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  Aug 2017 L B
Lazhar Bouazzi
I
The tongues of hell
Swallowed the leaves
The trees had uttered
To summon the rain.
II
(“I will not weep,”
Said the poet
To himself,
“I will repeat.”).
© LazharBouazzi, Carthage, TUNISIA, August 3, 2017
*Ifriquiya is the Arabized name given to the « Province of Africa, » the name the Romans gave  to Carthage (Tunisia)after they had burned it, which became afterwards the name designating the whole continent of Africa.
  Aug 2017 L B
Lawrence Hall
The White House Staff & Boys’ Choir

Gas-station shades, and identification
Dangling from their necks like nooses at rest
Ganymedes hoping to be noticed today
Dancing attendance upon the Throne of Games

Castrati commanded to tune their throats
Each secretly fearing he will be next
To be stripped of all for that walk of shame
Passes and pass codes passed on to others

Little Ken dolls flung about in childish glee,
While decorative generals nod and agree
A lapse - I almost always object to politics in poetry.   Mea culpa...
  Aug 2017 L B
everlasting cherry
who you are
how you feel
what you
want

and how
to get there

but these

slit serifs
shielded wounds
and white knuckles
are some things
in the way

give them
fresh air exodus

the walk is through
never around

remember:

the quickest way
between two points
is always & forever

a straight line
L B Aug 2017
I First Saw Scranton
...and did not unpack
my life
Iron--    ic  
as if always
meant to be a rusted ruin
I first saw Scranton
Not much of a view
beyond the smoldering mountains of the culm
dumps, decrepit
mills, of once...
prosperous coal
city in denial  
decay of Great mansions--abandoned
on the Hill    
away
from clapboard and spit hovels
of miners
in the barren
mud beside the river
below
and I remember thinking:

"How can I ever live here?" 

I own one of those hovels now
48 years-- under foot and harnessed
in the stays 
Just another in a string of small
sad 
cities'
people
so used
and
waiting
to be
covered up
once again by heaviness--
Its sin  
in the mercy of snow...
Scranton, Pennsylvania-- 150 miles north of Philly.  
Told myself I would never write this-- and out it poured today.
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