"copied" poems
From Alan Lomax to the commercial art and now the money machine.
At the turn of the century; when sound recording 1st became available to the masses, recording a song was an opportunity for folk to reach out; and tell the world something up front and personal.
It meant that people were able to put themselves on “The record” A way of leaving a permanent audio statement, an epitaph, an audio sound bite immortalising ~ life, mood, emotion captured and bottled for all eternity.
(A medium that conveyed messages from artists and storytellers of all kinds)
A recording was also a great addition to "The family album" something more tangible, a window to a real person, with a real life, a message and a point of view; a legacy, a blast from the past.
Few people expected sound prints to be re-designed, homogenised, formulated, copied, repackaged and that art and the message would be played over and over again by new artists in the form of "cover music" or that the style of the messages would become secularized, seperated into distinctive groups, or constrained by an elite clique or commercial genre.
Labelling and streamlining art & music mostly benefits the commercial art & music industry; and no longer the artists and creators.
I've no problem with good business, or the multi-billion pound industrys that have gained commercial success.
However the process of mass homogenisation, product synthesis, marketing, streamlining and then packaging fashion, sound and synthetic culture to sell a product, leaves very little room for creative people to just be creative.
A medium originally open to many for self expression, a historical record, an archive, a voice, a personal message;
Is now just a vehicle for advertising and perpetuating a genre of nonsense, so much so that there is now more white noise immortalised than messages.
To re-cap ~ I Think that creativity and expressionism; like story telling conveys moods and messages from the present and past!
Artists and musicians should have the opportunity to create and produce more information than they copy; thus creating a richer more colourful tapestry, whilst not devaluing the message of their predecessors!
Purcy Flaherty.
Jan 9, 2018
Jan 9, 2018 at 10:38 AM UTC
Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
I copied your exam,
And I failed too.
Nov 16, 2014
Nov 16, 2014 at 12:00 PM UTC
To the man who made me who I am
Being with you was like learning without a textbook
I just watched and copied and made it my own
From gardening to maths
You made me my own genius
I didn't have to speak for you to know what was wrong
You didn't judge me for the silly things I said
Or how I never learnt at school
You taught me to teach my self
You were my Mr Miyagi
With less riddles more jokes
I learnt that laughter can flood rooms like tidal waves
And we were leaves to float in it
And now you're gone I wont mourn
You would tell me to stop crying and cut my hair
I will use laughter to put a smile on raggedy dolls
And the stories to keep the dark days down
Thank you for being the Godfather of giggles
Making Sunday dinners not the day to fear Mondays
Having gardening not be a chore but a way to think
Rest well Granddad.
May 13, 2015
May 13, 2015 at 8:05 PM UTC
I get genuinely psychotic in the morning
when the sun creeps out to see
If I slept last night I would want to put a gun in my mouth
(breakfast with coffee, black)
just you and me.
I get depressed long and hard, and often feel like
the cream cheese that you scrape off your bagel.
As the hour goes on everyone's two dimensional
(photo-copy of photo-copied, of photo-copy)
and you are scraping your bagel
of the unwanted (but served anyway) cream cheese,
"You," (probably the plastic knife in this analogy) "drive me..."
Spat! in the trash
as your upturned nose tells me how much our days together
are measured in inches, not yards.
Nov 7, 2012
Nov 7, 2012 at 3:36 PM UTC
skyscraper man on seattle time
looms in the corner of swan lake and fry
untouchable denim untouchable blueblack plaid jacket
he's put together with clothespins
he's put together with stipends
he's crammed between taxi cab book ends
skyscraper man on seattle time
stoic as the jet engines roar by
all his friends are magazines all his friends currentbrief
he's got a little future
he's got a few dimes
he's got no father to call out the lies
skyscraper man on seattle time
watches smog children kick ***** on concrete
vulnerable under trees writes his novels in purpleink
he's married once before
he's read crucifixion lore
he's returned his money to the store
skyscraper man on seattle time
looking through spectacles of ***** and brine
the rain falls hard the breeze sweet on the leaves
he's emptying the soul of modern rock n' roll
he's emptying the tray of ashed thought
he's emptying the bank account cold
skyscraper man on seattle time
sheds crinkled skinmemory like the cicada
a twin-sized deathbed deathbed in apt. 203
he's nothing.
he's ever.
he's happened.
skyscraper man on seattle time
carbon copied and eternal as saltwater as rust
invisible and tapping at the runrain window
he's nothing.
he's ever.
he's happened.
skyscraper man on seattle time
climbs himself to the cosmos lightheaded perfection
ethereal visions of fullbloom love and legacy with measure
he's nothing.
he's ever.
he's happened.
Nov 20, 2012
Nov 20, 2012 at 11:04 AM UTC
I have been treated like a game and people ask me why.
I just want to sit on the sidelines.
Do you know what it’s like to be looked at as a number,
As flesh, as something that can fulfill someone’s temporary
Needs when all you want is so to be wanted as a person?
You start to believe it. You start to believe you can only
Be beautiful in the context of one night, one picture.
You start to believe you are as shallow as the compliments
That are copied to you and several other people.
You start to believe you have to fight for someone’s
Attention when you should never have to do that.
You start to believe that only certain clothes
make you attractive because when you’re wearing them, they notice you.
You start to believe your opinions don’t matter because
they don’t want to hear them.
You start to believe you will have to settle for an empty
day or week of flirting just so you can feel something.
You start to believe that there isn’t such a thing as love
because no one seems to be looking for it.
At least that’s what I started to believe.
I have lost sleep over people who didn’t even
consider me a loss. I have waited for texts and
phone calls that were never coming.
I have romanticized words and gestures that
were far from romantic.
I have fallen for people only to realize it was
because they pushed me. I have broken my own
heart on the behalf of other people.
I have laid right next to people who might as well
have been 100 miles away.
I have believed words that were empty.
I have let all of this happen in an attempt to find love,
and I have found the opposite.
Maybe there are people who don’t need or want something
that lasts, something that’s real, something that you want to
share in the morning light and not hide in the night.
Maybe there are people who don’t realize the games they
play have losers. Maybe there are people need nothing
more than a night or a weekend or repeated words.
And I guess all of that is okay. But I am not like that,
and that’s okay.
I want someone that I can fall asleep next to with
a smile on my face. I want someone who doesn’t make
me wait and wonder. I want words that are spoken
just for me. I want to fall for someone with the promise
that they will catch me. I want someone who tries not to
hurt me and cares if they do. I want someone who feels like
they’re right next to me even when they are 100 miles away.
I want to feel something that even scratches
the surface of what love is.
No matter where I go or what I do, you'll always be the one person I hope I can one day come home to.
Nov 7, 2015
Nov 7, 2015 at 2:34 PM UTC
As the days go by my frustration grows.
Frustration so neglected it has taken over my life.
The want and need to write something so powerful,
so visionary that everyone will be able to relate to it on all levels.
Something so outstanding and unique it cant be copied,
or even ignored.
Not to please everyone just to relate to everyone and all things.
Living and non living.
Too much to ask for?
Most likely.
Can it be done.
Im counting on it.
Nov 13, 2012
Nov 13, 2012 at 11:09 AM UTC
the phone rang at 1:30 a.m.
and it was a man from Denver:
"Chinaski, you got a following in
Denver..."
"yeah?"
"yeah, I got a magazine and I want some
poems from you..."
"FUCK YOU, CHINASKI!" I heard a voice
in the background...
"I see you have a friend,"
I said.
"yeah," he answered, "now, I want
six poems..."
"CHINASKI ***** CHINASKI'S A *****
I heard the other
voice.
"you fellows been drinking?"
I asked.
"so what?" he answered. "you drink."
"that's true..."
"CHINASKI'S AN *******
then
the editor of the magazine gave me the
address and I copied it down on the back
of an envelope.
"send us some poems now..."
"I'll see what I can do..."
"CHINASKI WRITES ****
"goodbye," I said.
"goodbye," said the
editor.
I hung up.
there are certainly any number of lonely
people without much to do with
their nights.
4.3k
I am a timeline of everything I've ever known.
It's copied onto thirty-five pieces of blank paper
and revealed to you in that mundane history course
that everyone naps through.
I can't deny
that among the black waves,
I've seen a sea star or two.
But I seem to be devoutly colorblind
to the silver linings that outline
what I've gone through.
You can't disguise your drowning,
nor can you swim to shore.
You just have to hope
that no one knows what to look for.
Dec 21, 2014
Dec 21, 2014 at 5:16 PM UTC
I slept with her, my rapacious pen, took me in quiet vengeance in
full on conjugation
raken and taken, me,
her overlording me now, her authorship, so long held
in my maledom abeyance,
a kept imprisonment, unleashing at last, a tongue lashing~leashing,
de-spite my un-desirous craven lying supplications,
excuses of innocence and accident, coincidence and conflation,
ashes, ashes, denials incinerated, all fall down
she wrote/stabbed upon my heartless chest,
in the cheap crudités colors of a prisoner’s inking,
“user of words mine, all mine”
gathered up my innards of loose words,
speculative notes & titles yet to be,
born and kept hid in password protected silent back labor files,
now hers, leaving me sputtering, unable to create,
a homeless mute citizen, possession-less,
helplessly hoping her hovering harlequin might relent,
without any shelter, even a glimmering, a single aleph or bet
she celebratory cackled and clawed,
professed her reclamation ownership of all my poems predecessors,
zola j’accusing that I, ripped from her forcibly,
with no granted permission, her womanly touché of my scribing,
warning of no more global warming for my unprivileged hands,
daren’t try for pretenses of stolen legal guardianship,
warning of a new, forced caining inscription,
a tattooing of “thief” upon my 5 knuckled right ******
“plagiarist” boldly inked in back & blue upon my left palm
I, predator,
she, victim,
of my now self-professed, admitted confess,
she, my single victim,
of a decade long serializing criminal coverup
her parting poem a threatening,
herein issued in this very verse,
damning all who would falsely credit themselves,
to suffer shame and an unimaginable curse,
this, the newborn eleventh of ten commandments
parting, she kissing my lips, even my emptied apertures,
with warning bitings,
she knew all my
my numerous noms de guerre,
no dead scrolls caves to hid in, and to be discovered some future day,
and if ever marked as copyrighted,
’twas no tunneling escape,
the exposed truth to be over-stamped
upon all, upon each, in every language,
”copied right from the tongue of a woman!”
and she would be wright...
May 23, 2019
May 23, 2019 at 10:10 AM UTC
Screaming
What's the use----??
Flower of the Graces
"The Tenth Muse"
"Everyday Use It"
The earth revolves
Around the sun
Minerals Love it
Drink it vitamin C
Mass of energy A-B-C
The gravity every day
We cannot use it_
Became the play money
Copied tainted not the
Bee's honey here's
The everyday economy
One lick of hope the
envelope not much
company
Everyday- Einsteins
Big profit scope
The brainstorm Reign
All signs detour cabin
Choo Choo train caboose
You nailed it the moose
One footloose
The one-man show
Two women know
The odds to their
advantage
Someone is the traitor
Mom is the Tailor
The zigzag lines
Crazy cat felines
"That's It" punctuality,
Use your capability
"Technet Technology"
take a walk favorite park
Shiba Inu rollover
The bad ones the
Millionaires homes
flip over the do
or dare
We cannot pay
NYC token fare
Words are our power
For Sale quick sales
Being sold
Too hot whats cold
Those emails trying
to delete
(More casualties
Tombstone mummies
Democracy leading us like
dummies chewing Bear
Valentine gummies)
Like the "Elephant Stampede"
New Orleans parade
Every day please donate
We never know about
our fate too early or late
Every day new Providence
Demon computer virus
Love comes with confidence
Love yourself and Venus
Apples and oranges minus
Use it You have a voice!!!
City clean up cockroaches
Swap your fake Rolex
Watchtower index
Trump tower complex
"Eiffel Tower Use It" to be kissed
Every day we need to cleanse
The "Godly Shower" be blessed
Practical Everday Use It
Magical write poetically
Precisely the right piece puzzle
You are the one
World it's you to dazzle*
Feb 2, 2019
Feb 2, 2019 at 9:54 AM UTC
am i just another girl
photo-copied into your life, like the last one that still begs for you?
please talk to me anyway
please kiss me anyway
please let me believe that you won't lie to me when you say
you don't think of her anymore
sometimes I hope you break my heart
you'd never fade
(but give us a while, I'm hoping you're more than a few pages in my life)
Mar 22, 2014
Mar 22, 2014 at 2:19 AM UTC
Do you ever feel frustrated?
I'm overcome with a million words
that I know I'll never say.
Time stops around me,
But my brain is a l i v e.
Thoughts gather,
and
jmup
aornud
Until I can't make sense of what I'm feeling.
E v e r y t h i n g becomes me.
I'm a deep, wide river
dried up in the sun.
Somehow barren,
yet
drowning.
I'm walking along this road,
not going anywhere.
I'm living each day of the year,
But it's routine, copied,
routine, copied,
routine, copied
The same t i c k,
t o c k,
t i c k,
t o c k,
Until I can't make sense,
Of where I'm going.
I am nowhere.
I'm spinning in every direction,
Standing on top of the world.
L O S T
But here
All the same.
Mar 12, 2016
Mar 12, 2016 at 2:32 PM UTC
519
’Twas warm—at first—like Us—
Until there crept upon
A Chill—like frost upon a Glass—
Till all the scene—be gone.
The Forehead copied Stone—
The Fingers grew too cold
To ache—and like a Skater’s Brook—
The busy eyes—congealed—
It straightened—that was all—
It crowded Cold to Cold—
It multiplied indifference—
As Pride were all it could—
And even when with Cords—
’Twas lowered, like a Weight—
It made no Signal, nor demurred,
But dropped like Adamant.
3.1k
Caves of Altamira
on the northern coast of Spain
paleolithic drawings can be found
the old stone age of cavemen
in a cave high above the ground
in Mount Vispieres high above the plain
the name Altamira given for high views
that prehistoric man could paint
was such confusing news
it was assumed they were not bright
they had no artistic skills
then came that discovery
high up in those hills
bison horse deer and boar
painted plainly on the wall
18 thousand years ago
painted oils copied in the museum hall
even the Dan wrote a tune
to praise these artists skills
they were stars before Hollywood
high on those Spanish hills
Gomer Lepoet...
May 9, 2013
May 9, 2013 at 1:21 PM UTC
I always wanted to be that random style of writer
Writing about things which have no connection
In reality but they are connective only by the ingenuity
Of his genuflection; the circumvention of his
Circuitous routing, his plaintive perturbing petulance
Which insists on stacking things of different orders
Flying birds together of different species
If I could write something of the ticking of clocks
Not as though the ticking were of premeditated duration
Embedded in metal tracks around perimeters
Of prevaricated die-cast hours; but as though the ticking
Were only a random fixture of a theoretical day
In which random clocks ticking played a minor role
During the still life of which a poet happened along
And copied it all down dutifully, not caring if
Ticking clocks were related to pitchers of Forsythia
Or falling off of cliffs into the Aegean;
The only task of the poet to capture it all
And let the reader sort it out later
In the random tracks of his circuitous brain:
Whether the pitcher was full of sea
Or the sea was stealing into the pitcher
One blue, serendipitous drop at a time
And where no clocks were keeping time.
Mar 7, 2010
Mar 7, 2010 at 5:36 PM UTC
O WHAT has made that sudden noise?
What on the threshold stands?
It never crossed the sea because
John Bull and the sea are friends;
But this is not the old sea
Nor this the old seashore.
What gave that roar of mockery,
That roar in the sea's roar?
The ghost of Roger Casement
Is beating on the door.
John Bull has stood for Parliament,
A dog must have his day,
The country thinks no end of him,
For he knows how to say,
At a beanfeast or a banquet,
That all must hang their trust
Upon the British Empire,
Upon the Church of Christ.
The ghost of Roger Casement
Is beating on the door.
John Bull has gone to India
And all must pay him heed,
For histories are there to prove
That none of another breed
Has had a like inheritance,
Or ****** such milk as he,
And there's no luck about a house
If it lack honesty.
The ghost of Roger Casement
Is beating on the door.
I poked about a village church
And found his family tomb
And copied out what I could read
In that religious gloom;
Found many a famous man there;
But fame and virtue rot.
Draw round, beloved and bitter men,
Draw round and raise a shout;
The ghost of Roger Casement
Is beating on the door.
2.6k
I looked into the mirror
To see
A terrifying monster
Staring back at me
I took a step back
And the monster did the same
Perfect timing
Perfect time frame
I made a confused face
And the monster copied me
A reflection of my actions
Oh what a sight it was to see
To test this beast I smiled
The monster smiled back
And I realized
I'm afraid of it
And it's afraid of me
Neither of us would hurt the other you see
And I learned
That the so called beast
Wasn't looking for a feast
Only someone who could love it
So
I became friends
With the monster in the mirror
And I discovered
What love really is
Apr 18, 2015
Apr 18, 2015 at 4:29 PM UTC
It was well said of him,
“The clothes bespoke the man”.
Yes, he stumbled in the mud.
Yes, his reputation soon was stuck within the stinking sludge
and, granted, it was all of his own making.
But surely you remember how he'd been so impressive.
Once I said, “You're spotless as a manikin”
and shared a hearty laugh with him.
Be we also had some serious conversations,
discussing what he meant by “loveliness”.
That was all before the storm that hit us
with the force of filth from continents and generations.
It reminded us, again:
not every love is innocent;
the finest gentlemen are capable of
(some say inclined to) monstrous crimes.
After, no one spoke of him.
He tried to hide behind his usual accoutrements:
the matching tie and handkerchief;
silk shirts;
his feathered hat and crimson mackintosh;
the smell of musk.
But he was tainted, spotted once the news was out.
As the headlines had it:
“Gilded Lily Withers – Roots Exposed”;
“If clothes have made this man, they're now irreparably torn.”
“Patent leather ******* now well scuffed.”
God knows what his publishers had to put upon his jacket
to sell off the remainders.
Yet even from the darkness of his prison,
he seemed to think he could rely upon
the persuasiveness of beautiful adornments
- “Always envied; often copied; never matched” (his line) -
trusting it would make him seem attractive once again, even clean.
He died the 23rd of May, 2007.
They say that night he'd tied his shirt a special way,
with a feminine flamboyance,
but it failed to impress as he intended.
In some dark hall (we don't know how) they caught him,
stripped him to the bare essentials,
leaving him undressed and cut, an ochre ugliness.
What were his final thoughts,
when all that he had left was soiled and bleeding?
What we he really needing?
Still, I'm glad I knew him,
Still call him friend, and miss him.
Oct 8, 2012
Oct 8, 2012 at 5:26 PM UTC
When beechen buds begin to swell,
And woods the blue-bird's warble know,
The yellow violet's modest bell
Peeps from the last year's leaves below.
Ere russet fields their green resume,
Sweet flower, I love, in forest bare,
To meet thee, when thy faint perfume
Alone is in the ****** air.
Of all her train, the hands of Spring
First plant thee in the watery mould,
And I have seen thee blossoming
Beside the snow-bank's edges cold.
Thy parent sun, who bade thee view
Pale skies, and chilling moisture sip,
Has bathed thee in his own bright hue,
And streaked with jet thy glowing lip.
Yet slight thy form, and low thy seat,
And earthward bent thy gentle eye,
Unapt the passing view to meet,
When loftier flowers are flaunting nigh.
Oft, in the sunless April day,
Thy early smile has stayed my walk;
But midst the gorgeous blooms of May,
I passed thee on thy humble stalk.
So they, who climb to wealth, forget
The friends in darker fortunes tried.
I copied them--but I regret
That I should ape the ways of pride.
And when again the genial hour
Awakes the painted tribes of light,
I'll not o'erlook the modest flower
That made the woods of April bright.
2k
Oh I wonder if I mean pounding
Or maybe it's pondering
Hell what do I know, spelling isn't my strong point
I've always been envious of all those brainy lot
To see me you'll know why I can never be an alfa male
So its better I hide behind a keyboard and troll
I can't help feeling inadequate when I read the good poems
All I do is steal words and ideas then twist them around
I pownd and pownd and pownd till I drive them away
I am a Pownder that pownd and get a pound for every pownding
I am a little person with a little mind and something else bothers me so much it leaves me with a Napoleonic complex
But I hope other men don't know about it but anytime I see a hot dog, wish I could just disappear and die cause I know that's one pownding That leaves me unpownded.
Excuse me I got a job to do
There's a poet here, I've got to drive him away from here
He's Benson or something like that and I just feel so small
Can never write like him and being a stinking bully and a Hater
I feel so inadequate and it's stressing me out, how good he is
He leaves me feeling so carri gibbanoius and useless pownding about
My job and aim is to oppose anything positive and good
I was born to destroy cause I can't do better
guess that's why I can't even spell an ordinary word like
POUNDING....
That benson fellow will soon leave and coward inadequate me
will rule with my mediocre drivel again or go copy from someone
and pretend its my work like I did at Junior High and college.
My good friend below wrote this to me:
Karijinbba › In His Grace..............
I hear the pownding waves of God in every day or written silences. I hear Gods loving waves in everyday's life's harships and struggles; even when God in his silence blessess, me in imagined lovers arms, and in dreams, when my breath away.....is taken.
He copied a poem written by me and improved on it and then
posted it back to me to show me how to improve on my work.
So I must learn from him and be a better writer
And stop feeling bad and envious about other people's poems
And writing privately to them to intimidate them and making
them quitting this site.
Sep 10, 2018
Sep 10, 2018 at 6:25 PM UTC
Fish heads for dessert
Confetti-saltwater taffy for lunch
Canned laughter for snack
And peptide bonds for a well balanced breakfast
"But whats for dinner?" says The Windbag
"But whats for dinner?!" screeches The Mimick
Hmm, well we have a choice between the sociocultural criteria and a toxic relationship
"Can't we have popsicles with answer-less riddles on the sticks?" asked the Windbag
"Can't we have popsicles with answer-less riddles on the sticks?!" copied The Mimick
"Leeme alone!" cried the Windbag
"Leeme alone!!" yelled The Mimick
In the end the decided to eat the pockmarks of bird feeding cohorts
They picked their teeth with proven points
Then watched The Windbag play the glockenspiel
Followed by The Mimick on the xylophone
As I put the leftover scraps in Tupperware, making sure to burp it before I put it away
-Tommy Johnson
Sep 28, 2014
Sep 28, 2014 at 5:14 PM UTC
Death-song
War garbles a tune, spits up
blood.
Bodies, empty pits
of eyes and entrails
break like a birch branch.
White waste flits down like snow.
An archetype, copied, laboured forever
melts into a meticulous concoction.
The apocalypse sets in with a daze, drawing
drunken curtains over the survivor soul.
The crow is a warrior,
with his black machine gun eyes.
Easy.
God coughs, the countryside,
elegiac to start
hacks with a demon.
The smoke pulls, harsh, and takes the tab.
It's all a waste of white ash.
Mar 25, 2013
Mar 25, 2013 at 11:08 AM UTC
I'm troubled by a broken tune,
that can't keep time and loops too soon.
Like Christmas in the heart of June,
each summer's heat a curdled moon.
It's not that I keep glancing back,
or wander down well-trodden tracks,
I've raged against a wall of facts,
interrogating every crack.
Yet still I feel its tender bass
and scrawl each lyric on my face.
I've copied out each line to trace
the meaning of this groundhog chase.
No matter which new route I choose,
this labyrinth seems short of clues.
There are no shields or string to use,
just an ageing bard that strums the blues.
And now begins another dance,
the waltz of sighs and askew glance.
It's orchestra tuned up by chance,
with instruments of circumstance.
And so returns the song's refrain.
Its endless echo back again,
to score my steps while I remain,
a different man, who's still the same.
Jan 15, 2014
Jan 15, 2014 at 4:50 AM UTC
A few renditions are nothing at all
But if I copied their strife
Would you notice my fall
Feb 24, 2019
Feb 24, 2019 at 6:10 PM UTC