The artichoke
of delicate heart
*****
in its battle-dress, builds
its minimal cupola;
keeps
stark
in its scallop of
scales.
Around it,
demoniac vegetables
bristle their thicknesses,
devise
tendrils and belfries,
the bulb's agitations;
while under the subsoil
the carrot
sleeps sound in its
rusty mustaches.
Runner and filaments
bleach in the vineyards,
whereon rise the vines.
The sedulous cabbage
arranges its petticoats;
oregano
sweetens a world;
and the artichoke
dulcetly there in a gardenplot,
armed for a skirmish,
goes proud
in its pomegranate
burnishes.
Till, on a day,
each by the other,
the artichoke moves
to its dream
of a market place
in the big willow
hoppers:
a battle formation.
Most warlike
of defilades-
with men
in the market stalls,
white shirts
in the soup-greens,
artichoke field marshals,
close-order conclaves,
commands, detonations,
and voices,
a crashing of crate staves.

And
Maria
come
down
with her hamper
to
make trial
of an artichoke:
she reflects, she examines,
she candles them up to the light like an egg,
never flinching;
she bargains,
she tumbles her prize
in a market bag
among shoes and a
cabbage head,
a bottle
of vinegar; is back
in her kitchen.
The artichoke drowns in a ***.

So you have it:
a vegetable, armed,
a profession
(call it an artichoke)
whose end
is millennial.
We taste of that
sweetness,
dismembering scale after scale.
We eat of a halcyon paste:
it is green at the artichoke heart.

grandeur

had brought the well outta ground the muscled men and she came upon them when they had split into teams and were rolling it and had not yet become competitive. the hands of her gone infant came back to her to see these men heave back and forth a vanishing. of her many fathers one had said ‘the deep train went even deeper and I could not wake’. he had said it to excuse his one day feat of linking unadorned toilet paper rolls to stretch a rat’s mile. her stomach had yet to go down and she was comforted by such literal remnants as thinking of the last place you had it.

libel

two white boys come outta shack each with a wrist one left one right being ****** at the mouth. their laughing I wouldn’t say manic but still not righted. like certain bible stories seem to tumble outta that book it’s the same with their eyes and ears. their heads each one shrunk so as to be united. I want to say here at least a ****** knows what it’s mocking. I only know one of’em and only as far as this thing being passed and told that he ain’t a foster but he was born in a pan and taken from the offices of the parent company his father got laid from. you think that’s the joke but had I not said white you’d have thought they were anyway. here come two girls grisly with month and I never seen two boys so quick to put down the shack they come from.

prayer

I like it best when my girl is pregnant because I get the sympathies. on her hand, she likes me drunk. at any one time, I can remember seven of our eight kids. this means of course one gets left home but also that not a one gets left grocery. I’d tell you their names but then I’d have to split this saying into parts. but I can tell you seven are boys. now and again they’ll slip on sister’s dress to **** up my math. a good joke I start with is that they take after their mother and if they take after me it’s with sticks. I change the batteries in the alarms for fire and carbon monoxide every two weeks mostly outta fear that I’ll lose them all and have to recount them to some fireman I went to school with. I don’t know if batteries are cheap or not, I don’t know anything about them, but I know I spend a healthy chunk of my portion to have. wife and I are keeping the ninth at bay the ways we know how. she don’t ask me and I don’t her. one kid a week goes with her to church and it’s up to me to remember who in my charge caught a fish the week previous. but I’m not wrong with god; no book is the bible, I believe that. at cemetery by which I am lack whelmed: I wish I had his memory.

nativity

wonder they ever told him grown, that black foster, how he'd been at three years dropped manger while crying for the congregates. straw in everything. back a throat, bottom a shoe. pop said he just about caught himself afire at work, straw sticking out his pocket. pop unable to split work clothes from churched. some wanted to resurrect a fuss about color; don’t go resurrecting a fuss and waved his hand he did that pastor ingénue. heard then I the word negress and after its saying the sayers looked about as if she would appear. this was our town after god and many were still making their own. this answers how the black foster needn’t audition. the gold I brought was soft on my thumbs and the flakes stayed in my nails weeks after. pop could tell for that time what I’d been touching so I’d cover when I could. we were quite a pair in our fooleries what with his straw and my gold. he stopped going on about the blacks and I was able to skip school with your sister the ****** mary. the town was never up for nightmares or for dreaming so I kept your share to myself until now how you seen mary fingered by a man with seven. heard him saying it's okay baby, this one's asleep.

holy ghost!

I will cut myself, Horror Film. will fidget my nethers a last time. maybe make the snow an angel with a third leg. which means I have gone outside. maybe my father will happen by you and put his beers together. but I will be gone. into the woods dragging my feet so some will think it took two to take me. I will whip branches about me and generally scuffle so the some will better convince the left. my poverty will be confirmed by your presence on videocassette. my father will hold you aloft and your tongue will droop above the depths of his hair. my father will claim a vengeance he owes on and the some and the left will follow him over the states of my angel and into the woods. when they find me I will say I had an in body experience; that the two men nearby sleep and it’s what we’re walking in.

haptics

little he knows that in holding them hoppers until they spit and before they go wing he is making hitch the upcome carriage of his *****. his future nudes are backtracking and the gravity of this has been diagnosed as your emphysema. he is your, nothing more, son. he will rub your back and worry his thumbs orphan. oh thumb; toe six. the way you deeply stand arms folded he sometimes thinks you have been replaced by a statue of his mother. it is then he remembers the fence his father built and the collective plank his father carried under his arm. you want life to be good again; your son’s low hand and the pups it could feed.

verbal abuse*

she has brought with her a shoplifted teddy bear. on a good night her age is seventeen. two days ago the voices in her head moved to her mouth. she has seven teeth that remain quiet. she fears so much how this third day will go. she has been told, and she believes, I am only in her mind. but there she is, at the sitting rock where we met, the rock I told her I could see things in. unprepared for her faith, I am unclothed. I am glad she has the bear and glad for my part in her having it.

spiders

we got some kind of plague in our toilets mama.*  that’s my dad calling her mama, my mom. that’s him declaring another plague. week don’t stop until a plague has been pieced together by this man so named Paff Snull on the subscription stubs of any number of unread magazines mom uses to swat dramatically at imaginary flies and wasps and locusts depending on the week. this time though I’m ******* because when dad cracks his knees and ***** himself to fetch mama from silence, I look in the toilet up and it’s true and in the toilet down and it’s more. spiders grey and black and off white. with our low water pressure, spiders having a ball. mom and dad they get tents and tell me twice to get inside mine once it’s on the front lawn. I get told things twice because I was born thick and I haven’t the heart to tell them that after the first saying the saying of it is diminished. I mumble to myself in corners, sure, but it’s the same mumbling. our dog gets a separate tent and I sneak into it when dog allows. seven nights so far outta three weeks I haven’t. mom says it’s because of my acne dog don’t recognize me sometimes. ******* bit the meatsy of my right hand a month ago and my handwriting got so neat I was sent from school for cheating. it’s most of my summer and the house is still spidery. the dog has gone to the river to drink and seems okay with it. mom, dad, and I **** in the backyard in shifts. mom ain’t swatting anything, she doesn’t have to on account of the spiders. when right now I mess up my shift I find myself next to dad and he’s just some guy telling me them glass-full people got the joke on them because the water is contaminated. he’s so happy it makes me think I’m the devil to be grinning so big. long wasn’t the reign of Paff Snull.

When Mom died in June of 1991 Dad was rather lost,
like the rest of us. I started writing little letters in
big print so he could read them. He would not talk on
the phone so this was the only way to make contact.
I found out later that he carried them around in his
bib overall pocket and pulled them out from time to time.
Occasionally they would get washed and when Sharon
let me know I would run off another copy and mail it.
It became a means for me to remember the past and help
Dad at the same time. My kids loved to hear stories of
when I was a kid so I would recycle the stories between
the kids and Dad. Now as I read them it is a reminder of
things that have become a little fuzzy over the years,
also a reminder that I need to fill in the gaps of the stories
and leave them for my kids before it is too late. So here it is,
such as it is, if you are interested.

=======================================

    Letter­s to Dad

    Nov. 14, 1991

    Dear Dad,
    Your grandkiddies, as you call them,
    send you a big hug from Idaho. Sara is
    five and in Kindergarten this year and
    doing very well. Kristen is in the forth
    grade and made the Honor Roll list the
    first quarter of the year. We are very
    proud of both of our girls.

    Do you remember when toward late
    afternoon you and I would get in the car
    and “Drive around the block” as you
    always said? We would go up to Cliff’s
    and go east for a mile then down past
    Cleo Mae house and on back home. I
    remember you would stop at the junk
    piles and I would find neat stuff, like
    wheels from old toys, that I could make
    into my toys. I think of those times often.
    It was very enjoyable.

    I will be writing to you in the BIG PRINT
    so you can read it easier.

    It is snowing lightly here today. Supposed
    to be nasty weather for a while.

    Bye for now.

    John

    ——————————————————–

    Dec. 3, 1991

    Dear Dad,

    Just a note to say we love you. I miss very
    much talking to Mom on the phone and
    having you play Red Wing on your harmonica.

    I remember quite often when I was very
    young, 4 or 5, and we would go out to the
    field to change the water or something.
    The sand burrs would be so thick and you
    would pick me up on your back. I would
    put my feet into your back pockets and
    away we would go.

    These are the things childhood memories
    are supposed to be made of. Kristen and
    Sara love to hear the stories about when I
    was a kid and what you and I did
    together. I try with them to build the
    memories that they can tell their kids.
    Thanks Dad for a good childhood.

    Bye for now.
    Kristen and Sara send you a kiss and a
    hug.

    Your son, John

    —————————————————–

    Jan. 12, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    We went to Oregon for Christmas and
    had very good traveling weather. Do you
    remember when you and Mom went with
    us once to Oregon at Christmas and
    there were apples still hanging on the
    tree by the Williams house? We made
    apple pie from the apples that you
    picked. Turned out to be pretty good pie.
    There weren’t any apple on the tree this
    year. I thought of you picking the apples
    and bringing them into the kitchen in
    your hat if I remember right.

    We have had some pretty good times
    together. I was thinking the other day
    about a picture that I took of you about
    12 years ago. It captured you as I will
    always remember you. If I can locate it in
    all the stuff, I would like to get it blown
    up and submit it to the art section at the
    Twin Falls County Fair this year.

    I hope this finds you feeling well. I love
    you Dad. Kristen and Sara send you a
    kiss and a hug.

    Oh yes, I would like for you and Tracy to
    sit down sometime and talk about when
    you were a kid and record it on tape. I
    would like to put your remembrances
    down on paper.

    Bye for now.

    Your son, John

    ———————————————————

    Feb. 11, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    Happy Valentine’s Day!!

    Spring is on the way and soon you will be
    85. Just a spring chicken, right? I hope I
    can get around as well as you do by the
    time I am 85.

    Thanks for the letter. I will keep it for a
    very long time. It is the first letter I have
    received from my Father in 48 years.

    Talked to Ed the other day. He said he
    talked to you on the phone and that you
    were wearing your hearing aids and
    glasses. Great! Mom would be proud of
    you.

    Talked to a guy last week who is
    president of the John Deer tractor group
    here. He invited me to bring my “M”
    John Deer to the County Fair and
    participate in the tractor pull contest.
    Might just do that.

    Well the page is filling up using these big
    letters but if it makes it easier to read it is
    worth it.

    Bye for now Dad, I love you. Pennye,
    Kristen and Sara send their love too.

    Your son, John
    —————————————————-
    April 13, 1992

    Dad

    Though the years have past and you are now
    85, you are still the same as when I was a
    child. The memories of going with you to the
    field, when you were “riding the ditch”,
    surveying in a lateral, loading up the turkeys
    in the old Ford truck and taking them to the
    “Hoppers” - is just as if it were yesterday. I
    think of you playing Red Wing on the harp. I
    remember when during the looong cold
    winters we would play checkers. You would
    always beat me. I learned to play a good game.

    Not much has changed except we are both
    much older now. The values you did not speak
    but lived out in front of me has helped make
    me what I am today. I pray that I will be a
    good example before my children to help them
    on their way through life.

    On your 85th birthday, I want to wish you a
    Happy Birthday and thank you for being my
    Father.

    Love
    John

    April 13, 1992

    ————————————————–

    June 10, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    I hope this finds you well. The Stevens
    family in Twin Falls Idaho is having a
    busy summer. Kristen just finished the
    fourth grade and was on the Honor Roll
    for the entire year. Sara will now be a
    big First Grader next year.

    The other day we went out to eat and
    Kristen had chicken and noodles. She
    said, “This tastes just like Grandma
    Nellie’s noodles.” I hope they can keep
    these memories fresh and remember all
    the good times we had back in Nebraska.
    It is difficult to accept that things have
    changed and will never be the same again.
    We miss the weekly phone calls to Nebraska.

    It is clouding up and we might get rain
    this week. It is very dry around here.
    Some of the canals will be cut off in July.

    Bye for now.

    Your Son John

    Love you Dad. I think of you often.

    —————————————————-

    June 22, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    Hope you had a good “HAPPY PAPPY”
    day. This note is to wish you a late
    “HAPPY PAPPY” day.

    I was thinking the other day about the
    times you would take me roller skating
    out at the fair ground on Sunday
    afternoons. I really enjoyed those times. I
    remember how you could give a little hop
    and skate backwards. For me staying on
    my feet was a challenge.

    Sara will be 6 years old June 29. Seems
    like yesterday when she was born. Time
    has a way of passing very quickly.

    Love you lots Dad. The family sends their
    love too.

    Bye for now.
    John

    —————————————————

    Aug. 11, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    Just a note to let you know that your
    Idaho family love you. It was good to talk
    to you for a minute or two the other day.
    I miss the harmonica playing you would
    do over the phone.

    We are all well even though the place
    was covered with smoke from all the
    forest fires last week. It got a little hard
    on the lungs at times but the smoke has
    moved on now. Probably went over
    Nebraska.

    Talked to brother Ed the other day. He
    had just returned from from Nebraska.
    Ed said you looked good for 85.

    Bye for now.

    John

    —————————————————–

    Sept. 10, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    I am sending a copy of what Mom sent
    me a few years ago of what she
    remembered about growing up. I wish I
    had more. How about sitting down with
    Tracy and Sharon and telling them some
    of the things you remember about
    growing up? They can record it and I will
    put it on paper. I would really like that.

    We are ok here in Idaho. Summer had
    disappeared and it is school time again.
    Kristen is in the 5th grade and Sara is in
    the 1st grade. The family went to the
    County Fair today for the second time.
    One day is enough for me.

    I think of you often and love you Dad.
    Thinking of the good times we had
    together while I was growing up always
    makes me happy. You and Mom raised
    four pretty good kids.
    God Bless you Dad. We love you from
    Idaho.

    Bye for now.

    John

    —————————————————–

    Oct. 11, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    We are fine out in Idaho. We are having
    beautiful fall weather. It has not frozen
    enough to get our tomato plants yet.

    Kristen and Sara are doing very well in
    school. They brought home their mid
    term report cards and are getting A’s
    and a B or two.

    Remember when we would go out in the
    corn field and pick the corn by hand? I
    would drive the tractor and you and Ed
    and Wayne picked the corn and threw it
    in the trailer. You guys kept warm from
    the work and I was freezing on the
    tractor. Before that we used the horses
    named Brownie and - was it Blackie?
    The one that kept getting out up north by
    the ditch was Brownie. He figured out
    how to open the gate.

    I remember the times that you were
    hauling cane or sorghum from the field
    east of Mercers and I would ride behind
    the wagon on my sled.

    I had a very good childhood really.
    Thanks for being my Dad.

    God Bless you Dad. We love you from
    Idaho.

    Bye for now.

    John

    ——————————————————-

    Nov. 10, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    It is snowy here and cold. I have a hole in
    the back of the house I must get sealed up
    to keep the cold out. We are redoing this
    part for the kitchen.

    Kristen and Sara made the Honor Roll
    this quarter in school. Kristen’s teacher
    said he wished he had a whole room full
    of Kristens to teach.

    Sorry the phone connection was so bad
    when I called the other day. It was good
    to here you say “hello hello….” any way.
    Glad you are feeling better.

    Your account in the credit union is about
    $34,000 now.

    I was just thinking back when we were
    cultivating corn with that “crazy wheel
    cultivator”. The one that you drove the
    tractor and I rode on the cultivator and
    used the foot pedals to steer it down the
    rows. I remember sometimes it cleaned
    out some of the corn row. Cultivator
    blight, right? It was kind of hard to keep
    straight. Those were the days.

    I keep remembering little bits of things
    while growing up. Sometime I will put
    them all together for my kids to read
    about the “good ole days”.

    God Bless you Dad. We love you from
    Idaho.

    Bye for now.

    John

    ————————————————
    Dec. 17, 1992

    Dear Dad,

    The snow has fallen and the kids stayed
    home from school today. The wind is now
    blowing so it will begin drifting the road
    shut. Besides that the whole family is sick
    with a cold.

    We are putting together a Christmas gift
    to you but it won’t be ready for
    Christmas. It is something that you can
    watch over and over if you want. So
    Merry Christmas for now.

    Last night was the kids’ school Christmas
    program. Kristen started playing the
    flute this fall and played with a group for
    the first time this week. She did very well
    and I got it on video.

    Time to get this in the mail. Love you
    Dad.
    Bye for now.

    Kristen and Sara send you a kiss and a
    hug.
    Your son, John

    ——————————————————

    Jan. 11, 1993

    Dear Dad,

    We have a lot of snow on the ground
    now. I was telling the family about the
    winter of 49 where the snow covered the
    door and you had to scoop the snow into
    the house to dig a tunnel out then haul
    the snow out through the tunnel. That
    was a 15 foot drift wasn’t it? It sure
    looked big to this 6 year old. Then the
    plane flew over the house for a few days
    until we could get out and signal an OK.
    Those were the days! What I do not
    remember is how you took care of the
    cows and stuff during this time. I
    remember being sick and Wayne took the
    horse and rode into Broadwater to get
    oranges and something else. The big
    white dog we had went along and was hit
    by a car. Wayne had to use a fence post
    to finish him off. I remember feeling very
    sad about the old dog.
    We haven’t had this much snow in 8
    years.

    I trust you are feeling well. Our prayers
    are with you all.
    Bye for now. Love you Dad
    The family send a BIG Hi!!!!

    Your son, John

    —————————————————-

    Feb. 9, 1993

    Dear Dad,

    When the kids go to bed they say “Tell us
    a story about when you were a kid on the
    farm”. So I tell them things that I write
    to you and a LOT that I don’t write to
    you. The other day going to school we
    were talking about one of the first snow
    falls we had this year. I spun the van
    around in circles in the parking lot and
    they thought that was GREAT fun. Then
    I told them about the time that their
    Grandpa cut some circles in the Kelly
    School yard and hit a pole with the back
    fender. Do you remember that? I
    remember Mom bringing it up every now
    and then. Then there was the time you
    got a little close to the guard posts along
    the highway just west of Broadwater and
    ripped the spare tire and bracket off the
    old Jeep. Of course none of US ever did
    anything like that. HA.

    It is good to remember back and tell the
    kids about the things we did “in the old
    days”. They find it hard to believe there
    was no TV and I walked through rattle
    snake country to go to the neighbors to
    play. It WAS a good time for me and I
    had a GOOD Dad to help me grow up.
    Thanks again Dad. You and Mom did a
    very good job on us four kids. Sometimes
    we don’t show it often enough but I for
    one thank you and LOVE you.

    Soon you will have another birthday.
    Before you know it you will be 90. I
    should be so lucky.

    I trust you are feeling well. Our prayers
    are with you all. Bye for now. Love you
    Dad
    The family send a BIG Hi!!!!

    Your son, John

    —————————————————–

    Mar. 9, 1993

    Dear Dad,
    Time has a way of disappearing so
    rapidly. I was going to write you a note
    two weeks ago and now here we are.

    It looks like spring is just about to arrive.
    I am ready for it. I’ll bet you are ready to
    get out side and do something. Do you
    miss not farming? I think often about the
    farm and the things we used to do. The
    kids always ask for stories about being on
    the farm. I tell them about raising a
    garden, rattlesnakes, floods, the BIG
    ONE in 49, anything that comes to mind.

    The family went to Sun Valley about 70
    miles north of here Sat. with Kristen’s
    Girl Scout troop for a day of ice skating.
    Pennye used the VCR and played back
    their falls and no falls. It reminded me of
    the times you would get your old clamp-
    on skates on a cut a figure on the ice. I
    never was very good at it. You could hop
    up and turn around. I couldn’t stay of
    my back side and head. I still have a big
    dent in the back of my head from the last
    time I tried. Nearly killed me. So much
    for that.

    Next month you will have another
    birthday. 86 years! Before you know it
    you will be 90.

    I paid your insurance for another year
    I trust you are feeling well. Our prayers
    are w

Petrified are the hoppers who fed on all the corn that died
Terrified are the squirrels whose nuts were taken for harvest
Angry are the birds that never seems to stubble upon a worm
Hungry is the cannibal who tore my flesh and drank from my blood stream

The hoppers will cut the dry hay pasture
Squirrels will dig into poultry houses
Birds will fly to were lichen surfaces rocks
But this cannibal will hunger to death 'cause I will return,
dust to dust, ashes to ashes.

There were grass-hoppers once, in these fields of green.

Leaf-hoppers too and a myriad other tiny wing'ed ones.

Now bees fidget fretfully along the hedgerows.

Lady-bugs, now only the twelve-spot greenhouse slaves.

Monsanto's beetles badgering them as they fiddle.

These ditches that once housed frogs and musk-rat, ferocious diving beetles,

The sky absent the wheeling martins, the boisterous larks.

Gone the pests, I rue the dearth,

bring me back my mud, my earth.

Never was I annoyed by them, always an ally that buggy thing,

Who yet knows how the June bugs sing?

A stir in the air,
parakeet helicopters,
silence reigns again.

I saw a gigantic tree.
Uprooted and on its side.
The great roots forming a mane for the snarling ringed face on the stump.
But the fallen beast is taken, it’s husk a Home.
A vibrancy of weevils, ladybugs, frog hoppers, Cockchaffers that’s skittering, scattered like a smashed ant farm.


Around its base were prehistoric ferns,
Curled and scaled like sand lizards’ tales.
Reminiscing the demise of the tyrannosaur.
When dust clouds darkened the sun which warmed their claws.
The skittering skinks, slow worms and other small lizards, who need far less to survive, then feasted upon the monsters’ flesh and found a home in its bone structured palace.

As whale sinks,
Distorted into a globster of its former self,
It hits the sea bed hard in oil-Black darkness.
The hagfish burrow, starved for millennia.
Brutally tearing at the befallen banquet.
Mouths used to scraps choking on steak.
Getting their guts knitted as they squirm over each other to grasp some sashimi.
Dripping saliva as if we’re sweat in the ruckus.

Yeti crab pinch, as do isopods
But get only mucus insulting their jaws.
And they thought they helped to cut up the portions.

Soon all that is left is a skeleton.
Hanging in a museum for future generations to see.

Once again, dust gathers, from bombed out sand.
Erupting in the air as giants hit the ground.
We may soon again see darkness fall.
As the rayiys is skinned.

But no tears are shed.
We all cheer none the less.

I HATE THE IDEA OF SUFFERING, BUT WITH ME THE WAY

I AM, I MUST SUFFER, BUT I SUFFER THOUGH BEING TREATED LIKE A LITTLE YOUNG DUDE

CAUSE I WORRY ABOUT GETTING TREATED LIKE THE ONLY ONE IN MY FAMILY

THAT WILL GET THREATENED AND KILLED, YOU SEE I BECAME A BUDDHIST

BECAUSE I WANT TO BE SAVED IN MY BELIEFS, EVEN THOUGH ALL RELIGIONS

ARE TRYING TO KEEP THE PEACE, YOU SEE I LIKE BUDDHISM, CAUSE, I CAN EXPLAIN

MY PREVIOUS LIVES, LIKE GREAME THORNE AND PATRICK DUNBAR, 2 8 YEAR OLD BOYS

THAT WERE KILLED, BUT I AM STILL SUFFERING BY THE CROWD UP IN THE HEAVENS

GETTING GHOSTS OF ED GEIN AND STEVEN BRADLEY AND TED BUNDY, COMES  OUT

AND FORCES ME TO THROW MYSELF IN GARGAGE HOPPERS AND TIE MYSELF UP WITH

VINNIES ROPE IN MITCHELL, SAYING KIDNAP ME TO AN ADULT, YA SEE, I AM A MAN

WHO FOLLOWS THE PATH OF BUDDHISM, WHERE, I AM WILLING TO UNDERSTAND OTHER PEOPLE’S

VIEWS, I AM SUFFERING THROUGH PATRICKS COOL KID, BECAUSE I COMMITTED A CRIME

BACK IN 1990, HE CAN’T SEEM TO EXCEPT, TO LEAVE ME IN, WE ARE NOT AT SCHOOL ANYMORE

AND I DON’T DO WHAT I USED TO DO, I LIKE LEARNING HOW TO BE AT PEACE

UMMMMMMMM   BRING ME PEACE


UMMMMMMMM FIND ME INNER HAPPINESS

UMMMMMMMM TAKE MY MATES OUT OF MY HEAD


UMMMMMMM ESPECIALLY WHEN THEY SAY, MY BROTHER’S NOT AROUND ANYMORE



UMMMMMMMM I WANT TO LIVE IN ADELAIDE SOME DAY

UMMMMMMMM  CAUSE IT’S A VERY FESTIVE CITY FOR ME


UM,MMMMMMM   TAKE DAD OUT OF MY HEAD, I AM NOT LIKE A YOUNG DUDE TO A ****

UMMMMMMMMM  LET ME BE REFORMED

UMMMMMMMMM  BRING ME PEACE, UMMMMMMM BRING ME PEACE  UMMMMMMMMM BRING ME PEACE

I DON’T WANT TO TRY AND BE THE ONLY ADULT OUT OF MY OLD MATES

I DON’T WANT THAT VOICE WHEN ALL MY PREVIOUS LIVES MY FAMILY PATRICK AND DANIEL AND THE KIDS OF THE PAST

ARE FLYING AROUND MY HEAD

I HATE PEOPLE TEASING ME IN MY HEAD, UMMMMMMMMM I WANT TO BE A PEACEFUL BUDDHIST MAN

I AM NO LONGER A KID OR A LADY, AND I AM NO LONGER A MAN TO A FIGHT

I DON’T WANT TO BE A LITTLE YEAH MATE YEAH KID, UNLESS IT’S SHOWING OFF MY STORIES AND ****

I AM A BUDDHIST, ARTIST WRITER YOUTUBE ENTERTAINER AND COOL PERSON COMING TO THE MALL WITH HIS COKE

UMMMMMMMMMM BRING ME PEACE   UMMMMMMMM BRING ME PEACE  UMMMMMMMM BRING ME PEACE

ONLY YEAH MATE YEAH KIDS OR NERDS CONCENTRATE ON BUDDHISM , I KNOW I AIN’T A NERD

I BELIEVE BUDDHISTS MEND EVERY BLADE OF GRASS AND LIKE ME THEY BELIEVE IN REINCARNATION

The Blue Nile is a Local Club
It Hosts the Poets Groove,
A Late Night spoken Poet event
That is the culture of the Smooth.

Desdamona The queen of the Poetry Scene
Hosted a Cool MC there for Years
Poets, Hip Hoppers and Rappers
All Gathered here bringing there words

Hip hop, Rappers, and Poets Hang
For that Late Night Poets Reading
The House band lays down your Music
Background as you perform the Speaking

The band can do from Jazz to Rap
They latch on to the feel and beat
Your doing your Reading replete
With the musical blendings complete

On the Stage with your Words
For an audience that heard
It gives you an incredible feeling
the Applause makes it all worth Dealing

I've seen Street Rappers Lay it down
Hip Hoppers with Singer Backgrounds
Girls with Love Poems, Feeling Alone
For a Poet its the best show around


All the Work here is licensed under the Name
®SilverSilkenTongue and the © Property of J.Flack

Fowl floating and flapping across an ocean canopy.

Lightly squawking and ascending in a calm summer sky.

Waves shine and melt into the beachfront in a dull roar slowly thundering in diagonal collapsing sectors.

The top of the ocean. The point of a sphere. Its water that falls slowly to the bottom of..... Here!

Ripples and puddles and drinks full of life, the clearest the murky and bluest in light.
Mountains and palisades can be rocks that reach skyward. God on a gravel road walking through.
The golden purple cattails glow in the sunlight like strawberry fields that fizzle on my hands in the wind that can dance. The vinyl green stem leafs sit stagnantly silently awaiting the moon.

Hoppers crescendo in a frozen moment singing in stillness that refuses to relent.
The trees around them bask in the energetic massage from the moving sections of recently called air vapors.

The Hi- C haircuts that nature reminds me it inspired bobble from the vectors.  

This climate ecology scenery breeds the moments religions were made for me.

We grow in a ragged garden
whose caretaker no longer cares
for himself except to prune back
only the most strangling branches
of his mind's miseries.
Effectively, we are left to
our own wild ways.

In all directions,
time's vine sprawls unnoticeably
slow in its natural haste
to overtake every creature.

We are the berries
strewn along this vine.
Our thin skins stretched and aching
around poisonous pools of bitter juices,
desperate for a touch,
a cause to burst,
a moment in which our existence is fulfilled.

To die in defense of the vine
is why we are here.

Most of us will never do but rot;
stuck to a stem that roots us in
idle uselessness.
It is my brightest & deepest, berry blue hope
not to rot here with the lot of you.

So, with great want I watch the passing birds
fly in the sky and seethe in need for the
little hoppers who come so near
just to tilt their tiny heads
and maddeningly flutter off.

There must be one who makes the mistake
of choosing me.
One who plucks me right off with its beak
and bolts to dine in some high, safe place.

It will die for its hunger,
and so too will I for satisfying it.
But, for a moment between boredom's end
and attaining purpose,
I'll see the garden from a different view;
a bird's eye.
I'll see the entire vine for what it is,
and hopefully; finally, know why
it's worth protecting at all.
*BURST

The cordoned enclosure saw room for exposure, for left was a gap in the gate

Climb too, or come through because you are just you, others will just have to wait

”Pass right along” they pulled from the throng, you’ve made it to pass, what’s wrong?

What’s wrong?"

Statistically I’m missing from the list if it’s your interest, I’m fit to pencil in a premonition’s false opinion


Prequisites parameters convincing your decision,  it’s easy to chew if you pursue, (yes I do, yes I do).

Does it matter if the gap between the passage and the trap was rapidly adapting to the path of least resistance?

(Knock it down)

The  fence was built for me, you can see, you can see, and I slipped through where the crow

bar cut the seam at your insistence.

(Knock it down)

Now you can pass for normal if we’re looking through my eyes, but for the sake of records,

please mark all that applies:

Are you  now or at any time have ever been hispanic, how much cans of beer were drunk

this week, now tell me did you plan it?

Are you a woman, are you gay? Are you black, or something else, how much money do you

make and did you make it by yourself?

(Knock it down)

List the creed that most reflects your personal beliefs, condense it for the register, it’s such

a big relief to know


That we can track the chart, we can craft the *****

We can tell you just by looking if for you there’s any hope

but X asks Y if it’s a study for the pundits

then tell me how we’re told to build if no one plans to fund it

Climb the fence it’s common sense, the barbs are not for you

Go on boy you’ve made it, climb on through, climb on through.

No need to be perturbed as fence hoppers were before us

Well the fence was meant for us, you no longer can ignore us.

Knock it down

fall hoppers kick to grass
as I walk down
sun-bleach lane

the anhedonia I felt yesterday
is pelted by the wind
away
away
to the breeze beyond
trash-bin creek

I walk past
a meddled roadside lover
kissing her own bloodied hand

must have been
bitten by the white-thing
panting at her feet

the image comes
and passes
with the balanced
autumn sunshine

I touch the twist of barbed wire
that guards a
re-habitated pond

a drop of blood
wells and surfaces
a moon-blazed penny

the dulled copper sting
of flesh and money
merges in the glory
of shortened days

all is accorded to the fleeting
nature of my heartbeat

that which comes and passes

I long for the smell of fresh turned soil , an experience I've never forgotten ..
The smell of diesel , oil and grease  ..The ringing of harrow and bush hog ...
My Liberty overalls and size ten clod hoppers , suede cowboy hat , pocket watch and Bloodhound tobacco ..
Bob White Quail walking the wood line waiting to
get their fill of turned ground morsels , grains and grasshoppers ..
Curious Whitetailed Deer hiding in the shadows , Redtailed Hawks
with a keen eye for field rats escaping the plow ..
A sixty two Massey Harris that ran like a' Top ' through rain
and heat , never missing a beat !
My mind prays for the simple life of man and machine , the brushfires
of March , the restoration of God's green earth ..

"I am going to punch you in the face" he said
burn
wistling sounds
wiped
wiped again
It's not a falicy
It's reality
you walk, you talk, you die
wonka? He was a sadistic ****
I'd drink his **** if  I had it in me
Everlasting gob stoppers. Clod hoppers
Fizzy lifting drinks to poo stink
swallow blood fest
**** out the rest
Sarpinos torpedos
squeeze my labedo chester chito
flaming hot meat he don't eat
so discreat. Now wipe your water on my leg.
is it really midnight.
YEAHHHHH
goodbye

The first rays of the sun were peeking over the green tree tops. The sky masked in shades of rich oranges and amber as they fought back the depths of the dark lonely night sky. Deep shades of reds and pinks collided with colors of the coldest blues and blacks, leaving a beautiful display of purples and violets bursting through the heavens above.

The lingering stars twinkled dimly and were fading fast with the sun rising brighter in the colorful sky.

It had been one of those warm clear peaceful summer nights with the stars and moon full and round, shimmering beautifully high above.

You could still hear the grass hoppers chirping their sorrowful tune as the night faded into twilight with the morning fog hugging everything it could reach.

Grass hoppers
Yummy pepper
Great rocker
Good cricketer
Perfect marker
Cool fisher
This is what I do !

Plastic pistols, cowboy hats
action men, palitoy combat

Hotspur, Tiger and Hurricane
leather footballs, broken panes

Matchbox, Corgi, Airfix, Meccano
Stickle Bricks, and (only) red and white Lego

Triang scooters, Raleigh Choppers
Dunlop plimsolls, orange space-hoppers

Down the park’s obstacle course
Witches Hat, iron rocking horse  

Bumps and scrapes, grazes and cuts
rub it all better, just-get-back-up

Home before dark, in time for tea
Billy and Ian, my sisters and me

Buenos días American virtuoso doyen's.
Buenos días English poet's between and around london.
Buenos días African designer's of the untamed poesía,
Buenos días Asian wordsmith's all over new and old Asia.
Buenos días Spaniard men and women of spicy descent
Buenos días to the rich, young, old, poor, to those who don't make rent.
Buenos días to the Arab's in dusty sand's, also those not Arab, just middle-easterners with a pen.
Buenos días to people's not discovered, lost-clans unknown to men, though with their pencil markings on walls- we will discover.
Buenos días to you who are in agony, may that agony leave.
Buenos días to those who smile, continue to be happy.
Buenos días to the hip hoppers and rappees. Freestyle for me.
Buenos días to the country music makers, play the acoustic please. Buenos días to the rock stars, drum a verse and sonnet,
Buenos días to the jazzy's play a saxophone so **** I can't forget.
Buenos días to the bluesies, drop a baseline of the fifties.
Buenos días to the poets in big, large, tall, small, or no cities.
Buenos días to those country, with that southern honey charm.
Buenos días to the east coast, York-jersey-maine-all around, where the city lights take away Your stars.
Buenos días to the Midwest, heart of the land-
Buenos días to the west coast, Washington, Oregon, Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, all of you, especially the cali-forn-i-ams.
Buenos días to all of you, and a Buenos días for the next day.
Buenos días for the world of poetry as a whole.
Buenos días I'll say.

When I think of soul food…
I don’t think of my great grandmother’s collard greens,
Or her delicious black eyed peas…
But instead of the black eyes that the slave masters gave the rebels…
Whose blood lines lead to me…
When I think of culture and song….
I do not think of our young black girls throwin’ it back in a circle…
Or black thirteen year olds contemplating whether or not they should wear that extra tight thong…
When I think of our women …
I remember the hard workers and the change makers…
Not the club hoppers and the rain makers….
I don’t know what you remember about our history…
But what I remember…?
I remember the long nights and the rainy days…
The colored only signs and the church hymns that were meant to break these chains…
As I recall..
All of our ancestors bleed their blood…
And shed their tears…
Took the wrongness…
And the noise that the cat of nine tails upon their back they did hear …
So that for us later generations...
The world would be a much better place…
So my question to you is why are we increasing the negative pace?!?!
One step forward and three steps back….
I don’t know about you…
But my grandfather told me we should be one as a pack…
Unbound from our chains…
UNIFIED AND BLACK!!!
I know you have more fight in you than that!!!
Come on and show the world what you’ve got…
Because the world doesn’t go round ’cause of underage youth’s highs on ***…
Our men locked up in jail…
All because of the “suspicious” things they do
And the socially Darwinised stereotype that our race is going to fail…
I am here to influence my generation…
So how hard are we going to fight for our emancipation?!?!
Let’s stop the domino affect…
And start a new…
Because how far our race goes up or down…?
It’s all up to you….
Please review!!!

Post deluge, slick hoppers lay suspended, savoring fresh water

Butterflies in the storm,
Only one loon on this lake..

Hoppers in the field;
You get stung going up
the hill; not down it.

I believe this is the hole,
for which i am looking.

This leads to the trail,
if you do permit,

me; go home.

Our shop at Parrot's Corner was quite large and had living space  behind and above the shop. I was nine years old, and I found it all very exciting. From the bedroom window above the shop I could look out and see a huge lake which had formed as a crane with a huge bucket scooped the sand and gravel out. It was loaded onto a conveyor belt, which carried it away to a yard full of huge hoppers for processing.  I used to go wandering around it at weekends when there was no one there, I soon found out that the lake- or gravel pit was full of Perch, and on a moonlit night I could see the shoals swimming by, with the moonlight being reflected from their silvery scales. As our business began to flourish I spent more and more time working in the shop, at evenings and weekends, and by the age of eleven I was making shoes myself. Most of our trade was repair work, and I learned to work quickly My Dad was only five feet two, but he could do the work of three men and had very high standards- so I had a good example to follow! The most challenging part of the day for me was the evening, when we worked on the heavy sewing machine, sewing the stout leather soles on.
I remember well that it took two turns of the handle to make one stitch, and there were two hundred stitches in a sole, four hundred in a pair of shoes and we used to sew about twenty four pairs of shoes every evening except Saturday and Sunday! The machine had an electric motor, but no one could make it work. It was heavy and stiff to turn, it needed a certain rhythm to make it work and I was the only one who could do it!  
I used to go to school tired, (I can't think why) When I left school I was bottom of the class! But it wasn't all work. One of our customers introduced me to the art of fishing and acted as my sponsor, allowing me to join The Feltham Piscatorial Society. I won the first match I ever fished in.
Now that I was able to go fishing by myself I liked to go to various places and my favorite place was the river Thames, where there were lot's of boats to watch. That was when I decided, it was time to learn new skills! I needed a boat, desperately!

Down into the alley
Wherein the fatal and despairing art found

Cheapened wine broken
Syringes decorating the ground...

And the juice from those syringes
Cometh by the pound...

Down on old cherry street
And Jefferson avenue....

Wherein the ******'s shooteth up quick
And fast deals cometh by spit,

In a place of demon's and fools!!!!

Downtown in the juncture of thing's
Art the rappers, hip-hoppers, dope boy's of the sling.....

Many gangs to ruin
Many false lovers to fail.

They taketh life by the gun
Payeth no taxes, but the jail's...

Lost to the world
Wordly indeed ...

Mother's missing her child
25 to life, to sixteen.....

As the cop's art just like those villain's
Doing unnatural thing's.....

Buying bags themselves
Sell it for a profitable dream.....

Everyone's out to **** one
Everyone's out for the take

Whilst the murderer's ****
The paper speaketh of everyday ****...

No country to them,
Their city delight's......

Loud music they implore
On dark summer nights...

Wilt they smile today at thee?
Or greet thou with a ****?

Whilst they filleth thee with ****** connections
To give thee a thrill?

This is metropolitan living's
Wherein all doth fail....

Hold thy signs up and protest
Thou just maketh thy own hell....

For if there is no change in thine own heart's
How canst thou changeth others? Thou art a world apart......

So maketh connection to God,
And throw away thy past....

Later wilt cometh
And thy death bed shalt last...

So loveth thy neighbor
Forgiveth thy last...

And look into the mirror in front of thee....

For the mirror is them,
For the mirror is thee that thou seeith...

If thou seeketh change
Thou must find it in thine soul......

TIME OF THOUGHT: 10:15PM
DATE OF THOUGHT: 2/12/2011
OGUNLABI OLAJIDE YUSUF-Nativepen

ROAMING RAVEN
Where from here
Art thou heading to?
On errand?
I believe
Oh! Wait and hear;
I have a message for 'them'
Branch up there
Tell them for us
That 'they' have done us evil
Tell 'them' their conscience is failing
And we are fainting of waiting
Tell 'them'
They vowed and swore
Vowed to wipe our tears
Swore to stand in for us all through seasons
Not to make it flow the more
Ask 'them' why they idle up there
While our land is wasting away
With our throat dried out of thirst
And our stomach twists daily of hunger
Tell 'them'
They are the leaf hoppers
That eats up our green land
Let them know
Their body language signals red-blood
And we are angry because of hunger
And they are cursed by what they have caused us.
Tell them
Their deeds makes our women a widow mother
And orphans of our innocent little children
They can never tell
What an hungry man will do
Because hunger is a  burning fire in the  bossom of an hungry man
To their conscience we awaits to judge them
This I beg you to deliver unto them
But please Raven, do not lead the wolf to them.

Do you remember those seasons in the sun? Carefree days of laughter and fun..
Remember seeing Star Wars and Close Encounters with a soundtrack by ABBA The Bee Gees and Boney M.

Do you remember playing football in the park. Staying out riding bikes until dark. Remember Kevin Keegan, Bjorn Borg and James Hunt. Iconic images of Concorde's first transatlantic flight.

Do you remember watching Space 1999,  Planet of the Apes and Dr Who from behind the sofa. Remember space hoppers and friendly village coppers. Endless lazy summer days soaking up the suns rays.

Do you remember Steve Austin, the Bionic Man. Getting a 99 with a flake from the ice cream van. Remember how cool were Starsky and Hutch and wanting a red Ford Torino.

I remember those seasons in the sun. I remember carefree days of laughter and fun.40 something years ago, where did the time go?

That little boy who cheered when the Death Star exploded, hid from the Daleks and danced to Rasputin and Ma Barker still lives within my memory and in my heart.