Green means
many things
"Picture this"
I get around in my EV
The trees neatly packaged
The streams and the grass
and the cows' milk
and the eggs of the poultry
in abundance
"You're living in
the wrong city my friend!"

My patience is a virtue
Still hands
Straight shots
Full bodied
Another on ice
Keep walking my friends

Johnnie Walker

The depth of a quarry
The mass of the ore
The heat in the furness
The diameter of the bore
The skill of a marksman
For sure. For sure.

In my kitchen
your place
is at the table

The brain,
what a glorious thought.
Surprisingly,
its splendour seems less remarkable
at times
Its purpose misunderstood
Where is its history?
Thoughts mined of Thoth's mind
Fossilised, it remains
in warm pellucid waters
Shallow as my human intellect

Deeper meditation takes forever
greys turns white undiplomatically
with all its human prejudices
Grey matters: its a matter of fact

It glows and grows
synapse after synapse
to perfection.  
A Shrine of Muses.
Each crenulated shelf follows
consciously
Serendipitous

Consider its vastness
lobe to lobe
hemisphere to hemisphere
where water entombs it
A hippocampus
Like Hippasus submerged
beneath open and violent sea
A cage for wild and hostile imaginations

To find its perfection
leave your thoughts behind
Dive deep outside yourself
The ocean ends where
reason reefs
the barbaric wreck sinks
senses are subdued
descend in slowly
The school
The sun
The rays
The colours
The species
The knowledge of life
The brain: Marvelously imperfect

That's right David!
You have a right
Not to remain silent

How odd of you?
To think of pastures...
a leisure of sort
So green and pristine
with the milk of laughter
T'was hard work
keeping you on the hill
in summer's sunshine
near the old barn
from spring to spring
Now memories are
limp and cold as winter
Rotting the heart of the tree
and even grass passes time
in faint contemplation of you

Sixteen, sixty
and seven
does not rhyme

in heaven. Hell
maybe. Keep that in mind

In purgatory
We pray for the saints

Sin first for those who wrote really bland stuff

Marlowe. Shakespeare.
You know, it is enough

Blank verse
Blank verse
A pandemonium

How odd of you?
To think of pastures...
a leisure of sort
So green and pristine
with the milk of laughter
T'was hard work
keeping you on the hill
in summer's sunshine
near the old barn
by the flowing spring
Now memories are
limp and cold as winter
Rotting the heart of the tree
and even grass passes time
in faint contemplation of you

Mannequin men; murals
stationed crazy
as a cat walks walls
There, mundane masks
Their bloodlust eyes
Such intensity
In the silence was night
Tiny drums crescendo
stubborn in teflon skin
Shooting stars stars.
Shoot like me, paparazzi
Free Speech Free Speech
Flee Speech,  a breach
It's Crazy!
Cats on a catwalk
Meow Meow Meow
Moving mannequin men

If this is innate,
why won't you wait?
Your mind won't keep
you asleep
Can you be who I am?
As I'd Conceived?
Carried in agonising pain?
Borne again and again,
naturally?

We'd slaughter ourselves
for your twisted paradigm
of ourselves. Now,
we slaughter ourselves
like sheep. Skin deep
Till our blood seeps
and colours a cause
It is not our body!
But, our mind drips
a physiology of remorse
We've suffered. No loss
deciding: who are we?

That grass
isn't that green?

Slash and burn!
Frankincense
And Myrrh
Like shorgum
Like maize
You, amaze me

Matzo's to eat
First night
Is law, Pat Yisrael

Netting up, nothing
Keep birds out
Bring birds in
Who? Yao? Nothing!

Nothing like bantu
Nothing like kin
He parts the Red Sea
Knesset

You in your world
Stones and mountains
Dust and desire
The morning star
lingers. No holograms
one or two scores and
You urge to recite it:
"make bread!"
"make bread!"
but on these words,
how shall you feast?
one or two bytes and
behold:
Height and Temple
Cities and World
So great
and here he left
No angels
No holograms

How many things
Time forgets
what was hung up
what was laid down

Across many years
a sudden reflect
memories are tears
and with brevity
that child sings:
Jesus loves me
Yes, I know!

Where do you stand?

For me,
it has never been
black and white

and I won't live
like a new moon
over an old world

masking
your colourful face

Let me live
for this is where I am
beneath my father's tree:
eternal and heavenly shade

Let me live
and I will gaze
across the vast ocean
of memories to you

You see
for you life plays
this sweet song

you must humble
you must listen
to the end
the silence

silence brings you
these tears for me
and sadness you feel
the death of my memory

Yet you know me
as I have lived

So let me live
in you
in your fondest memories

Let me live
as I have lived

Anthony J Pierre
July 16, 2021

What comes of love
after we taste
its earthly abundance

and we feel
how it shines
how it blooms
how it rains

perfectly

when one looks  
to listen closely
it seems these books
of history
were never meant
to balance

Did you?

Consider the zulu sun
Remittances to Estcourt
Okun's Law
Offshore accounts
Karl Marx in KwaZulu-Natal
Systemic and Systematic Risks

and yet
the shrike bird sings
of monetary matters

I knew you
needed this
sincere apology
to pull yourself
together

but you
had to be broken

so I could
keep myself
in one piece

who told Moise to flee?
from these mountains
so free, so free: "Hayti"

to the plains his men go
egos of pharaoh's Egypt
egos thunder at night
this land of promise
so free, so free: "Hayti"

fill this basket, Moise
and sail on our tears
to the promise land
from these mountains
so free, so free: "Hayti"

Some may say:
It is missing something!

Indeed, some have said:
This is incomplete!

Look:

these stones lay
gray with lifelessness
gray as the clouds gathering
over his graphite city

such oddity of geometry
peculiar buildings with
perpendicular lines
raising parallel paradigms

and the unpainted sun
casts awkward shadows
across the gray stones -
empty sidewalks -
devoid of colours
devoid of life
devoid of people

Yes, where are the people?

but to critique my art

La mort, après toi
ce soleil
ça brille et
ces ombres bougent

Pourtant, parmi tous
mes sombres circonstances
mon dieu, mon dieu
j'habite

Death, after you
that sun
it shines and
these shadows move

Yet still among all
my dark circumstances
my god, my god
I live

You think
you had enough, Silly?
It's a love song

Let us go
You and I
Where the music
Makes you high
Like patients etherized

What's wrong with that?

They will come
They will go
Speaking of Macca de Angelo

Let scarlet feathers go
as love does exiled too
One hundred leagues
One hundred Roman feet
One hundred prosody

For Augustus' dreams
condemns me treacherously
and I cannot breathe
Each gasp for life is death
Each death a new stanza

Let scarlet feathers go
as love does in exile, too
across white cloudy fields
beneath the asphalt sea
Let scarlet feathers go free

Don't lay debased
on the shore of nakedness
with discontentment

Battered by salty spindrift
and drunk moonlight kisses

to go to the summit...
You must ride each wave
to go to the depth...

You'll find an awesome pearl

This isn't news
It's Newport News
It makes you dance

Bill Bailey

And the moon walks
from sweet Virginia
never from Neverland

Bill Bailey

The first flight
In Apollo
blew up the night

Bill Bailey

Call it what you want
You can't walk on the moon
without the backslide

Bill Bailey

Have I sinned?

Getting nowhere!

One whole Earth
round and flat

Here's a balloon
Here's a plate

Reminds me
to celebrate with

An oblate pear
on steroids and
a flat Greek cake

A stupendous combination

Through contemplation,
the mind leaps to its haven
above reason's gaol

You say I'm a villain then so I'll stay
But sleepy sheep can't sleep on this wolf's bed
So please, just keep the flock out of my way

College left me poor for a rich BA
Where's the job for the books inside my head?
You say I'm a villain then so I'll stay

I lived right, light, didn't think I could stray
the dough needed, I never raised for bread
So please, just keep the flock out of my way

I can't act smooth like Sidney Poitier
My rough street skills are what I use instead
You say I'm a villain then so I'll stay

I feed the lost sheep and you know I prey
My soles clean, tweeds neat; I'm looking ahead
So please, just keep the flock out of my way

I've found my niche; today is my pay day
Short shifts but alms long like my daydream spread
You say I'm a villain then so I'll stay
So please, just keep the flock out of my way

LXI abrogari passuros aiebant articulum (Repeal article 61)
        
                 John was here, 1215

dream of birds in flight

dream of birds on trees

but rows on rows
of murderous crows singing

these dreams, have not please

Boo,
        I don't write love letters
like you do

My words get blacklisted

'cause with love,
       things can get twisted, quickly

You see:
the sweet hips      
                   drips
            with kisses ...  can easily be
                            
the creep's lips
                      trips
             with hisses

Don't misconstrue, Boo
I see you
      like you see me
            and, I agree
our minds are connected
  
                   But
                             our
telepathy
           can certainly be
                                the lepathy

to confuse you
          and
        contuse you too

You don't see the pain I see
                I see the pane you don't see

It obscures my view
     I'm one of the pragmatic few
          I'm being true to you, Boo

These love letters must end
           In its place I'll just send

"Deeds" things we can both do
                          and claim ownership to

They can't be misunderstood at all
   The same ones used at a concert hall

If it's great ... then I'll just applaud
If it's bad ... then I'll just ...

                        Boo, I'm through

... my world is made whole
with these tiny little things
I'm big with small love

Fireflies dance pretty
well, byte-sized fairies' tale
long & twistle: a tongue's whistle
In the dark, dark arts made
bright lights sing like a clock:

"Tik Tok, Tik Tok"

This chime, time circles
red like Asian kings: vultures
tightening the noose like Zeus
on Douyin's long neck. Hands dance, bytedance on a fairytale clock

"Tik Tok, Tik Tok"

Am I a sick man?

as I lived on a hibiscus shrub
Many rooms, long and short
Many face vividly coloured
with a beauty of sadness
grafted on a nameless rootstock

Am I an unattractive man?

as I lived like a petal in the sun
perfect for bees and butterflies
and the visitors; oh day! oh night!
as for me, time danced on a maypole around my dreamy garland head

Am I a spiteful man?

as I've counted all 3863 days, 1 by 1
that I lived on that hibiscus shrub
without a flight to my fantasies
Since then, I'm thrown underground
here I live like a ridiculed mouse

Do you know me, Dostoevsky?

It's a treasure trove
Words tossed up like confetti
Falling in our hearts

On Cassatt's easel
afternoon stretches out
its pink pastel faces
cool as the palms breeze
warm as the oolong tea

Life's a blooming rose
A special gift to possess
Death's a rose well pruned

Where Emperors go
caterpillars can't contend
but by changing state

Sweet Suga won't smile
Emotionless wild sedge stalk
Is Japan sweeter?

Blackboards love math dorks
not whiteboards, glassboards, or corks
Chalk's gathering dust

Is this heaven?
High above, above High
Bizarre, @ poppy sky height
leaping clouds on cloud 9
eyes, hypnogogic eyes
roams recalcitrant red
Idle! Martian! Deserts!
live streams can't pry
**** dried, silica tears
dam: # freedom cry
Free as a sand storm spins
Head: "I'm lost in the winds"
Headhunter's Hunger
Insatiable Appetite bites
Gnawing butterflies
crawling by poppy sky flowers
High above, above High
Heavenly Heights

Slave of briers courts
regal, purple, velvet robe
Picture perfect rose

Black is a book of secrets
The world's words written
without fanfare for the colour
just the hue of inhumanity
Like a plague... like a sin
if its black... it's hard bound

Bound, booked and stacked
high on history's shelves,  
real words living life: over again
chain, maim, pain, inhumane
Don't flinch figure! Lynch figure!
If you ain't a figure, go...

Figures, black as night as day
stray cats ain't panters, they can't pant
Counted cruelly as commodities
But who's been chequeing?
Says who black isn't beauty?
Says who diva Devi isn't a cutie?

Black is now back
with a Kodak claque
hot like Lewis Hamilton's wheels,
hot heels, a black dress stepping
on broadwalks, cats talking
"time to lift off the tarmac"

My wondering child
never lost in the clutter
young encephalon

Feather light words exhumed
heavy as Mussolini's clock
coo coo times, chimes
and a fascist bird sings;
sweet and succinct

Taken as is
might slight delight
The vitiation of words
in the phrases
Petals dead on a wet, rotted bough

Beyond these lines...
on worrisome papyrus
where names fall in anguish
like hailstones on Nebraska
cold and violent
none lost in turbulence
in the hall of two truths
weighed on death's feather

Beyond these lines...
words sharp as bayonets
on loaded guns, pointing
... pointed as lead, drawn far afield
beyond sight
beyond purpose
beyond comprehension, yet
accurate as a ******'s breath

beyond these lines...
these crude and relevant lines
that calls forth to death
with rhymes ... with syntax
imagery, impeccable imagery
refrain, can we refrain?
beyond these lines... of death
beyond these lines... of death