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Nat Lipstadt Jul 2016
aimless ruminations
(this is who I am, this is how I write)

<>

" I couldn't work or get ready for a piece of work
from a city base, from city life.
I need deep, deep quiet and a landscape too
that I can be absorbed into.
So much of the work is in the process of
aimless rumination
in which things may or may not take seed."

Daniel Day--Lewis

<>

just past six pm,
early but late, on a finely finished Friday,
long after-the-noon-hour,
the sun, presentable, clothed, well established,
high enough majesty in the hued blue sky

(all the orange pinks of  sunsetting soon to come but as of yet,
still guests of prior poems)

all around surround, the essential quiet,
essence of demure, parfumerie of the bath oil of
wind and wine, woman, a pacific stillness,
a soft sloping declension into the purity of just breathing

(well graced to prepare us for a slow descent into the soft richness
of a black ermine fur, a royal, star-studded night sky robe,
come to envelope, lit by jeweled sparklers of white dippers flickering)

but not yet...

O Magnum Mysterium!^
O Great Mystery!

a matin motet for a choral of four voices,
served up as an afternoon gift to us,
a present from the 16th century,
a tonal harmony of sweet majesty,
fills the sunroom atmosphere end of day musicale,
where we sip a Provence Rosé drink the music,
thoughtfully munch upon its pianist-accompanist,
slightly salted roasted cashews

punctuating the natural silence,
small bites of crackling noises,
planting the seeds of the nut tree in our bodies,
and licking the dead sea salt crumble, that moistens lips for licking-living

these then are the flavors of the moment,
quiet simple poignant pink and tawny tan of
clearly colored perfection

of earthly and earthy life tastes,
warmed salty sweet, from which all drawn to drink,
a celebration of the coordination of the sun outside,
the sun inside us,
sustaining, melding a harmony of soaring quietude

<>

ashamed, to have this spoil,
for just us two,
wondering why I,
why am I, compelled once more
to write of this Eden,
that so late in life I've come to cherish
as a rejuvenation, even satisfyingly sufficient
as just a bridging continuance between the speed bumps of...

of this time and place, I write once more,
surely not to flaunt, surely not to arouse,
somehow to share and tame
our crusted residues from a work week's enslavement,
end the drip of marking minutes, until to here, return,
where there are only tributes,
and no tribulations

but with you here, as well

how many times can
one mediocre poet write
of the same scenery,
the precise light, the my-oh-my-sky,
and not think, wish repeatedly,
as I do,
how I wish you were here,
all our dear ones,
to share the sharing

come sit beside us,
let I,
your faithful Sancho Panza,
pour your wine, remove thy scuffed shoes,
pull open the curtains, gift you the certains
of the great goodness of this garden,
give guidance to the yellow orb on how
to best warm the tarnished, slow eroding, river plain of
undernourished souls

let me bring you the readied ink utensil,
place in thine hand, the thin sliver of tree,
feed you, feel you feeling the felling blush of the grape skin,
all warm softened and proper chilled,
for receiving the new born fruits of inscribing

let all enfold, as we sit beside you,
watch with unconstrained delight,
as you too,
understand the addictive compulsion of this moment,
of this place and time that demands,
requires of you,  
not to justify existence, nay,
but to be absorbed,
but be come part and parcel, a resource,
grace this place and time by your hand,
elevate our existence

& write write write...


<>

always here, upon all this,
in this more or less, precise time and place,
doth nature beg me ruminate

permit eyes to inhale absolute aimlessly,
taste the floral glories, kiss the Roses of Sharon come to lavender bloom,
think deeply about nothing, and for anything present,
be concucopia bounty-full forever grateful

coming now to this our ending,
moved along by the gentling means of holy water sanctified tides,
the slow march of the sky's mentoring friends,
my aim, my ruminations, pointedly aimless,
my hands flowing, my eyes, purposedly never keener,
culminating in this so faintly heard,
nocturne of the absolutes of perfect...


<>

gifted to all my friends here,
poets who have happily transgressed into
kind caring friends


and also,
one gone missing,
Harlon,
who was, by his skill at praising this Earth's excellence,
was appointed by Nature as its very own poet laureate


7/29/16   6:06pm
Shelter Island
^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7ch7uottHU
cable news video brilliantly captures
the blood washing Parisian gutters
glittering in City of Lights sparkle

images of carnage coagulate in my mind
clotting my heart with searing resent

in desperate need for release
from the abject scorn
that boils within my veins

I flip the channel to
watch a Predator marathon
but light entertainment
fails to satiate my restive soul

I turn down the volume
and click back to News

My iPod is audio ready
to soothe the savage beast
with some righteous death metal
I blast my earbuds,
Culture of Death's new CD
prepares me for real action
  
ever at the ready
digital recreation
has me *******
my controller
mustering up my
Call of Duty
comrades

I am a recognized
high score battlefield hero
taking out godless apostates
in the global war on terrorism

I'm usually eager to
baptize Iraqi jihadis in a
Holy Ghosting
bloodbath
but tonight
Black Ops kills
fails to thrill
my controller and I
stand down

opening the gun case
I cradle my Bushmaster
the smooth barrel and rugged stock
feels so right in my hand

it pleasures me to know
I am one of the good guys with a gun
I relish the fear and respect
I garner during open carry
troops to McDonalds
the hairs on the back of my neck
sometimes titillatingly rise

one day I hope to
take out an active shooter
at a movie or the supermarket
that would be way cool

I place my Bushmaster
back into the cabinet
and carefully rearrange
one of my Glocks

yet even with this
considerable armory
I still feel insecure
it may be time
for a trip to Walmart
to secure another Glock
*** more ammo

my heart recovers a bit when
I think about tomorrows recon trip
to my tree stand in the Jersey Highlands

Bear season starts soon
for the past few weeks
I've baited the area with
Dunkin Donuts and bacon grease
I've detected lots of bear ****
can't wait to drop one of those suckers
I visualize one in my gun sights
should be easy pickens

my CD ends with
some real raucous ****
removing my earbuds
I turn up the volume
on the News

footage from last summer's
Black Lives Matter demonstration
runs in continuous loop
members of the
New Black Panther Party
are yelling into the camera
a woman in a black burka
her eyes squinting angrily at me
from underneath her cover
sends shivers up my spine

when we take our country back
they will be served some
Second Amendment justice

News flashes Ted Cruz
condemning Muslim
refugee resettlement,
in a Christian Nation
only Christians should be
allowed in...

News breaks back to footage
from the concert venue
highlighting the
blood stained mosh pit

News flashes ISIS Jihadis
riding in Humvee's
routing the fleeing
Iraqi army once again

News highlights a smiling Putin
firing off Caspian Sea cruise missiles
into the bleeding Levant
examples of decisive leadership,
if only Obama could grow a pair

News flashes to a Rose Garden Obama
bragging about killing Jihad Johnny

the drone strikes and
active bombing campaigns in:
Syria
Iraq
Libya
Somalia
Nigeria
Mali
Yemen
Sinai
Afghanistan
Kenya
Congo
and other unspecified locations
are working says the Muslim Prez

By the looks of Paris
any real American Patriot
would think not

we need to send a message
a quick strike fix
some major shock and awe
to placate a nations troubled soul

if that offends any Christian
turn the other cheek
wimp, so be it

I say go
Old Timey Testament on their ***
let our vengeance is mine God
**** them all
**** them all
**** them all

Culture of Death:
Cystic Dysentery

Barry McGuire:
Eve of Destruction

The Doors:
The End


jbm
11/17/15
Newark
lots of hate going round since the murderous tragedy in Paris....
let cooler heads prevail.....
be still and know that I am God....
John Leuven Apr 2014
I.

April made port.
The hordes of sand stood ready; surveilled
the eccentricities of April with a judging
eye. Lightwinds seem to sturggle pathing as if
they were still learning cantrips. No blood no magic.
All is well with my soul.

The crooning of the bony earth woke the
slumbering April-bud. It sang in seismic trembles.
We danced with the needles that recorded this symphony.
The ticking of your hair. The elevated pulses of
sharp, angled red; we rejoiced in the every spike.

Ruminations preserved.

II.

Sometimes, I wish there were
parking lots for ants in front of a bar
where they would swap stories while
drowning in vats of apple saliva.

Their antennae would sway to and fro,
and there would be proper queues which
would make the sight more stunning and
post-apocalyptic. There would be lots
of kissing. There would be courtesy and curtsies.
There would be stories about patriotism; how
they so love their Queen and would fight
for Queen and colony and breadcrumbs and peas.
There will be no discrimination; no one
shall look at one ant and say, “Hey, sugar-lover;”
the winged will fall in line as much as
the crawling red and black.

Ruminations reserved.

III.

O cold, cold, Earth, t’was your day, in echoing chime!
The miters sanctified by satyr priests bore bare
relations succinctly longed for and wanted! Godspeed!
The atmosphere wears its gown, the Aurora, in celebration!
The drum-line needs no motivating, it goes ever on, the snares
rumbling in sync with the fire-ants marching in time,
the fire-ants marching in time! Never before had a white flag
been as unnecessary. O cold, cold Earth,
cruise the orbit with this enchanting chanting, ever-going on.

Ruminations deserved.

IV.

The Queen is dead.
Long live the Queen.

*Ruminations unheard.
Raymond Johnson Apr 2013
The brain is a pretty rad little doodad. Sitting atop your neck, buzzing with blood and budding thoughts like an apple tree in spring.
I think it's fascinating that we're still quire clueless as to how it really works.
There's one particular part that still fascinates me, namely, memory.

Memories are the cranial equivalent of keeping a diary or writing in a journal. a collection of feelings and happenings of days gone by and words once said.
There are a few journal entries, if you will, that stand out to me. Ones I made with a girl... let's call her B.

If B were here right now, I'd look her in her big brown eyes and ask her:

Do you remember?

Do you remember the divine way the curves of your body fit into mine was we lay in an amorous embrace amongst the blankets and downy pillows?

Do you remember the way I told you a million times that I loved your hair. Your angelic, graceful hair, even though you thought it was too long and too messy?

How we walked through the forest for hours, talking about nothing and nonsense, and how we sat on a log for what seemed like eternity until I manufactured enough courage to finally kiss you?

They say that elephants never forget, and every time you cross my mind I feel my nose getting a little longer and my skin turning a little greyer.

Do you remember? Because I sure as hell do.

Do you remember how adorable you looked in those pajama pants of mine that were about a foot too long for you because you forgot to bring your own?

Do you remember how we sat on a bench and watched the birds flit from feeder to feeder as the sun waved us a crimson farewell?

Do you remember the feeling of your lips upon my lips, and the simple fact that it is impossible to properly describe that in any banal combination of 26 tired characters?

Do you remember the bittersweet intermingling of the smells of my eighty dollar cologne and your forty dollar shampoo?

Do you remember the way we looked into each other’s eyes? The vast universes of possibilities leaping from neuron to neuron behind those irises?

Wonderful memories. Pleasant memories. You couldn’t ask for anything better than these kind of memories. But there’s more. And there’s a reason why they’re just memories.

I remember the way the blood drained from my face like your used bath water circled the drain in my bathtub, and how my heart went on strike and stopped beating when you told me we couldn’t be together.

I remember how similar the crunch of the leaves and twigs under our booted feet sounded to the cracking and shattering of my sanity as you drove away on that sombre day.

I remember all of the dreams my brain pumped out of its pitiful pineal gland in a futile attempt to travel back in time.

I remember the empty spot in my bed and the gaping and gushing hole in my heart that still exists
To
This
Day.

But for all of these melancholy memories, these rotten ruminations, the beast of anger has yet to rear its matted mane.

In fact,

I thank you.

I thank you for this sadness, this regret, this longing, and this acute absence of rage,

For it is proof that I am alive.

I thank you for this sorrow, for this awful ammunition, for inspiration to machine masterpieces from the melancholy.

For what is light without darkness?

What is life without death, and love without loss?

So thank you.

I look back on our shared seconds not with eyes full of misplaced malice and fury,

But with gratitude.

Because even through tragedy

The heart survives.
https://soundcloud.com/blaxstronaut/memories
William A Poppen Jul 2015
Within stirs a persistent bane

birthed while on her mother’s knee,
endorsed with fiery warnings
loudly proclaimed from weekly pulpit.

Now her bones grate
against the cushion
while the rhythmic cadence
of rocking chair
runners on hardwood
breaks the dim silence


as past misdoings reverberate

on the back walls of her mind.

Disquietude prompts obsessions
she endeavors to prove invalid.
Her desire to flee

from reminders of falsehoods

and fake passions

nags her endlessly

like unforgivable sins

haunt a cloistered sister.
Neither pleas nor prayers

quell her remorseful ruminations.
Comments about wording, enjambments, content appreciated
The curtain on the
CPAC convocation rolls back,

as the revolution
in Tahrir Square boils.

America’s theater
of deadly political

absurdity commences;
to witness demagogues

recite holy scripture to
evangelize a religion of war.

A heavily invested
audience marvels

at the marionettes
pirouetting on strings

jigged along by hands
of invisible puppet-masters

donning dark masks of
clever 503C llcs

disguised in self serving
hues of red, white and blue.

This grand folly of masquers
conceals a fatal pantomime,

a cast of reactionary characters,
Neo-Conmen auditioning for

the leading role in a lurid play
of a deadly nation projecting
a dying imperial preeminence.

The martinets engage zero
sum games where the victor
belongs to the despoilers,

and the merchants of death
richly confer multimillion dollar
reasons for being, underwriting
the gilded egos of candidates

and their infatuation with the
vanity of feigned power.

These master rhetoricians
skillfully lather up the crowd

by pandering to basest
xenophobic nationalist
instincts and fantasies
of laissez-faire proclivities.  

Slathering on the partisan
pretense in layers so thick

a master chef, armed
with the sharpest Ginsu Knife

couldn't slice a hock tip
of blood red meat

hurled into the crowd of
gobbling Republicons

howling and yodeling
it’s derisive acclaim.

The rankled party line,
gibberish talking points

are hammer blows of
incessant propaganda,

so cocksure that any room for
doubt is crowded out by the

phantasmagorical McMansions
of hyperbole they ***** in

the pliant minds of their
gibbering minions.

The candidates preening for
president show off their

falangist affectations
in eager duels of oratorical

one upmanship; constantly
jockeying to outflank their

other Neo-Conmen opponents,
always concluding their brutish

diatribes with a solemn
denouement of a Republicon

psalm ending with a
Holy Hosanna Hallelujah

to the Ronald Reagan
Heavenly Buddha.

Punchline of the holy Amen
“what would Reagan do?”

to remind the faithful
to remain the faithful

bearers to the fiction
of dead Reaganism.

Evoking anything
Ron and Nancy

induces sanctioned
comportment of a

slow simmering
******* eubellence

providing a welcomed
relief of repressed
libidinal energy.

The mention of Goldwater
sends GOP acolytes to

pause in reverence,
envisioning Barry and

Ronnie looking down
from heaven upon the gathered,

inciting immediate ruminations
of falling dominos and

the viability of a
tactical nuke strike

against Ayatollah’s
underground
uranium factories.

The host of Neo-Conmen,
new age Falangist pitchmen

belch from the dais,
in ever increasing alacrity,

the stirring drum beats
and slick videos,

of glorious warriors
winning the battlefield

with the rippling glory
of the Stars and Stripes

flowing in a continual
loop behind them.

Romney,
Bachmann

Gingrich
take center stage,

goose stepping
to the roll of piercing timpanis.

Words slither
out of their mouths
like poisonous snakes.

Lies, hiss through
their teeth.

Open mouths
expose Black Mamba
fangs, dripping with venom.

Eyes squint
as their reptilian brains

implore the besieged
to flee from the
light of truth.

Seeking refuge in fear;
yet on the ready

to coil and strike;
while trembling

in ignorance,
exalting loathsomeness

worshiping violence;
they remain

poised to unleash
first strike armies;

boastfully evoking moral
platitudes of Bush Doctrine
prerogatives.

Trembling in ignorance
worshiping violence

exalting fear,
these dogs of war bay

to unleash armies
against the

Godless apostates
that threaten

to expose the
stasis of their

Capitalismo-Judeo-Christian
view of the world.

They have hijacked
the great faith traditions

to serve a narrow
political aim

and relish any
opportunity to

demonize Islam
in service to their lies.

Watch as they
they crouch down

on the dais to
open the nest

of vipers welling
deep within the
bowels of their souls.

They find relief
by excreting their

spawn of deadly asps
into the veins of

cable news networks;
scoring political points

with the terrorized
children of Faux News

capturing battalions
of straw men villains

to rise atop meaningless
straw polls.

They agitate for a second
American revolution

by injecting the venom
of fear and lies

into the body
politic.

Ron Paul
stands alone,

perplexed why
American's love

war as much as
they hate civil liberties?

Cheney and
Rumsfeld brood.

The people of
Iraq and Afghanistan

fail to embrace their armies
of liberation that run up

unfortunate collateral damage
body counts required to sustain
the American way of life.

Ever the defender of
democracy and liberty,

Gingrich slams Obama's
condemnation of Suleiman

"hes an able diplomat."
Gingrich  forgot to add

that Suleiman is a
skilled torturer and

an able tyrant any self
serving democracy would
be proud to call ally and friend.

Cheney and Rumsfeld
remain flummoxed.

Their armies of liberation bogged
down in the marshy Blackwaters

of intractability;  trying to solve
the conundrum of the diminished

equity returns of asymmetrical
warfare.  Spinning the math

to justify building aircraft carriers
to **** a gnat.

The families of dead soldiers
surround them and wave dime

store flags hoping the plastic
eagle remains fixed atop the pole.

Perpetually smiling
Michele Bachmann
raises the specter
of Muslim Brotherhoods
taking over Egypt.

The persecution of Christians
and the escalating war on

Christianity have the Crusaders
up on their seats waving Excalibur
once again.

Gingrich pink cheeks
flush with the cash

of a Zionist casino
entrepreneur

doubles down, stacks
his chips high.

“The Israeli Embassy
in Cairo was overrun
by angry mobs.”  

“Is this a precursor of
cancelling the peace treaty
signed with Sadat?”

“The pullout in Iraq hands the country to
radical Shiites effectively handing our
hard won victory to Iran.”

“Israel is threatened and will not
permit Iran to acquire nuclear

weapons. A nuclear empowered Iran
will not stand!”

“We mustn't let do nothing Obama
threaten the safety of our good ally
Israel.”

CPAC willingly holds the deadly asp
to the breast of a proud nation.

Urging, coaxing it to gently sink
its teeth into the sacred heart
of our dear republic...

John Lee ******
Crawlin King Snake

CPAC 2011

Matthew 23
Brood of Vipers


jbm
Oakland
2/10/11
Nat Lipstadt Jan 2014
Dreams of a Child
Created: Jan 23, 2011 5:44 AM
Finished: Jan 30, 2011 4:23 AM
Posted here  Jan 2014
Warning:
a very, very long poem, but within , I promise,
there is a precise stanza about, for you.  
Take it as my gift.
Let me know which you took home to play.

~~~~~~~


Some poets care not
for the
discipline of rules,
laws of punctuation.

Why bother brother,
with putting poems
in antiquated jailhouses,
prisons of vertical bars,
or afford the reader,
the courtesy of horizontal lines?

Question and quotations marks
these day refuted,
as a Catcher In The Rye
conspiracy symbology of big lies,,
political interventionism,
to the creative, most natural
right to be crude.  

Inconvenient impositions,
symbolic flailings, of an
over regulated civilization
in the throes of declination

Punkuation is but a
societal annoyance to
today's creative geniuses,
periods, commas,
nothing more than
a pause to think -
who needs 'em?
when we want to stink
up the atmosphere with vitriols
of half truths and inhuman
but oh so gleeful,
concentrated disparagement
of any person worthy of
nationwide late night mocking merriment.

Such free spirits, vivid animations,
within me do not reign,
though upon occasion,
boy got permission slips  
for breaking bad by invention
of an occasional new word.

New words, white truffles
vocabulic incantations,
my own cupcake creations,
meant to burr, or purr,
their tasty meanings, always,
were readily apparent.

Sometimes we rhyme,
sometimes  we can't;
doth not a reading of a
poetic periodic table
of rants, chants
love poems, and paeans
to a shhhh! pretend,
overarching, poesy ego
require some minimalist format?

How I envy you,
kind observer,
possessor of literary powers
untoward and untold,
delicate touches of a fingertip
rule and rue
poetic invention.

You can zoom away or in
for a closer examination
of unscripted revelations,
incinerate them like an
yesterday's newspaper,
thus demonstrate contempt for
less-than-historic ruminations,
as time has done before.

Witness the crumbled ruins of Ozymandias,
king of kings,
and how the critic's machinations
with a dash of tabasco time,
his works, now museum pieces,
in the Tate Modern's room of
Laughable Human Aspirations.

Don't panic, sigh or groan,
kind observer,
infection inflictions,
content of discontentment,  
ancient whinings that the publisher
long ago listed as discontinued,
will not herein unfold.

What has all these mumbled asides
to do with the Dreams of a Child?

Apologies prolific I distribute
for this long winded profligate prologue;
and even for prior invasions
of your contemplative fantasias,
but my intention certain:
**** out the weak chaff eaters,
feigners of faux interest,
who stanzas ago deserted us,
this confessional lore.

These prior lines conceived
to mislead and deceive,
to refer and deter
send away, the hangers-on
who litter our lives,
with whimpered falsehoods.


So, we begin anew:

Today's lecture entitled
Dreams of a Child
were formatted on a silver disc;
this communication's originations,
seedlings of block
roman black letters
on background of cleansing white,
re things that jar me in the night.

Easy slights that waken
from a fitful, pitted rest,
mental paintings
natured in gem colors,
tourmaline auras,
and vibratto hues
of blue zircons.  .  

I have never lain upon the couch,
in the inner holy of holies,
where one whispers
to the Father Confessor
an original composition,
subject, title and inspiration
of said unique origination,
decidedly of one's own choosing,
roots of the essay's telling,
harvested in the root garden
of one's dreams,
where grow herbs,
spicy ones,
flavors of childhood.

The lush and wooded smells
of a forest of childhood scars,
and it's concomitant
putrefying, fruited rot,
awoke and brokered
a stilted, tremulous sleep.

Went to bed a a man
of modest success,
of modest scenes,
a bond trader, who trades
exactly that:
his word, his bond,
his blessing to his
deal constructions,
all of which, ended with an
irrevocable cri of "Done!"

Yet like you,
I am oft undone.

Dreams.

In truth, not dreams, but
spectral moments of
our lives relived,
a melange of ancient lyrics,
taunts of childhood abusers and
peer humilators
who could
teach the CIA
torture techniques
of WORD boarding, par excellent.

Angelic faces of human ****
that birthed in me a holy duality,
anger and a,
love of words,
my vaccination serum.

Granted a love of
human kindness
from teachers who cherished their
high and mighty tight
to publicly humiliate,
knowing full well
that human laws could not
attempt to have them
justly incarcerated.

Where, where were
the supervisors
who let me be spit upon
in the back seat of a
Fifty's station wagon,
by the brothers of
a sainted dead shepherd?

I am still eight,
sitting on a stoop in the
modest side of town,
towel in hand, so handy,
to wipe the tears shed
for cause,
for the car-pool of suburban boys
who "forgot" to pick me up for
Sunday swim night.  

In high school,
in the back row,
I silently ******
the juice of a Sarte lemon and
essayed a term paper,
upon multiple mirrored
reflections of a man
called Camus.

As another self styled, only living
teenage expert
on "alien nations"
received with pride and trepidation,
a sentence of Ninety Eight,
on my term paper,
but the pedantic predators
deemed it an accident
for I, was  inscribed in their
Upper East Side
Coda of Prejudice,
as merely,
"just" a
man of USDA,
B grade quality intellect.  

Hand me downs
I did not get
as I was the
younger, sole brother,
but worn lint lines
of humiliation
when and where my pants
were "let down"
to accommodate growth spurts
were my growing marks of Cain.

Those growth lines
were economic reality signs,
and were rich fodder for
childhood monsters,
Scions of Income Superiority
who lived in ranch homes in
two car, color tv garage slums,
wearing band new Levis.

In the Sixties,
time of my unsilent spring
wore a cross of
teenage hood,
my hair,
worn long,
Jesus style

Worn with labor pride,
for it was
Made in the USA,
I was a most conventional
revolutionary.

In the parochial jail
of educated guesses,
where society's lesson plans
of all that was bad
were O so well taught,
I was apart, ahead,
of Our Crowd,
but not too, radically.  

But a spiteful
Principal of No Principle,
deemed my locks a
disruptive influence,
so to exorcise my rebel streak,
so to crucify his "Jesus Freak,"
so to exercise his diminutive spirit
a pompous uber man,
he had me shorn
like a sheep,
thrice
in just one day,

He loved his full employment
of his pharoic entitlement,
The Educator's Power of Abuse,

I was so denuded
of human strength,
the Italian barbers of the
East 86th Street subway station,
wept for me,
their cri du coeur,
Angels in Heaven did hear
and from God
did dare demand
an explanation!

He roared in manner celestial,
"Is he not my child too,
and if he be treated
in style *******,
it is purposed and willful."

Pornographic compilations of
slaps across a child's face,
I've got plenty
of and in My Space,
should you care to
add your own,
down under,
got plenty of room
for all comers    

In a Facebook world,
I pride, not pretend,
that having fewer "friends"  
is my honest and true
reflection of who I am, and,
life lessons learned -
quality, not quantity.  

Victims of discrimination
can be most discriminating
in matters of
human games, associations.  
****** or word,
lack of taking care
is not heart healthy.

Tried to forgive
the despotic progenitors,
of some of that which
is good within me
that, irony of ironies,
they can claim the title,
creator;

Tried to give them
what I had gotten -
from the happy malcontented  
evil spreaders,

That grace, grace is
the only methodology,
an inestimable but
valuable lost leader,
the only way
to survive on
this planet of
hardtack and
caste striation.  

Though still quick to anger
at the cutters and denigrators
I am quick still to
confess my own failings, and forgive those
of plain and honest folk.

Unfortunately, kind observer,
you had to share my brunt,
syllabic Iwo Jima battles
of a decaying verbal moonscape
to reach the denouement,
for now we have,
mostly arrived

Most likely you too
have long ago
deserted me like
so many others,
no matter,
this modulated breath
was born and released
from my heaving chest and
as I knew it,
know this:

My Absaloms
where ever you be,
presumably and hopefully in hell,
I give you thanks
and a mini bar drink
of absolution.
a tin medal of appreciation,
for the
Marked Improvement
you inadvertently nurtured
in this restless,
voyagered soul.

My ancient enemies
till now, be advised,
forgive and forget
was and has not  
fully formed
in my penitential template,

Unlike your natural capacity
for cruelty and mean
birthed unto you
in your third rate
genetic melange,
forgiveness is taught
in a Master Class
at a famous school of Ethical Drama,
that I did not attend

Though resident in
a better place,
my root garden,
the bitter herbs you planted
still grow but,
are welcome in sweet brotherhood,
until the selah days
of just one flavor.

Though the universe's expansion
is of a pace such that
time and space definitions
will stretch and warp
and need be
refined, replaced,
the governing principle here.
need not be rephrased.  

For goodness
from evil
doth come
and should your
evil spectres
once more try
for resurrection
in my benighted
dream world.
you will find the doors
locked and barred,
upon them a sign
not verbose,

**Done.
Whew.
afternoon's glint on the mirror-pond,
  a whirling specimen of fire,
   ocher-speckled, Sun's insignia
     vessels deep into the clammy water;

furiously swaying like a pinned down
    beast reluctant to be held—
  Makati traffic jostles the silent grieving
    of the asphalt. simultaneous burst of
      chrome on the metal bodies,
      oh, the coming and going,

  children laughing vibrantly without
    memory of scathing pasts and
      boorish origins— tossing coins
      beckoning the heaven in pursed lips
    and clenched fists tender with years
      dwindling along with the turning of
    the calendar's page, the sudden leap
      of figure lamenting the absence
         of language;

    i walk the street festooned with dried
      leaves and forlorn seasons,
    hurling no amaranth to the entire
       Makati cityscape.
Brian Oarr Feb 2012
Epiphany from the Berry Fields

You would not come with me
through constellations of Jack-in-the-Pulpit,
your reasons shrouded in obscurity.
I went there once to pray ---
Did I tell you? ---
I spied a grey squirrel
gnawing a cherished butternut
in a fury of drunken hunger;
forgot at once my prayers.

You went instead, alone,
to the Kingdom of the Mushroom.
I sealed my mouth
afraid to enter there.
You saw violent phosphorous rivers and
vivid galloping colors,
that were of mystical internal origin.

We might have eaten
vine-ripe strawberries and
drunk cold mountain water,
that gushed from the mouth of
the cave under the cliff.

Perhaps, like me you were afraid,
terrified by florid fields and familiar female.
How sad ---
Sometimes I am so dense ---
I should have told you,
I went there in the distance
as a girl.



       *Coincidental Drift


Through the airport window pane,
isolated, I watched the jet
traverse the field in silent shimmering motion.
My vagrant gaze remained
fixed upon the infinite horizon
long after the shadowy
plane had passed from view.
This seemed to me to parallel
my motionless furtive feelings,
as after one I've loved
has migrated in another season.

It was not long after this
that she re-entered the room,
bathed in the murmur of
alluring fragrance which
quickly drew my mind from
the solitude of thought to
a sensual appreciation of her perfume.
How easily she drew my mind astray
from pleasant thought of you and yesterday.
I recalled how earlier this morning,
as she lay neither asleep, nor awake,
but somewhere in between,
I had tried to touch her outstretched hand,
yet, uncannily she had withdrawn it.
The smoke that wafted above our bed then
was the only pervading reality and
not the Mona Lisa smile on her face,
nor the emptiness of my longing hand.

She's said, *She's ready ---
--- that her bags are packed ---
and shouldn't we be going?

Yes, Yes I suppose it's time.
And a wind howling in my brain recalled,
I'd either been here once before or
seen it etched upon an empty sky.
As seen from both perspectives

— The End —