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Screaming rage, the old pachyderm charges hard
Scattering predators away from the ravaged corpse of her fallen friend

The carnivorous stork and vulture cloud simultaneously take startled flight & retreat raggedly to the nearest dead tree, there to turn and glare with accusing eyes and cawing clamour. The hyenas and jackals scatter from the stinking cavernous maw of abdomen and scramble for the cover of thorn bush perimeter. Their hideous cackle and yapping adding to the cocophany of the noisy horror in this small, dry and dusty African drama.

Wheeling about the old cow surveys the clearing and, satisfied she has seen the vile things off, turns back to her fallen friend, shuffling through the thick white dust, she stands close by protecting.

Unfurling her massive trunk, she gently wraps it's sensitive tip around the scarred tusk of her fallen companion...and standing there, In a long, long sentinel silence...she remembers.......

Standing flank to flank in waters
Cooling spray upon the hide,
Trunks entwined to rumbled chortle
Bull and cow and calf abide.
Striding through the Serengetti
Grasses tall and sweet and green,
Grazing in this luscious plenty
Happiness in joy unseen.


New born calf cavorts, unsteady
Laughing at her rubber legs,
Keep a watch for lion menace
Always lurking for the dregs.
Cow to cow companionship
Builds the basis of the herd,
One reliant on the other
Cuddly calf to bull absurd.


Sunset on the far horizon
Golden glow across the plain,
Trekking for the waterhole
Through acacia tree domain.
Zebra throng with wilderbeast,
Quail and guinea fowl
Run through grasses long and brown
But leopard on the prowl.


Fun time with marula berries
Dropping from the trees like rain,
Staggering drunk pachyderms
Fall about but feel no pain.
Violence in defensiveness
Circled by enormous rage
Calves protected safe within
Roaring lioness engaged.


Quiet of the evening air
A stillness in the herd
Affection of companionship
'Twixt leather hides doth gird.
Companions together
The wise and the sage,
Companions endureth
Through an elephant's old age.


Kilamanjaro crowned with snow
Though plains are cracked and dry,
Prolonged drought has taken toll
And many creatures die.
Trekking from dry waterhole
A million dusty miles
To find the next one caked with salt
Enough to make you cry.


And when the cloud of death descends
A pachyderm must cry
For the memory of companion
Will bring a sadness to the eye.
Remembering their sister ship
Remembering their pain
Remembering shared elephant-ness
Brings good recall again.


Reluctantly a parting made
And fond and distant memories burn,
The taste of Africa prevails
As  skulking, predators return.




Marshalg
22 July 2012

© 2012 Marshal Gebbie
I know what it was before
it became what it is
I’m at a disadvantage perhaps
and must forget its ****** state
its absolute condition of whiteness
the purity of snow untrodden
unmarked except for the lines
woven in warp and weft

I don’t know how to look at this piece
if I had it in my hands I’d turn it about
this way that way upside down
even to lie on its diagonals perhaps
otherwise it appears like newsprint
smudged but I think for me its best
on its side so there are columns
not stories floors horizontal separators

There - now it has something of that
Annie Albers City Skyline
a tapestry seen together
on a January day you
blue-skirted with winter boots
grey-cloaked with stripy tights
a sketching bag on the shoulder
a camera in hand and I entranced
by every move you made

As though seeking an image
in a cloudscape I view a quintet
of panels on a painted screen
a Chinese landscape Han dynasty
stark trees slow fields low hills
rising to a darkening horizon then
a river flows a valley forms and I am
smitten by the accident of invention
as always my love as always
gathering myself into the pleasure
of it all dear artist of weave and print
http://instagram.com/p/xmAcsNqtCa/?modal=true
Living on a minor planet near a very average star,
There arose a type of primate, the most inquisitive by far.
Not the strongest or the fastest of the animals on earth,
but blessed with an intelligence that quickly proved its worth.
Long before they had the means to travel very far,
They raised their eyes in wonder at the glory of the stars.
thus embarking on a quest that has yet to reach its end.
as they parse the light of distant stars in their thirst to comprehend.
based on a quote from Stephen Hawking and written in honor of his 73rd birthday.
An Oklahoma politician
wants to outlaw hoodies
in the hood

It's true, it must be
I read it in Fox News  :)

I'd sooner be in Missouri or Cleveland
or New York City where you don't have to
wear a hoody or raise your hands to get shot


There are other things more pressing
than hoodies in the hood
that don't need ironing

like hoods in suits
and the elephant in the room
that needs shooting.
r ~ 1/6/15
I have seen them in their majesty, in ultraviolet light.
They stretch across five light years’ space there in the dark of night.
They are the womb of newborn stars, the cradle and the nave.
The elements are present there, in aquamarine shade.
Within the Pillars there is light, the light of proto-stars,
Surrounded by the swirling dust which will be what we are.
Then, sometime in the yet to be, on such a starry night,
They may note the death of Sol, the star that gave us light.
As they see our old star swell then shrink as fuels run out.
They too may pause and think, in wonder at the sight.
Written about the Pillars of Creation, as photographed by the Hubble space telescope
There are those who prefer to live on their knees when others would die on their feet,
Chabu is dead, but his words still resound, like the echo of shots on the street.
He was a free man with no child and no wife. No attachments can be a mercy.
A man who has paid for his thoughts with his life is a martyr who sets others free.
Vengeance is natural and there are those who will spit on these gunmen and curse.
In the showdown between “faith” and ideas, the artist will always draw first.



Il ya ceux qui préfèrent vivre sur leurs genoux quand les autres mourraient sur leurs pieds,
Chabu est mort, mais ses paroles résonnent encore, comme l'écho de coups de feu dans la rue.
Il était un homme libre sans enfants et pas de femme. Pas de pièces jointes peuvent être une miséricorde.
Un homme qui a payé pour ses pensées de sa vie est un martyr qui met les autres libres.
Vengeance est naturel et il ya ceux qui vont cracher sur ces hommes armés et malédiction.
Dans la confrontation entre «foi» et des idées, l'artiste puisera toujours en premier.
Je suis Charlie
This is it
The only one

Everything between the rising moon
and the setting sun
is all you've got

It'd be a shame not
to make the best of it

It's a new year
What's done is done
Today is here

Move on.
r ~ 1/1/15
Happy New Year!
it is christmas
we sit laughing admist
an **** of wrapping paper
eating croissants and red fruit compote....(family secret recipe)

watching our boy cycle
about on his new red trike
with nana ensconced in
her new whicker chair...

the air full of carols and christmas cheer ....

later, we will again open
our house to those with
orphans and the festivities
will begin.....

but for now....it is us....
wishing all of you
the best of the season...
be blessed...be safe...
be happy....
                 merry christmas
That night was cold and dry as we gathered in the park.
Someone, I don’t know who, lit the first candle in the dark.
The dark mass of the Dakota was ever in our view,
as we joined to mourn John Lennon in small groups of ones and twos.

They kept us from the crime scene where John’s blood still stained the stones.
He was gunned down by some lunatic who’d acted all alone.
John was groaning, barely conscious, when Cops got him in their car
He died there in the back seat before they’d gone too far.

I heard somebody singing, in a strong clear baritone,
the lyrics of “Imagine”; John’s song that’s so well known.
Other voices swelled the chorus, singing loud and long.
What prayer could not accomplish we would try to do with song.

I went back to visit recently to show my children where
Their Dad stood vigil in the park back when he had long hair.
Strawberry Fields forever, the name they call this green,
where greying fans still gather to sing, to mourn, to dream.
+The field in Central Park across from the Dakota was named "Strawberry Fields" on 10/09/85 which would have been John Lennon's 45th birthday
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