearts and depression?

Stars and music always forever
Anchor tattoos with a key to a heart, now a predator.
Forever enchanted by the la-de-dah and bleeding heart affairs
A savior in no motion or fashion but I dare not call you hypothetical

But a standard broad, beauty and-
So shameless I celebrate seeing you, awkward and so ****
Cleopatra, to be a bit dramatic-
Yes Cleo-mantra, I collectively disintegrate all charm and physical form
And you,  unfazed or unimpressed with either detail of romance

My friend, compromised by style and NO amusement.
There is much more to you than ****** faces and belittling arguments.
There is more to you then practicing soapbox rants in your kitchen.
There is more to you than a shallow mothers intoxications and material.
There is more to you than the new hair dye or the wigs you collect.

The things you store in the boxes cluttering your room with everything not in those boxes
The clothes on your floor, decorations from your teenaged 3rd or 4th personality.
The smell of perfume and coffee and more perfume all over,
stuck to papers, next to wine bottles, borrowed and never returned books, unfinished snacks,
used paper towels, lipstick stained mugs and glasses, your sons toy I stepped on 4 times,
pictures of gone lovers and notes, your license; now found again after the second time ordering a new one.
And…it's expired,
Then finally under the aftermath of years, doubt, clutter, your cell phone vibrating in the fray of sheets.

"found it."

Least we forget that, as we forgot we are both in this room together.
You are so much more than this mess I picked up for you countless times
And though I complain I will pick it up for you and not ask your permission
I won't scold you, I can only exhale failure and help.

Staring blankly into your screen discussing all genres of worldly horror and ways to divert.
Such plans and opinions but no federal funding!
We would pay homage to girl power and the early 90's and call her G.I. Jayne-
(Or not cause she doesn’t have that kind of sense of humor.)
But imagine a solider, a true solider of the meek.
That is theoretically, G.I. Jayne.
Has all of our best interest at hearts, our hero.
Songs of children are said to give her strength-
(She really doesn't like this kind of humor, I must move on.)

My friend truly distressed by the world she can't control from her tiny screen.
I place all comfort I can to her and understandably rejected like a stranger making rounds.
No trust comes from her nowadays, None for me at least. I can't speak for all.
I try to climb over the steep absurdity, alluding to her self-mutilation and task this is
but not going as far as just telling her this is ******* killing me.

I have no lesser or sophisticated words.
I'm dying every time we reach these altitudes.
Fingers and my tone raising at every disagreement .
How you can break me down to my atomic core and decimate miles of friendship.
My closest star in the sky, use to bring me morning tea, flowers and maternity
We now stand in quasar as our space and stardust find mass in thousands of millions of years in development
For me to be sent to the loony bin and you to prison like our heroes from Clinton to Lazaretto.
For my friend.
bobby burns Mar 2013
-
crack another thermometer open
on the broken bathroom sink,
pour yourself into me like mercury
and pan the bed of my stomach
for multitudes of gold flecks
like however many myriads
of sickly pill bottles in your
dresser drawer of socks.
-
see all
the shredded speckled petals
i ripped up before i'd let
the deer get to them;
i'm colorblind,
and i can't tell
the sun's reflection from plastic,
or tulips from the broken
pottery outside my front door.
-
and far least from another beer,
and another fifth of whatever
could be fit under your shirt
-
and never a chair pulled up to speak,
from standing like a soapbox
more suited to cleaning
than to preaching.
-
pour yourself into me like mercury,
because it's so much easier
when my veins weigh me down
to distraction, than being able
to think of hydrangeas again.
-
Kara Rose Trojan May 2012
There's a private, invisible flock of comedians chanting soapbox knock-knocks in my parking lot
            Noisy, clang, boom thingy aloft and clipping the air around the slimy snow
And why does ajax keep butting its nose into everything I’ve got?
They’re all just boom-lost facades in a canonical, sly-faced rant.
So slanted, frankly, and poised toward a milder pace that the clang clipped the frosty branches beneath a drunken frat-house party.

Ah, the dandy-clang : native to the sandy graves and morose olive branches.
            But only on the night of the dandy-clang, candy dances
for the branches are not partial to missed solid caches
            of want and woe
            of tongue and toe
and seldom shaken beneath the overbearing heat of a white-faced predator
for times it was that here and now, because
the wind had bitten harder
What am I saying?
That if the dandy-clang came. And if it produced the branches of the dancing eve fame...
with but not together. The clouds up in the ether
that lake and earth should wither
Kevin Eli Apr 2014
I can stand on a cyber soapbox all day
Telling you nothing was ever okay
That you have a voice, a million in one,
Able to be heard from here to the sun.
So tell me what is important to you,
If you're smart, or a *****,
Or just have no ******* clue.
You only live once.
No, hashtags don't include
Your memories of screens, drugs and delusions,
Fear makes the conclusions.
Drop the key in the lock on your mind
From the courage we all have
Lost long ago in time.
Stop acting.
Start living.
Ellie Nov 2010
This is my resolution
sick of this cage you've put me in
never even saw the bars till now

cold iron bars

I find my dusty soapbox
it's stained with blood and tears

with shaky knees I stand

the view is different up here
you seem so small and I so tall
will you listen to me now?

my head rises with hope and courage

I hold the key to my cage.
My resolution set me free.
Tommy Johnson Jun 2014
Her life has gone haywire
So she hits the sack of hay
Capital Hill tries to take advantage of this
So they try to revive their old conservative practices
With tools of maladjustment

The criminals give good ideas
To the goody-two- shoes looking to bust loose
Who create dark desire
For the demented ones with power

The Birthgiver slaves away
Until her heart gives out
The Embeder is on his hands and knees
Searching for sustenance
I, the final product is at the first national bank
Missing all who have died

The man from Illinois
Pleads not guilty
The judge looks in the eye
And says this mistake will cost him

His lawyer stands up
And puts his hand on the mans's shoulder
And tries to cheer him up
And says "it's only a life sentence, you'll be fine"

The smart mouth, while ridiculing the knife thrower
Sees the sword swallower  doing his act
And asks, "Did you pick that trick up from your ***** mother or **** father?"
The sword swallower regurgitates the saber and removes the smart mouth's tongue

Soon after, the smart mouth becomes the fat head
Who is now a priest
Who has no idea what he's talking about
But, neither do the people who follow him

Our six-star rank general calls an assault
And tells his soliders to do handstands
As he personally executes our last hope
To end this holy war we have nothing to do with

All the branches collectively agree
The public can never know their plans
They can only be spoon fed political promises
That aren't meant to be kept but to get votes and fund their federation

If you look up naive in the dictionary
You'll see the synonym ignorant
But in an atlas you find the address
Of some one who sees the school system more useful than an encyclopedia and library cards

I hope that the kids of tomorrow will be prepped and ready
For a world where it's not what you know but who you know
And where a degree is the equivalent to bathroom tissue  
But mutual friends are golden tickets

The musicians these days aren't artist but entertainers
Who write catchy tunes with an accessible message
While the social networks keep us connected
And up to date with everything they say we need to know

I dream of creating something simple
That can wake up the world from this trance
So it can stand up and make a change
And save the unborn and put the dying at ease
Waltzing through the chaos that life’s left for today,
Dragging along my battered horn in case she wants to play
‘Scuse me, Ms. Bartender, but I’ve got something to say
Ain’t nobody listening to the radio anyway

I don’t need a soapbox, no suit or microphone
Just a space to spread the truth wherever I may roam
I speak straight from the bottom of a bottle left at home
The night is not much easier when you take it on alone

Hear ye, hear ye, gather round to hear a tale
Of dreaming big, working hard, but destined still to fail

Shredding that loopy little melody,
The craziest cat you ever did see
Make you feel so alive, ladies screaming, “Wow boy!”
I jump and I jive, cuz I’m a bebop cowboy
"Jazz is dead."
~Anonymous
kenye Aug 2013
Woke up from the American Dream
     Hungover
     Hellbent on reality

After I saw the worst minds of my generation
      Destroy with their madness
      Rather than exploit their demons

They shot them in the heart with anti-depressants
     and let them wake up
     dead to ambition

They prescribed me like you
     Withdrawal made me like me
    
GOD MODE ON

Just reach for the sun we're touched by
      Fire in the mind.
      Controlled flame

I am American Madness
     Mommy's little monster gone manic
     Mood swinging from the right intentions

I am American Madness
     Jumping this shark with the high horse I rode in on
     Saving my country from soapbox to soapbox

I am American Madness
     The revolution in our minds manifested
     standing up for something un-televised

The psychos in sheep clothing
     Lycanthropy at the right time
     Letting out our own Howl

Standing present
       Our hands are red white and blue in guilt.
       With the ghosts that we're dragging from past lives

Tearing the throat out of
        the things we can run
                but can't hide

Fighting off our demons
      Transmuting the nightmares
      Caught in the American dream catcher.

We could be the champions of the oppressed
      Crossing the first threshold
     We all come back around together

© kenHeike, 2k13
This is part of a hero story/prose I'm writing. I wrote an anti-heroine piece a few months ago called "Konfusion" (http://hellopoetry.com/poem/konfusion-brokenfree-anti-heroine-origin-pt-i/). I plan to cross the stories over and end them both together.

p.s. I know that I sampled Ginsberg. This piece was heavily inspired by Ginsberg and Palahniuk with my own touch.
Brandon Halsey Jan 2012
This is one of those serious poems
And yet it has nothing new to say
But the poet needs to keep himself busy
And writing seems to be the easiest way

The poet rises up on his soapbox
Because he works better from an elevated height
He screams about organized religion, politics
And stripping away of our basic human rights

Like a magician with a classic misdirection
The poet wraps his moralizing in purple prose
He hits you over the head with one simple point
That he’s forgotten more than you’ll ever know

Around the time of the nineteenth obscure reference
The reader is in awe of his far-reaching knowledge
Then the poet overuses polysyllabic words
Just to prove he went to a good college

And the poet keeps filling up the notebooks
Even though he should have stopped long ago
But the publisher agreed to pay by the word
So unfortunately, there’s four more stanzas to go

Quickly, the release date approaches
There’s one printing, then two, then three
And the poem becomes a hit in coffee shops
Recited by grad students in between bites of biscotti

His face now graces the cover of every magazine
In an explosion of exuberant media admiration
Dozens of talk show appearances are scheduled
For the newly crowned “voice of our generation”

The publisher decorates the dust jacket with blurbs
Complimenting the book’s “dangerously original rhymes”
But it’s nothing more than passing hyperbole
Gathered from a glowing review in The New York Times

Now thousands grasp the paperback edition
And eagerly await the feature film adaptation
Meanwhile, the poet hunches over his typewriter
And commits more sententious literary *******
Jeremy Betts Feb 2021
{Political}

You know exactly who I'm referring to when I say...

They have this habitual political ritual of babbling on
Rambling wrong, your standard God complex politician
Standing in front of a congregation spewin' lies, oozin' corruption through thin skin
Politickin' about a mission we should sht on and skip the Charmin
This is my f
ck you dissertation, a doctrine based on real time observation
A deep dive into what has essentially become an unhealthy obsession with sin
Holding a position I'm told I have no right to speak on much less be a voice in
But if one life don't matter none, no life matters son
Including your own, don't confuse facts with opinion
Watching your tone would be wise in this situation
Hooked on the slogan defund every police station
Convinced it means let loose the entire prison population
You know, just for fun
Stoke the confusion, skip any and all explanation, no need for a reason
Willfully blind to the sedition, a corporation backed rebellion, it's open season for treason
To quote the law men, "we'll even hold the door for y'all till you're all in"
Then when they're leavin' make sure to welcome them back again
A simple bewildered complexion brings 'em satisfaction
Chaos the reflection of a lagit election
Regardless of the facts within reach, we witnessin' half a population claim fiction
Feel the friction
Destruction is the reaction, falling for a complex distraction
The consumption of our damnation overshadowed by a mutation of this god forsaken nation
How did we wind up in this position? How'd we let this happen?
I reckon we sure weren't just placed in this situation, a fraction of us stumped by long division
It''s by no means an answerless equation but a question we still debate on
Standing upon a soapbox trying to out crazy the competition
What was once neighborly is now seen as the opposition
Someone please just hit the gong so we can move on
Restoration is easier than resurrection so stay strong
Hope has been long gone for so long, maybe to long, a hopeless conclusion drawn
No anti venom for our venomous condition
A symptom raised from conception, taught to the young
We bet on corruption inside a polling station
Ballets a currency printed on different stationery then it's just simple addition
Still waiting on the announcement that we finally won
But that day will never come unless you're higher echelon
Controlled by the elusive free mason, I'm guessin'
Can't know for certain what side they on, influencing our direction from behind a curtain
A mission forgotten, a population forsaken
Praise God as dangerous as hail Satan
That should be a$$ backwards but it ain't wrong, I'm just sayin'
If you were payin' attention you wouldn't need an explanation
Incarceration eludes the criminals behind the walls of that white mansion
Not a single one ever pays for what they've done and that's fuel for frustration
The people scream out objection and beg for a proper ejection of this borderline evil pantheon
But they get to run over and over again every election and instead of serving up a strict ten day eviction
We just turn to digital b*tchin', no real action taken so we're stuck with this dangerous faction
One that holds Rome as its inspiration so you know this nation is collapsin' it's just a matter of when...and if we'll even make it to the end

©2021
Promises made
given and laid down in writing on stones.
I read runes in the ruins of what has become,
what they have done to me.
No longer free
I am devoured alive by those who contrive to control everything,those who bring nothing to the table and the table is bare,
I share my crusts with the beggars who sit on the street,in dark corners I greet them and then I console them
for they too have lost all to the mighty of Whitehall who don't give a ****,for
they are the ram raiders the modern day slavers and we're all in chains,laid on the slabs,looked at in labs,dissected,inspected and put out to tender,sent out as fodder for the high in society to shoot at like pheasants,for aren't we the peasants of old?
Life grows cold an old story indeed
those who can't pay are unable to feed.
So let us give thanks to those wonderful,fabulous,marvelous food banks who are there just in case we try to get out of the poverty trap that stares us in the face.
****'em all down in Whitehall I know where I am and I am a man not a note in a margin but marginalised just the same,just a piece in some game that they play.
It'll all change one day though I may not be here to cheer but where ever I am,I will still be a man, and
not a laboratory experiment.
david badgerow Jan 2014
the destroyers are out to destroy
they are the heat of the night
******-burned bodies trembling in the jungle
they are bullets nestled silently into the back of one's head
babies dangling from their mother's limp arms as
she builds herself a new body
made out of the countryside & the trees & dynamite
and she will bring the explosion at dawn
i could fit the memory of last night in a wine bottle
i fell asleep in the dumpster and you kissed me with your wine stained lips
in the morning i hoisted the sunrise into a wheelbarrow and headed west.

now i don't know who or what i am
all i need is a soapbox to stand on
or a cliff to climb
a little solitude
i need to be regurgitated as smoke
hanging over three lanes of asphalt
i need a valley with soft green carpet
and a pretty girl's adolescent thighs
i need my face shoved in her *****
i need the enormous bliss of a long afternoon
i need to find the intersection of
our intimate streets.
Kevin Theal Jun 2010
In case of Armageddon
Break the glass
And fasten your safety belts.
Actually **** the drill
Lets go wild in the streets with shot guns.
The gun toting evangelists
Pumping 38. And 12 gauge rounds into anything that’s not glowing or on fire
If the ground splits in half at least we know we’re going somewhere.

The bars near then end don’t serve anything strong enough.
You’d think the end of day’s could usher in some new era of alcoholism.
Maybe they’d break out the absinthe and write poetry with knives on the wooden bar stands.
Maybe men would walk in and request “something apocalyptic”

Right now I’m looking at these kids with this idea that lacks any emotional responsibility
It’s like gun’s without safety’s in the hands of kids
Some ones going to die (not get hurt. ******* DIE)
Because kids these days are impeccable shots.
The can blow the face of a man at 200 yards but they can’t get past the 4th  level of simon says
No these kids are doomed because I saw something great in a child
And now I’ll reap the whirl wind.
It’s like not stopping a blind person from walking across the highway.
It’s not a crime, but it sure as **** should be.

Put petty murders aside, when the bodies are piled to the sky
Break the glass,
It’s an emergency

-Kevin T
JLB Jan 2012
Like mourning bells ringing,
I woke to hear trumpets playing taps,
Next to a funeral casket.
I observed quietly,
With some foreign melodies filling the void between my temples.
Showing disregard out of mere respect,
Really.

Not for myself,
Certainly.

For I was as dead as the corpse I was grieving.
Falling into my fog again, screaming the names of ex-lovers

Over                                                  ­                            and over                                                             ­       and over.

Needing infatuation
On uneven planes of judgment,
As if I were seeking insight from an invalid.

But there was a time when I lacked even more
Than at that loathsomely lonesome moment.

And it went slithering on inside of the void
Like some ******* disease that was ripping the holy living **** out of my heart.

Seeing the casket lower
Under a cascade of flowers,
My temples went silent,

The melodies burned away like thousands of distant cinders,
And their voices occupied the void, as if my mind was their soapbox.
Shane Hunt Sep 2012
You can identify your own flaws by scrutinizing strangers.

I watched a woman
     from across a platform
at the subway station:

Straight, dishwater-blonde hair
glimmering in the subterranean fluorescence;
         striking posture—
     a dancer's figure—
and a thrifty ensemble that bespoke good taste
in spite of budgetary constrictions.

She pulled a circular compact from her purse
the way people in films exhume a pack of cigarettes.
   Then, in deliberate fashion,
she removed a pill and swallowed it.

             Birth control is like receiving a governor's pardon
         in the process of planning a crime.
             I resent her having that kind of indemnity.

I pass judgment on assumptions of character,
       high on the blissful soapbox of bigotry.


As that pill crested the ridges of her teeth
and met the soft tissue of her tongue, then esophagus,
my mind conjured a phantasmagoria of lewd images
on the surrounding subway walls--


         more a reflection of my character
              than hers.
Waleed Khalidi Aug 2014
If a congregation were to slowly grow
like a flock of birds coming to feed
And I stand amidst at the middle point
Everyone's ears waiting like children
As they're giving me the chance
to exhale the sickness that has dwelled in my lungs
To release a speech that deafens the demons
so that they'd no longer follow the sound of my steps
Giving me a chance to confess
all shame and regrets
Granted the moment to free my soul
from the prison of what's unspoken
And to free my head
from its delusional fiction
The time is drawing nigh
as the Sun has traveled the sky
Everyone has arrived in assuring attendance
Except my words

From an ornate podium
the orator spoke words--
..extraordinarily elaborate ones..
as if,
as if

But those who know..
we who have  laid low,
down in to the trenches
as grunts, both  outside
and inside  

    of the wire..

Those who have  quietly
done their legwork..
who have accepted their
difficult fate  as that   borne  of
and in to,  a training..  an equipping;
lay low,
lay low

.   .   .   .  

The throngs
at the foot of the podium--
mesmerized by their own  need
to be mesmerized,  never even
   noticed the children
who  in their innocence,  peered
out from under the crowd's legs

to better see the 'magnificent' podium..

The oldest of which, ran back to trenches
trying to describe what they saw.
Two of the quiet, unassuming-ones
made their way back to the podium,  
and in blocking out the orator's voice,
(which  to the  knowing,
was  as that of a clanging bell..)

Now observed up close, the inner-workings
of the elaborate podium
and sat in  wonder of its expenditures--
wrapped around such  slipshod,   weak
and hastily assembled framework..

And in having become interested in the
structure's groundedness to what one
would hope would be  a solid-built
foundation, placed onto solid, earthen ground
They instead gasped as they saw its
legs floating upon nothing..

"What the **** is holding this thing up..?"

War-trained and battle-hardened,
they remembered their superiors speaking
in hushed tones that even ******, with all
of his blowhard oratorical *******,   at least

had a semblance of the podium's fastenings..

Albeit, partially assembled by our own country's
stupidity within certain provisions brought forth
in the Treaty of Versailles,

   but this
   but this;

This oratorical misleading of the broken-ones
this empty illusion of a presentation,  borne
not  from a suffering  leading to true regeneration
but instead, a distractive short-cut into the Realms;
   This counterfeit substance..
as if borne in power,    as if..  as if.

    .. But the realms.. they know

It is only those down here on earth,  spirit
cloaked within the deceptive misgivings
of the flesh-- so aching to establish itself
apart  from the necessary legwork needed
to humbly become a part of Stream's flow:
(borne,  solely from the inner Wellspring--  deep
within the bowels of Love's True Ache)..


It is here.. on earth..  that you will find
the reward you seek..  oh wondrous orator,
oh magnificent 'smither' of fine words..

   Your podium, a whitewashed soapbox
   floating upon nothing..



--And therefore meaning   nothing
within the Substance-Based parameters  
    of the Realms.


"Now there were seven sons of Sceva,
a Jewish chief priest,  doing this.
But the evil spirit responded and said to them,

“I recognize Jesus,
and I know of Paul,
but who (the ****) are you..?”

And the man in whom was the evil spirit,
pounced on them and subdued all of them
and overpowered them,
so that they fled out of that house naked and wounded."
~Substance 19


..we are defined by our actions, not our words.
https://youtu.be/bGb3CT7ZKKI

xox
youtube.com/watch?v=vkQpgNecMQA

xoxo
youtube.com/watch?v=rECKlXkopIQ

xoxoxo ox
youtu.be/exaEt7szfi4?si=s91DV0Nk8fX0d9is
david badgerow Jan 2012
volcano the rat popped out of the sewer and ran down the road gnawing on a crooked table leg. the pin up girls have been crying in the chapel over strange men with belly problems. it is very early and the sky is still a black mongrel rolled in waves of silence. i was king midas for forty minutes in a dream last night, i held a crazy unspeakable microphone and i slapped myself in the face. buy me a soapbox just like jesus had, hang posters of houdini and exist in silence. i have the mad pulse of a child, a rosy cheeked poet am i. last night i secretly tried to chop down the church steeple, "down with enthusiasm."
Who are you to wave your finger?
Ya' must have been out your head.
Eye hole deep in muddy waters,
You practically raised the dead.

Rob the grave, to snow the cradle
then burn the evidence down.
Soapbox, house of cards and glass,
so don't go tossin' your stones all around.

You must have been high.
You must have been high.
You must have been-

Foot in mouth, and head up *******,
what'cha talkin' 'bout?
Difficult to dance 'round this one
'til you pull it out, boy;

You must have been so high.
You must have been so high.

Steal, borrow, refer, save your shady inference.
kangaroo done hung the juror with the innocent.

Now you're weeping shades of cozened indigo
Got lemon juice up in your EYE!

When you ****** all over my black kettle
You must have been HIGH, HIGH
You must have been HIGH, HIGH

Who are you to wave your finger, so full of it?
Eyeballs deep in muddy waters, ******' hypocrite.

Liar, lawyer, mirror; show me:
What's the difference?

kangaroo done hung the guilty with the innocent.

Now you'll weep
or change the cozened indigo;
got lemon juice up in your high-eye,
when you ****** all over my black kettle
You musta been!

So who are you to wave your finger?
Who are you to wave your fatty fingers at me?
You must, have been, out your, mind!

Weepin' shades of indigo
shed without a reason
weepin' shades of indigo

Liar, lawyer, Mirror for ya,
what's the difference?
kangaroo be ******
he's guilty as the government

Now, will you weep
or, change the cozened indigo;
got lemon juice up in your, EYE!
EYE!

Now when you ****** all over my black kettle.
You musta been HIGH, HIGH, HIGH, HIGH.
Eyeballs deep in muddy waters
Your ***** deep in muddy waters;
*****, p-lease!
You must have been out your
MIND!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycAByDNZYrA
mark john junor Jul 2013
wet. ambition of her silken hair
scatter my moral compass
but after terse words
we set out on the road
her tale carries us for miles
and leads to many thoughts
but I'm easily distracted and distraught
by soapbox celebritys and their
rabid claims to fame
and am left to letting her choose our path
she pens regrets to me and mails them
to the wrong address so ill never know her love for me
has grown cold

I befriend the postman
putting the letters of my words
carefully on his face with a fine line pen
but he keeps whispering that I should be
so sad because love has been rejected
and my heart was returned marked postage due
the description sours when
the ink hits the page
never quite suits the thought
as we trundle along the stony path
the bone rattling pace lends misgivings

find my way home in the song of her heart
find my weary way to her door
turning the door inward
and see the vault of her hearts fortress
reduced to rubble ans she has
now gone

she has fled eastward
wagon laden with tales and trinkets
her blue dress flowing over the side and fluttering in the breeze
wet ambition is no mercy
wet ambition is cold
written on and spell grammer checked by kindle fire.
Hurble B Burble Apr 2016
The end is neigh! The end is neigh!
Man, **** that guy. He needs to get high.
Spouting words of hurt from a book full of lies.
A disconcerting judgement in clever disguise.
A contemptible man, deserving despise.
Spewing forth ichor to blind your mind.
Take a look to his left and what do you find?
A troubled humble man wasting his time.
Trying to get you to open your eyes.
Start recycling before everything dies.
His message is simple and doesn't suprise.
All based on fact, as the lies subside.

The truth is out there, you just have to look.
Don't always believe what you read in a book.
Brent Kincaid Feb 2016
I truly fail to understand
Why it’s gotten out of hand.
It seems so very odd
There are so many God
Is supposed to have ordained
Some aren’t even trained.
There is an absolute dearth
Of an actual true rebirth
In the revivifying blood of Jesus.
It’s almost like allergic sneezes.

Pastures full of pastors.
Priests and beasts.
Defectors and rectors.
Pickers and vicars.
Bleachers full of preachers.
Clerics and hysterics.
Papal delegates and celibates.
Televangelists and Adventists
And hostile Pentecostals.

We are becoming overrun
With an ecumenical kind of fun
In which before we can holler
Another puts on a backward collar
And starts tell us what to do.
When the rebirthing is through
They are on their park soapbox
And ******* about our Xbox;
Telling us what we should watch
And the coffee in our coffee klatch
Is unGodly because Jesus never drank it.
Makes me want to grab and spank it
Before it multiplies. Jerks, those guys.

Pastures full of pastors.
Priests and beasts.
Defectors and rectors.
Pickers and vicars.
Bleachers full of preachers.
Clerics and hysterics.
Papal delegates and celibates.
Televangelists and Adventists
And hostile Pentecostals.
Michael McLean Sep 2014
I hide behind cardboard ceilings

walls and feelings

searing idols collide

find

ask me why

they trust the words we throw

I feel the wood and leaves at my hands and feet

and they are real to me

got the best

and found he who lies

and cover in a soapbox mound

where the standing shout

— The End —