"centurion" poems
"Democracy is the lesser of all evils."
Says the Liberal.
The Libertarian.
The Corinthian.
The Macedonian.
The Farrier.
The Squire.
The Stoic.
The Astronomer.
The Ornithologist.
The Eschatologist.
The Augur.
The Retiarius.
The Hoplite.
The Centurion.
The Governor.
The General.
The Senator.
The Orator.
The Assassin.
The Emperor.
The Ferryman.
Nov 25, 2018
Nov 25, 2018 at 8:54 PM UTC
A plume should be a thing lovely and light
dancing violet as it's fanned
at the flanks of the blue
bird-of-paradise
who hangs limberly
to solicit a mate
It should curl
blinding white at the back
of the puffy Samoyed
prancing fancy to please a master
who also preens on the oval
of a sawdust track
It should flop
red at the top of gold-painted tin
helmet awry on the head
of an aspiring actor
who plays centurion for tips
outside a mobbed Colosseum
It should spray
as clear and cooling drops out
the copper mouth of a grass-snake
green hose uncoiled by
the sneaky dad who tickles
giggles from sweaty kids
It should flutter
gray at the tail end of a quill
bouncing to the frenzied
jottings of an anachronistic
frump who takes the pain to outfit
himself far too seriously
A plume should not be a thing of plague
riding currents kissed by taint-
sweet crude blasted from a wound
gouged in the crust
of a frigid deep to feed
our shallow lust for eases
It shouldn't choke
It shouldn't muck
It shouldn't tar
It can't help
poisoning that last pretense
we cared about anything,
be it plumed or not, but
the finality of
a bottom line
May 31, 2010
May 31, 2010 at 6:54 AM UTC
Tube worms hellish creature
Centurion of pitch and isolation
No internal altimeter
Pressured to bake and cook life
Take energy from pressured light
Press and push and valve and close
Entrenched, in line to another world
A planet a dot, a dot a spot
a spot a rock, a rock a dot
Wiggle waggle struggle straggle
Life and death, dream and cot
It is hot down here
In passion of dream
and the brain can easily
Overheat
May 18, 2018
May 18, 2018 at 6:03 PM UTC
well... technically every *********** is an abortion,
i have it all the time, but when a woman has it,
esp. a Russian orthodox rich girl
it's time to call the Mamelukes
because "a mongol horde is invading",
there was nothing legally binding me
to alimony payments, no marriage
certificate, but my friend,
you meddle in other people's private life,
think you're the man with a career
in law but end up staging
your little: the judge, the jury the executioner
in your bedroom? FORGET IT!
you're just a lawyer, a scavenger,
you don't get to play the game 'who's your daddy'
so easily... you think you're allowed to provide
the architecture of a courtroom in your bedroom...
you're wrong.
take your little orthodox russian *****
with my ******* son and live a long life...
i asked her: i don't mind using condoms,
she said, ********* into me, i'm on
contraceptive pills... two apartments
in St. Petersburg and getting a degree in Edinburgh
you think she's poor? doubt it,
i'm not going to be a ploughing work-horse...
and forging your attempt to placebo the pills with lies...
all that feminism and still the russian
girls think they're killing a human being...
but like i said: the bladder and the ****
develop outside the womb, well brain too,
but the **** and bladder are more important
for the ***** what you're aborting
is just as much a tadpole as a fishy stink;
is your argument caused by the fact
that you gave the Star of Bethlehem to Jesus
and not Joseph because of Mary's fancy
for a centurion? it has to be! way-hey mainstream,
give it to the kid and you get Freud...
god i hate Freud... not because he's a jew,
it just made the whole being born a neurosis,
you need test-tubes, surrogate mothers, IVF,
two Elton Johns to not feel a stigma...
even if the world is harsh on you and you end up
living with your parents... mother *******
if they all adopted the Caesarian technique of giving
birth there would be no Freud;
well say goodbye to Darwin with that...
obstructing the Caesarian intervention with Genesis quotes
will still produce heads sticking out of vaginas
and by god that's no Michaelangelo.
May 6, 2016
May 6, 2016 at 7:02 PM UTC
The pastor stood before the church.
Standing behind the podium.
And asked why?
Why do he have so little of faith?
He shook his head.
He pause.
Then continue on with his sermon.
That he has never blamed God for his decision.
But learned from them as they have happen.
He request his congregation turn to all scriptures concerning faith.
He named the book and the various pages.
He addressed those with the littlest of faith.
How can you hope for blessings?
When you don't believe.
He spoke of the Centurion's faith.
Who felt he was unworthy of Jesus enterance into his home?
But the Lord saw faith.
He addressed the fig tree that was withering away.
While noticing the fruit tree and used it around having faith.
He used the mustard seed to point out faith.
Highlighting the grain and how nothing is impossible?
If you only believe.
By having faith in God as he use scriptures in Matthew and Mark.
Teaching that faith must be in the people.
Even the sinful woman was forgiven just for showing kindness.
For she loved so much and little was given.
He taught upon the apostles seeking to increase their faith.
Which the Lord addressed honestly to them.
After all, he point out we walk by faith and not by sight.
That God has open doors that we didn't know was coming.
And as he spoke.
He point out to them that faith comes by hearing.
And abiding in faith.
And believing in One Lord, one faith.
Cause the author and finisher of faith is the Lord.
And then he concluded his sermon to the people.
Faith is the substance of things hoped for, and the evidence of things not seen.
Doubt not God, for he know all things that's good for us.
Just have faith, Amen.
Let the people say.....
Jan 4, 2014
Jan 4, 2014 at 11:20 AM UTC
That second that slithers in
Beckoning forbidden fancies
As your lifeless figures lies in shadows
That eat at your lonesome soul
While he frolics among his virtuous games
Uninformed of the stains and bruises
You so carefully conceal beneath
Petty giggles and witty banter
This is what you so desired
What you long lost
When the others ripped your innocence
Limb by limb-
The purity which glimmers so brilliantly
In his golden eyes
That sincerity so eagerly falls at your feet
Yet your calloused hands reach
For the one who knew the girl
Before her brittle bones
Aches with sores and colds
The one who not only knows the history
But watched it unfold familiarly
Dec 28, 2013
Dec 28, 2013 at 12:29 AM UTC
i mean, i love your sanity, but
i need a drink; i learned more sanity from a cat
than i did trying to cure my eyesight;
if you think my parents did wrong
by giving me a proustian lifestyle
then i’m faust; polka dittoed devil usurps all
meanings, even the clever ones typed: chlorophyl.
well i'll be too many coo coo in pikachu for the orange
minding the size of the amazon
(and saying - there's a pain in my chest when laughing...
had i a heart i'd call it keith lemon) allowing
the "fashion statement" and instant grams of followers -
hey, it's called a middle finger for a reason - let me
anally absolve you from prayer
and salutation of the crucifix... k k o.k.?
Oct 10, 2015
Oct 10, 2015 at 11:35 AM UTC
Carla,
Whom I love and regret in equal measure,
Told me to talk less and think only in the morning.
It’s unfair, she said, for someone with your demons,
To obsess past mid day.
You will only exhaust yourself,
Become dizzy from looking over your shoulder.
It’s the sparrow’s lunch you eat, she said
Afterwards you think only of suicide,
It’s your pathetic answer to everything.
You have a propensity, an absolute need to confess, Carla advised me,
You see sin as an obligation,
As a necessity to fuel your ridiculous notion of salvation,
Repentance is a shell game,
No sooner have you apologized for being yourself,
Than you begin sinning all over again.
Your quest for innocence is a self-selected Sisyphean task.
I told her I had no idea what she was talking about,
And that if she wanted to save me she had to speak in simpler terms.
Quit looking for the meaning in things, Carla said,
Life is lived on the surface,
What we really fear is not that we will die,
But how we will die,
I mean good god,
The insane Christians
Have us picturing death
With nails driven through our hands and feet,
Hanging from a crucifix,
Can you imagine the indignity,
While some low level centurion,
Stabs at us with a sword,
I mean really,
Hauling crosses up mountainsides
Being laughed at and scorned in our weakest moment,
The drama is laughable,
When the absolute truth is most of us
Will die peacefully in our sleep,
Gone without even knowing the party is over.
Replace your metaphysics with a game of chess, Carla told me,
At least do psilocybin once in awhile
And have a genuine spiritual experience,
And she held up her hand for two more glasses of scotch,
Neat,
And lit her cigar.
Aug 30, 2016
Aug 30, 2016 at 7:10 PM UTC
They tried for years,
Perhaps to fill the boredom of a life-unfulfilled,
Perhaps to try to hold together their universal but tenuous bond-
Like leaves from the same branch of the same centurion tree,
They swayed to all the same winds,
Almost broke through the storm that was
her,
And then ultimately
His
torment.
And where did it come from?
Well nobody knows- not to this day
Can anybody say
Just where the fruit of her madness sow.
But it was as though one day,something just changed.
And at times there
was
even
Some quiet lulls in the Symphony
Of her self-destruction
where,
Perhaps,
pray tell
She (and so he)
Felt
Happy.
And so they tried,
For years,
Maybe out of stupid habit
Her name was Violet and she had always
Loved
The Element
That is Water.
The Ocean,
Like a purification from birth,
Draws her back again,
still
A ritual
That some say cleanse the sins
Of the flesh.
And she has flesh,
Raging, burning
Insatiable flesh
That screams for the touch of another.
But that scares her.
So she must create
Barriers around her heart
Perhaps to quell the fire
Of her absolute and inconsolable
Rage.
She had Irish in her blood,
Right from day dot.
It came from her
Daddy'
And those twisted genes
came
from that place of darkness
That neither her Mother nor Grandma can see.
Once upon a time...
There was a Prince
With a tussle of hair so long,
It dragged her up from the darkness.
He was the Dragon Side of her Rapunzel.
Violent Violet
was her name...
And She
Was
A super-hero from Birth
Mar 19, 2013
Mar 19, 2013 at 10:08 AM UTC
He knew the secrets of this wood
He knew it should be shaped for good.
He was not sure that he approved
when the Centurion came
seeking a rood.
The grain was heavy and unforgiving
It was surely meant to serve the living.
Now a means of torture it must be
for some rebel rabbi from Galilee.
Whipped and scourged like a beaten dog,
a poor excuse for a son of God.
He staggered through the streets of the City
Cursed and reviled for few showed pity.
His grieving mother, one courageous friend,
and his woman stayed until the end.
Nicodemus helped to take him down
with my ladder he had brought from town.
Those who died with him fed the dogs
but the Rabbi did not share their fate.
His body was lain in a Hillside tomb
on Nicodemus' own estate.
What happened next depends on Grace
What transpired there on the third day?
Did the body rise or was it just misplaced?
Some will scoff while others pray.
I contemplate the rough hewn rood
Now to me it seems a stranger.
Was it used for good or ill?
The secret is held
in the hands of the Maker.
Jul 20, 2013
Jul 20, 2013 at 11:10 PM UTC
*Georgia Sun relaxes in the fifth house
Hummers circle Florida sky from my shaded chaise
Blue Jays and Brown Thrashers lounge the
ripened Fig Trees , shadows walk the vegetable
gardens , nightshades ardent for cool , rainy reprieve
Crows muster high atop centurion Oaks
Bluebirds and Sparrows work the grass like -
two old time blokes as the ice melts away in -
a frosty *** and Coke* ......
Jun 28, 2016
Jun 28, 2016 at 12:26 PM UTC
Rows of rogue gladiators
Recaptured and crucified.
Muscles, grit and warriorship
Beyond that of any centurion,
Humbled, humiliated, spat upon
By the wine-greased gears of a
Machine the size of seized continents
And cultures crushed to crumbs
Within weeks -not centuries.
The stuff of contemporary tales and
Future feature films. Justice -not
Unlike poetry- is a purely man-made
Concept. But so very unlike the
Other; as frail in its mortality as
Man's own justless Self.
May 5, 2014
May 5, 2014 at 2:54 PM UTC
When the fifth nib broke,
I knew what she meant to me,
Realization, seeped in like a season new,
For I knew how it was meant to be.
Her eyes,
Empty, like uninhabited shores
Her tears,
Silent, like unopened doors
Her lips,
Dying, like the spirit of a centurion’s corpse
Needed, only her dreams,
Set afree,
Like an unsaddled horse.
But who would ride
A painted shadow,
A prisoner of pride,
For that’s how I mocked ,
My handcuffed bride;
And now watch me preach ,
Of Gods and Guilt;
To the bride who shook ,
The world I built .
When the fifth nib broke,
I knew what she meant to me ,
But when her fifth nib breaks ,
Will she ?
Apr 13, 2015
Apr 13, 2015 at 1:38 AM UTC
In you, I have found….
A peaceful happiness,
eyes to imagine in dreams
a calmness by your soft touch
a warmth…
a sweet soul to rock with me on a swing
someone
I have no fear of losing or hurting.
Someone
to wander the trail that leads
just into the woods
nowhere special, thousands of them on earth.
Someone
to listen to a bird’s chirp
and see the beauty in it like I do.
Someone
to share smiles with as we make faces in the clouds.
Someone
to hold onto in the darkest recesses of insecurity.
Someone
to balm my wounds and kiss with tears
to love, like love has never been seen.
~
***Far off in the misty glow
of one centurion
distant show
of a bursting new star
all alone
another
her brightness
showed
to draw him nearer
near to her
and he was reborn
as a nebula all pink and red all showy
as gravity and space collided
they made love
in the heavens dark.***
Jan 11, 2018
Jan 11, 2018 at 6:39 PM UTC
I read with passing interest
The death of the
Field Marshal’s son--
Manfred Rommel--
Gone at 84.
His father—The Field Marshal,
Had been given a choice:
Commit suicide or
Face a rigged trial
Charged with conspiring to ****
******
If he chose the trial, they said,
They could not promise
That his family would be
SAFE.
The father,
Der Feldmarschall,
Bit into a cyanide pill
And died quickly.
It was Oct. 14, 1944.
Thanks to the sacrifice,
Manfred got to grow up to be
A three-term mayor of Stuttgart,
Where Daimler-Benz makes cars.
Manfred Rommel:
A postwar liberal Deutschland voice,
Supporting immigrants and Jews.
At 84,
Deader than
A dreadnaught.
Makes you wonder?
A fate worst--wurst--
Something worse than
Death?
Really the moment of truth
For any honorable man,
Self-defined by nature,
Molded by nurture.
Family:
The fountain & source
The tribe you belong to.
Family: everything you are
When you get right down to
Where one’s loyalties
Supposedly lie.
Of course, you opt for suicide.
Wouldn’t anyone?
We are born into a net.
We must bravely defend the network.
Facing insurmountable odds,
Our duty is to hold on
Without hope, without rescue,
Like that Roman centurion
Whose bones,
Later excavated at that front door in Pompeii,
Steadfast & true,
That Roman soldier--
Vesuvius exploding,
A hard rain falling down upon him--
Died at his post because
They forgot to relieve him.
That is duty.
That is greatness.
That is thoroughbred pedigree.
An honorable end:
The one thing that
Cannot be taken from a man.
Unless, of course,
The times they are Orwellian,
And once again,
This time with feeling:
*“Do it to Julia.
Do it to Julia!”*
May 19, 2015
May 19, 2015 at 4:35 PM UTC
Lawmen oversee the old day's hanging's,
Exit signs designed only for those who wear worn out tennis shoes,
Conquered,
Overcrowding as if only cattle can fit through!!!!
No salt nor pepper to design creation meals of home,
Fall is near,
Plumbings far to clogged,
Days passeth night,
As night begins to freight!!!
Wolves on the outside trade fur's with ferrel dogs!!!
Clenching of teeth siren off as oven's they bake,
They brew,
Country town folk with rod and ungodly staff they overtaketh and rule!!!!
Crises of all temptation,
Bleeders to readers,
****** deviants get out to put down their own indignations!!!
Desire all thou wilt,
Desiree's,
Empathies,
Chalkers, scoffers , doctors of deaths pill!!!
Read on,
Read on uneducated pillar,
For thy hooks art thy scrolls,
Thy eyeglasses maketh thou gnomes of such readings to bring thou thrillers!!!!!!
Fragrant destiny resistant to all microbial force,
Accusation's humbling,
Sovereignty is a mystery to us mortals!!!!
Dragon's slayed to stature founder's ditches of war dug out of centurion portals,
Wreaking architecture drawn out of mapped whirlpools lies,
Some groweth deathly,
Sweet talkers are refusing to trust their own worried minds!!!!
Black coated tuxedoed hosts delighting their own escapes,
Some window's stay open,
Some stay closed in the fortress,
This inescapable place!!!!!!
Tis,
This human landfill,
Dump,
Waste!!!!
May 25, 2015
May 25, 2015 at 10:06 AM UTC
Three short ones from being a centurion
I met my next and the oldest one to date
Today makes number twelve. I got now, my first dozen.
Witnessing the frozen effect of your last breath
From across the room it was so clear
How wide the opening that your soul left behind
A silent scream they could not hear
Looking down into, I can see you’re now hollow
You grabbed ahold of my apple
And now it’s hard for me to swallow
Time pronounced fifteen twenty two
Time on my skeleton relic a mere six o four
In less than three to me you still felt warm
In a room, smaller than a college dorm
Snow globe by your side I just started to shake it
To start the raging blizzard that soon would begin to brew
I’m trapped in a white out, now what can I do?
Torqueing steel strings I held it closed
Packing cotton now I had no choice
I had to muffle the....
Silent sounds of your screams.
(CARSr. 8-13-12)
Nov 19, 2012
Nov 19, 2012 at 1:13 PM UTC
try hard as we might
there was no
ignoring
the scratching
coming from the walls
and there was no
reckoning
to be had
with the things
crawling on our skin
but we laid there
together
all we had
each other
and my arm was around you
and your head was on my chest
as you softly slept
and in your dreams
the storm must've turned
the scratching of the things
finding its way through
the tempest inside
and i heard you
start to mewl
and whine
and cry out
from the dark place
down where your dreaming
had taken you
and so i raised my hand
from its home on your hip
and softly
smoothed your hair
away from your troubled
beautiful face
so near to mine
and i cupped your head gently
and i loved you
and you were quiet again and
everything
was
perfect
Jun 30, 2014
Jun 30, 2014 at 4:25 PM UTC
It was simple curiosity, I have just myself to blame.
I was not the man’s disciple, though of course I knew the name.
I could see that he’d been beaten, saw the cruel marks of the lash.
I was told he’d fallen more than once on the steep and stony path.
So when the Centurion beckoned me, I hurried to comply.
I have a healthy fear of swords and was in no rush to die.
He bade me to take up the cross, to put my back into it.
I took the Prophet’s burden on; he could no longer do it.
Most of his friends abandoned Him, this man from Galilee.
He who soon would breathe his last stretched painfully on this tree.
They did not wish to share his fate, a death upon the cross.
They scattered into hiding just as soon as all seemed lost.
This work was hot and difficult for one man all alone
I struggled up the incline, Stepping carefully, stone by stone.
The Prophet was a beaten man whereas I was young and strong.
He came to this place to die, but I would get back home.
I saw his look of gratitude as I put my burden down.
I ‘ll not forget the dripping blood from down his thorny crown.
He said I’d be remembered for this thoughtful, kindly deed.
I told him notoriety is the last thing that I need
Apr 1, 2021
Apr 1, 2021 at 9:18 PM UTC
*Who made the hawk so sad
in winter sky , etching it's loneliness
to my wandering eye ,
Noble upon the tallest elm
Steeped in curiosity , crying tales
of Cherokee , of Muscogee , of hunter
and warring party*
*What hand did color the Georgia dusk ,
with lavender blue oils and orange sunshine
traipsing centurion forest
With waterbirds following the lantern of
God home , through arable pastures , o'er granite domes*
Mar 12, 2017
Mar 12, 2017 at 5:05 PM UTC
i sometimes wish i could age to be old and modestly rich, and see my own face in the girls i might care to swoop under my monetary belt in order to see rejection’s expression (pst! articles aren’t used when a meaning is duo possessive / either what you expect or what you don’t expect doesn’t matter) of my youth... a woman’s sex-drive gives her ample time to live longer than man.
it’s a ****** da vinci...
it’s so good
the only thing you
can do to it is.. graffiti it!
so you quote heath ledger
on the mona lisa:
'now i'm always smiling!'
he stole the fiction, heath ledger did,
he stole the fictive character
and committed suicide
because of it... heavy toll i say...
i sometimes wish more actors
took the character off the page
and into hades, as a way
to execute the relation of having
a father extinguished... that's classic that is.
me? ***** i think i got the
actor's part of christ... i.e. the antichrist...
and my crucifixion scene is in a sickbed...
and lasts too long like Tolstoy's war & peace
that no one reads...
and i sometimes get a sponge soaked with
wine given to me by a centurion,
or as i like to call it... some writing time
from the excesses of perspiration
doing the easiest of household activities
with the energy of someone aged 80;
no seriously, heath ledger stole the joker
from the realm of fiction and made it a reality
when hades dully acknowledged these
words to ring true:
telegram from the mediator of yhwh... heath ledger
is the joker... hades didn't reply and merely
gleed with awe like freshly oiled wooden flooring,
although a few dimples appeared on his face.
Nov 12, 2015
Nov 12, 2015 at 8:17 PM UTC
Alfred Edward Housman wrote about this county from London,
we smoke pipes and drink pints to honour the scholar's story,
which can be checked out the library, former learning quarters
of an explorer named Charles Darwin, who sits in grey outside,
despite leaving town in adolescence, returning from Galapagos
to The Mount, where my parents met in mental health sickness,
gave life to an original species that theories would have hated,
like Robert Clive, who earned his knighthood by looting India,
cried in parliament, now we want his stage ousted, his house is
next to the cottage where I sleep restless because myself and
a few other Shropshire lads failed to escape, even after studying
centurion debates, athletic form and getting serenaded by greats,
where are the names of those who rose from minimum wage?
Sep 28, 2020
Sep 28, 2020 at 12:30 PM UTC
*Nutmeg firma , fractured window abstractions -
of quivering pools , of desire abating thirst
Life giver , abundant wavering ripples finding -
grassy shore , tinseled in gold , copper , bronze -
precious metals , beads of sweat traveling rippled flesh , every -
desperate breath filling life's circuitry till its
conclusive end
Foot trails laced in dandelion , purple wire ,
terra-cotta stone , marble and granite
The birth of monuments riddled o'er the fescue -
expression , Bluebird followers , curt winged
purveyors of decay , August clod bank rows , barbed -
wire orderly plats , distant wavers of unrelenting sun-glow facing -welcome centurion lodges*
Sep 18, 2016
Sep 18, 2016 at 4:13 PM UTC