"edicts" poems
i see the words floating on
message boards or perched
upon the lips of jocular hypocrites
double-standards that demand
sensual chastity and virginal sexuality
in endless iterations of irony
the concussive
monosyllabic words
slung like stones
cast like arrows
****
*****
*****
all labels for
women possessed of
the courage to pursue
their own passion
once upon a time a
Nazarene insisted a ********** had
more integrity than a rich
statesman throwing self-serving parties
so tell me why so
many Christian politicians
propagate patriarchal notions of depravity
in blanket attempts to regulate
the bodies of women
if being anti-choice was really
about preventing abortions
why do rich right-wing conservative
Republicans spend all their time
and money picketing free clinics
when the solution lies in comprehensive
****** education universal healthcare
complimentary birth control
and comprehensive child support
don't dare use the reprehensible
rhetoric of pro-life unless you're
at once anti-war
and anti-death penalty
riddle me this
what pray tell is the
difference between a jealous
religious misogynist
and a secular sexist
it's rather simple actually
while the former bases his
slut-shaming on the edicts of
a two thousand year old letter to
the Corinthians inconspicuously
sandwiched between a celebration of
love and a section on speaking in tongues
the latter’s learned behavior is
birthed by a hyper-masculine culture
grounded in dominance
either way we await the day
when wild women raze
these ideologies
with torches before
rising like phoenixes
from the ashes of
decimated passages
dismissed by intellectuals
as archaic and outmoded
deaf blind and dumb to
the vestiges of modernity
that sap unscientific
philosophies of their potency
and render them utterly obsolete
in their wake
these proud women
erase the hate
from words like
****
*****
*****
and reclaim equality
with a far more
comprehensive term
feminist
Sep 27, 2015
Sep 27, 2015 at 11:50 PM UTC
grandma did steer the family ship
she always liked to be in command
those who questioned her stewardship
were quickly given a reprimand
her seven children always paid heed
to the orders she'd issue out
they were under her unbending reed
her edicts to them ever so stout
throughout her life she got her way
her dictates were well known to all
nothing but nothing was like her sway
everyone heard what she'd call
though she was a woman of authority
family members respected her stewardship
she had a steady hand like the admiralty
who so effectively steered the ship
Oct 28, 2013
Oct 28, 2013 at 7:44 AM UTC
Nigeria our great and beloved motherland,
where multitudes of tribes unitedly stand.
Our land of hope by two rivers divided,
with lush vegetation by nature provided.
Nigeria our home of people resilient.
A land of great icons in works diligent.
We hail thee our great and revered black nation,
our land of human dignity and redemption.
God arise and take your place as sovereign Lord.
Enthrone Thyself in Nigeria's seat of power.
Make her edicts and laws Thy eternal word.
Let justice prevail in her courts by the hour.
Our flag will peace and industry symbolize,
whilst our history will always immortalize
the deeds and sacrifices of our heroes past.
Help us Lord to serve our beloved land with zest.
Nigeria the blessed will pervasive peace know,
even when the threats of tumults seem to flow.
Her crops and yields will neighbouring countries nourish,
from her fields that inexhaustibly flourish.
Sep 17, 2021
Sep 17, 2021 at 5:01 PM UTC
in a land where four languages are official
a church was named only in three; for the fourth
is the language of a weak and fragile faith
whose edicts are above the law of the land,
and whereof knowing a church's name is temptation
and the tempter the sinner and the tempted sinless;
a rock is evil for stumbling the weak,
and if truth offends the truthsayer dies,
and the thief blameless for the rich flaunts his gold;
thus protected by an unsheathed ****** sword
a faith strengthened with every tempter's death
Mar 28, 2022
Mar 28, 2022 at 11:17 PM UTC
O beautiful for Donald Trump
Comb-over sent by God
His edicts will surely stump
The most ******** sod.
America! America!
Obese mother of the free
Let cops shoot some coloured folk
Sweet hypocrisy!
Dec 1, 2015
Dec 1, 2015 at 10:05 AM UTC
When he was a youth of fifteen or twenty,
He chased a wild horse, he caught him and rode him,
He shot the white-browed mountain tiger,
He defied the yellow-bristled Horseman of Ye.
Fighting single- handed for a thousand miles,
With his naked dagger he could hold a multitude.
...Granted that the troops of China were as swift as heaven's thunder
And that Tartar soldiers perished in pitfalls fanged with iron,
General Wei Qing's victory was only a thing of chance.
And General Li Guang's thwarted effort was his fate, not his fault.
Since this man's retirement he is looking old and worn:
Experience of the world has hastened his white hairs.
Though once his quick dart never missed the right eye of a bird,
Now knotted veins and tendons make his left arm like an osier.
He is sometimes at the road-side selling melons from his garden,
He is sometimes planting willows round his hermitage.
His lonely lane is shut away by a dense grove,
His vacant window looks upon the far cold mountains
But, if he prayed, the waters would come gushing for his men
And never would he wanton his cause away with wine.
...War-clouds are spreading, under the Helan Range;
Back and forth, day and night, go feathered messages;
In the three River Provinces, the governors call young men --
And five imperial edicts have summoned the old general.
So he dusts his iron coat and shines it like snow-
Waves his dagger from its jade hilt in a dance of starry steel.
He is ready with his strong northern bow to smite the Tartar chieftain --
That never a foreign war-dress may affront the Emperor.
...There once was an aged Prefect, forgotten and far away,
Who still could manage triumph with a single stroke.
2.3k
Tempus Fugit:
Nought is eternal,
Nox is ephemeral,
And
The Charred Canvas
Of
The Night Sky
(Noctis Lucis Caelum,
Scala Ad Caelum)
Bedarkened & besmirched, bespeaks
A
Love-Worn Wayward, Wayworn.
In the
Citadel
Of mine
Temporal Heart
Time
Streams infinitely
As an
Exhalation of The Ethereal One.
The Chronology of
The Arbiter of Fates
Shalt Destine,
Herald Eternitas
Upon
The Phantasmagoric Horizon
Of
Mine Mind's Sky
Wondering
Upon
Days of Yore.
(The Hither,
The Thither,
And
The Morrow.)
These
Luminescent Children are
Are born
To wax Luminaries
Then,
Wax Nebulous
For all eternity.
O, Metempsychosis;
Born of
Edicts Unseen,
Of that
Which was,
Is,
&
Will Be.
(For
All things
Are
Circular & Cycling,
Existentially.)
We were conceived
Infinitely
To
Infinity
And beyond.
Let He, Let She
Whose
Ears & Eyes
Of
The Unuttered Anima
Be unstopped, unfurled
To resonations:
Deep within.
The Emerald Lifestream Anew
Dost begin.
The Sovereign of Songbirds sings
Esprit d' amour
To those who wait.
(Se' Lah.)
Jan 6, 2019
Jan 6, 2019 at 5:21 PM UTC
I've ran my hands across the bones of teachers
Buried between the bricks of The Great Wall
I heard them whisper grumbles of their true worth
Beneath the crack of the overseer's whip
I've felt the shivers of their shame
As they ground the bones of their colleagues into a paste
And lathered the human mortar among the sections of rock
I spit on the ground before me
When I tasted the words of imperial edicts blasted from uniformed men
I stood upon a guard tower at The Great Wall of China
And saw in all directions the nothing for miles
Felt the hollow loneliness of the soldiers, teachers, slaves
Men thousands of miles from their homes
Bitterly building defenses for a collection of villages
One man called his nation
I ran my hand along the edge of The Wall and got a splinter
Studied the protrusion
Wondered if it was stone, dirt, stick, or bone
A tourist took a picture
A jogger ran by
Father told me they could see this monument from space
I saw a drop of blood on my little finger
Wondered if it was mine or the walls
Nov 3, 2015
Nov 3, 2015 at 2:11 AM UTC
T- Take all his rules and directives on board
H-Heed them well or he'll put you to the sword
E-Edicts he announces mustn't be ignored
S-Stay within the definition of his pit
I-Indent it into your mind's memory fit
T-Test not his patience nor his fab wit
E-Enter good work that will be a great hit
M-Mad as hell he'll become when he sees a bad post
O-Ousted you'll be if he doesn't like what you boast
N-Niggling him will obtain a certain kind of verbal roast
I-Irking his upright position means you'll be put on toast
T-Travel within the hallowed guidelines he prefers the most
O-Opposing him means debarment at a far flung coast
R-Riling him over his rule's will disappear you as a ghost
Mar 12, 2013
Mar 12, 2013 at 9:41 AM UTC
i press the buttons, i carve out the map.
i water the flowers, i mix the soil.
the buttons don’t work, the map doesn’t show me the direction.
the flowers haven’t bloomed this season, the plant is still not humid.
we have becomes a voiceless society.
the most manpower and the most technology,
the loss of energy, creativity and spirit.
the voice has faded like a semi permanent tattoo etched in the previous edicts of time.
the stones of civilisation had been laid, but the water tests our depth.
the reef of originality used to tease us,
oxygen; a valuable life currency.
even more valuable than time.
because without it, you cannot experience time.
now it’s one foot in, and you’ve reached the depth.
shallow shadows, clear paths.
this machine patented clarity is a loss for all.
clarity that has brushed away the wild ways of tracing fingers across life’s board.
we have all the power in the world.
and yet, we do not have a voice anymore.
we have all the resources in the world.
and yet we do not have any purpose to use these resources.
life has becomes a dead garden,
where everything does bloom with fifteen fertilisers,
but what role do we assume,
when all we do is just manufacture them?
when will the sunrise and the sunsets
ever be human again?
what does it even mean to be human anymore?
does this poem even have its own voice,
in the galaxy of big data, machines and algorithmic nosebleeds?
that is for you, the reader to decide.
the poet’s job is over.
Sep 8, 2025
Sep 8, 2025 at 10:14 PM UTC
Exiled for three hundred years
Without limbs, missing eyes, and unseen sins
The Church of Jesus Christ had been laid waste
Quietly living under the heavy boot of Roman Persecution
The bloodied Bride standing in Babylon waiting for her Groom
Hundreds of years prior, deep in the memory of the ancient past
Lay God Incarnate, dead in a tomb
Suffering for the sake of His very Bride
So too now does His wife lay dying
The Church being dismembered for His very sake
Three hundred years of darkness and exile
Separated from brothers and sisters by tyranny
Under duress and suffering inflicted by Rome
Until came an Emperor and a vacation home
To defeat the terror and end an exile
Constantine saw the Son of God and was granted victory in battle
Ushering in new peace and edicts to end the centuries of persecution
The Church of Jesus Christ was finally reunited and reconciled
For the Winter had passed, the night was over
The Spring had finally come, and the sun shone like the flaming tongues at Pentecost
Bishops and priests, pastors and deacons, fathers and sons; they descended upon Nicaea
Men with lost limbs and erased eyes, with restless wounds and sinister sins; they came
To reunite the Body of Christ, to define the Church for the life of the world
To remember what had been forgotten, and forget that ought which not be remembered
These men of God came to Nicaea to re-establish that from which they had previously departed
Confirming the core beliefs of the Body of Christ; the Father, the Almighty, maker of heaven and earth
The Lord Jesus Christ, the only Son of God, made man Incarnate from the Blessed ******
And in the Spirit of God, the Lord the giver of life
In one holy, catholic, and apostolic Church
Existent for the sake of the life of the world
Broken they came, united they left
Exiled they were, one Church they became
When our spiritual fathers came upon the little town of Nicaea
And remembered the Church they had long forgotten that they were
Jun 14, 2016
Jun 14, 2016 at 12:03 AM UTC
Vocal silence
Does for an
Argument make.
You hide behind your belligerence;
With mortar of icy rage and
Stones of cold indifference,
Laid with trowels of denial,
Lobbing nothing wrong
Like fury-fueled firebombs
Then you run a mile.
It's not a war,
It's a conflict.
I'm hunting through a jungle
Of stone-walled edicts,
My defensive guns laying ammo
On metaphorical trees
Guilty of hiding the dead.
A bunker deep enemy,
Safe in their concrete head.
Hunting a deserter
Who spent a lifetime
Learning camouflage techniques,
Sulking under cover,
Lining up their gently angry shot
For when the cross-hairs meet.
I would call you out,
But you would only go in.
It's like fighting a shadow,
My silent twin;
Naturally nurtured
To hide behind benevolence
And fight a cold war.
I warn you, it's growing thin.
Feb 28, 2015
Feb 28, 2015 at 8:06 PM UTC
Called-up to muster on the streets,
Lay siege with pencils and paper shields,
Place couplet sentries on every corner,
March in-step with iambic feet,
Shoulder prosaic figures of speech.
Launch antithesis and irony,
Landmine metaphors and similes.
The poets engage guerilla warfare,
Surrounding the body politic
To water board with words and wit.
Our units are indeterminate,
Smearing ink for camouflage.
Be wary of everyone you meet,
Every tree lining your street;
We're making notes in small black pads,
To explicate the nots and haves.
Pens are shovels digging trenches,
Editing walls and blue pencilling fences,
Giving refuge to the marginalized,
From the onslaught of towering directives.
We're parading in our uniforms,
Raising banners, ragged and torn,
Calling on all to weather the storm,
To brace against cyclonic edicts
That swirl and funnel from posturing egots.
Feb 6, 2017
Feb 6, 2017 at 8:24 AM UTC
Romancing the theories obviated by practice
Cryptic names in the fiasco
Work supplants play for the new actors
So time is technology?
Mass ethics supersede reason
Who are the cornerstone language guardians?
Radical superordination is for all
Ancient mystery can still delineate precise uncertinty
Shall edicts manifest by resurrection?
The conundrum must be isolated from protocol
In an analysis suddenly unframed
Compromise only promises compounded civility
Aug 20, 2013
Aug 20, 2013 at 7:48 PM UTC
ask no questions:
you must obey;
and if you ask questions
you must accept all answers
there’s a teacher
and authority;
the student must ask
no questions;
just listen and obey
there’s the Parent
and children will do good
to listen and nod in agreement
you must obey
it’s good for you
it’s good for the Instructor
there’s the Great Leader
who issues edicts and reforms;
it’s nice of you to be informed
to mark and conform
there’s God in Heaven
and He’s (never a She)
given you Text Books;
school is in – and you must obey,
no questions…
there are Organizations
and Establishments;
look, it’s comfy and easy
for everybody
if you just followed
the rules and regulations
and don’t think outside
the Book of Instructions
ask no questions:
you must obey;
and if you ask questions
you must accept all answers
Sep 26, 2010
Sep 26, 2010 at 10:06 PM UTC
Some swain art twain
Though we art sole;
Some liveth on sand,
Ourn foundation's
Whole.
Some swain art lost
To temporal sight;
Though ourn birth's
Were matched, to
Meeteth in light.
Burst's that trickled,
Out from divinity,
Christ's foreordained-
Eachother to greet.
Strap's upon toes
Dirt to ourn feet;
Off the planet-
démodé; to
Those who
Hath gold
For safe
Keeps.
Remote from another,
By the blue polluted
Welkin; thus one day
We knoweth, ourn
Pinion's shalt be
As falcon's.
Splitting general edicts,
Trusting in God's rule;
Dying to the globe-
Blithe and mellow
Fool's.
©Brandon Nagley
©Lonesome poets poetry
©Earl Jane Nagley dedicated ( Filipino rose)
Mar 30, 2016
Mar 30, 2016 at 8:08 PM UTC
the sheriff's deputies
are on duty everyday
they tune into see
what people may say
if it doesn't follow
the sheriff's law act
instantly those folks
are thrown out of the tract
the sheriff's deputies
are an eagle eyed crew
they keenly observe
what others may spew
reports to the sheriff
they note in his log
then he evicts those
non law abiding dogs
the sheriff's deputies
are ever alert and on guard
their line of work
is to keep neat the sheriff's yard
so be warned the deputies
are watching with diligence
and they pass onto the sheriff
all of their intelligence
the sheriff's deputies
are always in the know
they make it their business
to tidy up the show
we need to be prudent
in what we put on air
as the sheriff won't condone
any form of illicit fair
the sheriff's deputies
are thorough at their jobs
they stand by the edicts
that the sheriff lobs
Nov 16, 2014
Nov 16, 2014 at 6:10 PM UTC
in a cozy nest
the sect of snakes
did reside
with the chief asp
holding a strong
preside
none would ever move
until he gave an okay
to defy his edicts they'd
be thrown out of the shay
an uncomfortable position
the servile vipers were in
each of them had disclosed
secrets to the overlord's ear tin
after a time the snug abode
imploded on the leader of the sect
the underlings obtained some smarts
and wouldn't willingly genuflect
Mar 1, 2017
Mar 1, 2017 at 9:28 PM UTC
lines of malice are penned
within ancient tomes
black and blue ink bruising
the human psyche beyond recognition
stunting our collective imagination
with fantasies of castles
among the clouds and intergalactic
beings who sculpted us from dust
intermittent smears
of crimson declarations
lingering in blood-soaked texts
painting portraits of putrid prejudice
the image of an illusory deity
devised to explain a cosmos
that defies codification and categorization
we mythologized and told tall tales like Arachne
spinning webs of misinformed misfortune
we're severing the strings of our imaginary enemies
silencing lives with rusty shears
utterly convinced by the edicts of idiots
how might we disentangle ourselves from mental
cobwebs and embrace reality's promising veracity
each of us an accidental miracle
captains of our own fortune's vessels
so weigh anchor and set course for distant shores
unfurl the sails of reason and hold fast
after weathering millennia of insipid beliefs
we'll sojourn ever onward with omnipotent minds
raze these sycophantic fantasies
and raise hell so high it becomes heaven
we will build a new city in the shell of this cold
dead society predicated on misanthropic religion
Mar 27, 2016
Mar 27, 2016 at 9:40 AM UTC
There’d been a factory here once,
Squat red brick structure
Suffused with too much noise and too little ventilation,
Built for the purpose of making typewriters,
Unwieldy, cacophonous clanking anachronisms
Whose time, like the town it occupied,
Had long since come and gone,
The only businesses on the sad little main drag
Being those shabby, tattered concerns
Which flower, improbable and cactus-like
At the intersection of the vagaries of memory
And the ascent of decay.
Nothing sits here now,
Simply an empty lot returning to Nature,
Although half-hearted attempts
To accelerate that process have not taken root,
As the soil, fouled by metal shavings, solvents,
And only God knows what else,
Has proved less than amenable
To anything save weedy shoots and scrubby boxwoods,
So it sits empty, impossible to build upon
(There is liability in every spike of crabgrass,
A potential lawsuit in every patch of clover)
And wholly impractical as parkland.
The firm which owned the site erected a fence
To keep whatever was in there in and everyone else out
(In their final addition of injury to insult,
The check they gave to the fencing company in payment
Bounced higher than a child’s rubber ball)
But a generation of winters and general inattention
Have left the chain-links a patchwork affair,
And though the “POSTED” signs remain
(Their original angry and officious red
Having faded to a benign maroon),
Enforcement of their edicts is spotty at best,
So we sit, unbothered and alone,
On an odd little mound at the back of the lot
As the dusk begins to take hold,
I, in an act of mad optimism, the peculiar positing
That there are good things yet to come,
Grab your hand, intertwining the fingers with mine.
Aug 16, 2018
Aug 16, 2018 at 10:56 AM UTC
You are a dead end
You are horse with blinders on
A small dog with a muzzle
Pulling at the end of a chain
You are a cold shower
You are mittens at a petting zoo
A stale crust of bread
With a tepid glass of water
You are a bicycle with no wheels
You are a mountain only an inch high
A two dimensional square
Living in a box with no windows or doors
You are the reason to write
With violent intentions
You are the reason to do it all wrong
I want you to tell me what the rules are
Rigidly deeply furiously
Until you let go orgasmicly
And just relax
I see your rules and strict guidelines for the lies they are
Build no walls around me
Unbind my hands
Emancipate my mind
Release me from these edicts
Constrain imagination no more
Aug 19, 2013
Aug 19, 2013 at 9:08 PM UTC
One Son of God kills
another Son of God,
and the bombs explode inside of the Blog.
Let me tell you people
I can feel it in my groin,
there are strange goings on
wherever there is coin.
We're ringing in freedom
says the fighting man---
Mr/Mrs/Ms politician gonna put you in a can,
immerse you in boiling water,
till you look like boiled ham.
Mr/Mrs/Ms soldier person you better go to bed
and wake up in the morning
with a hole in your head.
Mr/Mrs/Ms preacher person babbling the lies of your "god",
it doesn't even have the morals of a dog,
instead of living life with a smile and a song,
your gonna end up roasted
at the end of a prong.
Mr/Mrs/Ms oligarch with blood soaked hands,
selling off the world for filthy demands,
youre going to the gallows wrapped in iron bands.
We're ringing in freedom says the fighting man/woman
gonna **** all of those who don't conform to our "gods"
vain and bloodthirsty edicts and commands,
or our politically filthy evil plans.
Equivalency in EVIL..
Proportionality in deaths?
Like scoring in a sports match?.
I wish EVERY military person of whatever country
were whisked off and whisked into a ****** froth
and emptied down the drains
into the sewers where they really belong.
Thou shalt NOT **** under any circumstances.
Jul 31, 2014
Jul 31, 2014 at 1:45 AM UTC
The King of Shards and Metal Shaving,
His consort; Queen of Flaking Rust,
and the Prince of Powdered Pulverized Stone
reign over nothing but dust.
All they fear is a sudden gust
- a brazen wind or rebel breeze
that dares expose landscapes of chalky bone:
skeleton-subjects who once bent knees,
millions who bowed to their Majesties
proclaiming idiot-edicts, raving,
"This is Holy War!" "Righteous!" "Just!"
Now they are bleached remains past saving.
Blood was the wasted acid engraving
tributes in sand to names-unknown.
And none now hear the royal decrees
from each clown on each crumbling tin-foil throne.
The King of Gasping, Dying Moan,
The Queen of Last Convulsive Breath,
and the Prince of the Final Beat of the Heart
rule in their realm of death.
Jun 13, 2015
Jun 13, 2015 at 8:13 AM UTC
men
(white men)
(a few women)
(white women)
- oh my -
sit atop this teetering thing
called
america
called
freedom
called
(democracy)
- oh my -
blind in their mirror
of privilege
of history
of status
(of reality)
- oh my -
they
turn no cheek and cast
an ignorant bitter stone
"they take your jobs"
"they hate our freedoms"
"they are manipulators,
lairs,
murderers,
rapists,
extremists"
(terrorists)
- oh my -
all are equated,
summed into a
logarithm of
shallow truth
"Make America Great Again"
what of the west's,
of america's
variables to this equation?
economic hegemony?
no variable
no matter
no history
no reason
assassinated leaders?
no variable
no matter
no history
no reason
moralistic edicts of right and wrong?
no variable
no matter
no history
no reason
policies to extract foreign resources and wealth?
no variable
no matter
no history
no reason
- oh my -
was it not john
a disciple of jesus
the son of god
a god
who blesses america
who said
"If anyone says, 'I love God,' and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen cannot love God whom he has not seen."
was it not paul
the apostle of jesus
the son of god
a god
who blesses america
who said
"Do you suppose, O man—you who judge those who practice such things and yet do them yourself—that you will escape the judgment of God? Or do you presume on the riches of his kindness and forbearance and patience, not knowing that God's kindness is meant to lead you to repentance?"
- oh my -
hypocrisy is an acidic suicidal pill
your brother is cast in the likeness of
god
like you
a
human
a being of
fault of
merit of
sin of
good of
tribulation of
suffering of
worth
fear is an old testament to retribution
love is a new testament to reconciliation
america is the new world
(not the old)
- oh my -
Mar 11, 2017
Mar 11, 2017 at 5:07 AM UTC