"bulleted" poems
the committee
has convened
(kangaroos corralled)
the agenda
is set
(scapegoats framed)
the politicos
are preened
(perfect patriots)
hair coiffed
teeth whitened
(fangs sharpened)
correct talking
points bulleted
(minds closed)
puffed chests
perfectly postured
(bombastic bravado)
freedom fighters
stand firm
(Constitution usurpers)
American flag
lapel pins
(sparkling bright)
liberty's spirit
and tolerance
(roundly condemned)
special interests
are watching
(payola earned)
partisan lines
clearly drawn
(democracy doomed)
Music Selection
Cream: Politician
Oakland
10/1/10
jbm
Apr 12, 2013
Apr 12, 2013 at 7:46 PM UTC
the wind whispers to you in furious ways,
ominous notes, like a dusty violin
stenciling finality into the air.
the percussion
of foot-soldiers trembles the grass.
you have grown, my war-child,
from the days of ****** tea parties
to a diva guerrilla,
terrible and well-rehearsed,
your bulleted libretto close to your chest--
and as trumpets sound in the offing,
the curtain draws back.
AK-47, pizzicato--
gasoline breeds fire, incinerates woodwinds,
the wine of the coloratura soprano
melts into blood.
witch, ***** daughter of gunpowder,
bella contralto, your
deep and tremulous vibrato is a
grenade,
and as death crashes to a crescendo,
mortality in the tin frequency of cymbals--
the only armistice
is annihilation.
Dec 4, 2013
Dec 4, 2013 at 10:27 PM UTC
You deserve an Ode, so here I shall bode.
You are the freckles on a child,
sporadic, excessive, and just as wild;
the raging dots of acne on a teenager,
hormones and stress as the main factor;
the bullets from the bullet point to-do list of an undergrad,
and maybe sometimes the actual bullets
in a graduate who would rather eat bullets
than check off another bullet
from their bulleted to do list.
You are many. You are few.
The wrinkles of the elderly;
the cracks on a highway;
the hairs on a head;
the texture on my ceiling.
I exist secularly. I lie here alone. But you.
You are all encompassing, omniscient, and misunderstood.
Not only visible at night, as you claim,
but forever present in the eyes of a lover.
Not capable of granting wishes as they say,
but still worthy in the eyes of humans to discover.
They discover and uncover another and another-
a never-ending game of hide and seek.
And you laugh, scoff at those who feebly scramble
in search of a higher power,
when there is no power higher than the stars.
Mar 4, 2015
Mar 4, 2015 at 7:32 PM UTC
I could toss my cares over a rainbow
Let it hang there a while and dry out its sorry behind
As I squeeze some slices of brackish time to research the deliberate contours of your patience
Swerving its way past concealed match sticks
Bend at the so definite behest of none.
Slurring backwards
Tentative graphica
Huge baskets of winding fun
Sketchy image pencilled in, for now
Details come later in -------- a terminal
(hopefully)
Charcoal drawings offer the sweet sound of breaking cumulus and sudden wax of orange
come to life on a sullen bed of love apples
shapes are p-p-p-pulled to painstaking proportion
deep lines stippled drastic
dragged along on unwieldy wagon strokes
Art never really tastes ink but celebrates ephemerae
yet trapping half understood and beautiful pictures
beneath mocking glass panels
smudged with such deep knowinggggg
You can do something to stop this **** blood impasse
beset more so with counterfeit decline
blind bull rage too ready and bloodthirsty acts bay
half crippled and on its knees, how your land cries
see the (over)spill of rightly invective remain unresolved
See the deprivation at the lake
all gall thirsty, yet none to drink
just a hapless event smarting
On a downward cyclic turn
no more will sing voices when old gripes unheard
scream in the long, red lines bulleted across that holy floor
albeit the wicked general holds the trussed up cards
he won’t bother scraping the dried salt of kin later
it grows ever more in sad mounds on the little green book
awaiting missing miracle
inflections of a restless mind
within the ***** creep
retorts from peerless craft forge
entangled moans in briars and sundry
resort to savour within disyllabic silence
Can you but count the ways in which these coins of seeking do ****** across
an afflicted floor of red lines to an exculpated heart, un(cor)rected ?
Unprocessed miracles are items of constant bewonderment in duress living
Dec 19, 2013
Dec 19, 2013 at 2:57 AM UTC
Splendid soldier you
I'm merely your descendant
barely fit to footstep follow
I'm discipled , My kindred hero
Foreign soils desperately dank
Churchillian's major tactical outflank
Death by bulleted blight
******* German bight
Evil eradication in Holland's nether land
Liberation free , Guaranteed
Twas his life he gave
Home to a war hero's grave
Death knell to heroic soldier blue
And maybe I'm a tad bitter 'tis true
My Blood lost his life to a gameplan
After all what's a medal without the man
Martyn Grindrod
My tribute to my Grandad
William Fred Grindrod
20/12/1918 - 30/11/1944
Who would have been 100 years old today.
Dec 20, 2018
Dec 20, 2018 at 8:47 AM UTC
In a panic, having lost control of the vehicle at high speed and swerving off the Data Highway, I assessed the impending impact and made quick mental notes for a feasibility study as the stationary tree moved closer rapidly. In a flash, ultimate outcomes passed before my eyes, like the newest edition of a celestial Clearslide/PowerPoint/Prezi presentation tool:
• Data drives performance as winter wind whips the data-driven snow.
• Real-time numbers are to outcomes what God is to Heaven.
• Data supersedes Life as Christ supersedes the angels.
• Vigorous data collection enhances and informs rigorous data selection.
• Data is to outcomes as outcomes are to income.
• Objectives tied to measurable outcomes bring numbers back into the game, turning benchwarmers into real-time benchmarks.
• Data quality ensures accountability, facilitates transparency, reducing redundancy.
• Performance indicators are ultimate vindicators, turning competitors into partners and sustaining creative growth by creating sustainable change.
• Data are plural – but only to the Brits…
These bulleted staff-development phantasms surged into my mind right before the massive, jarring crunch when my vehicle smashed into the Tree of Life that grows just off the Data-Driven Highway. I cannot recall the moment of collision, nor the impact assessment study that preceded it. It seemed many, many Continuing Staff Improvement sessions later when I awoke to the soothing pastel shades and muted color scheme of a projected graphic full of squiggly arrows, cyber-hieroglyphics and professionally-presented slides filled with corporate jargon. I was finally in Data Heaven where the numbers never lie but rise to live forever.
I had achieved my final measurable objective!
Feb 17, 2017
Feb 17, 2017 at 11:34 AM UTC
thoughts bulleted
in my brain, ricocheting,
creative side to practical side,
lustful half to hateful half.
sleep? yeah, right.
i got up, located cleanser
and sponge, scrubbed
the bathroom,
washed the dishes,
waxed the kitchen floor.
wrote a four- page
letter to my sister,
told her i was in love.
with a girl.
i think i asked
for her forgiveness.
wrote a poem, and epic, tinged
with dark humor,
decided to give it to my mom
because this was all her fault.
somehow.
went to the bathroom,
considered my ground stomach,
but the thought of food made me want to heave.
settled for a beer. That went down fine,
so I had another.
and another.
Jan 11, 2019
Jan 11, 2019 at 11:58 PM UTC
Thank you, but I have vowed
to accept the fact that luck is as good
a chance to take as grace,
no exchange, no earning luck, never was.
Good luck is only good, bad luck is a mistake,
a grasping at things that did occur,
to change
at sudden, certain, central points,
miss the aim as teleos is said to be a mistake,
the act of aiming
definite purpose, ala Napoleon hill, aim to ****
train the brain to fear no death, not mine,
not the other guys,
I am the weapon,
possessed of the spirit of the bayoneted and bulleted,
points used to **** flood the ******
Flanders fields, at that time of year, first the blade,
then the ear, then fields sing thanks and bloom
***** scarlet poppies… later in the spring
Aim at nothing, the mind
of the machine
gunner reacts, point and spray, if you pray,
I say,
pray for the man who takes careful aim,
and squeezes, knowing sudden
bang
budges not the aim aimed true and followed
through.
Machine gunner, pray for me.
Feb 20, 2022
Feb 20, 2022 at 5:32 PM UTC
Even if I find myself driving away
in a car all by myself breaking every law
and practically flying,
I am doing what I want right now.
I am home, I am safe, I am
loved no matter my flaws.
I pull out of the driveway and onto
the road.
This is how I party.
By myself, stopping for small bits of food,
and playing whatever song at the highest volume.
Before I was home I was in pain.
I suffered holding in every breath that meant
need.
I fought back tears as I walked where my flooding
eyes would be noticed.
I smiled and said I was good whenever the
‘how are you’ questioned bulleted in me.
I would have said,
‘homesick, not even a care that I am used to this place
away from home’.
Here at home I am forgiven no matter what I break and
loved no matter what forsaken move I make.
I’m breathing normally, and I am not worried
about who is out to hurt me.
I don’t hurt back,
I reassure my senses and nobody says I can’t
go home.
This is my real home.
Dec 17, 2015
Dec 17, 2015 at 9:52 PM UTC