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Alexandra Wilson Apr 2013
I gaze into transparency
and behold is me
from which I cannot turn

In my palm I hold
-temptation-
bestowed to me at birth

I cannot open my hand to let it free
I grasp the imitator that is me

Someone push on the tendon
to release my grasp
or must I suffer to the bottom
my hand then dwell with me

Please take my hand-
make it white by red
Then I shall hold it
only to blacken it again
We are our own worst enemy... enough said.
hfallahpour Oct 2016
Never cease to be an innovator
be a better thinker and good creator
Francie Lynch Mar 2014
I don't have pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis.
I'll stay away from Yellowstone.
If one's asthmatic in the Eifel region
You don't pronounce the "P."
This won't **** me.

I don't have COPD.
Everyone coughs in blue smoke.
My throaty itch won't **** me.
I won't constrict and choke.

I don't have an infectious disease,
Despite my personality.
I run for shelter in acid rain.
I drink water with ice cubes,
And spray my green out back.
As much as I hate to, I avoid rusty nails.
*** is safe... and at a distance.
Despite being repeatedly told to,
I never eat ****.
The great imitator
Is a snivelling mime.
If I'm bitten, I recognize the marks.
The erupting of the ring of fire won't **** me,
but perhaps I was precocious
To drop the "P" in
Pneumonoultramicroscopicscilicovolcanoconiosis.

I haven't succumb to animal flues,
I stay clear from the bars.
I donate to the SPCA,
Bet on ponies or the odds of SARS.

I don't have meningitis.
I like lights and loud music.
If I get the night sweats,
I turn down my electric blanket.

I haven't the minor or greater pox,
I spurn comparisons.

According to the scoop and scope,
I ascend and descent C free.
But the time spent on Referrals
Might be the death of me.

I don't have botulism.
My smile still concaves down.
Curling convex above it,
A condescending frown.

I'm not a *****.
I feel every poke and like.
My digits number twenty...
Twenty one.
My glasses are smudge free.
If anything I see too well.

Alcoholism can't **** me.
Alcohol can.

I haven't cardio entropy,
But I'd be remiss
To dismiss
The wise counsel Oz gave me:
"Hearts can never be made practical until they can be made unbreakable."
So true.
So true!

Anyway, none of the above will get me.

But, I do have what you have.
The young and grown.
The able and ill.
A hand.
A sweeping hand.
A second hand
Setting those infectious nonogerms
Like diamonds
In my Time-x.
Sombro Jan 2015
Some people think
That a poet is just an imitator of the truth
That if one writes of a dancing girl
Or a raindashed forest
Or a landscape bare
They are merely sating their wish to be these things
To be something more than a record keeper
An imitator.
I don't think so, for experience has taught me
That it is much more pleasant to think of being
Than to be.
Thank God I'm a poet.
With a pen in hand.
I say some people think, Plato thinks, but that's not important :)
PoserPersona Jun 2019
The poet speaks on anything
thinking their words are fresh as spring,
logical as philosophy,
and tuned to nature’s harmony



Socrates reasoned that the voice
of poets was not one of choice,
but rather was much inspired
by gods touching minds with fire

The audience finds more meaning
in the mad poet's own ramblings
than the epileptic speaker
himself will ever dare ponder

They speak first on others behalf
as if they are the better half;
fancying themselves conqueror,
fisherman, a seer, and doctor

By what means are they qualified
to serve as humanity's guides?
How do the epics of Homer
make you more than imitator?

Cicero, Plato, Lucretius
Davinci, and Heraclitius:
Rare to find artist and scholar
in the wise true philosopher

Be wary of the charms of rhyme
and seduction of meter’s time
As these are well known to allure
common fools to charleton's words
C J Baxter Aug 2015
P.  Why must you waste your time with petty quarrels
    just to hold up with hollow pride, your worthless laurels?
    Arrogant in faith, and blind in sin.
    Virtue without an hatred within.
    Your youthfulness is bold, but equally unlearned.  
    Love you've never possessed, and only ever yearned.
    Tell me now, tell me how you are the fix?
    Show me that you are more than a sad bag of tricks.

C.   Shut it ya ****.
Pompous verse can be outwitted by a colloquial slagging
David Crow Feb 2019
Sense of self-worth is something,
yet I don't know who I am
supposed to be,
Say something I could understand
and promise me to leave
me alone,
I don't understand why I have
no money and I am obsessed
with an image of someone
that I can never be,
I really want to write the
things I could never say and
I am affraid to say what I
want to write,
This is out of my dictionary
and the right words never
come and I lose the meaning
of it all,
I am an imitator and a
parrot,
my feelings frustrate me to no
end and precisely everyting
bothers me, to be honest,
what do I need to do when
I smile and grin at the
same time?
Something is horribly wrong
with me and I cannot make
sense of my surroundings,
this... this is what I
wanted to do! Yeah!! Oh, and
ontop of that, I'm somehow
consuming more than I
could chew;
there is nothing wrong with
me in a way and I
care about what happens when
I die,
Yes, I'm angry all the time
and it all starts from one simple
word that I did not understand
and it goes out to show that
I'm scared to be alone and
I do want to say so to someone
who cares,
life itself confuses me so there's
no point to even trying,
I lie and scream all the
time for no reason except when
I want to say something .. then
I keep quiet,
my mind is way too confusing
for people to understand so
there's no point in even trying
to speak,
the end is where I begin and
in the void I shall end!
Eryck May 2018
Original thought is not knocking at my door. It seems there's very little original thought at all any more.

Put my brain back in storage up on the musty shelf. Seems everything I believe in is learned from someone else.

I just simply repeat back the things I've  been taught. Year after year repeating thought after thought.

A collection of opinions, words of others that I spout. Seems the easy way, so I open my mouth and they fall out.

The politicians and teachers and experts and the news. Have radically systematically denied my freedom to choose.

Unwitting copycat and imitator who historically repeats himself.  Without a genuine idea, put my brain back on the shelf.

Has everything I've learned and believe and everything I  know, produced an unauthentic me, God help me if it's so.

A wealth of original ideas, that would be my kind of wealth. If not take what I've  got and put my brain back on the shelf.
I realized that most of the things I say, believe, and know have been taught to me by others. That's why the CREATIVITY of poetry and writing can feel so liberating. Everyone ...keep writing. And I'll  keep writing too.
Matthew A Hansen Nov 2011
Everything feels contrived…  There are too many coincidences taking place.
Everything feels contrived.  It gets boring very quickly, and feels like an imitator.
Everything feels contrived, as if he was following a recipe for success.
Everything feels contrived and designed to sell.
    The bigger issue, however, is that everything feels contrived, maudlin and superficial.
Everything feels contrived and extremely forced in order to get people to play the game.
Everything feels contrived and obvious.
    It’s difficult generating your own inspiration if you’re not used to doing it.  I think kids have it the easiest.  They can pick up and start a game of make-believe with the most complicated rules and ideas on the spot.  Me?  I have to work at it.  Nothing feels natural anymore.  Everything feels contrived and I end up walking away feeling old, tired and jaded.
Everything feels contrived and the laughs are forced.
Everything feels contrived, hollow even.  Is this what happens when you look at emotions from outside the experience?
Everything feels contrived and artificial.
Everything feels contrived and second-guessed, and in the end, you end up with a relationship with your philosophy of what pleases the other person, not with the person themselves. Whereas if you simply speak your mind, you’ll get to know each other for who you are, not who you picture each other to be.
Everything feels contrived.  It is only mildly fun.
Everything feels contrived and artificial.  If you aren’t in a relationship, a pink and white army emerges to tell you that you **** at every turn.
Everything feels contrived and there is no incentive to finish the story, as you already know what happens.  
    It's increasingly difficult to care about what happens, given everything feels contrived.
Everything feels contrived and staged.
Everything feels contrived working towards the inevitable.
mike Jan 2015
stick bug hiding
in the tree of life
shaking and
mimicking wind
Feeling Real Jul 2014
driving past red
calming hues of blues and greens
nature's imitator, bleakly, but resilient
if I were the ant I would step on me, too
often I am, but disguised
cracks in the sidewalk are cracks in my exterior
I paint myself thin upon tree branches
I drip - drip with gravity's whim
blurry-eyed and sleep-deprived
glutton for existing as such
in my hands, crumbled, dry leaves
relish in the ending of acts
misguided attempts at steeping leaves
harvested during new moon
tranquility is unreached at current times
I am always sure to remind what's forgotten
Mateuš Conrad Jul 2016
in ref. to the supposed "unholy" trinity -
i can only clearly identify one member,
antonym of the holy spirit (alias of
a community, rather than a person,
as stated by Žižek - in his words, should
it be different, it would be a profanity) -
if that is the case, then the variation
of holy spirit is ascribed the title zeitgeist -
or: the spirit of the times - the 20th century's
example is filled with zeitgeists -
communist, nazis, hippies, punks, goths,
beats, squares, or 21st century's militant atheists
and Jihadists, Blairites...
as is evident, the zeitgeist is short lived -
it's naive in being easily influenced - but because
of its gullibility it's also brutal in not being
influenced for worth of establishing a religion -
it's "unholiness" is precisely the reason why
it's poly-adaptable - multi-faceted - unruly -
it changes very quickly and is never rock-like -
but because of its gullibility it's also brutal in
not being influenced to the point of permanence -
the fluctuations are numerous, and democratically so,
many people can attach themselves to the "unholy
spirit" at any time they want, without knowing
they're actually part of a congregation - and as soon
as a congregation is established, the zeitgeist
implodes and disappears - the congregation breaks up -
soon overpowered by the forces of imitation -
ah - now the second person of the "unholy" trinity -
the Imitator - the flawed first entry post-zeitgeist -
never reaching the zeitgeist's potential, this tsunami
wave lasts longer than the actual zeitgeist - it's
a variation of nostalgia - not a nostalgia of thinking back
but a nostalgia of trying to revive - resuscitate -
the assortment of vanity projects; now i'm either too
hangover or just know what i have to do today
before the Royal Opera House and Verdi's Nabucco -
a peasant is heading into town, peasant better iron
his shirt and trousers and look respectably urban.
SoupHands Mar 2016
Earth, help me
I am but lowly beggar man
And I dont know how to take cover
Not from rain or stinging cold
But from those just like me
Who walk above and right past me
Grounded to the same surface
But none seem to be any closer to me
I am silenced, cries heard only by tree and concrete
Help me, Earth, please

Sky, help me
I am but lowly beggar man
Man needs not the like of me
They chose my fate as such
Fallen and wounded
Prayers for fire in the skies
Drink is what I chose now
Since I can no longer slate my thirst from you
I will die by the cruel darkwood imitator
That men invented to betray you
Help me, Sky, please

Fire, help me
I am but lowly beggar man
And lanterns cant warm me
Scraps are my home and hearth
And that is no comfort for any
I long for your touch
But since outside is no longer my choice
Ill warm my insides with atomized flame
Beaker bottle and batch aid me in feeling and unfeeling you
Help me, Fire, please
2014
I try very hard to be empathetic. I cant fathom how awful it must be to be homeless.
So I wrote a very idealized piece about those who live outside.
Each of them, a representation of how I think a lot of people come to those circumstances.
Kagey Sage Jun 2014
Are you the dynamic person you said you are 4,000 years ago? With no intoxication the conversation’s a bore. The stakes aren't high enough. I’m conditioned by the narrative and we’re all pretentiously pedantic, spewing poison at the heroic romantics.

I've lost my coper’s cloak. I remember how I dropped the dry ones at the river bank, I cut off my imitator’s finger, and as I fell into the tiger’s pit, I grasped a strawberry to make me sweeter. I crowned the beast a hero, cause out of perfect tiger dharma he tore off the limb that led him from his prison. Yet, the human dharma is to save all beings from our reckless peering.
Connor Mar 2018
I

Possesion/extension
Nightly woman instinct,
lend your guiding scent
to fierce winds/
combining
into poison,
deliver down
my mercy to the great shining

(seduction poetics,
unrestrained and visible like a crown
of death hanging proud
by my bedside, eager
to martyr oneself for fertility)

Cosmogonic dawn/blinking fire-wheels,
shallow, holy waters
receding as silken tides, awoke from idleness

Discarded silver haloes, thrown into the hallowed dirt to drench in mortal youth

Monarch eyes/careful
heart, sealed/felt lucidly
worried/cavernous and hidden/wild kingdom dancer

A proclaimed Fool.
Imitator, mutilator
clay creator/for pathless ambition
I sink further in sand
which lacks definition, it is careless
like myself

(take a trip to Angel river, where one longs to be freed from skeleton grins
& pagan bathtubs, pollinating one
with wivesblood)

II

Out of the fog to a
marriagebed & lambs head
mounted, awkwardly
backdropped to an altar of Furze &
disorientation-theatres draped in Neon
& excess
(where even the walls are unaware of their own Earthly position)

If I am the stone,
you are the water, carving
me closer to your desired
shape

to become an Outer, a cloud-catcher, liplurker, destined to Saturn worship

III

My zeal is an impatient grave & you assume the feral mother
whose flashflood voice draws me to rest

..Yet, I am willing. Carry my body
to your domain, feast kindly, until
paradise is all that remains of us both
Jack L Martin Sep 2018
Imitation is NOT
the best form of flattery
when the imitator
gets credit for the idea.
brandon nagley Jul 2015
i

Exquisite animation, the tubes channel of hereafter is dim at first
This foundation of earth was just a passing through to showeth love, as I've met good being's, I've seen material and unearthly things, I've felt the kiss of death, I've seen prison cells of thugs.

ii

I've seen popes, president's, crip's and blood's, I've seen Devil's of hate, I've witnessed lover's and their fate, I've tasted iron in mine mouth, from the health issues to me I've met, I've seen ruler's get greedy, killing children as a bet, I've payed mine dues and rent.

iii

I've shown kindness to other's, I've helped sisters and brother's, I've given all to help another, as the giving of oneself is the ultimate love of ourn creator, I've seen crying and imitator's, I've seen holy and devilish behavior, as minkind hath forgotten bliss.

iv

I've seen war on t.v, I've seen Hope's made to reality, I've seen young one's die of starvation and poisoned, I've seen sanctuary of  glee turned poluted, I've seen soldier's suited and booted with the media and secret societies back their war, for lies to thee allured.

v

Though through all this nonsense I've seen, I'm at peace on the water's of the hellion scream's, for tis I feeleth serene in this stepping stone stop, the drab funnel I'll enter, when this heart stops, though I shalt seeith the light, and taketh a flight to God..


©Brandon nagley
©Lonesome poet's poetry
Justin Aptaker Aug 2019
it's ready to happen
hours count down to launch, but the burners hum already
the structure is taken up
siphons slowly into the bloodstream

the catalyst, the moment
the agonist, the imitator

the perceptual set is set, and it's famished
not even lit, and it's waiting for more-
the stimulant, the ignition
the doctor, the system

like inlets of blood, the freeways carry us to the city
like carcinogens, like poison medication
like aluminum, like exhaust

i too am carried
and when i reach that center
i am deposited, and begin to take effect
while i wait for my own poison to take hold of me
blood within Blood
and
poison in Poison
medication in Medication in MEDICATION
we make sure all of our cancers are medicated

it has happened already
but i am waiting for it to happen again
the freeway now quiets itself in anticipation
a new day to repeat
the city is ready for more
Written ca. 2006
Ken Pepiton Sep 2021
Procrastination on reaching
destination
national
notional global
we,
the people, the species joined
by virtue, the power in/of/for life, of
truth, the oomph that fixes first trys,

so oft ging awry, ai ai ai
so we suffer
woe is me
I am so lonely I could die robby robot voice

ping. Time to imagine reality from thought
through thoroughly thundering herds
headed el otro l'ow
wow
allowance, we bit o' flex, stop the flow, oh,
no
prop-blem-blame, right, a real bullet in a real gun did that,
when we were kids, three times,
none of those killed me, so
one more big bang.
DID it, a gain for the whole gang.
And the whole team sorts the peace from chaos.
Masks on, filters set to AlphaGo rules of longest game
ever
imagined, as now,
with one of us watching this written,
with one of us reading this written,
and all of us, the unity denominator, we
- focus, slow, finer detail one, mind
as fine as
ever
imagined, as now,
breathe and think how I wished this could be,
imagine being, long ago,
me, uh-oh slipped,double mind-error, nospace
fine tuned enough to learn of the hope
this is we manifest in /as vessels full from his
faith in the effort to accumulate all we ever knew
ever learning, the art of discerning soul from spirit
-- effort to think this was given to us long ago by
the unsung
second son of The Admiral of the Ocean Seas.

{in the realm of bubbling reality, where ******* is more
a character arc than char'cter trai t or trade, give ya this
for that… this is not what you thought was real, this is
the deal. We all think we make it with ourselves,
imagine-ing as we are wont, we actively think,
we be lieve we leave no trace, gone gone gone
yet words
surface, as stones on unsold desert lots scraped
by Patten's Tank's, then by the future home,
of the rebuilt London Bridge, said to have
fallen for this one line of reasoning alone to know
that bit
of all we think we know, avowt Lawn'dbridtches
fallen down fallen down fallen down

oh did we become corroded, yet we be, still eh, slow
reader
slow writer ride on…

first time in the temple, kid?
have you no id-east being in you, knowing, growing
as it occurs, id have donithadiknown
groan-ing ping, pragnanz, several days misinterpt, but
here's the now trick.

I live in Hernando Colon's actual functional imaginary
library, and I have developed an untimely urge
to fake the leaking dam, flash, rec- current or creational
flow
I have no wish to know.
So, on we go. Where were we?

Colon is the Columbus family name, in Spain,
all over, not only on the plain, or even
mainly there,
this stream of science used as knowing being
knowing where answers may
be found.
London Bridge,
mind map says the humming bird intaglio
has cousins here
scarred from wars of we and them,
all locked in unalienable rights to hide lies.

Site Six, magic fish caught on worms,
imagine that…
one single summer in all the ever summers,
this seed first spat.

Treasures hid in serpentine winding tales
of pattern forming
on surface of bubbles that survive the rise
in the ever watched *** that seldom,
but does, some times,
moments
instants
in contemplation
boil
over the top and sizzzzle on
the tongue a fire four times hotter
ai ai ai the spice from hell

says the actual signal accept-slot set in the thought
this hot
at this particular set
of sensors tongue to taste tell if we can or not,

if you swallow there will be grumbles
from below, takes half an hour to burn in the end.
..
spit it out, be the fool. Ever a role any pup can play.

-- dark inside

I am the emissary, aware am I, of certainty
in certain future wedoms,
when each sensitive bit is accounted worthy, eh,
pay attention
to how hot these peppers really are,
and why
in ever was such pain endured and acquired,
as a taste,
of what's t'come kid, fresh man can did, ate it, didn't I, wink
; didn't we all
think you can handle it. That is not a question
this is it,
this thought is thinking we can take it through to sane,

or settle in the first unfilled-in peace valley we find, hell,
we could build on any refuse pile, 'ernando did.
- dis associate sigs scramble cipher it through
- read on, make it make sane, not mad, push

Did not know but now do, there exists in my library,
a book, new,
a compilation of a trove found in the leavings of
a harmless second son of Christopher Columbus,
herein known as 'erna'do, ern-ado, ern-ator, old
Ern,
TV character, yes, reincarnation of id- the arranger alone
sorting **** from shinola, and loving the effect of Brasso
on buckles, vestigal symbols
bucklers, ala WWWhatever bouts of dance-viol-ent-ities
we imagine,
as bears once were baited and dogs bred to ****,
angels wrestled with, naked,
as apes.
Eh, Socrates imitator, asks the imitator of anointed gnosis
refusing the sign of the serpent stood tippy toe pointed west

with a swirl into the realm of his magi-ist existancy, ah, me
see, qwerty key aware, stories
so often as mousemade plans can, due to sudden constant cut off
telomeres, mere word effectuality, wanes,

as voices of the dead in Later do. S.King novel reference, for
future cultural harvest.\
wait. see. now, as the reader, we steer the story through
the straits of Magellan, as one of the final 18, into
rest, safe harbor
home for real
feel
right at home, taste these peppers we brought back
boom
AND we are from a culture who laughed goodheart laugh
of I did that, spitting image,
I did exactly that, I spat it out and said
to hell with this,
yes, been there done that come visit say, some
visitation day,
pay the preacher for the story was the story preacher told
don't tell,
it's the business side of things, the paperwork you know,
art informing actual imagining aiming am-ping right
at artistic intuition
ai ai ai
next, time you visit the temple, plan ahead.

Wait, contemplation is momentarily
on instance access only,
one instance per new book discovery, acknowledged
we haf enough no to find the remains of
wasted time thinging wron thinks

The Catalog of Shipwrecked Books,
and touched on
just in time

settled dust
exist-dance in the anonymous peace past understanding
or caring if you do, I slipped
om u dodo doodot doo doah, yeah
jazzy after hours clickity click
sig sent, see
see me se-ing open open open outside the whole damnedmall

personally we is an offensive pronoun to me, I feel we
as intimate-permanancy, the outer shell
of ever,
where the math goes kerouac and ****** if ginzberg
had no secretmeaning of shirtshatsatin, some dope
some hope howls
some day may
be as good as any man can make up his mind to be, and if
that mind be evil in intention, we arise

to twist it otherwise, the filters, to now from then,
instant speed of fingers on keys,
and soon, very soon, Elon says,
think
and the finding of the answer is done, boom. So die.

Then is is believed no error of double mind striving for balance,
balance is not how we roll at all,

this is still the same novel found on the diamond farm

the longest game, keeps Sisyphus happy,

see Camus gave some old guy I knew as a mind meld event
once, in a book I think I read as if it were being written
by my friend, Ben, from Ben and me, yes,
early evidence of Disneyifity activated sooner than Later.

The fading voices of the dead, that adds urgency, right
to know,
gotta know, gotta pass through-t the penetralium

thought through thoroughly, roughly any sense of knowing how
to find the answer to any question that comes to mind,
locked in, same as dead? nah, why try to live,
otherwise, try
as an alienated mind, mass accessible.

Tune-in, drop-out, some did,
some said they did, then the judge
mental
we begin to sort ourselves from first nibble, first taste, first
snakey lick, with a kick, whoa
this is too too too hot to just
give
away, go, shoo fly, you bother me, I have no rich and famous wish,
I waited to see why we ever get old,
see.
Ever is ever not every e-very e-ver-y ai ai ai hot wire signal to the sun
start my fire
I come to offer up another day in a paradaise I imagined after
the fact.
It is a knack included in the greater works than these clause,
if you find the time to imagine that, after all
is
said and done, my side won, and this is what I do for the rest
I earned by enduring to the end, let go, lose loose ends,
trust the knowledge, constantly forming information
conforming to the spirit of peace in knowing
everything
has been thought, and all the enjoyment we can imagine
is used through knowing grown all this time one root, you
think
you can know by kindness, all things, faster now,
faster thinking
taking time, to think more faster ab
rupturous break through

and, *******, life ***** the life right, right, fight right
good fight
semper, simperingwisherypuke, fi

del- phi-delit, it's us,
we lost the temple but brought the fire
from the alter,
?
what does that pretend to mean, you think,
JFK eternal flame, boom
we know you know, run, fustus wit 'd mostus make us
think war was glories once,
oh, yeah, don't we all know, the glory and honor of war,
bestowed on a nation
?
a nation of unalienable rights,
right things one pledging must believe,
pledged, owed. Dues as debt, must be paid,
- we-owe we,
- we- owe- we, clink chanting hammer ringinh'
- we- owe we, marching as to war appear
to cut the muster,
not the mustard, we must only make it through the morning
call to arms, we remain
ready, read-up, prayed up, writers
of the purple sage sayings saying each
time
write this, stroke, this jot,
this tittle, write it a little off
on the whole
no big deal, endless paper endless ink ever learning yet all the truth
holds, who can know,
as you hold certain truths your own self,
proper, eh ly or ty, own properly property
self, you, reader, me writer, they
the unknown NPCs
on the journey named
for a genuine mad man with a plan,
gone awry, as oft we do, on the name of a fool,
remembered from a history test
to determine earthling status
ai aye, yes, a fool is
a man who says in his heart,
there is no god,
there is a friend in truth, a love
in knowledge formed as caverns
formed to be as beautiful as any seer can imagine,
these walls of all our marvel dc sony wonder world
of utter global disineyification allows in
ABC- text in context, seeing

we visited the pilgrim stories, speed of thought, bits of citixery stick
think. We ought pay the reader,
but I am the reader, so we think together flocking,
feather-wise alienated mind
flock.
DIP switch set to master. Set D and E to slave.
Remember the last 26 terrabytes.

Now. This has been a Hissing humming tail of a long story,
warning, it has been told as many times as you may imagine,
ever being as it is, changing,
and all.

Mere words. All mere word pairs, can be re searched, this is 2021,
but you may think you knowit,
knowing wrong does not **** you if you can make it right,
in the end you must swallow the tiny pepper whole.

That is the secret, chose the smallest pepper, do not chew
do not spit, swallow the tale, tell it true, each telling lengthens

the attention span of a very rare we. Who make the discerned
soul and spirit function as a good, we know, is hard to get.
But easy to make from bits of idle cultural refuse
piled higher all the time.
A pass time that keeps me ready to die happy I got to the bowels of courage,
on the old stories told by masked men,
Al Jun 2017
Him
My depression lashes out in his rage;
My body wears the scars of my brain.
He grows like ivy round my rib cage
He exists in all I write, every refrain
My body cradles him like a mere child,
Nurturing him 'til he beats me for strength.
I teach him to poison every smile
He tells me that all of my hatred makes sense
He tells me I'm unwanted, unloved
There's a teardrop every time that I blink
And his signature on my arm in blood
I can't be me, he won't let me think
He will taunt me until my dying breath
For the best imitator of life is death
Xaela San Feb 2019
In the quitest corner of her bedroom
A woman stares back at the mirror
Wearing the latest dark lipstick on trend
With her near perfection sharp arced eyebrows
And her three inched high heels,

She stood there amazed yet unsatisfied
Not only on her outer being but also for her soul,
Even with all the planned efforts she made;
Regardless the sleepless nights of pure thinking;
Imagining possible outcomes for her definition of beauty

Unsatisfied she started to flip from pages to pages
Of magazines of models and celebrities in their best glamour
She imagined herself in those shoes and glamorous dresses
Gradually she added jewelry unto her bare skin
And painted her pale face with pink blush and mascara

She became a silent imitator, a copycat in other people's dictionary;
An imitation derived from the motivation for beauty
She saw upon the perfect photograph of a photoshopped model on the front page;
She have become so focus to others à la mode fashion
She failed to remember her own creative manners of beauty

This goes on and on and on, it felt like forever;
Then the once creative young lady became just like everyone else
Up to date with the latest beauty trends;
Just like everyone, it inevitably sugar coats her insecurities aside
And progressively concealing her own uniqueness.
Jeett Ratadia May 2019
Fire. The devourer. The dictator.
Earth. The cosmic carpet. The shapeshifter.
Water. The liquid of many guises. The Unyielding.
Air. The neighbor. The stranger. The infiltrator.
Space. The habitat of substance.  The Ultimate void.
And then poetry, the masterpiece of Thought.
The Great Imitator.
Nat Lipstadt May 2023
<>

Donovan Leitch
“A word of advice: There's no shame in mimicking a hero or two”
(rock singer accused of being a Dylan imitator)

<>

Nat Lipstadt
you did not awake today,
announcing to no one particular,
I am today, as of now, a poet original

I will employ words in new combinations,
try & tricking you to believing my everything,
is cutting edge, unheard, dare I say it?

original.
yet that very word betrays us/me,
we all have origins, seen and unaware,
we intuit breathing words through our ears

the people’s patois, artists who invade us
subconsciously, placing jargon of beauty
on our paths overlapping, life’s happenstance!

Me?  Ogden & Walt, Dylan & Dylan, Donne & Cohen,
others unknown to you, when we stumble into one another
while traipsing verbal trails, toe stubbing on herbal pebbles,
rocky sounds, adjective crumbs

know. ac-know-ledge. if you can. sometimes you can’t…
other’s words subtle invade, takeover a particular neuron yours.
waiting for your employment, recirculating air mutuel.

yet, you understand, tho total recall is an impossibility,
so you pay extra for storage, napkin scribbles, torn pages, bytes of
snippets that face slap, irritate, burrs that burn inside

reach out to the masters, join your fellow plagiarists, ranks,
well worth joining, do not frustration forswear, nothing new,
under the sun, but yet! that very Sun rises daily, a familiar path

but miraculous diurnal, subtle modified, anew & renewed,
nonetheless, asking you for your worship, you very own
novel sunrise prayer, so come!

when gifting, regifting, write with reckless abandon,
commit, recall, conspire, despair, then inspire & believe
!

<>

Kurt Vonnegut

“In 2006 a high school English teacher asked students to write a famous author and ask for advice. Kurt Vonnegut was the only one to respond - and his response is magnificent: “Dear Xavier High School, and Ms. Lockwood, and Messrs Perin, McFeely, Batten, Maurer and Congiusta:

I thank you for your friendly letters. You sure know how to cheer up a really old geezer (84) in his sunset years. I don’t make public appearances any more because I now resemble nothing so much as an iguana.

What I had to say to you, moreover, would not take long, to wit: Practice any art, music, singing, dancing, acting, drawing, painting, sculpting, poetry, fiction, essays, reportage, no matter how well or badly, not to get money and fame, but to experience becoming, to find out what’s inside you, to make your soul grow.

Seriously! I mean starting right now, do art and do it for the rest of your lives. Draw a funny or nice picture of Ms. Lockwood, and give it to her. Dance home after school, and sing in the shower and on and on. Make a face in your mashed potatoes. Pretend you’re Count Dracula.

Here’s an assignment for tonight, and I hope Ms. Lockwood will flunk you if you don’t do it: Write a six line poem, about anything, but rhymed. No fair tennis without a net. Make it as good as you possibly can. But don’t tell anybody what you’re doing. Don’t show it or recite it to anybody, not even your girlfriend or parents or whatever, or Ms. Lockwood. OK?

Tear it up into teeny-weeny pieces, and discard them into widely separated trash recepticals. You will find that you have already been gloriously rewarded for your poem. You have experienced becoming, learned a lot more about what’s inside you, and you have made your soul grow.

God bless you all!”

**<POSTSCRIPT>
Wed Apr 26 2023
8:28am
nyc
Mateuš Conrad Jun 2021
i can only suppose that my expectations concerning
life... slowly fizzled out...
once i realised that i had no obligations
moving forward...
  obligation is a loose term:
              investments in responsibilities...
although: i still dabble in a variation of responsibility:
on a bicycle... minding traffic...
esp. at night... with no indicators...
or a front or a back light flickering...
aiming at 30mph downhill...
with my headphones in... not holding the handlebars...

what a silly little quest: at 35 i ought to have
a life resembling my father's, my grandfather's...
although: i'm not having all that much
"fun" that might also be expected in a man's
prime...
once in a while i'll wake up from half
a decade's slumber and shout:
that dwarf in the Game of Thrones will not...
have more fun in the brothel than me...
perhaps it was easier once upon
a time to wield a sword than
seek something from slowly downing
a bottle of wine...

there are moments of absolute terror
when i freeze all over and start
rummaging for my wallet after a night's ride
in my rucksack where i keep
my bicycle lock... for a splinter of what's
time... the entire tree:
that freezing sequence...
but then i find it and i remember
that... that one kleptomaniac in the brothel
didn't steal my debit card...
i guess it must be hard to go about
debit card fraud...
which is why i don't have a credit card...
although: so i heard:
you get better insurance if...
your credit card is... cloned...
but then: you also have the higher risk...
plus... at least with a debit card:
i can't spend more than i have...
i never liked the idea of credit...
it was a ******* nuisance...
i'll spend what i have...
if that involves me spending £120 for an hour's
worth with a *******
once every... half a decade...
by the time i'm through with: "man in his prime"
i'll have about... 3 notches on my belt
of... "conquest"...

while in between all those nights...
there was that handy... cheap... but handy...
£4.99 bottle of new south wales' Merlot
to ease into a dreamless sleep...

ooh: soppy puppy...
  unless listening to some French escort...
the prince charming the white night...
the mistress contra the wife...
such attitudes only French people can have:
of a certain economic stratum...
not among the yellow vests...
no no... the fairground carousel people...
professionals...
limitless: who... on a whim...
want all that: XAOS...

  interlude: just some doodles that kept
me awake before i drowned them
with a slice of bread
and some... pork: BRAWN
(pork tongues, pork jowl, skins, pork liver)...
am i missing something
beside the Swedish sweet mustard?
the gelatine...
but after the red wine:
i'd **** for a raw herring in some...
oil / vinegar and onions...
ooh... slurp me another sire...
this Baltic sushi!

    (that Hannibal Lecter slurp sound
that i will not bother to write an onomatopoeia
for)...
my sunken cheeks! my folding tongue!
tears in my eyes
are the memory of the taste that:
when retested... is always the same...

between what's..
hope... and faith...

  well... nadzieja and: wiara...

hope and belief...

hop along: e-tymological...

be a leaf: of this grand tree with past...
  otherwise the secular variation
of belief:
the negation of doubt...
was... belief ever a certainty...
or a masquerading of:

  "something"... ahem... "else"?

hope is faith
in that hope isn't belief...
belief is rigidity... orthodoxy...
faith is that one on the sly: *****-nilly...
faith is an indefinite article...
belief is a definite article...
perhaps in other related languages
but esp. in English...
the scissors of a-          -the-
  and some variation of -ism...
it cuts through most things, words...
subject matters...

  faith: indefinite... articulation of off...
sometimes even from...

it must be a balancing act... i write a sentence
akin to: hope is faith
i might as well draw a red circle...
or a blue triangle...
of a green square...
by any standards of "logic" and "image":
it's hard to imagine 2...
unless you're cycling for 2 miles...
20mph: but that requires a multiplication
of 2 via 0 and the mph suffix...

2 is hard to "imagine": translate into an image...
it becomes too symbolic:
a symbol isn't an image...
a pair... most likely...
2 would be a 7... with a curved base
and medium: chiral... chimera...

hope is faith = a red circle...
what's more important is...
  the secular variation of: to counter hopelessness...
the antonym of belief:
the negation of doubt... oddly enough...
the antonym of belief shouldn't
be the negation of doubt:
since the antonym of belief is doubt...
well: the antonym of doubt is most probably
negation...
bad faith... alias...
        
a drunk's muddles... muddles...
spaghetti for shoelaces...
now i rather walk either barefoot or in one sandal...
my left foot...
i'm right-handed ergo right footed...
i'd need a sandal on my "weaker" foot...
which foot is supposedly weaker
when i'm peddling?
kicking a ball... sure... the "weaker" left foot...
foot... because not the whole leg...
holding a pen: my right hand...
but i could coordinate left hand fingers
pointing as i would with my right hand... fingers...

- yes... the wine... to oil up my fingers
and to wet my appetite for the tongue
to rummage in its cave of 32 pearls...
then a knockout of a trap of ms. amber...
to put me out of my "misery":

and with these words: what conversation
would i have... a challenging life...
there is so much everyday soap opera drama
to get through though:
eyes glued to the television... perhaps...
the news: i'm still going to vouch for
a higher status of advertisers to that of journalists...
after all: in the editorial section...
the commentary section:
newspapers are sold... they're not pamphlets...
journalists are not... punk:
they're not pamphleteers...
apparently...

  are these words sacrosanct?
          nor are the words in a newspaper
in the opinions section:
are these words... cursed? i imagine they hold
a sway of cruelty about them...
teasing with mottos like:
to make art rather than money...
to forever escape the formality of language:
i'll be perched on a windowsill:
the whole 6ft2 200lb of me
cradling the night and...
one insomniac magpie or a crow...
accomplice of the moon...

ol' baldy... tod-kopf... grinning idiot...
and his nation has the flag
in the following colours:
red, yellow and white...
  i will not make money:
i already don't earn what i wouldn't
otherwise spend...
even in central London i pass these
homeless men and think:
they have achieved the stature
of Diogenes of Sinope...
but they're still... clutter of what could
agitate thought...
i found one mesmerised into a mantra
bemoaning the river of people
imploring them to see him:
the solipsist that he was...

the mantra run along the lines of
the following words: 'some recognition, please'...
on a ******* loop...
if i were down there:
i'd ask for a flute... while rendering the rats
to an obedience...
whimsical me... the charm of a dream...
although not tempting dragons
into the whole affair:
stray dogs is already pushing it!

- a dietary requirement of needing to feed
on... cow intestines...
the thirst word that comes to mind
via my translation: trollop...
tripe soup...
                    and all the edible parts of
the pig's body... including the parts
adorned to be worn as leather:
shoes... belts...
                            mmm... i will never understand
the Semite: whether Hebrew or Arab...
the critique of the desert gods' critique of
pig...
sheep stinks... here's mine...
you can eat almost all of pig:  except the nails
and the oink...

dry ******* a camel's... ****?
in between that... currency of Dubai buck latex:
only-fans: watch an American girl **** into
a bucket?
oh sure... this one time in Amsterdam...
i walked in on one of those peaches
of Puerto Rico...
she kept the window open so she could
moan... entice more customers in...
a little black boy brought me a can of beer...
while she ****** into a bucket...
all gratis...

i'd win the lottery aiming at homelessness
in Amsterdam...
just for the licks, kicks and...
lycra long-shorts... worn beneath...
decent garments for peddling...
the closest material i'll ever come across
to... compare with... mr. and mrs. gimp's latex
full-on... save the church: attire...

- i might have mentioned this once, twice...
thrice already...
a collection of 72: dobbermans,
rottweilers and alsatians stand between
me imagining a middle ground between
Valhalla & Jannah...
forgive me from lying to those timid
creatures... who probably turn out to
be man-flesh eating mermaids...

a ******* tamed by as many pedestrians
as she might already be tamed by:
and a ******? and there's supposedly
72 of them?
**** it... throw in a wrestling with
72 rottweilers...

to objectify a woman with metaphors:
is as close as i'll ever come across
painting an imitation Munch...
  *** like a Lamborghini...
a body of a well worn armchair...
and all the rest of "it": experience of an alcoholic
surgeon...
the whole body: an extension of her
mandible parts: esp. the jaw...
how she pretends to eat "something" would
needing to tease beyond the tease
of the nibble: all the world in the foray
of foreplay... before the "ugly" parts
come together: the eyes come first...
the tongues... the hands... the lips...

the arithmetic of fingers
and the arithmetic of the remaining body parts...
if i were rich enough to: if i were as poor as ****
but had the capacity to paint:
perhaps...
pause... insinuate a punctuation that's: mine...
forget the form... the rigidity of both
rhyme & / or lyricism...
of those brackets of verse of paragraphs...
now i'm looking for an imitator...

- perhaps unlike the analysis of Samuel Beckett's
use of the bicycle...
by none other than Milan Kundera...
come the nacht...
the air thins out...
i receive a jolt of momentum...
i can hear church bells from a mile afar...
and trains: that give of a whiff of
horses galloping imitation:
the air thins out... i gain momentum...
i like the concept of generating my own
momentum: breaking my body...

plus... the bicycle has given me
the added dimension of meaning:
with speed i have an AGENCY...

- i "think" of a woman i think of her
walking into the forest with me
in the zenith of the night...
impossible to come by...
nay: imaginary...
  who's this pseudo-Athena...
this Sophia that never materialises...
this almost Aphrodite deity that bridges
the concept of titan with man?

come night and some flashes of genius...
come day and a return to:
all that's accurately mundane...
the same people talking with their same
lot of arrogance... pride... fakery...
hoisting up their litany of...
          keeping up:
well... it was hardly called
sense & sentimentality...
was it? it was called: sense & sensibility
for a reason...
although: at the time of writing...
prudent girls:
2nd or 3rd or 4th wave of the ****** revolution:
seems to me... only the girls have
progressed...

the white girls are making all the shots:
said one mixed-race guy to a white boyo
on a street...
i guess they are...
do i mind?
i'm into Turkic girls...
ol' raven haired types...
blue-black hair types...
ink types...

              blotches of cull against the wind...
the sensation of pouring some whiskey
into a glass where once...
those red stained ice-cubes entertained
a more sober moi...
a more: deliberative typo...

don't mind me...
but if my freedoms are being undermined
by a polity of objects expressing their freedom
in a fashion:
of... however much they don't wish or want...
but nonetheless do...
here's my: butterfly to their... hurricane of...
nonchalance...
murdering them isn't enough...
living with them is already a ******...

if only i... if only i...
hence my need to remind myself: solo...
cycling in the night...
aiming at the prospect of a traffic accident...
for the thrills for the Parisian
cosmopolitan affair simulation...

goodnight: riddle and riddance.
LunaThads Jun 2020
I’m not a trendsetter
Nor am I ever an imitator
I am more of a developer
Of my own being
Not caring what
The world is offering
But what my soul is seeking

I’m not a fashionista
Nor am I ever a sociolista
I am more of a hood
Of my own mood
Not tending what
The world is trending
Rather flaunting my own thinking
Dr Peter Lim Dec 2018
Genuine should be every writer
never an imitator or impostor
poetryaccident May 2018
I saw myself on the screen
in the book and through the play
with validation I implore
as I’m judged beyond the fold

this revelation by a spotlight
shined upon the duplicates
near enough to speak my mind
imitator of disparity

affirmation in public view
this is permission for the whole
to avow my place to live
in the group from which I’m estranged

echoes of the hidden lives
sanctioned for all to see
blessing from disclosure’s path
of what was once sadly veiled

affirmation of what I am
what I already knew
is measured by the display
acceptance by the media

broadcast for full regard
the lack is seen at the same time
one or another seems the reward
for culture’s grasp of unity.

© 2018. Sean Green. All Rights Reserved. 20180527.
Marginalized, non-normative communities are often not seen in products of media.  I attempt to do my part in allowing the grasping of unity.
Chandy Sep 2021
Strength of a lion
Soul of a saint
Wish I had both
But all I do is faint
Can't handle existence
Even though I exist, I feel transparent
Look through me, see the fear within me?
----------------------------------------------------------
Ot­hers see men as men
All I see men as are wolves
Men and women alike
To be human is to be in a bubble
Blind to trouble, avoider of struggle
Chasing after pleasure by running over heads
The scales have broken, balance bespoken
--------------------------------------------------------­--
But, am I any better?
Never initiate the imitator
All you get is replication
Let these words fester in a letter
For to remain deranged is to be estranged
Patrick Harrison May 2020
They say in college I will be free,
they say in high school I will experience,
they say in faded sighs that elementary was long ago,
they say middle school should be a passing trip.
Get in, get out.

And repeat; like a revolver cycling the cylinder,
like a car rounding a hill.
Like a sun spinning for years, of the millions of years it follows.
Like the pointed stare of a disappointed mother, never ceasing.
But alas; always seizing my attention.

That is the grand mystery of life, besides love.
It is the gaze of a stern and bitter wind upon my face,
the rough click of my fingers tapping the keyboard,
and the culling of a feeling that I know I could've felt.

It is the wonder that brings me to tears on the mountain's peak.
It is the feeling of never being able to hike high enough,
to never swim far enough; to never be enough.
And mostly, it is the misery and my affiliation with fame.

Like talent is an old forgotten friend, or technique that flew from
the window like a blue bird released from it's cage.

I am deranged,
scarily deformed mentally.
Horribly scarred along my back.
Reminisce of liars I dare do business with.

The devil himself must have given me these hands,
and these friends,
and these sponsors,
and these slowly closing feelings.

Well, all that is left is the imitator, not the imitated.
Never the imitated would last in a field of growing orchid.
Trace the same scars as the hotel here now,
as I stand on the roof, where one half is missing.

The breeze almost shakes me, and I can see myself fall.

— The End —