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nick armbrister Jan 2018
atari games
when i was a teenager i had an atari games system
me and my mates played space invaders, pacman and river raid
competing to get the best score and be the best

it was a saturday afternoon in summer in the 80s

that's when it happened while we gamed away
we heard a huge bang and ran out of my mum's house
and down to the road for we knew it was bad
a crowd had gathered and oh ******* hell look!

a girl was lying still on the ground

was she dead?
but i only thought that later
we could see she was nice, too nice,
for all of her legs and **** was on display
as were her ******* and raised short skirt
and what of her face?

i knew she was pretty

there was blood on the ground
but we didn't see it till later
she was near a bus stop which was bent
was she waiting there when she was hit?
hit by the car that was halfway off the road

and equally thru the stone wall?

where was the driver?
the crowd said he'd fled the scene
over the fields and look,
there's tracks thru the grass

my mate's dad came to help the girl

her told his son to go to their house for a spoon
the girl was vomiting and it would **** her
soon his dad cleared the girl's mouth
so she could breath and he stayed by her side
while we watched from over the road

the ambulance soon came and took her away

and later still, the cops nicked the driver
he was drunk and driving and almost killed the girl
later still i learnt she made a full recovery
i wonder where she is now?

does she remember how close she came to death?

and what of the driver who hurt her?
this was 35 years ago and i remember it
like yesterday and the message it says:

don't drink and drive...
this was real...
Indian Phoenix Oct 2012
I hated Dawkins a little less when his words came from your mouth.

Your unabashed sincerity endeared me to you from the moment you showed me your vintage Atari. I don't recall if that was before or after you bragged about your Star Trek DVDs. Not that it matters, but I hope you've found a place to store all of those wires protruding out of your gadgets like Medusa's head of snakes.

My family liked you, especially my mother. It was probably your staunch advocacy of 4th amendment rights.

Remember those nights we sat in bed and traded secrets on small scraps of paper? We were lovers  for... five weeks by then? It struck me by the third slip that it didn't matter what it would say--I knew I'd still love you anyway. But I knew that from the moment you removed my knee-high boots and kissed my feet when I rode up on my Harley. You unstrapped my helmet and poured me wine. Though we promised to never tell anyone, I just wanted to say: I still smile when I think of your 15-year-old self trying to pick up a ******* on a desolate dusty road. Do you still have those hastily-written pieces of paper? They're yours to keep; I hope they're safe.

Nothing of my new world reminds me of you. There's no Jeopardy to watch, no NPR to hear in your white Saturn, and no desert mountains to hike. Not in India. Maybe it's because nothing is similar that my memories of us stay so firmly imprinted in my mind. Similarities would only erode my recollections. Maybe that's why I almost forgot about the chai tea I'd serve you in bed, coupled with almonds and apricots on the saucer.

But you, you're a walking encyclopedia of my home town. You knew every cactus-lined freeway, the name of the state attorney general, and the best place to grab a Four Peaks beer. Because of this, I could never extricate my love of home and my love for you. To me, you'll always be home.

For better or for worse, I remember it all. Including the soft piano rift of the chess game we'd play on your XBox. I'm guessing you'd beat me, should we play again today. I still have the wooden chess set I got you for your birthday... but we both know I can't give it to you. I'm sorry.

I never believed in saving people before I met you. Before, damaged was a weakness; now I think you just needed a polish. I never told you, but I read your psych evaluation--I found it when I was cleaning your room (with your permission, I add). The therapist was right: you're not aloof, just too smart for the room. I thank God that you never bought that container of nitric oxide.

I know we said we'd marry if I ever came back home. A no-frills city hall marriage suited us just fine. I have no doubt we would have had a simple, sweet life. You would've relented to letting me get a dog to keep your arrogant cat company. Our biggest fight would be over which castle door the RPG character should open, and you would've helped me improve my golf swing on the inexpensive dilapidated course near my old junior high school.

But likewise... our biggest adventure would've been only a roadtrip to the neighboring county. And I wanted to explore. I needed to explore. You, who never wanted to stray outside of a 100-mile radius could never satiate that curiosity. But I know we could have made it work. I know we would've been happy.

Sometimes I wish we could be the best of friends. I know we can't; not when I started dating my now-husband so close after we ended things in tear-stained emails when I went overseas. He swore off her; I swore off you. That's the way things go, I guess, when you get older.

I know it might seem like I've moved on and forgotten you.

Moved on, yes. Forgotten? Never.

It probably wouldn't be the same if we met again. I have too much love for you that could never be conveyed. My love for you has changed; it's not romantic. But it's still this throbbing appreciation for everything you are. I couldn't bear guarded chit chat. Not with you.

And I hope you are happy. Have you realized your worth yet, or are you still wasting your time with broken high school grads who listen to Ke$ha? I can't tell you who to love... but I hope she's an astrophysicist, someone who loves Carl Sagan even half as much as you. I want her to read Noam Chomsky to you late at night, and wake you in the mornings with a glass of milk and cookies. She'll prefer simple mashed potatoes to dim sum, and have a weakness for microbreweries. She'd be gorgeous in that bookish sort of way. Yes. That's the girl for you.

....I'm sorry it's not me, my dear atheist.
Patrick McCombs Feb 2016
In the depths of my basement
Hidden behind the christmas decorations
And under the family albums
Lies a box waiting to be discovered
It holds a legend from a bygone era
The atari 2600
It may be the grandfather of gaming
But it still plays like it's 1977
It's been going strong for forty years
But my laptop called it quits after five
You have to start with the classics
Like Pacman pitfall and pong
Galaga asteroids and dig dug
All of them in glorious 8 bits
A throwback to simpler times
When there were no updates to download
Nothing to install to the hard drive
12 year Olds didn't mock you online
It was just you and a joystick
Patrick McCombs May 2012
I'm really sorry
That I broke your atari
You look at me with ****** brewing in your eyes
And a boiling rage that you just can't disguise
You mutter "Mint condition 1977"
And how you had it since you were eleven
You hold your game cartridges lovingly in you hands
And say that know one understands
I'm gonna be sleeping with one eye open tonight
Daniel Coleman Jun 2011
Every time I touch a controller
I set a new highscore
I said a new highscore.
Look out behind you, *******.
I capped that ***;
You should've watched your back.
Now I got an L-shaped block
Watch as I drop it in that L-shaped slot.
Haters gotta throw the blue turtle shell,
Because they can't keep their kart on Rainbow Road.
Donkey's going to throw some barrels at me;
Don't worry princess, watch me jump.
I promise I won't get hit, not even once.
Hey there champ look right here;
I just stuck a plas grenade
On you right ear.
Lucky shot? So you say.
Still watching me tea-bag you
From the grave.
Pilot Wings, Punch-Out, Mario
Madden, Sonic or GTA
It doesn't really matter
The number of pixels we play.
D-Pad or joystick,
Night or day,
It doesn't really matter how you play,
Put me on tron I'll blow you away.
Turtles in Time:
You take that next slice.
Even blindfolded your no match
For my SuperScope.
Tony Hawk, what a joke!
In Pacman or Galaga in space
Even with the Kunami Code
You've got no hope.
So the next time you hear
Scorpion yell "Get over here!"
Have no fear
A Sonic Boom will soon be there.
Busting out Atari's Pong?
Noob, I'll pwn you
One-thousand to none.
Hell, not even Parapa the Rappa
Can touch my rhymes.
Read those initials
That score is mine.
I said read those initials;
That score is mine.
William Keckler Nov 2014
Atari clouds are digital ziggurats,
and rather minimal at that.
The sounds are Amiga.
Welcome to the eighties.

Your hair is big,
your clothes are odd,
and Nagel is a minor god.
Welcome to the eighties.

There is a plague
and ACT UP's rage,
but Reagan will not act his age.
For six years, he will say nothing.

Generation X gives birth to Y,
future hipsters to vilify.
All music is vinyl or cassette.
Rocks stars still wear epaulets.

There are two Coreys, podded peas.
Terrorists stay overseas.
Boy bands aren't quite yet in vogue.
Menudo carries a heavy load.

Ricky Martin is still straight.
Cimino ***** with Heaven's Gate.
Cindy Sherman is everyone.
Johnny Hinckley got his gun.

Welcome to the eighties.
Mateuš Conrad Mar 2017
war took mine, i was sold  playing tenchu
on level 6... just before i was to
assassinate this ***, and he practised all
his bow skill in private, then it was made public
by a ninja... i only completed final
fantasy 7
with a walk-through...
i hate the fact that i stuck to
the schooling narrative...
  but hose were the PS1 days,
those days are gone, gone gone gone,
bye bye gone...
                 the **** was that?!
an oscar for best actor at the gladiator premier?!
why isn't more gaming mentioned in poetry?
where is raziel, and the the legacy of cain:
soul reaver, and the story about how he
squashed his brothers:
dumah, melchiah, rahab, and zephon?
oh look: the geek in me!
                 100 years from a youtube video...
i'm bound to do the bristol d'uh and say:
i've never been to south america...
nor ever...
                        me go sort out this avalanche
if that's o.k. with you, hmm?
this is the thrill you get when seeing peoiple
play a reincarnation of gameboy,
i.e. candy-crush saga... if you moved beyond
the PS1 universe you won't get it...
if you remember PS1 games, you'll probably
remember SEGA and sonic,
and age of empires 2, and sim city 3000...
**** me! but you won't probably remember the
weathergirl... who was becky mantin
when this was written...
           odd, that little gray box of saturdays
and sometimes sundays, but definitely
saturday mornings...
                    it gone... and i don't feel like owning
an update of it, because games have become
overtly narrative prone, they only allow thise gameplay
that's too narrated... i switch on the console
and i want mario bros. calculator type of dynamism...
instead i get this really complex story
when i should be reading a book...
   no, really, when did gaming become so
****** engrossing that i try to become distracted by
brick walls?
           when did i or when didn't i take to playing
chess? well... when i started playing dominos
with 6 cigarette stumps and a black hardcover
philosophy book... maybe around then.
books i great, believe me...
but this nook of counter-arcade games?
i woke up at 9am as if about to go to school
and played that japanese fetish for hours...
so much if our culture in nearing the post-20th
century culture was axis... it was almost all japanese...
you can't take that fact out and replace it
concerning: god intervened at Giza and yawned
at chichén itzá...
because you would... still, i thankfully retired
from the gaming experience (when did PS2 come out?
i wanted it for about 2 years and still didn't
get it)...
    1998? 1997?
                      thankfully i get to mention computer
games like novels... SEGA mega drive?
yep, owned that.
                   and yes, i can cite an ATARI,
and ****, **** **** me!
   that original NINTENDO?!
              and that shooting mallard simulation
against a screen of televisions that could
still issue you with van der graaf static
   of "levitating" hair?
(when televisions were still 3D and played
you remnants of the big bang
       in televised black and white khrrr sound,
all dicta fidgety, like looking through the eyes
of a bluebottle fly)... or
    the original prince of persia?
     those two dimensional ferns rotating round and
round when approached in the original tomb raider?
oh forget the cone-****-madonna...
shaid the ish cream van man to shaun shoonery...
cheap ****: said the dead with charlie
at the head of their horde of entertainment's flops.
i retired from the gaming world though,
left it when PS1 expired...
and morphed into PS2...
           i'm half sad and half saying: i can understand
candy crush, because i can understand
the origin: TETRIS.
like i can understand why i can't do crosswords,
my father just said: even i can't do them,
the clues are all a bit of a wanking to comprehend...
it's as if they only based them on the thesaurus...
   we're good on sudoku though, that can be solved
without problems...
        i miss those games though,
i finished final fantasy 7 with a walkthrough
though... tenchu was also fun to complete,
crash bandicoot? anyone remember him?
           now for not faking it...
                                     i'm glad that's over,
i'd hate the gaming experience as i hate interactive
t.v. thesedays... all this pause and rewind?
  thanks to it i sometimes press the STOP
button when listening to the radio and wonder
why it just keeps running... oh right: this isn't
a c.d. transmission... funny though, the gaming experience
translated into t.v. really has made advertising
ultra competative or utterly useless....
   you just end up pausing before a break, and then
scrolling past the advertisers' airtime...
next thing i'll be buying is when they make
an advert for shoepaste.
Simon Soane Jul 2018
You?
You make me fabulous,
all wow and starry;
feel I can usurp King at Kong
and then move on to beat Federer
at ping pong
on the Atari!
Randy Johnson Dec 2018
My son asked for a video game console and I ended up being sorry.
I went Christmas shopping at a flea market and bought him an Atari.
When he unwrapped the Atari 5200 on Christmas morning, he had a fit.
He has blessed me out before but this is the only time that I've been hit.

He took a sledgehammer to his gift that he hated.
It was over thirty-five years old, it was outdated.
He called me stupid because I bought him a console that is 8-bit.
He said he wanted a PS4 or XBOX One and then he threw his fit.

I had all of his BS that I could stand so I put him over my knee.
His **** is black and blue because of the way he treated me.
I gave him a good spanking because he crossed the line.
Because of that Atari 5200, I put blisters where the sun doesn't shine.
DC raw love Dec 2014
We lose so much talent to addiction
Some of you may not care, but I do
This is my tribute to them

Alan Wilson
Canned Heat

Jimi Hendrix
The Jimi Hendrix Experience

Janis Joplin

Jim Morrison
The Doors

Brian Cole
The Association

Billy Murcia
New York Dolls

Danny Whitten
Crazy Horse

Gram Parsons
The Stooges

Gary Thain
Uriah Heep

Elvis Presley

Gregory Herbert
Blood, Sweat & Tears

Keith Moon
The Who

Sid Vicious
*** Pistols

Lowell George
Little Feat

Jimmy McCulloch
Wings

John Bonham
Led Zeppelin

Darby Crash
Germs

James Honeyman-Scott
Pretenders

Pete Farndon
Pretenders

Paul Gardiner
Tubeway Army

Gary Holton
Heavy Metal Kids

Phil Lynott
Thin Lizzy

Andrew Wood
Mother Love Bone

Brent Mydland
Grateful Dead

Steve Clark
Def Leppard

Johnny Thunders
New York Dolls

David Ruffin
The Temptations

Kristen Pfaff
Hole

Shannon Hoon
Blind Melon

Bradley Nowell
Sublime

John Kahn
Jerry Garcia Band

Jonathan Melvoin
The Smashing Pumpkins

Billy Mackenzie
Associates

West Arkeen
The Outpatience

Nick Traina
Link 80

John Baker Saunders
Mad Season


Bobby Sheehan
Blues Traveler

Wes Berggren
Tripping Daisy

Allen Woody
The Allman Brothers Band

Carl Crack
Atari Teenage Riot

Layne Staley
Alice in Chains/Mad Seasons

Kurt Cobain
Nirvana

Dee Dee
Ramones

Robbin Crosby
Ratt

John Entwistle
The Who

Howie Epstein
Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers

Jeremy Michael Ward
De Facto

Tim Hemensley
GOD

Dave Schulthise
The Dead Milkmen

Rick James

Kevin DuBrow
Quiet Riot

Ike Turner

Gidget Gein
Marilyn Manson

Jay Bennett
Wilco

Michael Jackson

The Rev
Avenged Sevenfold


Paul Gray
Slipknot

Mike Starr
Alice in Chains

Amy Winehouse


We are not bad people, we just have bad ways
Yet, not many understand
Have love in your heart for all
We are all one in the same
Ken Pepiton Oct 2023
National mindsets self interested suffer
forms of dementia as the order all confessed,
demands of each a concentration of self worth,
you bet your soul, but only in the spirit,
step into the fray, say, let me lead you,
say let me take elected office,
democratic to the edges, being your voice
in a popularity contest, not an intellectual joust.
Tutelary deontology 101.
Governing is managing the labor. Ask the king.
Any flock in the system, governs itself.
Business is business.
Some arrangements are always secret. All
grown ups are in the business of war supplies.
Let your children's minds be at ease.
Trust the checks and balances history proves,
have never worked on balance, for the poor.
Get rich quick as one can imagine, on a bet.
War meets Peace, like it is the storm
that left Greenland, a legend until now.

Easily intreated innocense, who could know.
Prosaic first morning pizz to prime the pump.

How deep is the generational debt due to war?
How many bonds have been sold to pay interest?
How many times has the national debt ceiling failed?
You know.
Every time.
"Each major conflict in U.S. history
has been accompanied
by a sharp rise
in debt as the government raises funds
to pay for the fighting."

But laws do exist…
"Without a declaration of war
to put the country on a wartime economy,
Congress paid for Vietnam
by increasing the national debt.
Over the course of the conflict,
America's debt nearly doubled, growing
from approximately $317 billion in 1965
to $620 billion in 1976."

Now the debt is rising
on interest alone. No need for another war.

And America's trade balance is hinged,
on the point of war.
The ideal centermost irritant, war's hate pump,
pain expanded by generational trespass acts
likened unto the pea
under the stack of feathered beds,
or the bit of grit forcing oyster stress
that has made the misshapen pearl sold
to sovreign entities, those colors on the map,
these mental aggregations called nations,
by nationalist mind frame riveters,
foundational eye beams, remove before demoting,
ah, slow, riveted beams spanning ferro-concrete tech- think.
Building a reasoning trap, children,
ask your fathers to whom we owe our national debt.
Ask also who sells the weapons to the world at war.
Semper fi,
no offence, but… holy hate is as crazy as hungry hate.

A voice from a song, from nowhere,
you just could rethink, or did, that first time think
a bridge over troubled waters being a truly old good idea,
come to rescue you,

in the early days of Boomer parenthood… being grown ups,
we never missed a Disney Movie, though by then,
they were losing the gnostalgia, old knowns to be like so,
were no longer even imaginably so.
Old Yeller,
Childhood's end, the separation
from hearth felt comfort,
to the class rooms and hallways
of massive cold concrete schools… where on day one,
the child pledges with its cohort of coeducatables,
the ancient bond of aliegiance...
I pledged mine first in 1954, the year "under God" was added.

In the just now settling down towns along the great freeways,
there has been no peace on earth in my generation,
at the level of military minds in conflict caused by stories,
boys bred with old hates just waiting for a sigh-psignal
sci-revealed to those willing to become Jason Bourne,
to the best of your abilities, ring the bell, any time.  

Welcome to the front. Sanity is on the line.
There is no conspiracy, we sell our souls for what money
can be demonstratively proven to allow and even augment.

War is all we sell. There is another game, it's a liar's game.
Many famous authorities have filled the space at the table.

Take your hat off, Bartholowmew, she does not understand you.

------------
Daily communication with myself,
one person, with no power to use
save the early cultural confidence;
sworn to tell the whole truth,
so help me, God. Yes, your honor.

Except we reactivate the curious why,
functionally suppressed during the standard
test taking by the proximate others
diligently filling in the blanks,
with graphite rounded just right, one swipe.

Except we see that hanging senselessly realized.
Each problem, one answer, not one option.
Only select correct answer.
Tell the child learning the pledge,
God is on our side, emphasize
how exceptional those who know so are,
extremely discriminatingly,
arranging the economy around
the great decussation at the air gap,
at the back of our national neck.

In this time,
thoughts and prayers, we hear
spoken of as easily done,
almost without thoughts, who
responds?, who, has ever responded
to the said to be going out constantly
thoughts and prayers, asking truth
to intervene and call the liars liars?

God is not angry, nor without resources,
according to the cultures now at war--
¿
Whose mortgage was not paid with earnings
from war readiness industrial complexes?

Whose talent was left with the userers,
because the Bible says y'sposed to earn interest?

Whose 401K deflated to oops?

Business begins with informed agreements.
Let's make a deal.
No killing, stealing nor needless destruction.

Minds join eye to eye, one mindwise agreed,
we become an entity, a being essential
to the parts, a mind in harmony, rank and file.

Greedy men with no agreement. Hmm, who loses?

Line up, not by rank, single file, fall in,
first and following, get in on the end,
and wait for the circle to close,
re done dances, life going wild as
we celebrate our circle, we sing of it
being unbroken in the sweet by and by…

The land of those who talk back to El,
yes, yes, we do, to honor Iyobe,
who first called for the Daysman,
who first
told reality, with all it's evil potential,
you cannot not be true, you know, in form
as spirit and truth containable in words, logos,
logos of all o-logies,
so powerful as to allow, in fact, cause, new mindforms,
species of thoughts that function as a system to make
sense, discernible, bits of valuation determinable in agreement.
--------------
Contractual obligations religiously adhered to
just between us, we take advantage for the nation's sake.
Madrassahs and aliegiance pledges set habits hard to break.

Set the cost of goods, lower than replacement cost of the price.
What does it cost a state to rear a warrior class individual
that self replenishes?

What does it cost me to scatter confusion in profuse create-ifity?
So, add a proper tip,
and pay the cost to ride this line to the next re-entering angle.
Middle east,
cauldron of all the holy empires thus far into the age
of entertainment so vast,
wise men can imagine, some day
there will be a war, and no parents will have
offered children to the infantry or made
righteous indignation acceptable national pride to k-ill for.

There Hamas, holy brainwashed haters of hatefulness.
Repents and perishes the very thought of peace.
Repay in kind, here, swear undying obediance,
fear not death, this is Allah's Promise, die killing Jews,
turns on the monstrous virgins awaiting you…
in post mortal walled places,
where the oldest civilizations occurred,
as God's great idea, I'll
empty the center of me, and seep
back in through fractured rationality
along trade routes between Africa and
the forested north above the desert.

Me, there, in mental efforting, thinking
thoughts, not prayers, but wishes, hopes,
thoughts that prayers attach to, as evidence.

"Ask and ye shall receive."
Love those who call you enemy, can you?

Face me, Mr. Nobody, the essence of other,
I declare peace, where none is, and you laugh.

No ritual, no enchantments with promise,
no sacred making of secular deaths, just
just just adjust the justice aspect, blame
the holy haters whose God dispenses vengeance,
at the behest of warriors fitted with military minds.

As when holy Americans gather to offer military aid,
blessed by the congregations alerted to intercede,
on the side that denies Jesus was God,--- ah, both sides,
in this case…
whither turn we, do we face Mecca, or Jerusalem,
or Petra or … Sol or Luna, all our enculturated faith,

blinks, a lense clarifying effort, rub the crust
of sleep fallen into while mourning, unsealing eyes
to see again, a war between two national identities,
both with warrior glory emulation traditions,
one with money as first de-fence, the other with hate,
nothing less than pure hatred, Cain to Able, sorry bro.

Old mean spirits.
If the hate can live in any man, wombed or un, it will.

Willingness to hate enough to k-ill a stranger, will
manifest as holy terror… enough to make Jesus weep.

--- and those were a few of the local thoughts made prayer,
seemingly automatically, as mysterious as most final secrets.

Part three, deeper, faster, harder… or not

Doings in the dark, are done by feel.
One, you or I, or some other sapien
augmented with the messiah's mind, feels the need for the deed.
Take the message from Garcia.

Mystic experience in story realms,
holding all the visions taken raw,
as revealed… as when a curtained
entry way is opened for inspection,

are we ideas in bodies?
are all ideas spirit in form?

Inhale an intuited absence of evil,
breathe the air of answered prayer.

Imagine that, let fly the idea of you,
beloved individuated potential saint.

Here is your sentimental inner edge,
your gnosis pressed flat as you see in.

The edge of this bubble, is distant
only to the holy cloaked in asceticism,
twisting wicks
for someday light in someday night,
circulate one way then the other,
rethinking perfected emptiness,
there are no others, up or down,
to and fro, vectors tie targeted states,
spider kites form single ray classic webbing,
slim banner, a flag unraveled long since.

Follow me, I say to me, follow me,
I say to you, saying back, I am not you.

My option.
Turn on, sit back and watch,
evolving cave wall interesting hooks,

look around, nothing interesting, eh?
Television as imagined by petrified apes,
during peak-info preservation history,
when men like Franklin and Voltaire,
met to share secret meanings of things.

Previous to any whole story
that remains, as when any mind mistakes
tzimtzum inside as first occurrence,

total emptiness, pre space, one time
this instant accepted as audience

in true gaseous we form, auto informing
the vegetable phaze passed eons ago, life
tells tales too esoteric for novices
to notice, in the ideal state, active
imagining, as with a child's mind, yours
since ever was, so far as you may wish
to remember,
a time when the state was deemed
comforting and beauty filled, chaotic
process of floating lipids, in form of air,
light has not dawned on us, we are
night scene setters of settings, nodes
of potential anything you can imagine,

level with me, even, straight, right… yes it
is the optional meandering mind engine,
an idol, or a daimon, madness of sorted
degrees, a little bit off the charts, sorted
out.
Not in, the bubble being becomes,
when one emerges in a self…

subtle is good, right, we agree?
Jesus, before Christianity, as a kid,
instructed with his cousin John,
likely by his temple servant uncle.

That can be imagined, projected
on the outerwall
of this bubble we be in.
At the moment,
on an Earth wired

for sound, elephants agreeing to meet,
to follow the pilgrimage, pilgrim beings
activated by stark necessity successful
to this degree…

by the reader's time's
at tension, pull
release
snap back, at what ifery, at once, push

most bottom centered point once sitting
in raw time thought processing, in
and out, efforting
- slightly off, not fully on
uncomfortable impression of holy
you better get better or else. Holy

blank slate, bubble pop, soft wow

Now, we're in the swirl, in the spin
toward, froward lips sealed, golden
silence,
subtler than any beast, creature,
living thing in the ruliad, am I? No.

BUT, you know, those penance prayers,
given you as a child, enchantments,
as with all your renouncements of evil
and pledges under God, in your child mind.

Look. To your own self, be true.
You still have private interpretation access
to your child mind.

If you put your worried mind to work
on some thought too deep to ponder then,

The idea of punishment by the Creator
of all that is not God, but was deemed good,
by God, because I said so, said the father,
in the child mind.

To know good and evil knowledge,
that talent, initial mark on our blank slate,
to know, not what you know, but ask
your child mind, how does it feel,

flat on your back gasping as others laugh,
and your child mind blooms an entire eon
- just to catch a breath takes for ever
and there were others, the whole family
of mankind of your kind, to your child mind,
stood laughing at your attempt to perform

a first flight, from an edged bet with an
I think I can virus perpetuated in ever after,

since mind made time make sense in chaos.
Instantly, things start to take shapes, in mind.
Non sense. Since. Processing time. Go.
Instants out of mind, in atari.
Fog of unknowns. I used to play the game.
Not really, only, one off thought forms,
cloudlike in symmetry, no clear tongue
and groove, fitting our pro-posed… pose

supposed, to listen and while listening,
learn the use of any knowing, can be
taken as granted possibility by your self.
- distant sound of light sabers actuation
Your blame and shame catcher, out front,
as we steam ahead across the gap,
thoughts made prayers must leap.

Keep your eyes on the prize, three
walnuts and a split pea with a hair, fine
infant hair, see it there, your old minds eye.

The unveiling of an artifice, an angle
greater than straight, from this point…
a re-entrant angle, like a point, banked shot.

in
Thanks, I needed you to ready become... said the little blue man... whatsoever we agree... indeed. Let us see...
Mark Toney Nov 2019
First commercially successful
Video game technology
Pong arcade video game
Made by Atari
Loved by millions instantly
Started an 80 billion dollar industry
Pong -no Ping-
Just Pong

Simplistic graphics still astound
Mesmerized by the sound
Blip
Blip
Pong, blip
Blip
Pong, blip
Pong, blip
PONG!!!

Hah!  Point made
In the shade!
First to eleven
In Pong heaven
Blip
Blip
Pong, blip
Blip
Pong, blip
Pong, blip
PONG!!!

A social lubricant it became
Relationships formed
Playing the game-
Rocking to our favorite songs
Staying awake all night long
Taking turns playing Pong
Pong -no Ping-
Just Pong
7/27/2019 - Poetry form: Rhyme - "Pong was the first commercially successful video game, which helped to establish the video game industry along with the first home console, the Magnavox Odyssey... The game has been remade on numerous home and portable platforms following its release. Pong is part of the permanent collection of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. due to its cultural impact." -Wikipedia "Pong" - Copyright © Mark Toney | Year Posted 2019
Jeremy Betts Jun 2023
Forget it...and forget you for even trying to think you could out run it. You can't handle this shiit nor can you hide from it, should probably quit or at least tone it down a bit, it's starting to get a bit pathetic.
It's already got you, it owns you, I told you. If you are hearing this then it's too late, there's nothing you can do. Sorry not sorry, can't say I didn't warn you. It don't matter if you believe it or not to be true.
It doesn't need you to accept it or to co-sign, it'll provide proof of what it can do in it's own time, in a lone rhyme that sends chills through your bones, directly down your yellow spine
Fuuck, they like to say they're just words but are they? These are like sticks and stones that break bones in a unique way, blacking out your heart and steal your soul away and it starts today...

...with me sitting here writing fear like a smear campaign, an assault on your ear that's so sincere, so severe that it'll appear to adhere to all you hold dear like an unwanted souvenir, make it real as the blood that'll smear from the front to the rear of my Chevy Cavalier from the people who use to be here but were met with the same fate as a lost deer wondering in the freeway just north of here. I know you can hear but have I done enough to make myself perfectly clear?

To make it known that I'm not one you want to mess with unless you've got a death wish, if you want to rot on your own cot in your own personal grave plot I've got the perfect spot to lay you down, plant you in you're own ceramic flower ***, but then I thought I oughta bought a big enough plot of land to lay down all who fall from this onslaught, a verbal Juggernaut but you can still come at me and take a shot if you want

And if you do, if that's the case then by all means, name the time and place cause I prefer face to face, I have this twisted trait that allows me to demonstrate how to create a ****** case, how to keep pace and champion a death race, how to get CSI looking at a piece of cheese on the end of a string i placed under a milk crate after a wild goose chase, not a trace of evidence just a message on the back of a bookcase to further the foot race, so check your shoe lace, you don't want to trip up and fall on your face while running from a phrase like trying to escape your goth days, a ridiculous phase

I lay it out plain and simple, just one well placed word or thought out syllable that will cause a tsunami title wave ripple that'll ******* any defence like Clearasil on a pimple, not a complicated riddle unless you're the monkey in the middle. It'll sit a little easier if we can keep it civil after the acquittal, critical thinking will get you through the hassle, to the end of the castle to save the princess but that's not the end of the battle, the system we're in is not a Nintendo, no Atari with a wired joystick paddle, these words are the detergent just added, nowhere near the rinse cycle, one wrong move could be fatal, if you think this a fable you could be one of the ones to wined up on an autopsy table

But it's damage to your psyche not your body that brought you to one knee, words they said couldn't harm obviously do have that ability, I grip that knowledge firmly, hold on tightly like it's a master key, the bounty is set and out, don't try to flee, got your mind hazy, to foggy to see, no friendly face here, no card to get out of jail free, these words that flow so easy from me hold you in captivity and break you down slowly, fully emersed, wrapped in perverse words like a mummy, held captive in this verse like a dummy, a cursed hostage with no request for no money, no escape once I've got thee and test out my theory that clearly I can do just as much damage with word trickery as one could do with assault and battery or a quick slice of a main vain artery but with no evidence visually I get away scott-free

So listen with caution, this cautionary tale is not spun to further the friction, there's not a fraction of this that's fiction, it's just that I can't stop what's already begun, what's done is done, I've won, your defenses are broken, the threat was one not as obvious as a gun so you thought it innocent fun but the jokes on you son, as soon as you read the caption it was straight to the coffin, my words just happen to often be a little somethin' like Jason, Mr Voorhees on a couple ****** sprees, tape shows once the chasings begun it would do no good to run, a fusion of life and illusion to cause mass confusion and frighten to the point you die of a brain contusion, written in a way that there's no coming back from, fallen from grace, in continuous motion as you fall through the bottom of your rock bottom, a deep chasm, a dark ocean, it's going to be grousome but by that point I'm on to the next one cause I know the outcome, you were ****** from before you could even apply caution,  before you realized you should use a life line to call someone, its already become something that could never be undone, don't look for a cure cause I can assure there ain't none. There's no fun in the remedy so I take action to make sure there ain't one

©2023
Michael Amery Aug 2014
Couple of things you should know about me,

One: I don’t like you.

I don’t know you and I don’t like you.
It’s not your fault,
I have been programmed this way,
An overbearing, overprotective monarch of a father
Combined with school yard bullies,
Teachers, priests, mother,
Evil grandmother,
And bad 1980’s movies all combined to ensure that
I don’t like you.
Stranger Danger,
Go away.

Two: You don’t know me.

How could you?
I don’t know myself.
The ‘me’ you find presented before you is nothing more than layers of ******* piled one on top of the other,
By family, friends, school yard bullies,
Morning cartoons, Atari, broken hearts and a mind that never sleeps,
(Certainly never shuts the **** up!)
A product of a society
No more advanced in this age of information
Then when we crawled out of the proverbial goo,
Cheaply constructed, covered with flashy pleasing knick-knacks,
Prettily packaged and presented for your purchase,
Swipe your credit card debt here please,
Yet not build to last.  
I am lost somewhere deep beneath the ‘me’ that was chosen by
‘You’.
This has been popping in and out of my head for years. Not sure where it comes from but thought best to explore it.
Everything is not what it seems..
Does your mind comprehend what your eyes see.
The government and media is playing us  Atari..
Two sides of the same coin republican and democratic parties
Do you really know who your siding with
When the guns start firing
who are you riding with
Better yet who riding  for you
The people you put your faith in is lying to you
Only God tells the truth
No one knows right a 90 degree angle
I align with truth too many align with a fable..
Live life off a TV guide aligned to cable
Minds locked to the DVR...
Press play witness disease birthed from the hands of man SARS
Call this the land of the brave
I call this the land of the slave
The walking dead the United States a mass grave
Only one can shed light
Only one can give life
His name Jesus, Satan will not suffice
The President to me is a equivalent to a grain of rice..
Despite the celebration it doesn't matter if he's black or white
I recognize a  puppet crafted..
Strings lead to a demonic master.
Katelynn Hillier Nov 2012
"What do you want?" He asked.
" Its not that simple" I say

It seemed like he stared in to my soul, he was searching for something.
Anything.
Soul searching?

"What do you want?"

Heavy breathing
My mind raced, what do I want?

Thoughts, pictures popped into my mind.

I want the rain to stop so I can see your beautiful face.
I want you to hold me and never let me go.
I want you to tell me, I'm the Dream Catcher to her Atari.
I want to wake up in one of your old t-shirts.
I want to hear your thoughts.
I want to hear you say I love you, and none other.
I want...
My head clear of you, I want to think about anything other than you.
I want to have my heart back..
I want the feeling of self pity to vanish.

" Something that isn't possible. "
Randy Johnson Jan 2016
When I was a child during the winter, I hated the sun because it melted the snow.
And when the snow was melted by the sun, school was where I had to go.
As a child, when it snowed, school was closed and it was sure to excite.
But when the snow was gone, it was back to school and that sure did bite.
When I got to stay home from school, I could play my Atari and it was fun.
But when the snow melted, I had to return to school because of the **** sun.
If other children are like I was, they become very happy every time it snows.
And when the snow melts, kids become like Homer Simpson, they yell "Doh!"
This is a true story.
Carlo C Gomez Jul 2020
What is sleep?
It's 1979 again
And I'm in Atari's Astroids
Caught in the laser beam
And no matter how
Many electric sheep
I count
There's no going back
To Pillowland
Midnight City is open
So are the caffeinated veins
Running thru
My nocturnal console
Night shifts have me
Splintered in my head
Let's see how I score
On the Athens scale
You are sitting there playing atari with your sunglasses on
smoking a cigarette
you are bad cat
a mad bat
gliding through the night
you wear your leather jacket tight
a cute bugs bunny girl hides
when she sees you
i am waiting on that ****** doo twist
till your charms jump the shark
so i can pick up that girl
that hides from you in the dark
David Ehrgott Jul 2015
Mommy,
When is daddy coming home?
He's out of town, on business
No, you can't phone
Play your Atari
Leave your brother alone
\Daddy, oh daddy
Is mommy dead?
We don't know yet, darling
Now, just go to bed
\Children, oh children
don't breath the air
No, no, don't touch that
That parcel's not cleared
\Our armies and air force
Will fight over there
It's war now, dear children
Be brave and don't fear
Michelle M Jan 2018
Cruising along mudddy
mountain back roads
in my father's Bronco,
A misty rain hovering,
on the horizon,

The Eagles,
Or Fogleberg,
Or Little Feat
drifting fuzzily,
into the back seat
Dad intermittently,
singing along,
and cursing the fog.

My Grandfather's musty trailer,
Atari games beeping and blooping,
from the television,
A jubilee of pixles,
thrumming on the 32 inch set.

My cousins chasing me,
through the hay lofts,
Michael falling from the rafters,
Six feet into a cow pie,
the size of Mt. Everest,
Neck high and flies buzzing,

Jake and I making the long trek,
back to our parents,
to report that our charge,
had been accidentally,
suctioned into a vortex of ****,
They were mostly mad,
that we had left him there,

The sweet strumming,
of my father's guitar by a bonfire,
Beer cans hissing and popping,
morphing into alien shapes,
in the flames.

Stars a cacauphony,
of tiny lights overhead,
If you walked just a few steps,
away from the blaze,
you could get lost
in their cosmic spiral,

My dad had a story,
about the time he saw a ufo,
in those stars,
How one shot up into the sky,
then straight down,
like a plummeting rocket,

Only he didn't belive things like that.
Ever the pragmatist,
quick to interject that we were all,
just worm food,
but when he told that story,
his hairs stood on end.

Days spent
picking grapes off the vine,
gorging myself in the,
strawberry patch,
and in the orchard,
There were so many apples
that we left some for the deer,

I recall being jealous,
that the boys got to go hunting,
while I stayed back canning fruit,
with the women.

Weirdly wishing,
that I could amass,
rank and file,
with the men,
Douse myself in animal ****,
and sit painfully still,
for hours,
in a rickety tree stand,
Our play house was probably sturdier,
and better insulated.

Looking after those stupid beagles,
and gathering eggs from,
stupider chickens,
Feeding infant cows with,
oversized baby bottles,
cradling them,
kicking and *******,
in my skinny arms,
barely aware of the pervasive smell
of manure.

Eating Papa's tomato casserole,
and drinking buttermilk,
Thinking they were only things
in his whole kitchen,
that weren't mouldy,
or mildly terrifying.

Walking wooded trails,
on cold mornings,
catching quick glimpses,
of foxes and grouse,
before they fled,
Warned off by the snapping
of small twigs underfoot.

Such rare and beautiful moments.
I didn't appreciate them then.
Only now that those days,
are long past,
just wistful songs in the mountains,
can I recognize their worth,
and sing their twangy melody,
with warmth and love.
Aaron LaLux Aug 2018
Come on man,
get with the program,
things are moving at a speed,
that's the opposite of a slow dance,

so no there's no time for negativity,
not at all not even a chance,
it's time to advance into the  21st Century,
we're no longer Cavemen & the Dark Ages have long ago passed,

& even though the Past has passed,
sometimes it still haunts our Collective Memory,
like that guy from Memento trying to count back to this moment now,
got the invitation long ago but still don’t know who sent for me,

but unlike that guy from Memento when I put back the pieces of the puzzle,
I hope I don't find a sick plot twist like discovering that I murdered my wife,
see sometimes we are our worst enemy plus memories can be tricky,
so I tread carefully as I retrace my steps that led me to this moment in time,

& I’m so fckn Emo for still dealing with these feelings,
of being in love with those that don't love me & pretending I don't give a fck,
even though I’m afraid of real emotions & afraid to show them & it shows,
so I guard my Heart’s ramparts & stand guard as my own Sentry ****,

& I'm just so over not being able to get over it that I'm sick to my stomach,

& of course I have regrets from my past,
& of course I have pain I mean who doesn’t have at least some of that,
but resilience is one of the main keys to not suffering defeat,
I mean at least not in the streets by the hands of a Broken Soldier in retreat,

or a Soulless body that sold it's soul to party or an Emotional Zombie,
both as outdated as the old Atari & sorry but I suggest you press delete,

& that's why I won't engage with any more enraged psychopaths,
I’ve been down that road before so now I know better than that,
no Sir, no Ma’am, instead, I am, on what, They call, The Path,
in a forward upwards onwards motion on a sorta sorted NoWarPath,

& you can go ahead & hashtag that,
if you want to attempt to invent a fad,
here I'll do it 1st & you can do it 2nd,
& hey 2nd isn't 1st  but hey it's also not last so really it's not bad,

#NoWarPath

don't want to rain down a shower of bullets,
would rather just take a bubble bath...

excerpt from The Holy Trilogy Vol. 2: Manadalas
available world wide here: www.amazon.com/dp/1721134158
I learned my ABC's
Before snakes and ladders
Only to find out the words ladders
Had less snakes, and what mattered

More than letters were numbers
Life's monopoly where's go
No get out of jail free card
And most of the X's and O's

Were in a game of tic tac toe
So life's complicated, unlike Atari
Where opponents, use fake words
When they ***** u like life was sorry

And like trouble, our plans fall over
Like a dominoe set
Money? Security? Like go fish
With a boss that's Alex trebek

Asks questions as you sweat
Constantly in jeopardy, an orphan
A game of hangman, and hang men
Who can't buy vowels, wit no fortune

so life's game is wheel of misfortune
Where there's no truth. Just dare
And the price is never right
I mean who doesnt wannabe a millionaire

But when your the weakest link
You're treated as a pawn for your labor
Left a contestant on survivor,
Not as smart as a fifth grader

That's why families feud
Until like scrabble words don't make
A sound, left with a frown to make
Everyone as crazy as eights

Left only to bluff like poker
Acting wild as a joker
With no bridge to bridge the hole
When ur the *******, going over

21, to bust like blackjack
Losing even in uno
Left only to play solitaire and lose
Like a skitzo beating himself in judo

Cause in the end, society reads the
Same code, as computers so Heros
Are those who don't quit the game of *******. When they aren't a 1 just zero

Cuz like binary code there's only 2 roads
1 or zero, and those that stuck through
And didn't forfeit their checkered chess match til the end, are those I look up to
Mateuš Conrad May 2016
****** XL - All Guitar Flamethrower Guy
Mad Max Fury Road OST Music Mix;
i kiss my cat goodnight...
**** me should i be found kissing
your forehead goodnight...
atheism would seem rather simple;
i tend to think of myself as the guitarist,
adding to the fact that i'm head-banging
adding to the rhythmic section;
and if you gonna be ******,
               you might as well be ****** with me:
K **** U C (https://goo.gl/LAI8R9)
and a leather crown on my head...
for added stretch marks
kindred of Pompeii goosebumps;
yep, and i'll be next to put a happy meal
between my legs to slice out
an Atari's solo worth of programming
and football and Turk vizier's backgammon;
like i ******* care.
Thomas W Case Feb 2021
I feel like I'm
stuck in a bad
video game,
like pong, from
the first Atari.
And I'm that little  
dot that gets ponged
back and forth.
Life is like a
Scene from Dante's
inferno...
Abandon all hope...
I need mountains,
The ocean,
And the breath of
6 week old puppies.
https://booksie.chainletter.io/i/thomaswcase888
Here is a link to my recently published Limited Edition book, Rise Up Collected Poems and Short Stories.
Jason Apr 2021


I am not an Atari running Logo.

I will wear a turtle costume for you.

I will Go-To-Line-22, and I will STOP for you.

I will even Go-To-End, for you.

But if you're not there, for me, you'll eventually find that turtle costume unresponsive.


Did you try turning it off and back on?
Randy Johnson Sep 2018
I want to go to a time when things were great.
I wish that I could travel back in time to 1978.
I'd like to revisit the seventies because I loved that decade.
Back then, 8 Track tapes and records were still being played.
Songs were clean back then, now they're littered with the F word.
In 1978, music meant something and vulgarity wasn't what we heard.
40 years ago, we had no smart phones and no High Definition TV.
But landline phones and standard definition are just fine with me.
Video games ****** back then but I could live with an Atari.
If I could revisit 1978, I dojn't think that I would be sorry.
Andrew Rueter Aug 2022
This week I want to be a rapper
so enjoy me repeating what everyone else says
as I resume my desperate journey for clout:
I come from the place I was born in
it made me tougher due to being a violent environment
stemming from socioeconomic conditions that continue to be neglected
but even though people born in these conditions usually end up poor
I did not because I'm a special individual
who admittedly sold drugs in the past
but now I have legitimate revenue streams
and thus no longer have to sell drugs
and can still buy plenty of expensive commodities
like cars and shoes and jewelry
so of course the combination
of my new worth and the public's awareness of me
leads to a plethora of opportunities for ****** *******
which is a lot of fun
like the drugs I do if I so choose
because my insulated social circle
condones and supports such activities
but there are people who don't appreciate my modality
you may or may not be one of them
but I don't care what you think (as long as you're listening)
because I believe your opinion is affected
by your jealousy of my material possessions and lifestyle
which I don't think is fair because you aren't aware
of the totality of my experience
or how my financial success is equivalent
to the amount of labor I produced
therefore I choose to disregard your negative opinion henceforward
because I'm compelled to follow my own determination
for what's suitable for me
which is rapping about hopping out the 'rari
and how you can't play me like Atari
over trap drums and magnums
you can't hear me say I'm sorry.
There are a lot of great rap songs out there this is just a parody of a specific overused template
Mateuš Conrad Oct 2018
well....
  (enter a pseudo-nervous laugh,
ever so shy on paranoia)....
if you're going to play
that sort of game...
        better meat, yes, meat
me, not meet me in my local
bastions...
                 see you in the thick
of night, in the forest,
                        rummaging
your way through a lurch of
fallen, autumn leaves
you get to equate to perfume?
come over here,
come these parts!
    what, you're ***** whipping
me out of the "contest"?
you think i haven't walked
these parts?!
             two squirrels fair way...
what?
  you tell me...
i'm done explaining what
is better explained by *******...
and firemen...
     and a Promethean concept
of fire...
               riddled down
by a most confusing role
of the minor role of being employed...
no wonder why i write..
videos...
   the hey-day,
of the rental days...
Godzilla...
      VCR... and the equipment that
came with it... JVC...
Blockbusters'?
**** me...
                        they still exist
at the dead-end of
the Central Line...
  Loughton...
                  i can't even comprehend...
how you can write a history,
with such immediacy of
nostalgia being intact...
you can't write a history
with such an impeding nostalgia,
a nostalgia,
that's trans-historiological -
a nostalgia that's less about the times,
but more about the technology,
of the times...
a hammer is a hammer is a hammer
is a nail...
         that doesn't change,
unless... well... originating it with
a bird's beak, and pecking...
different story...
  history has become revamped,
escalated,
expediently escalated from the birth
of Nintendo...
      even earlier, Atari...
manga cartoons overtook the point
of Disney...
we don't live in times
of post-history...
we've already had out atheistic phase...
atheism was the 20th century...
what we've inherited from
20th century's atheism
is... ahistoricity of the 21st century...
after all...
history was the romance
of the concept of time...
so before the romancing of space dies...
before all the tourists
settle the ****, down...
tell me what's on the bucket list of
"things" to die?
in the 19th century philosophers
and poets were nostalgic about
Ancient Greece (Nietzsche,
  Hölderlin)...
                     me?
vaguely nostalgic of Kant...
  but... **** me...
1990s music...
          i'm nostalgic about the time-frame
that constipates a lifespan...
the past 30 years...
and come to think of it...
by reducing history to a nostalgia...
i'm dragging time along with
me, ushering in a phase
of the most competent advent of
a fusion of mortality with death...
i am...
   seemingly...
   a perfected chapter,
within the confines of an imperfect book;
and i am not alone in
perfecting the crass craft,
also considered, life.
- but that's beside the point...
can you imagine people prior to us,
being nostalgic,
of their own selves,
just years prior?
no other people have been
nostalgic of, "themselves"...
not in their lifetime...
    in the 19th century the Germans
were "nostalgic" succumbing
to Ancient Greece reminder "psychosis"...
but we're the people...
who, with all the progress,
are nostalgic, concerning
only 10 years prior...
   which means...
    for whatever advancements...
we're basically hitting our heads
against a cul de sac...
since, by now...
it's a claustrophobia's worth
of history...
   19th century America?
it's no longer a nostalgia...
it's a fantasy...
                   i can't believe i am nostalgic
about what was circa 25 years ago...
then again i'm not
that much nostalgic...
       but at the same time i cannot
enforce a faking of dementia,
i can't synthesize an amnesia;
the kiddy element isn't there...
but sure as **** the technology
wasn't there to begin with...
we dug holes in the ground,
and threw marbles around,
we played hide and seek...
while the girls chalked the pavement
and "danced" the tic-tac-toe!
and the girls would jump the skip-rope!
and we would actually watch
MTV for the Queen videos...
and the Shakespeare's Sisters video...
now...
   this sort of ******* should be
written by someone aged 70...
i'm 32...
                    so... go figure what's up.
Michael Marchese Dec 2017
They call me Tyrant
The gypsy warlock
I’m a poetry raven
Tick tocking the debt clock
An equinox battle ox
Socialist loner
A criminal guru
A Holy Ghost stoner
An ironclad nightshade
The wind in the trees
A stoic centurion
Freedom disease
A pondering star
A bazaaro safari
A strategy master
An ancient Atari
A Godzilla movie
The wall on the fly
I’m a riot on acid
A really fungi

— The End —