The ultimate Dragon Poem and a childhood favourite of mine which still sends shivers to this day...

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee
Little Jackie paper loved that rascal puff
And brought him strings and sealing wax and other fancy stuff oh

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee
Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

Together they would travel on a boat with billowed sail
Jackie kept a lookout perched on puff's gigantic tail
Noble kings and princes would bow whene'er they came
Pirate ships would lower their flag when puff roared out his name oh

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee
Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

A dragon lives forever but not so little boys
Painted wings and giant rings make way for other toys
One grey night it happened, Jackie Paper came no more
And puff that mighty dragon, he ceased his fearless roar

His head was bent in sorrow, green scales fell like rain
Puff no longer went to play along the cherry lane
Without his life-long friend, puff could not be brave
So Puff that mighty dragon sadly slipped into his cave oh

Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee
Puff, the magic dragon lived by the sea
And frolicked in the autumn mist in a land called Honahlee

The Island Moorea,
backpacking Tahiti,
In the heat, the sun,
The rhythm of my footfalls
crunching loose gravel road,
The swish of pack swaying
in conert to my measured pace.

Breeze pushing branches of Palm,
Ocean waves breaching shoreline long.
Island vehicles passing, occupant's laughing,
a man laboring under large pack, alone walking,
Who could have been freely riding,
Unthinkable to Island Folk,
in hot tropical places.

Some humble homes passed along the way.
Greetings exchanged with smiling faces there.
Not long afterward a new sound approaching,
crunching gravel, rolling up behind me.

A lovely young girl, perhaps nineteen,
long brown naked legs bike a peddling.
Hair jet black, long to her waist, wearing
a sarong, split up the side,
Shoulders bare and brown.
Dark eyes of wonder, sparkling of youth.
A radiant smile adorning a splendid face.

We went for a time at my even pace,
looking and smiling each in our place.
"Hello there," I said, she giggled, beamed
even bigger. Perfect teeth displayed.

"Why you walk?" She asked in heavily
accented puzzlement.

"To get to where I'm going". I replied
This response producing a pleasant laugh
from the girl. In which I too joined in.

"You go One Chicken?" She asked
I stopped then and turned to her.
"Where is One Chicken?" I questioned
with a grin.

She raised her graceful arm,
one finger pointing up the road.
"One Chicken there," she informed.

It was a store/bar, sort of place,
In the very midst of nowhere.
Indeed, more than one chicken roamed,
Many chickens did and a pig or two,
mingling free and doing their thing.

We entered out of the bright daylight,
into the deepest of darks,
Like in a movie theater, when arriving late.
Eyes adjusting slowly to what lay ahead.

A few Island Beers later,
I had acquired several new friends,
The girl my invitation to the party of
already happy people a little drunk on beer.
The Music was mostly of French persuasion,
With a bit of Bob Dylan thrown in.
The Beatles also had a tune or two.
The Liverpool beat resounding down Tahiti way.

Before the light did fail, I shouldered my pack
and walked some distance from Chickens and Pigs.
Found the beach, hung my Hammock for the night.
Built a small fire and opened a can of Spam delight.

She appeared again about ten,
looking beautiful in the new moonlight.
Newly washed hair, still damp and
smelling fresh of Lilacs,
Or some such aromatic scent.
We did not speak, no words were needed,

Made love on the sand, 'till the retreat of the
tide and sand ***** did come out, in their
eerie numbers, to eat what was at hand.
I suppose even us if we were still and let
them.

We retired then both to my hammock,
A pretty neat trick if you can swing it.
And we did.

She was so childlike and yet,
very much a woman grown.
There was no pretense shown,
no false inhibitions rendered.
These were not limitations of her culture.
people that respond to their emotional
impulses. An open and free spirited
people living passionately within each
minute shared.

It all felt more akin to a dream than real,
All around me there was beauty,
Loving and being loved without hurry,
Free of guilt or even a single expectation.
Living in that wondrous moment,
of uncomplicated human splendor.
Like some Garden of Eden surrender.
A real-life Gauguin painting.

In the morning, we swam naked in the sea,
frolicked like kids having a day at the beach.
Made love in the sand, I dozed in the sun.
Upon awaking she was gone.

I waited an hour or two, packed up my camp,
shouldered my load and returned to the road.
A few minutes later, again I heard the now
familiar crunch of rubber tires, rolling road
surface and there she was, a straw basket in
her Bike's basket, a huge smile on her
unforgettable, beautiful face.

We sat in a grove of trees, among birds singing,
in sight of the sea, upon a Palm log and ate fresh
bread and fruit. Drank strong black coffee
(French Roast I presume,) nibbling some
marvelous cheese.

We tried to talk, but she understood little of
what I tried to say, my French was nearly
nonexistent, only adding to confusions sake.

She leaned her head on my shoulder,
the way lovers do and tenderly held
my hand within her two,
As if not wanting to let go,
Those gestures said all there was to say,
And we savored each silent moment.

We parted there, she on blue, rusty bike
and me on "shanks mare",
Off in two different directions,
Each out into the depths of our own lives,
Gone just like that. . . And yet,
Indelible, never to be forgotten or replaced.

I

He did not wear his scarlet coat,
  For blood and wine are red,
And blood and wine were on his hands
  When they found him with the dead,
The poor dead woman whom he loved,
  And murdered in her bed.

He walked amongst the Trial Men
  In a suit of shabby grey;
A cricket cap was on his head,
  And his step seemed light and gay;
But I never saw a man who looked
  So wistfully at the day.

I never saw a man who looked
  With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
  Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every drifting cloud that went
  With sails of silver by.

I walked, with other souls in pain,
  Within another ring,
And was wondering if the man had done
  A great or little thing,
When a voice behind me whispered low,
  “That fellows got to swing.”

Dear Christ! the very prison walls
  Suddenly seemed to reel,
And the sky above my head became
  Like a casque of scorching steel;
And, though I was a soul in pain,
  My pain I could not feel.

I only knew what hunted thought
  Quickened his step, and why
He looked upon the garish day
  With such a wistful eye;
The man had killed the thing he loved
  And so he had to die.

Yet each man kills the thing he loves
  By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
  Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
  The brave man with a sword!

Some **** their love when they are young,
  And some when they are old;
Some strangle with the hands of Lust,
  Some with the hands of Gold:
The kindest use a knife, because
  The dead so soon grow cold.

Some love too little, some too long,
  Some sell, and others buy;
Some do the deed with many tears,
  And some without a sigh:
For each man kills the thing he loves,
  Yet each man does not die.

He does not die a death of shame
  On a day of dark disgrace,
Nor have a noose about his neck,
  Nor a cloth upon his face,
Nor drop feet foremost through the floor
  Into an empty place

He does not sit with silent men
  Who watch him night and day;
Who watch him when he tries to weep,
  And when he tries to pray;
Who watch him lest himself should rob
  The prison of its prey.

He does not wake at dawn to see
  Dread figures throng his room,
The shivering Chaplain robed in white,
  The Sheriff stern with gloom,
And the Governor all in shiny black,
  With the yellow face of Doom.

He does not rise in piteous haste
  To put on convict-clothes,
While some coarse-mouthed Doctor gloats, and notes
  Each new and nerve-twitched pose,
******* a watch whose little ticks
  Are like horrible hammer-blows.

He does not know that sickening thirst
  That sands one’s throat, before
The hangman with his gardener’s gloves
  Slips through the padded door,
And binds one with three leathern thongs,
  That the throat may thirst no more.

He does not bend his head to hear
  The Burial Office read,
Nor, while the terror of his soul
  Tells him he is not dead,
Cross his own coffin, as he moves
  Into the hideous shed.

He does not stare upon the air
  Through a little roof of glass;
He does not pray with lips of clay
  For his agony to pass;
Nor feel upon his shuddering cheek
  The kiss of Caiaphas.


II

Six weeks our guardsman walked the yard,
  In a suit of shabby grey:
His cricket cap was on his head,
  And his step seemed light and gay,
But I never saw a man who looked
  So wistfully at the day.

I never saw a man who looked
  With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
  Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every wandering cloud that trailed
  Its raveled fleeces by.

He did not wring his hands, as do
  Those witless men who dare
To try to rear the changeling Hope
  In the cave of black Despair:
He only looked upon the sun,
  And drank the morning air.

He did not wring his hands nor weep,
  Nor did he peek or pine,
But he drank the air as though it held
  Some healthful anodyne;
With open mouth he drank the sun
  As though it had been wine!

And I and all the souls in pain,
  Who tramped the other ring,
Forgot if we ourselves had done
  A great or little thing,
And watched with gaze of dull amaze
  The man who had to swing.

And strange it was to see him pass
  With a step so light and gay,
And strange it was to see him look
  So wistfully at the day,
And strange it was to think that he
  Had such a debt to pay.

For oak and elm have pleasant leaves
  That in the spring-time shoot:
But grim to see is the gallows-tree,
  With its adder-bitten root,
And, green or dry, a man must die
  Before it bears its fruit!

The loftiest place is that seat of grace
  For which all worldlings try:
But who would stand in hempen band
  Upon a scaffold high,
And through a murderer’s collar take
  His last look at the sky?

It is sweet to dance to violins
  When Love and Life are fair:
To dance to flutes, to dance to lutes
  Is delicate and rare:
But it is not sweet with nimble feet
  To dance upon the air!

So with curious eyes and sick surmise
  We watched him day by day,
And wondered if each one of us
  Would end the self-same way,
For none can tell to what red Hell
  His sightless soul may stray.

At last the dead man walked no more
  Amongst the Trial Men,
And I knew that he was standing up
  In the black dock’s dreadful pen,
And that never would I see his face
  In God’s sweet world again.

Like two doomed ships that pass in storm
  We had crossed each other’s way:
But we made no sign, we said no word,
  We had no word to say;
For we did not meet in the holy night,
  But in the shameful day.

A prison wall was round us both,
  Two outcast men were we:
The world had ****** us from its heart,
  And God from out His care:
And the iron gin that waits for Sin
  Had caught us in its snare.


III

In Debtors’ Yard the stones are hard,
  And the dripping wall is high,
So it was there he took the air
  Beneath the leaden sky,
And by each side a Warder walked,
  For fear the man might die.

Or else he sat with those who watched
  His anguish night and day;
Who watched him when he rose to weep,
  And when he crouched to pray;
Who watched him lest himself should rob
  Their scaffold of its prey.

The Governor was strong upon
  The Regulations Act:
The Doctor said that Death was but
  A scientific fact:
And twice a day the Chaplain called
  And left a little tract.

And twice a day he smoked his pipe,
  And drank his quart of beer:
His soul was resolute, and held
  No hiding-place for fear;
He often said that he was glad
  The hangman’s hands were near.

But why he said so strange a thing
  No Warder dared to ask:
For he to whom a watcher’s doom
  Is given as his task,
Must set a lock upon his lips,
  And make his face a mask.

Or else he might be moved, and try
  To comfort or console:
And what should Human Pity do
  Pent up in Murderers’ Hole?
What word of grace in such a place
  Could help a brother’s soul?

With slouch and swing around the ring
  We trod the Fool’s Parade!
We did not care: we knew we were
  The Devil’s Own Brigade:
And shaven head and feet of lead
  Make a merry masquerade.

We tore the tarry rope to shreds
  With blunt and bleeding nails;
We rubbed the doors, and scrubbed the floors,
  And cleaned the shining rails:
And, rank by rank, we soaped the plank,
  And clattered with the pails.

We sewed the sacks, we broke the stones,
  We turned the dusty drill:
We banged the tins, and bawled the hymns,
  And sweated on the mill:
But in the heart of every man
  Terror was lying still.

So still it lay that every day
  Crawled like a ****-clogged wave:
And we forgot the bitter lot
  That waits for fool and knave,
Till once, as we tramped in from work,
  We passed an open grave.

With yawning mouth the yellow hole
  Gaped for a living thing;
The very mud cried out for blood
  To the thirsty asphalte ring:
And we knew that ere one dawn grew fair
  Some prisoner had to swing.

Right in we went, with soul intent
  On Death and Dread and Doom:
The hangman, with his little bag,
  Went shuffling through the gloom
And each man trembled as he crept
  Into his numbered tomb.

That night the empty corridors
  Were full of forms of Fear,
And up and down the iron town
  Stole feet we could not hear,
And through the bars that hide the stars
  White faces seemed to peer.

He lay as one who lies and dreams
  In a pleasant meadow-land,
The watcher watched him as he slept,
  And could not understand
How one could sleep so sweet a sleep
  With a hangman close at hand?

But there is no sleep when men must weep
  Who never yet have wept:
So we—the fool, the fraud, the knave—
  That endless vigil kept,
And through each brain on hands of pain
  Another’s terror crept.

Alas! it is a fearful thing
  To feel another’s guilt!
For, right within, the sword of Sin
  Pierced to its poisoned hilt,
And as molten lead were the tears we shed
  For the blood we had not spilt.

The Warders with their shoes of felt
  Crept by each padlocked door,
And peeped and saw, with eyes of awe,
  Grey figures on the floor,
And wondered why men knelt to pray
  Who never prayed before.

All through the night we knelt and prayed,
  Mad mourners of a corpse!
The troubled plumes of midnight were
  The plumes upon a hearse:
And bitter wine upon a sponge
  Was the savior of Remorse.

The **** crew, the red **** crew,
  But never came the day:
And crooked shape of Terror crouched,
  In the corners where we lay:
And each evil sprite that walks by night
  Before us seemed to play.

They glided past, they glided fast,
  Like travelers through a mist:
They mocked the moon in a rigadoon
  Of delicate turn and twist,
And with formal pace and loathsome grace
  The phantoms kept their tryst.

With mop and mow, we saw them go,
  Slim shadows hand in hand:
About, about, in ghostly rout
  They trod a saraband:
And the ****** grotesques made arabesques,
  Like the wind upon the sand!

With the pirouettes of marionettes,
  They tripped on pointed tread:
But with flutes of Fear they filled the ear,
  As their grisly masque they led,
And loud they sang, and long they sang,
  For they sang to wake the dead.

“Oho!” they cried, “The world is wide,
  But fettered limbs go lame!
And once, or twice, to throw the dice
  Is a gentlemanly game,
But he does not win who plays with Sin
  In the secret House of Shame.”

No things of air these antics were
  That frolicked with such glee:
To men whose lives were held in gyves,
  And whose feet might not go free,
Ah! wounds of Christ! they were living things,
  Most terrible to see.

Around, around, they waltzed and wound;
  Some wheeled in smirking pairs:
With the mincing step of demirep
  Some sidled up the stairs:
And with subtle sneer, and fawning leer,
  Each helped us at our prayers.

The morning wind began to moan,
  But still the night went on:
Through its giant loom the web of gloom
  Crept till each thread was spun:
And, as we prayed, we grew afraid
  Of the Justice of the Sun.

The moaning wind went wandering round
  The weeping prison-wall:
Till like a wheel of turning-steel
  We felt the minutes crawl:
O moaning wind! what had we done
  To have such a seneschal?

At last I saw the shadowed bars
  Like a lattice wrought in lead,
Move right across the whitewashed wall
  That faced my three-plank bed,
And I knew that somewhere in the world
  God’s dreadful dawn was red.

At six o’clock we cleaned our cells,
  At seven all was still,
But the sough and swing of a mighty wing
  The prison seemed to fill,
For the Lord of Death with icy breath
  Had entered in to ****.

He did not pass in purple pomp,
  Nor ride a moon-white steed.
Three yards of cord and a sliding board
  Are all the gallows’ need:
So with rope of shame the Herald came
  To do the secret deed.

We were as men who through a fen
  Of filthy darkness *****:
We did not dare to breathe a prayer,
  Or give our anguish scope:
Something was dead in each of us,
  And what was dead was Hope.

For Man’s grim Justice goes its way,
  And will not swerve aside:
It slays the weak, it slays the strong,
  It has a deadly stride:
With iron heel it slays the strong,
  The monstrous parricide!

We waited for the stroke of eight:
  Each tongue was thick with thirst:
For the stroke of eight is the stroke of Fate
  That makes a man accursed,
And Fate will use a running noose
  For the best man and the worst.

We had no other thing to do,
  Save to wait for the sign to come:
So, like things of stone in a valley lone,
  Quiet we sat and dumb:
But each man’s heart beat thick and quick
  Like a madman on a drum!

With sudden shock the prison-clock
  Smote on the shivering air,
And from all the gaol rose up a wail
  Of impotent despair,
Like the sound that frightened marshes hear
  From a ***** in his lair.

And as one sees most fearful things
  In the crystal of a dream,
We saw the greasy hempen rope
  Hooked to the blackened beam,
And heard the prayer the hangman’s snare
  Strangled into a scream.

And all the woe that moved him so
  That he gave that bitter cry,
And the wild regrets, and the ****** sweats,
  None knew so well as I:
For he who lives more lives than one
  More deaths than one must die.


IV

There is no chapel on the day
  On which they hang a man:
The Chaplain’s heart is far too sick,
  Or his face is far too wan,
Or there is that written in his eyes
  Which none should look upon.

So they kept us close till nigh on noon,
  And then they rang the bell,
And the Warders with their jingling keys
  Opened each listening cell,
And down the iron stair we tramped,
  Each from his separate Hell.

Out into God’s sweet air we went,
  But not in wonted way,
For this man’s face was white with fear,
  And that man’s face was grey,
And I never saw sad men who looked
  So wistfully at the day.

I never saw sad men who looked
  With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
  We prisoners called the sky,
And at every careless cloud that passed
  In happy freedom by.

But there were those amongst us all
  Who walked with downcast head,
And knew that, had each got his due,
  They should have died instead:
He had but killed a thing that lived
  Whilst they had killed the dead.

For he who sins a second time
  Wakes a dead soul to pain,
And draws it from its spotted shroud,
  And makes it bleed again,
And makes it bleed great gouts of blood
  And makes it bleed in vain!

Like ape or clown, in monstrous garb
  With crooked arrows starred,
Silently we went round and round
  The slippery asphalte yard;
Silently we went round and round,
  And no man spoke a word.

Silently we went round and round,
  And through each hollow mind
The memory of dreadful things
  Rushed like a dreadful wind,
And Horror stalked before each man,
  And terror crept behind.

The Warders strutted up and down,
  And kept their herd of brutes,
Their uniforms were ***** and span,
  And they wore their Sunday suits,
But we knew the work they had been at
  By the quicklime on their boots.

For where a grave had opened wide,
  There was no grave at all:
Only a stretch of mud and sand
  By the hideous prison-wall,
And a little heap of burning lime,
  That the man should have his pall.

For he has a pall, this wretched man,
  Such as few men can claim:
Deep down below a prison-yard,
  Naked for greater shame,
He lies, with fetters on each foot,
  Wrapt in a sheet of flame!

And all the while the burning lime
  Eats flesh and bone away,
It eats the brittle bone by night,
  And the soft flesh by the day,
It eats the flesh and bones by turns,
  But it eats the heart alway.

For three long years they will not sow
  Or root or seedling there:
For three long years the unblessed spot
  Will sterile be and bare,
And look upon the wondering sky
  With unreproachful stare.

They think a murderer’s heart would taint
  Each simple seed they sow.
It is not true! God’s kindly earth
  Is kindlier than men know,
And the red rose would but blow more red,
  The white rose whiter blow.

Out of his mouth a red, red rose!
  Out of his heart a white!
For who can say by what strange way,
  Christ brings his will to light,
Since the barren staff the pilgrim bore
  Bloomed in the great Pope’s sight?

But neither milk-white rose nor red
  May bloom in prison air;
The shard, the pebble, and the flint,
  Are what they give us there:
For flowers have been known to heal
  A common man’s despair.

So never will wine-red rose or white,
  Petal by petal, fall
On that stretch of mud and sand that lies
  By the hideous prison-wall,
To tell the men who ***** the yard
  That God’s Son died for all.

Yet though the hideous prison-wall
  Still hems him round and round,
And a spirit man not walk by night
  That is with fetters bound,
And a spirit may not weep that lies
  In such unholy ground,

He is at peace—this wretched man—
  At peace, or will be soon:
There is no thing to make him mad,
  Nor does Terror walk at noon,
For the lampless Earth in which he lies
  Has neither Sun nor Moon.

They hanged him as a beast is hanged:
  They did not even toll
A reguiem that might have brought
  Rest to his startled soul,
But hurriedly they took him out,
  And hid him in a hole.

They stripped him of his canvas clothes,
  And gave him to the flies;
They mocked the swollen purple throat
  And the stark and staring eyes:
And with laughter loud they heaped the shroud
  In which their convict lies.

The Chaplain would not kneel to pray
  By his dishonored grave:
Nor mark it with that blessed Cross
  That Christ for sinners gave,
Because the man was one of those
  Whom Christ came down to save.

Yet all is well; he has but passed
  To Life’s appointed bourne:
And alien tears will fill for him
  Pity’s long-broken urn,
For his mourner will be outcast men,
  And outcasts always mourn.


V

I know not whether Laws be right,
  Or whether Laws be wrong;
All that we know who lie in gaol
  Is that the wall is strong;
And that each day is like a year,
  A year whose days are long.

But this I know, that every Law
  That men have made for Man,
Since first Man took his brother’s life,
  And the sad world began,
But straws the wheat and saves the chaff
  With a most evil fan.

This too I know—and wise it were
  If each could know the same—
That every prison that men build
  Is built with bricks of shame,
And bound with bars lest Christ should see
  How men their brothers maim.

With bars they blur the gracious moon,
  And blind the goodly sun:
And they do well to hide their Hell,
  For in it things are done
That Son of God nor son of Man
  Ever should look upon!

The vilest deeds like poison weeds
  Bloom well in prison-air:
It is only what is good in Man
  That wastes and withers there:
Pale Anguish keeps the heavy gate,
  And the Warder is Despair

For they starve the little frightened child
  Till it weeps both night and day:
And they scourge the weak, and flog the fool,
  And gibe the old and grey,
And some grow mad, and all grow bad,
And none a word may say.

Each narrow cell in which we dwell
  Is foul and dark latrine,
And the fetid breath of living Death
  Chokes up each grated screen,
And all, but Lust, is turned to dust
  In Humanity’s machine.

The brackish water that we drink
  Creeps with a loathsome slime,
And the bitter bread they weigh in scales
  Is full of chalk and lime,
And Sleep will not lie down, but walks
  Wild-eyed and cries to Time.

But though lean Hunger and green Thirst
  Like asp with adder fight,
We have little care of prison fare,
  For what chills and kills outright
Is that every stone one lifts by day
  Becomes one’s heart by night.

With midnight always in one’s heart,
  And twilight in one’s cell,
We turn the crank, or tear the rope,
  Each in his separate Hell,
And the silence is more awful far
  Than the sound of a brazen bell.

And never a human voice comes near
  To speak a gentle word:
And the eye that watches through the door
  Is pitiless and hard:
And by all forgot, we rot and rot,
  With soul and body marred.

And thus we rust Life’s iron chain
  Degraded and alone:
And some men curse, and some men weep,
  And some men make no moan:
But God’s eternal Laws are kind
  And break the heart of stone.

And every human heart that breaks,
  In prison-cell or yard,
Is as that broken box that gave
  Its treasure to the Lord,
And filled the unclean *****’s house
  With the scent of costliest nard.

Ah! happy day they whose hearts can break
  And peace of pardon win!
How else may man make straight his plan
  And cleanse his soul from Sin?
How else but through a broken heart
  May Lord Christ enter in?

And he of the swollen purple throat.
  And the stark and staring eyes,
Waits for the holy hands that took
  The Thief to Paradise;
And a broken and a contrite heart
  The Lord will not despise.

The man in red who reads the Law
  Gave him three weeks of life,
Three little weeks in which to heal
  His soul of his soul’s strife,
And cleanse from every blot of blood
  The hand that held the knife.

And with tears of blood he cleansed the hand,
  The hand that held the steel:
For only blood can wipe out blood,
  And only tears can heal:
And the crimson stain that was of Cain
  Became Christ’s snow-white seal.


VI

In Reading gaol by Reading town
  There is a pit of shame,
And in it lies a wretched man
  Eaten by teeth of flame,
In burning winding-sheet he lies,
  And his grave has got no name.

And there, till Christ call forth the dead,
  In silence let him lie:
No need to waste the foolish tear,
  Or heave the windy sigh:
The man had killed the thing he loved,
  And so he had to die.

And all men **** the thing they love,
  By all let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
  Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
  The brave man with a sword!

it's hard to crack a
coconut while
sitting under the
water;
in order to understand
the fundamentals of a
broken heart
you've got to know the
secrets of the soul

wait.

99% of human beings
are enchanted
and to lick the moon
you don't always have to
travel to mars.

Now wait.

The Phoenix rose into the sky
And blazed so bright
The sun turned its eye.
The moon spun in delight
For finally the sun knew the taste of the night.

In fiery fury did that Phoenix fly free.
The taste of heaven its to sample,
The winds calling it to be.
Its joy was ample,
Its song beautiful in flight.

He flew unto the mountains
To taste the morning dew.
Sparkling lights from his plumage in fountains,
Little flames that rose and flew.
And everything was right.

Its indomitable spirit brought joy to the land,
Yet sorrow to the more covetous soul
That couldn't have him on hand,
And death if they could not capture their goal.
The Phoenix learned to fight.

So he faced their persecution and contumely,
Their arrows like a storm,
Their drive all consuming,
Their hate the norm,
And their numbers like a blight.

Their attacks wounded and even brought him to the ground.
But in a fiery blaze he always rose,
Reborn and not a scar to found,
Returning to the wind's currents and flows,
Outshining the daylight.

In icy lands one day he soared
When a songless tune tookwing.
He searched, adventured, the winds they roared
As he sought the owner of this tune to sing;
No one lay in sight.

The winds buffeted
And the Phoenix tossed and tumbled.
Tailspinning as the winds parleyed,
Into a valley he stumbled,
His landing narrow and tight.

In this valley lay the quarry at hand:
An ice elemental of purest blue.
She swayed and she danced and sang across the land,
Her laugh like windchimes and her voice true.
So the Phoenix let his voice alight.

The delighted elemental joined along
And they played and frolicked in joy,
Friendship made in song.
The Phoenix flighty and the elemental coy,
Raging flame temperedby cold's fierce bite.

They journeyed and traveled in wonder.
Where one dare not the other paved the way
Their compliment tore previous limits asunder
And made wonderfull each new day.
Their bond a happy fright.

But nothing lasts forever,
And shadows dwell wherever
The light shines free.
Thus came the darkness inevitably.
It stole the elemental away
Bringing an end to their play.

Then, did the Phoenix know sorrow;
Bitter, painful, dimming the light of tomorrow.
Then, did the Phoenix know anger,
With wrathful thought to linger.
And with determination did the Phoenix fly
Into the realm where darkness lie.

Once was there did battle engage
As torrents of flame flew with righteous rage.
The darkness stabbed and slew, bringing much harm
But the Phoenix rose again and again to face the swarm
And the darkness cloaked him in endless night,
Yet the Phoenix prevailed with blinding sight.

The battle won, hard fought,
As the darkness scattered did he see what he sought.
There lay his elemental fatally struck,
Phyrric victory claiming his luck.
And in the air rose a beautiful song
A sorrowful lament that played ever long.

And those who heard it wept,
Tears spilling from their eyes.
Heartache as they slept,
And sorrow in their cries.
They knew the Phoenix no longer alive,
For life doesn't exist where a broken heart may thrive.

Speak Knight of this foul dishonor you bring,
Unto me, your liege and rightful master.
Of this even the lowly peasants sing.
Arthur a cuckhold, the clergy murmur.
Give me words Man! Why hast thou done this thing
To me, your friend , your king and protector-
Who sat you- my right hand- at Table Round,
And heard you declare yourself honor bound?

My Liege, I am overwrought with my shame.
The woman is more than woman to me.
I am enchanted by the very name
of Guinevere- Sire, pray heed my sad plea-
Of two hearts tortured by Love's burning flame
Of kindred souls intertwined, reason free.
I say My Liege, where doth the man exist
The fair Guinevere's ample charms resist?

Best, Sir, to watch thy words, hold thy tongue fast!
You speak of the Queen, my love, and my wife!
You flaunt the Holy Writ of God at last
And play fast and loose with Eternal Life!
To foul Gehenna your soul will be cast,
to experience neverending strife.
Truly my soul is exceeding bleak.
Guard, bring the Queen that we may hear her speak.

How now my heart, that thy lips quiver so?
And tears besot thy alabaster skin?
Speak now of that which Mordred, base and low
Whispered quick, awash in the stink of gin,
Of the randy Stag and his demure Doe,
Copulating as beasts in the fields akin.
Lady, gaze into my eyes, mark me well
Speak truly now , as your tale you tell.

My Liege, Husband mine! my heart is most frail.
My soul a wasteland of desolation.
Tis true!  I met Lancelot in the vale,
And frolicked we after the setting sun,
As lovers are wont to do without fail
Where the rosy bloom of youth hath begun.
Tis true! I swear to the Good God above,
The brave Lancelot hath stolen my love.

Tis true, all too true, what Mordred hath said.
My wife, my hope, and the joy of my heart
She who I loved above all else hath shred
My life to pieces, bit by bit,part by part.
My boon companion Lancelot now dead
to me as well , who thought himself so smart.
Harken to my words, send for the court scribe
Listen well, hear thy punishment described:

Queen Guinevere, fairest of all the land,
Whose smile doth the very stars outshine,
Who once freely gave me in troth her hand,
With smoldering eyes, and words of love fine-
Creature of God with more of fairyland
Than mere mortal in your very design,
Now Adulteress, high treason thou wouldst make?
Tomorrow at dawn shall ye burn at the stake!

Lancelot, your honor lies in the dust,
Once White Knight, formidable in combat arms,
Tainted by sin and depraved ruttish lust.
The victim of a woman's haughty charms,
Who bleats of love as all feeble lost must
When rude passion ordered reason disarms.
Once friend, now foe, see your base heart's desire,
Expire at dawn, her black soul cleansed by fire.

Righteous
by Michael R. Burch

Come to me tonight
in the twilight, O, and the full moon rising,
spectral and ancient, will mutter a prayer.

Gather your hair
and pin it up, knowing
that I will release it a moment anon.

We are not one,
nor is there a scripture
to sanctify nights you might spend in my arms,

but the swarms
of bright stars revolving above us
revel tonight, the most ardent of lovers.

Published in Writer’s Gazette and Tucumcari Literary Review.
Keywords/Tags: love, lovers, night, stars, twilight, moon, spectral, ancient, scripture, arms, hair, revel, ardent, passion, passionate, desire, lust, ***, lovers



Only Let Me Love You
by Michael R. Burch

after Rabindranath Tagore's "Come as You Are"

Only let me love you, and the pain
of living will be easier to bear.
Only let me love you. Nay, refrain
from pinning up your hair!

Only let me love you. Stay, remain.
A face so lovely never needs repair!
Only let me love you to the strains
of Rabindranath on a soft sitar.

Only let me love you, while the rain
makes music: gentle, eloquent, sincere.
Only let me love you. Don’t complain
you need more time to make yourself more fair!

Only let me love you. Stay, remain.
No need for rouge or lipstick! Only share
your tender body swiftly ...



Homeless Us
by Michael R. Burch

The coldest night I ever knew
the wind out of the arctic blew
long frigid blasts; and I was you.

We huddled close then: yes, we two.
For I had lost your house, to rue
such bitter weather, being you.

Our empty tin cup sang the Blues,
clanged—hollow, empty. Carols (few)
were sung to me, for being you.

For homeless us, all men eschew.
They beat us, roust us, jail us too.
It isn’t easy, being you.

Published by Street Smart, First Universalist Church of Denver, Mind Freedom Switzerland and on 20+ web pages supporting the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities



Minor Key Duet
by Michael R. Burch

Without the drama of cymbals
or the fanfare and snares of drums,
I present my case
stripped of its fine veneer:
Behold, thy instrument.

Play, for the night is long.

Originally published by Brief Poems



****** Errata
by Michael R. Burch

I didn’t mean to love you; if I did,
it came unbid-
en, and should’ve remained hid-
den!



If Love Were Infinite
by Michael R. Burch

If love were infinite, how I would pity
our lives, which through long years’ exactitude
might seem a pleasant blur—one interlude
without prequel or sequel—wanly pretty,
the gentlest flame the heart might bring to bear
to tepid hearts too sure of love to flare.

If love were infinite, why would I linger
caressing your fine hair, lost in the thought
each auburn strand must shrivel with this finger,
and so in thrall to time be gently brought
to final realization: love, amazing,
must leave us ash for all our fiery blazing.

If flesh’s heat once led me straight to you,
love’s arrow’s burning mark must pierce me through.



The Drawer of Mermaids
by Michael R. Burch

This poem is dedicated to Alina Karimova, who was born with severely deformed legs and five fingers missing. Alina loves to draw mermaids and believes her fingers will eventually grow out.

Although I am only four years old,
they say that I have an old soul.
I must have been born long, long ago,
here, where the eerie mountains glow
at night, in the Urals.

A madman named Geiger has cursed these slopes;
now, shut in at night, the emphatic ticking
fills us with dread.
(Still, my momma hopes
that I will soon walk with my new legs.)

It’s not so much legs as the fingers I miss,
drawing the mermaids under the ledges.
(Observing, Papa will kiss me
in all his distracted joy;
but why does he cry?)

And there is a boy
who whispers my name.
Then I am not lame;
for I leap, and I follow.
(G’amma brings a wiseman who says

our infirmities are ours, not God’s,
that someday a beautiful Child
will return from the stars,
and then my new fingers will grow
if only I trust Him; and so

I am preparing to meet Him, to go,
should He care to receive me.)



Almost
by Michael R. Burch

We had—almost—an affair.
You almost ran your fingers through my hair.
I almost kissed the almonds of your toes.
We almost loved,
                            that’s always how love goes.

You almost contemplated using Nair
and adding henna highlights to your hair,
while I considered plucking you a Rose.
We almost loved,
                            that’s always how love goes.

I almost found the words to say, “I care.”
We almost kissed, and yet you didn’t dare.
I heard coarse stubble grate against your hose.
We almost loved,
                            that’s always how love goes.

You almost called me suave and debonair
(perhaps because my chest is pale and bare?).
I almost bought you edible underclothes.
We almost loved,
                            that’s always how love goes.

I almost asked you where you kept your lair
and if by chance I might ****** you there.
You almost tweezed the redwoods from my nose.
We almost loved,
                            that’s always how love goes.

We almost danced like Rogers and Astaire
on gliding feet; we almost waltzed on air ...
until I mashed your plain, unpolished toes.
We almost loved,
                            that’s always how love goes.

I almost was strange Sonny to your Cher.
We almost sat in love’s electric chair
to be enlightninged, till our hearts unfroze.
We almost loved,
                            that’s always how love goes.



Options Underwater: The Song of the First Amphibian
by Michael R. Burch

               “Evolution’s a Fishy Business!”

1.
Breathing underwater through antiquated gills,
I’m running out of options. I need to find fresh Air,
to seek some higher Purpose. No porpoise, I despair
to swim among anemones’ pink frills.

2.
My fins will make fine flippers, if only I can walk,
a little out of kilter, safe to the nearest rock’s
sweet, unmolested shelter. Each eye must grow a stalk,
to take in this green land on which it gawks.

3.
No predators have made it here, so I need not adapt.
Sun-sluggish, full, lethargic—I’ll take such nice long naps!
The highest form of life, that’s me! (Quite apt
to lie here chortling, calling fishes saps.)

4.
I woke to find life teeming all around—
mammals, insects, reptiles, loathsome birds.
And now I cringe at every sight and sound.
The water’s looking good! I look Absurd.

5.
The moral of my story’s this: don’t leap
wherever grass is greener. Backwards creep.
And never burn your bridges, till you’re sure
leapfrogging friends secures your Sinecure.

Originally published by Lighten Up Online



Egbert the Adorable Octopus

Egbert the Octopus
is so **** cute
& smarter than u
(the point is moot)
’cause he doesn’t pollute
when he commutes,
only, perhaps,
when he (ahem) “poots”!
—michael r. burch

I have also seen the diminutive Einstein’s name rendered as Eggbert the Octopus. Check him out on YouTube!



A Possible Explanation for the Madness of March Hares
by Michael R. Burch

March hares,
beware!
Spring’s a tease, a flirt!

This is yet another late freeze alert.
Better comfort your babies;
the weather has rabies.



Cold Snap Coin Flip
by Michael R. Burch

Rise and shine,
The world is mine!
Let’s get ahead!

Or ...

Back to bed,
Old sleepyhead,
Dull and supine.



Monarch
by Michael R. Burch

I had a little caterpillar,
it wove a cocoon for its villa.
When I blinked an eye
what did I espy?
It flew off, a regal butterfly!



Moonflower
by Michael R. Burch

after Robert Hayden

Marveling,
we at last beheld the achieved flower—
both awed and repelled by its alienness,
its moonlit petals,
its cloying fragrance,
its transcendence,
its shimmering and wavering intimations of mortality ...



Ebb Tide
by Michael R. Burch
after Goethe

Ebb tide.
The sea is wide.
In the depths
dark things abide.

Hush, pale child.
Never fear.
None as dark
as men, my dear.

Ebb tide.
The sea is wide.
In the depths
dark creatures glide.

Hush, now father.
Never fear.
Men are nothing
where you are.



How could I understand?
by Michael R. Burch

for the victims of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb blasts

How could I understand
that light
might
be painful?

That sight
might
be crossed?

How could I understand
the cost
of my ignorance,
or the sun’s
inflorescence?

Who was there to tell me
that I, too,
might be one of the
Lost?



I was so drunk my lips got lost requesting a kiss.—Rumi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



She Was Very Pretty
by Michael R. Burch

She was very pretty, in the usual way
for (perhaps) a day;
and when the boys came out to play,
she winked and smiled, then ran away
till one unexpectedly caught her.

At sixteen, she had a daughter.

She was fairly pretty another day
in her squalid house, in her pallid way,
but the skies ahead loomed drably grey,
and the moonlight gleamed jaundiced on her cheeks.

She was almost pretty perhaps two weeks.

Then she was hardly pretty; her jaw was set.
With streaks of silver scattered in jet,
her hair became a solemn iron grey.
Her daughter winked, then ran away.

She was hardly pretty another day.

Then she was scarcely pretty; her skin was marred
by liver spots; her heart was scarred;
her child was grown; her life was done;
she faded away with the setting sun.

She was scarcely pretty, and not much fun.

Then she was sparsely pretty; her hair so thin;
but a light would sometimes steal within
to remind old, stoic gentlemen
of the rules, and how girls lose to win.



Song Cycle
by Michael R. Burch

Sing us a song of seasons—
of April’s and May’s gay greetings;
let Winter release her sting.
Sing us a song of Spring!

Nay, the future is looking glummer.
Sing us a song of Summer!

Too late, there’s a pall over all;
sing us a song of Fall!

Desist, since the icicles splinter;
sing us a song of Winter!

Sing us a song of seasons—
of April’s and May’s gay greetings;
let Winter release her sting.
Sing us a song of Spring!



Over(t) Simplification
by Michael R. Burch

“Keep it simple, stupid.”

A sonnet is not simple, but the rule
is simply this: let poems be beautiful,
or comforting, or horrifying. Move
the reader, and the world will not reprove
the idiosyncrasies of too few lines,
too many syllables, or offbeat beats.

It only matters that she taps her feet
or that he frowns, or smiles, or grimaces,
or sits bemused—a child—as images
of worlds he’d lost come flooding back, and then . . .
they’ll cheer the poet’s insubordinate pen.

A sonnet is not simple, but the rule
is simply this: let poems be beautiful.



The Less-Than-Divine Results of My Prayers to be Saved from Televangelists
by Michael R. Burch

I’m old,
no longer bold,
just cold,
and (truth be told),
been bought and sold,
rolled
by the wolves and the lambs in the fold.

Who’s to be told
by this worn-out scold?
The complaint department is always on hold.



These are poems written for my grandfathers and grandmothers.

Sunset
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandfather, George Edwin Hurt Sr., the day he departed this life

Between the prophesies of morning
and twilight’s revelations of wonder,
the sky is ripped asunder.

The moon lurks in the clouds,
waiting, as if to plunder
the dusk of its lilac iridescence,

and in the bright-tentacled sunset
we imagine a presence
full of the fury of lost innocence.

What we find within strange whorls of drifting flame,
brief patterns mauling winds deform and maim,
we recognize at once, but cannot name.



Salat Days
by Michael R. Burch

Dedicated to the memory of my grandfather, Paul Ray Burch, Sr.

I remember how my grandfather used to pick poke salat...
though first, usually, he'd stretch back in the front porch swing,
dangling his long thin legs, watching the sweat bees drone,
talking about poke salat—
how easy it was to find if you knew where to seek it...
standing in dew-damp clumps by the side of a road, shockingly green,
straddling fence posts, overflowing small ditches,
crowding out the less-hardy nettles.

"Nobody knows that it's there, lad, or that it's fit tuh eat
with some bacon drippin's or lard."

"Don't eat the berries. You see—the berry's no good.
And you'd hav'ta wash the leaves a good long time."

"I'd boil it twice, less'n I wus in a hurry.
Lawd, it's tough to eat, chile, if you boil it jest wonst."

He seldom was hurried; I can see him still...
silently mowing his yard at eighty-eight,
stooped, but with a tall man's angular gray grace.

Sometimes he'd pause to watch me running across the yard,
trampling his beans,
dislodging the shoots of his tomato plants.

He never grew flowers; I never laughed at his jokes about The Depression.

Years later I found the proper name—"pokeweed"—while perusing a dictionary.

Surprised, I asked why anyone would eat a ****.

I still can hear his laconic reply...
"Well, chile, s'm'times them times wus hard."

Keywords/Tags: Great Depression, greatness, courage, resolve, resourcefulness, hero, heroes, South, Deep South, southern, poke salad, poke salat, pokeweed, free verse



All Things Galore
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandfathers George Edwin Hurt Sr. and Paul Ray Burch, Sr.

Grandfather,
now in your gray presence
you are
somehow more near

and remind me that,
once, upon a star,

you taught me
wish
that ululate soft phrase,
that hopeful phrase!

and everywhere above, each hopeful star

gleamed down

and seemed to speak of times before
when you clasped my small glad hand
in your wise paw
and taught me heaven, omen, meteor . . .



Dawn
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandmothers Lillian Lee and Christine Ena Hurt

Bring your peculiar strength
to the strange nightmarish fray:
wrap up your cherished ones
in the golden light of day.



Mother's Day Haiku
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandmothers Lillian Lee and Christine Ena Hurt

Crushed grapes
surrender such sweetness:
a mother’s compassion.

My footprints
so faint in the snow?
Ah yes, you lifted me.

An emu feather ...
still falling?
So quickly you rushed to my rescue.

The eagle sees farther
from its greater height:
our mothers' wisdom.



The Rose
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandmother, Lillian Lee, who used to grow the most beautiful roses

The rose is—
the ornament of the earth,
the glory of nature,
the archetype of the flowers,
the blush of the meadows,
a lightning flash of beauty.

This poem above is my translation of a Sappho epigram.



Mother’s Smile
by Michael R. Burch

for my wife, Beth, my mother and my grandmothers

There never was a fonder smile
than mother’s smile, no softer touch
than mother’s touch. So sleep awhile
and know she loves you more than “much.”

So more than “much,” much more than “all.”
Though tender words, these do not speak
of love at all, nor how we fall
and mother’s there, nor how we reach
from nightmares in the ticking night
and she is there to hold us tight.

There never was a stronger back
than father’s back, that held our weight
and lifted us, when we were small,
and bore us till we reached the gate,
then held our hands that first bright mile
till we could run, and did, and flew.
But, oh, a mother’s tender smile
will leap and follow after you!



The Greatest of These ...
by Michael R. Burch

*for my mother, Christine Ena Burch, and the grandmother of my son Jeremy

The hands that held me tremble.
The arms that lifted
fall.
Angelic flesh, now parchment,
is held together with gauze.

But her undimmed eyes still embrace me;
there infinity can be found.
I can almost believe such infinite love
will still reach me, underground.



Sailing to My Grandfather
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandfather, George Edwin Hurt Sr.

This distance between us
—this vast sea
of remembrance—
is no hindrance,
no enemy.

I see you out of the shining mists
of memory.
Events and chance
and circumstance
are sands on the shore of your legacy.

I find you now in fits and bursts
of breezes time has blown to me,
while waves, immense,
now skirt and glance
against the bow unceasingly.

I feel the sea's salt spray—light fists,
her mists and vapors mocking me.
From ignorance
to reverence,
your words were sextant stars to me.

Bright stars are strewn in silver gusts
back, back toward infinity.
From innocence
to senescence,
now you are mine increasingly.

Note: "Under the Sextant’s Stars" is a painting by Benini.



Attend Upon Them Still
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandparents George and Ena Hurt

With gentleness and fine and tender will,
attend upon them still;
thou art the grass.

Nor let men’s feet here muddy as they pass
thy subtle undulations, nor depress
for long the comforts of thy lovingness,

nor let the fuse
of time wink out amid the violets.
They have their use—

to wave, to grow, to gleam, to lighten their paths,
to shine sweet, transient glories at their feet.

Thou art the grass;
make them complete.



Be that Rock
by Michael R. Burch

for George Edwin Hurt Sr.

When I was a child
I never considered man’s impermanence,
for you were a mountain of adamant stone:
a man steadfast, immense,
and your words rang.

And when you were gone,
I still heard your voice, which never betrayed,
"Be strong and of a good courage,
neither be afraid ..."
as the angels sang.

And, O!, I believed
for your words were my truth, and I tried to be brave
though the years slipped away
with so little to save
of that talk.

Now I'm a man—
a man ... and yet Grandpa ... I'm still the same child
who sat at your feet
and learned as you smiled.
Be that rock.

I wrote the poem above for my grandfather when I was around 18.



Joy in the Morning
by Michael R. Burch

for my grandparents George Edwin Hurt Sr. and Christine Ena Hurt

There will be joy in the morning
for now this long twilight is over
and their separation has ended.

For fourteen years, he had not seen her
whom he first befriended,
then courted and married.

Let there be joy, and no mourning,
for now in his arms she is carried
over a threshold vastly sweeter.

He never lost her; she only tarried
until he was able to meet her.

Keywords/Tags: George Edwin Hurt Christine Ena Spouse reunited heaven joy together forever



Come Spring
by Michael R. Burch

for the Religious Right

Come spring we return, innocent and hopeful, to the ******,
beseeching Her to bestow
Her blessings upon us.

Pitiable sinners, we bow before Her,
nay, grovel,
as She looms above us, aglow
in Her Purity.

We know
all will change in an instant; therefore
in the morning we will call her,
an untouched maiden no more,
“*****.”

The so-called Religious Right prizes virginity in women and damns them for doing what men do. I have long been a fan of women like Tallulah Bankhead, Marilyn Monroe and Mae West, who decided what’s good for the gander is equally good for the goose.



HOMELESS POETRY

These are poem about the homeless and poems for the homeless.



Epitaph for a Homeless Child
by Michael R. Burch

I lived as best I could, and then I died.
Be careful where you step: the grave is wide.



Homeless Us
by Michael R. Burch

The coldest night I ever knew
the wind out of the arctic blew
long frigid blasts; and I was you.

We huddled close then: yes, we two.
For I had lost your house, to rue
such bitter weather, being you.

Our empty tin cup sang the Blues,
clanged—hollow, empty. Carols (few)
were sung to me, for being you.

For homeless us, all men eschew.
They beat us, roust us, jail us too.
It isn’t easy, being you.

Published by Street Smart, First Universalist Church of Denver, Mind Freedom Switzerland and on 20+ web pages supporting the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities



Frail Envelope of Flesh
by Michael R. Burch

for homeless mothers and their children

Frail envelope of flesh,
lying cold on the surgeon’s table
with anguished eyes
like your mother’s eyes
and a heartbeat weak, unstable ...

Frail crucible of dust,
brief flower come to this—
your tiny hand
in your mother’s hand
for a last bewildered kiss ...

Brief mayfly of a child,
to live two artless years!
Now your mother’s lips
seal up your lips
from the Deluge of her tears ...



For a Homeless Child, with Butterflies
by Michael R. Burch

Where does the butterfly go ...
when lightning rails ...
when thunder howls ...
when hailstones scream ...
when winter scowls ...
when nights compound dark frosts with snow ...
where does the butterfly go?

Where does the rose hide its bloom
when night descends oblique and chill,
beyond the capacity of moonlight to fill?
When the only relief’s a banked fire’s glow,
where does the butterfly go?

And where shall the spirit flee
when life is harsh, too harsh to face,
and hope is lost without a trace?
Oh, when the light of life runs low,
where does the butterfly go?



Neglect
by Michael R. Burch

What good are tears?
Will they spare the dying their anguish?
What use, our concern
to a child sick of living, waiting to perish?

What good, the warm benevolence of tears
without action?
What help, the eloquence of prayers,
or a pleasant benediction?

Before this day is over,
how many more will die
with bellies swollen, emaciate limbs,
and eyes too parched to cry?

I fear for our souls
as I hear the faint lament
of theirs departing ...
mournful, and distant.

How pitiful our “effort,”
yet how fatal its effect.
If they died, then surely we killed them,
if only with neglect.



PETRARCH

Sonnet XIV
by Petrarch
translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Lust, gluttony and idleness conspire
to banish every virtue from mankind,
replaced by evil in his treacherous mind,
thus robbing man of his Promethean fire,
till his nature, overcome by dark desire,
extinguishes the light pure heaven refined.
Thus the very light of heaven has lost its power
while man gropes through strange darkness, unable to find
relief for his troubled mind, always inclined
to lesser dreams than Helicon’s bright shower!
Who seeks the laurel? Who the myrtle? Bind
poor Philosophy in chains, to learn contrition
then join the servile crowd, so base conditioned?
Not so, true gentle soul! Keep your ambition!

Sonnet VI
by Petrarch
translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I once beheld such high, celestial graces
as otherwise on earth remain unknown,
whose presences might earthly grief atone,
but from their blinding light we turn our faces.
I saw how tears had left disconsolate traces
within bright eyes no noonday sun outshone.
I heard soft lips, with ululating moans,
mouth words to jar great mountains from their traces.
Love, wisdom, honor, courage, tenderness, truth
made every verse they voiced more high, more dear,
than ever fell before on mortal ear.
Even heaven seemed astonished, not aloof,
as the budding leaves on every bough approved,
so sweetly swelled the radiant atmosphere!



The Inconstant Cosmologist
by Michael R. Burch

An incestuous physicist, Bright,
made whoopee much faster than light.
She orgasmed one day
in her relative way,
but came on the previous night!



Pale Ophelias
by Michael R. Burch

Ever in danger of a lethal tryst,
with a comical father crying, “Desist!”
We’re all pale Ophelias in the mist.

“Children, be careful!” our mothers insist,
and yet we plow forward, in search of bliss,
ever in danger of a lethal tryst.

“Remember Eve’s apple,” some inner voice hissed,
which of course we ignored, the prudish miss!
We’re all pale Ophelias in the mist.

Such a sweet temptation!, and who can resist
the enticements of such a delectable dish,
whatever the dangers of a lethal tryst?

“Stay away, Cupid!” With a balled-up fist,
we lecture the stars when things go amiss.
We’re all pale Ophelias in the mist.

Lovers are criminals & need to be frisked!
We’re up to the task, like lobsters in bisque.
Ever in danger of a lethal tryst,
We’re all pale Ophelias in the mist.



Asleep at the Wheel
by Michael R. Burch

Florida will not be woke.
DeSantis made it clear.
The world may well go up in smoke,
but Ron will snore, no fear.

For Florida will not be woke.
Conservatives will snooze
with blinders shutting out all light
and any factual news.



When I visited Byron's residence at Newstead Abbey, there were peacocks running around the grounds, which I thought appropriate.

Byron
was not a shy one,
as peacocks run.
—Michael R. Burch



That country ***** bewitches your heart?
Hell, her most beguiling art’s
hiking her dress
to ****** you with her ankles' nakedness!
Sappho, fragment 57, translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



My religion consists of your body's curves and crevasses.—attributed to Sappho, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



I discovered the Goddess in your body's curves and crevasses.—attributed to Sappho, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



How Could I Understand?
by Michael R. Burch

The intense heat and light of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki atomic bomb blasts left ghostly silhouettes of human beings imprinted in concrete, whose lives were erased in an instant.

How could I understand
that light
might
be painful?

That sight
might
be crossed?

How could I understand
the cost
of my ignorance,
or the sun’s
inflorescence?

Who was there to tell me
that I, too,
might be one of the
Lost?



EGBERT THE OCTOPUS

Egbert the Octopus can be viewed here, in all his high-IQ’d-ness and adorability:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V32yeA9yUuk

Eggbert the Octopus
is so **** cute
& smarter than u
(the point is moot)
’cause he doesn’t pollute
when he commutes,
only, perhaps,
when he (ahem) “poots”!
—michael r. burch

I have also seen the diminutive Einstein’s name rendered as Eggbert the Octopus.



Driedel!
by Michael R. Burch, circa age 18

“Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing.” – Revelation 5:12

On Erble's fiery mountain
she lifts her eyes to greet
the avalanche of lava
as it cascades through the peaks.

Her eyes are fiery systems
burning with wonder,
all-seeing yet unseeing;
her voice is like thunder!

Soft as a thrummingbird she speaks;
she whispers to the dawn
of Erble's final awakening,
and the Void gives voice to song.

Driedel!  Driedel!  Driedel!
****** of the heights,
shed your gown of alasty
and come to meet Dark Night!

Her cheeks like alabaster,
her tentacles aflame,
she leaps to greet her Lover
and screams his godly name!

Her throat is black and violet,
her teeth are plated sjurl.
The fire licks her features
and laps her smoking curls.

A palatable offering!
The work is done; the deed
has been executed
exactly as decreed.

Driedel!  Driedel!  Driedel!
Go to meet your Lord,
and through your new alliance,
keep your people pure.

Driedel!



Daredevilry
by Michael R. Burch

Trees
full of possibilities
whisper of ancient mysteries—
mysteries of birth, of life and death.
Each leaf—illuminated, light as breath—
gives up clinging to the old verities,
embraces its frailties,
skydives …



Overshadowed
by Rahat Indori
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The brilliance of stars goes unnoticed
since the moon overshadows them every night.



So Be It
by Rahat Indori
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

If we’re opposed, so be it; there’s more to life.
There’s more to the skies than mere smoke.
When a fire breaks out, many wounds abound;
it’s not just my home in flames.
Yes, it’s true that many enemies also abound,
but they don’t control life with their fists.
What comes out of my mouth, are my words alone;
they don’t speak for me, do they?
Today’s rulers will not be tomorrow’s;
We’re all tenants here, not owners.
Everyone's blood irrigates Earth’s soil;
India is no one’s paternal possession.



Speak
by Faiz Ahmad Faiz
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Speak, while your lips are still free.
Speak, while your tongue remains yours.
Speak, while you’re still standing upright.
Speak, while your spirit has force.

See how, in the bright-sparking forge,
cunning flames set dull ingots aglow
as the padlocks release their clenched grip
on the severed chains hissing below.

Speak, in this last brief hour,
before the bold tongue lies dead.
Speak, while the truth can be spoken.
Say what must yet be said.



The Fog and the Shadows
adapted from a novel by Perhat Tursun
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

“I began to realize the fog was similar to the shadows.”

I began to realize that, just as the exact shape of darkness is a shadow,
even so the exact shape of fog is disappearance
and the exact shape of a human being is also disappearance.
At this moment it seemed my body was vanishing into the human form’s final state.
After I arrived here,
it was as if the danger of getting lost
and the desire to lose myself
were merging strangely inside me.
While everything in that distant, gargantuan city where I spent my five college years felt strange to me; and even though the skyscrapers, highways, ditches and canals were built according to a single standard and shape, so that it wasn’t easy to differentiate them, still I never had the feeling of being lost. Everyone there felt like one person and they were all folded into each other. It was as if their faces, voices and figures had been gathered together like a shaman’s jumbled-up hair.
Even the men and women seemed identical.
You could only tell them apart by stripping off their clothes and examining them.
The men’s faces were beardless like women’s and their skin was very delicate and unadorned.
I was always surprised that they could tell each other apart.
Later I realized it wasn’t just me: many others were also confused.
For instance, when we went to watch the campus’s only TV in a corridor of a building where the seniors stayed when they came to improve their knowledge. Those elderly Uyghurs always argued about whether someone who had done something unusual in an earlier episode was the same person they were seeing now. They would argue from the beginning of the show to the end. Other people, who couldn’t stand such endless nonsense, would leave the TV to us and stalk off.
Then, when the classes began, we couldn’t tell the teachers apart.
Gradually we became able to tell the men from the women
and eventually we able to recognize individuals.
But other people remained identical for us.
The most surprising thing for me was that the natives couldn’t differentiate us either.
For instance, two police came looking for someone who had broken windows during a fight at a restaurant and had then run away.
They ordered us line up, then asked the restaurant owner to identify the culprit.
He couldn’t tell us apart even though he inspected us very carefully.
He said we all looked so much alike that it was impossible to tell us apart.
Sighing heavily, he left.



I was so drunk my lips got lost requesting a kiss.—Rumi, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



Road to Recovery
by Michael R. Burch

It’s time to get up and at ’em
and out of this rut that I’m sat in,
and shat in.



The childless woman,
how tenderly she caresses
homeless dolls ...
—Hattori Ransetsu, loose translation by Michael R. Burch



Clinging
to the plum tree:
one blossom's worth of warmth
—Hattori Ransetsu, loose translation by Michael R. Burch



Oh, fallen camellias,
if I were you,
I'd leap into the torrent!
—Takaha Shugyo, loose translation by Michael R. Burch



What would Mother Teresa do?
Do it too!
—Michael R. Burch



Kabir Das (1398-1518), also known as Sant Kabir Saheb, but often called simply Kabir, was an Indian mystic, saint and poet who wrote poems in Sadhukkadi, a vernacular dialect of the Hindi Belt of medieval North India. Sadhukkadi was a mix of Hindi languages (Hindustani, Haryanvi, Braj Bhasha, Awadhi, Marwari) along with Bhojpuri and Punjabi.

The world grows weary reading scripture’s tomes
but a leaf of love enlightens us.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Without looking into our hearts,
how can we find Paradise?
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

How long will you live by eating someone else’s leftovers?
Find your own way, don’t live on regurgitated words!
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Keep the slanderer near you, build him a hut near your house.
For, when you lack soap and water, he will scour you clean.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

A true wife desires only her husband;
a starving lion will not eat grass.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Certainly, saints, the world’s insane:
If I tell the truth they attack me,
if I lie they believe me.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

When you were born, you wept while the world rejoiced.
Live your life so that when you die, the world weeps while you rejoice.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The one who enlightens the world remains unseen,
just as we cannot perceive our own eyes.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

No medicine rivals Love:
one drop transforms you whole being to pure gold.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Either grant me death or reveal yourself:
this separation has become unbearable.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

They called the doctor to investigate Kabir’s illness;
the doctor checks my pulse to diagnose my disease.
But no doctor can understand what ails me.
It cuts too deep.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I neither have faith in my heart, nor do I know anything about Love.
And what do I know of Love’s etiquettes?
How will I ever live with my Beloved?
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

My Beloved calls me with such intense love,
but I am sinful and gone astray.
The Beloved is pure but the bride is soiled.
How dare she touch his feet?
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Kabir kept searching and searching until he was completely lost.
The drop dissolves in the ocean; now nothing can be discovered.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Whatever you need to do tomorrow, do today,
for time evaporates and vanishes like a mist.
Thus work undone remains undone forever.
—Kabir, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



Autumn Lament
by Michael R. Burch, circa age 14

Alas, the earth is green no more;
her colors fade and die,
and all her trampled marigolds
lament the graying sky.

And now the summer sheds her coat
of buttercups, and so is bared
to winter’s palest furies
who laugh aloud and do not care
as they await their hour.

Where are the showers of April?
Where are the flowers of May?
And where are the sprites of summer
who frolicked through fields ablaze?

Where are the lovely maidens
who browned beneath the sun?
And where are the leaves and the flowers
that died worn and haggard although they were young?

Alas, the moss grows brown and stiff
and tumbles from the trees
that shiver in an icy mist,
limbs shivering in the breeze.

And now the frost has come and cast
itself upon the grass
as the surly snow grows bold
and prepares at last
to pounce upon the land.

Where are the sheep and the cattle
that grazed beneath tall, stately trees?
And where are the fragile butterflies
that frolicked on the breeze?
And where are the rollicking robins
that once soared, so wild and free?
Oh, where can they all be?

Alas, the land has lost its warmth;
its rocky teeth chatter
and a thousand dying butterflies
soon’ll dodge the snowflakes as they splatter
flush against the flowers.

Where are those warm, happy hours?
Where are the snappy jays?
And where are the brilliant blossoms
that once set the meadows ablaze?

Where are the fruitful orchards?
Where, now, all the squirrels and the hares?
How has our summer wonderland
become so completely bare
in such a short time?

Alas, the earth is green no more;
the sun no longer shines;
and all the grapes ungathered
hang rotting on their vines.

And now the winter wind grows cold
and comes out of the North
to freeze the flowers as they stand
and bend toward the South.

And now the autumn becomes bald,
is shorn of all its life,
as the stiletto wind hones in
to slice the skin like a paring knife,
carving away all warmth.

Alas, the children laugh no more,
but shiver in their beds
or’ll walk to school through blinding snow
with caps to keep their heads
safe from the cruel cold.

Oh, where are the showers of April
and where are the flowers of May?
And where are the sprites of summer
who frolicked through fields ablaze?

Where are the lovely maidens
who browned beneath the sun?
And where are the leaves and the flowers
that died worn and haggard although they were young?

This is one of the earliest poems that I can remember writing. The original use of “’neath” is an indication of its antiquity. Unfortunately, I don’t remember when I wrote the first version, but I will guess around 1972 at age 14.




Keywords/Tags: homeless poetry, homeless poems, homelessness, street life, child, children, mom, mother, mothers, America, neglect, starving, dying, perishing, famine, illness, disease, tears, anguish, concern, prayers, inaction, death, charity, love, compassion, kindness, altruism

In memoriam
C. T. W.
Sometime trooper of the Royal Horse Guards
obiit H.M. prison, Reading, Berkshire
July 7, 1896

I

He did not wear his scarlet coat,
For blood and wine are red,
And blood and wine were on his hands
When they found him with the dead,
The poor dead woman whom he loved,
And murdered in her bed.

He walked amongst the Trial Men
In a suit of shabby grey;
A cricket cap was on his head,
And his step seemed light and gay;
But I never saw a man who looked
So wistfully at the day.

I never saw a man who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every drifting cloud that went
With sails of silver by.

I walked, with other souls in pain,
Within another ring,
And was wondering if the man had done
A great or little thing,
When a voice behind me whispered low,
‘That fellow’s got to swing.’

Dear Christ! the very prison walls
Suddenly seemed to reel,
And the sky above my head became
Like a casque of scorching steel;
And, though I was a soul in pain,
My pain I could not feel.

I only knew what hunted thought
Quickened his step, and why
He looked upon the garish day
With such a wistful eye;
The man had killed the thing he loved,
And so he had to die.

Yet each man kills the thing he loves,
By each let this be heard,
Some do it with a bitter look,
Some with a flattering word,
The coward does it with a kiss,
The brave man with a sword!

Some **** their love when they are young,
And some when they are old;
Some strangle with the hands of Lust,
Some with the hands of Gold:
The kindest use a knife, because
The dead so soon grow cold.

Some love too little, some too long,
Some sell, and others buy;
Some do the deed with many tears,
And some without a sigh:
For each man kills the thing he loves,
Yet each man does not die.

He does not die a death of shame
On a day of dark disgrace,
Nor have a noose about his neck,
Nor a cloth upon his face,
Nor drop feet foremost through the floor
Into an empty space.

He does not sit with silent men
Who watch him night and day;
Who watch him when he tries to weep,
And when he tries to pray;
Who watch him lest himself should rob
The prison of its prey.

He does not wake at dawn to see
Dread figures throng his room,
The shivering Chaplain robed in white,
The Sheriff stern with gloom,
And the Governor all in shiny black,
With the yellow face of Doom.

He does not rise in piteous haste
To put on convict-clothes,
While some coarse-mouthed Doctor gloats,
and notes
Each new and nerve-twitched pose,
******* a watch whose little ticks
Are like horrible hammer-blows.

He does not know that sickening thirst
That sands one’s throat, before
The hangman with his gardener’s gloves
Slips through the padded door,
And binds one with three leathern thongs,
That the throat may thirst no more.

He does not bend his head to hear
The Burial Office read,
Nor, while the terror of his soul
Tells him he is not dead,
Cross his own coffin, as he moves
Into the hideous shed.

He does not stare upon the air
Through a little roof of glass:
He does not pray with lips of clay
For his agony to pass;
Nor feel upon his shuddering cheek
The kiss of Caiaphas.

II

Six weeks our guardsman walked the yard,
In the suit of shabby grey:
His cricket cap was on his head,
And his step seemed light and gay,
But I never saw a man who looked
So wistfully at the day.

I never saw a man who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every wandering cloud that trailed
Its ravelled fleeces by.

He did not wring his hands, as do
Those witless men who dare
To try to rear the changeling Hope
In the cave of black Despair:
He only looked upon the sun,
And drank the morning air.

He did not wring his hands nor weep,
Nor did he peek or pine,
But he drank the air as though it held
Some healthful anodyne;
With open mouth he drank the sun
As though it had been wine!

And I and all the souls in pain,
Who tramped the other ring,
Forgot if we ourselves had done
A great or little thing,
And watched with gaze of dull amaze
The man who had to swing.

And strange it was to see him pass
With a step so light and gay,
And strange it was to see him look
So wistfully at the day,
And strange it was to think that he
Had such a debt to pay.

For oak and elm have pleasant leaves
That in the springtime shoot:
But grim to see is the gallows-tree,
With its adder-bitten root,
And, green or dry, a man must die
Before it bears its fruit!

The loftiest place is that seat of grace
For which all worldlings try:
But who would stand in hempen band
Upon a scaffold high,
And through a murderer’s collar take
His last look at the sky?

It is sweet to dance to violins
When Love and Life are fair:
To dance to flutes, to dance to lutes
Is delicate and rare:
But it is not sweet with nimble feet
To dance upon the air!

So with curious eyes and sick surmise
We watched him day by day,
And wondered if each one of us
Would end the self-same way,
For none can tell to what red Hell
His sightless soul may stray.

At last the dead man walked no more
Amongst the Trial Men,
And I knew that he was standing up
In the black dock’s dreadful pen,
And that never would I see his face
In God’s sweet world again.

Like two doomed ships that pass in storm
We had crossed each other’s way:
But we made no sign, we said no word,
We had no word to say;
For we did not meet in the holy night,
But in the shameful day.

A prison wall was round us both,
Two outcast men we were:
The world had ****** us from its heart,
And God from out His care:
And the iron gin that waits for Sin
Had caught us in its snare.

III

In Debtors’ Yard the stones are hard,
And the dripping wall is high,
So it was there he took the air
Beneath the leaden sky,
And by each side a Warder walked,
For fear the man might die.

Or else he sat with those who watched
His anguish night and day;
Who watched him when he rose to weep,
And when he crouched to pray;
Who watched him lest himself should rob
Their scaffold of its prey.

The Governor was strong upon
The Regulations Act:
The Doctor said that Death was but
A scientific fact:
And twice a day the Chaplain called,
And left a little tract.

And twice a day he smoked his pipe,
And drank his quart of beer:
His soul was resolute, and held
No hiding-place for fear;
He often said that he was glad
The hangman’s hands were near.

But why he said so strange a thing
No Warder dared to ask:
For he to whom a watcher’s doom
Is given as his task,
Must set a lock upon his lips,
And make his face a mask.

Or else he might be moved, and try
To comfort or console:
And what should Human Pity do
Pent up in Murderers’ Hole?
What word of grace in such a place
Could help a brother’s soul?

With slouch and swing around the ring
We trod the Fools’ Parade!
We did not care:  we knew we were
The Devil’s Own Brigade:
And shaven head and feet of lead
Make a merry masquerade.

We tore the tarry rope to shreds
With blunt and bleeding nails;
We rubbed the doors, and scrubbed the floors,
And cleaned the shining rails:
And, rank by rank, we soaped the plank,
And clattered with the pails.

We sewed the sacks, we broke the stones,
We turned the dusty drill:
We banged the tins, and bawled the hymns,
And sweated on the mill:
But in the heart of every man
Terror was lying still.

So still it lay that every day
Crawled like a ****-clogged wave:
And we forgot the bitter lot
That waits for fool and knave,
Till once, as we tramped in from work,
We passed an open grave.

With yawning mouth the yellow hole
Gaped for a living thing;
The very mud cried out for blood
To the thirsty asphalte ring:
And we knew that ere one dawn grew fair
Some prisoner had to swing.

Right in we went, with soul intent
On Death and Dread and Doom:
The hangman, with his little bag,
Went shuffling through the gloom:
And each man trembled as he crept
Into his numbered tomb.

That night the empty corridors
Were full of forms of Fear,
And up and down the iron town
Stole feet we could not hear,
And through the bars that hide the stars
White faces seemed to peer.

He lay as one who lies and dreams
In a pleasant meadow-land,
The watchers watched him as he slept,
And could not understand
How one could sleep so sweet a sleep
With a hangman close at hand.

But there is no sleep when men must weep
Who never yet have wept:
So we—the fool, the fraud, the knave—
That endless vigil kept,
And through each brain on hands of pain
Another’s terror crept.

Alas! it is a fearful thing
To feel another’s guilt!
For, right within, the sword of Sin
Pierced to its poisoned hilt,
And as molten lead were the tears we shed
For the blood we had not spilt.

The Warders with their shoes of felt
Crept by each padlocked door,
And peeped and saw, with eyes of awe,
Grey figures on the floor,
And wondered why men knelt to pray
Who never prayed before.

All through the night we knelt and prayed,
Mad mourners of a corse!
The troubled plumes of midnight were
The plumes upon a hearse:
And bitter wine upon a sponge
Was the savour of Remorse.

The grey **** crew, the red **** crew,
But never came the day:
And crooked shapes of Terror crouched,
In the corners where we lay:
And each evil sprite that walks by night
Before us seemed to play.

They glided past, they glided fast,
Like travellers through a mist:
They mocked the moon in a rigadoon
Of delicate turn and twist,
And with formal pace and loathsome grace
The phantoms kept their tryst.

With mop and mow, we saw them go,
Slim shadows hand in hand:
About, about, in ghostly rout
They trod a saraband:
And the ****** grotesques made arabesques,
Like the wind upon the sand!

With the pirouettes of marionettes,
They tripped on pointed tread:
But with flutes of Fear they filled the ear,
As their grisly masque they led,
And loud they sang, and long they sang,
For they sang to wake the dead.

‘Oho!’ they cried, ‘The world is wide,
But fettered limbs go lame!
And once, or twice, to throw the dice
Is a gentlemanly game,
But he does not win who plays with Sin
In the secret House of Shame.’

No things of air these antics were,
That frolicked with such glee:
To men whose lives were held in gyves,
And whose feet might not go free,
Ah! wounds of Christ! they were living things,
Most terrible to see.

Around, around, they waltzed and wound;
Some wheeled in smirking pairs;
With the mincing step of a demirep
Some sidled up the stairs:
And with subtle sneer, and fawning leer,
Each helped us at our prayers.

The morning wind began to moan,
But still the night went on:
Through its giant loom the web of gloom
Crept till each thread was spun:
And, as we prayed, we grew afraid
Of the Justice of the Sun.

The moaning wind went wandering round
The weeping prison-wall:
Till like a wheel of turning steel
We felt the minutes crawl:
O moaning wind! what had we done
To have such a seneschal?

At last I saw the shadowed bars,
Like a lattice wrought in lead,
Move right across the whitewashed wall
That faced my three-plank bed,
And I knew that somewhere in the world
God’s dreadful dawn was red.

At six o’clock we cleaned our cells,
At seven all was still,
But the sough and swing of a mighty wing
The prison seemed to fill,
For the Lord of Death with icy breath
Had entered in to ****.

He did not pass in purple pomp,
Nor ride a moon-white steed.
Three yards of cord and a sliding board
Are all the gallows’ need:
So with rope of shame the Herald came
To do the secret deed.

We were as men who through a fen
Of filthy darkness *****:
We did not dare to breathe a prayer,
Or to give our anguish scope:
Something was dead in each of us,
And what was dead was Hope.

For Man’s grim Justice goes its way,
And will not swerve aside:
It slays the weak, it slays the strong,
It has a deadly stride:
With iron heel it slays the strong,
The monstrous parricide!

We waited for the stroke of eight:
Each tongue was thick with thirst:
For the stroke of eight is the stroke of Fate
That makes a man accursed,
And Fate will use a running noose
For the best man and the worst.

We had no other thing to do,
Save to wait for the sign to come:
So, like things of stone in a valley lone,
Quiet we sat and dumb:
But each man’s heart beat thick and quick,
Like a madman on a drum!

With sudden shock the prison-clock
Smote on the shivering air,
And from all the gaol rose up a wail
Of impotent despair,
Like the sound that frightened marshes hear
From some ***** in his lair.

And as one sees most fearful things
In the crystal of a dream,
We saw the greasy hempen rope
Hooked to the blackened beam,
And heard the prayer the hangman’s snare
Strangled into a scream.

And all the woe that moved him so
That he gave that bitter cry,
And the wild regrets, and the ****** sweats,
None knew so well as I:
For he who lives more lives than one
More deaths than one must die.

IV

There is no chapel on the day
On which they hang a man:
The Chaplain’s heart is far too sick,
Or his face is far too wan,
Or there is that written in his eyes
Which none should look upon.

So they kept us close till nigh on noon,
And then they rang the bell,
And the Warders with their jingling keys
Opened each listening cell,
And down the iron stair we tramped,
Each from his separate Hell.

Out into God’s sweet air we went,
But not in wonted way,
For this man’s face was white with fear,
And that man’s face was grey,
And I never saw sad men who looked
So wistfully at the day.

I never saw sad men who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
We prisoners called the sky,
And at every careless cloud that passed
In happy freedom by.

But there were those amongst us all
Who walked with downcast head,
And knew that, had each got his due,
They should have died instead:
He had but killed a thing that lived,
Whilst they had killed the dead.

For he who sins a second time
Wakes a dead soul to pain,
And draws it from its spotted shroud,
And makes it bleed again,
And makes it bleed great gouts of blood,
And makes it bleed in vain!

Like ape or clown, in monstrous garb
With crooked arrows starred,
Silently we went round and round
The slippery asphalte yard;
Silently we went round and round,
And no man spoke a word.

Silently we went round and round,
And through each hollow mind
The Memory of dreadful things
Rushed like a dreadful wind,
And Horror stalked before each man,
And Terror crept behind.

The Warders strutted up and down,
And kept their herd of brutes,
Their uniforms were ***** and span,
And they wore their Sunday suits,
But we knew the work they had been at,
By the quicklime on their boots.

For where a grave had opened wide,
There was no grave at all:
Only a stretch of mud and sand
By the hideous prison-wall,
And a little heap of burning lime,
That the man should have his pall.

For he has a pall, this wretched man,
Such as few men can claim:
Deep down below a prison-yard,
Naked for greater shame,
He lies, with fetters on each foot,
Wrapt in a sheet of flame!

And all the while the burning lime
Eats flesh and bone away,
It eats the brittle bone by night,
And the soft flesh by day,
It eats the flesh and bone by turns,
But it eats the heart alway.

For three long years they will not sow
Or root or seedling there:
For three long years the unblessed spot
Will sterile be and bare,
And look upon the wondering sky
With unreproachful stare.

They think a murderer’s heart would taint
Each simple seed they sow.
It is not true!  God’s kindly earth
Is kindlier than men know,
And the red rose would but blow more red,
The white rose whiter blow.

Out of his mouth a red, red rose!
Out of his heart a white!
For who can say by what strange way,
Christ brings His will to light,
Since the barren staff the pilgrim bore
Bloomed in the great Pope’s sight?

But neither milk-white rose nor red
May bloom in prison-air;
The shard, the pebble, and the flint,
Are what they give us there:
For flowers have been known to heal
A common man’s despair.

So never will wine-red rose or white,
Petal by petal, fall
On that stretch of mud and sand that lies
By the hideous prison-wall,
To tell the men who ***** the yard
That God’s Son died for all.

Yet though the hideous prison-wall
Still hems him round and round,
And a spirit may not walk by night
That is with fetters bound,
And a spirit may but weep that lies
In such unholy ground,

He is at peace—this wretched man—
At peace, or will be soon:
There is no thing to m

Dysfunctional behind closed doors
Shapeshifted the lovesick *****
She'll touch you timid, trembling hands
Scared that you arent coming back
Digs through drawers and under the sink
Searching for her missing link
A cigarette will do for now
At least it isn't puppy chow
Shameless in her actions past
Comfortable in coming last
Theres more than at the surface level
And everybody's personal hell
Clove hitch knot around her waist
She followed at a steady pace
Wrapped around your pinky finger
She mimicked all you seemed to give her
What her eyes can do to you
Back of my throat still tastes like glue
What a sullen memory
Of what that **** can do to me
She bites her nails and fingertips
Terrified that she might slip
A clumsy dance that she once knew
Of falling into penance due
Twirl your hair and crack a smile
This one's gonna take awhile
Different or the same old same old
They've paid for it in pounds of fools gold
Chasing after fading dreams
Tripping up on memories
Will she make it on her own
A concept simple, yet unknown
A reunion of the sweetest kind
Desperate to escape the time
Spirits burn an empty soul
But never can they make one whole
Echoing within her chest
"You have always been the best"
She sips and stares across the room
Shadowed by her phantom groom
Cut off from hearts nourishment
All on her own cursed to lament
The choices that she didn't make
And chances that she didn't take
A sigh inside an empty mind
A drop of water off the tide
She's buried next to clementines
Roots entangle, synchronize
What a pretty little mess
Of despondancy and tenderness
And she's still waiting underground
For a love once frolicked, love once found

It was early fall,
the leaves were vibrant
when I crawled to the bar,
catch myself a weekend buzz.

Fred’s drinks were pure trouble,
more jet fuel than mixer.
I mean you could torch your breath
after just one sip.
Rock blared there like a live concert,
loud enough to make you a deaf mute
after just one drink.
The dark walls swirled,
moved in & out, carnival-like,
I purred-down
Jack-elixirs.

I first saw her shining
from across the Mahogany bar.
She was hidden in the shadows,
a real good looker.
Her amber hair was crazy,
blowing everywhere
like the bride of the stitched-man,
electrode-neck.

She might have been a ******
or a nose-candy queen,
but after what the bartender gave me,
it really didn’t matter,
life was played ******* the edge
in them days.

I was enthalled with her,
captivated by her lady-vibes,
she was the perfect last call.
We sang rock and roll songs
in my 455 rocket, crawled
the back roads,
looped
all the way
to my country-place.

We were on auto-pilot,
dropped our guards,
fell into each other’s embrace.
She smelled like salty-patchouli,
had a killer innocent-face,
kissed me with fire,
such strong desire,
a beautiful-wantonness.
Her eyes were so red & green,
indeed she was
the consummate,
the prettiest,
late-night dream girl.

She was bathed in bright ink,
the sun, the moon, the stars,
vividly scrawled on her back
along with a frowning-tiger.
Above her privacy, I spied
a smiling-gnome
with outstretched arms
screaming, “I Wuv You.”

I obliged him,
there was no fighting
her ***** to the wall demeanor.
We shook the planet,
frolicked way past the wee hours,
deep into the noon hour.

When the earth-shattering stopped,
I was hung over on her & the jp4.
We crashed still trashed,
I still don’t know
how I ever got her home.

He wasn't very confident about himself
as he had lost a kite before. The kite was
playful and frolicked with the winds. She
wanted to fly as high as she could to touch
the clouds and reach for the sun. The winds
were too strong for the boy, and he lost his grip.
The kite wandered off and joined the winds;
She was lost in sight, and the boy lost his trust.

This time, the boy tightened the knots to his new
kite and made sure that the string wasn't too long.
He gripped as hard as he could and kept his eyes
on the kite. There weren't many clouds and the winds
weren't too strong this time. He ought to feel safe
this time, but to his surprise, the kite got stuck between
the branches of a tree, and the string got cut off;
He learned that some things just weren't meant to be.

Copyright, Ronnie Ng, 2011 (www.facebook.com/bolametrics)

We ambled the streets of Harare
Meandering aimlessly
Fleeting past wide-eyes scanning us enviously
Hand in hand we walked into the restaurant
Leisurely on Second Street
Our hunger awakened
Our appetites heightened
At almost closing time
With no one in overtime mode
A signal that here we could only dine on another day


Joina City was our next stop
Up the lift right to the top
'Closed' it read at the coffee shop
Into the nearest chair I went flop!
Though hungry, we gabbed non-stop
By and by we regarded the clock
It chimed 8 o'clock
And sadly, it was time to go home

Busy and noisy
Were the streets of Harare
Jabbering crowds, kombis hooting
Hawkers, vendors or is it hustlers now -
Calling for buyers or just huddled to pass time
No chill in Harare
Picturesque like a dream
Surreal…
Hand in hand we dawdled
In despair for a hot meal

In the shimmering distance
Like a mirage in the desert
The neon lights read
'Creamy Inn'
Something to calm our rambling bellies
At last…
Nippy evening air hit our souls
'Ice-cream tastes better at night'
I said
'I can't believe I'm having ice-cream'
He said
We frolicked
Hand in hand we danced past faces painted with adoration
'What a handsome lover!'
They probably thought:
My delectable younger brother

It’s difficult to comprehend that
this is the same skin that, a few years ago
frolicked around in bars, carelessly giving out kisses.

No fear.

Every scar carries more
ignorance,
my flesh, less young explains
the former stupidity I carried

Accompanied by confidence.

I was but a child, lost in the woods
unaware what dangerous animals lurk.

Even then, surprised by my own’s existence
Me still being here and
continuously breathing.

I was brave, but not brave enough.

The quick breaths during the
first attack.
I did not know they hit like a hammer, I
a hot blade

They were hardening fear.
Enormous, monstrous fear.

I was powerful and strong, every year
my height lowering, so that my
once clear voice turns into a
trembling
whisper.

An exhalation, kept alive by the ones
close enough to put their ear next to my
tickling lips.

What anger I contain.
How mutely I express it.

It was once powerful.
Erupted from my chest like
living fire,
burning the monsters far, far away from me.

Now it barely sparks when I’m reminded of
the long gone evil men
Mean, mean men who did mean things.

It’s not that I wasn’t fashioned to arrive at this point.

I was.

But the feet pressing onto my clay body did not help.

Now I’m dried and crooked.
My voice quiet, body
exhausted.

As I exhale smoke once more, I get inside
embrace my love and think:  


"**** it."

comparable to a parasite
but with a higher mortality rate
it has opened its mouth
and found a way to my insides
it began to multiply
an asexual creature
and slowly I was being consumed
they nested in the linings of my stomach
giving me sudden lurches
which triggered my anxiety
then frolicked in my eyelids
irritating the iris
and I was forced to cry
then such creatures
tunneled their way back to
my flaking epidermis
and for a split second my body remained its shape
but one could soon see
I fell victim to a consumption

When the first sweet scent of summertime,
sifted through the sea-salt scented air,
so many things and everything
were bright, light and happy-go-fair,
the Summer Life with you was finally here.

As soon as our bare feet hit the wood bridge,
running from the road up over the dunes,
great grey seagulls squawked, dove and swoon,
we held hands together, one and one
made two,
dash-dancing across the shiny sand with you,
dressed and undressed in our Summer Life moods.

Colours like pinwheels spun like yarn,
flashed and clashed bright orange to blue,
you danced and giggled like a loon,
pulled me up and so close, so close
to you,
that I had to dance, I had to dance like a loon,
I just had to laugh and dance and laugh along with you.

How we played, we frolicked beneath the beachy sun,
belly-surfed upon the waves just for funny fun,
flicked flecks of sand from our sticky picnic lunch,
shared swigs from a big blue thermos jug
of fruity-fruit yummy punch,
sharing and caring beneath the Summer Life's sun.

By evening-tide the air grew cool,
you called me 'lover,' I called you 'fool'
-with a big ol' blanket draped over our shoulders,
we kissed and cuddled, growing much bolder,
falling flat back
upon the mighty mattress of sand,
feeling the mists of the waves licking our hands,
as the Man-In-The-Moon arose and shone,
to dance and laugh with us on the Summer Life's throne.

I am tossed upon the tempest
I am tested on the tide
I have heard the ocean restless
I will by the sea abide

But I long for drier shorelines
Far from sandy bottoms deep
For a tower wrapped in rose vines
Above a sunny keep

I have played in water shallowed
I have frolicked in the spray
But while this sea to me is hallow'd
My heart draws me far away

My soul is meant for moonglow
My heart the  sunny glade
But my home lies far below
Where the coral reefs are made

And never shall I leave it
This realm of wave and foam
For my dreams may be on land lit
But the ocean is my home

Her name was Nanette -
        A student from France
Who wore red blouses
        And **** red pants

She wanted to check out
        The U.S. of A.
So a couple with twins
        Hired her right away

The twins had their own
        Ideas for fun
They loved Disney World
        Their place in the sun

They frolicked on rides,
        Ate hot dogs galore,
Loved parades, Mickey Mouse,
        Fireworks, and more

But Nanette's heart wasn't in it
        The job was no fun
She had no real interest
        In tending to the young

Nothing could cheer up
        This nanny from Paree
She'd rather read tabloids
        Than watch twins under three

She clearly preferred
        The company of guys
With muscles, tattoos,
        And Jello shots on the side

The guys were bad boys
        Completely entranced
By the Parisian charmer
        And her flair for romance

But the parents were upset
        With her profligate passion
They decided to dismiss her
        In a daring fashion

They took her to the
        Tower of Terror one day
And left her shrieking
        As they ran away

And that was the last time
        They ever caught sight
Of that naughty Nanette
        From the City of Light

They leave Jerusalem, with the acrobats from Shiraz. They were ghosts of poetry, wine, roses and fireflies; they were conjuring the path of the twelve camels to the intersection with the Cenotaph, where King David with the Cherubs of Kafersesuh will stay. They were Epi ghosts, basking in camelid footsteps. They went in all the intermittences of the bent nails and plants of the areas of the marquee of the other four ghosts that accompanied him. They were the jumpers with water wheels, wheel scales with tutelary cords, some with stilts of gold disgrace from the coins of Judas Iscariot and the last propelled by a caper that ruled all the others on the wings of the Fireflies. Withdrawn from the road that leads to the Kidron valley, 2,500 years of clay tablets from Persepolis fall on all of them, they were phonetized with the plaintive nightmare of Tirazis's one-eyed poem; which is currently Shiraz, in this way these ghosts escorted the Hexagonal Birthright, they were exiled from their ghostly cities for not paying the tribute of obedience to destroy and rebuild. As they began to be with them in the cove, the ghosts of the acrobats boiled with the eagerness to prevent everyone from being saddened by the departure from the orchard, which was falling further and further behind their footsteps, dancing with their pirouettes along the way, they told little stories. in the ears of travelers.

Hydro Saltimabanqui: “I come from Roknabad (also known as Aub-e Rokní), an underground canal that carries spring water to the city from a mountain located ten kilometers northeast of Shiraz. Here I have to mend the propellers and water ropes to do my acrobatics on the water, with greater songs in the poems of the Poet Hafiz. When we bite our tongues, we repair it with Hafiz's verses from the Koran; there are three hundred creeds, three hundred hectares to irrigate with my wheel the sadness of those who cannot have the gift of the rivalry of Montenegro and Monteblanco, to overestimate the liveliness of the caravan trembling with uncertain doubts on its way to Jaffa. "

Saltimbanqui of Bacule: "We are Epi ghosts, the reverie with tutelary ropes, to jump through the trapeze of the photometric units of the heavy Almería of the highest Mirror of the Sea. Here we look; from here we will board the barge that will take them from back to Limassol. Curiously, the same ship from Lepanto that sleeps in the swings of the sea and in the arms of Anaximander, in a new awakening from the lethargy of the super-string theorization, here is the intrinsic speculation of science, since this is not just to research purely empirical. "

Says Anaximander: “First…, we have no proof that string theory is not ultimately correct and in the future in any verifiable way. Second, we propose a project of the order of string theory, which is necessary for science and its importance, going even beyond the scientific to also project itself on the metaphysical and the religious, right here in this order of greater what to do together with the rope that leads me to Patmos.

Saltimabanqui of Bascule responds: “metaphysical and religious legitimacy, here we are tying knots in the rope that inaugurates a new masonry in the observable futuristic look. Here is the original fiction of continuing to raise the necks of the ants over our optics. We will jump on these ropes, but we will fall on intervals of placental physical dens, which were born from the new embryo in the twelve caves of Gethsemane, in a primitive late germinal process. The micro phonetic vibrations will lift us up from the hunger to follow and leave King David in his cenotaph, gored on his hips by the Cherubim, marking his holy antlers that become entangled in the blunting of the cuneiform scratches of his epigram.

In the middle of the magical theorists exotically as associativity of substance causally of the poetic and multiverse song, believing in the ghosts of Shiraz, as dreams injected to sublimate the Aeneids that they lamented on the bottom stones, even though they were independent of their material origin. Multi universes, multi paraphrase for who has to dress the word “Rosa in her noble long dress to the cliff of Ebdara when Vernarth acclaims his brother Etréstles, he comes with the Auriga from Messolonghi. Rested and determined to head to Tel Gomel, he comes with his horse Kanti to keep him company on this crusade. Kanti defied the Cliffs of Crete, he was servile to Markos Botsaris, 1821 (Royal Hero of the Liberation of Greece in the Turkish Invasion, Koumeterium Messolonghi - Palibrio USA), until in the afternoon he approached from a herd of beautiful places of steeds to him. This was heard by Etréstles and he seized His horse to have more than a Life from his company, more than a lost and lost aroma of his natural mother, to reach the one who would treasure it”.

The ghosts attribute quantitative passages from before leaving King David, and then continuing on the road to Jaffa and advancing on the ship back to Cyprus; Limassol. All were hyperkinetic bowls leveraged by the terrain that was on the **** of the acrobatic histrion foreshadowing the contours of the temporal filigree, which in each one made them smile at the carriage with oxidizing wheels, still being immaterial beings, but alive in its marvel gases, wading the serious bile that emerged from the glasses in his allegories. His footsteps and his undulating phonetic figures did not stop over the caravan, which had already passed Jerusalem. They were already undaunted by themselves and overshadowed by the foreboding modulation and encryption of the rehearsals they were doing, over the heavy atmosphere that seized and begged a small piece of the attention of those who did not celebrate their Shiraz pirouettes.
The areas, volumes, and lengths were fully encompassed by the Ghosts of Shiraz, the acrobats ran along the banks of Ramallah, it was already winter, the city received them with winds and rains from the southwest alternating with cold and dry winds from the northeast. The acrobats went like master geometricians to condone the fuss of the caravan, devising a dodexagesimal system. (Twelve centuries of ultra-nocturnal geometry and shipwrecks at the Alexandria lighthouse)

Positioning as a base the number 12, to measure times and angles that they needed to avoid the voluminous rains that hit the caravan.  Incredibly, the volumetric position of the plantar legs of the camels seemed like wheels that rotated without stopping in any anti circumferential radius, making some clouds a shutter that enclosed them like a trapezoid of God's flock in the high semicircle of the waters that tried to fall. , like axiomatic staves of Euclid's beard tempering his elemental construct.

The linear position of each one of those who were mounted was a perfect ergonometric based on the Muladhara pressing the four red petals on pressing the Achilles heel of Vernarth, which was dimensioning the Ramallah triangulation, with the fungi that were housed in its Xifos sword in the jet tip that carried the dodexagesimal cartography. In the same position, the Apostle Saint John seemed, he carried the rosary in his left hand in geometry that elongated his nose and feet in an adonis triangle, thirsty for one hundred and twenty degrees of the sextant that broadened its spectrum to align with this Birthright. Thus the stars and planets are positioned as celestial spheres with the gravitation of the Olivos Berna, revolutionizing curved and flat equations that intuited to go beyond the crossed pirouettes that the acrobats did all the way, even further than those of the withered path of oil, purposely of the axiomatic systems that the Ghosts of Shiraz intended to establish.

Shiraz  Ghosts

These Persian Epi ghosts, axiomatized abstract and ideal entities relating models of austerity and lyricism, which fluctuated in the lines and planes of movements of the clouds with the counterpoint of the legs of the Gigas, leaving marks in the sand like a point Morse, straight and flat, until the fifth step that tried to cross the lines of Ramallah, for the parallelism that the centuries that asked Vernarth to reorder the geometric geography of time and the positions that were added as a delay effect in the Garden, essentially of a hyperbolic vision, to appropriate the entities of the Ghosts that grasp with their little finger the strings of the times associated with Gaugamela in his palatial sovereignty with the footsteps of Vernarth and in the phylogeny of a world that is born behind the confines of religious micro- genetics , from whose space is born in another and would accommodate a circular bijective function, to attract the aerosisms of Ein Kerem in the new life signs of J Joshua in the reborn One-dimensional Beams.

Vernarth diluted his bones to sit near the tarsus and accommodate it at the end of the vertebra of the Muladhara (Chakra of 4 petals), making a sub-technical geometric function to preserve the figures of darkness that were also diluted, to arrive at night close to of Jaffa, in the surroundings the isometric fire existing in each one and in two dimensions…, but born of a common one. Raeder and Petrobus wore their floating eyelashes full of dusty and dense manias on their faces, with splinters gum that they had released from one of the pirouettes of one of the mountebanks when colliding with the basic postulates of the Ghosts of Shiraz, deducing undulating spaces like snakes within the isometric fire that dazzled them with the burning senses of humor of the last drops of the Shemesh codifying themselves in an absolute intuitive measure, beyond all dimensions, which is Consciousness destroying the planes and spaces that multiplied among themselves as members of another geometric conscious dimension.

Arriving at the Ben Shemen crossing, everyone undergoes collective hypnosis; the ghosts manage to embody each of the components of the Birthright but omitting a great factor. They relegated the Hexagonality of the genetics of this caravan, not raising the ghosts when calculating the area of once they were being intracorporeal within the members, thus having to abandon before the last ray of Shemesh threw them on their faces ashes of the Gehenna, for this supposed reason to leave them condemned to recycle the human species, for the purpose of reproducing sacred human beings, but being subservient to the cravings beyond the immortality of the miscalculation that led them to the citadel of Karim Khan, surprised with its stamp of thick stone walls and circular towers in the heart of Shiraz. This gave them a warrior aspect contrary to their fame and history: this was a city famous for two thousand years for its culture, with its gardens and its poets, now if in a conspiracy by this beautiful odalisque ruse that attracted the guide of the ecstatic ghosts, in a bad moment of extradition to a bad context of epi ghosts not yet defined in their pockets of apprentices boasting on the laurels of weak and doubtful ideas, which still swarmed within his white heart, trying to reach Vernarth's as former commander Hetairoi, now a servile mystic. In such a way, the complicated as ghosts like "Sufi", being, in reality, the genetic soul of the double ax that carries the double edge of today ..., of the sacrament of Medea in Abdera.

Pro says a ghost from Shiraz (embarrassed):

"The Universe is a sea that longs for dry shores,
without sea and without other wet longings ...,
no possible maiden could
Try to dry it with your star hands ...
Who calms the crying of the Universe ...
even so ..., simile remains floating as a verse between his dreams "

"How can I make my dreams another dimension of the universe?
if he is quiet and does not make me float in his sea ...
How can I make it possible for the tips of its stars
fill the spaces that have revealed it ...
and that have made circular shores without a sea in the mists "

"I walk alone and nobody sees me ...
so I don't wake up the candles that smile and accompany me ...
between days that turn into mornings on the shore
of the solitude of the universe, that nobody embraces him ... "

“Now the days tremble from almost falling on themselves,
They come out alive from their own loneliness of exhaustion and fullness ...of whoever appreciates them in the mists ...
being able to surrender their attention in Ben Shemen ”.
As the Ghost of Shiraz expires in Ben Shemen, he escapes all for nothing in the triad of hypnotizing conventions that still resided in the shameless air that engulfed him, all over the stationary enclosures of the entertainment spaces caused by the acrobats and epi ghosts. That seduced the indecisive beings that sailed over the limbs that made them doubt where to refrain from continuing, outside the radius of the caravan or beyond the skies that did not cease to be in good spirits, of the universe passing through the white hearts, six on the inside and six on the outside in their traveling artist folds.

The lands that are accommodated by the time of parapsychological hypnosis tremble again, as a separation from the physical magnitude of Gethsemane.  Creating a sequence that bends the heads of the ghosts, filling their translucent physiognomies between a cold past and a frozen future, from a classic mechanic, which from now on would depend on the dice thrown by the Third Phantasm of time. Here a relativism would be opened to those who want to see the past in the orchard in an unstable particulate present, leaving far from splitting both parts of the archetype of today, like a subdivided clash of several times that allowed integrating the remaining phantasmagorical spectra, taking over a story on a pluriaxial axis that prevailed in the time of a supposed numerical line from a vector, aligning itself towards the compass of the distance that shines between both northern hemispheres in the minutes that go to the right and the solid-gas seconds that burst almost in the walls of their own liberated beings. The four ghosts of Shiraz, had time differentials before this event with the caravan, verifying the simultaneous prop between the two pairs of ghosts between four dissimilar, but poetic ones that made them here at this point obviate and cancel between two relative nomenclatures of physical structure. The durability and classification of these micro-times of the phantom epi would make the database that St. John the Apostle and Vernarth will accumulate with their eyes closed, each one surpassing himself from the debatable areas, which concern to estimate in occupying the spaces physical in some of them at will so that one of them could embark to Limassol. This simultaneous and relativistic multi-active line, encloses events and squares of spaces in the cinematographic time of the parapsychological regression, as a link of physical images slowed down in the evolutionary and cognitive memory, passing from the conduit of expectation memorization events towards the set of absolute figures. not pigeonholed, but approaching the universe in grasping scales of those who value them. This elucidates even the very conception of conceiving oneself as a ghost, rather in what is called "Epi Ghosts", of absolute belonging of the identical ..., outside of oneself "Being with them and not, as a tacit phase of a dragged story with the seconds that were not lived ... "

This scaling conception will allow them to reside a few millimeters from the consciences of the caravan that was advancing automated along the tracks that already made time and distance in front of the absolute, in a jiffy, having in their faces Rizhon Lezion, who was made of images more than a marked and concrete story in a mechanics that kept the body as part of a large volume in all, to the rhythm of the plantar areas of the Camels Gigas, dividing as a stream of water that would flow fragmented between past, present and future, but as a starting pattern to the future as the only "today" for the time of the times. This unified three-dimensionality would mark the mathematical space of the attempts towards the future of the contiguous camelids of the ghosts of Shiraz, for the ownership of time between all with a single identity that cries out for the univocal will to rearm, even if the winds are very strong. Of the partition,  which separates the world from God and the believing observer into the future with a believer from a historical past in obscurantism, leaving and entering a new world whose notion is to spend connected and bound in a systematization dependent on the great causes, although the static feels isolated from the dynamics, inquiring probative to unite between the ghosts and others, even though they are inferior forces under the line of the generous gaze and the parallelism of the attentive spectator, which suggests more openness to receive and delegate the circumstances of all physical, emotional, spectral and mental-spiritual dimensions, flexing the emotional states hierarchical night and day. Everyone falls asleep hugging on cushions of lamb saddlebags, making it possible to get closer to them too, close to the Ghosts and sleep next to them hugging with the decanted strength of the frames that hang from their faces showing the emotion of being favorite children of the Mashiach, absorbed in the Kidron Valley.

The frontier of the future will be the pre-act of not traveling too much of the physical love to the touch that only awaits the love of the sleeping of a Cherub, this may occur when the sheep climb the hill of our consciences, and manage to be perceived as the simultaneous harness of satisfaction, who lack the vision that would speak to them of a past belonging immobile, to this ethereal topology that will have to biodegrade the molecules of the seconds that sleep in the sheep-man wool saddlebags, at a higher speed than it would last to go back near from the palisade, where it crosses the path to the immemorial arcades of the Mashiach, spinning around all creation at a speed that determines a verse in its soul around the orthogonal of Shemesh, quadrupled and cloistered in its self-consciousness scattered like iceberg down the back in the submissive thoughts that long to be tied to more precious time.

Our lord has us more tied to an absolutist past and future, looking at his calendar divided in such a way that it always fits the day that hurts the shadows of a sharp past, so that it always smiles in us, as the best luminous sign, of whom and with whom to repair the damage of various wounds that travel through the times of time, always wounded, to and from the borders of an anachronistic past. The ghosts, always fast tetra, marginalize themselves to the sound of greater diligence, they fled in Rizhon Lezion, to wake up a little further away from the rays of the stationary Sun, which from now on always surfaced in the degraded dark circles of the mountebank, prowling around the festivities of who knows how to wait, to make a toast under the pretext of faith and hope that exempts the cardinal turned into a flower in white attire.

Shvil from the Angels

The fast epi phantom tetra was emaciated, they lost their north and since they could not walk, they were not energized by the radiosities of the earth, which dominates those who lend divine graces if their feet rested on the tapestry of those who threw their footsteps in winter already near Jaffa. The Shvil Angels were angels that were on the route that cordoned off the pilgrimage of Vernarth and Saint John the Apostle, they were full of flowering Berne Olive Trees that made trunks of floral arches at the entrance of this ancient port. They were three when they walked, they were always distributed so fast that they seemed to be six, but they ended up averaging the quantum of three for each of the components of the Birthright, which from today would be the great circumcision event of the Universe, to make it part of those who one day will have to caulk the rhombuses of the fragmented light beams on the path of heaven so high, in the name of the phrases that never tire of looking at the incautious years that are of our father by the exogalaxies in the total company of the invisibility and relativity of cautious time.

This Semitic seashore beauty indicates and invites us to reach its salty Hebrew waters of Yofi, reinforcing the phonetics that runs madly through the border hills with its heart in hand, when foreigners appear in the name of plausive phylogeny. That brings him a piece of bearable land from the Universal Flood, this is why the ancient Canaanites have to receive them with the table set, to entertain them with winter flowers in Jaffa. The Hellenistic tradition relates the name to Iopeia, which is Cassiopeia herself, mother of Andromeda. After Pliny the Elder the name is connected with Joppa, who was the daughter of ******, god of the wind. Where Vernarth locked his Aspis Skolié shield so that it would shine in the bilges of the Eurydice, under the pentagon’s of the bronze layer of his shield, every time he approached the Dodecanese when the Auriga descended from Andromeda on the back of a punished rower by the storms taking him away from his mother galaxy.

Thousands of years BC Its merchants glorified themselves with their baskets full of belongings and merchandise, for its inhabitants, who today pretended to be pharaohs who paid tribute to the marine corners through the coast that today seemed to open up with more new waters that were reborn from the capering of the swells, founding thus the omens of embarking to attempt and submit to the omens of sovereignty between Judah and the Hellenic lands, to work with noble trees in their armories and utensils, of which they played an honorable part after the maintenance of the emblem of the last portion, of the shaft of the libertarian triumph of Alexander the Great over the Phoenicians in Tire. In the New Testament, it is related how Peter resurrected the believer Tabitha (Dorcas, in Greek, gazelle) in Joppa (Jaffa) and, later, how near this city he has a vision in which Yahweh told him that he should not distinguish between Jews and Gentiles while ordering the removal of ritual (kosher) food restrictions followed by Jews.

The Shvil of the angels distanced themselves from the desire of this station without reaching them and not making them drink salty water from Jaffa, therefore they resorted to Petrobus who a few meters before reaching the port, summoned a large number of Dodecanese Pelicans who were waiting in great celestial flocks, which hovered happily above the sky welcoming them. The pelicans levitate from a risky juggling act, over the caravan and headed to the high seas, collecting saltwater, then they went along the initiation path of Shvil and reconvert the saltwater into sweet with hazelnuts so that they would have holy water, to insolate it and pour it into the canteens of the temple guards of the Canaanites who were waiting for them, to distract them, making them believe they were other Syriac lands such as those of Ashera, which in this act, perhaps it would be good for them to sponsor the Hexagonal Birthright.

But the paths of the angels have confederated before the noisy crowds and Ptolemaic lemurs, who were incorporated into the empty spaces that remained. Faced with this gravesite, Vernarth shouted to the sky with the force of Falangist tradition to himself, and acclaimed heaven, for the sake of freeing them from their definitive income to Jaffa, summoning the Hypatists; elite warriors and spearmen, for them to gather at the portal of the ante entrance of Jaffa, for others who never came from nowhere and nowhere, only blocking it from its perfect plan of memorial and theological heritage conservation, upon return from the exit Judah, to embark with destiny through the sulphurous point that  will boil them in temporary waters, towards the Cyclades and then the Dodecanese, triumphing in inhabiting them wherever whoever was and whoever arrived with foreign promise.

As dusk falls in its first nubile shadows, the  Shvil presents itself to you with these three angels dressed in ivory white, each with a book in each hand and in the other a candelabrum, giving signs of ultra-interpretive catechesis, allying with silica. In combination, after the vision of the charms of the knowledge spread. Earth and sky in the second angel, washing the Semitic dew of anguished Jaffa, with teachings of sleeping well and awakening, to walk in the lands that want to seize the senses, of those who are called not to be oppressed, behind the bars of the Morbid and illiterate pan-vision of the angles of hasty entertainment of the angels when they were called by the Angel Regent, simply relaying information easy to carry to their hearts, in faint powers and poetic lessons, before falling into a thorny forest, burning their tongues in furrows of afflicted human positions, to later redeem them fervently with the judicious power of God.

Vernarth, is distressed by matters of seeing them so tender and so fragile, allowing them to crawl toward him gently. Finally, on these three rules of the Shvil, Hanael introduces herself; "Speaking of hindrances stuck in the literary cabal of grateful compliments for all".   Alluding to Vernarth, a subject desensitized and also distant from any Sub Yóguica disciplinary doctrine. This led him to stand behind San Juan, protecting himself and scared of everything around him, he was seeing in front of him, on the upper left side itself, that Zebedeo was, San Juan's own father calling him!

Saint John the Apostle says: “Justice, at this time, allows us to alleviate ignorance, if the riddles allow us only to look for the answer, God will not be here…, it will only be emotional catharsis, through a merely ideological  Shvil or passage, which moves our meaningless sentences, definitely leading us to the coffers that rearm one after one, after the mistake. We are faithfully interpreted by them, but we detest our regencies with the Escaton, when we all pretend to follow his light of thunderous density towards the sky, prophesying to follow him without losing ourselves in him ..., held on his shoulder glossary. On the claws that are released from the dazed angelic prey, correcting its wavering vision, unraveling the living presence of condemnations or salvation, in Eden with your bare feet or in hell with no departure time”

Inexplicably, some Praetorian soldiers of Domitian appear, who would be restricting the departure of the tretacontero to Limassol, curiously they were the same ghosts from Shiraz that continued to represent such a bad event, just as when he was expelled to Patmos by Domitian in 95 BC, in size was the scandal that the Shvil angels produced with their impractical ideologies, who opposed such spectral imagery, in such a way that they replaced their figure with that of another Hellenic man who wanted to embark for Patmos, the other members were fully incorporated to the ship, which frolicked on the pranks as it proudly carried them to a new ocean. Around the last drops that jumped in Jaffa on the coastal rocks, others appeared when the last divided and scattered drops were going to shine the navigation temples, thus it is possible to board in the same ship that brought the principle from Limassol to Judah that transited from Lepanto.

The chapel of ministers reappears offering a ceremony, which would return the messianic remora to the Angels of Shiraz, to return to their former positions within the paths of biblical characters, who tend to commit adultery in the game of loss of consciousness of the Escaton, probably requiring that everyone have to make pilgrimage routes for all humanity secluded and liberated by themselves. The Saltimbanqui finally manage to jump into the boat to sail to the Dodecanese, but the Shvil of the Angels stayed where other celebrities will require them to reroute the Shvil Escaton.

The ranch-bound bovines, in dehydration,
yet wary of Kool-aid, declined to drink.
They grazed in wonder, cowed rumination:
where does “beef” come from?  A herd tends to think

of pasturage, water, and basic needs.
Ranch-hands assured them all was in order;
privileged guests enjoy the finest  feeds.
Cows, content on this side of the border

try Buddhism, yoga – or simply gaze…
though things in the distance loomed ominous
(those lots at the edge of the well-hoofed ways)
– and a stench wafted into their consciousness.

Yet calves frolicked on while the bulls mounted heifers –
dreamed vegan dreams as they nibbled grasses
some earned doctorates, others went clubbing;
all loosed sustainable methane gases.

Soothing their calves with fables and stories
where cows are the measure of pastured life
they deflected the gist of the young ones’ queries,
affirming that Truth means avoidance of strife.

“It’s best to just graze. Don’t ask questions dear.
We’re on this planet without any clue.
We evolved. From just what is a little unclear –
but Cow Science has proved that it’s true.”

She frolicked through trouble, and dandled with mischief. Alison Wonderland; everything I wished I was and so much more. Ever emanating her doe-eyed façade; proclaiming our jests mere “mischief.”
Yet, an unspoken verdict (Foretaste? Conception? Notion?) had cloaked the truth: wickedness rippled beneath our parade.
I nuzzled her contours; my peripheral eye – nailed to her profile, her blueprints, her chassis. I stalked her mirage – dancing with vapor.
She glissaded about, no fool to my truth, varnishing my mantle.
I belonged to Alison: perpetually at her side. Our couplet became a “we.” So, We regretted nothing. We veered for the pyre: caroming(skimming?) those embers alit with vice.
She narrated my mental seminar. Discarding my dogmas to uphold her own; and thus, my mind was hers.
My mind was her mind.
Alison made heads turn, and mouths water, as we sidled – hand in hand – down the street. She was my Christmas morning: each colloquium – giftwrapped with finesse. She personified paradise, she illustrated utopia. Hatching our Carnival; netting us, enamored, sidling the Carousal. We’d skim, we’d sail, her halo – my fossil. Her lips, her eyes, her hands… they echoed the innocence of a child. Niave, innocent, and giftwrapped in wonder.
Little Miss Wonderland: my very own fairytale. She was mine alone; she was mine to keep.
Did I want her, or did I want to be her?
Alison Wonderland.
Her aura – so celestial – paralleled my prose. When she banished my husk – Maple Thatcher – I cackled good riddance… And I grew a new personality to accommodate her own.
For, without Ali – devoid of our we – I doubted the very existence of me.
On my composition, she bestowed rhythm. She gave tune to my silence; her chimes, her cadence. My ink was her song – fusing a symphony. A symphony of Alison: the melody to solidify our tryst.
My mind was her mind.
And yet… somehow, I missed a carriage – or two – aboard her train of thought. For, the same felon spiting my existence, was the angel I loved to life. Gladly, I huffed, and I puffed, and I blew Maple down.
Fused against Alison, I needed none of Maple.
Carnival infatuations…

Alison Wonderland.

Hello, whale,
yes, you there wallowing
and swallowing crustaceans
with all your calliousity
and my insatiable curiosity.

What a laugh that calf
of yours was
when it frolicked up
to us diverse divers
wanting to be survivors
of its childlike impetuosity
and eighteen foot
preposterous, gargantuan monstrosity.

When you rose up underneath us
I thought you were going to eat us.
You scared me, whale,
when you flicked us with your tail -
the one you splinter yachts with
when you act as Davey Jones' locksmith.

Of course, I retired then
from my dive-in on leviathan,
happy to survive
your forty-five
tonne introduction.

Then you glided into gloom
and sang your eerie song
about your alien, baleen life
in vast, mysterious,
deep areas of oceans.

Good luck along the whale's road,
you mighty minstrel, you diva of the deep.
This diver hopes all humans and harpoons
will spare you and you can share
your song again.
God speed, whale.

i moved my ethnicity up north, because in the middle-south the squabbles got to me, even though i don't speak the tongue in order to order a cup of coffee or marry, i moved it up north, to the doom and gloom... because the squabbles down south got to me, and i couldn't identify with either factions - although i could identify with the Scots and whatever ancient heart bred them toward separatist labours - come the Scots, come the Irish - the sloth of this anatomic segregation is getting on my nerves.

the difference between european introversion and american
extroversion is that the former bases theirs on an implosion
that dates back to prehistory and the latter bases theirs
to a piece of paper, a second Magna Carta...
every european implodes - every american explodes -
yet our history is longer, and is less trade-orientated,
consider the slave trade versus Atilla the ***...
Europe is the new Russia as Russia is the new
Siberia to "the light of the world",
Europeans always seemed to be introverted
when compared to American big cars big hamburgers
big whatever esp. ego - we work from
a Darwinism, you work from creationist-antagonism,
sure, a man in space, a man on the moon,
any tomatoes up there, might i ask?
the world eternal between the competition with
Tsar Slav Nicholas I and Donald Duck and Mickey Mouse,
it's hard to make cartoons of Ivan to be honest,
what with him throwing dogs off the Kremlin walls
and gauging out the eyes of the architect of
St. Basil's because "god" / Ivan instructed him to
an oath: no greater beauty will ever be seen by these eyes -
hard to make a comedy of it all -
if anything i'm *Jan Matejko's  Stańczyk,
the exact melancholia of a clown, a fancy-dress mm-hmm-ha-ha-ha!
while noblemen frolicked, Louis XIV petted a monkey
while shaving - the new aristocracy and the intervention
of the south park inventors over there? i'd be Mormon
in a nanosecond - whatever science divides or
multiplies it's still base one: the whole - whatever profession
it's still back to square one, the fudge, the glue,
no one can work that one out, explore in whatever
direction you want, it's still the Kantian dynamic of
coordination via (0, 0), the double denial, its not
an algorithm - Manchester encoding, logic 1, logic 0,
forget the sine and cosine graphs of smooth
marbles and hidden genitalia - it's different now,
zigzag paradise and ugly shapes like Syria
and Iraq and Iowa - all we need for the antidote to
Kantian symbolism (0 = negation) is the zed of affirmation,
just one... wondering... what direction would that entail?
life, x as 0 and y as 0 - ageing and mortality, all too often
subscribing the words: death apparent, but there's a third
line of coordination, no memory of babe consciousness,
no memory of nappies or eating apple pulp...
that strikes me as a head start - the less adventurous world
and the emergence of the unconscious and dreaming
as the new frontier, not necessarily -
i like the head start, i don't like shuffling into cubicles
of cognitive sterilisation, in that Freud makes thinking
attached to dreaming on purpose - i read a newspaper
then i read a poem, with the former i'm constipated
with the latter i get diarrhoea... i don't like attaching too
much thought to the content of dreams,
but to dreams per se - how does my brain encrust a
phosphorescent adaptability to the banality of sleep?
surely the brain cares more for the unconscious banality
of the night than what people-self-invoke as a banality
of life - the serpent eating itself already answered,
the brain automatically said: sleep is banal, we need dreams.
the self, a conscious abstract of Σ (sum of all parts,
liver, kidney, limbs, heart etc.) didn't necessarily make one
up, unless it's called philosophy - the body in sleep
already answered, the brain's answer to the banality of
it's existence rested in sleep is the act of dreaming - simple
enough, no one would imagine sleeping without dreaming,
but that's the automatic answer for the brain and
the banality of sleeping, given the complexity of
learning, unlearning, encoding decoding, love, hate
in that internet of ******* connectivity -
so if the brain answered the question of the banality of sleep
(well, given the ****** heart mechanised to smack its
forehead against a brick wall, little wonder)
with dreams... what if not a nether-realm, a heaven
or a hell the brain envisions? surely...
it's inherent for the brain to envision a heaven and a hell
when Σ is awake... as it's inherent for the brain to envision
dreams when Σ is asleep... it's logic... it's not some
fancy for rituals -the point is: heaven and hell would not
exist if we didn't dream, void, blank, void, blank,
no Freud - if you can argue against the non-existence
of any of such realms, you will have to train yourself
to not dream, to exclude the dream-realm - but i don't
think your brain will be willing to do such censorship -
after all, it's a double-consciousness we're talking about,
the brain is conscious of you, and you are conscious of the brain;
it's odd, i know, it's the one ***** that has such parameters -
well, it's more conscious of a skeleton than you -
the skeleton is the one thing that is verifiable for the brain,
the brain can't intrude on the heart or the kidney functions,
but the skeleton is all a playground for the brain.

Patristic Excerpt
John where made Patristic delays on the island in Christian times by building numerous panagias decorated with mosaics. They enter the port of the island walking in wild revelry after being greeted at the port. At dusk they arrive in Jorió finding the Venetian castle of the knights of the Order of Saint John, completely covered in blue olive oil (a phenomenon that had been caused by the previous visit of Etrestles and his entourage) In the same way, they make an antechamber to the northeast finding the Grotto of the Seven Virgins or Nymphs, whose satire succumbed to some incredulous neighbors, hiding some of their minor daughters after denying its consummation. This is not a minor legend told of how seven young girls disappeared into the cave when fleeing from some pirates, noting if it could be so, also the clues to find Etréstles that he had recently been here in frank search for his ghosts. “Behold, all this paraphernalia of bilocation was accentuated by the god Spílaiaus creating immediacy with all the times that they wanted from the present, and the future that is exclusive to the Itheoi gods” Petrobus the Pelican goes back to the colonies of his ancestors, he wore gold rings around his neck, and had no contact with his native colony since the last day they helped the fields with water due to the lack of fresh water. It is worth noting their property of converting salt water into fresh water but even more the quality of Petrobus in addition to where they step on its paws, everyone will shine and rejuvenate. It off-centers its wings with allotropic dyes that made it turn colors in addition to strengthening and lightening its body during long periods of flight, and lifts its angular bag and takes vertical flight to meet Reader and Vernarth again in the Early Christian Necropolis of the burial chapels, here they meditate with the god Azofar who levitated above them offering their submission to the wind that flows with great power under the catacombs pulling and moving spirits that wish to relocate with their placebo presiding over their doubts. They leave the port boarding a Triaconter that would take them to Kinaros before the night falls and is seized by the coastal fog, not resisting the rope that holds a ship, whatever it was many times these ships were maneuvered by rowing sailors but this time it was only consigned for them, it would only move without anyone intervening, only the eternal wind that kind will take them to the island of Reader's progenitors. On the transparent waters sailing in the Triaconter were the three, Vernarth in the Petrobus bow on the main mast of the sail, and Raeder beside him a few meters away remembering his parents when they emigrated from this island? The name of the ship that was named as “Eurydice” in every certain space of advance they approached the macaroon to empty the tears that this Nymph emanated through her half-open eyes, she would take a rag of the holy cocoon and wipe away the effusions that must have been more for some reason that he would want to know…? Upon arriving in the vicinity of Kinaros, a rainy cyclone hit them which lifted them above the surface of the island when they were less than 5 km from arriving. Vernarth takes the Xiphos's sword from him and cuts the ropes then Raeder noticing that they were at serious risk of being shipwrecked, tells Vernarth to get out of the ship and quickly runs to the bow covering the eyes of the Mask of the Eurydice and leaves the ship.

With an epic metaphysical tendency, he acclaims his magical steed Alikanto..., he flies over the ship and picks them up, and Reader takes hold of the rings on Petrobus's legs reaching the mainland consecutively. Kinaros is a land of fishermen and farmers, a long-lived land and ancient inhabitants who do not age; here there are no cemeteries or monuments, there is only eternal spring for those who can be grateful for a place that gives them peace, and melancholy love for those who do not live there. Here from this bountiful land come the Raeder Parents, they migrated to Kalymnos; being this land the one that saw his birth and immortalizes him so he remembers…: “In the islands of the Dodecanese, subdued by the carmine dew that falls at dawn on its crystalline waters, important archaeological remains and cenacles appear on the sand or gravel beaches to compete in athletic leisure, Raeder ran naked after the outfits of which his mother had made him. He was permeated by crystalline Byzantine, architectural and medieval monuments due to long Venetian dominations in his mannerisms what unite them to these islands is their history, and their occupations: that of the knights of the crusades to that of the Turks, the Italian occupation to the Greek annexation with their volatile outfits useless to dress up, Patmos is very popular among pilgrims from the moment his work was raised in one of the caves on the island of San Juan Evangelista, the disciple of Christ writing the Book of Revelations. Astypalea is the westernmost island of the archipelago and has Dodecanese Cycladic architectural features it is also related here in the Novel of Etréstles of Kalavrita matter of his victorious boast to Patmos when he resorts after the reverie with the Laziko Dance that was held by the little finger and circulated in commemoration of the stripping of the rebirth of spring with the Sousta del Dodecanese. These dances were engendered in the infra-ocean floor of the Ionian Sea, generating the power of the ethereal emanation of Etrestles from Kalavrita by daring to put Eclectic confrontation to the invisible portal of the Evangelist Saint John in his sacred basaltic cavern in the Patmos archipelago (Koumeterium Messolonghi, Chapter 16 - page 114. Editorial Palibrio-USA) (Koumeterium Messolonghi Chapter 16 - page 114 Editorial Palibrio-USA) It is also related here in the Novel of Etréstles of Kalavrita matter of his victorious boast to Patmos when he resorts after the reverie with the Laziko Dance that was held by the little finger and circulated in the commemoration of the stripping of the rebirth of spring with the Dodecanese´s Sousta. It is also related here in the Novel of Etréstles of Kalavrita matter of his victorious boast to Patmos when he resorts after the reverie with the Laziko Dance that was held by the little finger and circulated in commemoration of the stripping of the rebirth of spring with La Sousta del Dodecanese.

In the Chapel of Ministers: They were seconded by the high representatives of Kalymnos, among them the curious immortal serpentine Raeder son of native Kinaros farmers belonging to a clan group of six small islands and six small families. Some islets used to boast the genealogical beams and challenges of Antigone, and documented inspirations found between Leros and Kálymnos in the east and the Cyclades islands of Amorgós in the west. Raeder always got up before dawn on his window sill there always appeared a petite blue bonsai Pelican he called Petrobus, in the mornings he would run beating this Olympic bird in a fast dispute sometimes he was not able to say goodbye to his bird friend because he ran so fast that the days used to be weeks in a row, while Petrobus puffed through the Ouranos with his Hellenic Artificial Intelligence elytra, with his hyper exhalation he moved great rocky crags even moving and disorganizing the geographical nomenclature of these twelve polygon islands between the Cyclades and the Dodecanese. The lesser known and immaculate islands are Leros or Pserimos, while Rhodes and Kos the largest and most cosmopolitan islands are the goal of the migrated Blue Pelicans throughout the year. Before returning to his house, Raeder stretched out on grasses sheared by the heels of Petrobus's migrates and his henchmen in this grass dancer I could feel the dances with the gag dance bread vibrate through his arms in all the rumps of the maidens in the Sousta dance running after Petrobus with his golden mask and hanging from the wings or legs of his bird (Wings Mate), the art of flying with golden magical birds and his Ancient Mama Antigone to Raeder when sometimes he was flying by the legs of Petrobus, he thought...:

“My land… a thousand times I will lift you up with my arms, do not doubt it, my arms believe it… Oh, my venerated Ionian I will do apnea to please you a thousand times to become your Ionian molecule… Wind of Kalimnos himself…, I will make the flute an Ode that runs through twelve perforated epitaphs with my ancestors in the Dodecanese sleeping paroxysm in the panagia where I was baptized for the ninth time! And in the fatuous lavish fire, I will put the ceremonial ribbon of the Sousta Dance in the nap in the new migration of my transparent Pelicans….”

Raeder tells a visibly emotional Petrobus about imagining crying with his imagined friend. "Little Raeder of the Dodecanese" he utters to his magical imaginary friend; Petrobus, what else was missing from ground breadcrumb paste for next winter…? Petrobus, distracted and not looking at him tells him…, only placing his web-footed Hellenophile leg on his other equal…: “Fear nothing Raeder, God does not coexist! ...Now He and you are the same. With your arms you will be able to lift the sphere of the bare earth and reconvert it into a Healthy Earth of Milk and mead of our Kalymnos that runs like a quagmire through the mountains of your Life converted into a new House dressed in a new house” when Raeder finishes thinking…, Vernarth tells him that they had to sail to Patmos, curiously Eurydice's ship was in the bay, they believed that this ship had capsized and sank somewhere in the wide open sea of ​​the Aegean.
The three on boards the ship Eurydice, Alikanto stays in Kinaros batoning very well guarded by peasants who took great affection for him later he would join him on Patmos for service and trades pantry to Saint John the Evangelist. Alikanto will take a great contribution and role in the prophecies of Vernarth on the Isle of Patmos, just on board the Eurydice and surround themselves with a climate of seclusion and peace on the ship, not so far behind were the Cyclades and part of the Dodecanese he was full of vitality, he completely covered the Triaconter it was late and the moon was beginning to dress the deck with phosphorescence, Raeder and his little Petrobus were clearly exhausted deciding to sleep right there on the deck. He was also relieved of emotions after so much experimenting on the islands, as well as not being able to find his brother Etréstles to prepare to rest in her poetry, almost falling asleep he sees that from the bow a very quiet female figure approaches him with her lost gaze, and stands up seeing that it was Eurydice who was in front of him. She had her bandage on her eyes still approaching her and says Eurydice: “Can you remove the tape…? Only you can do that! Although due to this subtlety of yours in attention to me I tried..., of course, I must be able to recover my subsistence and its mobility as an indissoluble watercolor. Vernarth says; “In my narrative we know that Eurydice was a dryad, being the wife of Orpheus as a poet and musician. After evading Aristaeus´s harassment, she would now take refuge in a shipyard in Amphipolis and hide on a ship. She escapes with great speed and fear, as her heart only belongs to Orpheus, as she flees, Eurydice is bitten by a snake and dies, Orpheus, disconsolate, cries for her and her desperation finds no consolation, so he makes the risky decision to go in search of his sweet and beloved wife to Hades, the land of the dead. Vernarth longs to revive her in her comparative fable to her sweet song and her poetry, Orpheus managed to move Charon who lets him cross the River Styx, the boundary between the world of the living and the dead. Later, also with his artistic abilities, Orpheus manages to convince Persephone and Hades to allow him to take Eurydice. The subterranean divinities agree to be taken away but Orpheus must promise that he will not attempt to see his wife until he has brought her into the sunlight, so as agreed, Eurydice followed Orpheus on the way to the light, and at the moment when they were about to leave the dark depths, Orpheus had doubts thus, he began to think about the possibility that Persephone had deceived him and that Eurydice did not come after him, so he could not bear her temptation and turned to look at her and confirm that she was coming with him. When this happened, Eurydice was dragged by an irresistible force back to Hades. Orpheus, desperate tries to go again to rescue his beloved but this time Charon does not allow it, at this moment the god of the Genus Itheoi Aiónius clings to the purity of the distilled water pretending that Eurydice was going to the underworld, but the mirror flash of Ibico 1 would bring Eurydice from the darkness to the parallel world of Orpheus and Vernarth. Here Kaitelka and Borker (Semi Itheoi, concur in total harmony with Demeter, Persephone, and Hestia bringing from the labyrinths the rusty chains of Prometheus and Vertnarth that were wandering through infinity) Orpheus when he doubts is more than divine doubt, it is submithological human doubt that cracks the recondite doubts and trigger the valleys of perdition in the jungle dense in roads without being able to follow, especially if I personalize it in myself, said Vernarth. According to Vernarth giving ears in this magnanimous moment of what was narrated by herself, it represented Eurydice fearing being left unattended under hell, fleeing to Thrace to the port of Amphipolis, then boarding a ship stealthily entering being discovered by a captain later. She runs strong escaping from the officer and jumps overboard, the officer searches for her vehemently for several days, remaining buried in the holistic totally under a complication plot since a sailor had recapitulated her in a passage of this mythology that could take live life and action on your boat. Days go by and this Triaconter ship is whipped by the Persians on a disastrous day, everything frolicked from large figures to consider as well as fleeing from the Persians before an impartial and just intensified attack from the enemies the Triaconter is adrift. Eurydice follows in the footsteps of this ill-fated boat and then boards it again. “In the eighth month of navigating fully, she is discovered by Aristeo, She takes the start of a terrifying heart because she feared what could be born from the ship; perhaps become a subjective fear! She realized that it was not real and she understood that it was an anxiety of profuse delirium”. But it was too late for she hid in the bowsprit on her way to the bowsprit, with the decaying line to the figurehead she stays silent, tries to remove her feet and can't remain thus captive of the ship bound to the figurehead, provoked only by herself not by her as a divine Nymph but by the fear that haunted her like a viral fear in her own and her delusional fears. Vernarth, hates himself and tells Eurydice: “If you wish, I will jump overboard and be swallowed by the sea, and so I can find the oppressors who harass your persecution. Just tell me and I'll jump to save your reckless shattered fate. Only the existence that is nothing more than Bravery will combine the power to relieve you and free you from your chains.”

We are the weeping children of far distant desert lands,
We are the daughters nourished upon the ink of olive branches,
The stubble of our village was shaved off without news or trace,
Life’s bittersweet aftershave of memory still stings to this day.

We are the children with forlorn hands and forgotten faces,
We are those who have suckled the milk of honey and grief,
Our school is entombed beneath an avalanche of oppressive lies,
Our tongues string and weave the haunting tunes of broken trust.

We are the girls dressed in rags caressed by death’s pernicious smile,
We are the orphans who shelter in cemeteries dug by men of war,
Our eyes sparkle and glow with a kaleidoscopic firework of fear,
The carnation of our youth will be stitched into dry dead wreaths.

We are the sisters who buried the flowers that were our brothers,
We have frolicked under the barbed shadow of death’s high wall,
Our toys are plucked from the palm of dates sweet with our hopes,
The fresh fragrance of deliverance shall one day perfume our nation.

I remember a time when we knew how to fly.
It was a feat that just came to us out of thin air,
and oh how thin the air really felt when we took
off. Our finger would cross, cross like the stitching
of a hot air balloon that knew no bounds, filled with
the air we exchanged into each other’s lungs, and
propelled by the pulsing flames of our hearts. Your
sparkling eyes were intoxicating whenever they met
mine, they bore the same sparkle as the wishing star
in the sky I used to put all of my hope and dreams
into. Every instance our lips locked into each other,
whenever your mellifluous hair sashayed by my
nose, or each time you cradled my weary head to
your *****, the more our wings grew; grew to a
point where together we could soar to heaven off
of a single push. We danced through marshmallow
clouds as our wings tickled the sky. You carved your
name across the top of my heart then tucked the
needle of a compass beneath it so I always could find
my way home. We never knew where we were going
but trusted the winds to take us where we needed to be.
We never turned our backs to the skies for it was our
refuge, it was our entirety. Together in the far reaches
of space, boundless and free, the world below became
a place we had long since forgotten.


I remember a time when there was gray in the sky, a
gray that hued to black. Together we could not
recognize these skies and quickly became unsolicited.
The livid winds and the bitter clouds would pierce our
ears as they shrieked in malignance. A storm had
brewed and the rain was falling. The drops snuck
through the cracks between our hands. The harder we
grasped for each other the more we slipped until the
stitching our fingers once made became frayed then torn;
we were disconnected now. The whirlwinds then casted us
further and further apart until you were shrouded by
darkness. I was naked and alone save for the grief I then
became, facing the murkiest region of the storm. The clouds
I once frolicked with now spat a deathly light in my path
until there was nothing I could do and nowhere I could turn.
I wished to my star but I could not see your sparkle anymore.
I was at the mercy of the skies I once called home however
mercy was not to be arranged. The bright light paralyzed me
hard and fast straight through my heart, gouging out the
needle that always brought me back to you. I fell down from
the sky at speeds greater than I had ever flown up. Crippled
from above I was laying on the surface, with not even a scent
of familiarity. My once trusted winds fed the flames that now
scorched my majestic wings and took with it the fallen ashes
they sprinkled. The name on my heart I once cherished became
a curse, an endless reminder of what I could never find again,
where I could never go again. I laid there utterly vulnerable with
a single hand outstretched, reaching for the world I once knew,
reaching with hollowed gaps between the fingers you once
spanned. Over time the weeds I now rested in became hungry,
swallowing me into the dirt. I am consumed wholly to this prison
now save for the hand that reaches, reaches for a place that has
long since forgotten.

In a fleeting panic
my body aching
my head in manic
I was fitted for depression
by my fashion shrink
cosmic blue straightjacket
boots of shocking pink
Day-Glo eyelashes
and a faux stole of mink
I walked the streets of Soho
and climbed the Factory walls
a girl betwixt
a boy between
everybody’s darling
till morning came to town
in my corset of denial
I took cover in the rain
and sang naughty little ditties
seeping from the recesses of my brain
I tripped my way to Bellevue
where a thousand plastic junkies
awaited my return
I fell into their fancy
and we frolicked amidst our lies
and hopped aboard an east bound train
to a velvet paradise

Tomorrow’s sausage rolled along the road
And just beyond my hasty, tasty want for a drink.

Amidst giggle and sigh, my cohorts,
my companions and others
Muddle the horror, or meal at ends, most likely

Come this little pigs jump from the truck
Leading butcher.

In silence, I admire the –

Entrails on the highway;  jump opposed shank,
Surpassing my seventh mile for a
Seventh heaven,
Leaving me simply seconds prior Shenzhen.

Sure, little piggy’d never made it,
To the market, to the feast of it all,
But he’d met his end, and on his own terms.

He’d met his end and frolicked upon the
Fields lacking pans and bacon grease,
In opposition the role, the role we force, enforce
And devour time and again;

In silence, I admired the escape.