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1
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.

I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass.

My tongue, every atom of my blood, form’d from this soil, this air,
Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their
parents the same,
I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin,
Hoping to cease not till death.

Creeds and schools in abeyance,
Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten,
I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard,
Nature without check with original energy.

2
Houses and rooms are full of perfumes, the shelves are crowded with
perfumes,
I breathe the fragrance myself and know it and like it,
The distillation would intoxicate me also, but I shall not let it.

The atmosphere is not a perfume, it has no taste of the
distillation, it is odorless,
It is for my mouth forever, I am in love with it,
I will go to the bank by the wood and become undisguised and naked,
I am mad for it to be in contact with me.

The smoke of my own breath,
Echoes, ripples, buzz’d whispers, love-root, silk-thread, crotch and
vine,
My respiration and inspiration, the beating of my heart, the passing
of blood and air through my lungs,
The sniff of green leaves and dry leaves, and of the shore and
dark-color’d sea-rocks, and of hay in the barn,

The sound of the belch’d words of my voice loos’d to the eddies of
the wind,
A few light kisses, a few embraces, a reaching around of arms,
The play of shine and shade on the trees as the supple boughs wag,
The delight alone or in the rush of the streets, or along the fields
and hill-sides,
The feeling of health, the full-noon trill, the song of me rising
from bed and meeting the sun.

Have you reckon’d a thousand acres much? have you reckon’d the
earth much?
Have you practis’d so long to learn to read?
Have you felt so proud to get at the meaning of poems?

Stop this day and night with me and you shall possess the origin of
all poems,
You shall possess the good of the earth and sun, (there are millions
of suns left,)
You shall no longer take things at second or third hand, nor look
through the eyes of the dead, nor feed on the spectres in
books,
You shall not look through my eyes either, nor take things from me,
You shall listen to all sides and filter them from your self.

3
I have heard what the talkers were talking, the talk of the
beginning and the end,
But I do not talk of the beginning or the end.

There was never any more inception than there is now,
Nor any more youth or age than there is now,
And will never be any more perfection than there is now,
Nor any more heaven or hell than there is now.

Urge and urge and urge,
Always the procreant urge of the world.

Out of the dimness opposite equals advance, always substance and
increase, always ***,
Always a knit of identity, always distinction, always a breed of
life.
To elaborate is no avail, learn’d and unlearn’d feel that it is so.

Sure as the most certain sure, plumb in the uprights, well
entretied, braced in the beams,
Stout as a horse, affectionate, haughty, electrical,
I and this mystery here we stand.

Clear and sweet is my soul, and clear and sweet is all that is not
my soul.

Lack one lacks both, and the unseen is proved by the seen,
Till that becomes unseen and receives proof in its turn.

Showing the best and dividing it from the worst age vexes age,
Knowing the perfect fitness and equanimity of things, while they
discuss I am silent, and go bathe and admire myself.

Welcome is every ***** and attribute of me, and of any man hearty
and clean,
Not an inch nor a particle of an inch is vile, and none shall be
less familiar than the rest.

I am satisfied - I see, dance, laugh, sing;
As the hugging and loving bed-fellow sleeps at my side through the
night, and withdraws at the peep of the day with stealthy
tread,
Leaving me baskets cover’d with white towels swelling the house with
their plenty,
Shall I postpone my acceptation and realization and scream at my
eyes,
That they turn from gazing after and down the road,
And forthwith cipher and show me to a cent,
Exactly the value of one and exactly the value of two, and which is
ahead?

4
Trippers and askers surround me,
People I meet, the effect upon me of my early life or the ward and
city I live in, or the nation,
The latest dates, discoveries, inventions, societies, authors old
and new,
My dinner, dress, associates, looks, compliments, dues,
The real or fancied indifference of some man or woman I love,
The sickness of one of my folks or of myself, or ill-doing or loss
or lack of money, or depressions or exaltations,
Battles, the horrors of fratricidal war, the fever of doubtful news,
the fitful events;
These come to me days and nights and go from me again,
But they are not the Me myself.

Apart from the pulling and hauling stands what I am,
Stands amused, complacent, compassionating, idle, unitary,
Looks down, is *****, or bends an arm on an impalpable certain rest,
Looking with side-curved head curious what will come next,
Both in and out of the game and watching and wondering at it.

Backward I see in my own days where I sweated through fog with
linguists and contenders,
I have no mockings or arguments, I witness and wait.

5
I believe in you my soul, the other I am must not abase itself to
you,
And you must not be abased to the other.

Loafe with me on the grass, loose the stop from your throat,
Not words, not music or rhyme I want, not custom or lecture, not
even the best,
Only the lull I like, the hum of your valved voice.

I mind how once we lay such a transparent summer morning,
How you settled your head athwart my hips and gently turn’d over
upon me,
And parted the shirt from my *****-bone, and plunged your tongue
to my bare-stript heart,
And reach’d till you felt my beard, and reach’d till you held my
feet.

Swiftly arose and spread around me the peace and knowledge that pass
all the argument of the earth,
And I know that the hand of God is the promise of my own,
And I know that the spirit of God is the brother of my own,
And that all the men ever born are also my brothers, and the women
my sisters and lovers,
And that a kelson of the creation is love,
And limitless are leaves stiff or drooping in the fields,
And brown ants in the little wells beneath them,
And mossy scabs of the worm fence, heap’d stones, elder, mullein and
poke-****.

6
A child said What is the grass? fetching it to me with full hands;
How could I answer the child? I do not know what it is any more
than he.

I guess it must be the flag of my disposition, out of hopeful green
stuff woven.

Or I guess it is the handkerchief of the Lord,
A scented gift and remembrancer designedly dropt,
Bearing the owner’s name someway in the corners, that we may see
and remark, and say Whose?

Or I guess the grass is itself a child, the produced babe of the
vegetation.

Or I guess it is a uniform hieroglyphic,
And it means, Sprouting alike in broad zones and narrow zones,
Growing among black folks as among white,
Kanuck, Tuckahoe, Congressman, Cuff, I give them the same, I
receive them the same.

And now it seems to me the beautiful uncut hair of graves.

Tenderly will I use you curling grass,
It may be you transpire from the ******* of young men,
It may be if I had known them I would have loved them,
It may be you are from old people, or from offspring taken soon out
of their mothers’ laps,
And here you are the mothers’ laps.

This grass is very dark to be from the white heads of old mothers,
Darker than the colorless beards of old men,
Dark to come from under the faint red roofs of mouths.

O I perceive after all so many uttering tongues,
And I perceive they do not come from the roofs of mouths for
nothing.

I wish I could translate the hints about the dead young men and
women,
And the hints about old men and mothers, and the offspring taken
soon out of their laps.

What do you think has become of the young and old men?
And what do you think has become of the women and children?

They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait at the
end to arrest it,
And ceas’d the moment life appear’d.

All goes onward and outward, nothing collapses,
And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.

7
Has any one supposed it lucky to be born?
I hasten to inform him or her it is just as lucky to die, and I know
it.

I pass death with the dying and birth with the new-wash’d babe, and
am not contain’d between my hat and boots,
And peruse manifold objects, no two alike and every one good,
The earth good and the stars good, and their adjuncts all good.

I am not an earth nor an adjunct of an earth,
I am the mate and companion of people, all just as immortal and
fathomless as myself,
(They do not know how immortal, but I know.)

Every kind for itself and its own, for me mine male and female,
For me those that have been boys and that love women,
For me the man that is proud and feels how it stings to be slighted,
For me the sweet-heart and the old maid, for me mothers and the
mothers of mothers,
For me lips that have smiled, eyes that have shed tears,
For me children and the begetters of children.

Undrape! you are not guilty to me, nor stale nor discarded,
I see through the broadcloth and gingham whether or no,
And am around, tenacious, acquisitive, tireless, and cannot be
shaken away.

8
The little one sleeps in its cradle,
I lift the gauze and look a long time, and silently brush away flies
with my hand.

The youngster and the red-faced girl turn aside up the bushy hill,
I peeringly view them from the top.

The suicide sprawls on the ****** floor of the bedroom,
I witness the corpse with its dabbled hair, I note where the pistol
has fallen.

The blab of the pave, tires of carts, sluff of boot-soles, talk of
the promenaders,
The heavy omnibus, the driver with his interrogating thumb, the
clank of the shod horses on the granite floor,
The snow-sleighs, clinking, shouted jokes, pelts of snow-*****,
The hurrahs for popular favorites, the fury of rous’d mobs,
The flap of the curtain’d litter, a sick man inside borne to the
hospital,
The meeting of enemies, the sudden oath, the blows and fall,
The excited crowd, the policeman with his star quickly working his
passage to the centre of the crowd,
The impassive stones that receive and return so many echoes,
What groans of over-fed or half-starv’d who fall sunstruck or in
fits,
What exclamations of women taken suddenly who hurry home and
give birth to babes,
What living and buried speech is always vibrating here, what howls
restrain’d by decorum,
Arrests of criminals, slights, adulterous offers made, acceptances,
rejections with convex lips,
I mind them or the show or resonance of them-I come and I depart.

9
The big doors of the country barn stand open and ready,
The dried grass of the harvest-time loads the slow-drawn wagon,
The clear light plays on the brown gray and green intertinged,
The armfuls are pack’d to the sagging mow.

I am there, I help, I came stretch’d atop of the load,
I felt its soft jolts, one leg reclined on the other,
I jump from the cross-beams and seize the clover and timothy,
And roll head over heels and tangle my hair full of wisps.

10
Alone far in the wilds and mountains I hunt,
Wandering amazed at my own lightness and glee,
In the late afternoon choosing a safe spot to pass the night,
Kindling a fire and broiling the fresh-****’d game,
Falling asleep on the gather’d leaves with my dog and gun by my
side.

The Yankee clipper is under her sky-sails, she cuts the sparkle
and scud,
My eyes settle the land, I bend at her prow or shout joyously from
the deck.

The boatmen and clam-diggers arose early and stopt for me,
I tuck’d my trowser-ends in my boots and went and had a good time;
You should have been with us that day round the chowder-kettle.

I saw the marriage of the trapper in the open air in the far west,
the bride was a red girl,
Her father and his friends sat near cross-legged and dumbly smoking,
they had moccasins to their feet and large thick blankets
hanging from their shoulders,
On a bank lounged the trapper, he was drest mostly in skins, his
luxuriant beard and curls protected his neck, he held his bride
by the hand,
She had long eyelashes, her head was bare, her coarse straight locks
descended upon her voluptuous limbs and reach’d to her
feet.

The runaway slave came to my house and stopt outside,
I heard his motions crackling the twigs of the woodpile,
Through the swung half-door of the kitchen I saw him limpsy and
weak,
And went where he sat on a log and led him in and assured him,
And brought water and fill’d a tub for his sweated body and bruis’d
feet,
And gave him a room that enter’d from my own, and gave him some
coarse clean clothes,
And remember perfectly well his revolving eyes and his awkwardness,
And remember putting piasters on the galls of his neck and ankles;
He staid with me a week before he was recuperated and pass’d north,
I had him sit next me at table, my fire-lock lean’d in the corner.

11
Twenty-eight young men bathe by the shore,
Twenty-eight young men and all so friendly;
Twenty-eight years of womanly life and all so lonesome.

She owns the fine house by the rise of the bank,
She hides handsome and richly drest aft the blinds of the window.

Which of the young men does she like the best?
Ah the homeliest of them is beautiful to her.

Where are you off to, lady? for I see you,
You splash in the water there, yet stay stock still in your room.

Dancing and laughing along the beach came the twenty-ninth
bather,
The rest did not see her, but she saw them and loved them.

The beards of the young men glisten’d with wet, it ran from their
long hair,
Little streams pass’d all over their bodies.

An unseen hand also pass’d over their bodies,
It descended tremblingly from their temples and ribs.

The young men float on their backs, their white bellies bulge to the
sun, they do not ask who seizes fast to them,
They do not know who puffs and declines with pendant and bending
arch,
They do not think whom they ***** with spray.

12
The butcher-boy puts off his killing-clothes, or sharpens his knife
at the stall in the market,
I loiter enjoying his repartee and his shuffle and break-down.

Blacksmiths with grimed and hairy chests environ the anvil,
Each has his main-sledge, they are all out, there is a great heat in
the fire.

From the cinder-strew’d threshold I follow their movements,
The lithe sheer of their waists plays even with their massive arms,
Overhand the hammers swing, overhand so slow, overhand so sure,
They do not hasten, each man hits in his place.

13
The ***** holds firmly the reins of his four horses, the block swags
underneath on its tied-over chain,
The ***** that drives the long dray of the stone-yard, steady and
tall he stands pois’d on one leg on the string-piece,
His blue shirt exposes his ample neck and breast and loosens over
his hip-band,
His glance is calm and commanding, he tosses the slouch of his hat
away from his forehead,
The sun falls on his crispy hair and mustache, falls on the black of
his polish’d and perfect limbs.

I behold the picturesque giant and love him, and I do not stop
there,
I go with the team also.

In me the caresser of life wherever moving, backward as well as
forward sluing,
To niches aside and junior bending, not a person or object missing,
Absorbing all to myself and for this song.

Oxen that rattle the yoke and chain or halt in the leafy shade, what
is that you express in your eyes?
It seems to me more than all the print I have read in my life.

My tread scares the wood-drake and wood-duck on my distant and
day-long ramble,
They rise together, they slowly circle around.

I believe in those wing’d purposes,
And acknowledge red, yellow, white, playing within me,
And consider green and violet and the tufted crown i
Ceida Uilyc Jul 2015
I could tell you,
But you’d laugh at me.
Because it is bare, raw and pure.
You gloat on the preservatives.
You discard the genuine.
Listen to me, my friend, there is a part of the world, where even a bulb is never, ever, witnessed in real, but reel of the sanskrit Cartoon slots. The peppy  and ‘lone B-grade Cartoons .
Filled with Flesh.
The stories of tantric mantras, with a sliver of diminishing hearth,
on the
Dimensions and depth of the Yoni in the resin of shellac
on the Immaculate ceremony,
In a woodpecker hole just underneath the sealed power of the Yakshini who truly screws it up if you have taste of her once.
the one who harbingers drunk loners of Kavadiyattom alley after 3:20 am.
She takes them to the crown chakra of palm trees.
Shows them the world.
she pushes them off the crown and the falcon falls in endless spirals of a inhuman push that pushes the concrete innards to a danlgling mass of amoebic copulation.
Breath comes back.
It is a big nauseating gag of Kumbhakarnan's long sadya that lasted for half a decade.
Of the soma saras that made the entire India go, ga-ga and believe they've seen the god.
But not one nor any saw the same face, colour, shape or even vibe of the god they had seen alone.
They agreed in unison that all their hallucinations of beautiful humans in Flower UFO s and high-tech cloning, were a vital hair in the nostril of the cosmos.
They made, each a god out of their genuine mix of memories.
Or in the, priest's ways,
Hence, the 2.3 Billion populous of the country had the same, well, odd Spiritual benefactors.

Keeping it all aside, lemme be honest, I'd follow many a fairy god-mother but give my milkey teeny tooth to the special one.
Hinduism tells you God is omnipresent.
Hinduism tells you God is within you.
It also says, there is no God.
The clipper to snap off the confusion of this, lies in the same cheap stained-yellow cliche of love. It entails everything. You, me, animals, plants, cosmos, vibes, thoughts, dreams and the universe.
It tells you to live with your body mind and soul.
From Kamasutras that teaches sense.
The excitement, control and breakthrough of it.
Like tao did under his exposed roof without the sacred dung of from Hindu Land.
This is the secret of a rumoured Mohini,
Of her 1000 per hour ******* during the her/ his/ its 352 incarnations.
which was the reason for Big bang.  
Amidst the sultry scant of the voluptuous *******,
Their skin,
a vernacular reflection of a dusk on the Japanese gold beaches, And the mounts,
firm and glowing with the rusty shade of pharaoh’s Gold anklet.
The gooey glaze of yesterday’s glamour in the wink of a gay galore.
Paulo Ceolho’s Holy Communion with God,
Or like the Japanese Tengaman says,
Or rather screams,
That all it it takes is a little *******.
So, yes.
That precise art of attaining a consciousness, from where your mind was
Afloat
Wild
Free
Satiated
By yourself
You’ve just consumed the essence of you
Your Ojhas
And the tiny matter that teaches the universe
Of a Shunya.
That, momentary sense of lapse of your body mass,
Or the breakthrough into your eye of the crown.
Only to join the mundane bustle of the 10,00 speakers on all four
JBLs, Boses and Pioneers live looping the zillions of sanskrit mantras under one roof.
In your Ear drum.
A synechdoche of the Gods and their jacuzzi of amphetamine bubbles.
Splashed from a white Elephant's bejewelled Snout, which has the
crowned ring in your pineals.
Secret lies under
the rotten bone chip of Hussain Sagar
deep under the ***** green lake,  
drowning the rainbow Buddha in the city of slimy immortal maggots on ham.
Open your eyes.
For the Gods will
Else
Cut your eyelids off
to show you that
the city's shardminds await you.
roaring
Playing close to the fire demons of Redland
A nail close to your wide open lid-less
White flowing eye.
Hear the city scream.
The deafening chaos,
In unison,
Intoxicating their venomous fruits
of the delirious worlds
Or simply put, divine prayer and offering
for
the Omnipotent,
Omniscient
And the
Om.
Shunya.
Or the cyclic abyss of meaninglessness.
But,
Like, the wilted azures
that seduced those flies,
From a far far away,
To come the praise the combs of their bellies,
Filled with the red from the omnipotent, dead, weak and evil
In one little fly belly.
They came from the
land called Lullaby.
To go there
from here,
But, first,
bear the Weasleys' infamous extendable ears and heed me now, for I say twice and See him Come.
The snake, the tangy smell of goated black rub and blueness.
Siva shouldn't come?
Not yet. A little DMT more in the brain and perhaps the spark will happen.
Better than the potions of those gigantic forest priests.
No, Heed me, now.

3 Dodos Walk-afar,
And, take the lone left-laden log
the one that is,
limitless Long
loyal and  let alone
By those
languors which
Killed
Lord Leopard Loot'.
While,
Lord's Lass
Lays lolled lambs,
Lolled ‘long le ******,
Leech on the laiden log,
leading to Lord Lava,
Yes.
The bridge of Casilii Po.

Of the Lord.
Guarded
By these bubbling bellies with a drop of the world's make.
Assassins.
the Fly, flies.

retain the scarification of theolden curse,
Older than the rocks underneath this gurgling lava,
On which reincarnation steams.

As destiny should have it,
the astrologers had seen,
3 centuries back
That at a Sphinx’s Wedding,
a war of Vision,
will break.
It will
Bring the Stars
Out of those melting blue nightsky of Neruda's wails;
And the diabolic estrangement inflicting Eagle,
From Meena’s vibes,
that rubbed of a distinct scent of Malabar embedding a little of everybody in the village,
on its Kasavu lines posing
at the focus
of Sahib's Ferguson or Baker.

The gold turned white.
A liquid white, like that of the sap,
For that,
***** on a parrot green rubber plant
And work your fun with the white gluey milk,
fragrant than the sap
Like the  Ylang Ylang buds freshly kissed by the drooly dew,
sealed away
elegantly in a crystal Indigo bottle by the pen stand.

One that glitters if you look at its surface, but smells of naphthalene ***** in the sink
in
that
creepy trailer in
mid salem night of the tut.
Colourful.
This is colorblind.

White is motile.
White is wriggling.
White is life.
With a **** of Eve’s fabric-less
Skin.
White is divinity
feeding you excess of everything,
With an tenfold over dosage injected intravenous, by a silver-haired-glow-in-the-dark-dodo-cupid;

She is divine.
**** Her.
**** her on a Pyre.
**** her innards on a fire.
inflame the bubble
of her her oily effluent you found on the toilet seat
Instil in her, the seed of your sodomic occult,
Not by compassion, but through a hiss and sting
of the
flawless venom of the diabolic.  
Then. Disinfect your fruit that you flicked off the paradise.
And bellow to the blowing gurgling below.  
A reign of ****  nihilism,
moaning the mood-swings-of-a-98-year-old-menopausing-Bhairavi of the Indian Aghora Tales;
And Shelly, fueled in his undiminished hearth with the help of his impetous West Wind,
dreaming lucid,
on a flight in the sky for one week,
with Lucy’s sewing  sequined buttocks,
Stinging their luminescent, lactating, lustrous skin,
Like a tatto machine, lifting rays into the epidermis
So that it roasts, burns a soot and neonifies the only colour
A shade of
The rave, rainbow-red karmas of human existence,
Its little greedy quantas waltzing around the matter
And of its unleashed illuminations
That fuel the same vessel in the universe,
infamously known as,
the
black hole.
Uggh!!
All characters and plots are fictitious.
Your nightmares are yours, not Caesar's.
This is truly the fruit of my insomnia. I have been awake 52 hours now. Had to rant the wakefulness out.
It is unedited. All those offended, I didn't mean it, you did.
Sara L Russell Aug 2013
(A poem to be recited by actors)*

I

[Salome]

Jokanaan, such is my desire for thee,
The moon and stars hath turned away their face
I thirst to kiss thy sullen lips, softly,
I love thy lips, thine eyes that darkly gaze.

Fain would I strip thy garments all away
Replacing each with kisses to thy skin
Just as the dark of night becalms the day
Mine open arms shall gather thee within.

I burn to taste the kisses of thy lips
Just as the hummingbird sips from a rose
Stealing thy nectar with such tender sips
As melt thy sternest aspect, till it goes.

O let me taste thy kisses, holy man,
And quench desire as only woman can.


II

[John The Baptist]

Depart from me, daughter of Babylon,
That look'st on me with such covetous gaze!
Siren of *****'s mire, harlot, begone!
Away with thee and all thy wanton ways!

How canst thou speak with such depravity
Addressed unto a holy man of God?
How canst thou dance in merry liberty
Where our forefathers, seers and sages trod?

Look not upon me with thine eyes of lust,
With salivating, ravenous desire!
Love's purity shall outlive mortal dust
When thy dark soul burneth in Hades' fire!

Harlot of Babylon, strumpet, begone!
I am not thine to crudely gaze upon.


III

[King Herod]

Salome dances, circling the hall,
Gold lamplight shimmers in her dove-like eyes;
Her flame-red chiffon swirls with each footfall,
She glides like a bright bird of paradise.

Behold, she throws a veil onto the floor,
Exposing but a fleeting glimpse of breast;
Allowing but a small promise of more,
Another veil she throws, at my behest.

She sinuously sways her slender hips
And not one moment do her eyes leave mine;
She dances closer, smiles play on her lips
Those lips that could be sweet as Muscat wine.

And still she dances, ravaging my sight,
This light-skinned girl with hair as black as night.


IV

[John The Baptist]

Behold! She dances now before the king,
Whose eyes are full of lust incestuous;
For *****'s daughter, wildly gyrating
Whose very presence here is blasphemous!

I hear the music from my dungeon cell
Her light footsteps, distracting me from prayer,
She dances like a dervish sprung from hell,
I reel with loathing, knowing she is there.

Beware thy sins, Herod, Herodias!
Thy fall from grace approacheth like a storm!
Beware daughter of *****! None shall pass
Beyond the pit, the flames, the locust swarm!

Thy kingdom shall be cast into the flames;
Thy souls struck from the book of living names!


V

[King Herod]

Ah! Now the last veil flutters to the floor,
Her body holds no secrets from mine eyes;
Like ripened fruit making me thirst for more,
But I have promised more than may be wise.

Now I make good my promise unto you,
Salome, fairer sister to the moon;
Come now, I am thy slave; what can I do,
Name thy reward, and thou shalt have it soon.

Come hither, precious girl, I wish to share,
Take from the riches offered up to thee;
Choose from the sweetest wines beyond compare,
The rarest rubies of my treasury.

From treasured gems to pleasures of the vine,
Pray name thy heart's desire; it shall be thine.


VI

[Salome]

My heart's desire cares nothing for my love
What jewel can ever love me in return?
My regal beauty's deemed as not enough
For Jokanaan. I see him, and I burn.

I spurn thy earthly treasures set in gold,
I yearn not for their dancing play of light
There was but one pleasure I could behold
And he regaileth me with words of spite.

Thy precious cellar brimming full of wine
All taste divine; yet never quite as sweet
As luscious lips of he who can't be mine
Whose savage beauty stings me like defeat!

Therefore I say, reward me if you can;
Bring me the severed head of Jokanaan!


VII

[Herod]

Salome, you have asked a dreadful thing,
Such monstrous words flame from thy pretty lips!
I offer thee my finest emerald ring
The choicest clipper from my fleet of ships;

Thou canst prevail upon me for my land
My fields and vineyards all lain at thy feet;
Stables of horses all at thy command,
All of these gifts might make thy joy complete.

But do not ask of me the baptist's head,
His eyes disturb me far enough in life;
I listened well to everything he said,
His death would be a curse; a flaying knife!

Salome, quell the anger in thy breast,
I beg thee, reconsider thy request.


IX

[Salome]

Thou shalt not swerve the purpose of my mind,
My mind is set, this action must be done.
There is no greater gift that thou might find
Than that Jokanaan's eyes forsake the sun.

I prithee, take that scurvy **** away,
His eyes stare so, his tongue derides my name;
Silence his prating tongue, he's had his say
Now he must suffer for his words of flame!

I shall not sleep with that voice in my ears,
Sever that head, that mask of insolence!
He rants of prophecies, preys on thy fears,
Now he must make his final recompense.

I danced for thee. Reward me like a man,
Bring me the severed head of Jokanaan!


X

[John The Baptist]

A famine on thy fields, monarch of shame!
Locusts shall take thy vineyards and thy corn!
Rivers of blood have stained thy royal name
Thou art forever doomed, thy kingdom torn!

Thy family are coiled like nesting snakes
Thy daughter whispers with thy feckless queen,
They die along with thee, when the earth quakes
And fall into the bottomless ravine!

I hear thy soldiers storming through the halls
Approaching now, to my decrepit cell;
I shiver at the sound of their footfalls,
Though I'll not be the one condemned to hell.

May God send Raphael down from the sky;
Take me to somewhere better when I die!


XI

[Salome]

Ah now, thine eyes that once held so much fire,
Forever hide their light of righteousness;
I almost miss that shiver of desire
I once felt in their presence, I confess.

Thy tongue is silent now, that once cried out
In shards of venom, wounding blades of words;
And I'm at liberty to pluck it out,
If I desire; and throw it to the birds.

Thy rosy lips, as sullen as thy brow,
Soft petals, rendered harmless in repose;
They spurned me once, but I shall kiss them now,
As easily as one might steal a rose.

Thou once dared to refuse me, holy man,
Now I will kiss thy dead lips, Jokanaan!



The End.
Dead Rose One Sep 2023
"We are creatures of constant awe, curious at beauty, at leaf and blossom, at grief and pleasure, sun and shadow," U.S. poet laureate Ada Limón writes in her new poem that will fly to Jupiter's moon Europa aboard NASA's Europa Clipper mission.

"And it is not darkness that unites us, not the cold distance of space, but the offering of water, each drop of rain."
The poem, unveiled at an event tonight at the Library of Congress, is going to be engraved in Limón's handwriting and affixed to the spacecraft, expected to launch in October 2024, Miriam writes.
The big picture: The Europa Clipper mission follows in the tradition of others — like NASA's Voyagers — that have sent pieces of art representing humanity into the cosmos.

The poem uses water as a thread that binds Earth — and all of its humans — to Europa, a moon with an ocean beneath its icy shell.
For Limón, writing this poem was a very human endeavor.

"The thing I think that makes me the most beautifully overwhelmed is the idea of all the humans that are going to read it," she tells Axios.
The poem, called "In Praise of Mystery: A Poem for Europa," is featured on a NASA webpage where people can sign up to send their names to Europa with the spacecraft.
"I think to have it feel collective is really, really extraordinary to me, because it does feel like it's not my poem," Limón says. "It does feel like a collective poem. And as soon as I wrote it, it felt like oh, this belongs to Earth. This is our poem for Earth."
Between the lines: Sending this poem to Europa is an "evolution" of NASA's Golden Record, which is flying through space aboard the Voyager spacecraft, Robert Pappalardo, Europa Clipper project scientist, tells Axios.

Those records contain sounds from Earth — including music, laughter and animal noises — as well as a map of where we are in the galaxy. They are now billions of miles away, flying through interstellar space.
"This is an outgrowth in that we're not going to the stars," Pappalardo says. "There's no message to aliens here. This is purely a message to ourselves and a symbolic message to Europa."
wehttam Jun 2014
Friction into reality; I should say into fiction into life.  Small beads form on the upper lip,  Shoes strings become untied, a bottle is cracked as the ship leaves it’s slip.  Fret and cascade escape a troubled brow.  A boat builder an architect leans smirks and shifts toward the end of the pier.  The wake presses a ripple across the bay’s cloudy shiloutte.  Mooring lines tighten righting an unballasted keel.  Its crew makes up chalks and moors with figure eights and half hitches.  Take up slack and pull with the boatswains command.
Captain, Executive officer, and first mate critique fit for crew and evolution.  

Pea coats smocked, boots weather sealed with wax, glove, slacks, hat, and pants.  Stores are stacked and awaiting brow and chain gang.  Rations and stores for 4 weeks.  The harbor’s main berthing finds vacancy at the vessels underway taking.  Bow to stern aspect three hundred feet washed and clean.  She has a 9 foot draft with another 22 feet to the first rail.  

The lines in the boat shore for a nimble light sailing ship.  A clipper maybe,  I’ll wait to report further direction possibly assuming more command.  A cigarette falls from my first *******.  A jostle to my left crafts seagulls posturing a stolen meal.  Sulfur stings my nostril igniting the first of two puffs.  The captian rolls his eyes my direction gives the once over finding his intrest in the rest of the evolution.

A few pier hands set eyes on the clipper, smoking.

Mice run along the wooden edge of the pier away from some of the salted pork and grain.  Two other mice lose courage at my sight line.  XO and first mate shift and turn retrieving my concern.  The brow is being landed at the stern of the ship.  

No decals and no name yet.  At some point Ill find or ask to be apart of the ships crew.  Deck hand, cook, messenger, helmsman, assistant to first mate all compatible with ability.  The first mate chuckles and mentions a figurative by stander knowing that an employment opportunity starts with a  conversation.  

Crew’s first leiutenant for the most part looks squared away and a bit untouchable, salty.  Pants tucked into calf high boots, a beard, pea coat and a lost stare.  Hesitating a bit he grins and settles back to appropriate conversation.

My bag and jacket drop accompany to the stores.  Maybe a slow patient walk aft, there has to be a name for her.  At the stern a marching movement to my right and I can follow the rear of the boat and in peripheral the command group.

The Lion’s Winter in large old English print below a iron clad window pane bounces with the tide to the left and right in a roll.  I can see the ship, now calming into a quiet slop off of the pier and its mooring lines. The rudder is a massive distorted key shaped piece of poplar with copper piano hinges all the way to the back of the keel.  A small blue crab lengthens a breast stroke across the top of the water.  

The three follow the appropriate custom before crossing the brow and the first louie barks a few times.  Two of the ship’s crew begin inventory on stores while a bit of nervousness creeps over the contents of my only possessions.  Wetting my lips I can taste the salt on my face.

One of the crew yells,
“Louie, move him off.  He stump’n around the grub.”
He barks again,
“Turn two.  Got more an him eny’d, a Rat!”

I took that as on opportunity to introduction.  Mr. Louie straightened pursed heels and drained thought from my façade.  His eyes narrowed, he felt the calm of my urgency.  He knew I needed, obliged then walked to conversation.  “Cryme's, you look’n for someone.”

“Humm, a shipmate.”
I could see the it was not the conversation he was expecting.  He leveled, “Pretty tight around here. What do you have in the bag?”

“Mostly books.”  

“You cant cross the atlantic reading books.”

Sharply understood in sponse to kurt, “Is that an opportunity or an intrest accompany to nothing.”

“You can naught cross the Atlantic.”


Tim says leave the world.  I laugh and he says no righting, laughter.
The first chapter
Ronald J Chapman Dec 2014
In this vision though time,
My journey to the past begins,
Beneath the surface of ourselves, my soul rises.

Inside the dream my spirit whispers longing for the past,
In the dream though time the waves cry,
Amongst the shadows of desire.

Sailing on a clipper ship,
Fishing on my trip,
In the midday heat of a tropical sun.

The daily death and birth of the tropical sun.

The sleepy afternoon sun sinks into the Western waves,
The skies on fire with a setting sun,
Blackness of night has come.

Candlelight casts shadows over an ocean of mystery.

Seeing a glow in the sky before sunrise,
A yellow sun skimmed the blue horizon,
The strong morning sun shines on my face.

Sharks endure!
Gulls wave!
Winds blow!

Where is the old reef?
Courage is a warm shore!

Why does the captain wave?
Oh! Island girls wave!

In this dream though time.


© 2013 Ronald J Chapman All Rights Reserved.
HMS SURPRISE fully rigged Sails the Pacific, ship from Master and Commander Far Side of the World
http://youtu.be/QRjf6ddu4-***
Perilous voyages of small watercraft at sea , amphibious landings on well defended beachheads , Clipper ships whaling on distant oceans , military vessels in armed conflict , night of relentless cannon fire , explosive reflections across shark infested waters , treasure maps and chest laden with gold , rubies and pieces of eight , the cry of Viking warriors on the rugged coast of Newfoundland .. Pirates just off the shores of the Carolinas ..  Forts Pulaski , Sumter and Jefferson on the Dry Tortugas ..
Oil platforms racked by ferocious winds on the Gulf of Mexico ..
Union and Confederate battles on Mobile Bay , Riverboats traversing the Mississippi ..Tending barges along the Ohio ..On high alert through Georgia's intracoastal waterways ....
Copyright November 13 , 2015 by Randolph L Wilson * All Rights Reserved

** Bath time in '73 with imagination in full throttle ..
Lysander Gray Dec 2011
I coiled around  your coast
and gazed at the foreign shore.
The breakers, they did break
and the sirens they did call
to the clipper upon that fallen, foreign shore.

Were we sailors then, you and i?
Or were we shipwrecked?
I think we were shipwrecked.
The mast lay rotting in the waves.
Rope and sail- strewn as a discarded scalp
Upon that foreign shore.

I know the day of leave,
As i know that sirens call.
And I felt the breakers
and the hidden stones that rose as black teeth round your coast.
The wind pulled forth and we did nought to stop the pull.
And crashed upon your fallen shore.

Now we are castaways;
outcasts upon this isle.
Now we are foreigners
on this foreign shore.
Harmony Sapphire May 2016
Mail order groom.
I want to know you.
The sound of your voice.
The smell of your perfume.
Your handwriting.
Your habits.
Favorite food.
Your favorite place.
Hobbies.
Your flaws.
Your goals.
The things you like
Things you hate.
Who you love.
What makes you happy.
What makes you mad.
What you spend money and time on.
Who you love.
Who you hate.
Your favorite color.
Your biggest fear.
Your worst nightmare.
Your dreams.
Your beliefs.
Your qualities.
Your favorite games, books, movies or TV shows.
What size ring you wear.
What size shoe you wear.
Your favorite toothpaste, shampoo, & soap.
What's your most prized possession?
What are your skills?
Your allergies?
Do you have patience?
Respect?
Admiration?
Confidence?
Knowledge?
Intelligenc­e?
Greed?
Are you generous?
Charming?
Or do you make trouble?
Are you careful?
Or careless?
Are you sentimental?
Are you spoiled?
Do you brag?
Do you gossip?
Can you keep secrets?
Do you have shame?
Are you shy?
Are you a private person?
Does anything you do offend anyone?
Do you insult or compliment?
Do you glance or stare?
Do you tip?
Are you kind of mean?
Do you have manners?
What do you eat?
Are you a neat freak?
Or sloppy or neat?
Clean or *****?
Do you swear?
What do you have wear?
Do you sleep naked?
Do you lie, cheat or steal?
Are you honest and dependable? Trustworthy, helpful, and considerate?
Obnoxious?
Sober?
Drunk?
Do you cook?
Are you hard working?
Or lazy?
Do you eat meat?
Brush and wash daily?
Wash your own clothes?
Shop yourself?
Drive?
Mow your own lawn?
Vacuum?
Wash dishes?
Are you a licensed driver?
Do you have a car and health insurance?
Do you own property?
What are your assets?
Do you work full time?
Are you educated?
Do you respect women?
Do you like children & pets?
Are you mature?
Do you own a car?
Do you rent or own?
Do you exercise?
Are you fat?
Do you smoke?
Are you a handyman?
Can you fix cars?
Plumbing?
Paint?
Are you creative or an artist?
Are you nosy?
Do you read a lot?
What are you know that you
Do you mind your business?
Do you have a temper or anger management problems?
Are you violent & controlling?
Are you obsessed with *** or *******?
Are you a pervert?
Are you sane?
Are you busy?
Do you have a lot of free time?
Are you religious?
Do you vote?
Are you a loner?
A mama's boy?
An alcoholic?
Obsessive compulsive?
Do you speed?
Do you use sarcasm?
Are you a good driver?
Are you a lawbreaker?
Do you kiss and tell?
Are you a tattle tell?
Are you selfish?
Are you a rebel?
Are you conceited or ******?
Are you desperate or needy?
Are you nice and fun?
Are you bitter, creepy, scary, nervous, impatient, cruel, hateful, abusive, or sick?
Do you collect anything?
Are you well-dressed?
Well-spoken?
Do you make wise investments?
Are you an overachiever?
Are you responsible?
Convincing?
Do you like to argue?
Are you positive?
Or pessimistic?
Are you adventurous?
Or reserved?
Do you like to be the center of attention?
Or a Wallflower?
Do you blame others for your problems? Do you admit to fault ?
Do you need help financially, medically,  physically, mentally or sexually?
Do you like to have *** with the lights on and off?
Do you bathe or shower alone?
Do you shave, trim your nails, wear clean socks  & underwear?
Do you open other peoples mail?
Do you dig through the trash?
Do you always flush the toilet?
Do you snore?
Do you use deodorant, toothpaste,
Do have tattoos?
How do you wear your hair?
Do your clothes have holes, stains, or tears?
Do you need glasses, hearing aids, crutches, wheelchairs, walkers, braces or insulin?
Are you at are you obese, scizo, diabetic?
Do you have bad credit?
Do you have any injuries or surgeries?
Do you color your hair or tan?
Do you moisturize?
Floss?
Do you check the oil?
Do you barbecue?
Do you ****, burp, or pick your nose?
Do you cut in line?
Have you ever been arrested?
Are you a Penny Pincher?
Coupon Clipper?
Are you cheap?
Do you complain a lot?
Do you call people names?
Have you ever done anything to trick or con someone?
Are you understanding & forgiving?
Are you a cheater?
Have you ever been arrested?
Have you ever treated anyone cruly?
Are you rude or brutal?
Do you have any abnormal fetishes?
Are you flirty, friendly, persistent, or immoral?
Are you ambitious, determined, motivated, & successful?
Are you confused, depressed, anxious, poor, angry, or unemployed?
What are your values, concerns, goals and plans?
I can feel me
******* breaking under gray skies
As I dream of red eyes
And green grass
CPT Slime and Rasta's daft laughs
And the taste of tobacco on your tongue
While I wash up in SlimeyG's kitchen

Good God, if I wasn't there, that infamous week would've been filthy!

We can feel
The bass ******* it through the sideboard
SlmieyG's lounge walls are shaking hard
And we cackle bare
When Big Gay tumbles grinning downstairs
So I stick the kettle on

Good God, we caned a litre of milk in one round of teas!

I can hear
Those slimey green dawgs singing loud
When we bring Tom's cake out
And his face is a chuffin' picture
At the realisation of the six-layers' topper
So throw him a Clipper

Good God - eighteen, eighteen, EIGHTEEN tokes to clear it!

So, will you?
Can we all get together? We'll feel alright
For just one more warm hazy night
And when we sing these songs
Of freedom, we'll laugh in peace together. So long
To misery, my brothers
Jack Jenkins Apr 2016
Like an old clipper, sailing on the water
My soul searches all the seas of life
Trying to find that elusive treasure
Not made of gold or silver.

Guided by shining lights placed in towers
Guided by twinkling stars blazing in the sky
I find my wondering ways through the world
Living all the great stories yet untold.

Within the bounds of all four corners
Of this sphere we all claim as home
I search for that elusive treasure
Not made of jewels or gems.

And when I've passed on and sunk
No longer kissing the water's surface
I will be remembered always, forever
Like a ship in a bottle.
the flicker of a clipper,
is my calling card,
lighting up,
while i'm falling hard,
impulsively puffing,
passing time,
watching haze clouds,
helps me unwind,
oh ,
& A bottle in hand,
seems to be my latest trend..
an empty bottle,
is my closest friend,
but with each swallow,
i find myself..
feeling more hollow.
3am , & i'm on the floor,
holding on,
but i can't take much more..
these sleepy eyes don't find much rest..
& mother dear, never taught me what's best,
substance abuse was her pride & joy,
functioning insufficiently,
like a broken toy..
now, i'm not trying to play the blame game,
no pity parties here,
i just wish i would have been raised,
out of something other than fear.
Aztec Warrior Jan 2016
Whitman Revisited**
(Note: apologies to Walt Whitman.. this poem is metaphor for American/U.S. and not, as in Whitman’s classic poem “O’Captain, My Captain”, about Lincoln.)

“O’Captain, O’Captain"
the ship you sailed from port to port,
its prize did surely win,
but its sails were always blown
by winds of war and sin.

"O’Captain", your dreams
were born of pure fantasy of myth
to benefit a few,
all was needed to see the truth
was to take a whiff
of stench in genocidal schemes
turned into tears and screams,
creating chaos and more
from shore to shore.

“O’Captain, O’Captain",
your Yankee Clipper has won,
a single flag was raised
but never should be praised;
from the Halls of Montezuma,
to the shores of Tripoli,
your bombs and drones and unjust wars
have blown many Peoples away
on every single shore.
It’s called the good ship
Manifest Destiny -
it should sink and sail no more.

Aztec Warrior 1.6.16
Further Note: Walt Whitman was a wonderful poet, controversial in his views and style of poetry at the time, but Whitman saw Lincoln as a hero for uniting the states and ending “legal” slavery (though as history has shown, a different kind of slavery emerged after Reconstruction- share cropping. As stated in note above in beginning of poem, my use of Whitman’s poem is not about Lincoln, but is a metaphor for America/U.S. and it’s “myth” of the greatest country in the world and having a “special heritage”, “special people” and “destiny”. There are NO special people anywhere in the world. One of the best things to come out of the 60's was that for literally millions living here, began to understand that “American Lives Are Not More Important Than Anyone Else’s Lives.” And the politicians, and official spokes people hate us for it.
Abigail Shaw Jan 2015
Last Again asks,
But the guy shakes his head and ties her to the mast,
Of disappointment, of tears, as the waves crash past,
He’s edged her again, with his skin of alabaster,
And it’s only after this ******* has won she realises she's the disaster,
And all her hopes and dreams, well they were made of plaster,
Because they were meant to hold her up but she can break
hem if she has to,
And she has to alright because this bloke doesn’t have a
light,
So how’s she meant smoke and make herself feel alright?
How’s she meant to have hope when it feels like the night,
Is encroaching, approaching and she can’t put up a fight?
She searches her pockets and the lining of her coat,
Hoping her findings will enable her smoke,
Hoping finding the lighter will make the night a bit lighter,
But in her mum’s eyes she’s always been a fighter,
So she fights into her bag, against the sticking of that zipper,
Hoping her fingers they grab a zippo or a clipper,
She’s been sticking to her guns but never pulling the trigger,
Then she finds metal’s colder than the wind,
It bites as she brushes, the feeling it lingers,
And it’s never been so appealing for her to smell gas on her fingers,
Like a phoenix from the ash, the butane ignites,
Because we find in times of darkness, we must make our own light.
A Simillacrum Jul 2018
Night & her infernal hues
push the caffeine drip.
I'm caffeinated.

Night & her peyote cues
push the whole world flat.
I'm gelatinous.

Goo, yes, goo.
Star
to form
to dust
to mud.

Night & her violet light
guide me in to silence.

Silence but
for the strike
of a Clipper
or the pop of a
bottle top or
the rip of a
zipper.
Daniel Magner Nov 2013
Electric razor
buzzed to life
across my scalp
as hair fell
to the ground
fresh start
given to me
by a
No. 4
clipper
guard
Daniel Magner 2013
Broken Dreams


Tonight I´m happy and sorrowful
I refuse to cry over lost friends
I´m drunk as well.
It feels good to up the anchor of sobriety
let alcohol give wind to my sails.
A clipper buying tea in China
not useless plastic toys.
Sleek, the line and the women admired me.
Let the clipper sail.
I don´t care; I shall stay and make love to you.
I´m sorry I left my Liverpool girl
I went to Brazil to harvest coffee beans.
Guatemala, I got there by chance
a beach and moonlight.
I have not forgotten my promises
one day more, just one more day.
The clipper sailed to other shores
I never got to write
The poem of my life
Music by the ocean
sun tanned
aided by the suntan lotion
factor fifty five.

The sand crab grabs me in
a most peculiar place
mostly forgotten, but
just in case it's not
it reminds me
of
how lucky I got
and I got lucky by the score.

Sea shells yell at me as if the sea
was trapped inside them,
beware of carpenters
walrus too
but alas
the oysters never heard that
and so they never knew.

it's all Beethoven and Bach
on
the clipper
Cutty Sark

I am 'dancing in the dark'
music by the ocean
Meghan O'Neill Apr 2014
my lovely typewriter
smith-corona clipper
best christmas present
hope for the future
sleek black body
rounded black keys
belly full of mechanics
white paper in between
words flow from my brain
through my fingers
without comprehension
letters
words
sentences
paragraphs
pages
and then i throw it away
and start over
because no matter
what anyone says
it's always so much better
trapped inside my head.
kcpoetry Sep 2020
is life just a cycle of looking down at your feet and realizing that you really need to clip your toenails, but deciding that you’ll do it later because you can’t be bothered in that moment, and then 6 days pass, and you still haven’t clipped your toenails. and then after 2 weeks, you finally pick up the nail clipper and do what you said you would 14 days ago. a moment of relief. and then you go upstairs and look at your laundry pile and decide you’ll tackle that later.
Sometimes the velvet blue night is a sorcerers cloak , prestidigitation
centered on my downfall , the pun of a hurtful joke , belted to the yoke ,
trudging my demons at the crack of the whip , a clipper ship mired in the
doldrums yet life has no braking system , it's a no replay theorem , no drain to open to whirlpool away , no script to learn of the coming days , no Madison Square Garden for petty songs , no oracle defining right from wrong* ..
Copyright October 3, 2016 by Randolph L Wilson * All Rights Reserved
BTW Jul 2022
Reality
2 July 2038

Tattered Checker change-purse,
Zipper broken-worn.
Dented tin-full toolbox,
Sat with Clipper horn.

Handkerchief wash-snot-clean,
Work-boot bright-black-sheen.
Sweaty first dinner jacket,
Dusty rust-skin tack.

Stain-fold loving letters,
Hand scribed fuzzy matter,
Words he couldn’t spell,
Fear of burning hell.

Loved his owned reality,
Lived her life true well.
As the light fades and night takes it's duty
Hope does collect tinder and *******
she piles fuel onto the pyers
then with a clipper flick she lights the fires

She watches the flames take hold
they rush to consume eagerly
wood crackles, splitting and spitting  
throwing embers into the cool night air

Her faith never wavers or strays
for her love will be back someday
and as the cloak of darkness surrounds her
she takes comfort in the fires glow

Sitting by the embers of carbon spent
a tear does run down her face
that painful ache in her heart
memories never to be replaced

In a moment of loneliness
Hope does start to sway and sing  
with broken voice and trembling lips
her lamenting song is carried by the wind

She waits in solitudes cold embrace as the sky fills with stars
singing, my love will come back to me one day from so very far


By Christos Andreas Kourtis aka NeonSolaris
Michael John Mar 2018
in the spring
and agave falling
with rain coming in..

my heart a mad thing
light a caste stone
all blue and
emerald green!

i remember the springs
lord in crete
in crete..

ii

when i was young
and awed by nearly
everything
the blasted beat..
my brain a fried egg..

i looked in the mirror
and stared
who the **** was that there..

the blasted heat
the autumn sun
and wind
and i was a beach
***..

in my winter hut
the day a paper´s cut
away fom a soft
blinding night..

iii

when i was young..

iv

small bamboo constructions
right bang next to the surf..
with some red wine..

thus illiminating
the rent man..
stars and the moon..

and phospherous..
i had my guitar
and sang a song..

v

when i was young..

vi
in crete
in spring
is breath taken

from sweet gods
lip..
ambrosia broken..

a flailed heart trip
the blossems and a load
of pure beauty..

in crete
in spring
i found me..

i observed others
do like wise..
they shon and carried on..

in spring
when i was young
played backgammon

and drank cognac
no problem
no problem...






vi

to sail the clipper
the crow´s nest quiver
s in the grey brine

gulls dip their
soaring smiles
lost in mine..

love in horizons
lost in prayer
late too shiver

eyes of god in
bathes my soul
one great river..!

v
ne
Karen Apr 2016
Why the Alberta clipper again my Lord?
Have we not had enough to afford.

Oh this wetness, this coldness, will it not end.
The robins are in hiding and the daffodils suspend.

This precipitation subterfuge of snow, ice, and rain , occurs time and time again.

My love for summer and glorious sunshine shall give me hope.  
For it is your will and I will have to cope.
Carlo C Gomez Apr 2020
You took down both a lion and a bear. But not Delilah there. She was your glass slipper. Pretty little backstabbing hair clipper. She sold you out to the Philistines. Nonetheless, God allowed you to blindly pull down their temple beams. Oh Samson, strength was both your virtue and vice. In giving away your secret you paid the ultimate price.
JT Nelson Jun 2019
Feelings of aging aches beginning
Creeping in
Creeping in
In morning high snapping
Of joints and bones
Accompanied by deeper moans and groans

My reflection stares back at me now
Whiskered face
Whiskered face
The puffy eyes not younger
The hair I had retreating
I surrendered the troops to a clipper working

I wonder if Dad felt this way too
Numb to time
Numb to time
Boys running circles
Around his life
Did he have time to enjoy the sunsets?
Pagan Paul Jan 2020
.
The goods trains roll on by,
passing my window at night
and I wonder, wonder,
where are you going to?
May I come?
May I lay back slowly
and let you take me somewhere?
Anywhere.
Anywhere but now.
For here I lay
counting the rhythmic pulses
of iron wheels on iron rails.
As goods trains roll on by.

I need to feel in my bones
these rhythmic pulses
like temperate rain on tin roofs
soothing the beat of a heart.
I want to go and to expand,
to flow through the world
at an even metronomic pace,
to find a place of balance.

And my inner eye like a clipper
sails into the void of dreams,
yet, somehow, more real to me
as I watch myself explore.
Teasing out the dark corners,
bringing light to their inherent terrors
and exposing myself to fears.
But who's fears?

Individual pieces or the whole puzzle?
Pieces missing, the puzzle incomplete.
Its hidden away in my mind
disjointedly interlocking around holes.

I wrote about my sanctuary.
A special garden in a special forest,
providing me with safety
for when the holes become to large.
To this retreat I speed
when the sensory input overloads,
blows a fuse or severs a link
to the circuit of attachment
and fractures the edges of the puzzle,
scattering the composite pieces.
The further dislocation of logic
as I sit in my sanctuary and weep.

And through tears I can see
light flooding in to me,
the blush of morning sky
as goods trains roll on by.



© Pagan Paul (30/01/20)
.
Big Virge Nov 2020
You Know...
... " The Saga Begins "...

Is A Lyrical Trip...
Rapped By... RAKIM... !!!

A TRUE Lyrical King...
But The Saga I Depict...
is FAR From... Heroic... !!!

It Seems That The Saga...
of Blacks Bringing DRAMA...
And WAR Like ARMADAS...
Hasn't Quite Found A Groove...
That TRULY is... " Cool "...

DON'T TRY IT... It's TRUE... !!!

From Those Being Captured...
By Those Known As CRACKERS...
To Those Who Make Moves...
That DEFINE Them As *****... !!!

Deceiving And Sneaking...
Because Their Brain's Leaking...
BAD MINDED Thoughts...
That FEED Holocausts...
On... AFRICAN Shores...

And Bajan' Ones Too... !!!

******* And *****...
Now WATCH Brothers Figures...

And Choose To ABUSE...
Rather Than Take In Scriptures...
That Are An ELIXIR...
INSPIRING Mixtures...
of DIFFERENT Tribes...
Finding Ways To UNITE... !!!

That DENY PETTY Fights...
And PROTECTING Whites...
Who Work To... *** IDE... ?!?

So That THEY Can RIDE HIGH...
Whilst Watching Blacks DIE... !?!

A SAGA... CONTRIVED...
That CLEARLY Survives...
When Blacks Choose To ATTACK...
Their OWN... FELLOW Blacks... ?!!!?

What The ****'s UP With THAT... !???!

IF Black People Were GRREN...
With Tattoos of The Queen...
On Their Bods' Like MONEY...

Would Blacks Live In Peace... ?
And NOT Choose To BLEACH...

THEMSELVES To See WEALTH...
And.... SPIRITUAL Health.... ?!?

My Answer Is... Well...
Black Souls LIKE To SELL...
Themselves For THAT Paper... !!!

So... Knowledge of SELF...
Seems To Be A DISCLAIMER... !!!

Peter Tosh Said It BEST...

"A Big Ol' Fat ***,
and ******* that impress,
will win man child fast !"

While Peoples'... CREATOR...
Does NOT Impress Playas'...
Whose Game LACKS Good Trainers...
So NEEDS CASTIGATORS... !!!!!!

They'd RATHER BREED NUFF...
And Leave... Single Mums...
With Daughters and Sons...
And NOTHING But ***'... !!!!!

And TOO MANY Black Studs...
KEEP RUNNING Their Gums...
About... USING GUNS... !?!?!

AS IF It Is FUN...
To See Black Blood RUN... ?!!!?

So Is This Black LOVE... ?
Or Black IGNORANCE... ?

Cos' When Police Come...
They DON'T Seem So Tough... !?!

I'm NO Longer Stunned...
By How This Stuff Runs...

Of COURSE There Are Some...
Who Are Doing GOOD STUFF...

But COME ON The Black Saga....
Now NEEDS A NEW Charter... !!!!!!

And African HEADS...
Now NEED To Be SMARTER... !!!
Than FIGHTING Each Other...
As IF We're NOT BROTHERS...
From... ONE CONTINENT... !!!

THIS Type of NONSENSE...
Is PROOF That Some Smother...
The Truth For White Heads...

From... CIVIL RIGHTS Days...
To TODAYS' New Age Slaves... !!!

From CLIPPER Type Figures...
In The... NBA...

To Those Who Get PAID...
To DAMAGE THEIR BRAIN... ?!?
Or Pull Out Their *****...
To SPLIT These White Chicks...
Who Then HIT The Beach...
To See Which Beach ****...
Makes Their CROTCH Get HOT... !!!!!

"Oh, do those words shock ?
Well there's some more that i've got !"

Because of The SAGA...
That DRAGS ON And ON... !!!

Blacks Getting... " FAME "...
For Being... " GOOD SLAVES "...

While Those Who TAKE AIM...
By USING Their BRAIN... !!!

Are Named...

" TROUBLE MAKERS "... !!!

" AGGRESSIVE, EXCESSIVE...
... And NEEDING A CAGE... !?! "

Because of THE MESSAGE...
We Choose To RELAY...

One That Says FREEDOM...
From... IMPORTED Chains... !!!

Africa THEY SAY...

CRADLED Civilisation...

So... Is That TODAY...
What's Seen In Black Nations...
Now PLAYED Like PLAYSTATION... !?!?!

XENOPHOBIC Behaviour...
Towards Their OWN Neighbour... ?!?
The Type of Behaviour...
INSTILLED By CRUSADERS... !!!

The Saga Runs DEEP...
When It Comes To Black Peeps'...

Who BLEAT Just Like Sheep...
But REALLY Are WOLVES... !!!

HUNGRY With SHARP TEETH... !!!
Who PREY On The Weak... !!!

It's MORE HUMANITY...
That Africa NEEDS...

And LOVE For THEMSELVES...
Cos' HATRED Just SWELLS...
And DOESN'T Serve Well... !!!!!!

From These FAMOUS People...
Whose Love's CLEARLY Feeble... !!!

To Blacks Who Are LETHAL...
And TRULY... Deceitful... !!!!!

YES... TRULY DECEITFUL... !!!!!

Did You SEE What I Did... ?
I Just FLIPPED The Script... !!!

I'm NO KING Or REGAL... !!!
To Me... CLAIMING Such Things...
... Makes UNEQUAL LEGAL... ?!?

Aren't We ALL... Just PEOPLE... ?!?
My Thoughts Are Now SMARTER...
So ME I'm A Farmer...
Whose Produce Leaves MARKERS...

And Thought Waves That...
..... " Harbour ".....

A Wish For Black People...
To Be A Lot CALMER...
CUT OUT The Drama..... !!!

And...
Work MORE As PARTNERS...

To UPLIFT...

..... " The SAGA ".....
The sagas that we black folks go through, can really prove to be quite something, just look at the current trend of Black, Trump & Biden Supporters, who seem to have forgotten what these men have stood for, in the past, it's just CRAZY !!!
Tom Shields Jun 2020
Grab the human race by the collar
shake them and throw them and make it clear
you are not house trained you roaming fools
you know nothing of fear

Now tell them "Stay!"
Now show me "Stay"
Spreading your idiotic messages
the nice things without which,
you can't live, more cases every day
the air you can't breathe
means do not leave

Now show me "Sit!"
Now tell them "Stay!"
Watch them fail, your greatest hit
on a loop, humanity on play
pompous and stupid acts of discussion
they're safely tucked away from recession,
and this is what they say
look at those dogs infect each other
protests in the USA,
they'll only hurt each other at the end of the day

Now tell me "Sit!" Tell me "Stay!"
Hong Kong is being systematically silenced
in response to allowing adjustments to the violence
that people can inspire
when their rights are set on fire
tell me nothing, reason will not reach my heart
I am enraged and want no part
spit on oppression and share the sickness
it is a level playing field with the masks off,
approaching half a million dead worldwide
avoid injustice, tolerate, bide your time, swallow pride
clench your teeth, roll over; clench your fists
let momentum play dead and stay inside
you have nothing to lose in the matter but your voice
it is the impossible unfairness, a dangerous choice.
write

please read and enjoy
C Conner Apr 2022
I fade into my world
Where I am strong
Before the ebb tide -
Like a clipper ship
Embarked on her maiden voyage.
Passing the guarded line
Into deep water
Under the cover of lime
Darkness she hums leaving
Protected harbor - square rigged
For counted moments cradled
For pitch and heave in
Amniotic sway.

My cell phone buzzes and
I return worn. Cold with
Years of white breakers,
Tidal pull, and
Trips around the Horn.

— The End —