"herds" poems
The little cares that fretted me,
I lost them yesterday,
Among the fields, above the sea,
Among the winds at play;
Among the lowing of the herds,
The rustling of the trees;
Among the singing of the birds,
The humming of the bees.
The foolish fears of what may happen,
I cast them all away
Among the clover-scented grass,
Among the new-mown hay;
Among the rustling of the corn,
Where drowsy poppies nod,
Where ill thoughts die and good are born
Out in the fields with God.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
May 19, 2013
May 19, 2013 at 3:57 PM UTC
What's it take
These days
To write a poem
That makes the world go mad
That brings the crowds to their feet
That spreads like wildfire
Through a dry winter forest
Is it those excessively long words?
The ostentatiously loquacious
Platitudinous ramblings
Of an insecure mind aspiring
To authentic intellect?
Is it perhaps...
the "creativity"
of varied spacing
or... could it be..... the lack
of capitalization
the loathsome little letters
screaming out
hey, look at us!
... or maybe it's
the punctuation marks,
littered, haphazardly
through the text
(whether used correctly)
or, theyre not?!
despite worrds mispeled
and a grammar might is broken
can these gimmicks increase interest
though miswritten or misspoken?
Is the trick alliteration
Whose bite brightly bids us
To center on the snappy sounds?
Although all along
unvoiced underneath
Ideas idle in the isles
(or perhaps the aisles)
Of the mind
To meld and craft and bind
Our thorough thoughts
And worthy words
Into lines
Which
Heard by herds
Raise the
Praise for which we
Privately, desperately
Pray
Maybe it's a magical mix
Of splendid in-your-head rhythm
Marvelous meter that perfectly clicks
Flowing smoothly without schism
Well-spaced stanzas
Well-used time
Well-crafted phrases
Well-thought-out rhymes
Well, maybe not...
those gems are often ignored
cast-aside, unread, even abhorred
Why?
Because the modern world
doesn't need your rules
your restrictions
your regulations
your misguided boundaries
your oppression
your antiquated ideas
of "the right way"
to write
to speak
to act
to live
to (fill in the blank)
No, what the modern world needs
is
Negation!
Contradiction!
Resistance!
Revolt!
And poetry whose words
Say the same thing
Repeat the same meaning
Echo the same lyrics
Rephrase the same thoughts
But in an ever-so-slightly
Different
Varied
Altered
Adjusted
Changed up way
Line
After line
Of synonyms
over
and
over
and
over
again
-----
What's it take
These days
To not give in
To narcissism's spiral?
But more importantly:
What's it take
To make my poem go viral?
Aug 12, 2018
Aug 12, 2018 at 12:17 AM UTC
She sang a song
of ice and snow
and dreamed of oceans
swaying slow
She swam through clouds
and flew near stars
Fell so proud
and dove so far
She was a sad harmony
A song she unsung
A silence unheard
A deed undone
She hummed a tune
of fish and birds
and bore with devotion
The beasts she herds
She swam through life
and flew from death
Fell from strife
and dove bereft
She was a sweet melody
A smile she unsmiled
A violence in violet
My hope she defiled
She sang a song
that twists the mind
and played my emotions
Leaving me blind
I swam near folly
and flew through sin
I fell in love
and dove right in
Jul 29, 2019
Jul 29, 2019 at 3:55 PM UTC
She's an innocent little girl
Unknown about the people in this world
Who think it's a curse that she is born.
It's nothing to do with her but with her gender.
She has to suffer because she's her.
She grows up while listening to those painful words
By the voices of herds.
Those words which struck her like a bullet inside her heart
Now it's broken so much, it can't be mended even if we try hard.
This is not what she wants
But she's dumbfound like a mime,
Stuck inside, bounded by walls
Walking inside the empty halls.
She screams but no one hears
She wails but no one cares.
There's no one here who feels her pain anymore
As people ignore.
It's a curse that she is born even if she did nothing bad at all.
She has nothing else to do
But to dream about another universe,
Where people are one,
Where there's no boy or girl
That's what she thinks is a world.
But that's not true,
It's sad to say:
She is a curse in every way.
Why would they hurt such beauty and charm
When they do so,
She is so calm.
She has wings
Which are broken now
And it stings
If she tries to fly.
But still try,
You are not alone.
Dec 26, 2014
Dec 26, 2014 at 9:38 AM UTC
For seventy or more years TV
And radio ruled the world,
Along with telephones.
But then computers made their mark,
Soon followed by mobiles, Smartphones,
Ipads, Bluetooth, Wifi and who knows what?
In no particular order.
So herds of sheep migrated
Into Cyberspace
Even Myspace!
Then on to Planet Facebook
And Terratwitter.
We talk with people we’ve never met,
And meet folk with whom we’ve never talked.
It keeps us occupied I guess,
And gives relief from stress.
These images that yet fresh images beget,
I’m sure Yeats would agree.
I tolerate these adverts flashing in my face
And soak up knowledge to my solid mental grace.
A world of wonders beckons in
The depths of Cyberspace,
And as a Nerd before they were invented,
I have to say I’ve truly found my place.
Paul Butters
Jul 12, 2014
Jul 12, 2014 at 9:44 AM UTC
Racing, blind nights gone weary,
Missing like cold wind, blowin'
Trees, objects of nature caught ruthlessly divine,
Simple cognition or possible chasing lights drowning tears mark moons and mansions alike, in the presence of fire,
The great blind rat lifting it's tail, in disgrace showing motionless mass,
Get the blackness on the Jordan river death urge silently moving like herds of sheep in the hills of Holy
Thousands of nation men, trodden down with sand and mud just to get the right passage of mind and thought
A small Vietnamese girl,
About the size of a...
Nevermind the voices you hear they all come awake and slowly disappear
Droughts of ether alike in tunes I might just do without the rest of doubts hedges lawns and patios
Glazed in passionate flowers
Paradoxical a nebula unhidden,
Slow chasing the candle lit masks
Mar 7, 2015
Mar 7, 2015 at 4:29 AM UTC
My dear summers dream was to the taste cream
Pass me the triple beam the microphone fiend
Back on the scene simplicity is your complexity
So amazingly like grace I be rockin' the place
Like we Studio 54 shut down the doors
Once the bubbly pours and the **** adores
Ya mental **** ya sentimentals and these new aged millennials
They too satirical I make miracles flow potholes
Creatin' mass mayhem your an inconvenience
Cuz of ya hesitance my presence is known
Without even being shown paragraphs of stone
Hard to crack waxing tracks like a shark attack
Felonious acts we never back down
Til my soul drown in the core of the earth
Royalties since birth new my worth they tried to mirth
At my pain tryna change the game cuz all these cowards
Saying the same thang got dang got dang
Time to chess box like Wu Tang leavin' a stain
On ya reign no tears though I'll be on solo
Rippin' up instrumentals ya know how we do so...yeahhh
From the Sunny to bees that make the honey
Sticky icky like my spliffs be call me smokey
Puttin' fire to mother natures forests check the creases I
unleashes
Rap game mafiaso so so better back back
Or else get dropped lika Domino so here we go!
Here we go!
With the ghetto jams love girls with the derriere's of Pam
Got **** once again it's time to slam
Mics harder than Shawn Kemp ya flows shrimp
That's why ya girl calls me Mr **** no limp
Slick as Rick hello young world tilt and a whirl
Catch the swirl of Qatar Pearls on the neck of ya girl
Suckas better know I'm coming with a blow
Harder than Bowe combined with a super glow
black Saiyan raps slayin' turntables layin'
So I can get wicked lyrics Pickett
like Wilson
Flows in unison formation
of words
Herds a violent surge
feel the purge
We high rising no disguisin'
knockin' out Suckas who jivin' ain't none survivin' ?
Sep 28, 2018
Sep 28, 2018 at 11:09 PM UTC
The Day...
...huff, huff, ...huff
breathe
Not one but many,
downed
twenty-two a numbered set
Push!
break, reset, align...
frost, huff,
Great God of Light reveals our Glory!
breathing...breathing
Field of pain, torn, exhausted,
sweat, rain, mist, colder
as grass-stained; the warrior's drobe.
Situate,
whistle! -stop!
Realign,
Randint, paired, matched to offset...
feign, move
'Eleven-by-Eleven,' storied beget
tension
Forty-Five!
Eighteen!
Okemah!
Rush...
*In the fields herds collide,
as Chaos, Eros, Geron, Adonai,
War portends a losing side?
The cheering throngs cast coronae...*
*Eleven steers to sacrifice,
go they do to God.
The ritual structure to suffice,
Violent nature absorbed by sod.*
BULL *
Dec 20, 2016
Dec 20, 2016 at 7:54 PM UTC
If there are infinite worlds,
there must be one where umbrellas never close-
hinges locked open like stubborn jaws,
gape-mouthed against walls in patient herds.
No one in their twenties owns one,
their hamster-cage apartments
too small for such luxuries.
They ask for rain jackets on birthdays.
Mary Poppins still drifts down Cherry Tree Lane,
her umbrella never folding,
only floating.
Children carry slips home
for violating umbrella laws,
forging signatures in loopy ink.
The Morton Salt girl wears a slicker,
yellow as a warning flare before the flood.
My mother walking me to kindergarten in rain,
transparent vinyl dome above our heads-
I, the opposite of a fish in its tank.
Her hair plastered to her forehead
by the time we reached the door.
Everyone looks most beautiful
with rainwater running down their face.
In the open-umbrella reality,
time can walk backward-
you can unwater a plant,
unpeel a clementine,
un-kiss someone.
Endings lift again,
fabric billowing, as if the story
had been left open in the wind.
Heather and Mike find the road out.
Rosemary tips the bassinet.
There, perhaps, neither of us was born.
What lay between us
stays open too long,
collecting rain until it sags,
slow and certain, like sugar
in the first storm.
Aug 12, 2025
Aug 12, 2025 at 8:06 PM UTC
Gender ******
truth pretender
parents send her
life defender
he's a ******
slimy maggot
feeling ragged
bag and tag it
hurting words
spitting herds
cheezy curds
stupid nerds
mental case
dizzy space
ugly face
**** my race
Time to kneel
grab a feel
scary tweel
innocence steal
Eat a steak
garden rake
veggie snake
life forsake
Not pretend
we defend
savior send
the end
Aug 31, 2018
Aug 31, 2018 at 11:58 AM UTC
Your body
Is a creation of the galaxies
A coming together of milky ways and solar flares
When I first saw you, I was stunned
At the sheer amount of stardust it would take
To make something that beautiful
Your body
Is a glass case
Struggling to hold rivers in your veins
Herds of wild horses in your chest
The monarch migration in your stomach
Slowly you are cracking
The glass relenting to the spirit it cannot hold
But when it breaks you will not hurt
You will be free
Sep 9, 2014
Sep 9, 2014 at 8:25 AM UTC
All of the moves on a
chessboard of which
the permutations are
infinite, have been
witnessed at Camp-
Nou by the G.O.A.T.
Upon hillside tracks
and mountain passes
where herds pasture
on unsure footings at
cliffs edge in all types
of weather is the Goat.
Think of a goalkeeper
waiting for an indirect
free out of vision from
behind a wall of players,
imagine the thoughts-----
between predator & prey.
................
|˚ |
| |
Tribute to Lionel Messi
Barcelona on his 7th Balon D'or.
Dec 7, 2019
Dec 7, 2019 at 6:20 AM UTC
Spring bursts to-day,
For Christ is risen and all the earth's at play.
Flash forth, thou Sun,
The rain is over and gone, its work is done.
Winter is past,
Sweet Spring is come at last, is come at last.
Bud, Fig and Vine,
Bud, Olive, fat with fruit and oil and wine.
Break forth this morn
In roses, thou but yesterday a Thorn.
Uplift thy head,
O pure white Lily through the Winter dead.
Beside your dams
Leap and rejoice, you merry-making Lambs.
All Herds and Flocks
Rejoice, all Beasts of thickets and of rocks.
Sing, Creatures, sing,
Angels and Men and Birds and everything.
All notes of Doves
Fill all our world: this is the time of loves.
6.4k
sitting here but not
my insides
in a twist
my organs blooming,
their flower landscapes
rising in my solar plexus
like poetry expanding
its cellular shapes
into
light frequencies
I need way more.
I need the pulling off
and stripping down
of souls
I need to meet in
a depth of falling
I need to be pushed off
the silent gates of madness
into endless sea
no looking back
senses piqued
from slightest brush
of oral butter pouring
on hot cream
my mouth, a searing
crimson wound
oscillates in
contraction radar pulses
ripe for intense
tongue exploration
aching to be filled up with
your distinct flavor
My essence molecular is
overflowing with fluid
giving me life
in throbbing, raw
electric vibes
whipped organic, in
rolling tides
Somewhere, out there
our volcanic impulses
meet in steamy ebbs
and send energyflow
to a new and ancient universe,
magnetic
and I am
a raging heaven's child
wrapped in
a tight little
tourniquet
blood pumping
through these veins
my longing for
dark stretches
of intimate caresses
to soothe
the spikes
of snaking pain
Give me
those airwaves that
let me breathe freedom
into the fields of our skin
Let me run like wild herds
of the animal within
and as I find myself
hanging off
my
own
edges
my many-braided loops
in zigzag split,
a-fray
my skin rips open,
parting fibers
that expose my
very
DNA
helix swivel
undulation
hips grinding into
soul
reaching in to
pull out
fresh rebirth
from between my folds
O help me to allay
this tender affliction
undo me, already
so I lose control
one little shove
and I am over the cliff
deep into ocean
**** over spliff
I am beyond ready
so grind it to the hilt
Give me your
tender-ripped heart,
spill your honeycomb milk
I am here, ravenous
in the pan
uncooked yet ripe
saliva and breath
steaming my own innards
flushing out strife
I am piquant hot pepper
ready to be broiled
my blood is already
boiling
my tender meat oiled
mull me over
in your oral cavity
like sacred wine
until I drip
through your bones
and down your spine
Just meld with me
and flow
into that light tunnel
of dark time and space
so I can stake out
my rhythms
and claim
my
new
sacred
place
Aug 15, 2017
Aug 15, 2017 at 12:20 AM UTC
Upper East Side
The Hamptons
Aspen, Colorado
The plastic people
Follow each other
Moving in herds
Like cattle to the
Slaughter
Drifting
Floating
Shifting focus
From one charity event
To another
Whatever’s trendy
Whatever’s fashionable
Whatever’s happ’ning
Whatever’s the need
Tainted new artists
Society’s rejects
The film-maker who fits in with
The flavor of the month
The disease or the cause
That captures the moment
Stigmas overlooked
Deformities relieved
By one hyper exertion
By one pseudo good deed
Changing bedrooms
Changing partners
New alliances
Noblesse oblige
Mrs. Astor’s
Four hundred
Reinvented forever
Reinvented with fervor
On the edge
Of hypocrisy
Keeping up with the Jones’s
Maintaining the houses
Paris, Rome, Cote du Jura
Malibu, Palm Beach
Couture fashion
Madison, Rodeo
Worth avenues united
Avenues of the liege
Location, location, location
The right address unspoken
Dinner in the right places
Sporting events to be seen
Three martini luncheons
Halcion evenings
Business is business
Where money’s retrieved
Look to plastic people
For fashionable guidance
No matter the moment
No matter the need
Remember to catch them
While jetting to Santa Barbara
Saint Maarten, San Troupe
San Marco, warp speed
They live in their milieu
Can’t function outside it
Can’t follow a shadow
That others believe
It’s easy to find them
They leave behind footprints
But barely a mem’ry
Or singular creed
Other than finding
The latest in fashion
The latest persona
Or new plastic breed
Aug 8, 2018
Aug 8, 2018 at 8:19 AM UTC
Wish I had a special pair of lenses
A tool for me; just for my senses
That grant me binocular vision
Allow me to see with heightened perception.
Peer through mountain crags, over dunes of sand
Pierce skyscrapers in familiar foreign lands
A sight beyond nimbus clouds
Amazingly through temporal shrouds.
Past breathtaking ridges and quiet plateaus
Alongside a ****** of black-feathered crows
Tripping over singing brooks and moss-covered pebbles
Herds of quadrupeds as they frolic and gambol
Extraordinary views and candy for the eyes
Travelling linear between earth and skies.
But...
You're too far away for me to see
Even if bestowed upon me...
Still,
I wish my eyes binocular...
Because I need you so much closer...
Aug 14, 2014
Aug 14, 2014 at 2:23 PM UTC
When I was a windy boy and a bit
And the black spit of the chapel fold,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of women),
I tiptoed shy in the gooseberry wood,
The rude owl cried like a tell-tale ***
I skipped in a blush as the big girls rolled
Nine-pin down on donkey's common,
And on seesaw sunday nights I wooed
Whoever I would with my wicked eyes,
The whole of the moon I could love and leave
All the green leaved little weddings' wives
In the coal black bush and let them grieve.
When I was a gusty man and a half
And the black beast of the beetles' pews
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of *******
Not a boy and a bit in the wick-
Dipping moon and drunk as a new dropped calf,
I whistled all night in the twisted flues,
Midwives grew in the midnight ditches,
And the sizzling sheets of the town cried, Quick!-
Whenever I dove in a breast high shoal,
Wherever I ramped in the clover quilts,
Whatsoever I did in the coal-
Black night, I left my quivering prints.
When I was a man you could call a man
And the black cross of the holy house,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of welcome),
Brandy and ripe in my bright, bass prime,
No springtailed tom in the red hot town
With every simmering woman his mouse
But a hillocky bull in the swelter
Of summer come in his great good time
To the sultry, biding herds, I said,
Oh, time enough when the blood runs cold,
And I lie down but to sleep in bed,
For my sulking, skulking, coal black soul!
When I was half the man I was
And serve me right as the preachers warn,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of downfall),
No flailing calf or cat in a flame
Or hickory bull in milky grass
But a black sheep with a crumpled horn,
At last the soul from its foul mousehole
Slunk pouting out when the limp time came;
And I gave my soul a blind, slashed eye,
Gristle and rind, and a roarers' life,
And I shoved it into the coal black sky
To find a woman's soul for a wife.
Now I am a man no more no more
And a black reward for a roaring life,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of strangers),
Tidy and cursed in my dove cooed room
I lie down thin and hear the good bells jaw--
For, oh, my soul found a sunday wife
In the coal black sky and she bore angels!
Harpies around me out of her womb!
Chastity prays for me, piety sings,
Innocence sweetens my last black breath,
Modesty hides my thighs in her wings,
And all the deadly virtues plague my death!
5.3k
(for Cyril Connolly)
The piers are pummelled by the waves;
In a lonely field the rain
Lashes an abandoned train;
Outlaws fill the mountain caves.
Fantastic grow the evening gowns;
Agents of the Fisc pursue
Absconding tax-defaulters through
The sewers of provincial towns.
Private rites of magic send
The temple prostitutes to sleep;
All the literati keep
An imaginary friend.
Cerebrotonic Cato may
Extol the Ancient Disciplines,
But the muscle-bound Marines
Mutiny for food and pay.
Caesar's double-bed is warm
As an unimportant clerk
Writes I DO NOT LIKE MY WORK
On a pink official form.
Unendowed with wealth or pity,
Little birds with scarlet legs,
Sitting on their speckled eggs,
Eye each flu-infected city.
Altogether elsewhere, vast
Herds of reindeer move across
Miles and miles of golden moss,
Silently and very fast.
4.8k
My friend and I talk about it
Neighborhood got decimated this year
One after another the corners of community are gone
We touch the elder memories
as one might touch a head in blessing
as loved ones pass
We linger longest over John
Found dead after ten hot days
by other-worldly hazmat crew
flanked by cruisers
with their special, yellow truck
and zipper bags
...found 'im
glasses folded neatly on the night stand
in his jammies
all tucked into bed
No one thought it strange
that strange young guy would die
already decomposing in his head
Lost
among his personal effects
his fleet of rusting cars
and half-assed projects
Deck tacked to garage
his herds of “pets”
Easy to pretend he wasn't really there
between jail stints or some imagined threat or theft
of crap
haunted by the shadows of his persecutors
caught in motion lights
and cameras' blinding evidence of
jungle-jumble and malfunctioning alarms
going off in the wind
Everyone's out to get his stuff
We could dismiss him--
mostly
sorta
...except for times
he mowed his grass at night
or hand-built “the lunatic tower”
just for mom
from scavenged scraps and
hammered hours
power-sawed
through the housing codes
and horror
of the neighbors...
...Such a special spectacle...
******* crazy-- John!
He was enough for one day at a time
like when
he flung that threatening bolder
on bilco doors
for percussive effect
"Get off my fuckin' property!”
(not using his “inside voice")
“Next time, that'll be your head!!
He announces his intent
to not get mad, behave himself
to call the cops on me instead
Fake-dialing
While his mother screams in dread
“John is off his meds!”
My phone is set to speed dial
911
____
“How did we miss this?
How did we not miss him those quiet days?”
How we miss him now
How quiet
Sep 17, 2018
Sep 17, 2018 at 4:18 PM UTC
When I was a windy boy and a bit
And the black spit of the chapel fold,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of women),
I tiptoed shy in the gooseberry wood,
The rude owl cried like a tell-tale ***
I skipped in a blush as the big girls rolled
Nine-pin down on donkey's common,
And on seesaw sunday nights I wooed
Whoever I would with my wicked eyes,
The whole of the moon I could love and leave
All the green leaved little weddings' wives
In the coal black bush and let them grieve.
When I was a gusty man and a half
And the black beast of the beetles' pews
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of *******
Not a boy and a bit in the wick-
Dipping moon and drunk as a new dropped calf,
I whistled all night in the twisted flues,
Midwives grew in the midnight ditches,
And the sizzling sheets of the town cried, Quick!-
Whenever I dove in a breast high shoal,
Wherever I ramped in the clover quilts,
Whatsoever I did in the coal-
Black night, I left my quivering prints.
When I was a man you could call a man
And the black cross of the holy house,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of welcome),
Brandy and ripe in my bright, bass prime,
No springtailed tom in the red hot town
With every simmering woman his mouse
But a hillocky bull in the swelter
Of summer come in his great good time
To the sultry, biding herds, I said,
Oh, time enough when the blood runs cold,
And I lie down but to sleep in bed,
For my sulking, skulking, coal black soul!
When I was half the man I was
And serve me right as the preachers warn,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of downfall),
No flailing calf or cat in a flame
Or hickory bull in milky grass
But a black sheep with a crumpled horn,
At last the soul from its foul mousehole
Slunk pouting out when the limp time came;
And I gave my soul a blind, slashed eye,
Gristle and rind, and a roarers' life,
And I shoved it into the coal black sky
To find a woman's soul for a wife.
Now I am a man no more no more
And a black reward for a roaring life,
(Sighed the old ram rod, dying of strangers),
Tidy and cursed in my dove cooed room
I lie down thin and hear the good bells jaw--
For, oh, my soul found a sunday wife
In the coal black sky and she bore angels!
Harpies around me out of her womb!
Chastity prays for me, piety sings,
Innocence sweetens my last black breath,
Modesty hides my thighs in her wings,
And all the deadly virtues plague my death!
4.9k
Retail-hunter gatherers pick
clean processed bones, digging graves
with their shiny teeth, studious in
their reveries as they drone
past worlds dumped in the thresher;
the trucked-in fields of film-wrapped
gore splayed lustily before the managers
wound tight in Machiavellian design.
A shepherd herds his flock of
wreathed iron back to its pen, its
skeletal tangle lit in riotous gold by
swords flung from lambent eyes of
pre-dawn’s shunting chariots
Cages shunt and bobble like tugboats
chugging stoic up swimming pool lanes
of nondescript tile, cheered on by shouting
colours to float through archipelagos of
paper towel and chocolate blocks past
the vegemite diaspora, and the arctic
wastelands cased in sliding glass fields of
perfect steady storms as wraiths baked in halogen
ask silent questions of the silverbeet, while
Lana Del Ray’s voice falls like
nightshade—slutty and serene—coating
shelf stackers in a Piaf sadness as the
shelves reach their arms out for more.
The check out chick hatches
a sense of déjà vu as carrots
and biscuits drone towards her
mind berEFT of any twitching
sense of POSsibility that wised
up and flew this leering coop and
deep in her catalogue of grey folds
something stillborn and waxen is
perched on gleaming steel, reeling
out her guts like cassette tape with jerky
nightmare arms and laughing like a
banker watching ***** films, mornings
dull cerise an invocation through
auto-jaws as she bursts out to warble
with magpies in car park’s climbing fire.
Jul 25, 2013
Jul 25, 2013 at 9:23 PM UTC
Brought forth from a darkness so secure, baby boy relentless in the pursuit of education gazed upon the egg shell walls and sterile environment.
Breathing as if it were natural.
A construction of steel and concrete was the new cocoon , the window was an eye to a neoteric world. Bright white lights shone from within and a dull foreboding cloud loomed beyond the glass for the child to appreciate.
Mother exhausted collapsed sighing. She is the antidote to all that is evil, she is the mother to the world. A usually stick-thin figure now distended but leisurely relaxing.
Nursing her son as if it were natural.
Swooning nurses swaddle infants, the original factory workers. Substantial days grafting, workhorses prancing throughout aseptic halls.
The heroines of our world.
A tribe appears from dust clouds, over the dunes, panting, half-alive. Heavenly Ethiope arriving in time for the world to begin. Tumescent in her ecclesiastic luminescence bearing a King destined to travel great distances primed for expulsion from the cimmerian safety of the womb.
The seas of the earth accumulate before the small band of tall-standing creatures of exquisite anthropomorphism. Creatures from across the great unexplored continent at the centre of our world gathered in frenzied crowds. The Elephants marched in earth shattering herds, the lions of the Savannah put aside their differences and sat amongst the wild dogs of Ethiopia and the grévy's zebra, the dibatag stood and eagerly waited. Shrews, mice, gazelle, otters, cheetahs and giraffes all surrounded the tribe. Taking a silent vow and allowing stewardship to be passed along to a new generation.
Every mother is the mother of the earth. Her earth, the personal concept of earth that only she may understand.
Both children are connected by the planet they learn to walk upon. Connected by a thousand generations but connected nonetheless. They are one and the same. Each bought into a world in which they have no knowledge, each merely a slate eager to be scrawled upon by the elders of this fine rock.
Jan 12, 2013
Jan 12, 2013 at 9:53 PM UTC
--To C. M.
Fountains that frisk and sprinkle
The moss they overspill;
Pools that the breezes crinkle;
The wheel beside the mill,
With its wet, weedy frill;
Wind-shadows in the wheat;
A water-cart in the street;
The fringe of foam that girds
An islet's ferneries;
A green sky's minor thirds--
To live, I think of these!
Of ice and glass the ******
Pellucid, silver-shrill;
Peaches without a wrinkle;
Cherries and snow at will,
From china bowls that fill
The senses with a sweet
Incuriousness of heat;
A melon's dripping sherds;
Cream-clotted strawberries;
Dusk dairies set with curds--
To live, I think of these!
Vale-lily and periwinkle;
Wet stone-crop on the sill;
The look of leaves a-twinkle
With windlets clear and still;
The feel of a forest rill
That wimples fresh and fleet
About one's naked feet;
The muzzles of drinking herds;
Lush flags and bulrushes;
The chirp of rain-bound birds--
To live, I think of these!
Envoy
Dark aisles, new packs of cards,
Mermaidens' tails, cool swards,
Dawn dews and starlit seas,
White marbles, whiter words--
To live, I think of these!
3.9k
The stink of fish on earthen streets
A hot wind blows from ochre hills
Black faces shine with brilliant teeth
Street market ***** doth cure all ills.
Redness in her plaited hair
Rhythm in her steady tread
A harmony of balance, she carries
Water jars on her head.
A market girl is singing
As she sits among bananas
The drama in her music
Is as dusty as the street,
It fills the air with magic
As it lilts above street chatter
In the atmosphere of Africa
Where new and ancient meet.
The goat boy herds his docile flock
Through camel trains and bales
The steamer tethered at the dock
Announces that she sails
With billowed steam and mournful wail
It echoes through the town
And the planter and his agent
Bargain with a harried frown.
The bleating of the goat herd
And the stench of fish and dung
Is as ordinary as Africa
In the searing mid day sun.
Zanzibar is spices, Zanzibar is Stone.
Club Zanzibar is whiskey on the rocks
Consumed alone
Or shared upon the balcony
In the shadow of a palm
With the turquoise Indian ocean
Reaching out beyond the arm.
Do you see the dhows are sailing?
Do you see the fishing nets?
Do you hear the oarsmen chanting?
Did you see black muscle flex?
Have you watched the dripping sweat
Cascade on alabaster brow?
Have you inhaled the scent of Africa
And allowed it to allow?
Colobus monkeys in the treetops
Narrow lanes in the bazaar
Dull white walls adorn stone buildings
And the rupee is by far
The favorite tenure of the Island
Since the days when slaves were sold
By Arab camel caravaners
Who traded coin for young black gold.
East and west collide in concert
Africa and Asia blend
The Sultan's mix of race and spice
In Zanzibar, beyond lands end.
Marshalg
Mangere Bridge
3rd June 2008
Oct 13, 2009
Oct 13, 2009 at 11:06 PM UTC
BWOY This DISRESPECT Thing’s...
..... Really Interesting..... !!!
Many CLAIM Disrespect...
Because of TRUTH Said...
That Upsets Their Heads... !?!
Well In My Experience...
These Heads Are DELIRIOUS... !!!
Cos’ Their Form of Defence...
Is Mostly PURE NONSENSE... ?!?
From Women To Men...
They Act Like Children... !?!
When They’re Taken To Task...
For Behaving Like An ***
Whose Not Had Some Grass... !!!
Standing On Grounds...
Where Their Morals AREN'T Sound... !!!
QUICK To Run Their Mouths...
Like... Lipsticked Clowns...
Cos' Their Disrespect Circus...
Really Has NO PURPOSE... !?!?!?!
Cos Their Acts Are WORTHLESS...
Like A... BURNED Epidermis... !!!!
Cos' Their Skins Are TOO Thin...
For The Truth To WIN... !!!
So Their Disrespect Begins...
With... RIDICULOUS Links... !!!
So... Wrong And Strong...
Is What They PROLONG...................
When THEIR DISRESPECT...
Is Proved To LACK Strength... !!!
Because What They Try...
Is To Try To... DENY...
TheIr Fallacies And LIES... !?!
Cos’ They're NOT Wise Guys... !!!
Whose Type of DISRESPECT...
Leaves People... DEAD... !!!!!!
Especially When …
They Come INCORRECT... !!!
I’ve Now Been Disrespected …
By So Many Collectives...
That It Feels Like An Infection …
That WON’T STOP Spreading... !!!
As If I Am... The Target...
For IGNORANCE To Market... !?!
But It’s Now Become CLEAR...
That My Veneer And Thinking Steers...
Most Eyes And Ears To Clearly FEAR...
When I Start To Draw NEAR... !!!!!
Because of My Skin...
And Because of My Lips... ?!?
And Because My Words...
Are TOO PURE For The Herds...
of These SHEOPLE People... !!!
So I’m TOO BLACK For Some...
But NOT Black Enough For Others...
Who Share The Same Colour... ?!?
As If... Taking Care of My Mother...
Was … DISRESPECTING...
My Own … Blackness... ?!?
Some People Should THINK...
BEFORE They Link...
Their Words To Things...
That Are Clearly STUPID... !!!!
So Of Course Some Women...
Have Run Their Lips Like SINKING Ships... !!!
When It Comes To How...
I Break Them Down...
DISRESPECT of My TALENT... ?!?
When I Choose To CHALLENGE...
Their... DOUBLE Standards... !!!!!!!!
With Words That RAVAGE...
The LIES They... Manage... !!!
Has PROVEN To FEED...
DISRESPECT Speech...
From IGNORANT Peeps’...
Who Seem To BELIEVE...
That They Really Know Me... ?
DISRESPECT For THEM...
Are Thoughts That Lend...
Themselves To Express...
SO MUCH NONSENSE... !?!?!
That I Now Call Them...
..... IGNORAMUSES..... !!!
So Called... " Friends "...
And.... " Acquaintances "....
Should DO THIS LESS... !!!
Choose To EXPRESS...
A Lot of Talk That’s DEFECTIVE... !!!
Because Just Like ME...
NOBODY's ABOVE... Being...............
.......“ DISRESPECTED “..... !!!!!
Aug 23, 2020
Aug 23, 2020 at 12:03 AM UTC