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Bouazizi’s heavy eyelids parted as the Muezzin recited the final call for the first Adhan of the day.

“As-salatu Khayrun Minan-nawm”
Prayer is better than sleep

Rising from the torment of another restless night, Bouazizi wiped the sleep from his droopy eyes as his feet touched the cold stone floor.

Throughout the frigid night, the devilish jinn did their work, eagerly jabbing away at Bouazizi with pointed sticks, tormenting his troubled conscience with the worry of his nagging indebtedness. All night the face of the man Bouazizi owed money to haunted him. Bouazizi could see the man’s greasy lips and brown teeth jawing away, inches from his face. He imagined chubby caffeine stained fingers reaching toward him to grab some dinars from Bouazizi’s money box.

Bouazizi turned all night like he was sleeping on a board of spikes. His prayers for a restful night again went unanswered. The pall of a blue fatigue would shadow Bouazizi for most of the day.

Bouazizi’s weariness was compounded by a gnawing hunger. By force of habit, he grudgingly opened the food cupboard with the foreknowledge that it was almost bare. Bouazizi’s premonition proved correct as he surveyed a meager handful of chickpeas, some eggs and a few sparse loaves. It was just enough to feed his dependant family; younger brothers and sisters, cousins and a terminally disabled uncle. That left nothing for Bouazizi but a quick jab to his empty gut. He would start this day without breakfast.

Bouazizi made a living as a street vendor. He hustles to survive. Bouazizi’s father died in a construction accident in Libya when he was three. Since the age of 10, Bouazizi had pushed a cart through the streets of Sidi Bouzid; selling fruit at the public market just a few blocks from the home that he has lived in for almost his entire life.

At 27 years of age, Bouazizi has wrestled the beast of deprivation since his birth. To date, he has bravely fought it to a standstill; but day after day the multi-headed hydra of life has snapped at him. He has squarely met the eyes of the beast with fortitude and resolve; but the sharp fangs of a hardscrabble life has sunken deep into Bouazizi’s spleen. The unjust rules of society are powerful claws that slash away at his flesh, bleeding him dry: while the spiked tendrils of poverty wrap Bouazizi’s neck, seeking to strangle him.

Bouazizi is a workingman hero; a skilled warrior in the fight for daily bread. He is accustomed to living a life of scarcity. His daily deliverance is the grace of another day of labor and the blessed wages of subsistence.

Though Allah has blessed this man with fortitude the acuteness of terminal want and the constant struggle to survive has its limits for any man; even for strong champions like Bouazizi.

This morning as Bouazizi washed he peered into a mirror, closely examining new wrinkles on his stubble strewn face. He fingered his deep black curls dashed with growing streaks of gray. He studied them through the gaze of heavy bloodshot eyes. He looked upward as if to implore Allah to salve the bruises of daily life.

Bouazizi braced himself with the splash of a cold water slap to his face. He wiped his cheeks clean with the tail of his shirt. He dipped his toothbrush into a box of baking powder and scoured an aching back molar in need of a root canal. Bouazizi should see a dentist but it is a luxury he cannot afford so he packed an aspirin on top of the infected tooth. The dissolving aspirin invaded his mouth coating his tongue with a bitter effervescence.

Bouazizi liked the taste and was grateful for the expectation of a dulled pain. He smiled into the mirror to check his chipped front tooth while pinching a cigarette **** from an ashtray. The roach had one hit left in it. He lit it with a long hard drag that consumed a good part of the filter. Bouazizi’s first smoke of the day was more filter then tobacco but it shocked his lungs into the coughing flow of another day.

Bouazizi put on his jacket, slipped into his knockoff NB sneakers and reached for a green apple on a nearby table. He took a big bite and began to chew away the pain of his toothache.

Bouazizi stepped into the street to catch the sun rising over the rooftops. He believed that seeing the sunrise was a good omen that augured well for that day’s business. A sunbeam braking over a far distant wall bathed Bouazizi in a golden light and illumined the alley where he parked his cart holding his remaining stock of week old apples. He lifted the handles and backed his cart out into the street being extra mindful of the cracks in the cobblestone road. Bouazizi sprained his ankle a week ago and it was still tender. Bouazizi had to be careful not to aggravate it with a careless step. Having successfully navigated his cart into the road, Bouazizi made a skillful U Turn and headed up the street limping toward the market.

A winter chill gripped Bouazizi prompting him to zip his jacket up to his neck. The zipper pinched his Adam’s Apple and a few droplets of blood stained his green corduroy jacket. Though it was cold, Bouazizi sensed that spring would arrive early this year triggering a replay of a recurring daydream. Bouazizi imagined himself behind the wheel of a new van on his way to the market. Fresh air and sunshine pouring through the open windows with the cargo space overflowing with fresh vegetables and fruits.

It was a lifelong ambition of Bouazizi to own a van. He dreamed of buying a six cylinder Dodge Caravan. It would be painted red and he would call it The Red Flame. The Red Flame would be fast and powerful and sport chrome spinners. The Red Flame would be filled with music from a Blaupunkt sound system with kick *** speakers. Power windows, air conditioning, leather seats, a moonroof and plenty of space in the back for his produce would complete Bouazizi’s ride.

The Red Flame would be the vehicle Bouazizi required to expand his business beyond the market square. Bouazizi would sell his produce out of the back of the van, moving from neighborhood to neighborhood. No longer would he have to wait for customers to come to his stand in the market. Bouazizi would go to his customers. Bouazizi and the Red Flame would be known in all the neighborhoods throughout the district. Bouazizi shook his head and smiled thinking about all the girls who would like to take rides in the Red Flame. Bouazizi and his Red Flame would be a sight to be noticed and a force to be reckoned with.

“EEEEEYOWWW” a Mercedes horn angrily honked; jarring Bouazizi from the reverie of his daydream. A guy whipping around the corner like a silver streak stuck his head out the window blasting with music yelling, “Hey Mnayek, watch where you push that *******.”

The music faded as the Mercedes roared away. “Barra nikk okhtek” Bouazizi yelled, raising his ******* in the direction of the vanished car. “The big guys in the fancy cars think the road belongs to them”, Bouazizi mumbled to himself.

The insult ****** Bouazizi off, but he was accustomed to them and as he limped along pushing his cart he distracted himself with the amusement of the ascending sun chasing the fleeting shadows of the night, sending them scurrying down narrow alleyways.

Bouazizi imaged himself a character from his favorite movie. He was a giant Transformer, chasing the black shadows of evil away from the city into the desert. After battling evil and conquering the bad guys, he would transform himself back into the regular Bouazizi; selling his produce to the people as he patrolled the highways of Tunisia in the Red Flame, the music blasting out the windows, the chrome spinners flashing in the sunlight. Bouazizi would remain vigilant, always ready to transform the Red Flame to fight the evil doers.

The bumps and potholes in the road jostled Bouazizi’s load of apples. A few fell out of the wooden baskets and were rolling around in the open spaces of the cart. Bouazizi didn’t want to risk bruising them. Damaged merchandise can’t be sold so he was careful to secure his goods and arrange his cart to appeal to women customers. He made sure to display his prized electronic scale in the corner of the cart for all to see.

Bouazizi had a reputation as a fair and generous dealer who always gave good value to his customers. Bouazizi was also known for his kindness. He would give apples to hungry children and families who could not pay. Bouazizi knew the pain of hunger and it brought him great satisfaction to be able to alleviate it in others.

As a man who valued fairness, Bouazizi was particularly proud of his electronic scale. Bouazizi was certain the new measuring device assured all customers that Bouazizi sold just and correct portions. The electronic scale was Bouazizi’s shining lamp. He trusted it. He hung it from the corner post of his cart like it was the beacon of a lighthouse guiding shoppers through the treachery of an unscrupulous market. It would attract all customers who valued fairness to the safe harbor of Bouazizi’s cart.

The electronic scale is Bouazizi’s assurance to his customers that the weights and measures of electronic calculation layed beyond any cloud of doubt. It is a fair, impartial and objective arbiter for any dispute.

Bouazizi believed that the fairness of his scale would distinguish his stand from other produce vendors. Though its purchase put Bouazizi into deep debt, the scale was a source of pride for Bouazizi who believed that it would help his profits to increase and help him to achieve his goal of buying the Red Flame.

As Bouazizi pushed his cart toward the market, he mulled his plan over in his mind for the millionth time. He wasn't great in math but he was able to calculate his financial situation with a degree of precision. His estimations triggered worries that his growing debt to money lenders may be difficult to payoff.

Indebtedness pressed down on Bouazizi’s chest like a mounting pile of stones. It was the source of an ever present fear coercing Bouazizi to live in a constant state of anxiety. His business needed to grow for Bouazizi to get a measure of relief and ultimately prosper from all his hard work. Bouazizi was driven by urgency.

The morning roil of the street was coming alive. Bouazizi quickened his step to secure a good location for his cart at the market. Car horns, the spewing diesel from clunking trucks, the flatulent roar of accelerating buses mixed with the laughs and shrieks of children heading to school composed the rising crescendo of the city square.

As he pushed through the market, Bouazizi inhaled the aromatic eddies of roasting coffee floating on the air. It was a pleasantry Bouazizi looked forward to each morning. The delicious wafts of coffee mingling with the crisp aroma of baking bread instigated a growl from Bouazizi’s empty stomach. He needed to get something to eat. After he got money from his first sale he would by a coffee and some fried dough.

Activity in the market was vigorous, punctuated by the usual arguments of petty territorial disputes between vendors. The disagreements were always amicably resolved, burned away in rising billows of roasting meats and vegetables, the exchange of cigarettes and the plumes of tobacco smoke rising as emanations of peace.

Bouazizi skillfully maneuvered his cart through the market commotion. He slid into his usual space between Aaban and Aameen. His good friend Aaban sold candles, incense, oils and sometimes his wife would make cakes to sell. Aameen was the markets most notorious jokester. He sold hardware and just about anything else he could get his hands on.

Aaban was already burning a few sticks of jasmine incense. It helped to attract customers. The aroma defined the immediate space with the pleasant bouquet of a spring garden. Bouazizi liked the smell and appreciated the increased traffic it brought to his apple cart.

“Hey Basboosa#, do you have any cigarettes?“, Aameen asked as he pulled out a lighter. Bouazizi shook the tip of a Kent from an almost empty pack. Aameen grabbed the cigarette with his lips.

“That's three cartons of Kents you owe me, you cheap *******.” Bouazizi answered half jokingly. Aameen mumbled a laugh through a grin tightly gripping the **** as he exhaled smoke from his nose like a fire breathing dragon. Bouazizi also took out a cigarette for himself.

“Aameem, give me a light”, Bouazizi asked.

Aameen tossed him the lighter.

“Keep it Basboosa. I got others.” Aameen smiled as he showed off a newly opened box of disposable lighters to sell on his stand.

“Made in China, Basboosa. They make everything cheap and colorful. I can make some money with these.”

Bouazizi lit his next to last cigarette. He inhaled deeply. The smoke chased away the cool air in Bouazizi’s lungs with a shot of a hot nicotine rush.

“Merci Aameen” Bouazizi answered. He put the lighter into the almost empty cigarette pack and put it into his hip pocket. The lighter would protect his last cigarette from being crushed.

The laughter and shouts of the bazaar, the harangue of radio voices shouting anxious verses of Imam’s exhorting the masses to submit and the piecing ramble of nondescript AM music flinging piercing unintelligible static surrounded Bouazizi and his cart as he waited for his first customers of the day.

Bouazizi sensed a nervous commotion rise along the line of vendors. A crowd of tourists and locals milling about parted as if to avoid a slithering asp making its way through their midst. The hoots of vendors and the cackle of the crowd made its way to Bouazizi’s knowing ear. He knew what was coming. It was nothing more then another shakedown by city officials acting as bagmen for petty municipal bureaucrats. They claim to be checking vendor licences but they’re just making the rounds collecting protection money from the vendors. Pocketing bribes and payoffs is the municipal authorities idea of good government. They are skilled at using the power of their office to extort tribute from the working poor.

Bouazizi made the mistake of making eye contact with Madame Hamdi. As the municipal authority in charge of vendors and taxis Madame Hamdi held sway over the lives of the street vendors. She relished the power she had over the men who make a meager living selling goods in the square; and this morning she was moving through the market like a bloodhound hot on the trail of an escaped convict. Two burly henchmen lead the way before her. Bouazizi knew Madame Hamdi’s hounds were coming for him.

Bouazizi knew he was ******. Having just made a payment to his money lender, Bouazizi had no extra dinars to grease the palm of Madame Hamdi. He grabbed the handle bars of his cart to make an escape; but Madame Hamdi cut him off and got right into into Bouazizi’s face.

“Ah little Basboosa where are you going? she asked with the tone of playful contempt.

“I suppose you still have no license to sell, ah Basboosa?” Madame Hamdi questioned with the air of a soulless inquisitor.

“You know Madame Hamdi, cart vendors do not need a license.” Bouazizi feebly protested, not daring to look into her eyes.

“Basboosa, you know we can overlook your violations with a small fine for your laxity” a dismissive Madame Hamdi offered.

Bouazizi’s sense of guilt would not permit him to lift his eyes. His head remained bowed. Bouazizi stood convicted of being one of the impoverished.

“I have no spare dinars to offer Madame Hamdi, My pockets are empty, full of holes. My money falls into everyone’s palm but my own. I’m sorry Madame Hamdi. I’ll take my cart home”. He lifted the handlebars in an attempt to escape. One of Madame Hamdi’s henchmen stepped in front of his cart while the other pushed Bouazizi away from it.

“Either you pay me a vendor tax for a license or I will confiscate your goods Basboosa”, Madame Hamdi warned as she lifted Bouazizi’s scale off its hook.

“This will be the first to go”, she said grinning as she examined the scale. “We’ll just keep this.”
Like a mother lion protecting a defenseless cub from the snapping jaws of a pack of ravenous hyenas, Bouazizi lunged to retrieve his prized scale from the clutches of Madame Hamdi. Reaching for it, he touched the scale with his fingertips just as Madame Hamdi delivered a vicious slap to Bouazizi’s cheek. It halted him like a thunderbolt from Zeus.

A henchman overturned Bouazizi’s cart, scatter
Three years ago today Muhammad Bouazizi set himself on fire igniting the Jasmine Revolution in Tunisia sparking the Arab Spring Uprisings of 2011.
Chris Chronister Oct 2013
Twenty-six times the bells will chime today
Tragedy lives where apathy is sought
Gazing outside I see no children play
Tears which we shed in a glass are now caught

The tears are now saved and we will have drink
Twenty-six times we have pain to swallow
Tragedy's cup compels fairness to shrink
And fragmented hearts embrace the sorrow

When the cup runs over we start to drown
On the sadness we invited to come
And jewels we place in tragedy's crown
Provide the reason we will mourn for some

As we choke on sorrow with awareness
Ponder the elusiveness of fairness

© Christopher Chronister. All rights reserved
A sonnet written about my feelings after the Newtown shootings.
Eden Tucay Aug 2016

Hindi lahat ng prinsipyo ay tama gaano man ito kapositibo. Ang kawastuhan ng bawat prinsipyo at pananaw ay naaayon sa: panahon, tao, katangian at kakayanan nito, konkretong kalagayan at kung minsa'y kasama pati ang kulturang kinabibilanagan.
Kaya ang sabihing "wag **** masyadong seryosohin ang buhay" o kung ano pang mga kasabihan, ay maaaring tama at mali, ayon sa mga nabanggit.
Ano't ano pa man, ikaw pa rin ang huling magpapasya. Ano man ang maging pananaw ng ilan sa iyo, ituring **** ito'y bahagi lamang ng buhay...ng buhay mo at hindi nila.

4/1/2016 - Hindi porke nagiisa malungkot na. Dahil mas malungkot kung nakiki-high five ka sa lahat pero pag talikod mo fina-**** u ka na pala.

4/4/2016 - kahit ano pang sabihin nila, mas masarap pa rin sa pakiramdam yung umiintindi ka ng kapwa kesa sa naninira ng kapwa. kaya sa tingin mo sinong may mas masarap na pakiramdam ngayon?

4/11/2016 - napag-alaman kong hindi sa lahat ng pagkakataon ang iyong pagpapagal ay may mabuting kapalit...na ang iyong mga inaasahan ay may balik. hindi sa lahat ng panahon ang polisiya ay nasusunod.. ni ang itinakdang panukat ang siyang ginagamit na panukat.


4/21/16 - kahit ginawan ka ng masama ng iba, nasaktan ka, 'wag kang gaganti...dahil hindi mo trabaho yun. 'wag **** agawan ng trabaho ang Diyos. Dahil alam mo sa sarili mo pag ang Diyos ang gumati, mas sakto at perpekto.

4/26/16 - Those people who mocks prayer entertain curse to their lives.


4/27/2016 - "ang position nilalagay sa puso, hindi sa ulo." - M' Avie


5/11/2016 - Alin ang mas pinaka-nakakapagod, ang magtrabaho gamit ang isip o gamit ang pisikal na katawan? Kasi sa totoo lang, wala naman talagang nakakapagod doon...mas nakakapagod makitungo sa mga katrabahong mahirap pakitunguhan...

6/6/2016 - Duwag lang ang nagpaparinig.

7/12/2016 - Wala naman talagang absolute fairness, dahil ang tao minsan nagdidesisyon sa ngalan ng "fairness" nilang tinatawag pero ang totoo, ito ay nagsisilbi pa rin sa kanilang interes dahil may integridad silang pinapangalagaan. Doon masasabi ng iba, "fair" ang taong ito.

7/28/2016 - monologue at bugtungan


"Ginagawa ko naman ang trabaho ko pero habang tumatagal ako sa serbisyo hindi ako nadadagdagan kundi nababawasan." - Lapis

"Tingin-tingin, maghapong nakatingin. Kahit pa magdamag, 24/7 walang kurap." - CCTV (tao, bagay, hayop?) :-)

"Gusto nila sa akin laging mabilis dahil pag bumagal ako sasabihin nila "nakakainis", "walang kwenta.", etc, etc. - BAGP network
Chad Chumley Dec 2014
How beautiful is the fairness in her *****.  It makes me.  Is the sun shining within me?  Is the lover's ***** alert again?  Me?  Is the party?  How goes within here? Is the true morn awake, smiling too?  ***** fire too?  Within recesses there stands all fire, cold fire, majestic fire, Who?
Based on the same layout of one of Baha'u'llah's healing prayers.
Staff Sgt. Joseph D'Augustine
a proud Jersey son
whom Thou hast blessed
laid in St. Luke’s ground
for his heavenly rest
April 4, 2012

1.

in a far off province of
God forsaken Helmand,
our dear son Joey
met his untimely end

an explosive crack
a most terrible sound
felled a beloved Jersey son
to the cold cruel ground

working the live wires
of a well placed IED
a deathly burst killed him
it was awful to see  

Staff Sgt. Joseph D’Augustine
in solemn duty fell
fellow brothers in arms
will forever reverently tell

of courage and character
of a dear fallen friend
and how the valiant warrior
met with death at his end

for he was always faithful
to his beloved corps
comrades couldn't ask
a valiant marine for more


2.

details of his death
are not the real story
selflessness and bravery
are but part of his glory

is it brash to
question why he fell?
in a useless bitter war
an embroiled senseless hell

a generation mustered
to fight in the war on terror
serving four tours of duty
in a lost decade of errors

two tours in Afghanistan and Iraq
could a nation ask a man for more?
for he was always faithful to the call
upholding pledges he hath sworn

3.

the burden of war
to a  few confined
it rarely crosses
an American’s mind

incessant war machine
drones on apace
the horror of conflict
so cleverly displaced

with afternoon baseball
and super bowl parties
big disco paychecks
and other selfish priorities

pay hollow tribute
to dear weary troops
when valor is mentioned
we gather in groups

we’ll raise the flag
sing stirring anthems
than its back to the party
pay it no more attention

self styled patriots
wave handfuls of flags
but ask them to contribute
the zeal soon lags

its left to the few
to shoulder burdens of many
fairness is lost
its a democratic calamity

four tours in a decade
an inhumane task
burdens require sharing
its only fair to ask

Joey was always faithful
to the task at hand
willing to step forward
to serve his homeland


4.

in the wake of 9/11
a nation deeply shaken
young patriots stirred
liberty’s call not forsaken

a call to serve answered
to quell the rise of terror
a clear clarion alarm
marks the nature of the era

Joey boldly came forward
to train and learn
the art of warriors
his bright patriotism burned

deployed to Afghanistan
to capture Osama
routing the Taliban
without much problem

but a pacified Afghan
not enough for Bush
he invaded Iraq
another military push

we rolled into Baghdad
adorned with victors garlands
Saddam’s statue toppled
our troops were honored

deposing a dictators
soon turned to occupation
a ****** mission transformed
to build the Iraqi and Afghan nations

once honored liberators
now a conquering force
bestriding broken nations
on a civil war course

military industrialists
stood to profit most
sweet protracted conflict
record earnings to boast

lives bartered for lucre
a region held hostage
the conflict deepened
hostilities hardened

America dipped into
a great recession
the war machine
bled money and
kept on ticking

scooping up contracts
rewarding investors
the dividends of war
heaven sent treasure

continuation of hostilities
preys on a nation's youth
as casualties mount
ill portents forsoothed

a fraction of citizens
bare heartaches of war
gulping measures of despair
to guard a nations door

a nation always faithful
to the holy pursuit of profit
a highest citizens calling
put money into your pocket


5.

our beloved Jersey son
gave a full measure of devotion
in dress blues they shipped him
back across the ocean

on the Dover tarmac
they received his remains
for a last ride northward
to his hometown terrain

repatriated body
bereft of soul saluted
solemn escort knelt
hearts trembled, tears muted

a hearse for a gallant man
flanked by state troop cruisers
to escort the funeral train
assure an honored movement

one last trip up
old thunder road
the storied highway
Joey often trod

the last detail legged up 17
reverent firefighters saluted  
from overpasses
to honor  the woeful scene

as the motorcade passed
the Garden State Malls
frenzied consumers
failed to notice at all

busy window shoppers
didn't to turn an eye
as Joey rolled home
to the sweet by and by

vets interred at the
Old Paramus Church
gently stirred in their graves
reasons for war they search

Channel 12 Chopper
circled its eye in the sky
televised the sad parade
captured many teary eyes

the early spring blooms
colorful petals displayed
maples and forsythias
a royal carpet laid

spring remains always faithful
as the new season turns
offer sunshine and glory
as our sinking hearts burn

6.

motorcycle escort
northbound lane clear
rolling homeward
Waldwick was near

leaves exploding
green shoots budding
****** white maple blooms
natures accolades stunning

the oaks yet bare
just waking from slumber
winters death passing
a sad day put asunder

the motorcade passed
Joey’s home on Prospect Ave
few  envision lifes endings
this woefully sad

red chevy pickup idles
in hoop crowned driveway
never to drain jumpers again
departed children can’t play

the eye in the sky
framed neighbors in mourning
welcoming back a fallen hero
unsettled emotions dawning

neighbors waved Old Glory
from painted stoops and curbs
unsure how this tragedy
visits this blessed suburb

green grass of home
always flush with spirit
tears welled in the eyes
most difficult to bear it

last cruise of the town
sad neighbors stand witness
paying final due respects
and ponder from a distance

what purpose is served
by this man’s passing?
the dead cannot speak
rationale is for the living

the terrible herse
death circles our town
moves through our day
hope of spring drowned

murderer of sunshine
killer of young flowers
budding trees breaking
our hearts an ashen pallor

we remember the beauty
of Joey’s stout face
as it looked on your finest day
exuding pure honor and grace

old vets gather
donning caps and pins
boasting semper fi jackets
jutting tear dripping chins

shaking hands, giving hugs
bearing tattered banners
the hearse ambles onward
we head home in solemn manner

good folks are always faithful
where beloved ones grew
the death of our children
we sadly cannot undo


7.

the bells of St. Lukes
called out from the sky
platoons of limping vets
marched in with pride

pomp and circumstance
requisite dress blues
family, friends, townsfolk
overflowed the pews

doleful bells resound
tolling a mournful reckon
the cost of war mounts
a family’s loss beckons

the casualties of war
falls upon a nation's youth
a seasons page not  turned
a flowing wound not soothed

the wistful cornet calling
floats on the fluted air
the bereaved ***** gently sounds
a congregations somber despair

an unsettling dirge
the parish grows uneasy
nationalist bravado wanes
in the forlorn sanctuary

both church and flag
draped in colors of war
mock stain glass windows
communicants adore

is it a betrayal of the flag
to offer enemies
psalms of reconciliation?
where does true loyalty lay
with God or a warring nation?

afterall this is a sanctuary
where peace and harmony reigns
are we not called to beat swords
into ploughshares as the highest
calling of our Lord?

we are always faithful
to the pathways to war
when the practice of peace
is what we should adore

8.

coughing and whispers
incessant low murmur
a baby cries out
we sit and remember

the crucifers process
in solemnity to greet
subtle ***** notes salute
a coffin draped in Old Glory sheets

the beloved child welcomed
to his eternal repose
priests splash holy water
within the sacred dome

an amazing grace revealed
lifted by marine pallbearers
dearly departed body presented
gently placed at the altar

a grief struck sister
lovingly eulogizes
recalls tonka trucks,
GI Joe’s and cool transformers

a punch in the nose
an approaching wedding
beckoning Eastertide
vacation plans left begging

my second grade class sent
Christmas cookies and cards
to dear Joey and warrior friends
he said it warmed stark winter hearts

he was raised in this church
taught trust and reconciliation
the comfort of the Lords peace
may it surely go with him

for he was always faithful
to sisters, family and faith
his resurrection service
imbues sacredness
to this space

9.

sharp in dress blues
Eddie T USMC Gunny
big 50 caliber smile
offers his eulogy

Bada Bing Jersey Humvee
we called him Joey Calzones
good mood, loved sausages
he tickled the funny bone

always willing to sacrifice
loved the Patriots Tom Brady
a women dominated household
gave him a way with the ladies

his calling explosive ordinances
he said he was livin the dream
March 6th last time we met
knocking frost off cold ones
man whatta scream

a gallant marine,
beloved brother,
a sure friend
he was always faithful
I’m deeply wounded
by his untimely end


10.

the gospel read
the homily offered
Ecclesiastes wisdom
a time for everything
proffered

God never turns
an eye from the beloved
though seasons change
we are not forsaken
never unloved

as loss arrives
surely grief grows
turn away not
wisdom knows

in resignation
love lay dead
diligent intention
banishes dread

our rekindled hope
we rend and sow
our beloved Joey
knew this was so

our favorite son’s
example taught us
now rises on eagle’s wings
to claim his divine justice

Jesus faithfully tramped
the path to an awful death
Joey too fought the good fight
a warrior now gratefully at rest

The Lord holds him close
to the ***** of sure love
a cantors beatific voice incants
Joey’s spirit that forever enchants

The Lord is always faithful
to the bereaved and  beloved
no one ever forsaken
all unconditionally loved

11.

the Holy Eucharistic cup
affirms everlasting giving
tasted to nourish evermore
a libation for the living

singing the Beatitudes
praising peace makers
mercy filled voice and song  
pallbearers lift Joey’s coffin

off to seek his final peace
an earthly occupation ended
he’ll suffer worldly hate no more
down the aisle his coffin wended

the family closely followed
a mother haltingly sobbing
faithful marines came forth
to steady her wobbling

there is no sudden waking
from this terrible dream
the pungent incense rose
to the chapels sacred beams

the stained glass murals depict
the passion of Jesus’s story
illuming a consuming sorrow
in all its grace filled glory

the ***** of death slinks on again
we search for consolation
the recompense of honor blest
leaves a hollow heart wanting
no answers offered to quell the dark
of these terrible life’s moments
only the desperate need to hold onto
beleaguered treasure that sustains us

for we are always faithful
to the things we know
always faithful to the
things we refuse to let go

12.

the color guard and funeral detail
assembled in front of St. Luke’s
the cemetery right next door
the procession a short troop

the living will stumble through
the darkness of separation
seeking elusive answers
of poignant uncertainty;
all gave some, Joey gave all
nothing more required for his
journey through eternity

Joey will always be with us
his stories forever retold
as long as the machinery of
great nations engage
the gears of wasteful war

Joey’s spirit lives
in a peoples desire
for freedom, only if
our hope of peace
is greater than the
need for conflict

Joey’s lifes work
is sure to bear fruit
if those remaining
fight the good fight
by taking up the
task to protect and
expand the values
of liberty we
hold most dear

like our good
friend Jesus
Joey wears a crown
bejeweled with
a ring of thorns
hoisted on a
terrible cross
the sweet
incense of you
meets our nose
we inhale your
earthly presence
beholding beautifully
adorned crucifix,
a reminder of
unjust persecution
and a perfect
resurrection
yet this wretched
coffin remains

pledging allegiance
we rationalize our
stories, articulating
our small parts
in  heroic sagas,
reciting myths of
ourselves, recording
the grim history of
a young marine
surrounded by
a smart color guard,
feasting on todays
eucharist, this
days sweet taste
of  the daily bread
of human sorrow

The priest finishes
his graveside
commendation
of Joey D

Taps conclude
a wind rises
crows take flight
winging over
a stand of budding
Sugar Maples
exploding in white
blooms, reveling
in the glorious
sunshine of this
magnificent day

St. Luke’s stairway to
God Country and Home
smiling portrait of you
forever young

we surround your grave
to bless the earth
you've returned home
to your place of birth

our flowing pride
and salty tears bless
the anointed ground
that you loved best

a proud Jersey son
whom Thou hast blest
laid in St. Luke’s ground
for his heavenly rest

for he was always faithful
to the blessed land
forever at peace
in the soils sure hands

Charles Ives
The Unanswered Question

Oakland
11/10/13
jbm
Mateuš Conrad Jan 2021
like a "sickness" in the stomach *** 7am
    after only going to bed at 2(am) -
       and not from any considerable mention /
allusion to a "lack of sleep";
     in that "sickness" is more or less
    akin to a metaphor of a centipede wriggling
about on a hamster wheel /
   a rollercoaster of sorts...

   tough-chew of a fiddling with imitation
   walking...
             prized pins in the feet that have
turned to custard-hardening numbness...
immediately a towing of verbiage
seems more apparent than ever...
   perhaps an interlude of

   'and here's one i prepared earlier'...
          
//

  besides: no one really wants to write something
maxim esque every other sentence:
feeding a readership of
exasperation and sighs - from what i've
heard writing maxims and / or aphorisms
can be a rather tedious undertaking -
for all the times that: when should be forgotten /
'suppose i dreamt it?'
              - and any other offer than can
come with: working out a best lived towards
the amnesiac astral domain...

it just came out of a deep need for perhaps
conversation - then again i am too tired -
             a tiredness that probably sounds better
if i push for some eloquence and
technicality - a miasma is too strong a word -
i'm trying to focus on ancient "things" -
   a chimera variation of a turtle -
               a talking sequoia (but an oak would
do just as well)
                                        and a jellyfish...
  from centuries old... lethargy...
                            with this living:
                                        a tryst a harangue
a search for catharsis -
                                 if need be for a mystery:
loitering on the promise of -
                                    by the gallows on
                                         a Sunday -
                                            in a year were all
such days could be: literally read as being borrowed
from the benevolence of
that                                monstrous UV bulb;
and her copperskinned serpent
                          monstrosities of trickle a tease
of skin's to sizzle: undertones of
                 thrashing water against a window
in the ear reach(ing) a pitch higher...                
                                                                                    //

towing too much space: nudging forward
a shy rubric - an omni- litany (by any other
prefix, squalor)
            between a noun like shy
    and an adjective shyness - formality:
a word genus out of identifying it as such -
a technicality of teaching / learning
                                this (a) language...

- but it dawns on me that i have perhaps
eroded too much of origin and thought
and perhaps even an originality via
the cameo cinema of memory (fickle creature),
but it also dawns on me that
perhaps 10 years apart (circa

                                          ) is enough "time" /
the same sort of space that would allow
a rereading of a work that's
             either Herr Watt (ha    ah      ha)
or a Thin Geon  
                           Anne's Wake -
                    for what use to i have for any
more of that democratic endeavour -
   if only to reprise upon: from the catacombs,
the labyrinth, the ancient library,
the depth of sea upon sea of paragraph-congesting
a drawing-up a coming up for air
akin to (verbatim)

- ****, Nick & the Naggies / Glugg &
    the 3 riddles - Chuff etc. -

   in the house of breathings lies the word,
all fairness. the walls are of rubinen and the glittergates
of elfinbone. the roof hereof is of massicious
jasper and a canopy of Tyrian awning rises and
still descends to it. a grape cluster of lights
hangs therebeneath and al the house is filled
with the breathings of her fairness,
  the fairness of fondance and the fairness of milk
and rhubarb and the fairness of roasted
meats and uniomargrits and the fairness of
promise with catatonia and avowals...


that from out of nowhere and for reason
other than: in order to write proper  & "proper":
tossing and fidgeting the little oystertongue
like imitation(?) i.e. forget conversational
standards of languid, lingo, linguine -
in a frock of half down and in a tuxedo of
half up
                for none of this could possibly
make it into: it's a Thursday morning
   by now all the newspapers have,
                               have been printed...
                  perhaps i'll tender a pause to imply:
pounce-stealthily-hidden in
                                                         wait:
  trainspotting & *****-tickling itch-not-itchy...

now that would be a-happening of sorts:
beside all the bog-****-sodden autobiographical
miasma and fog...
beside all the fog-coup-nudging shadow
with elbow and prayer to a nuke-UV-bulb...
a heart a sparrow a ribcage:
                when farting into the wind
when throwing a stick against a tree
in a forest -
                        when the unbelievably
corrupt sense of self is content, pure,
             by pure i'm only aiming at:
                           uninterrupted -
                           or... without a conjunction
like                                            and...

                that's before: that's a before veering
toward:                          image - begin, again:
a chandelier made from champagne flutes...
       on a side:
i can stomach divulging and bulging in
                                   shackles and monkey's
cackling imitation giggles -
some existential angst (although not something
grandiose as a 20th century sort
or "European" / 19th century precursor)
  
       on the periphery of some "now" (a variation
of when, what if - how, what?)
       such that it is a beautiful lie:
this life...
              and my newly  found estimation
of revising esteem for: not wriggling
in worm-food and silly-ink:
a medium of tedium of being taken
seriously (even if as a "reverse psychology"
reversal of joke)
    
       a puncture a wound that "word-thing"
compilation of:
       well beside something as interesting
as: it's an essay by a lucy ives and
                 it's an essay but for me it's more
a shortcut a footnote parade for my own:

   would it ever (at all) be better
to cure an itch by a pinch
   or in(deed) by a scratch...
             gravestones and heads of matches:
possibly very itchy specimens
it's not hard to imagine
******* on a pebble: no, not imagining
it to be a toffee (landrynek)
              
but honest to god and all that's
Port & Geese (Frugal, Portent - i forgot
the attached -al in s.p.e.l.l.i.n.g)
                 i have nothing equivalent to:
beba babe caco (clot)...
in my own in nomine patris
            since: what is much dissimilar
besides... "******": baba implies
               old woman / peasant woman /
         or woman as harangue (of sorts)...
even though babka =
                        a sort of cake (elevated
sponge, elevation = more bite to it)...
   then comes the suffixation of
the diminutive (adjective)
                             to the word...
babeczka, babusia... babcia
                                              (grandmother):
no language policing here or alt.
   wizardry / frothing at the "salad" i.e.
         concretely (in conc.) a D. Pignatari ref.

but for me: unless not congested (at least
like so) then latin is: loophole it see-through
it's almost flimsy it's barely visual:
why-because-it's-so-******-pragmatic
& why-because-it's-so-utensil-where-none-required
& economically sound
& sieve & water & thirst &
it's hardly an M like Ⰿ
                     or Ⱄ as S
                                let alone an I (pronoun)
i.e. not vowel(,) which is a syllable compound
of Ⱑ   (let alone Я) -
                          perhaps via some distinction
between vowel and pronoun
                    and aye i.e. yes...
             i̊ must say if the pronoun is so bothersome
and more: cut the head elsewhere
sınce ıt's there by no real dıstınctıon
when compared to              får
                          when compared to fát...
                    unless that dıstınctıon be made:
also elsewhere - ȷust like so (Jettıson Bothersome
& Blues)
unless: bothersome camouflage like
a broccoli in a sea of cauliflower akin to
ınınınınınınınınınınınınınınınınınınının
nnnnnnnnnnnnnınnnnnnn­nnnnnnnnn
when "oops" and Bob's your uncle
   i.e. ınınınınınınınınınıninınınınınınının

...never mind - i've been here before
but for the sake of convention (ctrl-c-ctrl-p)
     as clear as day:  
                                  i̊ might add...
       because it would not (otherwise)
  in any other way not suit me -
              thrice up ¡¡¡           thrice down !!!      

all in all: a leisure of an exercise in...
                              terms of waiting for such
pennies of a wording to drool off
a muse's heavenly gob.
Jay M Wong Feb 2013
1:1
Stop. Who’s there? Tis clock strikes twelve,
brings thy Horatio to seek tis specter from hell,
In Denmark, something is rotting in thy state,
In Norway, unimprovèd mettle hot and full awaits,
Tis specter arrives to arouse confusion and fear,
but to treat it violence and majestic threat,
thy specter departs as the ****’s crow drew near,  
leaving the blows of malicious mockery to regret.
And for Hamlet may speak to the wandering soul,
Tis morning to Hamlet must the three a’go.

1:2
Claudius, thy Uncle, is crowned King a’last,
Gertrude, thy Mother, hastily marries a’fast.
With duties done, Laertes to France adieu,
Hamlet griefs thy Father’s death and thy Mother’s dine,
for once a Hyperion to now a satyr is Uncle to Father a’new,
is but now a little more than kin and less than kind.
Horatio brings poor Hamlet the fatherly news,
that King Hamlet’s specter is now a’loose.
The joyous Hamlet is but joyous to see,
the two month father, dead and decease,
but for he calls that foul deeds will foully arise.
He hurries to the heavenly site prior sunrise.

1:3
Laertes to Ophelia, a brother to sister, he warns,
that Hamlet is but a fiery lover and to love he sworn,
but to love now is but not the future,
for Hamlet’s fire may, thy mind unpure,
for his lovely vows are not to believe,
he is but a man of deception to conceive.
For when Laertes departs, Polonius rants,
that Hamlet’s love, Ophelia must recant
for his affections and fashions are but false wows,
for when blood burns, lends the tongue false vows.

1:4
Shrewdly the air bites, nipping and eager,
at Horatio and Hamlet thy specter nears.
To speak alone, it beckons so,
But Horatio to Hamlet speaks no,
for may it draw thy madness and strip thy reason,
but to thee specter does Hamlet go,
for thy life is but a’lacking living reason.
Aback do they hold him most,
but Hamlet, his sword he wields
Fate has brought him here, he feels
To hold him back is but to turn a’ghost

1:5
Revenge, does his heavenly father speak,
of tis horrid ****** of unnatural feat.
For the orchard’s snake, wears thy father’s crown
and ****** thy gracious Queen, whose now evil abound.
With dignity and devotion she loved me so,
but tis sinful ******, Hamlet, you must’a know!
Through my ears, a venomous potion he drew,
thy fair Uncle, Claudius that potion he brew.
Abed, my life he ended this night,
And to my crown and Queen took he a’flight.
For thy dearest father, revenge must thy draw
upon thy villainous head, Claudius must fall
And to thy sword thou dearest friends must swear,
to tell not the occasions of this night we bear,
And to madness Hamlet must falsely seek,
to discover the truth of horrid deed beneath.

2:1
Reynaldo to Laertes, Claudius a’spies,
to Paris, Reynaldo goes with a’plan devised,
to seek the situation of Laertes in foreign hoods,
with bait of falsehood takes this carp of truth.
Ophelia then enters, with her father she shares,
"Oh, father, father, I’ve just had such a scare!"
In her sewing room, it is Hamlet she sees,
with no hat, nor buttons, nor stable knees
For he stared and stared to let out a final sigh,
Love mad he may be, a’to King we must a’by.

2:2
With Rosencrantz and Guildenstern,
Directly or indirectly will Claudius learn,
of Hamlet’s matters they are to return.
Polonius, with news of Hamlet, he waits,
for thee Ambassador, to inform that Denmark Gates,
Are to be opened for young Fortinbra’s ****** defeat,
Polonius to Claudius, reveals thy madness roots,
For Hamlet is but love crazy for the fairest fruits,
of dearest Ophelia, who a letter he wrote,
Proclaims the fairness of her upon tis note.
And to test the truth, their confrontation, must’e spy,
Behind the arras to view thy love-mad side.
Is but our hastily marriage and his father’s death,
thy Mother, aware, are but the means of his mad breath.
Polonius then to Hamlet, speaks of witty words,
A fishmonger he calls, but one of two is misheard,
For when Polonius humbly takes a’leave,
He is but to take anything, but his life, shall he not receive.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, enter to Hamlet, they chat,
but Hamlet to quickly find the two are but a King’s ****,
Only sent to spy on a dearest friend,
And to human’s name do they offend,
Only to betray a dearest friend in honor of the King.
And so Players arrived at Denmark grounds,
for they, the best in the world, Polonius sounds.
And then for Jephthah, witty Hamlet chants,
the song of a foolish man who accidently grants,
the sacrifice of his beloved daughter.
Pyrrhus, do they perform for dearest Hamlet,
His sword is a’air, but a’air it sets,
for he hesitates to swing thy sword,
And with this, Hamlet hopes to store,
the strength to **** the horrid Lord.
Though he is but ashamed, for upon false emotions can Players act,
And in himself upon truths, strength can he not extract.
So a play for the King’s conscience does Hamlet devise,
for the heavenly ghost may be false in his advice.

3:1
To be or not to be; that is the question,
For Hamlet to be nobler or to a’take action,
Shall he withdraw with ****** self slaughter,
But shall’st never may see thy fairest daughter,
To die, but to sleep for a mere dream,
But in sleep shall fair or foul be unseen?
Now Polonius and Claudius awaits,
for Hamlet’s arranged meet with a’bait.
Hamlet to Ophelia, his love recants,
For honesty and beauty are but Someone’s grants,
Once did he love her, but now a’figured,
that women are but corrupt and impured,
For one’s honestly and beauty can and shall be taint,
For if God given thou one face, dear not another by paint.
For honestly and beauty has God falsely bred,
All but one, shall women *****.
All but one, shall women be nun.
Hence this marriage is over, and to a nunnery at once,

3:2
Let this mousetrap be named and this play a’set,
Shall capture thy horrid mouse or thy Uncle of Hamlet.
Polonius to Hamlet, the theater he knows,
For a Caesar death died he at thee Capitol.
Upon the lap of fair Ophelia, does Hamlet, lie,
Only to think of country matters and nothing (he implies).
And the play begins, with a prologue so brief,
Like a woman’s love, was Hamlet’s belief.
The King and Queen, a loving bond they share,
But the King by a mystic potion envenomed beware.
Thee action to ****, a murderous scene it was,
Leaving Claudius to regret the murderous act abuzz,
He arises to say: Let there be light! Let there be light!
And to the joy of Hamlet to see tis joyous sight,
For the words of thy heavenly father was but right.
Now shall the minute parts of truth ignite.
And to his Mother he shall speak daggers wield none,
for shall his tongue speak of the cruelties undone.

3:3
With Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, to England a’go,
Should insane Hamlet know not a hawk from a crow,
And behind the arras, Polonius will again spy,
the taxation of Hamlet and his Mother’s cry.
Polonius departs to spy upon the Mother and the Insane,
Only to leave Claudius to regret thy hideous Mark of Cain,
Shall he pray the Heavens to forgive him his actions,
For thy stripped thy Brother of life, throne, and attractions.
As Claudius is never to withdraw his stripped token,
Divine forgiveness shall never then be unspoken.
Hamlet can **** not his murderous Uncle in praying stance,
For a hideous monster shall not a’go Heaven by chance.

3:4
So behind the arras dearest Polonius stays,
to view the idle and wicked tongue arrays,
Thou’st the Queen, Thy Husband’s Brother’s wife!
But to hear a rat, shall Hamlet for a ducat its life.
Oh, but death ‘neath the arras, may it the King?
A horrid act? To **** and wear thy brother’s ring?
Oh, King it be not, but be a wretched, rash fool,
And now shall Hamlet tell thy Myth a’Ghoul.
For thy murderer has slain thy Heavenly mate,
And only now by natural law does he abate.
Upon these portraits shall ring a’clear,
That from thy Heavenly father is he nowhere near,
A murderer, a villain, a horrid fiend,
He is but a devilish murderer yield unclean,
No way can one drop from THIS to THAT,
And shall by this scene, the specterous soul attract,
Dear not be untenderly to thy Mother it speaks,
And shall this revenge soon awake its peak,
Hamlet appears a’mad to thy watching Mother,
but to his mother he warns, abed not another,
For two mouths should speak of none,
of this revenge that will soon be done.
And again, abed let not him ****** you so,
For now, apart to English must’e a’go.

4:1
Gertrude to Claudius, she continues to reveal,
Of Polonius’s ****** and his arras squeal,
"A rat! A rat!" A’mad Hamlet is,
Brandished, to rapier the life of his.
And now where’s thou Hamlet still?
To draw apart the body he hath killed.
Rosencrantz and Guildenstern is but yet called again,
With discord and dismay, are they to seek that thou slain.

4:2
The two seek to Hamlet, for the body’s lair,
Compounded with dust now does it wear,
And a sponge, does Hamlet call them so,
for the King to squeeze them dry and thorough,
"A knavish speech sleeps in a foolish ear."
The body a’by a’King, but a’King, the body unnear.
And so, Hamlet to the King premiere.

4:3
And to Claudius does Hamlet call,
That Polonius now rests at a dining hall,
‘til a conference of worms devours him all
He shall eat not, but they eat so,
‘tis our fate despite status quo.
And upon the lobby stairs a corpse may lay,
One of dearest Polonius, slain to heaven or hell
Now to English death must Hamlet pay,
To one mother does he give two farewells.

4:4
With a Captain does Hamlet now proceed,
Who tells of young Fortinbras of Norway accede,
The Norway prince through Denmark he leads,
to seize a’minute ****** patch must’e receive.
A worthless land, must many die for one,
But true greatness acts not from fair reason,
But for the sake of the mind when honor is won.
And has Someone granted the reasoning mind,
For man to hesitate so cowardly inside,
For thy deed to act, must we rid the mind bind,
And act on instinct and be not wise.
And from the reasoning state must Hamlet now leave,
for honor he shall act, and his emotions he’ll believe.

4:5
False sanity is but false no more,
For fair Ophelia’s reason be not restore.
A’now sings of thy premature stone a’foot thy father’s grave,
and the departure of Hamlet for thy wed depraved.
Claudius is but to blame for thee rotting state,
For Polonius, a proper ceremony he not awaits,
For poor Ophelia, stripped from her reasonous state,
For Laertes aback from France, by thy father’s death, irate.
And Laertes enters, with thy support for king,
For the murderer, vengeful death shall he bring,
So Claudius to Laertes, says he is not to blame,
but thy father’s murderer is but another name.
And enters Ophelia, with figurative flowers to give,
But those of Faithfulness have ceased to live.
Alive are but for Thoughts, for Remembrance,
for Adultery, for Repentance, and for False Romance.
For his sister’s sanity is but another to blame,
Laertes, a vengeance mind, is but now aflame.

4:6
Horatio, a letter from Hamlet he receives,
that upon a Pirate ship has Hamlet board,
And that shall with speed would’st fly a’breathe.
Meet to hear the story Hamlet has a’stored.

4:7
Claudius to Laertes, he speak of innocence,
for by public appearance, the truth may bent,
For the public count loves Hamlet so,
And to thy fair Mother, Claudius a’beau.
Thy noble father lost and sister insane,
The murderous filth of Hamlet is to blame.
At this, a loyal messenger approaches,
to deliver the news that but Hamlet reproached,
An English death did Hamlet face not,
For now his destined death are they to plot,
Naked and alone, will he return to Denmark a’learn,
Of the honorable fence-match, he shall earn,
Against Laertes, whose fatherly love nor illusion,
Shall the death of Hamlet draw conclusion.
Even a’church will Hamlet, Laertes slay,
Death by no bounds, must Hamlet pay.
Envenomed rapier and wine shall prepare,
the faithful death of murderous Hamlet a’near.
Gertrude then enters with Ophelia’s news a’share,
For sorrows comes not in singles but in greater pairs,
Upon muddy death has Ophelia drowned,
for now another death has but profound,

5:1
Two Gravediggers upon one grave they create,
for to the death of thy Graveowner do they relate,
To die by self slaughter or to die by not,
the attention of passing Hamlet have they caught.
With Hamlet does one of thee two chat,
for once a woman, shall this grave be buried at,
A quick digger for Hamlet to his surprise,
Revealed that to England is mad Hamlet to advise.
For a corpse to live for eight or nine,
Thy dearest Yorick’s skull is to find,
Thy a corpse to date three and twenty,
Leaves Hamlet to recall thy memories a’plenty,
And to think Alexander, o’buried alike.
Here comes the King, Laertes and the Queen,
And upon the burial grounds is Ophelia seen,
His dearest sister does Laertes mourn,
But to Hamlet, her death, his heart a’torn.
Laertes to Hamlet, must’e not compare,
the death of one is a little more foul than fair,
For forty thousand brothers can sum not his love,
For the death of the fairest maiden beloved.
Claudius to Laertes, must Hamlet pay thy debt,
the plot of night prior shall’st not forget.

5:2
Hamlet to Horatio, does his truths trust,
Of thy wretched King and his unjust,
Of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern English death they meet,
With sacrifice and thy seal was thou to spare self defeat.
Now’st Osric enters to Hamlet a’chat,
For’st not hot, nor cold, nor sultry at.
And a’wish to court, with thy Laertes of excellence,
For Hamlet’s head does thee King expense.
With six French rapiers and poniards assign,
For by fate’s determination, shall this court incline,
For a special providence in the fall of a sparrow,
Can we do not, but abide by fate a’follow.
Trumpets and drums, now’st the fence begins,
For Hamlet and Laertes hand and hand therein.
Pardon he begs, Hamlet to thy brother,
For in him is but foil Hamlet yet another,
And so they fence for honor and fence for life,
Two of two leads Hamlet the strife.
The King, to Hamlet he drinks,
Tis pearl shall he the cup he sinks,
And unwounded for two, Hamlet prevails,
But Queen, the dearest Mother, so faithfully frail,
For she drinks thy cup of heavenly pearl,
For heavenly it be not, as thy malicious plot unfurl,
The cup! The cup! A poisonous potion,
Cause yet another by venomous commotion.
A distracting cause, for Hamlet to bear,
For Laertes envenomed blade must’e beware,
Now envenomed blood shall Hamlet shed,
Shall he hold thy rapier of Laertes instead,
to shed thy venomous blood of thy venomous mind,
For now thy murderous plot shall unwind,
At the honorable death of brother Laertes,
Shall the death of Claudius be a’seized.
The King’s to blame for the death of all,
And tis day shall he see his destined fall.
With thy venomous blade held a’hand,
Let the doors be locked and the evils banned,
For Hamlet wounds thy treacherous soul,
And shall horrid Claudius pay his destined toll,
For Hamlet forces to drink thy murderous potion,
And shall he too die of venomous commotion.
The death of four and tis ****** scene,
Shall Horatio tell to those unseen.
Shall he speak of murderous truths embark,
for Fortinbras shall now throne Denmark,
For in Fortinbras does his admiration lay,
For does Hamlet trust thou’st fiery ambitious way,
And tis now concludes thy Hamlet’s life,
For death and death thou’st all alike...
A dedication and summary of Shakespeare's "Hamlet" the tragedy of the witty prince of Denmark written in 2011 for a class journal assignment.
Sarah Oct 2014
Justice is not equality
Freedom is not fairness

It’s better to admit you don’t understand
than to torture the hopeless

Waiting for peace on earth,
you dare to hold your breath

So I’ll let you suffocate;
We are equal in death
Shashank Virkud Jul 2012
You keep walking out
to see who's going to chase you.

But honey fairness is and fairness was.
That's right,

fairness is
and fairness

was.

I'll be straightforward with you,
I speak in riddles and rhymes,
have you got the time?

I don't have
any flowery words for you,
the **** if I know,
fair chances,
careful glances
in my direction,
could you fall in love or in line?

I won't chase you.

It wouldn't be fun.

I won't chase you,

but it would be fun

to watch you

run run run run run!
Jay M Wong Aug 2016
Her gorgeous eyes but a mighty dam for none to know,
Shields her like curtains---the unpredictabilities of tomorrow,
But aye a foolish boy who've fallen deeply in romance,
Her love, her kiss: fairs thee, in inescapable trance,
Shall with grand sails flee beyond the ocean's horizon.

Doth she wears the gowns of unfair fairness in farewells,
For a love unblossomed must she leave far too soon,
Ath daggers thy chests at the thought of bygones like hell,
Incapable of sleep tonight 'neath the glimmering moon,      
For her beautiful eyes makes the midnight skies far too bright.

Must we always harbor love like shipments far too late,
In which had pale doves flown their Winter paths,
And shall by Summer's end, does her 'membrance await,
In uncounted miles shall separates what once un-hath,
And bids this glimmering leaf of love an unspoken adieu.

A gorgeous pearl to whom had but drifted out to sea,
Until one day doth it perhaps drifts back to me...
And like a child to whom with bright eyes wistfully wish,
For the magic of Winter and her beloved, angelic kiss.
Oh, now maybe--just maybe she feels the same...
     The wretched wrath of life and the unfair fairness in farewells.
vircapio gale Mar 2014
1.

dear feminism,
do i think of women
when i write to you?

why do i personify?

angry at an unjust world,
angry at injustice in ourselves,
have i been taught to fear you?
ignore inequity of fears?

or hide  
in the shadows of your salty curves
speaking soft with sycophantic tilt?

was this what mother meant,
portending talk of therapy
two decades in advance?

a bouy on three waves,
i crash against protuberances too:
limp didactics on avoidance for the victims,
waking in continuums of shrugging crime.

sameness differs in utopias --
every latent gut avers the right to spill.
despite the lissome quell forgetfulness contains,
my proper sphere will leave me
deafened in a wrack-dry
tidal echo--
'Fairness' stains clear beauty dark
as my imagined egos drown at last
from down our oceanic well of shame.

sacrifices fade,
i cannot write...
i write, and fail,
defined by sediment cliche,
reading women authors out of obligation ..odd desire,
and so in dim medieval-fashion
miss
the trail of monoliths erected
for a craven ease

2.

dear civil rights,
why were you taught
through prisms of boredom?
my voiceless reading left you to your rage,
while i communed with glossy nature,
private leaves.

how dare i clap your back
"congratulations"
at your tidy givens  granted
scars were open past my seeing,
and bleed still

while right here, empathy dies, now

dreams are bombed,
grafted to infected faculties
to wallow tended in a garden of injustice
erudite and dead,
i **** a bit i tell myself then stuff my face with food,
cover breath with smoke
and sleep in sour ignorance
no courage left to care.
blind grins bouquet the status quo
of rotted stems, discarded roots

i bury you with homeland fear
the killing silence filled with just intentions
for tomorrow

3.

dear feminism,
you speak for me, too--
my genderless ear attunes

cathartic sweep of ills
scaled beyond your other selves,
sexing into common chosen songs

no fearful tremble
at a mainstream backdrop reprimand--
to be a good gender,
--this gender not that gender--
gestate bigotry of symbol wombs,
cut ripe to cater to unquestioned whim;
no violent selfhood requisitioning
to closet inner innocence in pain

contractions shock in further waves
i midwife simple hope i hope
true fairness you have nursed in seeing death


4.

dear punk **** feminism,
marginal i ask as i perform
unstructured sutras on my heart
exemplar of a meta-freedom
burning in the core of threaded ages strung--
how then life without your voice,
vast silence unobserved,
the hidden anti-*** persisting
in our gender-theory--theorizing sterile norms--
sweet pulsing concupiscence
in our every waking breath
a pollinating zephyr tease toward
celebrating every feotal bathtub bliss --
unbridled ideologies unleashed
unmade into opining din

5.

dear temperance,
i vote you cherished
whirlwind
singing endless through the ageist ridicule
apparent failure in the civil warrior's eye
dogma blinks
denial of the rights you suffered for
but underneath compassion all along
i rally in your family's younger gaze
staring down,
questioning the steady rhythm of a whiskied fist

6.

dear feminism,
have i been taught to celebrate you?
have i been taught to fear for you?
have i been taught to treat you as a woman?
why do i personify you?
like some Sophia cybered up atop the forums of our age

blind and failing
i would be dust as well
like any rightful fading into dust
be swept along with all coercive screenings,
fear-born silences
immune to reason and the reasons of the heart--
rather than to live forgetting
letting go the questions giving rise to equals in a discourse
revising what it means to ask the meaning of


#
dear feminism,

when you are gone..
i for one will sing you
hope

to protest bigotry
a raging tranquil step
of care-filled voicing

dare an upward sloping arc
a dream becoming shared
to overcome
attain
inspired by once unfamiliar names

i will still be here,
the angry feminist
burning in my flagging underwear

brightest outrage at injustice
your deeper loves, fairness
selfhood honored
as if written in the stars
or ancient shorelines
-- you will not be gone
"She says, he wrote it--he says, she wrote it." -Lucretia Mott, speaking to the collaborative efforts of J S Mill and Harriet Taylor
mannley collins Aug 2014
It was but was not god nor  goddess.
It was but was not deva nor devi.
It was but was not angel nor demon.
It was but was not metaphysical being of any kind.
It was but had not any name nor could it be named.
It was but had not any  face nor likeness.
It was but had not any body or corporeal state.
It was but had not any form nor lack of form.
It was but not incarnate nor disincarnate.
It was but was not existent nor non-existent.
It was but could be described in words in any way.
It was but had not depth nor height nor breadth nor volume.
It was  but could not be measured in any way.
It was but had not materiality of any kind.
It was but had not immateriality of any kind.
It was but had not space nor lack  of space.
It was but had not direction nor lack  of direction.
It was but had not nothingness.
It was  but had not somethingness.
It was but had not anythingness.
It was but had not beingness.
It was but not Isness or non-Isness.
It was but had not light nor dark.
It was but had not wetness nor dryness.
It was but was not nowhere.
It was but was not nowhere.
It was but was not somewhere.
It was but was not anywhere.
It was and then It manifested the nature of Its essence
and became the universe and all that was in the universe.
All that was incarnate and disincarnate.
All that was physical and metaphysical.
All that was existent and non-existent.
And still It was.
It manifested Itself in ignorance of Its own nature as the Isness of the Universe,
in order to participate in the existence It had created from Its own essence,on an equal and fair level with humanity.
It gave of its own essence by putting a small piece of its own essence--the individual Isness-which is equal and autonomous and individual and independent--into all human bodies,both female and male,at conception.
And It made humans ignorant of their nature--the  individual Isness--
as It  made itself ignorant of Its own nature.
And then It set humans and Itself the Riddle of the Existence
that had come from Its manifestation of its nature as the universe and all that was in it.
It posed these three questions to humanity and to Itself.
1--Who am I?.
2--Why am I here?.
3--When I knowhow I am then what is my purpose?.
Who am I?.
Like all humans,and for the sake of fairness,
It manifested Itself  into ignorance of its own nature also.
The Isness of the Universe set humans the task of realising their own nature--which is the individual Isness--as an equal individual autonomous and independent part of the essence of the Isness of the Universe,so that they could then show the Isness of the Universe Its own essence and then share existence together.
The principle governing Its action in creating the universe and all it contains, especially humanity,was that before you can reach the heights of existence you must go through the depths of existence.
Why am I here?.
Obviously I am here to answer the first question.
After answering the first question --which can only be done existentially and not intellectually--
there would then be the third question to be answered.
The answer to the first question lies in regaining your existential nature--the individual Isness--as a small but equal,independent, individual,nameless,formless,genderless and non-physical Isness formed from the Isness of the Universe which is free from Mind and Conditioned Identity.
The answer  does  NOT lie in amassing the false knowledge of all "religions" and "political systems  that the Mind and Conditioned Identity have created in order to mislead the individual Isness from realising ,existentially,its true nature.
The Isness of the Universe  did not want a world of maniputed puppets,as the Mind/Conditioned Identity,does but in order to achieve fairness in solving the Riddle of Existence,it gave humanity these attributes and the ability to live out their opposites.
Freedom of Will.
Freedom of Choice.
Freedom of speech.
Freedom of Truthfulness.
Freedom of Association.
Freedom of  Debate.
Freedom from Violence.
Agreement to Disagree.


www.beyondenlightenment.co.uk
Yenson Aug 2018
Build me a slow boat to Timbuktu via China
Heave down a fleecy cloud and let me float to Nirvana
Hunt me a unicorn and let me ride to the Enchanted Forest
Find me a giant eagle and let it lift me to Outer Mongolia East

'please don't leave me here amongst demons with human faces'


Show me a Church and I'll show you a hall full of Sinners
Point out a wife and I'll reveal a liar and a fake and none dimer
Call a Doctor and its a Monster who betrayed the Hippocratics
That Government Boss is a cruel heinous snake without ethics

'please don't leave me here amongst demons with human faces'


See that Preacher and see a spineless hypocrite back-stabber
That lover was nothing but a sick deranged false **** twister
My dear acquaintance a heartless corrupted shyster unhinged
A Newsagent full of pitiless, gloomy, vile, psychotic joy-suckers

'please don't leave me here amongst demons with human faces'


That friend of years a bloodsucking Judas who betrayed and stole
Uncles who rained terror with sadistic pleasures in parts unwhole
Show me nieces and find two-faced ******* with poisons in veins
Neighborhoods full of silent killers and Rapists of truthful genes

'please don't me leave here amongst demons with human faces'


A vicars' daughter wielding angst axes better than a viking
The pathetic Moors zombies tearing flesh on masters beholding
The dead-eyed Arabs salivating madly or at daggers drawn
Contemptible Men-kids with pin ****** used as King's pawns

'please don't leave me here amongst demons with human faces'


Build me a cottage in rolling green fields with blue skies
Find me a fair maiden with a true heart and warming smiles
Show me a place that holds fairness and justice real and dear
A world with humanity we're all sisters and brothers for care

'please don't leave me here amongst demons with human faces'


copyright@LaurenceA.9th August2018
Zoe Dec 2011
is it fair
that i dont know
that im not sure
that i simply have no clue
is it fair
that its a long wait
that theres no end to be seen
that the timer seems endless
i know its not fair
that is why
i am sorry
I found I was inexperience the very day
I experienced my first experience,
So I decided to do wrong because
I was engaged in over righteousness,

I have sown a particular seed of truth
In the strange garden which I planted,
The seed must be allowed to germinate
And grow until it is ready for harvest,

It shall bear only one fruit,
The fruit shall contain only one seed,
This seed shall be the seed of crime,
Oh, some crimes brings much
Experience in liberty and justice,

We have been liberated in the
Mist of their inhumane crimes against us,
I wonder who really invented the name Africa,
They think we are poor and needy
But we are rich with excess
Untapped human and natural resources,
We are not lost
But have found the Black Star
Which is the compass for all mankind,

We never went to them,
They came to us,
They came to exploit us by cheating,
Deceiving and bringing confusion among us,
Oh, that old serpent, the devil,

They began colonizing us,
But with ***** on our side
None sustained into the twenty-first century,
They claim to be superior to the black man,
But this is just the beginning,

Within forty-years, we were able
To gain our independence
First with the spirit of Ghana
And finally crushed apartheid triumphantly,

We gave them a hospitable atmosphere
When they first arrived on our shores
As orphans and beggars,
Not knowing, they were looters and murderers,

They pride themselves as the introducers of
The Christian faith in the land of the Blacks,
They have no idea about Makeda, the Queen of Sheba,
Who later marriage King Solomon, the wise king,
No idea about the Ethiopian ******
Who was baptized by Philip in the name of Jesus,
No idea about Ras Kabutu Munhunutapa,
Was Jesus Christ not nursed in the Land of Blacks?

They realized the beauty in the
Black woman and had the gut
To propose to mother Africa (Sudan),
Upon refusal, they ***** and brutalized
Some of the daughters of mother Africa,
But the Almighty shall restore the excellence
And pride of Africa,
Like the excellence of the Garden of Eden,

Oh, what a devil with an attitude,
None of them speaks the truth,
They are full of injustice and deception,

Yes, Ethiopia is our home
And the Land of the Pharaohs is our pride,
We do not only boast in our ancient glory,
But we have a future glory of an Africa,
Which a future Mentuhotep II shall unite us with,
Yes, a future glory of black superiority,
Which a future Ras Kabutu will make us behold,

We are all pilgrims walking on the same
Road with different destinations,
Yet they are afraid of a united African force,
They shall surely give an account to Him
Who is ready to judge the living and the dead,

They sold us as slaves in order to
Steal our pride, depopulate and demoralize us,
So that, they can use their secondary
Intelligence to exploit our resources,
But they will not succeed for long,
For we know their ways of deception,
Yes, we are the prisoners of hope,
Very soon, we shall be like Jewels of a crown
Lifted like a banner over the earth and space,

Is it normal to be normal?
Oh, see how the Balance weighs down
The opportunist and the Group of Eight,
Inequalities have taking over the
Impartiality and fairness of man,
Who got away with the last hit?
The answer is always in the naive one
Who has purposed in his heart not to answer,

For they built themselves towers,
Heaped up our silver and diamond like dust,
And our gold and timber
Like the mire of the streets,
Behold, the Almighty will cast them out,
He will destroy their powers in the sea,
And they will be devoured by fire,
For we are the children of Tweaduampon,
The ones made from the richest part of the earth
The cradle of mankind,
The true descendant of Ras Kabutu,

We are the Africans
We are the survivors,
We seek a Heavenly Nation,

We keep our faith in the African Personality,
We keep our eyes on the road of African Unity,
Keep your head up on the Black star,
Keep on keeping on in the Black mentality,
Without defying the establishment!


© PRINCE NANA ANIN-AGYEI
Email: nanaspeaks@gmail.com
Ophélie S Sep 2018
i.


not bad,
i commented to myself as i watched you do your thing
for the first time ever ;
not bad was my way to say
extraordinary
still is today
i have standards, you see and —
well...
they were met when i
heard you say,
"that's only half what
i can do."

let's get this straight:
i was the best at what i do until
you came around ;
it's not like i'm mad though —
quite the opposite 
in fact.


ii.


here's something else:
i have always liked the way your eyes
shot daggers
even when you were smiling ;
a death stare, they named it and, you know,
i won't call them wrong —
i'm rather fluent with the concepts of
death
and staring myself, after all.


ah,
do you remember?
when we spoke to each other —
it was always a sparring of
eyes
rather than words.


iii.


a fact:
you have been called cold
more often than
you have been called pleasant ;
i know  —
it's not like you'd disagree
not like you'd be stupid enough to
deny ;
cold is a comfortable shadow
to hide in,
something people like us
wear as a coat or
a scarf
from july to june.


now,
there's this saying that the addition of
two negative objects
turns them a positive
result ;
i'm not much of a scholar so, honey,
what's on your mind?


iv.


i get it now,
if i'm propellers
you are wings —
rather than a mirror, we're
distorted reflects
a thing evolution knows
a great deal about ;
this yearning is the aspect of you
i'd wish to keep
bottled up ;
"what for?" you'd ask.


no,
yearning is not a thing
i'm a stranger to ;
i've yearned for many things including
strength
sleep
serotonin
and you —
i've been struggling
to make them mine, though
perhaps because i'm never really trying.


v.


that's how you do it:
you take what you want with
clawed hands
accomplish miracles with
thunderous silence —
an entity of cruel fairness,
icy anger but —
what you want is a complicated
thing
with definite shape to your eyes
but blurry to those of
others.


okay,
i'm neither believer nor seer but
here's a little prediction :
the day you are satisfied is the day
hellmouth
shuts down upon us all and
half of me
prays for it.


vi.


about extremes —
some will say grey is a better shade and
though i confess
it does have its charms,
it still has to paint me a picture more striking
than a soul with
adamentine purpose.

see —
i stare as you pass by,
terrific in beauty
beautiful in hardness and
off —
goes my heart, sanity, ego
and shirt.
Mada Apr 2013
You were my hero once.
I loved you unconditionally.
Never flawed -- just bright.
I didn't understand what was wrong,
That I was being cheated.
My life wasn't what you told me it was.
I was different, but not special.

I knew you.
Every inch, every breath, every glance.
I admired you.
Sat and watched.
I was your number one fan.

Your smile saved me.
So did your kiss.
Trapped by your arms I could never be happier.
Holding your hand -- flying above the clouds.

But this is just another sad poem I am writing while crying because of you.
I wonder how many of those I have...
What type of hero does that?
What type of hero hurts the good people?
I thought you stood for justice -- fairness.
But really the only fairness you practiced was making sure there was enough of your love to fairly go around to everyone.
Cause like I realized Hero,
I'm different, but not special.
5 minute writings are a new strategy for me. They probably will never be structured and half won't be poems, but they will be a collection. Some will be happy and some will be sad and some will not make sense and some will be masterpieces.
I hateth th' song of th' grass outside;
and t'eir blades t'at swing about my feet
like fire. How unfeeling all of which are-
did t'ey really think I wouldst ever be tantalised
by t'eir sickly magic? Such a gross one-
demanding, rapacious, parasitic!
Even I am fed up with t'eir proposals,
and ideas t'at t'ey fervently throw
in th' hope t'at t'ey canst corrupt my dreams,
my feelings-ah, yes, my sincere feelings,
and secure, t'ough imaginary, dreams.
Oh, and my comfortable desire as well!
My rosy desire-which at times canst tiringly
petrify me-ah, unbelievable, is it not? Th' fact
t'at I am so satiatingly, and daringly, petrified
by my own desire-and reproved by th' one
whom I am astonished at, praise, and admire;
How pitiful I am! How horrific and tragic!
I hath knitted my sorry without caution,
I was too immersed in vivid glances
and disguises and mock admiration.
Perhaps it hath been my mistake!
Eyes t'at blindly saw,
ears t'at wrongly judged!
Lies t'at I forsook,
tensions t'at I undertook!
Oh, how credulous I am-to vice!
Mock me, detest me, strangle me!
Stop my sullen heart from breathing-
as I hath, I hath spurned my darling-
oh, I hath lost my love!
How sorrowful, tearful-and painful!
And how I hath lost my breath; for cannot I stop
my feet from swimming and tapping
in t'is fraudulent air, gothic and transient
With poems t'at no matter how mad,
but nearly as thoughtful and eloquent,
I shalt still remain doleful and sad,
for my love for him is indeedst thorough-
and imminent; No matter how absurd he fancies
I am, and how he looketh at me oftentimes
with twigs of governing dexterity;
but most of all, shame.
I hath no shape now.
I hath lost, and raked away,
my elaborate conscience;
I hath corrupted my conciseness,
I hath wounded my sanguinity,
originality, and thoughts even, of my poetic
soul-of my poetic bluntness and sometimes
rigid, creativity.
I am an utter failure.
I am a mad creature; I am maddened by love,
I am frightened by virtue, I despise and reject
truth. I hath no sibling in t'is world of humanity,
ah-yes, no more sibling, indeedst,
neither any more puzzles of fate
t'at I ought to host, and solve;
I deserve nothing but fading and fading away
and give up my soul, my human soul-
to being a slave to disgrace
and cordial nothingness.
I belongst not, to t'is whole human world;
T'is is not my region, for I canst, here-
smell everything sacrificed for one another
and rings of delightful and blessed laughter
which I loathe, with all th' sonnets and auguries
of my laconic heart. Oh, I am misery!
I am evil, evil misery!
I, myself, equal tragedy; I am a devil,
a feminine and laurel-like devil-
just like how I look,
but tormented I am inside,
as a cursed being by nature and God Almighty
for never I shalt be bound to any love;
and engaged to any hands
in my left years and in th' afterlife outright.
I shalt have never any marriage within me,
any marriage worthy of talks, parties,
neither anything my wan heart desires;
like sweets with no sweetness,
or dances with no music.
No human love should ever
be properly conducted by me,
I am incapable of embodying
a unity, I am destined to be with me.
To be with me only-ah, as sad as it is,
as vague as how it sounds, or it might be.
O, and how I should love, emptiness!
Any loss should thus be romantic to me:
Just how death already is;
my husband is death,
and my chamber is his grave.
I shalt, night and day, sing to th' leaves
on his tomb,
ah-as t'ey are alive to me!
Yes, my darling reader! To me, t'ey are living souls,
t'ey open t'eir mouths and sing to me
Whenever I approach 'em with my red
bucket of flowers; lilies t'ey eat, ah-
how romantic t'ey look, with tongues
slithering joyfully over th' baked loaves I proffer!
T'eir smell of rotting flesh my hug,
meanwhile t'eir deadness my kisses!
T'eir greyness, and paleness-my cherry,
and t'eir red-blood heath my berry!
So glad shalt I becometh, and shimmer shalt my hair-
and be quenched my buoyant hunger-
beneath th' sun, with my hands, t'at hath
been aborted for long, robbed of whose divine functions
Laid in such epic, and abundant rejections
Brought into life again, and its surreal breath
But t'is time realistic, t'ough which happiness
shalt be mortal, as I perfectly, and tidily knoweth
and as I flippeth my head around
And duly openeth my eyes, I shalt again
be sitting in th' same impeccable nowhereness,
nowhere about th' dead lake, with its white-furred
swans, ghost-like at t'is hour of night-
Wherein for th' rest of my years should I dwell,
with no ability and desired tranquility
t'at canst once more guarantee
my security to escape.
T'ere's no door-yes, no door, indeedst,
to flee from th' gruesome trees,
t'eir putrid breath solitary and reeks of tears,
whilst t'eir tangled leaves smell strongly
of vulgarity and hate.
I hate as well-th' foliage amongst 'em,
grotesque and fiendish art whose dreamy visages,
with sticking tails wiping and squeaking
about my eyes, t'ough as I glance through
thy heavens, Lord, gleam like watery roses
before t'eir petals swell, fall, and die.
Oh-so creepy and melancholy t'ese feelings are,
but granted to me I knoweth not how,
as to why allowed not I am,
to becomest a more agreeable mistress
to a human-a human t'at even in solitude
breathes th' same air, and feels all th' same
indolent as me, by th' tedious,
ye' cathartic, morn.
Ah, and shalt I miss my lover once more
And t'is time even more persistently t'an before,
For every single of his breath is my sonnet,
and every word he utters my play.
He is th' salvation, and mere justification
I should not for ever forget,
just like how I should cherish
every sound second; every brand-new day.
My heart is deeply rooted in him;
no matter how defunct-
and defected it may seem,
as well as how futile, as t'is selfish world
hath-with anger and jealousy, deemed.
How I feel envy towards t'ose lucky ones,
with lovers and ringlets about t'eir palms,
so jealous t'at I cringe towards my own fate,
and my inability to escape which.
How unfair t'is world is sometimes-to me!
Ah, but I shalt argue further not;
I shalt make t'is exhaustive story short-
I am like a nasty kid trapped in th' dark,
without knowing in which way I should linger,
'fore making my way out and surpass her.
She is a curse-indeedst, a curse to me,
t'ough at th' moment she is a cure-but to him,
but she is all to forever remain a bad dream,
which he should but better quit,
she shalt subdue my light,
and so cheat him out of his wit.
She is an angel to him at night,
but at noon he sees her not,
she is an elegant, but mischievous auroch
with ineffectual, ye' doll-like and plastic auras
She is deceit, she is litter, she is mockery;
She hath all but an indignant, ****** beauty
She does not even hath a life, nor
a journey of destiny
She hath not any trace of warmth, or grace,
and most of th' time, at night
It is her agelessness t'at plays,
she ages but she falsely tricks him-my love,
into her lusted, exasperating eagerness;
t'ough colourless is her soul, now,
from committing too much of yon sin
She still knoweth not of her unkindness,
and thinks t'at everything canst be bought
by beauty, and t'at neither love nor passion
canst afford her any real happiness.

Ah, my love, I am hung about
by t'is prolific suspense;
My heart feels repugnant in its wait;
uncertain about everything thou hath said
As thou wert gentle but mean to me;
despite my kindness, ye' mistaken shortcomings
as I stood by th' railings th' other day, next to thee.
Ah, thee, please hear my apologies!
Oh, thee, my life and my midday sun,
a song t'at I sing-in my bed and on my pillow,
last week, yesterday, today, and tomorrow.
I am, however, to him forever a childlike prodigy-
shalt never he believeth in my tales,
ah, his faith is not in me,
but I in him.
How despicable!
But foolishly I still love him,
even over t'is overly weighing injustice
on my heart-
ah, still I love him, I love him!
I love him too badly and madly,
I love him too keenly, but wholly passionately.
I love him with all my heart and body!
Oh, Kozarev, I love thee!
I love thee only!
For love hath no more weight, neither justice
within it, if it is given not by thee;
I was born and raised to be thine,
as how thou wert created
and painted and crafted-by God Almighty,
to be mine. As I sit here I canst savagely feel, oh,
how painfully I feel-yon emptiness,
t'is insoluble, inseparable solitude
filled not with thy air, glancing at
th' deafening thunder, rusty rainbows
With thee not by my side.
I fallest asleep, as dusk preaches
and announces its arrival,
But asleep into a burdened nightmare,
too many fears and screams heightened in it,
ah, I am about to fallest from smart rocks
into th' boiling tides of fire beneath my feet.
I wake into th' imprudent smile of th' moon,
and her coquettish hands and feet
t'at conquer th' night so cold.
She is about to scold me away again,
'fore I slap her cheeks and send her back
to sleep, weeping.
I return to my wooden bench, and weep
all over again, as without thee still I am,
barefooted and thinly clothed amongst
th' dull stars at a killing cold night.
Th' rainbow is still th' rainbow,
but it is now filled with horror,
for I am not with thee, Kozarev!
Oh, Kozarev, th' darling of my heart,
th' mere, mere darling of my silent heart,
even th' heavens art still less handsome
t'an thy images-growing and fading
and growing and fading about me
Like a defiant chain, thou art my naughty prince,
but th' most decorous one, indeed;
thou art th' gift t'at I'th so heartily prayed for
and supplicated for-over what I should regard
as th' longest months of my life.
O, Kozarev, thou art my boy,
and which boy in th' world
who does not want to
play hide-and-seek in th' garden-
like we didst, last Monday?
Thou art my poem,
and thus worth all th' stories
within which. Thou art genial,
cautious, and beneficent. Thou art
vital-o, vital to me, my love!
I still blush with madness at th' remembrance
of thy voice, and giggle with joy and tears
over yon picture of thee; I canst ever forget thee
not, and sure as I am, t'at never in my life
I shalt be able to love, nor care for another;
thou art mine, Kozarev, thou art mine!
Thou art mine only, my sweet!
And ah, Kozarev, thou knoweth, my darling,
t'at the rainbow is longer beautiful
tonight; and as haughtiness surfaces again
from th' cynical undergrowth beneath,
I am afraid t'at t'eir fairness and brightness
shalt fade-just like thy love, which was back then
so glad and tender, but gets warmer not;
as we greet every inevitable day
and tend to t'eir needs,
like those obedient clouds
to th' appalling rain, in th' sky.

Ah, but nowest look-look at thee! Thy innocence,
t'at was but so delicate and sweet-
like t'ose bare, ye' green-clustered bushes yonder,
is now in exile, yes, deep exile, my love!
I congratulate thee on which, yes, I do!
I honestly do! For thy joy and gladness
doth mean everything to me,
'ven t'ough it means th' rudest,
th' eeriest of life; t'at I shalt'th ever seen!
But should I do so? T'at is a question
I canst stop questioning myself not.
Should I? Should I let thee go
and t'us myself suffer here
from th' absence
of my own true love-
and any ot'er future miracles
in my life?
I think not!
Ah, and not t'at there'd be
any ot'er mirages in my love,
for all hath been, and shalt always be-
united in thee! O, in thee, only, Kozarev!
For I am certain I love thee,
and so hysterically love thee only,
even amongst th' floods-ah, yes,
t'ese ambiguous piles of flooding pains,
disgusting as blood, but demure,
and clear as my own heartbeat;
I love and want thee only,
as how I dreameth of,
and careth for thee every night,
t'ough just in my dream,
and in life yet not!
Ah, Kozarev, I am thy star,
just like thou art mine-already,
I am fated and bound to thee,
and thou to me.
Thou art not an illusion,
neither a picture of my imagination.
Thou art real, Kozarev,
thou art real-and forever
shalt be real to me;
thou art th' blood,
t'at floweth through my veins,
thou art th' man,
t'at conquereth my heart-and hands,
thou art everything,
thou art more t'an my poem
and my delicate sonnet,
thou art more t'an my life
or my ever dearest friend.

Probably 'tis all neither a poem,
nor a matter of daydreams;
perhaps still I needst to find him,
t'ough it may bringst me anot'er curse,
and throwest me away
and into anot'er gloom.
Ah, Kozarev, thou-who shalt never
be reading t'is poem, much less write one
Unlike thou wert to me back t'en;
Thou art still as comely as th' sun;
Thou art still th' man t'at I want.
Even whenst all my age is done;
and my future days shalt be gone.
David Cunha Feb 2023
Time skips in between screen time emptiness
Mind's fuzzy with the traffic sounds
Eyes blinded by the flashing lights
Hands struggle to reach something pleasurable, at least,
As the heart beats excited for the minute-lasting serotonin blast

The hair grows an inch each week,
The numbness comes in days and leaves for a couple hours by bits,
The blood's rage meets the grinning face of guilt,
And the will to change is temporary.

What will it be when I'm 70?
What will change in me?
What will it be like when I'm not me?
And if I'm not me, who else should I be?
Why should I care for the fate of the world?
Why can't I be cozy for 20 years and die alone, slowly?
Why do I have to get up in the first place?
Why do I have to belong to the human race?
Racing indefinitely
Pretending to wear the shield of bravery for someone else's dream-****-like-fantasy,

What are all these brands and all these bands of crows?
Eating fleshless people with money for bones
Why is the circus always in town?
Why does the TV lie?
Why does the Internet lie?
Why do the people who run our money lie?
Why do the people who run us lie?
Why is it all so fake and sly?
What is all this bellyful hunger?

What is it that I can't grasp?
Is our nature really all that nefast?
If this is peak humanity, why should it last?
- David Cunha
february 8, 2023
4:00 p.m.
~~~                                              The thirteenth day at Kurukshetra
                                                     ­   verily an unfortunate day
                                                      for this is the day a hero falls
                                               the likes of which were never seen again

there he stands on his chariot                                                          ­          but his face is clouded with worry
his armour shooting arrows of  light                                                        ­         mind disturbed by confusion
truly he looks like the son                                                              ­             a David among Goliaths he stands
of the king of the night                                                            ­    a mammoth task on his youthful shoulders
                                                his uncle, the king must be protected
                                                       ­      his father is away
                                             the enemy has planned a tricky strategy
                                   a war formation-which only he knows how to break

                                          The Chakravyuha or Padmavyuha as it is called
                                            in the shape of a circular lotus it is arranged
                                                 a deadly trap like a venus fly-catcher
                                                  dea­th is certain for those who enter
“I know how to enter, he laments                                                          ­      but my lovely mother fell asleep
but of how to escape it  I am unaware                                                      unin­terested in the skills of warfare
my father taught it to my mother                                                           ­             so I learnt only how to enter
when I was in her womb                                                    and of knowledge of the exit I was deprived”

                                                  “Go­ forth bravely”, his uncle says,
                                                          w­e’ll follow you closely
                                                       no one can harm even a hair
                                                    on your head while we are there

                                                          ­  and so Abhimanyu enters
                                                          ­    a hero-true to his name
                                                            ­ with courage in his heart
                                                         and the Lord’s name on his lips
he prays, ‘let me make my father proud today”                                              so rapidly do his arrows fly
like a lion he is fierce, like an eagle swift                                              that they remain unseen to the eye
ten thousand soldiers fall                                                             ­                          only their stabbing tip is felt
under his wrathful gaze                                                             ­             before the receivers keel over and die
                                                             ­   the brave warrior forges on
                                                              ­    unaware of the goings on
                                                        his uncles have been trapped behind
                                                          ­  he’s alone behind the enemy line

                                                           ­      when he realizes the danger        
                                                                ­            its far too late      
                                                            a true warrior does not his fate berate
                                                          ­        bravely onwards he wanders
finding chinks in the enemy’s armour                                                         but treachery raises its ugly head
he is Yama himself incarnate                                                        ­                               alone he battles a crowd
into every heart he strikes a mindless fear                           Karna, Drona, Vrshasena, Salya, Durmashana
claiming lives as he plans an escape                        Duryodhana, Dussasana, Lakshmana, Aswathhaman
                                                           and Kritavarman all surround
                                                        ­scavengers against this lonely lion
                                                         Karna does his bowstrings break
                                                     and Kritavarman leaves him chariotless

                                                    ­           multiple arrows upon him rain
                                                            ­    he is now grievously wounded
                                                         ­          yet unnerved and undaunted
                                                       ­      he rises with sword and shield in hand
he challenges his attackers thus,                                                          come one by one and I shall be glad
“O mighty warriors, this cowardly act                                                              ­       to give you a good fight
does not your stature befit, the laws of war                                        and in this fair combat befitting kings
do not prescribe for many to stand against one                                                        may the best man win”

                                                           ­  but his plea for fairness went unheard
                                                   Karna breaks his shield and Drona cuts his sword
                                                           ­      unarmed and bleeding he employs
                                                         ­       his chariot wheel as a final defense

                                                        ­             but corruption is a cruel master
                                                          ­        that ruled the minds of his attackers
                                                       ­                       together in all injustice
                                                       ­     they smash  the chariot wheel to smithereens
they laugh their wicked laughs                                                           ­        with deceitful swords he is felled
and rejoice at Abhimanyu’s helplessness                                                     ­  but even in death he is dignified
to his honour and their ignominy                                              his only regret is that he shall not live to see
with ruthlessness they strike                                                           ­               his queen, Uttara and his child  
                                                         ­    but as he thinks of his father
                                                          ­    his heart is filled with pride
                                                     “look father”, he screams to the skies
                                                        “y­our son has died a hero’s death”

                                       “against many Maharathis  he has stood his ground
                                               and fulfilled his dharma - he hopes you are proud
                                                          h­is last wish is that you should avenge
                                                   the treason that has driven him to this end”

with these last words                                                            ­                  poor Abhimanyu - his words echoed
he leaves this world                                                            ­                              filling the battlefield with dread
the villains around him dance                                                            ­        his uncles hear his bellowing roars
in a shameful victory celebration                                                      ­      and know that their beloved is dead
                                                       with their mind-numbing sorrow
                                                         comes their unquenchable fear
                                                       how will they let their brother know
                                                          th­at he must light his son’s pyre

                                                           with bloodshot eyes they swear
                                                       that his noble death will be avenged
                                                         and then they fall deeper in sorrow
                                                          ­as the sun sets upon their beloved
his blood mixes with the earth                                                            ­              his death shall be a reminder
as the Gods rain praises above him                                                             that honour comes not with age
“here lies a true champion                                                     but by one’s actions is one’s worth determined
unbeaten and courageous                                                       ­           ascend Abhimanyu to the heavens!”

                                                    Th­e thirteenth day at Kurukshetra
                                                     ­        verily an unfortunate day
                                                            f­or this is the day a hero fell
                                                   the likes of which were never seen again
- Vijayalakshmi Harish
   16.09.2012

Copyright © Vijayalakshmi Harish
In the Indian epic Mahabharata, Abhimanyu is the son of the Pandava Arjuna and Subhadra the sister of Lord Krishna. He is thus the nephew of the other four Pandava brothers. Since Karna is also a son of Kunti, he also was a nephew to Karna, one of his murderers. Though Abhimanyu and the other Pandavas were unaware of this fact, Karna was cognizant of the relationship, which is what makes the killing of Abhimanyu a particularly heinous crime.  
He is husband to the Matsya kingdom's princess, Uttarā, who was pregnant with his child Parikshikt at the time of his death.
Abhimanyu is also said to be an incarnation of Varchas, the son of the Moon God.
The Mahabharata records that Karna was instrumental in the killing of Abhimanyu. Karna asks Drona how Abhimanyu can be killed to which Drona replies : "Abhimanyu is young, his prowess is great. His coat of mail is impenetrable. This one's father had been taught by me the method of wearing defensive armour. This subjugator of hostile towns assuredly knoweth the entire science (of wearing armour). With shafts well shot, you can, however, cut off his bow, bow-string, the reins of his steeds, the steeds themselves, and two Parshni charioteers. O mighty bowman, O son of Radha, if competent, do this. Making him turn back from the fight (by this means), strike him then. With his bow in hand he is incapable of being vanquished by the very gods and the Asuras together. If you wish, deprive him of his car, and divest him of his bow".
Abhimanyu was 16 years old at the time of his death. The name Abhimanyu is a Sanskrit word meaning "heroic".
Bree Sep 2014
Twisting, turning, yearning
That is what I do

Laughing, smiling, cheering
That's what you do

I have sorrows
You have joys

You've hurt me
I've served you

The fairness of this world is as perplexing as a quadratic formula

As I get hurt, those who hurt me excel

As I am pained, others are healed

I see who I once was
Laughing, smiling, cheering

Now, I hardly recognize myself
Not my best, but today wasn't the best either
K Balachandran Dec 2011
stop unfairly
monopolizing
seduction;
let fair ***
share  the fun.
Norah DiMarini Oct 2011
Wistful lust and melancholy mangoes
Succulent decadence and still I am morose
A plum for pining, a kiwi for whining
Pineapple dreams are the clouds’ only lining
For in the resting realm the reality is nigh
Alas cruel consciousness eradicates the high
And thrown am I back into awareness
That life and love are not games of fairness
a May 2015
newspaper headlines emitting fear and news channels repeating the same
informative slogans they used last week, with promises to always update the public on the ever-continuing War in the East, never to hide any event or withhold information about that death on _ street.
and they hold true, giving the name of the killer and hastily adding the fact that the murderer, aged 32, is muslim
but then, when advising the public about current naughtiness, the family whose car was bombed in yemen isn't included as part of the list. or it is, but bomber, 23, is only bomber, 23, not christian, jewish or athiest bomber, 23.
hmm.
In as much as I tamed the Infidel
Baptism pokes her Holistic White Tongue
Such that if you try to flip the Role-Model
For which Hypocrisy had said and done
You do not know me. If Duty must care
And stand accused tackling my Man to like
Your Mass does not shrink me; And if you dare
Take a Pied Contest and taste the First Strike
Yet in fairness your Swan-Form does exist
As billed by Tom's Twin circled in craft
Now may I come in? Or should I resist
And Boot my *** on the Beach by the Draft?
Those Stripes were hostile from a Few Years Past
Enjoy Iberia Minor; Healing can last.
#ChrisMears93
Kyle Kulseth Jun 2018
I thought I heard
               Canadian slang
from the opposite bed-side
Like it's 2009, rub some lines off my face.
Inner space bleeding outward,
deep red, a nosebleed,
angled points on white of The Maple Jack.
               A Nip at the Sal's on Esplanade-Riel.

Grab your runners and toque,
               it's warm, but not forever
and these legs are sore. Polar bears
on the sweater you wore in the Fall--
Churchill, Manitoba, the streets are full of teeth and claws.
Awoke and wanted warmth lacking.
I thought I heard Canadian slang.

I thought I heard "it'll be okay"
from the voices of feathers fletching arrows falling.
     they whisper and screams sink deep behind
                                     eyelids
                                     closing.
A sentence unfinished,
                sinking in flesh
                              in time
                sinking
                              in snow and ice
                sinking
                              in water in Summer
                sinking
                              in memory.

I thought I heard
               plans being made
and shy laughter.
I heard it 5 times. Didn't I?
Days fade, ears dull*
Walking on streets, in the cold
towards her home
I thought I heard laughter--
                                   heard something
                        like laughter--
I thought I heard rain, as the Lodgepoles drank water.

I thought I heard laughter.

I thought I heard wax melt.
I thought I smelled fairness.
I thought you wanting more time
to bleed and blur tenses.
I thought I heard rivers rushing and roaring
                                                 their battle cries--
--asserting their presence.
I thought I heard cars pass and sounds of the daytime
                    and late March walk along bridges.

I could swear I heard something
     Like Canadian slang,
                 sweet
                     water
                  light
                      laughter.
Som­ething.
Sarah Rodriguez Feb 2015
It's not fair that I wait up all night for you.
I'm not saying that it's your fault;
I'm just saying that it isn't fair.

It's not fair that I got too serious.
I'm not saying that it was my fault;
I'm just saying that it isn't fair.

It's not fair that I'm too stressed to smile.
I'm not saying it's the world's fault;
I'm just saying that it isn't fair.

It isn't fair that I'm writing sad poems at midnight.
I am saying that it's your fault,
but I guess not entirely.
Wen Ao Long Nov 2014
Hello snorer, I hope you didn't sleep any poorer
when I stayed up all night typing this not-poem
I meant you no harm, but I had to stay up
Because I couldn't make music out of your obnoxiously loud cacophony of windpipe crap, er "music".  Time to not-pretend to absolutely hate your snoring under the guise of being perfectly okay with it for the sake of setting the tone a bit nicer to all who must hear it, so they can BEAR to, for otherwise it would be absurd.  Not as absurd as anyone hating to have aural drills applied to all their chakras all night, but still absurd enough to get a chuckle out of me (I hope it didn't wake your fine specimen here). It was never my intent, though it was always my ethical concern (if only everyone could be as reciprocal as you and I).   Oh, my not-pretend hatred is very thinly veiled.  I wasn't totally defeated by your snore-sound armies so that I couldn't type words, but I may have lost some of my desired effect due to the sometimes wincing distraction they caused to my piece of mind at this or that time when I needed it the most (even though I was awake, which is no crime if snoring at night and keeping me that way isn't).

Well, I did ask you if you'd mind if I typed,
I did tell you that you could tell me if its quiet purr of clicks would bother your precious sleep
But I never felt a need to be concerned, because whenever I
was typing, I heard you snore, and whenever I was in the heights of
some new discovery or epiphany, your sharp sudden thunderstroke of near death
corrugated metal vibrating in the torrent of some sudden gale force gust of wind.

These were signs to me of your restful sleep.  So I simply didn't worry about your sleep.  I was certain that my electronic beeps were every now and then music to your ears, just as they were to mine.  This is because in the midst of these I heard you snore, and when you snored, I took you to be asleep.

Ah but then again, then again, these are fanciful constructions which simply say that what is wonderful for me should be just fine and dandy with you, at a bare minimum, and on those grounds of very unsymmetrical attitude about right and wrong I would have to begin my music tirade of words as well.  But I don't view justice and propriety along such selfish lines as these.

What I see is that duplicity is your thesis.  I have anecdotal accounts which are marvelous to behold first hand, but the details of the absurdities cannot be done justice in the language of men, for the intensity of such insanity can only be borne lightly by the frailest frayed ends of my sanity for having lived through your acoustically maddening inanity.

You didn't ever admit to me that my noises were not music to YOUR ears.  Indeed  you claimed never to be bothered by them because you never voiced up against them.  I suppose you might as well voice up against them in the street as well if it turns out not all of you snorers-go-a-viking types like to hear my mouse clicking away like a tapping noises on a metal plate in your skull.  Sorry if it is another non-snorer-who-must-stay-up-late-and-so-be-occupied person whose nocturnal joys were misinterpreted as direct assaults on the dignity, spirit, or just basic mental viability of your wounded snoremonster troop of anti-late-stayer-uppers, because in fact, we used to be sleep-at-night-entities like you, but that was before you showed up, thoracic marching band in tow.  Marching bands are musical also, to some people.  And for some all hours of the night are perfect for a marching band.  Who am I to tell them otherwise.  

Well let me know the next time a marching band is given special permit to come through your neighborhood at night, and I'll be glad to point out to you the first Snorer'sville, because only they should be expected, in all justice to live with the macroscopic manifestation of their personal narcissistic paradises.

Let you all go to your own place and form your own nation, and see if you can consistently demand everyone else find music in your ****** and accursed racket!  But until then I expect some of you will have to take the damage returned by the growing number of people who are very much tired of living under the horrors of your infliction upon us, your demonic and evil tyranny of mind-crushing hate that is your ****** noise.  We will do yoga and breathe, and stretch, and some light calesthenics to relax and seek some focus and composure, whenever our spirits require, and this will be unchallenged by you so long as you are asleep, and it will be unchallenged by you so long as you are awake too.  For in the latter case you are already awake (and so still are we, usually) while in the former case it is far quieter than your snoring, both in its valleys and peaks.  And moreover it has not kept you up, but in fact I have noted that you wake yourself up with your own music when it reaches a certain crescendo.  

Unless you want to say that those crescendos are some sort of involuntary complaint about MY crescendos of spirit, when I start typing about 20% faster than normal, with perfect focus and accuracy while reaching an aesthetic pleasure approaching ****** as I realize that it is almost unerringly in the midst of such an experience that I hear your crescendo resound. And since it was no more intended to be a distraction for me, then surely my music must have also gone undetected by your ears, as well as your spirit. Or is it fairer to say it was the very cause of your crescendo, or at least its inspiration?

Therefore I needn't worry that it is I that is keeping you up, even if for only brief stints at a time, especially by comparison to my all-night vigils.  Not so, but it is you who are so enraptured by my occasional laughs or giggles as I edify my weary, sleep-deprived mind on some bit of morale boosting entertainment.  With headphones on of course.  It's also courteously plugged into the computer to prevent my favorite bit of Judas Priest from hurting your ear drums, or else overstimulating your music appreciation centers, which are verily attached to your ear-drums by a nerve bundle (and what nerve you all have there).  This means I've spared you too much distraction from any already-abundant music of the spheres effect you may be savoring which might have emanated from my bumbling around in the dark (to keep the lights out of course, after all people are sleeping).

Yes but that is a minority of you perhaps, who would lie about that and in fact who ought to say that our nocturnal emissions are not what you'd call restfully mind-relaxing crickets in the dead of night with an occasional hoot in the distance...  But they are a minority, the rest of you are so definitely in good faith.

But then why do I always run into those of your tribe who have strange and unethical habits, such as destroying others' lives by ruining their one perhaps most preciously personal and inalienable need second only to air and water, and that is sleep.  It is, in terms of acute necessity, in many ways more needed than food, though in the long term food catches up.  But food catches up only because not eating food is a  lot like not getting sleep, but just a lot more intense on the body when it drops to some critical point because we know from experience it is on raw nerves that we can go for a while in search of food, but if the food can't be found (perhaps because of our lack of sleep ruining our cognition in some way), then we will not eat, nor sleep, because we'll be dead.  

But either way, we'll be dead, for lack of sleep kills, both directly and indirectly, if suffered over a short time and/or in a diluted form over a long time.  That would be poetically commensurate to the sadistic similitude of the types of snoring sounds with the types of ways to die from being deprived of sleep according to two modes (acute and chronic), over many keys of incident, accident, lost opportunity and ill-stared fate, all of which can be mapped in some way back to that auditory persecution of our very souls of which your kind are in some swelling numbers quite proud.  Just think of all the car accidents, work accidents, altercations, fits of rage, inability to concentrate well or sometimes at all, and other life-damaging conditions of the mind, and also of the body, which accrue from lack of proper and healthy sleep at night!

Good thing for most of you though, right?  Because surely our music is also sweet, and I really hope I've inspired many to face this need for equality, and be on their guard against any unjust whining or groaning from those who seem in point of fact to value their sleep just a good deal more than they value anyone else's.  Not only because they really really love to get those zzz's but because they think that in the natural order of things, before people suddenly went mad and evil, people went to bed and slept well even partly BECAUSE of this brachio-esophageal orchestral lullaby.

But we'll be on our guard against those complaints, because we know you have plotted to take to the streets against us to defend your noisiness-all-night-every-night rights.  So we'll be on guard to defend ours, TO THE LAST FIBER OF OUR BEING.

Because you insufferable ******* are cruel, and cruelty no one should abide.  No one in my world, in my society of people, will be allowed to inflict cruelty on another person, nor be callously prejudicial in their own favor when injuries do occur because of their actions merely on the grounds that the damage it causes coincides with the fulfillment of a need on their own part, even while that fulfillment is of a need which is obstructed from satisfaction in the other part, and by THAT VERY SAME REASON, so that your sleep depends on keeping others awake.  UNLESS you can somehow con or coerce them into developing some form of Stockholm Syndrome and confuse the torment you inflict upon them with a sign of your love and wonderfulness to be around.

Yes, I know you hear me typing now, through your well-behaved proxy.  I feel it. If not he per se, then in a parallel universe not too far off, there's a version of him who does.  Perhaps not the one I know now, on day one of having moved into this room, but perhaps one represented in this universe by someone who has found himself in some sort of circumstances found later on during his stay, this mixed with the fact that familiarity breeds contempt... He'll start making some righteous demands of some kind, and I might not be in a such a good mood about that due to lack of proper sleep, and this will coincide with said contumacy against my own rights (such as to breathe, type, surf the net, or do other nocturnal things other than snoring which might keep others up).

As to that last point in parentheses, snoring is an activity which you perform in conjunction with your getting sleep, and it therefore means not well for your notion of fairness to say things as they are, and simply say the truth, which is that your getting sleep deprives others of theirs, but it can be logically deduced.

It can also be logically deduced that the don't give flying **** if you don't like the fact that we don't like your ear-**** night after night, which is a good name as any, but should perhaps at times be amended to body-demolishing soul-****** of a mortally sinful nature, and with an ethical incongruity to good character of a person to maintain it, all the more to sings its praises to us and call it "good poetry".
My tirade is intended to be expressive of a sincerely felt Truth, manifested in this which is only one of many forms, where things are never neutral, but divided neatly and perfectly into either Good or evil, so that no thought, word, or deed can be trivialized as mundane, neither in its innate import nor in its exported impact for others.  This is of the essence of ethics and has many metaphysical groundings which can be rationally demonstrated, but only to rational people.
The hardest part of growing up is the disappointment. The rules of fairness get thrown out the window and it's up to you to pursue your interests. Each person becomes their own main priority. Self preservation. Your heart loses it value to others, your feelings no longer spared. Doing what is right mistaken with what feels right. My problem as of lately has been not doing what has felt right, but what's best for me, finding who's best for me.

Now, don't mistake me. He was a dream. My eyes glittered when I smiled. The first tender touch that scared me, but I was too proud to flinch. Laughter was endless, love ran lucratively. I guess you could say he was the beginning of my disappointment. No kiss could be as sweet.

The next was the captain of saving. He loved the skin I was in and taught me to do the same. He gave me affection, recognition, and a dilemma of delicacy. So sweet yet so twisted, wicked some may say. The sweet taste of sin. My disappointment grew with the seduction of satan.

Now I transition. The ending of a roller coaster. The disappointment began with the first drunken "I love you" I started to believe it myself. In actuality, I think I was just trying to fill the void that sweet kiss originally gave me. Nothing else could replace it. Not even his return. These short romances burn out quickly, only lasting months at a time, but experiencing the most significant of moments. Together, my loves have caused my heart to wither more and more. But it's those small  moments that make it all worth it. The moments that I knew somewhere in the midst of the mess they learned to love me, even if it wasn't forever. It happened, and in these moments disappointment grew because I knew they'd eventually end.
vircapio gale Nov 2012
fem in isms,
i imagine Sapphic eyes:
bad *** advert coruscates elite
fairness sensing slavish blind
in gestate calm affirm
in genders More numerous of Windows--
Superior--for Doors--
O harsh judgement foiled,
as a foil, as unknown truth
foil-doubles in the brow,
abject symmetry to systemize
a fertile lack of sterile barrenness,
i am a mediatrix rend,
nirwaan, hijra wonderment aside
from transemotion's ground swells
demeaning to be understood.
i celebrate and face the same
to be what paperwork tests being
normal being, freely chosen
atom each belonging moves
an asterisk of paths
of mutate art of nature social darwin maze.
i imagine Sapphic eyes,
ginko soft they pile up all cobble
memories themselves concretely
cloistered  fame
spray of salty waves,
macho screams symbol
for dismissal ease
for tearing at an inner unsaid war
with lists offense of proper taste
to what posterity intends
an undulation womblike seeming nourish safety sounds.
i imagine Sapphic eyes
past
debauched
meanderings
where hyster-clarity rejoins its titular
and reliable escapisms curl the lips
of maleness found
here and there  smile  sneer love
i imagine Sapphic eyes
linguistic pirouettes
congest that wisdom nonetheless
the moment passed  on to a
feigning truth in pretty rhyme
ornamenting time with fine  meter  fine
vernacular chimes peter in
to juggle perspectival paradox,
redichotomize the twilight idols,
resolve the conflict like a dawn
Aurora,
i imagine Sapphic eyes
running plastic with Alaskan wolves,
toga floats to snow
to let us see the purest fairness form
a ****** circle,
Hypatia ascends from tenebrous grave,
Impregnable of Eye is pregnant now
with Wollstonecraft revered
in liberation's fount
families held exemplar gaze of
Taylor, ******, Cady,
Anthony resanctified
to vote entitlement's
empathic origins, waxen mold
of nascent categories,
narrow hands spread wide to panoply anew
the manifest evolve in true unknowns
Twenty-four years’ marriage certificate released today
Mirrors cracked, tragedy lives where apathies traces.
We, create only a smaller voice than
the angels, have crouched hopes in   

We, A Mountain, An Ocean, or at A Journey
Gazing sky, we see no woman and children play

Tears which she planted in a frozen hut are exposed
The tears are saved and we have vases of sorrow drink 

Unfairness imprisoned herself inside this cage
The sorrow that was building transforms rage

And fire within us naturally grow

We, A Mountain, An Ocean, or at A Journey

The Truth, The Sun and all about her fairness right
Armed for slaughter, her mouths spilling words
Mountains echo as we choke on an ocean of sorrow

An end with hopes is what we patiently await.
Note: For a chained woman who been human trafficked
in China.

— The End —