Here is a primer on the history of poetry

Features of Modernism

To varying extents, writing of the Modernist period exhibits these features:

1. experimentation

belief that previous writing was stereotyped and inadequate
ceaseless technical innovation, sometimes for its own sake
originality: deviation from the norm, or from usual reader expectations
ruthless rejection of the past, even iconoclasm

2. anti-realism

sacralisation of art, which must represent itself, not something beyond preference for allusion (often private) rather than description
world seen through the artist's inner feelings and mental states
themes and vantage points chosen to question the conventional view
use of myth and unconscious forces rather than motivations of conventional plot

3. individualism

promotion of the artist's viewpoint, at the expense of the communal
cultivation of an individual consciousness, which alone is the final arbiter
estrangement from religion, nature, science, economy or social mechanisms
maintenance of a wary intellectual independence
artists and not society should judge the arts: extreme self-consciousness
search for the primary image, devoid of comment: stream of consciousness
exclusiveness, an aristocracy of the avant-garde

4. intellectualism

writing more cerebral than emotional
work is tentative, analytical and fragmentary, more posing questions more than answering them
cool observation: viewpoints and characters detached and depersonalized
open-ended work, not finished, nor aiming at formal perfection
involuted: the subject is often act of writing itself and not the ostensible referent

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Expressionism

Expressionism was a phase of twentieth-century writing that rejected naturalism and romanticism to express important inner truths. The style was generally declamatory or even apocalyptic, endeavoring to awaken the fears and aspirations that belong to all men, and which European civilization had rendered effete or inauthentic. The movement drew on Rimbaud and Nietzsche, and was best represented by German poetry of the 1910-20 period. Benn, Becher, Heym, Lasker-Schüler, Stadler, Stramm, Schnack and Werfel are its characteristic proponents, {1} though Trakl is the best known to English readers. {2} {3}

Like most movements, there was little of a manifesto, or consensus of beliefs and programmes. Many German poets were distrustful of contemporary society — particularly its commercial and capitalist attitudes — though others again saw technology as the escape from a perceived "crisis in the old order". Expressionism was very heterogeneous, touching base with Imagism, Vorticism, Futurism, Dadaism and early Surrealism, many of which crop up in English, French, Russian and Italian poetry of the period. Political attitudes tended to the revolutionary, and technique was overtly experimental. Nonetheless, for all the images of death and destruction, sometimes mixed with messianic utopianism, there was also a tone of resignation, a sadness of "the evening lands" as Spengler called them.

Expressionism also applies to painting, and here the characteristics are more illuminating. The label refers to painting that uses visual gestures to transmit emotions and emotionally charged messages. In the expressive work of Michelangelo and El Greco, for example, the content remains of first importance, but content is overshadowed by technique in such later artists as van Gogh, Ensor and Munch. By the mid twentieth-century even this attenuated content had been replaced by abstract painterly qualities — by the sheer scale and dimensions of the work, by colour and shape, by the verve of the brushwork and other effects.

Expressionism often coincided with rapid social change. Germany, after suffering the horrors of the First World War, and ineffectual governments afterwards, fragmented into violently opposed political movements, each with their antagonistic coteries and milieu. The painting of these groups was very variable, but often showed a mixture of aggression and naivety. Understandably unpopular with the establishment  — denounced as degenerate by the Nazis — the style also met with mixed reactions from the picture-buying public. It seemed to question what the middle classes stood for: convention, decency, professional expertise. A great sobbing child had been let loose in the artist's studio, and the results seemed elementally challenging. Perhaps German painting was returning to its Nordic roots, to small communities, apocalyptic visions, monotone starkness and anguished introspection.

What could poetry achieve in its turn? Could it use some equivalent to visual gestures, i.e. concentrate on aspects of the craft of poetry, and to the exclusion of content? Poetry can never be wholly abstract, a pure poetry bereft of content. But clearly there would be a rejection of naturalism. To represent anything faithfully requires considerable skill, and such skill was what the Expressionists were determined to avoid. That would call on traditions that were not Nordic, and that were not sufficiently opposed to bourgeois values for the writer's individuality to escape subversion. Raw power had to tap something deeper and more universal.

Hence the turn inward to private torments. Poets became the judges of poetry, since only they knew the value of originating emotions. Intensity was essential.  Artists had to believe passionately in their responses, and find ways of purifying and deepening those responses — through working practices, lifestyles, and philosophies. Freud was becoming popular, and his investigations into dreams, hallucinations and paranoia offered a rich field of exploration. Artists would have to glory in their isolation, moreover, and turn their anger and frustration at being overlooked into a belief in their own genius. Finally, there would be a need to pull down and start afresh, even though that contributed to a gradual breakdown in the social fabric and the apocalypse of the Second World War.

Expressionism is still with us. Commerce has invaded bohemia, and created an elaborate body of theory to justify, support and overtake what might otherwise appear infantile and irrational. And if traditional art cannot be pure emotional expression, then a new art would have to be forged. Such poetry would not be an intoxication of life (Nietzsche's phrase) and still less its sanctification.  Great strains on the creative process were inevitable, moreover, as they were in Georg Trakl's case, who committed suicide shortly after writing the haunting and beautiful piece given below

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SYMBOLIST POETS
symbolism in poetry

Symbolism in literature was a complex movement that deliberately extended the evocative power of words to express the feelings, sensations and states of mind that lie beyond everyday awareness. The open-ended symbols created by Charles Baudelaire (1821-67) brought the invisible into being through the visible, and linked the invisible through other sensory perceptions, notably smell and sound. Stéphane Mallarmé (1842-98), the high priest of the French movement, theorized that symbols were of two types. One was created by the projection of inner feelings onto the world outside. The other existed as nascent words that slowly permeated the consciousness and expressed a state of mind initially unknown to their originator.

None of this came about without cultivation, and indeed dedication. Poets focused on the inner life. They explored strange cults and countries. They wrote in allusive, enigmatic, musical and ambiguous styles. Rimbaud deranged his senses and declared "Je est un autre". Von Hofmannstahl created his own language. Valéry retired from the world as a private secretary, before returning to a mastery of traditional French verse. Rilke renounced wife and human society to be attentive to the message when it came.

Not all were great theoreticians or technicians, but the two interests tended to go together, in Mallarmé most of all. He painstakingly developed his art of suggestion, what he called his "fictions". Rare words were introduced, syntactical intricacies, private associations and baffling images. Metonymy replaced metaphor as symbol, and was in turn replaced by single words which opened in imagination to multiple levels of signification. Time was suspended, and the usual supports of plot and narrative removed. Even the implied poet faded away, and there were then only objects, enigmatically introduced but somehow made right and necessary by verse skill. Music indeed was the condition to which poetry aspired, and Verlaine, Jimenez and Valéry were among many who concentrated efforts to that end.

So appeared a dichotomy between the inner and outer lives. In actuality, poets led humdrum existences, but what they described was rich and often illicit: the festering beauties of courtesans and dance-hall entertainers; far away countries and their native peoples; a world-weariness that came with drugs, isolation, alcohol and bought ***. Much was mixed up in this movement — decadence, aestheticism, romanticism, and the occult — but its isms had a rational purpose, which is still pertinent. In what way are these poets different from our own sixties generation? Or from the young today: clubbing, experimenting with relationships and drugs, backpacking to distant parts? And was the mixing of sensory perceptions so very novel or irrational? Synaesthesia was used by the Greek poets, and indeed has a properly documented basis in brain physiology.

What of the intellectual bases, which are not commonly presented as matters that should engage the contemporary mind, still less the writing poet? Symbolism was built on nebulous and somewhat dubious notions: it inspired beautiful and historically important work: it is now dead: that might be the blunt summary. But Symbolist poetry was not empty of content, indeed expressed matters of great interest to continental philosophers, then and now. The contents of consciousness were the concern of Edmund Husserl (1859-1938), and he developed a terminology later employed by Heidegger (1889-1976), the Existentialists and hermeneutics. Current theories on metaphor and brain functioning extend these concepts, and offer a rapprochement between impersonal science and irrational literary theory.

So why has the Symbolism legacy dwindled into its current narrow concepts? Denied influence in the everyday world, poets turned inward, to private thoughts, associations and the unconscious. Like good Marxist intellectuals they policed the area they arrogated to themselves, and sought to correct and purify the language that would evoke its powers. Syntax was rearranged by Mallarmé. Rhythm, rhyme and stanza patterning were loosened or rejected. Words were purged of past associations (Modernism), of non-visual associations (Imagism), of histories of usage (Futurism), of social restraint (Dadaism) and of practical purpose (Surrealism). By a sort of belated Romanticism, poetry was returned to the exploration of the inner lands of the irrational. Even Postmodernism, with its bric-a-brac of received media images and current vulgarisms, ensures that gaps are left for the emerging unconscious to engage our interest

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IMAGIST POETRY
imagist poetry

Even by twentieth-century standards, Imagism was soon over. In 1912 Ezra Pound published the Complete Poetical Works of its founder, T.E. Hulme (five short poems) and by 1917 the movement, then overseen by Amy Lowell, had run its course. {1} {2} {3} {4} {5} The output in all amounted to a few score poems, and none of these captured the public's heart. Why the importance?

First there are the personalities involved — notably Ezra Pound, James Joyce, William Carlos Williams {6} {7} {8} {9} — who became famous later. If ever the (continuing) importance to poets of networking, of being involved in movements from their inception, is attested, it is in these early days of post-Victorian revolt.

Then there are the manifestos of the movement, which became the cornerstones of Modernism, responsible for a much taught in universities until recently, and for the difficulties poets still find themselves in. The Imagists stressed clarity, exactness and concreteness of detail. Their aims, briefly set out, were that:

1. Content should be presented directly, through specific images where possible.
2. Every word should be functional, with nothing included that was not essential to the effect intended.
3. Rhythm should be composed by the musical phrase rather than the metronome.

Also understood — if not spelled out, or perhaps fully recognized at the time — was the hope that poems could intensify a sense of objective reality through the immediacy of images.

Imagism itself gave rise to fairly negligible lines like:

You crash over the trees,
You crack the live branch…  (Storm by H.D.)

Nonetheless, the reliance on images provided poets with these types of freedom:

1. Poems could dispense with classical rhetoric, emotion being generated much more directly through what Eliot called an objective correlate: "The only way of expressing emotion in the form of art is by finding an 'objective correlative'; in other words, a set of objects, a situation, a chain of events which shall be the formula of that particular emotion; such that when the external facts, which must terminate in sensory experience, are given, the emotion is immediately evoked." {10}

2. By being shorn of context or supporting argument, images could appear with fresh interest and power.

3. Thoughts could be treated as images, i.e. as non-discursive elements that added emotional colouring without issues of truth or relevance intruding too mu
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PROSE BASED POETRY
prose based poetry

When free verse lacks rhythmic patterning, appearing as a lineated prose stripped of unnecessary ornament and rhetoric, it becomes the staple of much contemporary work. The focus is on what the words are being used to say, and their authenticity. The language is not heightened, and the poem differs from prose only by being more self-aware, innovative and/or cogent in its exposition.

Nonetheless, what looks normal at first becomes challenging on closer reading — thwarting expectations, and turning back on itself to make us think more deeply about the seemingly innocuous words used. And from there we are compelled to look at the world with sharper eyes, unprotected by commonplace phrases or easy assumptions. Often an awkward and fighting poetry, therefore, not indulging in ceremony or outmoded traditions.
What is Prose?

If we say that contemporary free verse is often built from what was once regarded as mere prose, then we shall have to distinguish prose from poetry, which is not so easy now. Prose was once the lesser vehicle, the medium of everyday thought and conversation, what we used to express facts, opinions, humour, arguments, feelings and the like. And while the better writers developed individual styles, and styles varied according to their purpose and social occasion, prose of some sort could be written by anyone. Beauty was not a requirement, and prose articles could be rephrased without great loss in meaning or effectiveness.

Poetry, though, had grander aims. William Lyon Phelps on Thomas Hardy's work: {1}

"The greatest poetry always transports us, and although I read and reread the Wessex poet with never-lagging attention — I find even the drawings in "Wessex Poems" so fascinating that I wish he had illustrated all his books — I am always conscious of the time and the place. I never get the unmistakable spinal chill. He has too thorough a command of his thoughts; they never possess him, and they never soar away with him. Prose may be controlled, but poetry is a possession. Mr. Hardy is too keenly aware of what he is about. In spite of the fact that he has written verse all his life, he seldom writes unwrinkled song. He is, in the last analysis, a master of prose who has learned the technique of verse, and who now chooses to express his thoughts and his observations in rime and rhythm."

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OPEN FORMS IN POETRY
open forms in poetry

Poets who write in open forms usually insist on the form growing out of the writing process, i.e. the poems follow what the words and phrase suggest during the composition

Captured in the psych ward part 12



This was a weird day for Ron, you see, he has to make sure that all the patients
Get the right dose of their medication,and he likes to be friendly to the patients
Cause it's hard for him to be harsh and every time a patient came out saying I am
Charlie Chaplin or Jesus has healed me. Well Ron wasn't ready for our next person
Who was Graham Toad, and he lived a great life in Broadmeadows with his cat
Snowball, off the show the Simpsons and he had a lot of fun with snowball, every
Chance he got, he would throw him around making snowball snarl at him and, this looked weird for the neighbours to see and they hated the idea of this cat being out at night
And asked Graham very nicely to bring his cat in at night, but graham was a sucker
For having a cat out having fun all the time when he wanted, said, ******* ya old fogies
And then went inside and unknown to him, the neighbours rang the police to get them
To come over to teach graham about being nice to his neighbours, and when they came
Over graham said, ******* ya ****, I live my own life here, and if you don't like the way I
Live, you can *******, and the police said to graham, the neighbours are complaining
About you, you need to respect their wishes, to keep quiet at night, and graham said
******* pigs, I don't want you **** around here and then the police left and put snowball
Inside and graham and snowball were having a wrestle and the police were worried about the well being of the cat, and just sat down on his porch and he saw a very violent for a
Cat wrestle going on and the police walked in and said, I have to tackle this cat, you see
It's the dingo that killed Azaria chamberlain, I need to **** the spirit, it's spoiling the aura of this place and the police, put his hand on Graham's shoulder and then graham said I have to do this, and tbe police said, it's your little cute cat snowball graham, and the neighbours
Were watching like a pack of peeping toms, and as graham was being pulled to the car
He said to the neighbours, stop staring at me, you stupid stupid old clots, get off my fucken
Property, and get off it right now and then he pushed the police man down, and ran inside his house and locked the door and told everyone that, he will stay in his house forever,you
See, he said, I will be the judge if I am well, or not and there is no way known to man, that
The psych ward will ever get him and keep him in that psych ward, but the police rang the
Psych ward and they sent the doctor Ron cooper and they rang him up from the cafe
Where, Ron was speaking about the interview with Macauley Culkin he saw on YouTube last night and Fran said, what did he have to say and Ron said, nothing much, just speaking about writing a book and all that jazz, and them Dan said, that Macauley Culkin is a real
Troublemaker, but then Ron said, there is ** such thing as a troublemaker and we should
Be nicer, than those ****** adults of the 80s decade and then the phonecall came and
Ron was called out to Graham's house, to try and convince him to go to the psych ward
And he opened the door, but only to yell,,at the policemen to give his cat to him and then
Ron showed up on his doorstep and said, I don't think so, I know you love this cat, I don't
Think you are ever guilty of ever loving this cat, ok, but if you love him, you will let us take him off you, you see graham there is nothing wrong with being taken to the psych ward
You are sick, you need to be monitored on medication, and then Ron grabbed graham by the arm and graham said ******* ya ****, get off me ya stupid baby man, I want you to
*******, right now ok, if I do go with you, I want you to sleep the first night with me, cause
You go to your warm bed at night, thinking you are king ****, and Ron said, I would be breaking rules, if I did that, things could happen, and graham you are handling this like a
Coward, remember what ya dad used to say and graham said, yeah, my dad ain't around no more and I feel a bit insecure, with going to that psych ward and Ron said, ok, then he told
The police, to leave him here, but Ron said, he will take snowball back to his house and
He bought a weeks worth of cat food and a fish and chip meal and went home to rest
And fell asleep in front of the TV, with the cat running up and down the house, and Ron
Had snowball sniffing his nose,which made him sneeze


Sent from my iPad

I never knew what beauty was until I saw him
With every imperfection,
With every stumble,
and with every stutter,
My heart knocks hard inside my chest
Trying to escape
Hoping to be captured by his warm, calloused fingers.
And you don't even know who I am

That day you bumped into me
I dropped all my books
You helped me pick them up
And I got to look into your eyes
They were a lovely color
Not even Picasso could recreate
And you still don't even know who I am

We bumped into one another again at a party
You slurred apologies and "excuse me's"
And I laughed it off
Trying to Ignore the fact that your hand was creeping on my waist
Your fingertips igniting sparks in my skin
You held your deep gaze with your Picasso-colored eyes
And dragged me into a room tripping over nothing
I thought you finally knew who I was

The next day at school you bumped into me again
You had dropped my phone
This time you didn't pick it up
And you walked away without a second glance or apology
And you still don't even know who I am

VERSE ONE
She's bleeding from her lip
From every time he hit
Can't believe that she
Just turned up on my doorstep
Looking like this
And all that I can think
Is how much I want to **** him
Better help her in
Come on let's get you cleaned up
Tell me what happened
Tell me everything he did
Firstly let me clean the bloodstains
from beneath your lips
Wipe the smudged mascara
from beneath your eyes
Seeing you hurt like this
Hurts me deep inside
Gotta be strong for you
Make sure you're comforted
Reassure you everything is gonna be alright
Meanwhile, body temperatures raising
As anger boils deep within
All these thoughts come flooding in

PRE CHORUS
I'm not sure I can keep
All of this rage caged
Killer instincts kicking in
And all I want is revenge on him
For treating you like this
Gotta stay calm,
Keep this girls mind at ease
Help her rest and heal
And as I wipe the blood from your lips
ever so gently
As I wipe the tears from your eyes
You look deep into mine
with every ounce of strength,
she had left she said
please don't go after him
even after all he did

CHORUS
And as she takes my hand she says
You're different
All I need is for you to be there
I just need someone who really cares
Someone to wipe away these tears
You're the one guy who tames my fears
I don't need any more protection
then you already give
And I don't want you to end up like him
Even though the love I have for him
Runs deep, I see his faults
But I know his needs
And he is such a big part of my heart
His my addiction, my drug
Don't expect you to understand
I see the mess this is, I can't stop my love for him

VERSE TWO
All these words, I soak them in
All these thoughts
are running up and down my mind
How could she not let me step in
This hurting could stop right here
I'm giving her everything,
She just wants me to sit back
Watch from the sidelines
While she takes on this fight
Why won't she let me stand at her side?
And all of this confusion envelops in me
I'm losing focus, Push this to the back of my head
Need to take care of her here and now
Because she needs you here most
I carry her into the bed tuck her in
As I crash back on the couch
All of the things she said to me replay

PRE CHORUS
I'm not sure I can keep
All of this rage caged
Killer instincts kicking in
And all I want is revenge on him
For treating you like this
Gotta stay calm,
Keep this girls mind at ease
Help her rest and heal
And as I wipe the blood from your lips
ever so gently
As I wipe the tears from your eyes
You look deep into mine
with every ounce of strength,
she had left she said
please don't go after him
even after all he did

CHORUS
And as she takes my hand she says
You're different
All I need is for you to be there
I just need someone who really cares
Someone to wipe away these tears
You're the one guy who tames my fears
I don't need any more protection
then you already give
And I don't want you to end up like him
Even though the love I have for him
Runs deep, I see his faults
But I know his needs
And he is such a big part of my heart
His my addiction, my drug
Don't expect you to understand
I see the mess this is, I can't stop my love for him

VERSE THREE
As I wake the next morn
I go to the bedroom to check on her
I see an empty bed well made
on the bedside desk, a neat note laid
Saying thank you for everything you did
Repairing and mending me back to health
I couldn't have a better friend
Sorry I left before you awoke
Just had to get home
Just want you to know
I'm thankful and grateful for all that you are
You'll always be the brightest shining star
Guiding and watching me from afar
And as cheesy as it sounds
It brings a smile to my face
And for a slight moment concern leaves my conscience
But I hold out hope everything is gonna be okay
That's when images of last night run before my eyes

PRE CHORUS
I'm not sure I can keep
All of this rage caged
Killer instincts kicking in
And all I want is revenge on him
For treating you like this
Gotta stay calm,
Keep this girls mind at ease
Help her rest and heal
And as I wipe the blood from your lips
ever so gently
As I wipe the tears from your eyes
You look deep into mine
with every ounce of strength,
she had left she said
please don't go after him
even after all he did

CHORUS
And as she takes my hand she says
You're different
All I need is for you to be there
I just need someone who really cares
Someone to wipe away these tears
You're the one guy who tames my fears
I don't need any more protection
then you already give
And I don't want you to end up like him
Even though the love I have for him
Runs deep, I see his faults
But I know his needs
And he is such a big part of my heart
His my addiction, my drug
Don't expect you to understand
I see the mess this is, I can't stop my love for him

VERSE FOUR
Another night, another microwave meal
It's been a while since she last came over
Must be working out,
the counselling must be helping them now
And for once in my life I'm relieved
Knowing she's happy calms my mind
I watch the clock tick time passes by
through montaged scenes
This feels like a happy ending to this story
And photographs of you and I
Are packed in a box
I only open it up from time to time
Childhood memories captured in polaroid frames
I like reminiscing about all those good times
Everything was different then
Together just you and I
Hanging every day and every night
until you moved on with your life
that is just a perfect memory captured in my mind

PRE CHORUS
All of this rage is caged
Calm and content I've stayed
The revenge I wanted on him
Has been forgotten
Even after all he did
I'm calm, breathing and relaxed
My minds at ease
We're both rested and healed
The bloodstained cloths
that cleansed your lips are cleaned
ever so gently you're easing my emotions
As I wipe the tears from my eyes
I think of the way you always look into mine
with every ounce of strength,
You've made me a better man
She was right in what she said
even after all he did

CHORUS
Still feel the tender touch of your hand
And I remember every word she said
You're different
All I need is for you to be there
I just need someone who really cares
Someone to wipe away these tears
You're the one guy who tames my fears
I don't need any more protection
then you already give
And I don't want you to end up like him
Even though the love I have for him
Runs deep, I see his faults
But I know his needs
And he is such a big part of my heart
His my addiction, my drug
Don't expect you to understand
I see the mess this is, I can't stop my love for him
And all I can think is how lucky he is
To have a girl like you

VERSE FIVE
As I sit on my couch watching tv
It's been months since she last seen me
When I hear a soft knock at the door
I open it up to see you sitting on the pavement
outside of my front door
she is leaning against the brick wall
Head in her hands, crying
Tears constantly streaming down her cheeks
Bruised arms, black eyes
She looked at me and said
I'm bleeding from my lip
From when he hit
That sentence just tore me to bits
Gotta be strong, Take care of her first
Then I'll hunt him down and make him hurt
Shes covered in scratches, puffy eyes
He really lost control this time
And I'm about to lose mine
I pick her up and bring her in
Pull out the first aid kit,
A warm washer to clean her up
Every dab soft and tender to the touch
I won't hurt you like him ever
I'm the one who will make this all better

PRE CHORUS
I'm not sure I can keep
All of this rage caged
Killer instincts kicking in
And all I want is revenge on him
For treating you like this
Gotta stay calm,
Keep this girls mind at ease
Help her rest and heal
And as I wipe the blood from your lips
ever so gently
As I wipe the tears from your eyes
You look deep into mine
with every ounce of strength,
she had left she said
please don't go after him
even after all he did

CHORUS
And as she takes my hand she says
You're different
All I need is for you to be there
I just need someone who really cares
Someone to wipe away these tears
You're the one guy who tames my fears
I don't need any more protection
then you already give
And I don't want you to end up like him
Even though the love I have for him
Runs deep, I see his faults
But I know his needs
And he is such a big part of my heart
His my addiction, my drug
Don't expect you to understand
I see the mess this is, I can't stop my love for him

VERSE SIX
That time those words don't cut it
Now the hunters become the hunted
I tuck her into bed to sleep
stay with her until she falls into dreams
I watch her smile and breathe as she lays peacefully asleep
I go around to her house just when he walks out
I strike him hard and fast, I made him bleed so much blood
All the pain he put her through I made sure he felt that too
I couldn't keep that rage caged
had to let it out and get revenge
One day she will understand
I did what was best for her
I won't ever let her hurt
He got a few shots in
But nothing compared to what I did to him
Stitches in my hand and brow
I left him hospitalised
I'll never forget the look she gave
when she found out

PRE CHORUS
I tried to explain
I couldn't keep this rage caged
Killer instincts kicked in
And I got my revenge on him
For treating you like this
Didn't stay calm
Didn't keep her mind at ease
Help her rest and heal
I wiped the blood from her lips
I wiped the tears from your eyes
What he did to you killed me inside
with every ounce of strength,
And everything I am
I went after him
after all, he did

CHORUS
This time she didn't take my hand
And I knew I wasn't going to be a fan
of what she had to say
I regret putting my trust and faith in you
You aren't different
All I needed was for you to be there
I just needed someone who really cared
Someone to wipe away these tears
You were the one guy who tamed my fears
I didn't need any more protection
that you hadn't already given
I didn't want you to be like him
Violence never solved anything
I was ready to leave him for you
You went against everything I said
My love and admiration for you ran deep,
I see your faults
I know your needs
But now you have betrayed me
You were such a big part of my heart
You could have been my addiction, my drug
I was hoping you would listen and understand
Not go after him like you did
I can see the mess this is, my hearts been shattered
Beyond repair, I never want to see you again
Those lines run on repeat through my head.

©2018 Written By Benji James

A captured breath among the ancient trees
Glowing in a perfect dream
From time and tide drifting upon your sea
In the dustless shadow
Of faint moonbeams

A fresh-bloomed rose, smiles at morning dew
Its thorns have yet to *****
The hands of time, which fairly flew
Sweetness unripe
To pick

Time and tide drifts upon the ancient seas
Rolling in a perfect dream
Capturing breaths from unplanted seeds
Before becoming
As they seem

The fresh-bloomed rose a thorn reveals
Within the perfect dream
Yet time and tide drifts into quickly heal
A captured breath
Is now redeemed

Captured in the psych ward part 5


You see Ron cooper and his ex Sally went on a cruise around noumea and New Caledonia and they really enjoyed that a lot and while they were on that cruise, brad was in a fowl tenoer cause everyone was watching the shows he doesn't wanna watch and Robert told brad that in life **** happens and brad said ******* and started to argue with the nurses saying he is the Buddhist messiah and needs to be given a special drug to take him to nirvana and he had a smart alek nurse say, I ain't religious, so I don't care and I think nirvana is a rock band not eternity ok patty walked in and said, I wanna see the nurse. And when the nurse came patty said, I have just came from Washington DC
And I saw president Obama and introduced mysrlf and he was proud to meet good old George Washington. You see. Well anyway thank you for that ticket to the states, it was muck appreciated and
Martin Kelly was banging the wall very loudly and saying you **** you **** you **** and Anne who was on the other side said as she walked past said you fucken stop banging on the wall you kid grabber or phedaphile yeah stop banging ya phedaphile or I wlll bash you up, I am going to bash you up, you see you can't hide here forever, one day the hospital will say your fit to go home but when I see you our there. Mate I will bash ya ****, ya stupid ****** phedaphile and Robert got up to take a **** and they bought lunch out and a fight between Anne and brad and Susan started to erupt and the nurses were having a hard time, they had to bring in the doctors with the ****** and lock them in their rooms abs Ron and and Sally are having a great time in New Caledonia waking around and Ron'a leg is getting better and you see Ron and Sally are really beginning to hit it off as they are in a pub having a scotch and back at the HDU. Brad and Anne were cursing at each other through the walls but both wanted enough power to break the walls
But they couldn't hear each other cause thru were on the opposite sides if each other and Susan went our and said shut up abe went over to the TV and said to Robert, we are watching TV, please don't talk to me. I ain't into talking to kids, so just keep your conversation. To a minimum and Patru roe said.  How about you shut up Susan, Robert is a funny little kid, I line him and dusab said ******* ya **** and then Kate walked around the whole psych ward and as she passed brads room she said. Why don't you shut the **** up snd Ron and Sally were having inter course in the cruise and
The new patient was being driven by the police to the HDU but this was going to be a strange situation you see young 19 year old jack Drendlw had ******* a 10 year old who teased him and it ended up killing him abd to that day the police have been trying to crack this ****** case and the boys parents were told that jack is mentally ill and isn't going to jail
And going  to the HDU and the boys parents couldn't except it so they stole a police paddy wagon dressed up as police men and took jack hostage saying he is going to the HDU and instead they took jack into
Their house and tied him up in their sons room and this was part of their plan to really make Jack suffer for what he did /and this is going to be sweet revenge and back at the hospital when they got the phonecall saying that jack wasn't there, well they rang the police and yes they knew where he lived but it would be a nightmare to get there and the next day Ron and Sally's ship was arriving into Sydney harbour and when they arrived there, Ron said goodbye to Sally who lived in Sydney as she drove him to the airport and then Ron boarded the plane for Melbourne and when he touched down, in Melbourne Ron gor his luggage and gor a taxi home
And dropped off his bags and before he unpacked he put the 3-00 news on nine and heard about jack being tortured by his victims parents but the police said jack was supposed to be at the rmh HDU  and Ron went straight there to see if everything is alright and he got theu and clocked in and went to the HDU and said what had happened, how did thus one fall through the cracks and the nurses seid that the family of the victim didn't like the idea of him bring sent here. Ya see it's too nice for him and Ron said they can't think they taking the law in their own hands like this and Ron went into the HDU to check our the patients and
Saw Robert and patty in rte common room and Susan and Kate knitting together in the dining room and Kate asked how was your cruise and Ron said, it was ****** good and my leg is healed and are you feeling alright
And they said yeah and then went to solitary to say hi to Martin and George and Anne and they said ******* **** and ajnne said did ya enjoy ya cruise and Ron said I Did and them said hi to brad and brad said ******* and when he found our it was Ron, the first question he asked was how was your cruise and do you know it's great that you can go on a cruise whole we are locked in here, you see you are like fucken Rupert Murdoxh with those poor foxtel suckers and then the dinner cart was coming out and Ron clocked off and went home and made some stir fry
And Singapore noodles and looked our the window and two young people were having a domestic and at first Ron said, I roll leave then alone but suddenly the bloke gor out
His gun and threatened to **** her and calked the cops and went down
To save the woman and the man has paranoid schizophrenia which was ****** obvious and it took 25 minutes for the cops to arrive and when they did the man was arrested and sent to the staton and the lady thanked Ron and Ron asked are you going to be ok and and she said yeah. And Ron went up yo her unit and sat on the couch and watched the TV and fell asleep on the couch
He has had a hard day


Sent from my iPhone

When we were younger
We made our parents
Shut the closet doors
Check under the bed
Tuck us in at night
In an attempt to ward away the monsters
Some of us weren't so lucky
We escaped them in the dark
But they captured us in our dreams

Now that we're older
The monsters are demons
They hide in the dusty corners of our brains
If we're lucky, and they're not bolder than we are, they stay hidden during the day
But at night they roam free
They torture us with
Regrets that we have
Mistakes we have made
And images of those that we miss
Sleep is our only escape
But some of us aren't so lucky
We escaped them in the dark
But they captured us in our dreams

(poems from the Chinese translated by Arthur Waley)

Last night the clouds scattered away;
A thousand leagues, the same moonlight scene.
When dawn came, I dreamt I saw your face;
It must have been that you were thinking of me.
In my dream, I thought I held your hand
And asked you to tell me what your thoughts were.
And you said: ‘I miss you bitterly . . . “

As Helen drifted into sleep the source of that imagined voice in her last conscious moment was waking several hundred miles away. For so long now she was his first and only waking thought. He stretched his hand out to touch her side with his fingertips, not a touch more the lightest brush: he did not wish to wake her. But she was elsewhere. He was alone. His imagination had to bring her to him instead. Sometimes she was so vivid a thought, a presence more like, that he felt her body surround him, her hand stroke the back of his neck, her ******* fall and spread against his chest, her breath kiss his nose and cheek. He felt conscious he had yet to shave, conscious his rough face should not touch her delicate freckled complexion . . . but he was alone and his body ached for her.

It was always like this when they were apart, and particularly so when she was away from home and full to the brim with the variously rich activities and opportunities that made up her life. He knew she might think of him, but there was this feeling he was missing a part of her living he would never see or know. True, she would speak to him on the phone, but sadly he still longed to read her once bright descriptions that had in the past enabled him to enter her solo experiences in a way no image seemed to allow. But he had resolved to put such possible gifts to one side. So instead he would invent such descriptions himself: a good, if time-consuming compromise. He would give himself an hour at his desk; an hour, had he been with her, they might have spent in each other’s arms welcoming the day with such a love-making he could hardly bare to think about: it was always, always more wonderful than he could possibly have imagined.

He had been at a concert the previous evening. He’d taken the train to a nearby town and chosen to hear just one work in the second part. Before the interval there had been a strange confection of Bernstein, Vaughan-Williams and Saint-Saens. He had preferred to listen to *The Symphonie Fantastique by Hector Berlioz. There was something a little special about attending a concert to hear a single work. You could properly prepare yourself for the experience and take away a clear memory of the music. He had read the score on the train journey, a journey across a once industrial and mining heartland that had become an abandoned wasteland: a river and canal running in tandem, a vast but empty marshalling yard, acres of water-filled gravel pits, factory and mill buildings standing empty and in decay. On this early evening of a thoroughly wet and cold June day he would lift his gaze to the window to observe this sad landscape shrouded in a grey mist tinted with mottled green.

Andrew often considered Berlioz a kind of fellow-traveller on his life’s journey of music. Berlioz too had been a guitarist in his teenage years and had been largely self-taught as a composer. He had been an innovator in his use of the orchestra and developed a body of work that closely mirrored the literature and political mores of his time.  The Symphonie Fantastique was the ultimate love letter: to the adorable Harriet Smithson, the Irish actress. Berlioz had seen her play Ophelia in Shakespeare’s Hamlet (see above) and immediately imagined her as his muse and life’s partner. He wrote hundreds of letters to her before eventually meeting her to declare his love and admiration in person. A friend took her to hear the Symphonie after it had got about that this radical work was dedicated to her. She was appalled! But, when Berlioz wrote Lélio or The Return to Life, a kind of sequel to his Symphonie, she relented and agreed to meet him. They married in 1833 but parted after a tempestuous seven years. It had surprised Andrew to discover Lélio, about which, until quite recently, he had known nothing. The Berlioz scholar David Cairns had written fully and quite lovingly about the composition, but reading the synopsis in Wikipedia he began to understand it might be a trifle embarrassing to present in a concert.

The programme of Lélio describes the artist wakening from these dreams, musing on Shakespeare, his sad life, and not having a woman. He decides that if he can't put this unrequited love out of his head, he will immerse himself in music. He then leads an orchestra to a successful performance of one of his new compositions and the story ends peacefully.

Lélio consists of six musical pieces presented by an actor who stands on stage in front of a curtain concealing the orchestra. The actor's dramatic monologues explain the meaning of the music in the life of the artist. The work begins and ends with the idée fixe theme, linking Lélio to Symphonie fantastique.

Thoughts of the lovely Harriet brought him to thoughts of his own muse, far away. He had written so many letters to his muse, and now he wrote her little stories instead, often imagining moments in their still separate lives. He had written music for her and about her – a Quintet for piano and winds (after Mozart) based on a poem he’d written about a languorous summer afternoon beside a river in the Yorkshire Dales; a book of songs called Pleasing Myself (his first venture into setting his own words). Strangely enough he had read through those very songs just the other day. How they captured the onset of both his regard and his passion for her! He had written poetic words in her voice, and for her clear voice to sing:

As the light dies
I pace the field edge
to the square pond
enclosed, hedged and treed.
The water,
once revealed,
lies cold
in the still air.

At its bank,
solitary,
I let my thoughts of you
float on the surface.
And like two boats
moored abreast
at the season’s end,
our reflections merge
in one dark form.

His words he felt were true to the model of the Chinese poetry he had loved as a teenager, verse that had helped him fashion his fledgling thoughts in music.

And so it was that while she dined brightly with her team in a Devon country pub, he sat alone in a town hall in West Yorkshire listening to Berlioz’ autobiographical and unrequited work.

A young musician of extraordinary sensibility and abundant imagination, in the depths of despair because of hopeless love, has poisoned himself with *****. The drug is too feeble to **** him but plunges him into a heavy sleep accompanied by weird visions. His sensations, emotions, and memories, as they pass through his affected mind, are transformed into musical images and ideas. The beloved one herself becomes to him a melody, a recurrent theme [idée fixe] which haunts him continually.

Yes, he could identify with some of that. Reading Berlioz’ own programme note in the orchestral score he remembered the disabling effect of his first love, a slight girl with long hair tied with a simple white scarf. Then he thought of what he knew would be his last love, his only and forever love when he had talked to her, interrupting her concentration, in a college workshop. She had politely dealt with his innocent questions and then, looking at the clock told him she ‘had to get on’. It was only later – as he sat outside in the university gardens - that he realized the affect that brief encounter might have on him. It was as though in those brief minutes he knew nothing of her, but also everything he ever needed to know. Strange how the images of that meeting, the sound of her voice haunted him, would appear unbidden - until two months later a chance meeting in a corridor had jolted him into her presence again  . . . and for always he hoped.

After the music had finished he had remained in the auditorium as the rather slight audience took their leave. The resonance of the music seemed to be a still presence and he had there and then scanned back and forward through the music’s memory. The piece had cheered him, given him a little hope against the prevailing difficulties and problems of his own musical creativity, the long, often empty hours at his desk. He was in a quiet despair about his current work, about his current life if he was honest. He wondered at the way Berlioz’ musical material seemed of such a piece with its orchestration. The conception of the music itself was full of rough edges; it had none of that exemplary finish of a Beethoven symphony so finely chiseled to perfection.  Berlioz’ Symphonie contained inspired and trite elements side by side, bar beside bar. It missed that wholeness Beethoven achieved with his carefully honed and positioned harmonic structures, his relentless editing and rewriting. With Berlioz you reckoned he trusted himself to let what was in his imagination flow onto the page unhindered by technical issues. Andrew had experienced that occasionally, and looking at his past pieces, was often amazed that such music could be, and was, his alone.

Returning to his studio there was a brief text from his muse. He was tempted to phone her. But it was late and he thought she might already be asleep. He sat for a while and imagined her at dinner with the team, more relaxed now than previously. Tired from a long day of looking and talking and thinking and planning and imagining (herself in the near future), she had worn her almost vintage dress and the bright, bright smile with her diligent self-possessed manner. And taking it (the smile) into her hotel bedroom, closing the door on her public self, she had folded it carefully on the chair with her clothes - to be bright and bright for her colleagues at breakfast next day and beyond. She undressed and sitting on the bed in her pajamas imagined for a brief moment being folded in his arms, being gently kissed goodnight. Too tired to read, she brought herself to bed with a mental list of all the things she must and would do in the morning time and when she got home – and slept.

*They came and told me a messenger from Shang-chou
Had brought a letter, - a simple scroll from you!
Up from my pillow I suddenly sprang out of bed,
And threw on my clothes, all topsy-turvey.
I undid the knot and saw the letter within:
A single sheet with thirteen lines of writing.
At the top it told the sorrows of an exile’s heart;
At the bottom it described the pains of separation.
The sorrows and pains took up so much space
There was no room to talk about the weather!

Dear Emma and the rest of the Sumatran orangutans of Chester zoo

To you, today was just routine. To you, in your bubble of a world, just another friendly face came to talk to you again. To me, this visit was bittersweet, in fact I would say 80% bitter. In seeing you, in meeting your gaze the guilt and shame ripped through me like like a tiger's claws. Ah yes, the tiger, 7 years have past since they had disappeared. People have all but forgotten already, there were plenty of tigers safely locked away right?
You probably don't know this and I doubt that you can read this, but I write this letter to you anyway, do what you want with the letter. Look at the photograph I have included of your Asian relatives that I took during my travels nearly 20 years ago. Or you could discard it, tear it, eat it I don't care as long as you receive this. For nearly 2 centuries your people have been captured and killed and we destroy everything you know. Our growing population pressurised us, we strove for urbanisation, painting a thin venire of chrome. Our colour of comfort, but we made it worse for ourselves as our most important livelihoods were replaced by dust villages and starvation. You were not immune to our pillage I'm afraid, from that first time Charles Darwin met Jenny our blessing became your curse. 3 weeks ago the last of your Asian brethren died. We saw your demise coming, some of us tried our hardest to halt or postpone it, setting up rescue stations and reserves. But the mindless machine wirred on, it wasn't until the last 90 miles of forest remained that the Indonesian bigwigs realised what they had done. In a blind panic they planted new tree seedlings, maybe somehow in the hopes that more bears, frogs, birds and orangutans would materialise from the roots? It was already too late but perseverance drove them to try everything. Everything. Nyaru Menteng offloaded their remaining 8 charges to Western facilities where artificial habitats had been created. The rest of them watched over and monitored the remaining native population, sending out vets and human doctors to keep them alive at all costs. I watched every second of it, followed the blogs and the news. It hurt so much I didn't think I could follow anymore, grief stricken with each "progression" but I was compelled to carry on. And finally, there was one.
A male, Gregory. He never grew his cheek flanges because he had no competition. No drive to find a mate. He knew as much as we did that he was alone. No one knew why they kept him there, all knowledge of reproductive biology was forgotten and replaced with superstitious magic. We kept him there, stayed by his side, fed him and doctored him until finally at the age of 39 he died of a heart attack. The news was like a punch in the guts for all of us. It was announced as breaking news all over the world, pongo pygmeus and pongo abeli officially extinct in the wild. A minority mentioned that many captive orangs still remained in zoos and sanctuaries and that we should not be so sad. But they were quickly shushed like an outspoken attendee of a funeral. Those remaining would not last forever either once inbreeding became too rife, plus, their artificial living arrangements meant these fat, shut in orangutans would live a second rate life, plagued by the same mental ailments that the rest of us urbanites suffer. They would never know the joy, fulfilment, danger, even, of the wild. And these zoo populations were like ghosts or holograms of what used to remain. 
I was afraid for the last 3 months to visit you again, incase you knew and you would turn your head away from me in disapproval. Your disgusted expression would render me speechless. But logic told me this would not happen and I had finally plucked up the courage to see you again. As always you brachiated towards the window and pressed your face against it while I talked to you and pretended to stroke your hair. You were oblivious and ignorant, I envied you. I cried and you wondered why, other humans understood and some looked forlorn themselves. I could see you and your granddaughter looking in concern at our apparent sadness. I tried to look brave for you, I played with your granddaughter as normal. 
Though I had no direct influence over your demise I feel just as remorseful as the loggers did, I was careless in my choices. Living such a sheltered city life and not realising until my second decade the true dangers facing you. I chose too late to be mindful of my grocery shopping, avoided palm oil, never watched films with trained animals in. My few actions made no difference, until very recent years I was still the minority. Don't mistake me for someone self pitying, I don't want you to think I was thinking only of my own feelings and being a martyr. If anything self loathing, I've always been a misanthropist but as of late I've abandoned my species altogether. Apart from my immediate family of course. You were not the only ones that went, Asian elephants too disappeared around the same time. Mackaws of South America have almost completely been depleted. The once hopeful 200,000 chimpanzees whittled down to the last 5000. Bonobos gone already from the wild since the last 100 were taken to sanctuaries and zoos to "rebuild the population" but there were very little captive bonobos to begin in. Gorillas: 1000 (only mountain gorillas are left, ironic isn't it? We focused so much on that one race we neglected the rest). African elephants: 4. Giraffes: 100. The list goes on. And we too, **** sapiens, the most numerous of large mammals are feeling the pinch. It started with Japan over 20 years ago, people retreated more and more into the office, no longer caring to build families and the population declined. The rest followed suite, bursting at the seems we could no longer steal more land for ourselves, more destruction meant less air to breath, less food. People have started to fight their reproductive urges, like the Japanese, retreating into a single life in a cubicle. Sitting by the screen. We are committing a species wide, slow suicide. I consider this a blessing, the rest of nature can finally get even. Some are scared and upset, others relieved. The divide is equal.
I have come to visit you every 3 weeks since I was 21, I am 40 now and in that seemingly short space of time I have seen the world change dramatically while you sit and climb and think your own isolated thoughts in your little bubble. 
Please accept my sincerest apologies. No matter if you read this or not. I am so so so sorry. On behalf of myself, on behalf of my species. Please forgive us.
Yours Sincerely,
Sophie

I was a caterpillar ,
before I became a butterfly .
The pain I had to endure in order to transform into the beauty I am today .
This is my tale .

In the forest there was,
My cocoon wrapped in the finest silk,
With a power to live in a colorful world.
To dream and conquer goals.
A Vivacious soul spinning in the purest silk
Growing and maturing as I spun.
Wishing for freedom with my beautiful wings,
Counting the days to be free and soar
as a lively butterfly
until
You winded into my community
Lured my queen and her uneven monarch.
Tempted to sabotage my purity.
For that you,
Lured yourself into my vulernable cocoon
with that trust,
you decided to disrupt my process.
How can one man ruin my nesting site?
And I had faith in you ,
to be a figure
I never had.
I wanted.
My heart ached for it.
I needed it.
To be loved .
To be nurtured.
To never be like those stray dogs
looking for a home.
This was the moment .
Where....
Innocence stripped, heart captured.
My Freedom gone.
You were naive to comprehend
On what you were doing...
You would stab my cocoon
with your sickening poison .
Over and over you stabbed .
Ruptured the veins of my innocence .
To break my finest silk .
Purity banished.
Stabbing your poison was
Making my cocoon
useless ,
worthless ,
unwanted,
colorless,
I tried to run and I tried to scream
but I was devoured by this poison
It was the love I deserve.
Couldn't escape , numb to the pain
For every poison injected, I began to
Question God?
Where was he ?
when I shed out a tear of help.
Where was he?
when my cocoon was destroyed.
Was I loved God?
when I muffled help in your name.
I hated myself ,
I stay in my cocoon
afraid to see my future.
I wasn't going to be a beautiful butterfly
Battered Butterfly
My life seemed to be colorless
No one wants a battered butterfly
My life....
It seemed it had ended
when poison sunk onto my helpless body .
No one wants a battered butterfly
Imprisoned to these chains.
Being poisoned every night by different
Predators.
Oh God....
Those predators ...
Battered lifeless little butterfly
Was I ever loved in my nesting site?
But then again nobody loves a battered butterfly
How can I reach to heaven when
I was worthless.
Believed I was a vile *****.
Tricked into a poison of hell.
Battered Ugly Butterfly
***** Little butterfly.
There was no light in tunnel
There was no holes in my silk
To escape this poisonous nest.
Why?
Because I believe nobody wants save a battered butterfly
How can the man I trusted ruined me.
I thought you could be the one to complete my lovely monarch .
To complete the missing piece.
But you continued to misuse me.
To haunt me.
To barricade my heart
To own my soul
But one thing I can truly say
You never once won over me.
You never imprinted my change.
I endured your pain
That was a sign of God
To show me what strength I am capable of.
That was the light that I found,
You had no control to inflict pain anymore.
Because I became impervious to your pain.


I am a beautiful butterfly
reigning over my monarch
with no thought of you.
**That is my freedom

The first settlers to the area called the Lumber River Drowning Creek. The river got its name for its dark, swift-moving waters. In 1809, the North Carolina state legislature changed the name of Drowning Creek to the Lumber River. The headwaters are still referred to as Drowning Creek.

Three p.m. on a Sunday.
Anxiously hungry, I stay dry, out of the pool’s cold water,
taking the light, dripping into my pages.
A city with a white face blank as a bust
peers over my shoulder.
Wildflowers on the roads. Planes circle from west,
come down steeply and out of sight.
A pinkness rises in my breast and arms:
wet as the drowned, my eyes sting with sweat.
Over the useless chimneys a bank of cloud piles up.
There is something terrible in the sky, but it keeps breaking.
Another is dead. Fentanyl. Sister of a friend, rarely seen.
A hand reaches everywhere to pass over eyes and mouths.
A glowing wound opens in heaven.
A mirror out of doors draws a gyre of oak seeds no one watches,
in the clear pool now sunless and black.

Bitter water freezes the muscles and I am far from shore.
I paddle in the shallows, near the wooden jail.
The water reflects a taut rope,
feet hanging in the breeze singing mercy
at the site of the last public hanging in the state.
A part-white fugitive with an extorted confession,
loved by the poor, dumb enough to get himself captured,
lonely on this side of authority: a world he has never lived in
foisting itself on the world he has -
only now, to steal his drunken life, then gone again.

1871 - Henderson Oxendine, one of the notorious gang of outlaws who for some time have infested Robeson County, N. C., committing ****** and robbery, and otherwise setting defiance to the laws, was hung at Lumberton, on Friday last in the presence of a large assemblage. His execution took place a very few days after his conviction, and his death occurred almost without a struggle.

Today, the town square collapses as if scorched
by the whiskey he drank that morning to still himself,
folds itself up like Amazing Grace is finished.
A plinth is laid
in the shadow of his feet, sticky with pine,
here where the water sickens with roots.
Where the canoe overturned. Where the broken oar floated and fell.
Where the snake lives, and teethes on bark,
waiting for another uncle.

Where the tobacco waves near drying barns rusted like horseshoes
and cotton studs the ground like the cropped hair of the buried.
Where schoolchildren take the afternoon
to trim the kudzu growing between the bodies of slaves.
Where appetite is met with flood and fat
and a clinic for the heart.
Where barges took chips of tar to port,
for money that no one ever saw.

Tar sticks the heel but isn’t courage.
Tar seals the hulls -
binds the planks -
builds the road.
Tar, fiery on the tongue, heavy as bad blood in the family -
dead to glue the dead together to secure the living.
Tar on the roofs, pouring heat.
Tar is a dark brown or black viscous liquid of hydrocarbons and free carbon,
obtained from a wide variety of organic materials
through destructive distillation.
Tar in the lungs will one day go as hard as a five-cent candy.

Liberty Food Mart
Cheapest Prices on Cigarettes
Parliament $22.50/carton
Marlboro $27.50/carton

The white-bibbed slaughterhouse Hmong hunch down the steps
of an old school bus with no air conditioner,
rush into the cool of the supermarket.
They pick clean the vegetables, flee with woven bags bulging.
What were they promised?
Air conditioning.
And what did they receive?
Chickenshit on the wind; a dead river they can't understand
with a name it gained from killing.

Truth:
A man was flung onto a fencepost and died in a front yard down the street.
A girl with a grudge in her eyes slipped a razorblade from her teeth and ended recess.
I once saw an Indian murdered for stealing a twelve-foot ladder.
The red line indicating heart disease grows higher and higher.
The red line indicating cardiovascular mortality grows higher and higher.
The red line indicating motor vehicle deaths grows higher and higher.
I burn with the desire to leave.

The stories make us full baskets of dark. No death troubles me.
Not the girl's blood, inert, tickled by opiates,
not the masked arson of the law;
not the smell of drywall as it rots,
or the door of the safe falling from its hinges,
or the chassis of cars, airborne over the rise by the planetarium,
three classmates plunging wide-eyed in the river’s icy arc –
absent from prom, still struggling to free themselves from their seatbelts -
the gunsmoke at the home invasion,
the tenement bisected by flood,
the cattle lowing, gelded
by agriculture students on a field trip.

The air contains skin and mud.
The galvanized barns, long empty, cough up
their dust of rotten feed, dry tobacco.
Men kneel in the tilled rows,
to pick up nails off the ground
still splashed with the blood of their makers.

You Never Sausage a Place
(You’re Always a ****** at Pedro’s!)
South of the Border – Fireworks, Motel & Rides
Exit 9: 10mi.

Drunkards in Dickies will tell you the roads are straight enough
that the drive home will not bend away from them.
Look in the woods to see by lamplight
two girls filling each other's mouths with smoke.
Hear a friendly command:
boys loosening a tire, stuck in the gut of a dog.
Turn on the radio between towns of two thousand
and hear the tiny voice of an AM preacher,
sharing the airwaves of country dark
with some chords plucked from a guitar.
Taste this water thick with tannin
and tell me that trees do not feel pain.
I would be a mausoleum for these thousands
if I only had the room.

I sealed myself against the flood.
Bodies knock against my eaves:
a clutch of cats drowned in a crawlspace,
an old woman bereft with a vase of pennies,
her dead son in her living room costumed as the black Jesus,
the ***** oil of a Chinese restaurant
dancing on top of black water.
A flow gauge spins its tin wheel
endlessly above the bloated dead,
and I will pretend not to be sick at dinner.

Misery now, a struggle ahead for Robeson County after flooding from Hurricane Matthew
LUMBERTON
After years of things leaving Robeson County – manufacturing plants, jobs, payrolls, people – something finally came in, and what was it but more misery?

I said a prayer to the city:
make me a figure in a figure,
solvent, owed and owing.
Take my jute sacks of wristbones,
my sheaves and sheaves of fealty,
the smell of the forest from my feet.
Weigh me only by my purse.
A slim woman with a college degree,
a rented room without the black wings
of palmetto roaches fleeing the damp:
I saw the calm white towers and subscribed.
No ingrate, I saved a space for the lost.
They filled it once, twice, and kept on,
eating greasy flesh straight from the bone,
craning their heads to ask a prayer for them instead.

Downtown later in the easy dark,
three college boys in foam cowboy hats shout in poor Spanish.
They press into the night and the night presses into them.
They will go home when they have to.
Under the bridge lit in violet,
a folding chair is draped in a ***** blanket.
A grubby pair of tennis shoes lay beneath, no feet inside.
Iced tea seeps from a chewed cup.
I pass a bar lit like Christmas.
A mute and pretty face full of indoor light
makes a promise I see through a window.
I pay obscene rents to find out if it is true,
in this nation tied together with gallows-rope,
thumbing its codex of virtues.

It was starting to snow as I entered Pere Lachaise cemetery. The few that had ventured in, were streaming out, as daylight faded, fast giving way to twilight, on this 1st of February night. I had 30 minutes of daylight left, to take the shots that I’d planned for all year.

I knew where I was going, having visited the cemetery in the summer, to scout locations for this moment. I walked up l’Avenue Principale towards Le Monument aux Morts and took the first right on l’Avenue des Puits. My pace quickened, not wanting to waste a single second, of the dying light.

I crossed path with the the last stragglers, most likely having paid homage to Chopin or Morrison. I was entering the oldest and most forested area of the cemetery. It sent a chill up my spine, not because of the cold February air, but because of the surreality of what was in front of me, a cobble stone path, lined with old trees, surrounded by an ocean of tombs, fading into the white and gray of a snowy afternoon.

I arrived at my location, the tomb of Heloise and Abelard. I set down my tripod and camera bag. I stopped to take it in. It was eerily beautiful, the snow slowly falling, lightly covering the tomb, the flowers, the love letters, laying around the plinth.

I was surprised at the number of single roses and love letters that were strewn in the yard, between the wrought iron fence, and the tomb. Even during the dead of winter, young women pilgrimaged to the tomb, leaving letters and prayers, hoping their love will last forever, in life and in death. Sadness overwhelmed me, as I felt the longing and pain of their and my,  unrequited loves.

I pulled out my camera, turned it on, double checking the battery indicator and exposure. I put the viewfinder to my eye, slowly pressed the shutter till I heard a beep, as the auto focus sharpened the view and my world became crystal clear. I zoomed in and out, composing my shot. I was too close for my lens. I picked up my tripod, turned around, and surveyed my work area.

I moved up the path, three tombs over, next to an old wide trunked chestnut tree, set my tripod and bag down, and recomposed my shot. The snowfall had intensified, to a heavy flurry. The snowflakes were thicker, fluffier, slowly drifting down like dandelion seeds. I was swimming in an ocean of white magical specks. Everything around me was dusted in ******, pure white powder.

I unfolded my tripod, mounted the camera to the head, and verified it was securely attached. I zoomed in and out till I composed my shot, stepping down the aperture and up the speed, till I achieved the dark, moody, feel I wanted. I pressed the shutter and captured the shot.

I was looking through the viewfinder when a woman stepped into my shot. For a split second, I was angry, then confused, then intrigued. I looked up, stepped back from my camera, to see and understand what was unfolding before me.

She was wearing a full-length white Lynx fur coat and cap, black leather gloves and boots. She was stunning, breathtaking. Was I hallucinating? Was she real? She hadn’t seen me, as I was behind her, catty corner, partially hidden by the chestnut tree.


She was holding something. I couldn’t quite see. I looked through the viewfinder, zoomed in on her. She held a single long stemmed blue rose in her left hand.  Instinctively, I pressed the shutter, captured the shot, the photo, the image, of this unworldly scene.

It was late, almost dark. What was she doing here? Was she praying, why, to whom, Heloise, Abelard, or both? She moved up to and placed her right hand on the protective wrought iron fence. I took a shot, then another. Then with her left hand, she gently threw the blue rose, time slowed, I pressed the shutter, never letting go, as the flower arched in the air and landed perfectly, on the plinth, at Heloise's side.

I released the shutter, still looking through the viewfinder. She placed her left hand on the wrought iron fence, bowed her head, just stood there, in the darkness, in the snowfall.

She pulled her right hand away from the wrought iron fence and wiped her eyes. Was she crying?

She slowly turned around. I pressed the shutter, held it down, for a continuous shot. I saw her face, her raven black hair, her incandescent blue eyes. Like a cannonball hitting me in the chest, I realized and recognized who she was. It was her, the woman from the metro.

She looked up, turned her head, and looked directly at me. I zoomed in, framed her face, continuously pressing the shutter. Her face expressionless, her eyes aglow. Had she seen me? I don’t know. She took a step, turned her head, and walked back up the cobble stone path, and faded into the night, into the falling snow.

captured in the psych ward — hooligan taken away from christmas concert for being poor



today ron was awoken at 10.99 pm on the night of the sidney meyer music bowls christmas carols

by the HDU, when young harry butler was admitted for sitting writing stories and sending them via

facebook via his phone and at the 2nd carol, the security guards picked him up and threw him out and when

he fought back, the guards rang the HDU, to come and get him, and as he was being transported

all sorts of delusions were coming into his head, like he is jesus christ and he is currently suffering

for everyone’s sins, and then he said, he was eberneezer scrooge, and the guards were aware of that

and had to throw him out of the carols and then was given an order to never attend it because he is

a danger to everyone and himself, and ron asked him what happened and he said, the guards wanted

to get rid of me because i am scrooge, and when i explained that to them, the guards told me to shut up

and leave, and when i didn’t leave, they said ok, come on scrooge, it’s time you had a little journey to the

psychiatric unit, to be placed on a better medication and ron said, do you really believe you are scrooge

and harry said i must be, because all i was doing was sitting there writing stories and singing carols

but the guards just picked on me, because i have an illness and ron said, ok, but are you sure you didn’t

do anything to provoke it, and harry yelled ‘NO’, i look like a hobo so the fucken guards decide to pick on me

and then harry asked ron did you watch the carols and ron said, yeah till the phone rang about you, you

see i can’t understand why the guards pick on you, i can assure you, i look bad tonight, but are you sure

you didn’t **** out on the lawn or in a private tin, so you don’t wait in line and harry said ‘NO’ and then said

that is the most discussing thing i have ever heard of, i could actually drink that if i got really thirsty but ron

said he has to explore the options and also find out what medication is best for you and harry said, NO YA ****

I DON’T WANT YA BLASTED MEDICATION, I WANT TO GO BACK TO THE CAROLS, ron told harry that wasn’t an option

and tried to hear the rest of harry’s story because at present his story is keeping him in the HDU for a long time

because we need to make sure the families are safe though, then harry asked if he could watch the carols on TV

and ron went in there with him and then harry started talking about moses being at the carols attempt;ting to crowd surf and

harry thought that was funny and then he saw leonardo di vinci paint a picture of him being taken to the nuthouse and

now he is there, the finale came and harry was getting cranky with ron saying you don’t fucken care for the sick people

such as myself and ron told harry to settle down saying i care, i care i care, and harry said all you want top do is pump me full of drugs

and i am a poor man with his family taken away from him by those greedy **** from the mental health tribunal

and then ron, they had the hide to tell me, i must go through a lot of fucken treatment to get them back

and ron said, have you been offered medication to, (harry yells stop) ron said, let me talk to make you feel better and

harry said, *******, i have been pumped full of drugs day in and day out, and ron asked, can i ask what drugs and

harry said seroquel and chlosiphine and i get by smoking mariguana, and ron said, you do know that mariguana can cause

brain damage and harry yelled, ‘SHUT UP YA FLAMIN’ DRONGO’, mariguana was the only drug which helped me and

when i get out, i will go back to smoking it and forgetting about the fucken side effect medication, you ***** subscribe for us

and ron said, we have to give you medication while you are here, to get you better and make you a free man, and harry said

I DON’T WANT TO BE PLACED ON SOME WONDER DRUG TO GET ME OUT OF HERE, THE WORLD FUCKEN HATES ME

SO PLEASE ALLOW ME TO FUCKEN GET OUT OF HERE, and ron said, no, and gave him a shot of ****** to calm him down

and every time harry saw ron, he yelled GET ****** ****, but the ****** was slowly making his voice calmer and calmer

and he went to sleep, and ron went home to get ready for the christmas party, but he said to the nurses at the HDU if he gets up

screaming, give him more ****** and if that doesn’t calm him, call me and i will be right over, but the ****** will keep him quiet

till he agrees to take medication, he is high on dope and he thinks it’s helping him so ****** is the best option for him, it gets rid of

any signs of mariguana, and personally i think taking him away from the carols was the best thing, because just imagine if the kids

saw an angry man like him at the family event and ron left and started preparing for his christmas party and at 1.00pm on christmas

harry held a fork at the nurses throat and said LET ME FUCKEN SEE THE DOCTOR YA **** and ron came back and gave him

600 mills of seroquel and told him to relax but harry said, I WILL FUCKEN **** YOU TOO, IF YOU DON’T LET ME GO OUT, I HAVE

A CHRISTMAS PARTY WITH MY FUCKEN PARENTS and ron said, ok i will give you more ****** because we can’t let you go

because, you are danger to yourself and to other people and then ron said merry chrkistmas and went back home to clean up the

party dishes and watched the micheal buble christmas show on television, and then went to bed and woke up at 8 am for work and

went to his cafe for breakfast where he told them about harry who was brought to the HDU from the carols on christmas eve and after

finishing his coffee he went to work and harry was restrained because he became violent and harry gave him some more seroquel and

then asked him what was bothering him apart from the visible but harry yelled GET ****** and ron went back to the nurses saying keep

an eye on harry ok, we can’t have him go free because he could cause harm to the other patients and to us, and ron went home, ordered a pizza

and watched a video on how to control dope users.

Some moments are not to be captured
not in a photo
not in a story
not anywhere
Some moments should only live in a memory

Well, it’s thanks to my friend, Neillie, that I'm standing here today;
He captured me down at his shop as I reached out to pay.
He said, “I have a job for you, and you've twelve weeks to prepare.”
I thought, my God - he wants his toenails clipped or help to dye his hair...

Now, a toast that's for the ladies; Lord, wherever will I start?
He said, “That's nothing rude and nothing crude, something from the heart.”
So, I scratched my head and searched my soul; I was’nae getting far.
It seems that Neillie's harsh restrictions took out half my repertoire.

Anyway - oh the Bard, he loved the ladies, and oh how they loved him back;
Seems a poem's all it took those days to get them in the sack.
No wonder he liked writing of the love that hid within,
Which explains his suave and healthy look, and how he kept so trim.

If only it were like that now; I’d write for all I'm worth,
Grabbing every chance I could each day to nail another verse.
And my wife, she would be pleased for me at all my new attention,
And I'd be thin from running scared from too much pain to mention.

Now, once my business took me roaming to each corner of Great Britain,
So, I catalogued the ladies; just the ones that I was smitten.
Well, Welsh girls they took hours to please, and the Irish take some beating,
And the English girls are very, very nice if your ears can take their bleating.
Ah, but Scottish girls are best by far; as steady as a rock,
But, if by chance your eye should stray, you'll wake withoot your ****.

So I married one, with no regrets; best move that I've made yet,
And I love her dear, with all my heart, in a life with no regret.
For like the Bard, I settled down when love could get no hotter,
But compared to him and his wondrous works, sure I'm just a ditty jotter.

Oh Sweet Ladies, you are dear to us - where would we be without you?
In wrinkled clothes and motley beards in a house of straw and cow poo.
Without you we would just exist - watching football in a bar;
Just sitting, drinking, laughing, eating, drinking…..and sleeping in the car.

Dear, Sweet Ladies, we don’t kid ourselves; we know you have us beat,
Hence why we hold the doors for you, and chairs each time you seat.
We love to do the chivalrous stuff - it makes us look the strongest,
You see, we have to make the most of things - you live the fecking longest.

Well, at last it’s time for me to stop - and give you chance to mingle,
And I'll make peace with my dear wife, before I'm Facebook status: single.
Now, gentlemen, I ask you all - please charge and raise your glasses,
And join me in a bumper toast: “To the beauty of the Lassies.”

captured in the psych ward, the delusional helper


ron cooper is having memories of his time he had his appendix at royal melbourne hospital

when this delusional marta like man is admitted to his HDU and ron had to take good care of him

by asking him, who do you want to help, the man said, i want to help feed the hungry and ron asked

how are you going to help like that, the man said, i can cook a meal a day, and if i have no helpers

i will do it myself and ron asked, yeah, do you realise you will be rushed off your feet and the man yelled

at ron, SHUT UP YA BIG WALLY and ron started having these visions of him yelling at the doctor who

wanted to take his appendix out and talked to a social worker about it and as he was doing that, the nurses

got a name out of him, but the name was jesus claus, and then the man said, my parents are heavily into christmas

and seeing their last name was claus, they called me jesus, and the nurses went away to work on what medications

jesus claus needs to be on, whilst talking to the social worker who said it might be a good idea to play with him as if he is

making a difference, whether he is or not and at lunch time, ron thought jesus was not fit for the lunch room, so ron bought it into

his room saying, here is your lunch, or helpers need lunch so they can help many people and jesus said, can you give a pass out

so i can council some of these people, involved in this school shooting and ron gave him a plastic card with nothing on it and

told jesus, that every time you want to help someone use the trillion dollars on this card, and jesus asked, how about i have a computer in here

and ron gave him a broken down eftpos machine and told jesus to swipe it in this, and then you watch the news, and they make money

it is all you, ok, jesus said, ok i will help everyone with the doctors money, but ron was risking his job, and had to keep tabs of jesus’s goings on

and another thing, ron asked jesus, we want to help you help people, so i need to know how you do it, and ron gave jesus some risperidal and largactil

to calm jesus’s delusions and in  about 1 hour, jesus was too busy helping to eat and when ron came to collect the lunch tray, jesus said

if you ant to help me, give money to the dead and alive victims of the tahiti plane crash, you see i gave them $1,000,000 and they made i and a quarter million

and ron, they need your help and ron said, ok, when i get home, i will give them some loot to save them and ron asked jesus if he wants to join this group and

jesus said, i am too busy, and ron said fine and walked away and after the group was over, ron bought jesus his lunch and said to him

jesus claus, who are you helping now and jesus said there was this kid who was kidnapped by a gangster and i have to pay the ransom out of your money

but this is fun, ron, can i have some more and ron said, ok, i will put money on the card when i get to my office,ok

jesus thanked ron, as ron went back to his office knowing that he is just feeding the dilution into him and when it became time to collect his dinner plate

ron said, my mum and dad and uncle rob told me, you can only help people if you help yourself as well, so ron said, i need to borrow your helping card and machine

and jesus said, i know why you are doing this, you are jealous of my power and my talent, i have this gift of helping people, and ron said, your not helping, you are a marter

and jesus yelled  WHY ARE YOU CALLING ME A MARTER FOR, YA **** and ron said, because you feel your helping with broken technology and this made jesus very angry

and ron had to get out of there but when he came back to jesus’s room, the TV was thrown against the wall and he started yelling at ron which made him get the needle and

inject some ******, so they can give the medication to him, and after they injected him with ******, they were forced to inject him with risperidal and largactil to help him relax and calm his delusions

and when ron left, he asked the nurses to call him, if he gets angry and at 4 in the morning ron who was burping pizza, was forced to come to his HDU because jesus was walking around with a dinner knife

yelling and threatening people and ron gave him a shot of ****** and refused to go home because he has so many drugs inside of him, ya know he could die, and as the next day passed

jesus was ok and ron gave jesus risperidal at lunch and went away and gave him more risperidal at night with largactil and then while he was feeling tired, ron bought

a hamburger and a beer and went home to lose himself in prim time TV'

captured in the psych ward, fear of being kidnapped by demons




today ron got out of bed and went to the cafe for a morning coffee and spoke to them

about his latest patient, who was in the psych ward because he feared being kidnapped

by demons who are flying around his head, you see a few nights before he was admitted

to the psych ward, he tied himself up claiming the demons have him, and if he told people

about the demons, his next door neighbour will snarl at him with his coffee saying your not a cool

kid buddy and the reason why he told them there, because they won’t blab, and nobody outside

will know about the 21 year old paranoid schizophrenic he has in his psych ward, and ron left the

cafe and headed to the hdu to give the morning medications out and he gave it to patty roe, and

charlie chaplin and when he came to the 21 year old he stopped to have a little talk saying

how was your sleep last night and then he said my name is olly hammond, and i was being threatened

outside a nightclub in the city and that gave olly horrible kidnapping thoughts thinking he would be

kidnapped by them, but really they were roughing him up, but olly knew nothing of that, and the thugs said i might

kidnap olly in a minute and illy heard it, and ran off yelling, the demons have got me, the demons have got me

and ron was not really proud of the drug they chose for olly but gave him a dose of the drug for the morning

and then after handing all the medications out, he went to do research on his computer about trying to find

the right drug for olly, because this drug he was on was making olly feel nautious, and definitely made him

very paranoid, but the nurses didn’t share ron’s enthusiasm about putting him on another drug, because

sometimes it’s good to tackle the problem by digging the whole root rather than just the bush, and ron said

yeah i agree with that, but while he is on this medication he will be violent to himself or another patient or

even one of us, i know olly is only young but he can **** a man, because nobody really looked after him

much as a kid, and the nurses said ok, but really putting him on another medication could **** him by making

him very slow and ron said, yeah, but he thinks demons are kidnapping him, and if anyone makes fun of him

olly will become very violent toward himself or others, and then as ron was talking he noticed afexor, which

was made for depression, but as ron was reading it, it can help paranoid schizophrenics if they are monitored

properly and then 15 minutes before lunch, ron went to olly’s room to say, we are taking you off the drug your on

and putting you on afexor because it can get rid of the paranoyer in your head, and let’s put this bluntly, get rid of

these demons who are threatening to kidnap you, and olly asked when do i start this new medication and ron said, how about tonight

and because you have only been on medication for 4 days, we can’t see why we can’t not give you any more doses

of that medication, and ron left and then went in to deliver the lunches to everyone and patty roe and charlie chaplin

and olly and 12 more patients all came out, but olly started yelling because his meal looked like **** and tore strips off

charlie chaplin because he told him to shut up and ron took olly to his room to talk to him and then ron brought his

lunch in and olly used his hand to throw his lunch all over his room and ron gave olly a ****** to calm down and

then went back to his office to work on this affexor experiment and olly slept right through to dinner and he didn’t like that either

and ron said, olly, you must eat something or you’ll starve and then the nurses force fed a tube into his stomach, and olly

screamed saying ******* ******* ******* ******* ******* YA FUCKEN ****** and ron gave him his

first two tablets of affexor and it might have calmed him down, and as ron clocked off and bought fish and chips and

went home to retire on the couch, at 3 am, the nurses rang ron up saying the new medication is giving him a rash all over

his body, and this is making him very hard to settle down, and ron said, ok, try him on melleril, 3 tablets, tomorrow, and we’ll

scrap the affexor, and the nurses apologised for getting him up, and ron said, don’t worry about it, i want olly well as well

and the next morning ron went to his usual cafe for breakfast and then went to the HDU, to hand out the morning medications

and when ron came up to olly, he copped a serve saying, that medication you put me on gave a fucken rash, and then olly said

next time you think about a wonder drug, can you please think about the fucken side effects and ron gave him 1 tablet of melleril in the

morning and when it came to the nighttime medications he gave him 2 tablets of melleril, and so far so good, and after he gave the 9 o’clock supper

ron went home and heated up some soup and watched TV, and fell asleep on the couch, and the next day, melleril was a wonder drug

but it’s only early days, will this drug stop olly’s demon kidnapping, thinking everyone is going to bash or kidnap him when noone is after him.

Have you ever seen the sun rise?
Witnessed with your own two eyes?
Watching exactly how it went?
Not through someone else's photo captured moment
You'll really enjoy it more if you view it live
& you'll appreciate just being alive

I've watched the sun rise countless mornings
It's like my own private showings
Each one completely different in every way
& the best way to start any day
They're bright & beautiful
Breatakingly blissful

You'll never feel the same once you've experienced it
& so many will never understand the feeling you get
It's hard to explain but I'll do my best
I'd imagine it's like fresh air deepily inhaled into your chest
Your lungs fill up with all the freshness
& you exhale all that causes you stress

Your worries all just disappear
Your mind is calm & clear
It's a feeling that just forever stays
Until your dying days
Joy & happiness is all you release
It is what brings you inner peace

All you care to do now is enjoy everything
No matter the troubles & obstacles life may bring
A happy soul is all you've got & need
Your heart has compassion & optimism is what you bleed
Sharing your smile with all you pass or whoever you meet
That is your favorite way to say hello & greet

All from experiencing a live sun rise happen
That all may seem impossible to imagine
All that out of just a sun rising?
When it happens to you, it IS quite surprising
Shocking at first, you just can't believe how you feel
& you wonder how can this even be real?

If you allow yourself to let go of your worries & any doubt
Then you make room to clearly feel what it's about
You're allowing yourself to be vulnerable
& that's when you become more relatable
Clearing your clouded mind of opinions from useless chatter
Let's you finally enjoy what most may think or say doesn't really matter

Those are the ones who don't pay a lot of attention
& are afraid to get lost in their imagination
Never will they set a foot out of their "safe" box & risk crossing that thin line
It's OK, it's their loss & that's just fine
They'll just never understand your constant positive attitude
& can't recall a time you were even the slightest bit rude

They will never know how to just live happily
Inside their soul will be dying slowly
Some won't see how beautiful a sun rise really is
It's something no one should ever miss
A sun rise & even a sun set
Are too amazing to just forget!!

captured in the psych ward the cool heavy metal fan winds up being captured in the psych ward



you see while ron is busy in his hdu trying to look after everyone, in werribee, there was this man

playing heavy metal really loud, and the real **** of a bloke came out to complain about it

the heavy metal fan told him to get nicked and put it up even more louder, and this bloke rang the

police and the police came down in 45 minutes and the heavy metal fan said, dude, i am only sharing

the music i like the best, and it is good music he said, but the police said, TURN IT OFF, and when the

heavy metal fan refused and also spat right in the cops face, and the policeman grabbed him and

put him in the back of the paddy wagon and sent to the lockup, when he got there, he stopped swearing

and became suddenly good, actually forgetting about why he is there and this prompted the police to
‘
put him in the HDU, saying he is a danger to himself and others, but he became very defensive when it came

to defending his music, he punched charlie chaplin and patty roe, for saying his music is crap, and ron

went into his room to try and get his name, and he said it was axil slash bone, and ron didn’t believe that

was his real name, but it was hard to get his real name out of him, so he called him axil, and ron said

do you know why you are here, and axil said, i was listening to my cool heavy metal music and this big fat

rich ***** came over and threaten me into turning the music down, i refused because heavy metal is made

to be enjoyed and ron said, have you been on any medication in your life, and axil said, medication, are

you calling me crazy, only crazy people take medication, and ron said, well, for what i heard, you might need

something to calm you down, and axil yelled out THERE IS NOTHING WRONG WITH ME, and ron said

maybe not, but you have to control your behaviour, axil told ron to get ****** saying, i am not like these

******* in here, i am a cool heavy metal fan who deserves a break, ron was prepared to break it for a while

but at dinner he yelled at the dinner table threatening to bash charlie, saying, you are crazy, you do know

that your not fucken charlie chaplin don’t ya, charlie said, leave me alone you idiot and except medication

and axil picked up a metal knife and started chasing charlie around with it saying come here ****

come here ya bleeding **** and charlie yelled out, HELP ME, HELP ME, the mad man is after me

and ron gave axil a shot of ****** and put him to bed and went to the nurses office saying axil needs

to be trialled on medication, he won’t like it, but we might have to convince to him, his behaviour was

disruptive and needs to be placed on a drug, so when the dinner dishes were picked up and they

bought out the sandwiches for supper, then ron bought out the medications and he had some risperidal

for axil, and when he reached axil, axil yelled so loud, I DON’T WANT ANY MEDICATION, THERE IS NOTHING

WRONG WITH ME, and ron said, yes you do, and you are going to take this medication even if i have to

force-feed this down your throat, and axil said, why do you care so much, all i was doing is playing loud music

there is nothing wrong with that, ron said, you got aggressive with the man, so the police bought you here

and while you are here, you must take medication, and as he did it, ron said, what is your favourite music

axil said, i like AC/DC and twisted sister and WASP and guns and roses, and that is where i got my name from

and ron gave him the medication with a glass of water and left the HDU and went to the pizza hut, to buy a super

supreme and retire to the couch to watch TV.

wind chimes and I think of you
when your laughter echos
stillness in my heart  
when you hold me with your gaze
blue eyes shining like the stars
on a clear night
captured like a fox in a snare
helpless and wanting

My heart is beating so for you
believe ne honey my love is true
What had i done not hate me please
eloquent you and your sweet English

you know what you told first
Give this rose to someone best
I am not wrong i chosen you
again I tell my love is true

Where we met at corner there
Fergusson-Modern one bus stop were
when you spoke one word so bold
and I was tried your hand to hold

What stroke of your sweet bright eyes
why not given that GOOD-LUCK prize
to win your grace I worked so heard
but why you turn and proved me bad

Where is your that fancy dress?
which give you round and rolling grace
I choose you for my red rose ;why?
your little height and sweetest shy

when you move ;why?your hidden soul
which time ?did you perform that role
only you and our Indian airs
how I tell you I love you dear

o dear show me that secret shine
In that many youth you are divine
I like your turning and rolling round
in your language one poetic sound

fear no more dear wait for year
coming soon i am in the name of dear
it nothing but the joy you seen
you know what that echoing shrill

I saw that air with rhyme rhythmic
don't  know what is the measure for it
I like you and your thiny lips
I was dreaming in the night of sleeps

What am I wrong ?really tell me
that smell I want and together we
not matter what rule and law
keep me with you or declare draw

what you like .......I know it
take care of yourself and on time  Eat
who was that one you moving around
wind was so cold on that ground

with whom your speaking I feel jealous
where are you in the sky;come to us
In my nation lush garden green
you get everything;what I captured in

o dear crazy wayward listen to mine
I never smile at others fairy shine
o honey I cant send you away
we make together our one way

happiness and pleasure will be there
I like your innocent face dear
your heart is like the deepest ocean
your sound rhythmic has special motion

It is not cross the limit of soul
you the soulmate I told you whole
I cant say more about your nature
like dancing peacocks reathers feature

my singing dove is waiting for you
your peaceful shadow -tell;how are you
how I say about my soul
wish to be your guard is my role

In the garden of coconut at evening
moving wind with yellow shining
wants you dear ;be the friend of mine
little stars of heaven its twinkling shine

don't change your friend for my heart
I'm  the one will ever your guard
I know why?your anger high
your tempered eyes give terrible joy

not matter anger it shows your beauty
your nose,lips hair looks  sweetly
you're the one who university queen
give me that your hidden unseen

no not why but you are the one
I like your speech and anger like sun
I wish to hold your hand quickly
heavenly little queen looks sweetly

come to me at list at last
if one break your heart so fast
not matter if this next seven birth
what is this earth;is it the worth?

this my love is paradise of love
messenger of peace my friend is dove
it is the one my immortal song
ever I love you,is fixed,not wrong

o sweet heart,dear listen to me
made for each other couple are we
what I say don't get bother
we have to take seven birth together

you and me were roses in first birth
you the bud I was flower on this earth
scent of love we had given to the world
and yet we loved till get to the old

In second time we became singing doves
day and night we live in love
fey free-in the sky with keeping peace
peaceful messenger really love this

you and me will  became the snake
we ran in the jungle and moved into lake
touching our body embraced each other
breathing closeness sleeped night together

At fourth time you the flame of fire
that was the time your wish so higher
in romance we spend each the time
your breathing air spoke rhythm and rhyme

Fifth birth must deep down in the sea
in that blue world what lovers would we
lush green surface had softy blue shine
nature of you was perfect divine

This is the sixth,you teacher ;student I
teach me poems of love,it need;why?
you teach that all what love you made
In the garden of banana we make our shade

At last we will die, leave this world
and beyond all this remains our love
Last seventh time we the stars in the sky
we'll blessings to the lovers with immortal joy.

Horror speaks in silence
    and Fear speaks in signs
              it’s written on my face
                        and on the faces I see.

How did I end up here?

A masked man brought us food.
The smell of it drives us mad in hunger.
We eat like we're crazy.
Devouring it like messy animals.

I see the eyes of superiority
            in the sight of the masked man.
I look at them with deep curiosity.
He looks back with a look of intent.
Deep blue eyes inspect the whole me.
then I realized, everyone, including me
            wears nothing but just two pieces of
                                                      undergarments.                
I quickly cover my well-being,
then he just walks away.

I felt ***** ,
            Weary,
and Cold in this rusty dark place.
Where are we going?
Our future is uncertain.
I felt that our life is for sale,
like animals going to be slaughtered.

Sleep is taking my reality
Hoping that dreams will wash away
            the fear, horror and uncertainty along the way.                      




*© Pax

its a blue Monday
after Super Sunday
Americas 45th funday
yesterdays spectacle

the dip is done
the broken bones
of buffalo wings
fill giant glad bags

the ridged ripples
of broken Doritos
scattered on the floor
wait for a vacuums hum

dead soldiers rattle
a melodious cascade
the aroma of flat Bud
plunge into recycle bins

ribbed Trojans
dripping bagged ****
rim plastic trash cans
confirm an ****'s frenzy

the game forgotten
commercial reveries remain
seared into the briney mush
of compliant olfactories

collective hallucinations
successfully branded
a new and improved
global consciousness

Madmen Shamans
ebulliently channel
transactional zeitgeists
from the ripped boxes of
Best Buy plasma screens

Monday morning
water cool scuttlebutt
the planet is buzzing about...

Google's cool slap
of iPod clad automatons
the vanquishers of IBM's evil empire
Apple's brave new world is next
("meet the new boss,
same as the old boss?")

we all dug
rolling with Eminem
through the glitzy
streets of Motown

How cool is 8 Mile?
The hoods lookin good
angelic chorus lifts spirits
Swing Low Sweet Chrysler

The artistic types
faun over
the graphic beauty
illustrious aestheticism

moving story line
the epic journey
of the worlds
greatest brand

heroic product marketing pros
rival Jason and the Argonauts
sojourning trans-formative odysseys
of clever packaging and fat tail shelf life

holding precious real estate
of living imaginations
infecting hearts and minds
of future generations

realizing
everything
ends better
with coke

The State Farm Pre-Game
Jimmy Johnson's new coif
jawed away with his old boss
rattlesnake booted Jerry Jones

A poignant embrace captured in
living color on grand jumbo trons
lording over a cavernous palace
a new stadium for Homeboys

Jimmy J asks Jerry J
"Why you overpaid
for The Boys New
Crib?"

"A billion 4,
a palace for the masses".
Jerry breaks some news
with an impish wink.
"No expense is spared
for the peeps."

"I always make out,
get a good return. I
make a profit. Ain't
America great."

This year Super Bowl
went Hollywood
and installed
a long red carpet.

Mike Strahan, collared
Harrison Ford.
Bagging his greatest sack
on a dazzling red rug.

"How many Super Bowls
is this for you?"
Strahan whistles
through his gaped teeth.

The aging Indiana Jones
came to promote his new flick,
"Cowboys and Aliens"
(I'm told an early Cannes
favorite. And it should be. Spoiler alert,
the movie is a moving story of an American tragedy.
Romo blows another one
throwing an interception in overtime.
The Aliens return it 95 yards for a touchdown.
Boy's lose again. America's Team vanquished by bubble headed Martians.
All of Texas weeps.)

Indy
coolly quips an answer
whipping with sarcasm,
"after today, one."
yuck yuck
lol

Strahan continues
to stalk Ford like a
scrambling quarterback,
"where will you be sitting?"

Ford shrugs
"dunno,
somewhere
up-there,
I guess",
he points to
the lofty
luxury boxes.
Royalty sits
next to God
in Jerry Jones
house of the
people.

Ford dons a green scarf.
He's down with the Pack.
Another sunshine *****
in the seat.

Michael Douglas and Zeta Jones
arrive in time to hear
Keith Urban sing
"Who Wouldn't Want to be Me?"

"He's alive
He's free
Who wouldn't
want to be me?"

Indeed who?

The parade
of heroes
continue.

The walking,talking
little S Corp, LLC's
dance their way
into the stadium
on resplendent
cushions of red.

Terrific brands
all earnestly
questing to
urgently
deliver
messages
to promote
themselves
and plug
shameful
products.

A Black Eye Peas
teaser
blinks onto
my giant
flat screen.

Will I Am
a black man
in a blacker mask
marches down the street
zapping people
with a ray gun.
(fascist culture is so cool, a
little light on liberation,
but **** does he look bad as all get out
in that leather rumble don't **** with me
outfit)

Jamie Foxx on the royal carpet leaks
that he yodeled three tunes
at a pregame party for Jerry's Kids;
T Boone and the Big W among them.

Quick cut
to Jamie's
new movie
Rio.
(I wonder if its
about Mexicano's
crossing the river?)

Wealth
Power
the perfect
image of ourselves
take a pill

I am Limitless
a new movie?
I've seen this one before.
I think I'm watching it now.

Just Go With It
Adam *******,
Jennifer Aniston
Americas sweetheart
teamed with Americas
kosher jokester.

He looks hot
in his droopy
pretend
don't give a ****
orange sweatshirt
and acid washed jeans.

Jennifer's ****, legs
what can you say
about America's sweetheart?
I think Brad Pitt
made a big mistake.

Bill O
is next.
Posturing,
arm wrestles
with the Prez,
shadow boxes
with the Big O.

"Muslim Brotherhoods
Rendition
Mubarack goes off the reservation
knows where the bodies are buried"
***!
***!

(Do we really need a dose of Fox Fear?
Is there no escape from the pernicious harangue?
Don't they know its Super Bowl Sunday?)

Bill O's drive by continues,
"Obamacare,
why do Americans hate you?"
Great journalism by this Fox ****.

Bill O is
haughty,
arrogant,
disrespectful
a despicable bully
and a self serving blow hard.

(My bladder is busting.
Its a great time to take a ****.)

We escape to
the freshness
of Owen Wilson's
smiling face,
playing two hand touch.

His bent nose
shining
he trots about
Jerry's field
carefree as a child.
(Is this a pitch, pass and punt
contest for A Listers?)

Other stars
join the light fun;
goose cheerleaders
give the cabana boys
hand-jobs
and themselves
a well earned blow-job.

Its an **** of photo ops
product placement
a sizzling collection
of dancing brands
prancing on the gridiron
of the New Cowboy field.

Ashton Kutcher
peeks over the shoulder
of a tweeting W.
I'm impressed
W knew
how to use
his thumbs.

Mrs. W's
permanent smile
was clearly visible
from the stadiums
cheapest seats.

Condie sat
way to the right
quietly stewing
lamenting
lost opportunities
of a gig as NFL
Commissioner.

On the stadiums floor
the frenetic dancing
of the
bumping
brands
fast
approaches
ecstatic elation.

Hollywood's version of
Whirling Dervishes; is
immediately stilled
as the solemn portion
of the program
commences.

The Declaration of Independence
is read by a bright galaxy of stars
accompanying armed service personnel
and other diligent American's.

"We hold these truths
to be self evident"

"United colonies
levee war,
dissolve bounds,
our day of allegiance
lives, fortunes and sacred honor
freedom is common sense,
free, equal, united"

CEO's
imprisoned
in Jerry's
luxury boxes
overcome
with
emotion
pound fists
on the glass
smearing
cocktail sauce
on the windows
of the suites.

Illegal
Chicano's
bravely
step forward
with rolls
of Bravo
and Windex
to wipe
it clean.

The focal point
of festivities
seismically
shifts like a
tectonic plate
almost as large
as Jerry's Stadium.

The stampede
of cheers
thunder like
canon shots,
the patriotic
ramparts of
militant
free market
capitalism
supplants the
shallow frivolity
of consumer slavery.

We are
compelled
to kneel
to celebrate a
Eucharist of
nationalism.

My partner explodes,
"Can't watch a football game
and view it for what it is,
a ******* football game."

The Fox
broadcasters
dedicate
this segment
of the show
to our military.

I squirm in my seat.
Sorry,
but the declaration is about
free people in free societies
not militarism.

Next up
dis old cowboy
Sam Elliot.
He knows
how to speak
the language
of real football fans.
Finally, a man of the people.

Sam introduced the cities.
He starts with Pittsburgh.

"Built on steel
a place where
terrible is good
these are the
enduring qualities
of this great American City."

The Steelers
make a timely entrance
onto the floor of the stadium,
as millionaires erupt
shaking their terrible towels.

Sam's
fuax
folkism
for
Fox Sports
continued.

"Green Bay is Title Town
the people never quit.
Crafty veterans are winners
exhorting all to greatness"

Images
of Lombardi's
toothy grin
fills my 72 inch screen.
A visitation by
America's Saint,
the sanctifier
of all competition
anoints the proceeding,
the quest to claim
the trophy named
for the games
very own
Archangel
of the
Gridiron.

The extended gig of
Lombardi's ghost
has haunted America
for over half a century;
has reportedly been seen
stalking the stage
on Broadway.

The anointed
Packers sprint
onto the field and
millionaire cheese heads
taking big bites out of life
erupt in cheers.

My hi def wide screen
made by Sharp reports
Battle of Los Angeles
opens 3/11/11.
The Chicago Code
premiers on Fox
sometime in March.

Walter Payton
Man of The Year Award
is presented
to an NFL Player
watching the game
with the troops
in Iraq.

The millionaires
don't cheer,
but the Fox announcers
are verklempt
overcome with patriotism.

Michelle Lee,
star
of Fox'***** show
Glee,
poses in front of a
sanitized choir
in blue uniforms to sing
America the Beautiful.

The beautiful song
is but an opening act
for the musical centerpiece
Star Spangled Banner.

The cameras cut
to a smiling W.
He can't get into Switzerland
but ******, he won't be turned out
of JJ's OK Corral.

Christina Aguilera
takes center stage.
She mounts
the silver football
crowning the
Holy Logo of the NFL
to sing the hallowed
Star Spangled Banner.

She fumbles her lines!
She forgot the rockets red glare!
The Steelers are crying.
The Packers are angry.
Ice melts from the stadiums roof.
The foundations of Jerry Jones
new stadium shakes.

A fly over of 4 fighters in formation
appears to be unaffected by the flub.
The planes do not crash.
They stay in formation.

The pilots spare Christina
a strafing and drone strike.
The republic remains
secure for now.

An unfamiliar announcer
addresses TV land.
He offers an apology to the fans
who cannot be seated.

The fire marshals
have revoked
Jerry's seating plan.
Greed got the better
of this man of the people.
Cowboy Stadium
is overbooked!

What is happening?
Is this America?
An ATT commercial
arrives just in time.

ATT has a new plan for America.
They encourage us to live social
with the new ATT AG.
Free market solutions
always work best.

Michael Douglas
reads another
patriotic exhortation.

"United we,
see the journey
of Acme Packers
as our journey."

"We see the resolve
of US Steel
as our resolve.
Big dreams
believe the best
journeys are
celebrated together."
(I'm down with that.
Whats good for Jerry Jones
is still good for me.
Right On! Check this stadium.
Power to the people!
It may not apply to the people who
will not be seated but tough nuggies.
This is America ******. Everybody
can't be seated at the table.
Even if they paid for their seat.
This ain't Red China.)

Neon Dion and other inductees
into the Football Hall of Fame
tosses the coin.
Steelers' call tails.
Heads it is.

At half time
The Black Eyed Peas
descend from
an upper Valhalla.

Still attired in
black fascist threads
The Righteous Peas
start wailing as
white metallic minions
dressed as
Imperial Storm Troopers
gallop to surround
their idols.

Precise formations
goose steppin bops
choreographic steps
the visceral *****
perfect counter-point
to swabbles of wiggling Peas.

Slash,
Guns and Roses
guitar hero
gunslinger
strode on stage
winging
this gal of mine
in choreographed
unison with
the leggy
Fergie.

Pumping it louder
the spectacle incites
the dancing
Imperial minions
quick steppin
and fetchin it
as Usher descends
in white unison
to leap and dance
over nasty
black peas.

The Gods
are descending
upon us.
Their words
have become
flesh.

The BEP's bleat
"kids are dying
wheres the love?"
Art does mirror life.

The neon hearts
of cheap
glow sticks
light up
the time
of our lives.

We are
cubed box heads
happily dancing along
the 50 yard line
answering China's
resounding drum
of frantic proletarians
bashing away
neocolonial disgrace
during the opening
ceremony of the worlds
greatest Olympian
display of
the pounding will
of an emerging nation
arriving on the world stage
with urgent insistence.

In America
we party on
every night
swiping
revoked
credit cards
for express lane
exits at the
local Walmart.

We are proud
highly personal
bar codes!

We refuse to be
marked down and flung
into discount bins at a
Tupelo Dollar Store.

Our light of life
flashes across screens
directing the trading pits
at the Chicago Board of Trade.

Each Super Bowl Sunday
souper bowl beggars
collect canned soup
for hungry Americans
at the local Shop and Drop

begging for larmen
boxes of Kraft
freeze dried noodles
and cans of Progresso
the feast of kings

A triumph
of the
Will I Am
BOOM BOOM
Says
Will I Am

I finish my bag of
Cool Ranch Doritos
and lick my partners
fingers clean.

You Tube Music Video:
Black Eyed Peas
Joints and Jam

2/7/11
Oakland
jbm
(WIP)

poetry is photography:
the photography of your soul

it begins as an observation captured in stuttering syntax:
the lens of your soul pointing towards a subject, a metaphor, a line
within you, within the world, within the two.

if vague and smudgy this image at first,
the lines rearrange themselves, the grammar settles,
and the image comes into focus - sharp and still.

as you would a camera, approach things at angles,
you flood your poetry with perspective, with self, with distance,
stamp yourself onto it, and you know it belongs as yours.

and you know you have captured that pearl in an oyster,
those millions of dying stars exploding within you,
an image of yourself.

yet, sometimes, you're out of film and however you click the shutter,
your words fall off the lines, burst into dissonance, or finds itself unwritten.
like photography, you do not expect a stable yield of inspiration.

then, with the years, you lay your poetry on a wall -
chronologically, alphabetically, thematically, or anything -
and you will step back to see a montage of your life in eloquent snapshots.

if poetry should ever be photography - then -
it would be the photography of one's soul.

My heart has been captured;
It's beating it's wings
Against the bars of your presence-
And refusing to sing.

The nearness of you
Stops all singing, all breath;
It just wants to breathe you-
Live in you, till death.

My heart has been captured,
Too far from it’s tree.
It's no use now; it doesn't
Even care about free.

captured in the psych ward, new year special




it’s new years eve and ron bought along his punch bowl and a few sushi dishes

as well as party sandwiches, to make the people in the psych ward have a good atmosphere

for the new year, and this year charlie chaplin man was going to read all of his poems as the

entertainment and the nurses did a lot of work so the patients feel calm enough to enjoy

charlie’s show, so medication time was before the show and even charlie, because he was worried

he would yell very loudly if he didn’t and then it started

ron said, ok guys we are going to have a mini new years eve concert run by this man charlie chaplin

charlie said, welcome and happy new year and my first song is   The schitzophrenic


You see I am sitting at the mall
I am having dillusions of people teasing me, and I wish this will all stop, oh please, just leave me the f..k alone
And then I hear voices that aren't really being said o hear Jon killed my best friend named Fred, the thing is I have no best friend, oh year
1 2 3 4 do the schitzophrenic
From the first diagnosis till the day you reach 45, you see if i take medication it can be controlled yeah oh yeah
I am schitzophrenic
Then I went to see my psychiatrist and he told me, to try and get a life, I told him I was blackbeard and John F Kennedy, he just threw a smart *** comment my way, I thought that comment was rude and ******, yes it is hard to be liked when you do
1 2 3 4 do the schitzophrenic
Yes it's easy to do, just let me hang out
You see with my medication it can be controlled, ooooh
I am schitzophrenic
You see I get paranoid when I see people around and right wing governments want us locked up
It mighty hard to have this illness and I cab say this
1 2 3 4 do the schitzophrenic
Do it once and you get all hooked and after that you feel like a geek, cause your a schitzophrenic, and also with medication it can be controlled
Oooooh I'm a schitzophrenic
Yes, that's true

charlie said, that was a great song and it’ll get you started ya know, the next song is maybe later


maybe later, i will get what i want

maybe later, i will rediscover the beauty

of being alive in this great world

it’s just a long-awaited journey

from beginning to end

and i will try and enjoy the moment

in the psych ward spotlight

i say, please slow down, your moving too fast

please almighty one, let me live long enough to give

a poor old soul a home

they don’t want a bench and they don’t want an old burnt out hall

it’s not fun for me

to look at these big buildings

with hot shot business types, when your not one

it’s enough to drive you mad

please make me except it could be later




the next song charlie sang was standing on the inside looking out, a song that explains what we are going through


standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

in the psych ward trying to get better

you see i was visioning i was in glenelg bay

but instead you get doctors saying how are you enjoying your day

i wished i was well and enjoying my life

instead of being in here wasting away

then i called out to almighty god

and the best i can get is a man who claims he is jesus christ

i said, no, were you nailed to the cross

and he said yeah after i rode in on my horse

and i said wasn’t it a donkey you ran in on and i was

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

in the psych ward trying to get better

i was getting bored, so i asked the nurse

to give me a pass out to the cafe

because i was starting to lose my mind

and when they said no i let out a little wine

i said please please please, mate, this place is driving me mad

the inmates here, smell really really bad

so the nurse made me a banana smoothie and i said thanks

and took it away to my bed, walking past every room before mine

i even tripped over a piece of fishing line

then i sat down in my glenelg bay apartment sipping my smoothie saying

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

in the psych ward trying to get better

dinner time came and i had fish and chips

it was ever so discusting, ya know like hospital food

i opened my orange juice and gave it one almighty sip

and i ate my chocolate mousse, yeah it is as tasty as

when dinner was over i went to the TV room

to watch the news and home and away

then some dude came into watch it with me

and he said, did you know i was GOD, i said, no

as i sat there thinking i was

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

in the psych ward trying to get better

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

standing on the inside looking out

in the psych ward in the psych ward

in the psych ward trying to get bet-ter


charlie chaplin after that song was over sang his small poem titled a smile has nothing on us, here goes


whether you let out a big smile or not

you could add it to your melting ***

what you need is a great big melting ***

big enough to take the world and all it’s got

every thing that you can eat

my rundown car is really neat

the coffee urn is piping hot

boiling whether you like it or not

but your smile comes through and through

like a fresh flower, blooming every day for me and you

i try to smile all the time

cause  it’s very fun to do

i like smiling, cause it’s fun



charlie then announced his next song saying spare me, because when your poor you always say spare me. here goes


spare me some money for the bus

spare me some money for the bus

spare me some money

so i don’t look like such a dummy

spare me some money for the bus

spare me some cutlets for my tea

spare me some cutlets for my tea

spare me some cutlets

and some vegetables

thank you very muchlets

spare me some cutlets for my tea

spare me some wine to go with that

spare me some wine to go with that

spare me some wine

so i can feel so divine

spare me some wine to go with that

spare me some chocolate for after that

spare me some chocolate for after that

spare me some chocolate

so i can have what you have

spare me some chocolate for after that


charlie then said, my next song is every day is a day of disappointment because being here really *****


Every day is a day of dissapountment

One day as I was walking down a busy street, saying g'day to everyone who u walk past, then I went back through the park and I saw so many walks of life, from the beggars asking for money and the rich refusing to give it to them, and it all sounds so crazy as I walk through doing nothing like that, after that I felt a bit peckish, so I went to the take-away to buy myself an hamburger with egg and bacon and there was this weird looking fella standing at the door, greeting each customer with a smile, he didn't really work there, but he will never be told to leave, cause he ain't a threat, oh no, then after that I went to the grocery store to buy enough supplies to last me for a week, or maybe more, I could hardly know, then after that, all that shopping made me a bit thirsty, so I went to the sports club and drown my day away, with a ice cold fosters lager or a ice cold can of VB, after that I will get so drunk o could hardly stand up and my friends drove me home and they also walked me inside, just to make sure, I don't collapse on the front lawn, you see, your day seems to go from good to bad, if you make the wrong choices and that makes every day, a day of dissapointment, after that horrible night on the *****, I got up and had a hangover cure, consisting of two raw eggs and worcestershire sauce, yes that sounds so very tasty, yes I love it and live by it, it really makes me feel like I can have a party in my mouth and everyone is invited to spend about a year or so, at the local sports club doing one thing every single day, and then after that you won't seem like every day is a day of disappintment for everyone on this earth



charlie then decided to pretend he had a best mate named albert waldron and back then albert gave him lyrics to a song, here it goes



Alfred Waldron looking back, oh yeah



You see I was a great footballer, man
Yes, I was so ace, but it was a long long time ago
About close to 1 hundred years
You see I payed in South Australa
And I played footy very well, and after the match
I would go to my car, and get my BBQ an start cooking the snags
Yes, I loved that, it was really really cool
Everyone thought I was an average cook
And they all came over for some meat
Yes, I even had some nice cold beers
Yes, I think thats so very cool
As I cooked the meat, the other players were saying
Come on mate, cook us some nice beautiful Aussie snags
I also played cricket, for South Australia as well
And I even took my BBQ to the cricket for after match food
The only way you can do that now, is if you just stayed local
And some days, like at the footy and the cricket
Every player got very vocal
I was a real Australian guy, who loved to play, footy or cricket
And I loved the BBQ at the end, yes it was so esquized
Yes I had the muscles, and I have lots of those
Everyone enjoy eating a snag a sausage
And then an egg and bacon roll
Since that footy life ended i felt cool


ron said to charlie just one more song because people are yelling and we can’t control them, but charlie we will have the midnights fireworks for you, ok



charlie said he has got his fresh old legs going wild here it goes


they will dance

they will run

into the midday sun

they will race

warm embrace

be a bit lazy

head to the pub

go to the shop

to buy some clothes

angels coming down

worshipping the town

playing football

driving cars

around the good old town

having drinks with the guys

fresh flowers for sale at the shop at SHOPRITE

SHOPRITE SUPERMARKET

CUTTING ALL THE FOOD BILLS YEAH

spiders coming through the window

to destroy all mankind

makin g lamb for dinner

nicest you’ve ever seen

i said i will stay home and watch my mate, mr bean

yeah, your fresh legs go wild

when they do all these things

and before the end, charlie got the entire staff and patients to sing auld lent zine at 10.00 pm

because everyone was getting tired and cranky
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot,
And days o’ lang syne!

Chorus:
For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne,
We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet
For auld lang syne!

We twa hae run about the braes,
And pu’d the gowans fine,
But we’ve wander’d mony a weary foot
Sin’ auld lang syne.

We twa hae paidl’t in the burn
Frae morning sun till dine,
But seas between us braid hae roar’d
Sin’ auld lang syne.

And there’s a hand, my trusty fiere,
And gie’s a hand o’ thine,
And we’ll tak a right guid willie-waught
For auld lang syne!

And surely ye’ll be your pint’ stoup,
And surely I’ll be mine!
And we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet
For auld lang syne!




ron and charlie were helping each other clean up while the other patiens were being injected with ******

from yelling too much and after the cleanup was done, charlie went to the TV room to watch the fireworks

that were on at midnight on the TV, meanwhile, ron clocked off and went to the pizza hut and went home to

watch the fireworks on the TV thinking, today, ron made charlie a happy man, by letting him do his concert

it wasn’t till midnight but they can’t do that in the HDU.

From Alan Lomax to the commercial art and now the money machine.

At the turn of the century; when sound recording 1st became available to the masses, recording a song was an opportunity for folk to reach out; and tell the world something up front and personal.
It meant that people were able to put themselves on “The record” A way of leaving a permanent audio statement, an epitaph, an audio sound bite immortalising ~ life, mood, emotion captured and bottled for all eternity.
(A medium that conveyed messages from artists and storytellers of all kinds)

A recording was also a great addition to "The family album" something more tangible, a window to a real person, with a real life, a message and a point of view; a legacy, a blast from the past.
Few people expected sound prints to be re-designed, homogenised, formulated, copied, repackaged and that art and the message would be played over and over again by new artists in the form of "cover music" or that the style of the messages would become secularized, seperated into distinctive groups, or constrained by an elite clique or commercial genre.
Labelling and streamlining art & music mostly benefits the commercial art & music industry; and no longer the artists and creators.

I've no problem with good business, or the multi-billion pound industrys that have gained commercial success.

However the process of mass homogenisation, product synthesis, marketing, streamlining and then packaging fashion, sound and synthetic culture to sell a product, leaves very little room for creative people to just be creative.

A medium originally open to many for self expression, a historical record, an archive, a voice, a personal message;
Is now just a vehicle for advertising and perpetuating a genre of nonsense, so much so that there is now more white noise immortalised than messages.

To re-cap ~ I Think that creativity and expressionism; like story telling conveys moods and messages from the present and past!
Artists and musicians should have the opportunity to create and produce more information than they copy; thus creating a richer more colourful tapestry, whilst not devaluing the message of their predecessors!

Purcy Flaherty.

The train robber captures Brian Allan



You see in late 2013, a train robber died to get cronus and prevent him from helping people in the big way, you see Cronus”s earth body, Brian Allan was in
Psych ward with a breakdown and when Brian Allan started to perform every
Night in Space, the train robber decided to stop Brian Allan once and for all and
Turn everyone against him and really drive him nuts, with teasing voices that are
Not really there, and Brian was suddenly dragged into the dungeon where Mark
Marlor was captured and he was really suffering, but Brian was pushed by the
Train robber right into the bottom of his cave, after he said that Jews are trying
To take the evil out of the cave, you see the evil witch doctor who captured both
His last lives, Patrick Dunbar and Graham Thorne and he is so determined to make, Brian suffer for his crimes, of his past, and all the kids are calling down to
Him saying, come on little kiddie, get up, but the evil train robber wants to trap
Brian Allan to save the future world from dangerous pheadaphiles, you see, he wants to rid his spirit, he tried to say to Mark, go home, and if you don’t go home
I will get a pheadaphile to capture you, and you will be here with me forever
With me and Brian. You see I want you with me, cause it’s a safe way to keep
You safe, especially if you Brian Allan wants to save the world, but if your friend
Keeps saying that you are like him, he will get captured by me on another planet,
But I want you mate, you see, my brother was the witch doctor, who died two years after Graham Thorne was killed, through execution, no you are the one
I want, so just stay in my dungeon, but beware, you must do something cool, mainly cause you could be treated like an old fogie, and they are oldies if they
Want to stop you from being like us, ok, now Brian you are with me, I have got this axe over your head, you will suffer in silence, you see, I am a nice criminal
But I can’t say the same for the other criminals on earth, you can’t expect a free
Ride, I don’t know why they want to play mind games with you anyway, Brian Allan. I killed a lot of people in the trains, just to catch you so you can help the
Poor and not worry about being a little young dude, cause, really he ain’t around you, and you should get trapped in my dungeon, and try and stay out of bad guys
Way, but if he wants to be captured, he has another villain, cause Brian Allan you”re the one I want, ok, you are going to suffer, your way, because, really
The world ain’t ready for your kind of technology yet, but some people work hard at work, and you have had a more enjoyable time, you have worked, but
Not as hard, but you should do your tapestry, and try and do a picture of me and
Also that witch doctor, cause Cronus, only you can draw me, nobody else can draw me or point me out, but people try, but it never works out, ok.
I want you to say to the Canberra people, wake up, in a way, they will listen,
but I know reicarnation is true, but I don’t wanna come back, so when I do
Come back, I will be a teasing kid, and you have to tread carefully, hey dude,
Ok I will let you go now and start my new life, I am interested, I am a train robber
To you and I have captured you and only you heh heh heh, you will see you again

captured in the psych ward, a special case comes in to the HDU





since florence jones was put on seroquel, she had weird finger movements as

well as weird sudden movements in her sleep, like she was pushed down the stairs

and she went into the mental health building to abuse them that they take better care of her

you see every time florence watches a TV show, she would act on it and her flat mate lived in the

dark ages with her because there were certain programs that thru shouldn’t watch

but flornce just sat there looking at her hands, and she saw them having abnormal movements

and then she watched an episode of prisoner, and for about 20 days she dressed up as b smith

and then vera bennett saying to all the rich arrogant screws out there is room to reform, because if b smith

can move from inmate to prison guard and it wasn’t just in her imagination, oh no, she would bash an old

***** on the street and steal her security pass and after that she said she would never do that and

the police took her to the HDU, where ron diagnosed her with multi personality disorder and kept her on

seroquel where she will be monitored just to make sure these delusions she is getting to go away

and florence said to ron at the point when he said, do you want me to contact your parents, she jumped up

and said, no, they aren’t my real parents, i was led on their doorstep when i was 3 months and i was too

young to know what they looked like, and ron said, i know, but it would be handy and nice of you to have

the people who raised you and florence said, they did a hopeless job of raising me, i never got to do anything

i wanted to do, and then ron said why is that, and florence said it started from disney land, they promised me

i will go to disney land, but i got grounded and they cancelled the tickets, and then i wanted to go to adelaide

to watch the christmas pageant and they said yeah, but then i got grounded again and we didn’t get there

they said i needed help, but i said, i was just being a normal kid, ya know want this want that, and ron went away

to check her records and rang her parents and they said, they took her bushwalking every weekend and

they took her to the melbourne zoo as well as phillip island to see the fairy penguins, and we had  to say to a few

of her wild and wacky suggestions, simply because we had no money, but i assure you, we never led her on

and ron said goodbye and went out to the HDU, and said, are you sure your parents did this, because they

explianed that they didn’t have enough money to go everywhere and florence said what crap, they have you

twisted around your little finger because they never cared for me from day 1 and ron said i will put you on

serence, both these drugs together will push all the anger out of you, and, yes your fingers are moving, but

that will cure in time, and then florence said, ok and afterwards told the nurses to get ******, and not bother

to get dinner to het, because she hates hospital food and ron bought out the dinners as well as a counsellor for

florence, you see, florence could hurt someone, so trained counsellors are employed to stand outside her door

in shifts and then ron came back out to deliver the medications and charlie chaplin said, is my medication threre

i am tired, ron said hello tired i am dr ron and ron went home, stopping at the wood fired pizza restaurant bought a pizza

and went home to lose himself in front of the TV, trying to figure out how to cure Florence

The strike of the rainbow warriors
After a few hours in the dark cages of horror we suddenly see a sharp light in the sky of evil. The golden goddess notices another ship coming towards the devils spike city.

At that moment the orange and black pirates run towards their  ships in dock and sound a long dark horn of terror. The golden goddess notices a large rainbow type ship sailing in firing laser rays at the pirates vessels of evil.

The ship sets into the dock of spike city while  some remaining  pirates get cut down and captured with blue laser nets of torture.  Our eyes  open with horror when  rainbow type creatures with bows and arrows jump out of the ship and circle our cages of horror.

A few of the black  pirate in the purple bushes try and shoot the rainbow warriors but get cut down with their laser fast arrows.  The commander of the rainbow warriors suddenly jumps down from the  ship and lifts up the cages with power and  ease while the warriors round up the captured pirates.

I comfort a shaking luitent megs while the commander shakes our hands before releasing the other golden warriors from their dark cage.  The horses bow their heads towards the commander while the golden goddess looks with hope in her beaten heart.

All of a sudden two rainbow warriors march out a swearing and aggressive woman  holding a long jagged sword and pirates armband. The rainbow warriors quickly zap her evil body  and hold her down tightly .  The golden goddess goes  over for a better look while her long tongue  of nails  cuts of a warriors head off  with ease.

The rainbow warriors  chop her evil tongue off with a swipe of the rainbow sword  before pinning her to the cold ground. two of the warriors then begin to peel  her black  dress of horror off while  other rainbow braves flock around.

A curious golden goddess peeps though for a better look while the warriors are  undoing her  small black studded bra of terror. The goddess looks on with a smile and twinkle while she screams in anger at her ******* bouncing in the dark cold night.

All of a sudden the commander comes inside the circle of torture  and begins removing her  devilish red ******* while the  warriors cheer and scream.  The golden goddess looks  on with  a content smile while  the  warriors chop her body up into bit with their  glowing swords.

After a few minutes the rest of the pirates are shot and executed with laser bouts  while we all sit watch with open mouths of  horror.  The commander then takes us aboard the rainbow ship of safety  while the pirates come back to evil spike city with four more pirate ships of torture.

We all sail across the red  evil sea towards a big large rainbow in the glowing  yellow sky whilst  being followed by two black  pirate ships.  Once we reach  through  the rainbows end we begin to notice the water  turning bright pink  and the pirate ships turning  back towards the red river of horror.

A relived golden goddess  turns towards her army and smiles while we we all jump about on the rainbow ship of safety.  I hold luitent megs tight in my arms while the green moon sets across the  blue landscape in the distance.

written by wayne mockler
ownership and copyright wayne mockler

when the clock ticks at 12,
another minute has passed and another day has been renewed.
it replenishes an entire moment that separates yesterday from today.

when the clock ticks at 12,
a part of me has left something for good.
something that could only be retrieved by the nostalgia
of the passing hours that gives a pang of discomfort and dismay.

when the clock ticks at 12,
a fairy godmother is there waiting for me to move past everything and start fresh,
like nothing has ever happened from yesterday

but when the clock ticks at 3,
my emotions are scattered,
eating me alive.
it kicks me out of the zone - exposing me to a world of nothing but things to hide.
it haunts my core, dwells with my demons,
building up emotions that don't seem to collide

and at 3, I find you - once again with all the sublime images we’ve captured
and grand words we’ve uttered.
i find you, drowning from the roots
of my memoirs... and there I see how midnights took parts of me

because at 3, I’ll always remember how I grew with thee


a.t.

Learning Not to Love Anymore
1/8/2014

Have you ever captured a firefly?
Watched it flutter, trapped in a jar?
Well my heart was once captured,
but trapped in a sinkhole of emotional tar.

I first told you, "Take a chance,"
but we started with an ending, engulfed in azure.
My heart stretched further apart, as yours stayed unsure.
It broke finally.
Vanished in a month's mournful moment,
by the blink of those refusing to cry eyes.

It was the first night I met you,
on my 21st birthday.
You were the stranger of the party.
Nobody knew you, not even me, not yet.

I wanted you to stay that night.
It wasn't love at first sight.
It wasn't lust, but something just felt right.
When your eyes caught mine across the room, my heart took flight.

As time went by and I got to know you better,
I gave you a lot of things you had never really asked for.

I gave you my money when I paid for your drinks.
I gave you my funny with all my awkward winks.
I gave you my secrets though I didn't have many.
I gave you my ***, my first, my virginity.
I gave you my time although it was valuable.
and now I give you this rhyme even though it's not rational.

I gave you these things because I didn't need them.
I gave you these things, hoping that you'd keep them.
But I didn't give you my heart,
although I would have, had you asked for it.
Yet somehow you captured it,
all the while, keeping your's well hid.

Those wings you gave my heart,
eventually they caught on fire.
Crimson bursts ablaze with blood.
A heart that bled but refused to break.
Something inside of me wanted it so badly.
To believe that the good and the bad times would balance out.
And then there I was.  There I left myself.

I live in a world where someone I love lives.
Stuck with a heart whose loud palpitations still vibrate to the rhythm of his.
This heart that refuses to break, but bleeds through its holes
needs to Learn Not to Love Anymore.
I exist on a planet with someone I love.

That ******* firefly in a jar suffocated someday.
But I refused to let my heart break,
no matter how much it gasped for air,
for him to release it from captivity.

I know I didn't write about the great things in love,
How can I share something made up, that  I only dream of?
I never owned your heart or felt it in my hands.
I never saw it in a jar,
or watched it twinkle in your eye, your own private star.
Because it was always buried under your emotional sands.

but that's not the point.
I lied.
I felt your love.
I felt it a lot.
I just don't want to share it with anyone, because I'm clinging on.
I think that with each tear I drop writing about my love for you,
It too will fall from my insides onto my face,
down to the floor where I won't see or feel it no more.
It's not for others to know.
I wouldn't wish that kind of love on anyone.
No, no.

That firefly could have been set free from a jar,
allowed to continue living and fly away somewhere far.
But no matter where it went and no matter how much time passed,
its lungs may have been collapsed from suffocating, trapped.
It would live out the days, its big brave beating heart with a timeless tiny tear.
Then, the firefly would know what it is like to lose in Lovers' Warfare.

Bride of the desert
the indomitable town
Solomon’s Kingdom

            
Lost in history, I wander through a city that was fortified by King Solomon, raided by Mark Antony and ruled by Queen Zenobia who made it the capital of an empire, only to be captured herself and paraded through Rome in gold chains.

Civilisation upon civilisation are entombed within Tadmur; in a huge plain of carved stone blocks, massive columns arched in rows or standing alone, a Romanesque theatre, senate and baths, dominated by a great temple whose origin dates back four thousand years.

Due to a clever mistranslation from Arabic by the euro-centric traveller who ‘discovered’ Palmyra, the city also has a modern name.

Here for millennia, a tribe of Bedu have camped within the folds of these desert steppes and blackened Tadmur’s ruins with their camp fires, to trade camels or herd goats and sheep. Walking the divide between city, desert and the more fertile steppes, I search for their surviving descendants and find a black woven goat’s hair tent with its edges raised to capture a cooling breeze.

Hamed and his sons, huge and wary of foreigners, welcome me to sit within on  carpets and then graciously serve dates with innumerable small glasses of tea. I indicate ‘enough’ in the traditional manner by rolling my right hand and the empty glass. Hamed continues to voice his concerns about the lack of feed for their sheep and the prices achieved at market. I readily succumb to several small cups of greenish Arabic coffee, before being allowed to take my leave.

For millennia the wealth of this city was based on tariffs levied on goods flowing out of the desert aboard swaying camel caravans. Today, these once proudly fierce tribal Bedu no longer breed, train or ride camels.

The Bedu greatly prize their reputation and the respect of their peers. Their traditions are the foundation of these small tribal communities and may predate Islam;  a life now undermined by borders, nationalism, government settlement plans, conscription, war, television and tourism.
                                         *+     +     +      +      +

Black torn empty shells
swept by Mount Lebanon’s shade
Cannabis Valley

As I recall a haiku of ‘images’ of  my very first journey to Damascus, from war-torn Beirut through the lushness of the Bekaa;

in the here and now
a dark suit and Mercedes
cross the Euphrates

Defence Minister, Rifaat al-Assad is in town with his fifty thousand strong Defence Companies, complete with tanks, planes and helicopters.  A coup d’état is in progress to assure Rifaat’s succession to the Presidency of his older brother Hafiz al-Assad, now recovering from a heart attack.

Last year, Rifaat massacred some forty thousand Syrian citizens when he ordered the shelling of the city of Hama. Nobody in Damascus will be underestimating him.

All political and military power is in the hands of the al-Assads and key generals, who command the military and police. The majority of whom are of the Alawite minority Muslim faith from the rural districts near Latakia in the North. Before their revolution, governments came and went in weeks.

My friend Elias is allied to Rifaat’s cause, by simply doing business with the son. Now he and his family share the risks and dangers of this coup failing and stand to lose a fortune. Monies paid locally in Syrian pounds for goods delivered to government agencies.

Elias’s connection with Rifaat and Latakia, as well as his confident presence, humour and love of life, still allows us easy access to the Generals’ Club. Sadly, there is to be no table and floorshow, but a closed meeting with two senior Generals, where we learn that Hafiz has recovered enough to take charge and is now locked in discussions with his younger brother.

The decision is therefore made for us. We say our goodbyes and drive to Latakia.

On Sunday Elias meets his brothers, then with his family, we visit his parents small holding and enjoy a meal together. A wonderful fresh mezza that includes my favourite, courgettes stuffed with ground lamb and rice, in a yogurt sauce. Syrian food is amazingly healthy and my cuisine of choice.

It is a cloudless Monday morning, as I, Elias, his wife and children drive into the docks to board an old 46 foot motor cruiser. Huge cases are stowed as I make my inspection, then start the twin diesels and switch on the over-the-horizon radar. Our early departure is critical. We cast off and the Mate steers for the harbour entrance below the cliffs that guard it. As the Mediterranean lifts our bow in greeting, the disembodied voice of the Harbour Master tells us to return as we do not have permission to sail.

Ignoring the order, I increase our speed through the short choppy surf. We are sailing under the Greek Cypriot flag and in an hour I hope to be out of territorial waters.  At 14 knots we are a slow target.

Fifteen nautical miles from the coast of Syria, I leave the mate to follow a bearing for Larnaca. Elias has opened a bottle of Black Label. I quaff a glassful.

Later noticing a noisy vibration and diagnosing a bent prop shaft, I shut down the starboard engine. Our speed is now a steady 8 knots, so I decide on a new heading to discern more quickly the shadow of the Cypriot coastline on the radar screen.

Midway, the mate and Elias begin babbling about a small vessel ahead and four separate armoured boxes encircling it. Ugly Israeli high speed gun boats or worse, Lebanese pirates. Should they board us and find stowed riches, we will be killed.

Leaving the Mate to maintain our course, I go on deck to play the ‘European Owner’.  The vessel they have trapped is long and lean with three tall outboard motors but no crew are in sight.  Leaving them astern, our choice of vessel now fully exonerated, I and Elias throw another whisky ‘down the hatch’.

With us holding the correct bearing, I ask Elias to wake me as soon as we near Cyprus. Feeling utterly exhausted I collapse into a bunk.  

I wake unbidden, to find the Mate steering for the harbour entrance. Shouldering him aside, I spin the wheel to bring the vessel about. Shaking, I ask them why there are minarets on the ‘church’ and did they not notice our being observed from the top of the harbour's hillock, below which a fast patrol boat is anchored?  The Mate sprints to the Greek Cypriot flag and is hugging it to his chest; Elias wisely prays.

I command the wheel as we motor directly away from the port of Famagusta and Turkish held Northern Cyprus. We later change bearing and pass tourist beaches, it is night fall before we moor-up in Larnaca.
                                         +     +     +      +      +


Later that same year I am called to a last urgent meeting in Cyprus with Elias. He calmly tells me that he will be arrested when he rejoins his family, who have returned to Syria. Elias asks me to take full control of his Cypriot Businesses, then returns home and ‘disappears’ with his brothers.
                                         +     +     +      +      +


Since sacking the two Arab General Managers when they tried to get control of the bank accounts, it has taken more than six months to locate the prison holding all the brothers. We obtain the release of all except Elias, who has been tortured.  We then ‘purchase’ him the exclusive use of the Prison Governor's quarters and twenty four hour access for Elias’s family, nurses and doctors.
                                         +     +     +      +      +


Over the last two years, I have honoured my promises and expanded trade as far as Pakistan. Elias is still imprisoned.
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