"casablanca" poems
It's a special blend
of leaves & spices,
the warmth it brings
goes down so smoothly.
While waiting for the mint
to take effect,
I travel on
an ethereal journey.
I fly to the
streets of Casablanca
& listen to tradition,
searching the faces
to find my kindred.
And when I find them there,
I close my eyes in comfort,
soothed inside
my wildest dreams,
my own special blend
of leaves & spices.
Feb 11, 2014
Feb 11, 2014 at 6:29 AM UTC
Is a million memories ...
Like your favourite Beatles track,
Like breakfast coffee in a Turin bar,
Like the old friends that never grow old,
Like your favourite Italian pasta in Rome,
Like summer swims in warm sea with cold rain,
Like the aria which sends shivers down your spine,
Like the magical taste of Gaja Barberesco for lunch,
Like coming home to a smiling face after a long trip,
Like your child buying you dinner for the first time,
Like how beautiful she was on your wedding day,
Like your first date movie being on TV again,
Like capturing a moment in a photograph,
Like rereading your favourite book,
Like watching Casablanca again,
Like publishing your first book,
Like living every moment...
... And a million more to come.
Nov 25, 2012
Nov 25, 2012 at 8:35 AM UTC
Africa is beautiful and beautiful is usual in Africa
Continental wonderland of love this is Africa
What's in Africa? What's there to see?
I asked myself on the New Year's eve
I thought that I was good in geography
But I didn't know Lagos or Nairobi
I might be ignorant, I have to admit
About Africa I knew just a little bit
The great Sahara - sands of mystery!
The Nile river - so much history!
Africa is magical and magical is usual in Africa
Continental wonderland of joy this is Africa
Namibia, Nigeria, Niger, Angola, Algeria
Burundi, Benin and Libya, Lesotho and Liberia
Burkina-Faso, Botswana, Guinea-Bissau, Ghana
Djibouti, Zimbabwe, Zambia, Uganda, Rwanda, Gambia
I saw a film on Serengeti Park
A one of a kind, a must-see landmark
I watched a documentary on pyramids of Giza
They're much much older than Mona Lisa
I heard that oldest coffee plants
Take their roots in Ethiopia's land
And that samba, rumba, funk and jazz
Take their beats from African drums
Africa is beautiful and beautiful is usual in Africa
Continental wonderland of love this is Africa
Cameroon and Congo, Malawi, Mali, Morocco
Côte d'Ivoire and Kenya, Mauritius, Mauritania
Tunisia, Tanzania, Eswatini, Eritrea
Sudan, Senegal, Somalia, Sierra Leone, South Sudan
You can travel around cities of Africa
Like Cape Town, Cairo or Casablanca
If you're in love or plan to be
Go to Zanzibar, feel that ocean breeze!
Climb up mount Kilimanjaro
Watch the zebras cross the Masai Mara
If you're adventurous, you're a dreamer
Take a wild trip down Zambezi river
Africa is magical and magical is usual in Africa
Continental wonderland of joy this is Africa
Comoros, Chad, Cabo Verde, Democratic Republic of Congo
Ethiopia, Egypt, Guinea, Gabon, Equatorial Guinea and Togo
Madagascar, Mozambique, Central African Republic
Sao Tome and Principe, South Africa and Seychelles
Africa is beautiful and beautiful is usual in Africa
Continental wonderland, I'm on my way to Africa!
May 3, 2022
May 3, 2022 at 7:33 PM UTC
The sea cast a gift ashore
one stormy sullen day
and the barren rocky coast
was suddenly recast
as a natural history museum.
A whale.
A real whale, just lying there
shining on the shale
In another time,
we'd have known how to react.
This astonishing bounty
would have been quickly stripped
Bones for building
baleen for support
blubber and oil for fuel.
But now it lay
surrounded by detritus
made of better stuff.
The truth was,
we didn't really need it,
couldn't really use it,
like being presented with
Casablanca on VHS.
A sign appeared:
"Quad bike rides, £2",
red paint on rainsoaked cardboard.
I wasn't tempted.
Children poked it with sticks
in a desultory way,
stricken, intrigued, ashamed,
and utterly dwarfed.
The weeks passed
as we coughed in embarrassment
not knowing what to do,
until finally
someone brought a digger down
and discretely buried the beast.
By now, it will be a perfect skeleton
a prehistoric wonder
an artefact from unjaded days
when nature could still astonish,
trampled by unknowing tourists
as they dream of sunnier beaches.
Jan 1, 2012
Jan 1, 2012 at 3:06 PM UTC
Dressed in black, dark eyes amused
She strolls into a room
With the specialised tread
Of a femme fatale,
Tossing her streaming hair in arrogant joy.
Her perfect body
Contains the calm and unexpected force
Of the sea, shifting in a moment between
Reason and fury.
She graces the men with sure-footed Arabic,
Stark, sibilant, passionate words
Laughing like a poem.
A Moroccan beauty,
Guedra dancing in the sun,
From the desert coloured mosque of Casablanca
Punctured by the worship Of 70,000 songs,
To the unremitting souks of Marrakesh,
Her complexity
Emboldened by the courage
Of poets.
She has a silence in her intellect
Such as few have,
Unusual evidence of a soul
In a world of franchises,
Her past imaginings deeper and wider
Than that of her peers,
Dancing to fast Gharnati rhythms,
Beneath imagined Andulusian sunsets
And glowing skies.
An effervescent scintillating gasp of fervent
Desert air, beating across her limbs
Moving gently towards silence.
Nov 12, 2015
Nov 12, 2015 at 10:55 PM UTC
Rehashing the rare
Out with the new,
In with the old.
She's always had a thing
For the things that exude
A quirkiness and a bucolic charm
The smell of old books
The black and the white
Good ol' Chaplin, James Dean
And the Sound of Music
The Beatles, a tape recorder
High-waisted pants
And the gramophone
And a rustic old bar
With a gruff bartender
Who's off his rocker
But he'll double up as your therapist
And for the boy with the dark brown eyes
Who looks across the bar at her.
And smiles.
It's all black and white again
Except this time,
It isn't her favourite Casablanca scene
But a white screen
And a thousand particles
Microcosmic
A milieu of
Unfathomable numbers float
Through the atmosphere
Connecting her to him.
And she doesn't want that.
She's always had a thing for the old,
But he makes her doubt that.
Sep 24, 2014
Sep 24, 2014 at 12:22 PM UTC
I don't know what Jonas has been preaching,
There's a pigmie on the roof
And claymores in the kitchen.
I never rejected nothing
Cept when I was dazed and dazed and confused and confused
If I wanted to leave
I would use the door I saved for later
That leads out into the void.
I need to take a day away
Or breakdown and watch Casablanca all day long...
Because I thought it was a forever song I was singing,
But I'm out of tune,
And my rheumy eyes are liars,
And I want to christen my great granddaughter
But I'll be dead...
I just wanted my declarations to resound,
But in a town of disrespect
Chain link fences make for noisy neighbors.
I have every bit of it on the line for YOU.
I'll drop it,
But it will stand on end,
Like a trick quarter.
Four in the morning
Forty five caliber bullets blasting
I found myself in the backseat
Of a burned up police car.
Every thing is rotten,
Except the infantine seamstress
Who doesn't come out anymore,
Because you scar(r)ed her.
I just wish I could eat a bag of salt brine soaked
Ballpark peanuts, shells and all without having a **** stroke.
I wish I could, smoke, without Jiminy Cricket, calling my doctor,
And the red squad arriving with the straight jackets,
And the bear mace.
I can't project the rigght radiation,
I get that, but its not for lack of dying.
So this is my death letter, to be read to my reincarnated infant self
Twenty three times, by twenty four different people,
I want a life size wax model of Eeivel Keneival
To throw rice at me thrice
Once for each marriage,
But on the third throw wild rice
Because that is what I think of when I think of you.
The burglar ate my begging strips
And the ravenous dog
Is getting impatient....
I've seen the truth in the darkness of the soldier core.
Why not open the gate to abracadabra land,
Give me a list of your one thousand forms
In code of course,
And I will pay the piper
So he can finally change this doggone song.
Sep 6, 2012
Sep 6, 2012 at 6:56 AM UTC
Take a deep breath inventory
Of yourself
Do not count your hands or feet
Not your wandering legs or
Wavering arms
Do not take inventory of your clothes
Not of your favorite shoes or
Your special hat—not even your
Coat that you save for those cold,
Cold nights
Ignore your car—payments or paid off
Your home—apartment, trailer, mansion
Your work uniform—whatever that may be
Make emergency stops only
You are still several miles from
The intersection of contentment and identity
And you have not been there
In far too long
Do not take inventory of how you look
In a summer dress or a tuxedo and bowtie
Don’t count your history with
Drugs and alcohol
Don’t count your computer, your television
Or that collection of movies
Or albums
Or books that you’ve been working on
Don’t take account of your ability to curl
Dead weight
It’s just curling dead weight
Don’t count the number of visible abs
You have
Or your BMI
You are so much more than a body
You are so much more than possessions
Your body and belongings have not
Done you well to feel like you belong
Instead take inventory of your joy
You have some joy don’t you?
Count your friends
Count your love letters
Count the moments when it rains
And you have an umbrella
Count the last time you had strawberries
Count the start of every kiss
Count the paid off credit cards
Actually, count those twice
Because freedom counts for twice as much
Account for all of your freedoms
Take inventory of playing catch with your dad
Your last home-cooked meal
Account for the last time you rode a bike
When you didn’t think about exercise, you just felt the wind
Count the times you wrapped birthday presents
Count the smell of the last bouquet of flowers you were given
Count the last time you went to the zoo
And you swore, nobody ever fell in love with the
Animals quite like you did
Cause you have an eye for beauty
And you’re seeing it everywhere
Take a deep breath inventory of the beauty you have seen
And when you can’t seem to find anything that matters
To take inventory of
Count those dark moments where you still
Have the hope to rack your brain
To try to find a memory where you had joy
If you still have hope to try to find it
That is joyful
All on its own
Because I know they can be hard to find sometimes
Those things worth taking inventory of
But I have found the greatest of these things is love
Not the way I love Pulp Fiction and Casablanca
But the way I love my wife
And my father and my mother
And a good rescue
Cause that is what I’ve had—a good rescue
And life is sweet like honey
Not because it’s easy
And certainly not because I feel good all the time
But because I have found joy in a rescued life that I can hope in
When I take a deep breath inventory
I have to realize all I have is love
The rest will go away someday
But not my hope and joy and love
May 25, 2013
May 25, 2013 at 6:11 PM UTC
To all officers: 504 ERROR
Two German couriers DIAGNOSED WITH AFIB
THIS HAND LOTION IS carrying official documents
murdered on train from LIKE US FOLLOW US
Screen freeze: restart
Oran. AN ERROR OCCURRED IN THE SCRIPT
Murderer ELIMINATES LAUNDRY ODORS
and possible JAW DROPPING accomplices
headed for NOT RESPONDING Casablanca.
Screen freeze: restart
WE’VE GOT AN UPGRADE FOR YOU round up all
suspicious characters TRY IT YOURSELF
Screen freeze: restart
Thanks to:
https://www.springfieldspringfield.co.uk/movie_script.php?movie=casablanca
for access to the script of Casablanca.
Sep 25, 2018
Sep 25, 2018 at 3:30 PM UTC
Smugglers paradise
Casablanca '41
Sam plays it again
A black and white love affair
That is far from black and white
Jul 11, 2010
Jul 11, 2010 at 12:45 PM UTC
Father-
You were so many icons:
The Chief to me.
My ***** Harry.
The Chris to my Gordie.
An Alexander Supertramp.
The Rick of Casablanca.
Father-
You were so many nouns:
Protector,
Guardian,
Hero,
Breadwinner,
Rapscallion.
Father-
You were so many adjectives:
Funny,
Caring,
Interesting,
Strong,
Adventurous.
Father-
You were my biggest downfall:
Five times I’ve seen you cry.
For me, always baseball games.
Three school events attended.
Too many addictions.
One ruined childhood.
Father-
You were so many villains:
Jack, the dull boy.
Gollum, with your own Precious materials.
Michael Madsen, every time.
Keyser Soze.
The ego of Marsellus Wallace.
Father-
You were so many roles:
Liar,
Gambler,
Alcoholic,
Promise-Breaker,
Black hole.
Father-
You were so many problems:
Unreliable,
Restless,
Invisible,
Hopeless,
Cold.
Father-
I am what you made me.
I am evil and broken.
I am cold and emotionless.
I am restless and relentless.
I am insane and dark.
I am conflicted and confused.
Father-
I am everything you aren’t.
I am everything you are.
I am nothing good.
I am nothing inside.
I am a part of you.
I am because of you.
Father.
I wouldn’t be without you.
But I would have been better off.
Feb 26, 2012
Feb 26, 2012 at 11:26 PM UTC
She was a pretty little girl with a jaded brain
and movie stars in her eyes
From a little town in northern Maine
where dreams fizzle out and die
She was looking for a Casablanca gent
to match her Ingrid Bergman looks
But all she found was me - her discontent!
Her face was like an open book
I paused to read and
she proceeded
to tell me that we had no chance
Before her mouth could shut
I jumped onto her tongue
and asked her if she'd like to dance
We waltzed into a secret fantasy
like our dreams were intertwined
She was blowing pink bubbles with her chewing gum
and it just about blew my mind
It wasn't long and we were lying on the floor
My shirt had come undone
For a workaday girl from a quiet town
she sure knew how to have her fun
Before I buttoned up
she handed me a cup
I drank and I asked for more
My head was swimming
like a salmon when
I watched her walking out my door
Jan 4, 2021
Jan 4, 2021 at 3:49 PM UTC
The Roman empire has fallen
sadness weeps bitter tears
how the mighty became poor old waif
and the west held their jamboree without ignominy
For once they were carried on shoulders in sedan trains
in pomp and ceremony the masters sought safaris and ruled lions
from Goa to Timbuktu the whiff of toast on marmalade n Darjeeling
jackboots and clipped voices rang in plantations n hymns in churches
The Roman empire has fallen
Tea two anti-depressants please
Oh no no how have the mighty fallen
unwanted unloved we cry diminished glory
no invites to Continental parties no lovers in Casablanca
the dusky maidens as footstool are Doctors at the corner Surgery
those hunky dark torsos ferrying cocoa to steamers heading Cardiff
are now earning two hundred thousand grand a week and drive Rolls
The Roman empire has fallen
now we just drink Bitter all the time
the mighty s of the universe are now *******
come see the bullies in the school playground playing the Raj
let me show you a place where four in ten cannot spell enterprising
did you know when not in the Tropics some go for weeks un-bathed
shock and awe jealousy n envy is the new black making them so mad
old n young no self respect, no dignity and now only sad mad bullies
Jun 6, 2019
Jun 6, 2019 at 4:29 AM UTC
German refugee husband: “Liebchen – sweetness – what watch?”
German refugee wife: “Ten watch.”
Husband: “Such watch?”
Carl the Bartender: “You will get along beautifully in America.”
-Casablanca
I check the time on my retirement watch
(A Seiko; they did not think much of me)
And consider that there is no time at all
Unless Creation is some sort of clock
Childhood is watchless, timeless, careless, free
But adults must be catalogued and timed:
Bulova, Timex, Rolex, and Longines
And even a railway Regulator
I check the time on my retirement watch -
And hustle off to my chapter two job
Aug 16, 2019
Aug 16, 2019 at 8:52 PM UTC
The French (History) Teacher
You’re not actually French. You just brought in a French textbook,
told us you wanted to bring in a World War I pistol instead, but this will have to do.
They say we didn’t help them during the war, that Paris was never taken, that we may, in fact, have lost our minds between the trenches, the gas, and the bombs.
N’est ce pas?
I only touch my face to remind myself that it is still there, and – beneath it – is a mind that may not be my own. When I say this to the class, you handed me the gas mask, right in time for a smile.
It was old paper in my hands, and it was easier to ask when I put it on,
but harder to hear when you responded, au fait.
My French grandmother never believed in that.
But I finally understand Bogart in Casablanca when he says his German is rusty.
Oh, mon ami.
If I kissed you for the last time, I knew it wouldn’t be written down.
Oct 24, 2014
Oct 24, 2014 at 2:18 AM UTC
I know your pain,
They broke my bones and divided me.
Where have you been?
It’s been 19 years of this ****** mess.
This is your mother asleep at the wheel, This is your brothers blood in the backseat
When everything you love only seems like something you feel.
Sacred sediment wrapped in white gold.
Shiny as god’s revolver but twice as cold.
What you hear is all Casablanca and she’s shivering cold.
They took your teeth, fragments of what they sold.
Take these seams from me.
Split them down these American IV dreams.
Take these seams from me.
Take these two lips, cut me clean and free.
She put me out like a cigarette.
Burned at both ends.
And my history to the anesthetist
and my body to surgeons
Take these words from me.
These cystic fibrosis regimes.
Take these words from me.
Light blue collar worker bees.
- MW
Jul 28, 2011
Jul 28, 2011 at 9:32 PM UTC
Are you a male or a female?
Hey, Dude
Describe yourself:
Funny sort of bloke
How do you feel?
Clutching at Cheese Straws
Describe where you currently live:
The Bright Side
If you could go anywhere, where would you go:
Casablanca
Your favourite form of transportation:
tightrope
What’s the weather like:
Today is not a day for adultery
Favourite time of day:
Nocturne
Your relationships:
Romantic
Your fear:
Snipers
What is the best advice you have to give:
No Surprises
If you could change your name, you would change it to:
Barry Bungee
My soul’s present condition:
Fits and Starts
Jan 17, 2014
Jan 17, 2014 at 9:10 AM UTC
I know your pain,
They broke my bones and divided me.
Where have you been?
It’s been 19 years of this ****** mess.
This is your mother asleep at the wheel, This is your brothers blood in the backseat
When everything you love only seems like something you feel.
Sacred sediment wrapped in white gold.
Shiny as god’s revolver but twice as cold.
What you hear is all Casablanca and she’s shivering cold.
They took your teeth, fragments of what they sold.
Take these seams from me.
Split them down these American IV dreams.
Take these seams from me.
Take these two lips, cut me clean and free.
She put me out like a cigarette.
Burned at both ends.
And my history to the anesthetist
and my body to surgeons
Take these words from me.
These cystic fibrosis regimes.
Take these words from me.
Light blue collar worker bees.
- MW
Mar 21, 2012
Mar 21, 2012 at 5:42 AM UTC
Ramble on I do
with visions I have of you,
pink pussycats,
a falling star,
itchy palms,
the balm of this or that,
Casablanca,
Philadelphia freedom,
the Red, White, and Blue,
******** you to the wall,
egg rolls,
soul-stealers,
planting seeds,
the madness of Jack,
quack quack quack,
****** body parts,
kissing Detroit,
drunk on sunshine,
mountain zephyrs,
pixie-talk,
Kingdom come,
down dogs,
London fog
Vegas folly,
dead roses,
sweet sensations,
hurt,
pain,
pop tarts,
warm velvet,
porcelain orbs,
whack whack whack
universal soldier
lover.
Aug 30, 2014
Aug 30, 2014 at 4:28 AM UTC
Ilsa's hair blew like silk in the soft Parisian breeze.
Rick looked 10 years younger driving his sportster
down Champs-Elysees. Arc de Triomphe was in the
distance. Young, radiant, Ilsa was the most beautiful
woman in the world. Every man who ever saw her
instantly fell in love with her, myself included. The
German army was only a day from entering Paris,
but that didn't stop Rick from proposing to Ilsa in
La Belle Aurore as Sam played AS TIME GOES BY.
That Ilsa didn't meet Rick in the pounding rain at
the train station as they had planned to take it to
Marseille on their way to Casablanca foreshadowed
the protracted, brutal war the Nazis had already
begun one conquest after another across Europe.
But ****** was not prescient enough to realize
"...a kiss is just a kiss...." and in his Berlin bunker
first swallowed a cyanide capsule then put the muzzle
of his revolver into his mouth and pulled the trigger,
his only constructive act since becoming Chancellor
in 1933.
TOD HOWARD HAWKS
Dec 18, 2022
Dec 18, 2022 at 7:59 PM UTC
Oh Rick, if only things were so simple. . . .
If only there were Nazis shooting children,
bullies like Major Strasser waiting to take over,
women like Ilsa --
so beautiful and passionate
that just the memory of their love, just the shadow,
is enough.
We would sing the Marseillaise
and in the air itself,
just breathing in that hot, dry air,
would find all the meaning we need.
But we live in an everyday world,
with everyday human beings.
And we must start again each morning,
with scraps of faith and feeling,
to make the world's meaning in the foundry of our heart.
Aug 1, 2017
Aug 1, 2017 at 3:43 PM UTC
Weaving through these memories, I glimpse...
The plains I lied in to watch the clouds,
When I really just watched you.
The woods that floated in fog before me,
While I floated in your eyes.
The ocean waves I trespassed,
As I swam out to your smile.
The desert sands that stung my eyes,
To make you a mirage through my tears.
Volcanic fires that would have melted me,
If I had not already melted in your gaze.
The ice that clawed my warmth away,
And gave it back when it reached my heart
And saw how much I loved you.
Weaving through these memories I glimpse...
A darkened room and lying on the floor,
As silently her hand slipped into mine.
The theater playing Casablanca,
When suddenly I felt her head in the soft spot on my shoulder.
An empty scene filled only with
The kiss of an angel.
The blindfold on my eyes,
As her whispers tickled my ears.
Falling away into dreams,
As she softly snores beside me.
A ring slowly sliding on my finger,
From the veil that hid her face,
But could not hide the joy between us.
Weaving through these memories I glimpse...
Six jobs, two apartments, and one house
We shared together.
The wrinkles etching themselves in our faces,
Though they still couldn’t hide our dimples.
The times we argued....and always came out stronger,
Even if we didn’t agree.
Falling in love again,
Every time we watched Casablanca.
The most wonderful and utterly frightening news I’d ever heard,
Which is just what she said after she’d gone to the doctor.
Two infants, two kids, two teens, two adults,
Because though they’re the same,
Each left their own impression on us.
Weaving through these memories I know
She will always be the one I loved without end,
Through each of these steps of love.
Jun 14, 2012
Jun 14, 2012 at 9:40 PM UTC
Tu ausencia en mi tibia cama, se hace más presente
No por no querer buscar lugar, sino por no tenerte,
Y estos labios, cada vez más tuyos,
Y esos ojos, cada vez menos míos.
Sólo queda por correr, dónde nunca corre el río,
No me pidas que te deje
Que aquí sólo hace frío
Dame una señal de esos labios,
Sosténme la mano en hastío
Que si muero hoy, triste y timorato, no habrá de mí que llorar.
Son sólo besos, que se pierden vano
Y al tiempo se los voy a cobrar.
Sobre tu vientre morir, sobre tu boca resucitar
Sobre tu voz escribir, y sobre tus besos cantar.
Y no me pidas perdón, cuándo no exista la culpa,
Que si de amor se trata, no habría forma oculta,
De besarte una vez más; a ojos cerrados.
De tocarte noches enteras; con estrellas de tu lado.
Tu amor, a mí sólo me resplandece,
Culpable no eres de existir, y que de ti todo florece, ay pobre de mí.
Son sólo besos, que se pierden vano
Pero que al tiempo, se los voy a exigir.
Lluvia de otoño, fútil amanece,
Lluvia de verano, quién te viera nacer
Sobre las costras en el mar abierto, como una venus llorar,
La virgen María se pregunta, con quién tiene que hablar
Porque de ti hay poesía, llena de verdad,
Y los rezo a ti, ninguno te va.
Quién fuera canción a tocar, versos dulces a tu oído,
Quién fuera la muerte comandada, por emisarios perdidos,
No te lloro, por correspondencia,
Te lloro sensato.
Que si de amor nos tenemos,
Nos tenemos de a ratos.
Jul 18, 2017
Jul 18, 2017 at 5:35 AM UTC