Working in an office with a lot of girls mainly
Suddenly it was that time of year again... Christmas
And the Office party it was looming
As I went toward the pub where we were having our gathering I was feeling nicely laid back and relaxed
Primarily because I'd just been to another pub beforehand and had a few quick scoops/ drinks
Now I was bolstered, all pumped up, I was like a Boxer ready to step into the Ring.

Our pub it was festooned with decorations, lovely colours and glittery things
They were hanging out of the ceiling and stuck on every wall
Above our table a big jovial Santa Claus
Looked down, beaming at us all
As I sat down one of the girls asked rather suspiciously "Where were you?"
Holding up my alibi, a little shopping bag with some items in it
I told her, lying beautifully of course,  that I had to go down the shop to get some things.
As I sat there I noticed the atmosphere was a bit subdued, people weren't talking much
I said to myself, this... this won't do
So I took it on myself to take the lead, I'd be the one to spread some Christmas cheer
So suddenly I blurted out "Wh..Wh..What does Santa say... after drinking a bottle of *** ?
"I don't know" they all said, "what does he say".
I paused a moment for dramatic effect...then I hit them with the punchline...he says "Yo ** **!"
They all looked at me blankly
You don't get it, Yo ** ** and a bottle of *** is the famous pirate song from Treasure Island
Santa's catchphrase is **!**!**!
He drinks the *** and suddenly it's Yo! **!**! (Jeez I thought, I got to explain my own jokes)
Still there not impressed, one shakes her head, another raises her eyes to the heavens, another comments "A silly joke"
But really I don't care, I say to them
I suppose you don't want to hear my Snowman joke then
"O Go on", they say, "get it over with"
It's a bit risque I warned them
What do you call a Snowman... standing outside the window of a Brothel ?
"A hot Frosty", someone said
No! ... The Abominable Snowman.

I say to myself, well at least I tried, I made an effort
I done my bit, now I can sit here quietly for the rest of the evening
Some of the girls have now started to talk amongst themselves
One girl sitting right next to me who I hadn't spoken to in awhile
She suddenly inquires after my wellbeing, she asks"How are you?"
I tell her O! You know me, I'm just... just hanging on in there, yea! just hanging on to the Ledge of Life by my fingertips trying not to look down at all the crocodiles circling below
"Things aren't that bad, are they?" she says a little concerned
I smile and say Well I might be exaggerating there... a little bit
She smiles and offers "You're a real Drama Queen".

Suddenly one of the girls announces that she's done an evening course during the Autumn, she's done Bellydancing of all things
I thought we'll have to get her to give us a demonstration later on (but not before dinner LoL)
This girl then starts asking everyone did they do any courses and what their hobbies were
Finally she comes to me and I say Well I've been making some music on this little keyboard I have, yea! I've been playing...I've been playing around with my *****
(this gets some laughs)
I go on, Actually I've been writing a song
"Writing a Song!" says one of the girls really impressed, "we know you write stories, now you're writing songs, my! you are talented.  What's it about, your song ?"
I tell her it's about a girlfriend whose... well she's a bit of a Goldigger,
Then I smile, I have a great title for it, I call it (I pause for a moment then I say proudly), I call it...Octopus of Love.
"Octopus of Love!!" says one of them dismissively, "what kind of name is that for a song.  There should be a Society for Prevention of Cruelty to songs"
I ignore her and then suddenly launch into a verse of the song

     She said she was a dove
     But she's my Octopus of Love
     A hundred hands in search of one thing
          only
     Yea! My wallet, my Pride and glory.

     When she whispers in my ear
     Her fingertips they tiptoe across my rear
           and into my back pocket  
      O! She's my Octopus of Love
      She"s not at all what I dreamed of.

     When I hold her in my arms
     She sets off all my alarms
     She tells these great big whopping lies
     Man! She's got a finger in all my pies.

    She said she loves me dearly
    Visiting the most expensive shops
    Buying the most expensive gear
    I say, could you not make it more cheaply instead,

  O! She's got me in her grasp
   Her tentacles they hold me fast
   Then she asks what's all the fuss
   And she's so innocent looking
   Man! She's a lovely Octopus.

"I wouldn't be giving up the day job just yet" says one of the girls,
"That's funny" says another
Then someone ups and says "Tell us another one of your little stories",
"A good one, this time!" adds another
"Yea! A good one! We need a good laugh" says another,
I feel a bit slighted by this for some reason, the way they say it, their attitude
It's like their making light of my Art, my labours, my great works
Like their just bits of fluff for their titillation
So suddenly my mood it darkens and my voice it takes on this ominous ring and then I say a little threateningly
"So you want to hear a good one, do you!"
With this I smile and then say menacingly"I'll give you a good one"
Then I look at them slowly one by one
And it's almost like I've gone into this trance state, switched into ghostly mode
A distant remote look comes into my eyes
It's like I'm looking through them into the far distance somewhere...  
And then suddenly I intone real solemn like and with great gravitas
"The Great American Novel!"

"What's that?", asks one of the girls
Now most of the girls are married Moms with kids
They wouldn't have gone to college, they would have gone straight into work after school
So they probably wouldn't have known about English literature and  the Classics and all that high brow kind of stuff
Their only exposure to literature would probably be the so called Chicklit books down their local supermarket,
So I say to them 'You never heard of the Great American Novel'
"No!" says one of the girls, "what is it?"
Well, I start to explain, it's like the Holy Grail for all writers, novel writers anyway
How can I explain...how can I put it... The Great American Novel...
It's like this amazing fantastic legendary mythical beast of such great beauty and magnificence
That roams free and unfettered on the literary plains of a writer's imagination,
Many an author on his death bed admits, "I seen it once, I had it in my sights...had it in my grasp but I let it get away". They then turn their heads away and cry bitter tears of regret...
Or...or it's like... it's like this Great Mountain
that's no one's ever been able to climb
It stands there defiantly, supreme in its isolation, it's peak glistening in the sunlight or shimmering in the moonlight
Unreachable, unattainable... unconquerable
(I'm really on a roll now, I'm waxing lyrical and there's no stopping me)
The Great American Novel...it's like... y'know it's like that old fairytale, what was it called
Was it Snow White. No! Snow White had the dwarves in it
What was the other one?
One of the girls whose always been a bit negative, she suddenly says rather unhelpfully
"It wasn't Pinocchio was it?"
Of course I get her reference, when Pinocchio would tell tall tales his nose would grow longer
Then I point to her and say rather surprisingly "That's it!! Sleeping Beauty!" Remember Sleeping Beauty
The King and Queen have a beautiful baby daughter
At the christening all the good fairies come and bestow Blessings on the child
She'll be the most beautiful
She'll be warm and kind and generous
She'll have a lovely heart
She'll be so wise and so artistic...
Then suddenly who should arrive but the Wicked Fairy
She wasn't even invited to the ceremony and she's really angry
She storms into the Palace right up to the child
Then she says "When this Beauty, this Child grows up she will have an accident"
It's like The Great American Novel is the Beauty, the Child
And it's like she's saying "This Beauty no one shall have, no one shall ever write The Great American Novel"
And of course, when the child grows up she's so wonderful and so amazing
But then she has this accident and falls into this strange deep deep sleep
And everyone in the castle too, they also fall asleep,
And suddenly this big thicket of dense thorns springs up around the castle so no one can enter it
Many a brave young man having heard of the Great Beauty behind the Wall of Thorns
They valiantly try to get to her but are invariably driven back by the thorns
Alas! They fail and gradually the story of the Great Beauty passes into legend.....
That is till one day, a Knight appears, a Knight so noble and pure of heart
The moment the blade of his sword touches the Wall of Thorns
A path opens up right through the thorns leading to the castle
He finds everybody there fast asleep
He climbs the Tower and finds in her chamber this incredible Beauty sleeping
He is so taken with her that he must kiss her on her lips
In that moment her eyes they open and she smiles a radiant smile. And the whole world awakens again, comes alive.

I look around at all the girls, their all a bit spellbound by my story (at least I like to think)
I go on 'It's like I was walking in my mind one evening, seeking some inspiration
And then I just turn a corner and there he is, in all his glorious splendour
Remember your Greek myths, the fabulous white winged horse... Pegasus... this beautiful mythical beast
Just there drinking at a pool right in front of me,
So quietly I sneak up on him and then suddenly I jump up onto his back
He rears up and then spreads his mighty wings
And starts to rise way above the earth
My eyes they are suddenly opened, and I see what I had not seen before....
I look at the girls but then just as before, a strange dark look comes over my face and I say
" I'm really afraid but I think, I think I've done it
I think I've nailed it
Yea! ... I think I've written The Great American Novel.

I go on 'Yknow  whenever a new book comes out the Critics, they all wonder
Will this be the One, will this at last be The Great American Novel
Of course, their always disappointed, the candidates they all fall short
It was a good try but...but not quite
A valiant effort, maybe next time
In the Critics Room one of them will be given my book to read
Slowly as he reads, his eyes will grow wider
And his jaw will start to drop in awe
When he finishes he'll sit there in his chair stunned, almost like he's been shellshocked
Then he'll rise unsteadily  with his finger pointing at the book
He'll be stuttering and stammering
"What's wrong!", people will inquire of him
He'll look at them in a mad crazy way
"My eyes... my eyes they've seen it" he'll say
"Seen what?" they'll ask
"It...it... it's The Great American Novel.
They'll all stand up and gather around the Book
Suddenly someone will grab a pair of binoculars and look up at The Great, the Holy Mountain
And there on the top, on the summit
There'll be a lone figure standing with his little Irish flag
"Truly he is the One", they'll say, "and a feckin' Irishman, wouldn't you know".

"So what's it about then", asks one of the girls interrupting my flow
What!', I say
"The Novel! What's it about"
I look at her and then I smile and say rather mysteriously 'Well, that's another story isn't it'.
"Wait a minute", says the girl whose usually very negative, "so the valiant Knight with the noble heart, that's supposed to be you is it ?
I raise my hands innocently as if to say what can I do
"O! I think I'm going to be sick", she says. Then she continues "Where did you get the time to write a Novel anyway. All the time we thought you were working you were probably just there daydreaming over in the corner".
"It's not very long", I say to her "my story".
"How long is it ?", she asks curiously
"Actually it's only about ten or eleven pages".
"What! Ten or eleven pages!!!", she says jumping on this with exaggerated disgust, "that's not a Novel, it might be a short story but it's certainly not a Novel. For it to be a Novel it has to be several hundred pages long ".
I tell her But 'I didn't need a few hundred pages just ten or eleven was enough, it's all there, the whole thing'.
"But it's not a Novel", she maintains
I answer, it's the spirit of the thing that matters, the Spirit!
She then gathers herself and I can feel an offensive coming
"I don't want to rain on your Parade", she begins, "but One you're not American, Two it's not even a Novel, and Third if it's anything like your song I for one won't be holding my breath".
I look at her a bit crestfallen and then I say
"You really like to burst my balloon don't you" , then I say, "I'm reminded of the classic lines of W.B.Yeats the great Irish poet
And then I declaim theatrically
"And Great Art... beaten down".

Anyway now the spotlight moves away from me, the girls start talking among themselves
"Let's leave him to his delusions", one says and now our meals are starting to arrive, I'm forgotten about for awhile.
For some reason the word "Parade' has stuck in my mind
And the pub has suddenly grown more boisterous, some people are singing and blowing whistles (those paper things that roll out and then roll back in again) their throwing streamers and confetti about
Suddenly I'm reminded of those old ticker tape parades they used to have over in New York when they'd be celebrating something or someone
All the faces looking out the windows of the skyscrapers and all the streamers cascading down, and the cheering crowds
And up on a big Podium there standing, the President himself.
I look up at the wall at Santa Claus smiling back at me
And I say to myself "Hello Mister President"
I can see him welcoming me up onto the podium, then with his hands he quietens the  crowds... and then...then he speaks
"Fellow Americans, we've waited a long time for this day
Many thought I'm sure that it would never come but some...some still dared to believe Yea! That one day a man would appear and that a Book would be born"
(holding up the Book) I give you the Book
It may be a slim volume
But don't let that fool you
Sometimes good things come in small packages...
Yes! I give you the Book,
The Great American Novel!!!
And I give you... the Man (motioning to me)
"He told it like no one else could, he said it like no one else could say it
Let the bells ring out across the land, in every city and town...in celebration"
So sitting there I raised my glass to Santa Claus smiling on the wall
And said quietly and secretly to myself
"Here's to you Mr. President, Merry Christmas!

364

The Morning after Woe—
’Tis frequently the Way—
Surpasses all that rose before—
For utter Jubilee—

As Nature did not care—
And piled her Blossoms on—
And further to parade a Joy
Her Victim stared upon—

The Birds declaim their Tunes—
Pronouncing every word
Like Hammers—Did they know they fell
Like Litanies of Lead—

On here and there—a creature—
They’d modify the Glee
To fit some Crucifixal Clef—
Some Key of Calvary—

Nota: his soil is man's intelligence.
That's better. That's worth crossing seas to find.
Crispin in one laconic phrase laid bare
His cloudy drift and planned a colony.
Exit the mental moonlight, exit lex,
Rex and principium, exit the whole
Shebang. Exeunt omnes. Here was prose
More exquisite than any tumbling verse:
A still new continent in which to dwell.
What was the purpose of his pilgrimage,
Whatever shape it took in Crispin's mind,
If not, when all is said, to drive away
The shadow of his fellows from the skies,
And, from their stale intelligence released,
To make a new intelligence prevail?
Hence the reverberations in the words
Of his first central hymns, the celebrants
Of rankest trivia, tests of the strength
Of his aesthetic, his philosophy,
The more invidious, the more desired.
The florist asking aid from cabbages,
The rich man going bare, the paladin
Afraid, the blind man as astronomer,
The appointed power unwielded from disdain.
His western voyage ended and began.
The torment of fastidious thought grew slack,
Another, still more bellicose, came on.
He, therefore, wrote his prolegomena,
And, being full of the caprice, inscribed
Commingled souvenirs and prophecies.
He made a singular collation. Thus:
The natives of the rain are rainy men.
Although they paint effulgent, azure lakes,
And April hillsides wooded white and pink,
Their azure has a cloudy edge, their white
And pink, the water bright that dogwood bears.
And in their music showering sounds intone.
On what strange froth does the gross Indian dote,
What Eden sapling gum, what honeyed gore,
What pulpy dram distilled of innocence,
That streaking gold should speak in him
Or bask within his images and words?
If these rude instances impeach themselves
By force of rudeness, let the principle
Be plain. For application Crispin strove,
Abhorring Turk as Esquimau, the lute
As the marimba, the magnolia as rose.

Upon these premises propounding, he
Projected a colony that should extend
To the dusk of a whistling south below the south.
A comprehensive island hemisphere.
The man in Georgia waking among pines
Should be pine-spokesman. The responsive man,
Planting his pristine cores in Florida,
Should ***** thereof, not on the psaltery,
But on the banjo's categorical gut,
Tuck tuck, while the flamingos flapped his bays.
Sepulchral senors, bibbing pale mescal,
Oblivious to the Aztec almanacs,
Should make the intricate Sierra scan.
And dark Brazilians in their cafes,
Musing immaculate, pampean dits,
Should scrawl a vigilant anthology,
To be their latest, lucent paramour.
These are the broadest instances. Crispin,
Progenitor of such extensive scope,
Was not indifferent to smart detail.
The melon should have apposite ritual,
Performed in verd apparel, and the peach,
When its black branches came to bud, belle day,
Should have an incantation. And again,
When piled on salvers its aroma steeped
The summer, it should have a sacrament
And celebration. Shrewd novitiates
Should be the clerks of our experience.

These bland excursions into time to come,
Related in romance to backward flights,
However prodigal, however proud,
Contained in their afflatus the reproach
That first drove Crispin to his wandering.
He could not be content with counterfeit,
With masquerade of thought, with hapless words
That must belie the racking masquerade,
With fictive flourishes that preordained
His passion's permit, hang of coat, degree
Of buttons, measure of his salt. Such trash
Might help the blind, not him, serenely sly.
It irked beyond his patience. Hence it was,
Preferring text to gloss, he humbly served
Grotesque apprenticeship to chance event,
A clown, perhaps, but an aspiring clown.
There is a monotonous babbling in our dreams
That makes them our dependent heirs, the heirs
Of dreamers buried in our sleep, and not
The oncoming fantasies of better birth.
The apprentice knew these dreamers. If he dreamed
Their dreams, he did it in a gingerly way.
All dreams are vexing. Let them be expunged.
But let the rabbit run, the **** declaim.

Trinket pasticcio, flaunting skyey sheets,
With Crispin as the tiptoe cozener?
No, no: veracious page on page, exact.

Profitis Ilias

Zefian brought the Toxota and Pezhetairoi arrows; they were sovereign moldy points of the Bronze tips of the Taxota Archers and the Falangists. That in turn from the high sky formed a great pinwheel when the great dimension shone from the flat equinoctial sky, bumping the chins of Kaitelka, the dealer of the Parthenon lost, which rang the great bronze pine, and kilometers in length forming the makro koelum of Patmos; with vertices of the Pythagorean canon of Polykleitos. A large horizontal "V" was seen from Aorion's falling acrotera, projected in a bronze mega bolt coming from Betelgeuse's armpit, and forming a sidereal Vee, launched by the hunter Aorion from his constellation. This would be architectural form and Pythagorean canon-mathematical for purposes proportional to the Mandragoron. They fell from the four arrows that Zefian launched, from Crete that approached the contravening of Apollo, and Artemis towards an olive tree, originating in the arrows of Zefian, to mark the new cardinal points. Thus they began with two first sagites that are placed in the arc string, each one belonging north-south trajectories and the other two that were again violated with the eastern arc, to shoot the east-west arrows with southern magnetism limits. Three bolts are deposited in the canon of Polykleitos, and in the reticulum of the Pleiades that Aurion pursued.

The first two were Taxotas:

- North: Vóreios (Zefian Boreal)
- South: Nótos (Austral de Borker)

The last two were from Pezhetairoi:

- West: Dyticá (Sunset of Leiak)
- East: Aftó (Equinoctial of Kaitelka)

A - Zefian Vóreios

In the intertestamental of these egregious Pythagorean calculations, they stood out in the Vernacentricus, or extra automatism of foundation of the points to refer geodesics for the lifting of the Ultramundis Vernacentricus. From the Vóreios the Zefian canons are inter-testamented, which uses Horcondising forces, following the northern one of the Nothofagus Obliqua, essentially in the fungi of their trunks that paraded along the paths of the iterated populations of the Ezpatkul Forest; who was a servant who had remained from the last diaspora of the horcondising transmigrant by Joshua de Piedra, patriarch of the Orthodox mountains, and from the cordons of the Ambrosiella Ceratocystidaceae fungi, with a large proportion of the Ambrosia Mercurial, and of great influence from the fungal fungi, provided from the Legacy of Vernarth in Zefian to demarcate the northern boreal or Vóreios for the purpose that this Ezpatku, with its prominent Augrun or Gold teeth turned all the borer beetles demarcating the Vee of the Vóreios throughout the Horcondising region, bilocusing it in the borers of the Encinas de Patmos, with such frenzy... !, that from there they would extract the force of the Mapuche north winds from the Meli Witran Mapu, starting with the Pikún-kürüf North wind, first two arrows of the Taxotas, and South Waiwén, of the Pezhetairoi, of the quantum of transmigration of the sub-mythology of the Horcondising – Panhellenic. Then the Puelche that drags the borer beetles with more force to lift the uprising fungi of the Mandragoron by the East vertical, to culminate with the Lafkén-kürüf.

Zefian had enough time to mediate the ratio of Polykleitos to Ezpatkul. This Kanon or Canon will be of great relevance for the topography and survey of the temple, knowing that we must emphasize the perfection of the basal measurements, and the acrotera that will be suspended in the sensorial iconography of its forms, and in the star Betelgeuse giant with red blood cells, for the morphology of their own three-dimensional bodies, towards a comparatively human paradigm of Gaugamela anatomy bled in his pectoral, from here the Templar base of Megaron or Mandragoron began. Its size will be colossal but more ergonomic; it will be to redirect visuals of the Orion Belt, from where the fourth and last Zefian arrow was already on its way, to join the other three remaining from the Cretan *****, for the entire front of the façade Principal. The chromaticity will be sulfur yellow and red blood cells, both dependent on complementation with Cinnabar, and on the raised bodies of Court V of the Helleniká Necropolis in Kímolos. Under vileness or absence of light among the darkness, or of the apocryphal light of Evil, in contrast to the robust equanimity of light, and partisan shadow of Saint John the Apostle, for the hegemonic good and the incorruptible vision of him.

The naturalness made the world apologetic, and the immune defenses of the polish textures, invoiced proportional mathematical measures ibidem of the Hommo Novis, and of the Geometric Pythagoreanism for a body seven and a half times, starting from the base of the feet as the base of the plinth or frieze, until reaching near the capital that exemplifies the chin, before reaching the cornice, highlighting the figure of the capital with the front of the proportional ligament between the trunk, and the columns duly. Here the seven-headed Kanon of a David will declaim the measures of the psalms, counts in degrees, and sighing dimensions. The kinetics was earth towed by towing carts in tetra bronze arrows, which balanced the unbalanced balance and harmony of the created whole. The symmetry of the transverse poles was muscled to make kinetic centripetal in the inertia of the bolts as the faint glow of the canon rays struck. The stone of the mound was made of the sustentacular, and Vernarth's counterpose when the Himathion was tried, appearing disguised and in composing. In this way the movement and position of the muscles and of the figure in general of the human temple are portrayed, when pressing the third arrow of Zefian it adorned the consecutive cardinal points; in this position of the myriad, and their forces widened the line of sight of the Vernacentricus, dispersing the oblique line in forty-five degrees that would join with its right counterpart, in the middle of the radius that joined the central point destined where the fourth arrow would fall.

Zefian falling from the Belt of Aorion, destined to embed itself at the intersection of the next full moon. The volume of naturalism resembled the directive of Polykleitos, but it was far from his figurative geometric conception, being conceptualized by an intertestamental tendency of sub-mythology, and the Duoverse, which in turn was condescending of morphology by reestablishing a prehistoric figurative, which tended to be reflected in the similarity of an anachronistic contrast of the original morphism of the aesthetic universe, being retransformed into a sub-mythological Duoverso.

the common words used
don't qualify as diction
hold no versimilitude
leave me to ponder what is so compelling
about the word like
that you have to use it
several times
in every sentence?

i hail a car
in time's square
i'm going to Harvard
the world's premier academy
where i won't be asked
to stop using "big words"
but instead receive diatribes for being prolix
because they're too pretentious
to admit ignorance

you!
how dare you try
to say you never
shoved your tongue down my throat
no fancy words
no "flowery fluff"
there it is,
now fight it!

I hide in my room
pain isn't pellucid
in the dark

EEEE!
it's a womanizer
mujeriego
or a bat...
murcielago
i always mixed up those two words
an idee fixe

as i declaim
to anyone who will listen
in my Faux-cab-you!-lair-EEEEE!

The mockingbird in arbored sanctum
rehearses his newest musing
an addition to his lifelong
plagiaristic monologue

satisfied,
he ***** into the chaparral
to declaim his litany to
anything with ears.

It is a fallacy we all believe.
As we vehemently exclaim six words
to prove the chastity of our thoughts,
to fill our pride with self-validation,
to ratify our existence with falsehoods.
"The Devil made me do it!"

"The Devil made me do it!"
I bitterly laugh at your blundering gaucherie,
as you lay blame on an eons old transgression,
as you smote the sinnerman flying with flames,
as you called him out for your own actions
impassioned by heresy.

Impassioned by heresy
You sought to relieve yourself from perdition;
brought upon by perjury declared,
brought upon by authenticated truths,
brought upon by the duplicity,
of your favored reverent ideologies.

Of your favored reverent ideologies
which is to laud your skirmish against evil
in order to remove yourself from auburn eternity,
in order to induct you as a citizen of argent fields,
in order to orchestrate contempt towards another?
Is there no truth to you?

Is there no truth to you
now that perfidy imputes your entirety?
as you declaim in front of paradise lost,
as you coerce to regain what is rightfully deprived,
as you throng duress by intoning your delusion:
"The Devil made me do it!"

"The Devil made me do it!"
Its recurrence is maddening to Him
while you, in all your sentience, chose to act unbecoming,
while the celestials perched on your shoulder bawl,
while He that you blame does absolutely nothing.
It is a fallacy we all believe.

Golden wave:
Noise muted.
Hands harvest blows.

Cicadas sing
Cedars on the horizon:
Voiceless words.

Birds declaim
The feeling of wet
Earth in wet air.

Gray clouds ragged
By a thousand lightnings
Released in a look.

Running water:
I Run with the stream.
Which mouth awaits?

Now for Iberia the Goat trips the Swan
To expound his Potentials his Win compete
His Wing - now Healed - placed Earnings on his Fawn
And ensure his Feet leave Imprints complete
Though needed it be keep Sweets in his Box
To open once his Strategy proclaim
That by Politic break Legs with the Fox
And sap one's Owl of its Senses declaim
Sport or Savoury either Ties relay -
May your Holiday Cheers by Random bless
Sustain Tomorrow; Else promote Today
The Road to the Gold your Instincts progress.
Should Hands for Wine toast; Cheer for Moment's come
Will my Handles flip; Transmute Wine into Rhum.

‬

Figure on the hill,
the vast and dark;
heinous conqueror
with single, vaulted eye.

That common passing mark
a whitish spear
who often in the morning
passed unheard.

Color in the walls,
the tangent all of space;
and I most meet
and he the thrilling knight.

Braggart of the ears,
where sleepest thou,
an curvature would bite
that runs upon the steely edge of wit?

In this repose, and let no man declaim
that music cannot work the bones of fame.

Morning came.
The sun, though wanly yet,
From out the clouds did creep,
And chilled but more the coldness in each heart.

Night had passed.
Their craft its course had set;
They roused themselves from sleep,
Despairingly aware this was the start.

*
And then within their ******* a wondrous joy:
“We are alive. Our pained heartbeat
Is Freedom’s precious blood;
Though fugitive, we plant our feet
On this uncertain road.
Reprieve, we pray, these victims of Hanoi.”

But what inexorable dream did drive
Them to this pass? Utopia . . .?
Can desperation so
Produce a mass myopia?
Or did they simply show
A crass and rude desire to stay alive?

Freedom they sought and yet from freedom fled;
Their sorrow spent, alike their gold,
(Why give up gold for strife?)
Bewilderment assailed the old,
The rest were for their life
Content, who measured wealth by rice and bread.

This is no refuge for the older men.
Here Mammon reigns. Who dares offend
Its promissory trap?
The tree retains a bitter blend
That yet within its sap
Contains the best of threescore years and ten.

No sanctuary this; no lotus land
With blossoms sweet. Another scent
The fragrant harbour bears.
Its airs defeat their loud lament
And gives voice to their fears:
Retreat or here remain to make a stand.

Accumulated wealth; decay of man;
The evidence is all around:
This is cold comfort farm.
No penitents do here abound;
No charity; no charm.
“Dispense with it” some said “and change our plan.”

But still they stayed, and still more of them came
In constant hope: some few sanguine,
Some cynical, some scared;
The misanthrope and the benign,
Each really ill-prepared
To cope, alas, when menaced tongues declaim:

“You are not wanted here! You have no right
Our aims to thwart. We have our own
Philosophy to fill
An empty heart. Leave us alone
To line our pockets still.
Depart! Desist! This scene offends our sight.”

And whither shall they go when doors are locked
to them and barred? Another land?
Another sea serene
Yet still as hard? Forever banned;
Regarded as obscene;
Ill-starred, kept out, each avenue but blocked.

The days lay heavy on them, and the weeks
Marked mournful time; and endless nights
Of sleepless hours compose
No rest sublime. But lawful rights
And liberties opposed
By crime whose legal putrefaction reeks.

Pity those huddled masses in their hive
Of human pain. What choice had they
Beyond their selfish dream
To hope again? Perhaps to pray,
Or, with a piteous scream,
Complain once more: “We merely want to live!”

Was it not ever so, since the first dawn?
Did not our Lord (perchance, too, theirs)
Enjoy the same disdain?
(The same reward?) For what compares
With crucifix and pain
Of sword and scourge, save that one is reborn.

*

Winter brought
Another wakening day;
The menace of that dream:
Demoralizing symbol of their fears.

In the Spring
The well-tide of their gay
And sacrificial stream:
The flower must die before the fruit appears.

12/30/2018

The eloquence of listless years is lost on heady overweening heels that submerge reality in a cavernous of oblique light shrouding the dark mysteries to come. Axiomatic but refractory we swim and tread danger and peril because the unsaid screams for awakening as the roosters outfox the owls and completely change history based on evil skullduggery that awaits the gainsay of titans compromised in security but elevated over the doldrums of quotidian thought. It is my solemn forbearance and consistent steadfast prayer for alacrity and industry to conquer the dudgeons of incurred opprobrium to clinch a beatific convivial festivity for a time-informed claque of leaders that delight in simplicity but dissemble their true disguise in open shark-infested waters. Salvage the impositions of the many and cull the best to anoint their favor on uncertainties improbable but likely as the discerning will master reality rather than be the dross of yesteryear. We swarm with importunate guilds of serfdom to surrender their edifice to the chiselers that operate and extravagate beyond bounds established by parochial priggishness that is a flagging patriotic insistence on drenched graft dank with the mildew of balkanization but not entirely as reproachable as some relics of the ancient law detest with misguided guile and paranoiac sophistry that is a precarious canker of otiose tastes drawling on with misinformed skepticism. The hounding gray in the pallor of alpenglow light ennobles the concatenations of wistful dread but at the same time esoteric flavor that enriches the emblazoned gallantry of the few to become the mainstay of all relevant considerations. Wish upon a coruscating menagerie of miscegenated aboriginal languages that have always abided in the shadows but exist in brevity among the elite coteries that coddle the world in its infancy away from the artifice of exegesis and the importunate placations of swarthy umbrageous shadows that exist apart from the factitious apartheid of race and gender. We must stand united as brethren enduring the tribulations of human vicissitude to abhor the diseased rhetoric of pandered puritanism amalgamated with aleatory financial alarmism calculated to swindle the dilapidation of penury that burns as a smoldering conflagration of concerted ignorance leading to ochlocratic determinism rather than a whispered percolated pedigree that drowns sorrows but simultaneously strands the pariahs of time in insular self-reflection unbecoming of an age that demands an importunate, ubiquitous and outspoken corporate altruism not superintended by a bloviated and tumescent dysnomy of congregated botched bureaucracies that encroach with a daunting donkey commandeered by headless horsemen who are only known by pennames and cognomens that flinch at the demise of their undeserved anonymity. We use valor as an instrument to prevent a scuttled vessel of a seaworthy humanity slinking along a very balmy coast as we await future instructions at the apropos time for a simpatico relegation of commercial collectivism. We expect instead a demassified world to enliven the dialectic of epistemology itself and renew covenants long ago moribund in their ragged and wretched desuetude that they may be vanquished as vestigial habiliments to the tatters of sloppy abnegation leading to a swollen piety that dares not to pretend but simultaneously believes so much in its pilloried hubris that it provides erasure for the secular enlightenment of a messianic time. Squalor and riddled eccentricity drive a brackish but saccharine attempt to homogenize the pastures that we graze upon but look no further than a bequeathed divine providence of smirks rather than the jibes of sneering ostentation. Whisper you fame rather than declaim against the arraignments of a scuttled pettifoggery of miscegenated justice that embroils foreign wineskins for domestic turmoil rather than the demotic enlightenment of the abrogation of inequitable laws that preserve the totemic dissolution of society rather than the prized ameliorative enlightenment of science informed by faith and faith beckoning the clerisy to seek supernal wisdom and furtive swank to reconnoiter the righteous and jettison renegades imploring for a piebald blinkered apostasy on a rudimentary subconscious level but never realizing their effrontery is gravid in a heedless ignorance interpolated by menacing secular hobgoblins that ransack barren treasure and cherish it as a trinket for a chrysocracy that is specious rather than veridical. Barnstorm for justice but appoint the abeyance of foolhardy prescience so that the enigmas of time can beckon their own deliverance through a culmination of waggish flickers rather than the kowtowed toadies of a quidnunc reality divorced from proper temperance outmoded but thriving among those that disavow newfangled foudroyant spectacles. Always and with alacrity indulge the gladiatorial sportsmanship of a zeitgeist beyond contention as the paragon for livid dreams and lurid imaginations to drive the mutiny against plebeian ears and purblind eyes. Live for the eternal present with providence and forswear the vestigial fossils of flippant eras domineered by dragooning fictitious sentiments buttressed by castles built against the encroachment of the imaginary foes of vassal states that submerged the world in a fideism that rejects too many axioms of modernity to vie for preponderance. The government is not irreproachable, but it is a primeval reflection of the propensities of an aggregated society flippant against choice wisdom of the ageless Constitution that is peremptory proof of the divine providence of sempiternal liberty. People that chide against liberty because they fear precarious cankers that endanger from a distance because of their swollen specters need to uphold a commitment to a wistful remembrance of tragedy but a sturdy ruddy optimism to perdure and prosper on this greenest of worlds for both the greenhorn and the expert alike. Never kowtow before the altar of avarice and always pilfer resourceful contemplation in the respite of quiet times that engage our best faculties to awaken rather than slumber. Recruit the collective imagination to superintend chaos and the leviathan becomes tamed because it requires human synergy in both prosperous times and desperate measures to foment the earth with the brontides of due warning simultaneously murky and misleading but always reflective of an irenic pasture of withering sheep and abundant shepherds. Regal promises have always loitered in the penumbras of the elite but now is the time for absolution rather than scattershot contumely. We believe in the federal way and the state farm system and we don’t believe in foreign monoliths becoming the pasquinade of slippery hebetude that ensnares the immobilized futilitarianism of ignorant creeds and divisive claptrap. Barnstorm together for God and liberty as those two principles-however squandered they might be by listless speculation that doesn’t hinge upon the concerted subaudition of the deeply fathomed sources glistening with profundity- will clinch a victory for the beatific future of a guided humanity rather than the guileless intemperance of choleric fools who wage conflagration against only their own plodding ignorance rather than reaching with outstretched hands and tenacious grasps to invent the future according to the helical perfection of the past. May God rule forever on earth! A prosperous earth! An Earth filled with pleasure and an Earth that approximates heaven more closely every day. Amen  



12/31/2018

Riddled by bewildering supernal designs of an ineffable splendor that drapes reality in iridescent cloaks of rigorous and strenuous limber we trounce through the effigies of a profaned pasquinade to gallop through the doldrums of time for the allocated investment in the refined human condition to exacerbate the declension of foes but link the Abrahamic faiths with taciturn reflections and wizened countenances beckoning a newfangled harmonious destiny. Livid are the naysayers who proffer gainsay with insouciance and flippant sorcery to denigrate sacrosanct axioms with persnickety maxims that are only auriferous when viewed through a refracted entropy of disdainful speculative mutiny against propriety in values and stances. I sidle through a refractory zeitgeist despised for my aureate temerities against the chided condemnation of those who flout so-called gobbledygook because they lack stringent acuity and pale to the polish of ennobled grace that anoints favor and felicity on the laurels of an age very intransigent against latitudinarian capriciousness that will one day ransack the world of its flickered graft and its paltry obsessions with quondam gaucheries. A house divided against itself will flounder because of titanic pressures of oblique balkanization that is opaque only to the hounded ignorance of wishful but labile people who wage acerbic gambles against the delegated authors of an aborning covenant for irenic reconciliation in a blinkered piebald world. I like to saunter in private with my insistent lucubrations because I know the majestic gestures of jest are more bountiful in their fecund harvest than any circumlocution of blunt poetasters who calumniate the verve of self-made upstart grandeur that I brandish at every opportune occasion to pilfer my due inheritance from the coffers of a self-fulfilling fatalism divorced from solipsistic monisms and the denigrations of the futilitarian quest to deprive sustenance in the exercise of deft skepticism disempowering the perspicacity of miserly mendicants who treasure their science but pale in their trepidatious momentary twinges of faith that are insincere and unctuous abominations against a steadfast God that wallops our misery with the lurched progress of human amelioration wrought by the succor of alien wizardry beyond even the most quixotic imaginations of people who in their prolixity miss the pithy glib sacraments of a terse and burlesque pragmatism. I simper because I know about carbon emissions statistics with hearty gusto and a convivial banquet of amalgamated personalities and wraiths that emanate from the ether of the 12th dimension of reality: transdimensional interspecies sentience. I wrangle on the outskirts of a bustled city embroiled in a relegated civil war entangling plebeians and plutocrats but not engorging any coffers in a zugzwang destined for pejorative scuffles rather than synergistic revivals of the human fraternity, a consensus about intellectual meliorism that will fossick with due efficiency cognitive resources frittered away in the respite of laziness and the abeyance of prospective diligence to conquer rather than waylay with furtive gambits of appeasement. Everyone need to leapfrog beyond the quotidian plane by indulging the oneiromancies of self-efficacy aggrandized by presidential favors and collective efforts to unite the 16th version of reality with the penultimate version of reality. For the ultimate version of reality is corporeal death upon which we are transplanted unto an ethereal dimension beyond contemplation without the horological diminishment of wizened age.  We trudge in the miserly conditions imposed by pharaohs of pettifoggery that swindles with blustery graft and strident intimidation of the audacity of hopes and dreams to foment the requisite fin de seicle zeitgeist that deserves more of a heyday with the revivalism of nostalgic entertainment against the opprobrium of inferior tastes facile in formulaic conformity but deficient in its nutritive enrichment of beatific festivities that traverse the earth at lightspeed because of the vehement energy of foudroyant amazement is beyond contagious when conveyed through the dexterous vehicles of more centralized rather than skeletonized organization. The bonhomie of a copacetic future demands the interpolation of scrupulous adherence to authoritative dictums but the laissez-faire demagoguery of titans trouncing the ragamuffins of cacestogenous upbringing in a miserly husbandry that stunts the stilted imaginations of formalism rather than bequeathing a seminal insemination of a future hybridized race mechanized but humanized simultaneously to accomplish what would once seem impossible that now looms considerable with the democratization of the furtive at a faucet’s trickling pace to empower the future to heed the past and the pastors to revere the eschatology of final conditions rather than a favoritism for aboriginal barbarisms created by the snare of hobgoblin phantasms that exist only to make us tremulous rather than swanky. May God bless this great green earth with many decades of prosperity to come and heap plaudits on the intellectuals fighting the fight against simpleton groupthink. Have a very festive New Year!

How To Speak Poetry**

Take the word butterfly. To use this word it is not necessary to make the voice weigh less than an ounce or equip it with small dusty wings. It is not necessary to invent a sunny day or a field of daffodils. It is not necessary to be in love, or to be in love with butterflies. The word butterfly is not a real butterfly. There is the word and there is the butterfly. If you confuse these two items people have the right to laugh at you. Do not make so much of the word. Are you trying to suggest that you love butterflies more perfectly than anyone else, or really understand their nature? The word butterfly is merely data. It is not an opportunity for you to hover, soar, befriend flowers, symbolize beauty and frailty, or in any way impersonate a butterfly. Do not act out words. Never act out words. Never try to leave the floor when you talk about flying. Never close your eyes and **** your head to one side when you talk about death. Do not fix your burning eyes on me when you speak about love. If you want to impress me when you speak about love put your hand in your pocket or under your dress and play with yourself. If ambition and the hunger for applause have driven you to speak about love you should learn how to do it without disgracing yourself or the material.

What is the expression which the age demands? The age demands no expression whatever. We have seen photographs of bereaved Asian mothers. We are not interested in the agony of your fumbled organs. There is nothing you can show on your face that can match the horror of this time. Do not even try. You will only hold yourself up to the scorn of those who have felt things deeply. We have seen newsreels of humans in the extremities of pain and dislocation. Everyone knows you are eating well and are even being paid to stand up there. You are playing to people who have experienced a catastrophe. This should make you very quiet.  Speak the words, convey the data, step aside. Everyone knows you are in pain. You cannot tell the audience everything you know about love in every line of love you speak. Step aside and they will know what you know because you know it already. You have nothing to teach them. You are not more beautiful than they are. You are not wiser. Do not shout at them. Do not force a dry entry. That is bad ***. If you show the lines of your genitals, then deliver what you promise. And remember that people do not really want an acrobat in bed. What is our need? To be close to the natural man, to be close to the natural woman. Do not pretend that you are a beloved singer with a vast loyal audience which has followed the ups and downs of your life to this very moment. The bombs, flame-throwers, and all the **** have destroyed more than just the trees and villages. They have also destroyed the stage. Did you think that your profession would escape the general destruction? There is no more stage. There are no more footlights. You are among the people. Then be modest. Speak the words, convey the data, step aside. Be by yourself. Be in your own room. Do not put yourself on.

This is an interior landscape. It is inside. It is private. Respect the privacy of the material. These pieces were written in silence. The courage of the play is to speak them. The discipline of the play is not to violate them. Let the audience feel your love of privacy even though there is no privacy. Be good ******. The poem is not a slogan. It cannot advertise you. It cannot promote your reputation for sensitivity. You are not a stud. You are not a killer lady. All this junk about the gangsters of love. You are students of discipline. Do not act out the words. The words die when you act them out, they wither, and we are left with nothing but your ambition.

Speak the words with the exact precision with which you would check out a laundry list. Do not become emotional about the lace blouse. Do not get a hard-on when you say *******. Do not get all shivery just because of the towel. The sheets should not provoke a dreamy expression about the eyes. There is no need to weep into the handkerchief. The socks are not there to remind you of strange and distant voyages. It is just your laundry. It is just your clothes. Don't peep through them. Just wear them.

The poem is nothing but information. It is the Constitution of the inner country. If you declaim it and blow it up with noble intentions then you are no better than the politicians whom you despise. You are just someone waving a flag and making the cheapest kind of appeal to a kind of emotional patriotism. Think of the words as science, not as art. They are a report. You are speaking before a meeting of the Explorers' Club of the National Geographic Society. These people know all the risks of mountain climbing. They honour you by taking this for granted. If you rub their faces in it that is an insult to their hospitality. Tell them about the height of the mountain, the equipment you used, be specific about the surfaces and the time it took to scale it. Do not work the audience for gasps ans sighs. If you are worthy of gasps and sighs it will not be from your appreciation of the event but from theirs. It will be in the statistics and not the trembling of the voice or the cutting of the air with your hands. It will be in the data and the quiet organization of your presence.

Avoid the flourish. Do not be afraid to be weak. Do not be ashamed to be tired. You look good when you're tired. You look like you could go on forever. Now come into my arms. You are the image of my beauty.

He sits on a porch-swing dying of heat.
The midday sun is merciless.
It juts out a golden face to ****
To test
To accuse.

He strokes the side of his face.
There is misery here but not remorse.
Sweat runs down the hollow of his neck
Traces his neck
Falls away from his neck.

He closes his eyes against the day.
And more besides.

The sky burns in opposite colors now.
His eyelids play the stars and scenes of an afternoon.
After a time, blackness swallows the image.
He is perfectly closed.

Off past the gate sound cicadas,
Locusts, call them here,
Like an African choir concealed to chant
Concealed to slough away
Concealed from commentary.

He hears the door and feels her weight
on the swing. The cicadas seem louder.
She's come outside to speak with him
To speak at him
To speak about him.

"I hate you," says a voice but not in words.
"I love you too," sounds the other with a tone that says more,
Much more besides.

The dusk is usually far more perfidious
But not tonight. The weather is still,
The sun has nothing more to declaim.
She is perfectly closed.

The opus begins in a tentative way
Each character playing their signature phrase
With gesture, with posture, with rhythm and grace
The dancers then enter the stage.

The conductors baton, Imposing control
Directing the tempo and pace
Blues jazz folk rock, rap and rounds
The singers are finding a voice.

The orators speak, the actors declaim
Crafted prose flows from their lips
While jesters and. punsters, irrepressible funsters
Are gagging and cracking their quips.


The master of ceremonies calls all the spots
He hopes the production will gell
The shifters and movers, and technical groovers
Do their jobs amazingly well.


The instruments thunder, brass blares, and strings soar
Drums are the loudest by far
Then silence descends, a pause, the applause
That’s all folks, lets go to the bar.

At Etemenanki, the bell has rung
Echoing into the dark desert night
Apostates speaking the Adamic tongue

Though the sky is old, the earth is still young
And the world is still full of love and light
At Etemenanki, the bell has rung

Free the prisoners who have not yet hung
For even the ****** could never indict
Apostates speaking the Adamic tongue

Every voice cries out, every song is sung
While the jealous one looks on at this slight
At Etemenanki, the bell has rung

And from the ziggurat, his hand has flung
(As they all protest and declaim his might)
Apostates speaking the Adamic tongue

The crowd babbles and speaks and shouts among
Themselves, but none meet with any insight
At Etemenanki, the bell has rung
Apostates speaking the Adamic tongue

Forty white birds ask us to be over forty,
Thirty-three wide, 40 long...
More space to see the sky from the earth...
Live time we are alive hearing pass the time.

Forty spread God's word behind us,
And 33 distributed to our entire main front...
Forty long by 33 wide...
It is the crypt of our dreams waiting Reborn.

Tracks 40 and 33 also,
We are told flies through the world and exclaims before the creation
Your experiences,
However it is measurable only those who drag us,
In our range of life 40 x 33 ... we remain trapped and limited...

Jesus has its coordinated laptop,
We walk exponentially multiplying our life within the limits,
And their word will continue to walk with his Gospel, larger crypt which deserves a mortal on earth.

Jesumani and not Getsemani,
Crimping Christian temples...
Via Crucis Vialucis and No Viacrucis...
Generosity and no Privacy,
All the world's forests exceeding your shoulders,
It will be waiting for your return, you release your body breathe
And consecrate the spirit of all over 40 long and 33 wide.

Jesumani is more to think about to be reborn...
Is coming with handfuls of experience back the changes gives us eternity...



Life is eternal,
Eternal is dreaming,
Eternal is glistening,
Eternal is eternal,
Eternal life is hyper,
Hyper dream,
Hyper heal,
Hyper revive,
Hyper resurrect...
Hyper the gentle voice of a child,
Hyper the voice of one or more,
Hyper oxidant and execration Dream,

Forty enough the magnitude of our crypt in Heaven,
So as being take a path,
So I'll get my hands icy missing 33 to gather the meditations I dare tell me, something lost in life not knowing what else I have to live and let me do it.

Thunderclap and thunders and lightning sound come,
Big thing altogether deafening even today not having ears...

As I said, every Easter to come hear me the white birds and I sing psalms growth of my crypt, my great all inclusive resort for all to visit me in my large crypt, in my renovated say ...

Declaim to stand without getting tired, just hearing 40 and 33.
Easter, World Holy, Holy Word ...holy Eternity...


Jose Luis, Easter 2018.
Majoris Hebdomadae Mundus Deo

worthless words
fall from my mouth
to beat like moths
at the dim light bulb of your brain

we at present speak
different languages
and have no desire
to find a translator

we circle each other
and watch understanding
whirlpool down the drain

for the wont of kindness
we expire, we declaim
not my fault, as we take new aim

this is not a dual,
life at ten paces
not a race
no one wins
no gold for first place

this is life, and living
gritty bits and all
this is the big wide world
where all are destined,
to fail and fall

this is how you get up
not how you fell down

this is the world of world weary
and the panache of wearing
a truly battered crown

this is the sticking point
the stinking, smoking left-over joint
the left behind,  the neverminds

this is your day
and yes...
you can live it your way

but you need to know
there are consequences
things that go bump in the night
things that in later years
you strive to make right
things that affect the trajectory
of your haphazard flight.

live your life!
live it free....
but sunshine,
in my class...
if you don' t hand
in your assignments
you heading for disaster
and this is the word.... from
the red ink master.

L.O.L.
How great is your expectations toward me.
No acquaintance
No Relation
My mere existance provokes criticism
Child of the new age
Much is required of you
The bar is set very low
Rise up its time
Centre your stage
Valuable gems come tumbling down from your lips, hips and your tippy toed tango
Come on strong
Declaim
Declare
Frame
No time to gasp
Talk sense
Arise Oh Suffragette
Exist to Emancipate

Who cares?

A daily hunger
that doesn't show.

Who cares?

A daily trip into that gag,
banished by reproach.

Who cares?

A daily path of reach
and retreat, retreat.

Who cares?

Who'd notice
if I'd not be there?

I don't care.

I've rested my case
and refuse to declaim.

". . .THE WONDROUS ARCHITECTURE OF THE WORLDE. . . ."

I laugh
the road over the Hog's Back
closed because....it melted

was the sun ever so
back in your day
eh Kit?

and what do I read
Mr. Marlowe?
why words, Kit, words

that word magician
Dr. Burgess he presumes
to bring you back

to life again
and so it seems
I see your blood Kit

streaming in the firmament
nay only a Deptford sunset
dragged screaming from memory

your blood upon the page Kit...
mere cherry juice it
stains the words

and so to Deptford I
do go
thanks to Madame Remembrance

I a poor
purveyor of poetry
clutching at words

and here
a great reckoning
not  in a little room

but on a lost street
staining the scene
a sickly yellow

and so enough
of Prologue...
Act 1 begins

a smiling ruffian
see his knife smiles too
the blade eager for blood

alas I
in so much pain I
have no fear of death

indeed would welcome
the flicked knife
if it would release me

from my life
a man prepared
to die if it be so

"Come live with me and be
my love..." I doth quote
in my best Passionate Shepard

"Wot?" he wots
scared of my insouciance
the ghost of Marlowe by my side

ahhh he the very villian
a scar from eye to smile
he aims to do the same to me

"Where, rogue... did
they get thee?" I mock
"VILLIANS 'R' US?"

Marlowe's ghost laughs
"Aye lad...aye lad
to him!"

"Only one of us..."
I warn my hellhound
"....will come out of this alive!"

I pause for effect
"And I'm afraid
it won't be( hee hee ) thee!"

I take a determined step
towards my would-be
now trembling killer

who all this wordage
being too much for him
he flees

ahhh the glint of words
defeats the glint of steel
he my would-be-not-to-be-death

"What God or Feend, or spirit of the earth,
Or Monster turned to manly shape
Or of what mould or mettle he be made...?"

I declaim to an audience
of cats and cans and
other streetly filth

I...I. . .unable to
find the next line
and so I etc., etc., etc.

and once more
I am of Guildford yet again
30 years or more away

and there melts a road
upon the Hog's Back
and I laugh to be alive

"Doth teach vs all to have aspyring mindes:
Our soules, whose faculties can comprehend
The wondrous architecture of the worlde.."

Watch what the pedant swine does- whose gargling
fills the Scabbards. Those near men who nestle in
with peers and well heeled cogs, Laced and misshapen
by all the verdant narcotics of the Time. For all to see
they'll Stand and declaim clotted regurgitations of
promises already Framed.

Their attire in constant lave, and limbs Strung up by
the unnatural- Their throats lined thickly to the teeth,
of figments and cruor, and the fiction they spiel forever
a plush Decor.

For, you see, all but few buy what they Sell- counterfeit
talk stocked pretentiously upon shelves. And all speedily
Corked fit in viewing eyes, plugged into those who've not
the time to Reason why? Bought in bulk- a Politician plying
his delicately chosen words.

HOW NOT TO SWEAR WHEN ONE IS SWEARING

After I hit it
with a hammer

my old thumb takes on
a now cartoonish character

pulses and throbs
grows biggerandbiggerANDBIGGER.

My three year old
gasps in astonishment

that an adult would/could
do such a silly silly thing.

"Bold Daddy!" she scolds "Bold Daddy!"

My mind screams in silence but
my tongue longs

to utter in the demotic
a good old fashioned Anglo-Saxon

ffffffffffFFFFFFF...word!

I somehow( don't
ask me how )

gaze into my little one's
baby blues

delete the expletive
carefully in slow motion

substitute the first
thing that pops into the mind

the first( as it happens )
of Mr. Joyce's thunderwords.

None of Eliot's
"  Shantih     shantih     shantih "

I had the presence of mind to
"Finnegans Wake" it!

"BABABADALGHARAGHTAKAMMINARRONNKONNBRONN
TONNERRONNTUONNTHUN­NTROVARRHOUNAWNSKAN
TOOHOOHOORDENENTHURNUK!"



"Funny Daddy!" she chortles "Funny Daddy!"

Now whenever things
go wrong and

they will go wrong
( as sure as words is words )

she begs me
to "...do the thunder!"

Waits for her little
bit part so she can

chime in with her
". . .TOOHOOHOO..."

and I gather her up
in my arms and we

both declaim
as one

". . .THURNUK!"

CECI N'EST PAS UN... poème!

It's always
the same

the adverbs
blame the adjectives

the adjectives
the nouns

and the nouns
the verbs

for the imminent
collapse of this poem

The images declaim
we're not to blame.

The rhyme just
buggers off.

The figurative language
can't be bothered to get

up of their ar..

A senile simile smiles
wistfully

in a to be or not
to be voice.

The metaphors
have gone on strike.

Oh for Gawd's sake
doesn't anybody know

wot de !%&
they're !%& doing

I ask
using the demotic.

There is a sudden silence...

all that is to be
heard outside

a weeping willow
weeps for me.

How pathetic can one poem
get?

No...don't answer that
it was a rhetorical question!

The words all
look to me

to pass
sentence. . .

I tell them
that's it

( there is a collective
moan )

I'm calling this poem
- off!

The waters slowly recede
From shore, from sand
From coast and land
As the chill wind's blow
Grasps the calm of night
And every fading light's glow
Reflects the rising tide

This hurling wall of death
Unstoppable, with all its rage
Spared no bated breath,
It strikes unforeseen, into a sleepy town
And gushes into barricaded homes
As both opulent and poor fall down
Tearing every hope and gentle tone

The heavens yield and cry
As anguished screams erupted
From both earth and sky
It sweeps away every memory
Those stolen lives had held dear
For none could flee but only fear
The embrace of this surging sea

As dawn begins to stir and rise
It meets the bitter, poignant eyes
While they seek for their life and love
They strive to deny the truth
For the wave had washed their dreams afar,
the debris and loss did declaim
That nature's wrath had left its scar

Vouchsafest Thou?

Do you enjoy the word "vouchsafe" as much
As I?  It isn't as musical as the phrase
"Thence forward," or “joylich,” “leman,” and such
Or "confusticate," - who says that these days?

“Wherefore,” “abroche,” let us now celebrate
“Antic” English words: “aforetime,” “perforce”
“Slowcoach,” “freshet”, “befall” - at this late date?
And dear “daffadowndilley” (but of course!)

“Declaim,” “forsooth,” “marchwarden,” and “descry,”
And let us not forget the sweet “day’s-eye!”

". . .THE WONDROUS ARCHITECTURE OF THE WORLDE. . "

I laugh
the road over the Hog's Back
closed because....it melted

was the sun ever so
back in your day
eh Kit?

and what do I read
Mr. Marlowe?
why words, Kit, words

that word magician
Dr. Burgess he presumes
to bring you back

to life again
and so it seems
I see your blood Kit

streaming in the firmament
nay only a Deptford sunset
dragged screaming from memory

your blood upon the page Kit...
mere cherry juice it
stains the words

and so to Deptford I
do go
thanks to Madame Remembrance

I a poor
purveyor of poetry
clutching at words

and here
a great reckoning
not  in a little room

but on a lost street
staining the scene
a sickly yellow

and so enough
of Prologue...
Act 1 begins

a smiling ruffian
see his knife smiles too
the blade eager for blood

alas I
in so much pain I
have no fear of death

indeed would welcome
the flicked knife
if it would release me

from my life
a man prepared
to die if it be so

"Come live with me and be
my love..." I doth quote
in my best Passionate Shepard

"Wot?" he wots
scared of my insouciance
the ghost of Marlowe by my side

ahhh he the very villian
a scar from eye to smile
he aims to do the same to me

"Where, rogue... did
they get thee?" I mock
"VILLIANS 'R' US?"

Marlowe's ghost laughs
"Aye lad...aye lad
to him!"

"Only one of us..."
I warn my hellhound
"....will come out of this alive!"

I pause for effect
"And I'm afraid
it won't be( hee hee ) thee!"

I take a determined step
towards my would-be
now trembling killer

who all this wordage
being too much for him
he flees

ahhh the glint of words
defeats the glint of steel
he my would-be-not-to-be-death

"What God or Feend, or spirit of the earth,
Or Monster turned to manly shape
Or of what mould or mettle he be made...?"

I declaim to an audience
of cats and cans and
other streetly filth

I...I. . .unable to
find the next line
and so I etc., etc., etc.

and once more
I am of Guildford yet again
30 years or more away

and there melts a road
upon the Hog's Back
and I laugh to be alive

"Doth teach vs all to have aspyring mindes:
Our soules, whose faculties can comprehend
The wondrous architecture of the worlde.."

With your sudden depart
to keep your
destiny-date,
noons at the Coffee House
will never be
the same again
my friend.

We, your friends
sit at
your select table
to reminisce
the debates dialectical
and your
fervid fervour.

Even now, we sit
dilate & declaim
over steaming
cups of coffee.

The moment
the wall-clock
strikes
the one & a half hour,
we rivet our eyes
to see you enter
and attune our ears
to hear you say " Hello ".

The goings -on now
veer round to
what we said
and did through
your presence.

We still keep
the time of
your departure
2 o'clock.
Which reminds us
that you're not
going to come
forever and forever.

You have depression, contact a declaim. Be certitude, it is quotidian. It is all about ingenuity and try to cull and have some sublime.
Seek help of a savant who will acquiesce and will do eclectic.
It is all about namby-pamby or ennui. If it's not inexorable will not be living peacefully.

No one wants tomorrow
For today's joy assuge the sorrow
Even the moon proscribe no friend to the sun.
Now tell me why man invented gun?

Oyin I shall not believe you
Tell the sun why he shouldn't give way to the moon?
Before you was you
Begging and slaughtering taste of honey Moon's

I shall not believe you Oyin
Plucking your linden like my ancestors
Putting me on the majestic peak of love colour
My faith would declaim you before the win

Wreck me with the mirror of your jaunty mien
It kindly reflects what would be at dawn
Don't make me laugh and lack behind men
In your hollow mind narrow as the lawn

Thus will furrow at your **** and wear
I vow high the hill on nothing to fear
I shall not call you honey twice
For a reason and giving no one is nice

Fear not you ogre to ogle me down your throat.
I thought you are nun but tranquil goat
When your mellow voice militate their thoughts,
I renounce my faith to your remiss and gutt

I knew a girl who wore dark clothes,
Who would not, could not, speak in prose.
She could, of course, declaim in rhyme,
For many hours at a time..

No thoughts prosaic or profane
Had anyone heard her exclaim.
Just poetry poured forth from her like wine;
a vintage nuanced and sublime.

She did not gossip, curse or tweet.
In matters of the heart, she was discreet.
I was her muse, she said. She, mine.
Her love for me, a gift divine.

We danced in silence without a word
To music only we two had heard.
She charmed my heart with every rhyme
In English, French, or American sign

Was this a talent? – Or a Curse?
I married that girl for better or verse.

The world has ended.
Few survivors gathered
round the fire in their camp
before the night has come,
and flooded the earth with her presence

Then, one man, without any hurry,
breathed the evening air filled
with cicadas sounds, and stood up.
He sat on the boulder beside the cracking wood and weeds,
and started to declaim poems,
and no one interrputed,
everyone listened

COUNTING WITHOUT NUMBERS

a great crowd of hes and shes
slightly more shes than hes
so my tiny daughter tells me

there is apparently more mens
with beards than there is
mens without beards

she's at this stage where
everything has to be
counted...held accountable for itself

her terminology is still
more thans and less thans and
an abstract science

her method is to point and declaim
"There's one....there's another and
another and another and another!"

this annoys the life out of
her mother but
delights me

soon tired of all this
"counting"
she sleeps softly against my shoulder

her breath
tickles
my neck

she my one
and only
a million times over