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You have heard it said that
A rose is a rose is a rose is a rose
But truly I tell you that
I am that I am that I am that I am
Dripping with Jehovah and stardust we fell to earth
Pieces of atmosphere pieced together
And who can trace the mythology of our chemical compositions
Or rewrite the narrative of our anatomies?
I fell to earth soaked in Yahweh and covered in snakebites
Black holes where the fangs sunk into the astronomy of my freckled skin
All the galaxies of my body each with their own elliptical orbits
Connect the dots to form two wolves in my milky way
Romulus and Remus –
My ******* bear venom white as the purest lamb
Whisper astrology and
Remember the day we built Rome by stacking corpses
Remember the day when all the stars burned red for us
But that was millennia ago and
I’m not your Venus anymore –
I’m nobody’s ******* Venus anymore
It was the age of Pisces and we came out drenched in Messiah
You found me picking painted roses on asteroid planets
With a blonde-haired child and a fox
In the garden green snakes and white roses
Thorns and soft pink ribbon-tongues
Fangs and velvet petals
Two drops of blood in the white sand like Mary,
I bore a son and named him Ares
I named him Mars
I named him Set
Boys will be boys will be boys will be monsters, you know that
I am that I am that I am that I am.
Swim down deep enough into the black waters and you’ll reach the heavens
Keep drawing blood from thorn wounds and you’ll drag out the atmosphere
Stare out intently into the abyss and the abyss will stare back into you
These are the things we knew
When we reached the outer boundary of the cosmos
And realized how hydrogen is nothing but celestial amniotic fluid
We, motionless
Smothered by God and Carbon and perfume and poison
In this ****** we named universe
On this fetus we named Earth
I am that I am that I am that I am
Truly with you until the end of the age
Until the afterbirth of star matter gets tossed out with the baby and the bathwater.
You have heard it said
A rose called by any other name wouldn’t smell as sweet
But truly I tell you
A rose is only as beautiful and fragrant as its thorns are sharp
And if you want to know what fills the space between protons and electrons
The gaps between breaths
The light-years between planets
Then listen to the sound of your own heart beating
Counting down the gestation period of our own reality
I am that I am that I am that I am
I’m more than a Rose.
Diaspora
From the Greek

When I heard the word I felt it
And I looked it up
In my old red dictionary

I could have used the Internet,
I suppose

But I like to run my forefinger down pages
Of words

I read the definition
And I felt it
Oh

Oh
We are diaspora.

Am I using it correctly?

We are a diaspora.

Diaspora
From the Greek

From the green valley of Ottawa
From Scotland
From Ireland on wooden boats

From the French village thirteen children
From the mines in the North
From Poland and from Germany

From the churches and
From the Blueberry patches
From the Island Manitoulin

From the dark lake Kagawong
From Kinburn and Arnprior
From Markstay and from Sudbury

From Waterloo
From Kitchener, Michener
From the Suburbs

Oh

From the Suburbs
From the red bricks, red currants
And geraniums
From green island cabins

From the desert

Oh

From the desert
From the potholes and pipes
From the salty wind
Cracked Caspian Sea
From the middle of the east of nowhere.

From the mountains

Oh

From the mountains
From the crystal water fountains
From the tram bells
On the cobblestone streets
From the torrents of the Rhein

From the white cross

Oh

From the white cross
On the green hill
From the river Laurence
From the French and from the English
Plains of Abraham

We are diaspora
We are a diaspora

Diaspora
From the Greek

How did it end up here on my tongue?

It is diaspora.
It is a diaspora
Diaspora is a diaspora

And I wonder if it misses its other pieces
The way that I miss mine

Ours

There is no
Roping us back together now

There is no
Home to go back to

There is no
Point of meeting
Of reunion

No
White steeple in our old town

No
Yellow slide in our backyard

No
Old folks on an old farm

No
Walled house on a hill

No
Luzernerring 93

No
Familiar riverwater

There is no
Ancient Greek anymore
Diaspora

Only fragments of fragments
Of roots of stems of words
In different dialects

There is no
Place for you to belong,
Diaspora

You’ve been sliced to pieces
And scattered
Into the wind

But
When people ask you
Where you are from

You say simply
From the Greek

Oh

From the Greek

And
When people ask me
Where I am from

I say simply
From the diaspora.
Wonder not whence thy shalt depart
Let not the inevitable trouble thy heart
With silent whispers when he doth come
Let not death triumph thee in keeping calm
Steal the wings of my fear and I'll come down falling
Heal my wounds, wipe every tear shed while recalling
Treat me like you don't see I'm stuck in the past
Prove to me that blessings can touch even the cursed
Make me no promise then maybe I'll have faith
Come closer and let me savour in your sweet breath
Prove to me that you're true, that we will make it through
The storms experience has taught me we must face
Fill my world with warmth for it's an empty place
Maybe then I'd know the one I've been waiting for is you
Keep me safe in your embrace far way from hurt
Assemble every piece of my shattered heart
Paint a rainbow of tenderness in my dark sky
Don't cuddle me with words for words can lie
Be the sweetest and my favourite wine
Drug me with such affection that will tempt me to call you mine
For I desire to be called someone's love again
But I'm afraid it'll happen only if you prove you're worth the pain
 Nov 2015 TigerEyes
phil roberts
When I was a young man
A heedless headlong consumer of life, was I
Above and beyond the norm or necessity
I wore paths deep and wide
To the pleasure centres of my brain
And I rode my soul like an easy *****
Oh happy daze of hedonism
How sweet life tasted then

If there was drink to drink
We drank it
If there were songs to sing
We sang them
If there were fights to fight
We fought them
We had fast feet and faster wits
If there was hell to raise
We raised it
Excess and adventure in equal parts
How fast, how high we flew back then

And then the magic playground
Became a bleak and dangerous place
Peopled by predators and prey
In an ever changing food chain
And I was only one step away
From the totally oblivious
One brain cell ahead of
The permanent reality challenged
Then friends began casually dying
Barely noticed in the rush to join them
Now the race is on
And I have grown old and slow

                                              By Phil Roberts
 Nov 2015 TigerEyes
phil roberts
Look at me
Look at me
I'm scared into flames
And I feel there ought to be a joke round here
Somewhere
Hold onto me
Hold onto me
I'm flying into space
And I can't find anything that matters here
Nothing really matters

Flying high
Flying way too high
With nothing to hold onto
And needing nothing at all
Because everything is possible
So, let my wings glisten in the sun
For tomorrow I crash hard into the ground


                                           By Phil Roberts
was previously a poem called HERE I GO. the second verse is edited to suit purpose and make a better poem
 Nov 2015 TigerEyes
phil roberts
They lie warm together
In the afterglow of torrid love
Her head on his chest, he says
"Sing me to sleep, my love"
So she hums and croons
A tune he does not recognize
With soothing sounding words
In a language he does not recognize
"I love you," he murmurs as his eyes close
"I know," she says smiling
And so, as he sleeps
She lies open-eyed
Imagining a future he will not recognize

                                        By Phil Roberts
 Nov 2015 TigerEyes
phil roberts
I have been mayor here for many years
Do they call me Pedro the Mayor?
They do not
I have built half this village with my bare hands
Do they call me Pedro the Builder?
They do not
I am a lay preacher in their church on Sundays
Do they call me Pedro the Preacher?
They do not
You **** one sheep..........

                                    By Phil Roberts
sometimes I like a joke.
A common thread our swanky prance
Obdurate circles while we dance
Harmonious we'd make romance
And for each other we'd enhance
With eloquent and wanton stance
While willingly we take the chance
To reach across unknown expanse
And though akimbo not askance
We flaunt unfettered by durance
While at each other we would glance
As if enraptured by a trance
Inspired by a poem called DNA by a poet on another site
http://www.eliteskills.com/z/199536
 Nov 2015 TigerEyes
Dead lover
My lust, my thirst,
Day by day happen to increase,
But the truth is it darling,
That my life till date has been cease (d)
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