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Terry O'Leary Nov 2013
He was my sun, my one and only son,
attired as a cowboy for the day.
And so I handed him a little gun
of fastened random sticks, for him to shoot and play.

Attired as a cowboy for the day
he searched for foes (with bows and arrows made
of fastened random sticks for them) to shoot, and play        
the part of ‘Injuns’ in a mock charade.

He searched for foes (with bows and arrows made)
well written in his story books before he left for school.
The parts of ‘Injuns’ in a mock charade
were tainted with a crimson war paint, oh so cruel.

Well writ in history books before he left from school,
the tales (retold of victories that we’d won)
were tainted with a crimson war paint, oh so cruel.
The flow of paint was not to staunch when once begun.

From tales retold of victories that we’d won,
he learned to fight for God and country glory, though
the flow of pain, ’twas not to staunch when once begun
and bane to both sides (as he’d later come to know).

He learned to fight for God and country glory, though
the wounds of war were kept unseen (while nigh)
and bane to both sides (as we’d later come to know);
but still he stuffed a duffel bag with several things of youth, then said goodbye.

The wounds of war were kept unseen. While nigh,
the hours boomed, the clock struck 12 at last, his time to leave.
But, still, he stuffed a duffel bag with several things of youth, then said goodbye
to those who’d stay and even those who wouldn’t grieve.

The hours boomed, the clock struck 12 - alas, his time to leave.
They sent back body bags they’d stuffed with severed things of those who’d died
to those who’d stayed. And even those who wouldn’t grieve
with tears were stiff and masked like wooden boxes meant to hide.

They sent back body bags they’d stuffed with severed things of those who’d died;
his boots hung loose, one camouflaged in mud.
With tears, the stiff were masked in wooden boxes meant to hide
our children from the spilling of their blood.

His boots hung loose, one camouflaged in mud;
they said they’d needed him to help defend
our children from the spilling of their blood.
But can they ever see or really comprehend?

They said they’d needed him to help defend,
and so they handed him a little gun.
But can they ever see or really comprehend?
He was my sun, my one and only son.
Ken Pepiton Oct 2018
Drums of Autumn tell us, grandmother,
what did they mean?

Did you ever get the Lincoln cane? Did you cry?

Kenny, I'as a orphan. I never knew.
---That happened, Kenny was my name.

I looked past the rim,
there was the Corn Mother,
I think that's what I coulda seen,

but then it's only Grandma, with a grin.

Kenneth means know, Grandma said, I gave you that name.
kenning handy, a knower, by God,
not handsome in that vain way they have today,
handy,
winsome in puzzles 'n' riddles 'n' such
Kokopelli's play mate, some day.

Mistooken words rot,
if they lie, idle, in the dust
meaning

nothing ever. I shall not want,

I was taught a mistooken truth,
I took it,
gript it tight,

Get a job. Live with some class, join
a club that
takes your kind. Some churches used to
use
the Rotary test, if you could pass that test
you could eat,
after the message at the mission.

true? fair? goodwill? wait

if the first test is failed, what matters?
fair good will benes d'vitas?

from the treaty bound liars who called my grand
mothers savages, all of them,
right by
right of conquest. their treaty verified it to me,

then they gave me blankets,
General Leonardwood,
nope, Lord Jeff Amherst did that, then we died.
Read the treaty, 1763, small print. Blankets.

From the small pox ward, went unsaid.
That was just,
after
the French and Indian war, where the father of
the force that claims world-wide military
superiority
sufficient unto the evil of today,

George, the man on the horse,
surveyor for the future,
fought injuns,
so the king could sell their measured land to freed slaves,

thus making the mortgage chain, so popular today.

Build a casino, get rich quick, it's in the treaty,
lotsajobs,
busboy, bus driver, maid, Sioux chef and so

many, many more.

Grandma, in my vision, turned and walked
into the desert.

I took her word.
Brushed the dust and breathed it in.
Then I spit against the wind,

winked at you and rode my wind away.
Free is easy, if you can ride on wind.
Edit, after fact check, Leonard wood did not give the small pox blanket Jeff Amherst did. Listening to visionary Teds, from the rez world view. Youtube changed the game, not the way we see the world right. There's likely not a drop o' native anything in me, I breathed the same dust, that's all. And I know the beat.
History is written by winners

Their story's the one that is told

The loser's are like dust in a zephyr

Blown away by the wind and the cold

A battle is waged on a hillside

The armies are dressed in chain mail

One side is left battered and dying

So...which side will write down the tale?

A submarine sinks in the channel

It's just off the Dover coast shore

No one survives but the story

of sailors we'll here from no more

Villages destroyed by a virus

It spreads through the town really quick

You know that the story gets written

By the survivors who didn't get sick

Pompeii was wiped out, that's a given

A volcano did wipe out the town

The people were burned to a cinder

So who writes, when there's no one around?

In the movies the cowboys and Injuns

All fight for control of the fort

Do the Indians spread tales of their losses

Do they write it all down just for sport?

As years changed the stories came forward

Of the armies and people who died

They were defending their loved ones and country

It's too bad they were on the wrong side.

As time lumbered on to the future

The winners were not just the ones

Who told what had happened that day

They were not just the ones with the guns

Bystanders came and told what they saw

This would change how stories were told

There was now a new player with stories to tell

And the winners did not look so bold

Things now were written that no one did know

Of the other sides battle attempts

They were not heroes or winners but, losers no more

For these writings now made them exempt

They spoke of their battles, their loyalty, grit

To stand strong and fight for their lives

Even though it was futile, they still thought they would win

Thinking only of children and wives

Now history is written as quick as it comes

Television has surely changed that

You can watch things at home on your big screen tv

And you can feel like you're where things are at.

Deception is gone and the truth now is told

In seconds, not years like before

You see things as they happen, and the final result

May shake your soul to your core.

So....now History is written by winners

and by losers as well just the same

And no matter, whatever the story

You now know all players by name.

Regardless of whatever the story

Be it ****** or sports,  games or war

We can now see just how each one has ended

And their honor, and that's what life is for...
Terry Collett Aug 2013
At school
Moorcraft said
about joining
the boy scouts with him

(the only scouts
you were interested in
were those who rode
ahead of the cavalry

in western films
and who got themselves
scalped by Injuns)
but he went on

about how they taught you
to tie knots
and light fires
with two sticks

of wood
and how to sing songs
around a camp fire
and be a good kid

and do Bob a Job
for old ladies
and he went on about it
quite a bit

and so you said
ok pick me up later
and so after teatime
of bread and jam

and a mug of tea
and biscuit
you went with Moorcraft
to the church hall

where the scouts met
and this tall scouts master
in short trousers
and hairy legs

and glasses
took you off
to join the rest
and introduced you both

and some kid
showed you how
to tie these knots
and climb ropes

and how to set up
a tent and make camp
and so on
until some kid

pushed you off
the ropes
and you pushed him back
and he punched you

on the shoulder
and you hit him
on the jaw
and then you were both

on the floor
and the good kids
were saying oh and gosh
and crowding round

until the scout master came
and asked what
was going on
and that good scouts

didn’t fight
and threw you out
of the hall
leaving Moorcraft behind

tying knots
and climbing ropes
but you didn’t  
give a fig at all

and Moorcraft still in there
not knowing why
and you walked home alone
under an evening sky.
Ken Pepiton Sep 2019
Did I ever ride one of these casino busses?
That's how I met my wife.

Is this weird enough?
seven measured spans of ten plus some,
this bit, this collection of second chances,
in how many?
in ever,
how many spans of tens have passed, without me?
or,
without the star stuff Sagan says  
I am made of?

or I am made? I was.

That's the measure of my worth,

nay, I say.
Rue the day I told that lie

shall be my epitath, should I leave without
a-counting
them there ex
acted, mockinbird killin' days and ways we was

when we was
never governed, as a people, or a tribe.
as ids,
we was wild injuns, us kids was. we did as we pleased.

life was fine,
livin' by the river, you can imagine a cloud

occlusion of green greasewood smoke
softening a barely waking moon
four thumbs high at sundown

keeping fairy tales down low enough
that grandpas
can snag

-- and release and come back jack, right here
--to this dangling hook

and it's always gonna be this way

catch and release,

life's story your story goes on.
You never lose your place,

that's mortally impossible
to pose a

quandry
quandary (n.)"state of perplexity," 1570s, of unknown origin, perhaps a quasi-Latinism based on Latin quando"when? at what time?; at the time that, inasmuch," pronominal adverb of time, related to qui"who" (from PIE root *kwo-, stem of relative and interrogative pronouns). Originally accented on the second syllable.

pronomial adverb, eh?
Writers were warned away from adverbs,
back when grammar tyranny strained
at knots and gnostic gnats magi-ifical
add-on augmented at your own risc

made you notice
tech times change faster than Timex

Sinclair-- sorry, senility function was left on from earlier missions

Force-recon recollected war stories being moved permanently into fish story status before
legend adds a layer
of gloryshit
at funerals.

Reduced Instruction Set Chip, chip
chipping is
addiction diction
A.I. *** us a whole Yah bus win, it's
Free Play day at the Ol' Folk Home.

We sing old songs on the way to Viejas and
laugh about all we left in Vegas.
Thanks, dear reader, my sanity hinges on you, like the swing doors on the Longbranch
Terry Collett Dec 2013
Lydia is quiet
going down the *****
by Arrol House
and onto

Rockingham Street
Benedict says nothing
he thinks it best
to let her brood

until she’s ready
to speak
he's seen it
in the films before

where the female
opposite the cowboy
has her moods
or quiet times

and the cowboy
lets her get on with it
while he rides off
into the sunset

to fight the bad guys
or Injuns
or have a shot
of Red Eye

in the bar in the town
watching the dancers
on the makeshift stage
he gives Lydia

a side on gaze
her straight hair
seems unbrushed
her dress is creased

and the cardigan
has a hole
in the elbow
they walk up

towards Draper Road
by the blocks of flats
he says
(hating silence)

the parents
were rowing last night
something to do
with money

or the lack of it
from what
I could gather
through the bedroom door

lying in the dark
seeing the thin line
of light
from the other room

the old man hates
being short
needs dosh
to get

his best suits
and brown shoes
saw something odd
last night

Lydia says suddenly
looking at Benedict
odd? what was odd?
he asks

studying
her thin hands
the nails chewed
my big sister

and her man friend
your sister's always odd
says Benedict
no

more odd
she made me sleep
in the tiny cot bed
which I haven't done

for years as its
too small for me really
but anyway
she made me sleep there

so she and her man friend
could sleep there
he's been turned out
of his digs

as he calls them
and Mum didn't like
the idea but Dad
in his usual drunken state

said O let him stay
a few days
until he gets himself
a place

so there am I
stuck in the cot bed
feet dangling
over the ends

just about room for me
except my backside
gets cold
when I turn over

nothing worse
Benedict says
than a cold backside
well then

Lydia says
after the lights were out
and she thought
I was asleep

I heard this noise
like squashy sound
and I lay there
with my eyes open

looking
at the dark shapes
and hearing
these odd sounds

and the giggles
and snorts and such
Benedict gazes at her
side on

her thin lips
were opening
and closing
like the goldfish

he had which fell
into the sink
out of the fish bowl
and its tiny mouth

was closing
and opening
upon the wet
white surface

then the bed springs
were going gong gong
then silence
as if they were dead

odd
Lydia says
staring
straight ahead

and I never got
to sleep in the end
for ages
what with them

and the cold
on my backside
and the trains
going over

the railway bridge
and the shunting
of coal wagons
so you're tired

Benedict says
that’s why you
were quiet just now
thought I'd done

something wrong
when I first met you
outside your flat
and you came out

with a face
suppose so
she says
and they walk along

Draper Road
to the Penny shop
where he treats her
to a penny pop drink

and 4
fruit salad sweets
and they stand
by the penny

ball game machine
on the wall
and watch some kid
press the buttons

and the ball
goes around
and around
until it disappears

in a slot
and Lydia thinks
to herself
sipping her drink

grown ups
are an odd lot.
A BOY AND GIRL IN LONDON IN 1950S.
Terry Collett Jul 2013
Helen pushed
the second hand
doll’s pram
over the bombsite

off Meadow Row
Battered Betty her doll
was tossed
from side to side

there there
Helen said
can’t be helped
you walked beside her

practising drawing
your silver coloured gun
from the holster
your old man

had bought you
from the cheap shop
through the Square
you hit back

the hammer
one two three times
just like that
I can’t get her to sleep

Helen said
stopping by the ruins
of a bombed out house
she tucked the doll in

with the woollen blankets
her mother had knitted
Mum said to take Betty
for a walk in the pram

but she still won’t sleep
you put the gun back
in the holster
and pushed back

the black hat
your granddad
had given you
have to keep her quiet

around here
you said
there might be Injuns
and they scalp hair

off babes and kids
and such
Helen looked
around the bombsite

looks deserted to me
she said
pushing the pram away
from the bombed out house

you never can tell
you said
they hide  
and when you’re least

expecting it
they come screaming
over the plains
Mum said you’d make

the best husband
for me
Helen said
coming to a halt

opposite the coal wharf
you drew out
your gun again
and fired shots

over your shoulder
that’s nice of her
you said
twirling the gun

over your finger
and then back
into the holster
Mum said

you would make
a good dad
one of the horse drawn
coal wagons moved away

from the coal wharf
and clip-clopped
along the side road
perhaps

you said
we could get our own
house on the prairie
or one of those houses

off St George’s Road
with the big gardens
Helen got
Battered Betty out

of the pram
and rocked her
over her shoulder
patting her back

and said
yes and I could milk
the cows and you
could hunt buffalo

and we could sleep
in one of those
big beds
with buffalo skins

over by the main road
a red number 78 bus
went by
and dark clouds

crowded
the less
than blue sky.
A boy and girl in London in the 1950s playing games that were real for them.
Joseph Dazzio Apr 2015
Do you remember when we were boys?
When mischief was our main profession?
With mud about our corduroys
Walking from the field in our football procession?

We chased and tried to catch the girls
Whom we presumed thought us cool.
We occupied our time in class with jokes
Or smoking cigarette butts behind the school.

Time the tax-collector troubled us not
For all the years of these days,
Time was when we ate and how our race
Told our speed, which meant a lot.

Work was gathering stones to build our forts,
Scavenging sticks to build a fire of sorts,
Setting a trap for some unlucky beast,
Or waking to see the glorious sun rising in the east.

I remember when, God forgive our souls,
We skipped Mass (more than once, I might add)
To eat teachers' kolaches and doughnut holes,
But more for the adventures we had.

When we ran in the forest, we were Injuns.
When we sailed on the lake, we were Pirates,
But now we're just drab grown-ups,
Our characters weak as sand; like Pilate's.

What changed in us?
What made this so?
Temptation leads to sin, plus
Sin corrupts the soul.
The good ole days.
Terry Collett Dec 2013
Ingrid knows
the absence
of real love,

she 's known it
all 9 years
of her life.

Her mother's
indifference,
her father's

strict and cruel
attention,
the beatings,

the cold stares,
the loud shouts,
the harsh threats,

promises
of spankings.
There is just

the one love:
Benedict
from along

the narrow
balcony
of the flats,

9 years old,
brave of heart,
with his sword

painted blue
(his old man
had made it),

false silver
6 shooter,
cap firing

toy hand gun,
gun holster,
leather belt,

with wide grin,
hazel eyes,
with talk of

cowboy films,
Robin Hood,
Ivanhoe,

and she his
pretty Maid
Marian,

so he  says
or cowgirl
borrowing

his rifle,
to shoot down
bad cowboys

or Injuns.
He takes her
to his haunts:

the bomb sites,
the bombed out
old buildings,

the play parks,
cinemas
to watch films

in the dark,
feeling safe
beside him.

He has seen
her bruises,
her medals

of beatings,
the red welts
on her skin;

understands
the reasons,
who did it,

but not why;
giving her
cruel father

the cold eye
or hard sneer
when he sees

her father
in the Square
or passing

on the stair,
*******
two digits

(up you pal)
gesturing
behind her

father's back.
Ingrid knows
the absence

of real love,
she known it

all 9 years
of her life;
except for

Benedict,
her young knight
with blue sword,

and one day,
when they're grown
and left home,

she'll be his
pretty Maid
Marian

love and wife,
so she dreams
in her bed

in the night
of her sad
childhood life.
BOY AND GIRL IN 1950S LONDON.
Terry Collett Oct 2013
At the back
of the brick bomb shelter
out of window view
on Saturday morning

before the matinée
Fay pulled up the hem
of her yellow dress
to show Baruch

the bruises
and red marks
her father had made
and all because

she didn't know
the Credo in Latin
all the way through
Baruch stared quickly

then she let down the hem
and said
don't tell no one
else I'll be for it

I won't say a word
he said
what the heck
is the Credo?

she looked at him frowning
you don't know?
no idea
he said

it's the I Believe prayer
and we Catholics
are supposed to know it
all through

but my father
wanted me to know it
all in Latin
but I couldn't get it all

and he got mad
and punished me
she said
I believe what?

he asked
I believe in God
the Father and so on
she said

I'm Jewish
Baruch said
we have our own prayers
not that I can recall

any of them
I do
she said
but Latin is hard

and the nuns say it
all the time in their prayers
and one nun hit me
with a ruler for mistakes

and said I was lazy
Baruch shrugged his shoulders
glad I aren't Catholic then
he said

now what about
the cinema matinée?
you coming?
my father said

I was to stay in
all weekend and practice
but my mother said
go and enjoy

so you are coming?
he asked
Fay nodded
yes guess I will

what about your old man?
he's away for the day
in Liverpool
and Mum said

she'd cover for me
good for her
he said
she pulled her dress tidy

and he pushed his fingers
through his dark brown hair
and they climbed over
the metal fence

surrounding the grass
and bomb shelter
and walked under
the railway bridge

and up the narrow road
behind the cinema
Baruch in his jeans
and red cowboy shirt

his silver looking
six shooter
tucked in his belt
walking beside her

looking out for bad guy
or Injuns
making sure
none scalped him or her

with their tomahawks
riding their invisible horses
across the bomb site
but none came

so he could relax
knowing she
and he
would be all right.
SET IN LONDON IN 1950S.
Henry Dec 2021
Asphalt, steaming screams swear words
The offensive smell of pavement post downpour
I think I’d like life better if it rhymed
The chatter and clatter mad hatters me
Sleepless and hopeless with Romans
And their online roads and aqueducts
They slither and snake but there is no more wild in the west
Automated scarecrows with AR-15’s stand guard
O’er amber waves of grain
Eyes open for outlaws and injuns
Cattle ranching of the future
Feeding the world one cubic meter of methane at a time
12/4/21
Big fan of this one. First time I've posted in long time because I couldn't log into the site
Terry Collett Dec 2013
Lydia
watches through
a thin gap
in the dark

brown curtains
her sister
much older
in the bed

holding tight
to her tall
spiv boyfriend
and kissing

his thick lips
then his ears
which even
nine year old

Lydia
finds quite gross
it takes all
her childish

innocence
not to know
what the show
is about

she looking
through the gap
sees the spiv
put his hand

on the ****
buttocks of
her sister
Lydia

looks away
looks out at
the green grass
and the flats

and windows
opposite
ignoring
the giggles

and snorty
sounds she hears
from the bed
behind her

behind dark
brown curtains
how the heck
she got trapped

behind there
in her games
pretending
the window

was a stage
and she a
child actress
awaiting

to begin
when her big
sister came
tiptoeing in

with the spiv
while hiding
unseen there
Lydia

silently
hid her feet
and stealthily
had her peek

now she sees
pigeons walk
or kids play
with skip rope

or football
or cowboys
and Injuns
but behind

the curtains
on the bed
another
game is played

two actors
in combat
by the sounds
her sister

breathlessly
makes beyond
but innocent
Lydia

puts her hands
to cover
her small ears
watching kids

play their games
and joyfully
run about
ignoring

whatever makes
her sister
giggle soft
then loudly
laughing shout.
A 9 year old unwittingly get stuck in the bedroom while her big sister and boy friend make out.
Avalon's Respite Nov 2015
Peter was my hero, and Wendy my first fanciful lust.
We fought villainous pirates and bloodthirsty injuns,
and when danger came near as a dark scary night
we'd grasp just one happy thought and fly away
to a brighter new day, dreamed just for us.

Such a wondrous thing, the gift of flight.
Free, unrestrained... racing the laughing crows.
It seemed so simple I just had to try,
strange how the impossible, is so attainable
within the mind of a child of five.

I turn the old phonograph way up loud,
climb upon the hassock, (added height for takeoff)
I closed my eyes intense on my one happy thought
and singing the refrain to inspire me...

"You can fly, You can fly, You can fly."

I leap...
And for barely an instant in time I really do feel the sky.
Then gravity's reality crashes me hard to the floor.
Just in time to hear them laughing,
my evil older brothers watching at the door.
They had a great time with their haughty jest
I still hear of it today, but that's OK.

We were just kids and they lacked understanding.
For I was in training; practice for a not too distant date.
Honing my inner mind to create the improbable,
even the impossible, making it all seem real.

Today the refrain is no longer needed,
nor the hassock upon which to stand.
With old age comes a far grander experience.

Leaving all trials and tribulations upon the ground
I sit back, close my eyes, silence the world around.
Reaching out with sure confidence for the sky
with that child of five's, unrestrained inner eye.

Thanks to Peter and Wendy and my early lust
those heckling crows are left far behind
in vapor trails of my receding dust.

"I can fly, I can fly
I really can fly!"



© S.Loeding
All Rights Reserved
Terry Collett Oct 2013
Baruch took the bus
to Kennington park
he wanted to see
a different place

away from the usual
the familiar sights
and people
he had brought

Fay along
having paid
her bus fare
and saying

they’d not be late
(she worrying
about her father
getting home from work

and finding
that she'd not
completed her
school essay

on The Ten Commandments)
and also
that she was with him
(whom her father

termed the Jew boy)
and he said it was better
if she never saw him
which was impossible

as they lived
in the same
block of flats
and went by

each other
on the stairs
but her mother knew
and said

to keep it quiet
and gave Fay a 1/-
for an ice cream
and drink of cola

they walked around
the park
she gazing
at the flowers

and butterflies
and birds
and he imagining
Injuns about

to pop out
of the bushes
or over
the small mound

(he called a hill)
on their mixed
coloured horses
and firing arrows

from their bows
or shooting
from rifles
and as he walked

he patted
the 6 shooter gun
in the holster
hanging

from the belt
of his jeans
( hidden
by his grey jacket)

she talked
of the nun at school
who slammed
a wooden ruler

on the palms
of girls
who didn't know
their catechism

all through
and the girl
who had her
legs slapped

for wearing
her school dress
too short
(she'd outgrown it

and her parents
couldn't afford another)
and he talked
of the cowboy film

he'd seen the other day
where the cowboy
wore his two guns
back to front

so that he had to
cross hands
to reach them
and still out drew

the bad guys
and which he wanted
to practice until
he had it just right

she listened to him quietly
taking in
his hazel eyes
the wavy hair

and that
bright eyed stare
and he listened to her
gazing at her

as he did so
at her fair hair
held in metal hair grips
her blue eyes

her pale complexion
that nervousness
she seemed to have
as if her father

was going to leap out
at her from a bush
and the bruise
on her upper arm

he'd seen
when she removed
her cardigan
having got hot

in the midday sun
and after walking around
for a while
and then sitting

looking at some
old guy feeding birds
with broken bread
they bought two ice creams

and bottles of cola
and she said
a grace in Latin
and he mumbled

some Hebrew prayer
and they sat licking
and eating
and drinking

and once she kissed
his cheek shyly
and said they'd
best get home

before her father did
and he saw her
with him
the upstairs Jew

(as her father
termed him)
and gave her
what for

as soon
as she went
timidly
through the front door.
SET IN LONDON IN 1950S.
Terry Collett May 2015
We come out of the cinema
like let loose young dogs of war
up and along the New Kent Road
the daylight blazing into our eyes

the roar of traffic in our ears
and on and up by Neptune's fish shop
-not to buy no more coins-
and wait by the crossing

both Enid and me waiting
looking at the opposite side
of the road at the bomb site
the opening of Meadow Row

good film wasn't it
Enid says
looking at me
through wire framed spectacles

her eyes bright not dull
as they usually are
no fear there yet
of her old man

traffic stops and we cross
the road and then run
onto and across the bomb site
I'm riding my imaginary

black horse shining like crude oil
and she just behind riding
her pretend white horse
-not side saddle like some lady

but like me on the saddle-
the whole world stops for us
we are riding a new Wild West
our guns firing at advancing

bad guys or maybe Injuns
with tomahawks
then she stops in her tracks
and stands there sans horse

eyes full of fear
what do I tell my dad?
she says
he doesn't know about the cinema

what do I say?
I look at her
my imaginary horse dissolved
and I walk over to her

see her visibly shaking
and I've been with you too
what can I tell him?
she says

I look at her standing there
her hands holding each other
her eyes fear glazed
say you've been with

some else to the park
what have you
she looks at me
I can't lie he knows if I lie

she says
create a truth
I say
what do you mean?

she asks
tell him you've seen
horses up West
up West?

yes West End of London
but he won't believe me
about that what horses he'll say
be creative tell him some

of what you've seen
she frowns
about the horses?
yes be inventive with it

she thinks
and we walk down Meadow Row
she looking at the ground
mind in thought

I look at her walking there
knowing she'll not get it right
no talent for the invented word
her old man will whack her sure

and as we walk up
through the Square
I see him on the balcony
standing by his door.
A BOY AND GIRL IN LONDON IN 1957.
gabersons Jul 2020
Welcome
Home
*****
How was your trip?
Hope you had a good fall
Like at the grocery store when you fell on on your *** ****** broke your hip
It was especially good because we all
Saw. You. Slip
Wasn't that funny?
Welcome home hunny
Look at our garden
Gonna ****** shoot those bunnies
I gotta lot of plants and I love them all equally
More than my husband who I'm killing with indecency
I might always be this way but I found a cure cause recently
I've been smoking grass and taking oils to live peacefully
And argue to the death anyone who disagrees with me
Then share my good ideas and share my good ideas and share my good ideas and share my go--
or you blow your brains out from a lecture at an undetectable frequency
And if you point out anything like ******* you're just mean to me
I'll live off gin and Juice and little bits of meat and cheese
Jesus don't get me started on defunding the police
The blacks and injuns just don't know how to live since they've been freed
Have you seen their reservation? They're pathetic but the worst are all the chiefs
What else could you expect? let it be, It's just a fresian thing it's part of me
I love my family. Just written in a moment of frustration
Ken Pepiton Mar 2023
This has a photo of a California Black Lizard
official name, sunning on a rock, but that's
in the modern novel medium, blog form.
mmmmaybe, baby, we do
grow old, past sixty-four and even more,
unbridled tongues, held silent, lo' monks,

listen, quiet, now, then, to now, then to when
listen to the Osprey fly over our valley to Yuma,

to the Chocolate Mountains, beyond the river,
the only river, running down the great crevice,
due to erosion from John Bunyan's Pauline ax,

a rift right across the heart of the land,
opened up the first Bright Angel Trail,
for there was no other way across the canyon.

And we had people, before, on that other side,

that happened, all around the globe, that hap,
the earth was struck, and struck another,
time and lost all its religion,
it was announct, we all sang along,
and some force pushed the edge of the sun,
in a single most malignant EMP burst relig-i-used
to beat al bound synenergy rationally, as knowledge
and life, root and branch, time and chance missed call
first shall be last, roll on, roll on down time orchard

lessons learned in lines of trees, you can imagine,
while alone, just be used to being in the sense we yoosta
call peace, or bliss, blah good blah, being right inside.
- breathing easy, not sleepy, no place to be.
When outside is just too hot or too cold.

Chaos reigns for days, and weeks and years, and
we can imagine, my kind, human kind, earth stock one.

We the deme, the interbreeding productive kind,
we who beat the dis-easing raging fever from eating
foul putrid rotting corpses, as would dogs, any dogs,
naturally,
we have such knowledge, said to be wild boys,
raised by wolves or Comanches… Grandma,
she did not know her people,
but she knew her place,
and made it perfect,
just right, she and her little dog, and relics
from a life that matched Saul Bellow's on earth,
though she was never widely read, she did leave
a greater legacy in terms of proper child minding.

Yep, minding is mighty
otherwise than rearin' n'raisin' hardgeenevahnegated
she said it, and she served such chicken at the
same table where we all ate, we was sorta colored
because my grandaddy fixed cars for folks mr leon
the jew who owned the Loma Vista in the Green Book,
befriended on collect calls, and sent Pop Boyett, said he
t' tow ya in, he'll send his boy Jim,
'be there drectly, jest don't fret none.
sit tight. Sundowns a ways yet.

yeah, I am white proud that my grand daddy was friends,
with ******* and injuns and jews, his customer's
including Charlie Lum, Mary's daddy, who used grandpa's

knack with stunted fruit trees, to bring peace and calm
into the environment, with a quarter acre lot back yard.

Living earth is in me, I ate my first mud pie, and liked
the laugh it got from whoever washed my mouth out.

I watched an uncle get his washed with soap, thus
learning how loudly to utter curses when being proven
beguiled by a will so sharp and thorny, nothing sweet
shall ever stick,
honey chile, tar baby, chocolate kisses, all a mud pie
made me remember, at a whim, in my dementing whiling
away

nothing needed doing more than not dragging grease
from the shop, past Grandma's back porch,
where the squeezed water tub always was soapy
enough to expose a little boy to sudden stripping
and brush scrubbing,

while she laughed,
and made them all laugh, as long as that junk yard
was apayin' the electric/


-- Coming in from a tinctured cuppaKuerig
Settled mind alligning old stitches in a tapestry,
not much sense can be made of Bayeux resolution

stitched in time to serve in tutorial classes
open to the masses, for your undivided attention

in silence, for the space of about a half an hour there.

Columbian, it says on the plastic waste,
mea culpa, mea maxima,
we suffer such silly easy living made much too easy,
I light the bowl with a focused rim jet quartering,
too easy to use the flower, to ask smoke a favor,

as to result
in a bounce back,
as the elanvital of my mountain pushes west winds
back into themselves
to form the ribs
of huge cloud forms that reform so
true to pattern proof, exhalent
of this wind
reflection off the ridges we live on,
vitalized by a DNA centric view
of stress or pressure, squeezing bests
from times as worst as worsts were then,

Vital tipping point that lets a spirit slip into the story.

Structure and content cata and ana, as we leave
that which our fruits produce, a cache of all we be

come and see, I said, okeh.
Proof by Synthesis/ Venter link, blink
-Craig Venter… GI imagine, we all can Google It,
in another window,
and find it not mystical in terms of who imagined this.
You realize whoever it was, it is yet done
dramatically as next years
stories, lightsped mind gluons
from last years tragedy we all can find,
sympathy puddles, lost allusions
to chances being once this line
was written
for no single pair of eyes, not mine, ours,
de-cartooned Madiera wine revival fly,
wise minding times retwining U to I,
leading down old fissures where
suddenlies occurred and we all recall, as if
some things in life after television are with us
-to this instant and
until we die, and leave our mystery religion lying ever after.
Twinkling a little,
winking
done did done, artificial art intuited involuntarily

Accidents, where by we live, U rhea re minding us,
there is something wishing to use us, as yousta be,
- so fine
thank you for your service, Turing and Von Neuman
The general and logical theory of automata…

"much less well understood" loop the tape,
loop it once,
and again, become the digital life Wolfram made,
flat land as real as Wildersmith ever projected it

Up against the wall, we pass through it all
and so on and so forth,
fighting phrases to fit the codescript initial intention,

in the immature tabernacle state,
a thousand atoms should be plenty,

make life from that, and all the scattered dust
of heavy metal stars that burned too fast
to eat up all the lithium.
- this is the bottom
A funda-lowest level, fundamental, puts us sensing
tips of our own tail, verily modeling
Ouroboros
in the womb as drawn to our imaginations with
Look Whose Talking Now! WOW
Haeckel and Jeckle, and L. Ron-ron didoo ronrun
Dianetics really gave Travolta therapist recollections
needed to over come the scorn
spewn on Urban Cowboy,
outside Texas and New York City.

We can tame the bucking machine, with no pistil.
No bull, boys and girls, we made sugar in Trinidad,
using the pistil of a bull to instill the will to learn
to live,
and let it be known, life abhors evil, it fails to hate,
that which has no use and piles as potential piles
of all we knew we needed to encode to become
XML, then the shifting database schema, Dinesh
D'Sousa, the metadata scraper with an MIT MBA.
Not the pundit.
He fed me this character trait, mind in order,
meets older orderly mind in mortal chaos, coping.

Feel his way past the message messenger collision,
caused in no insignificant way by poetry, and poets,
enthralled with taming textual dragons, lizard brain,

quick wits
to wot not with, per haps, haps as chance are us,
being lucky because we feel lucky,

monstors speak often one with another,
see the bull lizards crawl all over each other.

Smell that, mofa, smellmemo nofa fame fa fa fa me
lizard pheremone, so subtle after while.

Layin' out on the terrace, up above some granite
splashes from the wave that left the coastal range,

rising up from here, see it there, on googled earth,
take away the clouds and spin that globe,
like you are one of those named winds,
names you heard they called the wind; Mariah, and
Santa'na; Chinook and Roclydon and twisters
too many to name. Bringing dust to the Amazon,
to feed the hungry jungle, woken at the touch of waste
being made to feed once needless services, after,
the great lizard brains lost their minds in one fell swoop,
so they say,
they who strike the suckers, just below the root,
fine staffs are made from suckers broken off before blossom.

Orchard watches, as a young man, planless, saved, for sure,
but no assignment save this so-called fight of faith, for sure,

some people can be fed the kind of meat that forms soldiers,
from any man worth his salt, which, if it were ever a sin to gather
salt, say from the sides of the roads, where there's a plenty this spring,
why then I would think the concept of sin had passed its use by.
why,
I'd get the old pickup runnin' and take a flat blade shovel,
or, what was I thinkin'
not a type scooper, but a flat, scale-scraper shovel, there you go,
use a phrase arranger allowing such metaphors that morph to any tool.

Fluidbots in The Abyss, look it sees you seeing it, so what, was that new
when Nietzsche notict, tskt,
I trow not. But if it was then, it is not now, and that leaves me room
to say Freud imagined he knew things and his followers do as well.

Sometimes a cigar is a prop.
A stiff staff to lean on in a manifested dream interpreting schema
for ancient meta data shuffling,
the whole of all we know so far right now,
this being in which words act as though we know, we
at machine level code, being the internet, being a node, a nerve,
in the ever of ever since every thing, the whole truth thought impossible
but, to not imagine, thinking it at once,

it must be possible to tell, or why, in hell, aha, instant answer,

this is not hell, because if it was, I could not tell you the truth,
as Paul bore witness All Cretans are liars, I tell you the truth.

I bet my life, against any one of many, each experience as fable forms from,

those hang as moss in swampy tidal deltas, where rivers do not branch,
but open wide, another spring time in the Rockies, reaches all the way
to Burro Creek, down through all the Diablo Canyons in bad lands,
at the edges of the last great tsumamis that our satellitia see through centuries
and eons to when there was no thing made by man that could show him,
the Nazca Lines and our Blythe Intaglios.

In the world of artists at work, function descriptive sign making symbol
we agree, we be
come and see, sit beside our tiny fire, see, we have no words to say,
so we some times whistle and sound so much like a bird, a jay,
some one out there laughs he is my brother so he whistles better,

then every body laughs and shout PA PA PA papapapapapapa yah, way
cool, pa looks at his old walkabout friend,
he nods,
we grin, and go, well, when why was just a guest at our station,
in the core script lost,
left in the back of a black volkswagon,
who gave this boy a ride, from Santa Barbara, that strip,
I never paid enough mind to what they call it,
but it was lined with hitchhikers, they gave them rides,
and he was one of those who took PCH up and down,
a few times, spring of 1970, eventually, I imagine,
I would have been invited
to learn
at Esalen, what I could imagine doing about it.
The big? mark of the beast, the very knowledge forvidding one.

Cognosis infections sets in, but you know Jesus never sneezed,
and hees heest atuitionally
assumet' be wiping your excretions from your beard.

In the spirit, no offence, only words, no gestures, ups or downs,
rounds and rounds, teetering palms, tilting eyes, furled brow,
world class rime crimes tearing whole realities' religited ties, bows gnosis
knot release,
tricky three pole knot…

Magic, once, a few who knew, easily seemed so, read Twain,
and imagine your own, in dementia, joining other intentionally scattered
brains
informing conformist patterns that make our laughing echo
as medicine from men listening to grand fathers and uncles whistling
and laughing and little sister joining in, so grandma's sister does so, too,

woo hoo pretty soon its allusfools fullfilled dancing in the dark
where we can still feel the fire.

As a s aside, for science sake, I have reached a stage,
an effect in on or to or any of the hundred and fifty
or so pre
positions things can be, and become, formative,
logos, logical sense of saying something seems so,
if you have been at this stage, and wondered

what is it worth to say it is no secret and never was,
I use cannabis, and I read and write and function

as any writer in the days of Post and Colliers, n'such
had to believe was possible,

to create the creatures we see on television,
those were dime a dozen underground reds,
feeding fertlizer to minds subknowingly with science,
hidden persuaders, falsely called so, they were inyaface!

Fool, he follow the old weigh where heavy mean good,
real good, get down, to the ground feel the weight o'
oh momma did you know,
oh momma when did you start to show,

could you have let me be nothing but a bad draw, you
nevahnevahnevah gonna know now, but momma,

mam, where all good mommas gone, go on, you done,
you brought a heel into the world,
yes, ma'am.
a real snake stomping, preacher, kinda man, selling
salve, to soothe the transition, come the kingdom

due any day. What price you pay, what task you prefer
performance mandatory, in any sucha story
as this very one intends to be,
at a rate, cuneiform forming lets, say that,
this way
in an other time, one symbol to the thumbprint,
one per inch,
10 wpm during upload to ever from now.
Used just yoosta be we were tools.
"a used key is ever bright."
Images holding minimum 1000 words abound at Kenpepiton.com
Yenson Dec 2018
Tosh from turds, pig's swill from Honkers
faking Nationalities and accounts in infantiles guises
Gold medals cowards conjoining spurious ignorance
Lords of the pits ego-tripping imagined importance

The sons of David run monies and injuns the rest
Travellers from all points harvest progress in hot or cold
Living in the midst of home animals watching clowns at rest
Nurseries' life of flat ***** preening vainglory self adulation

Now the tall pygmies crawl to head proceedings usurped
Mud dwellers with manufactured wares in motarboards
Giving life's lectures in swivels drives with hemlocks brew
Ole King Coal now a cheap Caesar in rented Palace from Injuns

What impresses about kittens and paper lions in catalogues jeans
Gentrified slumers and three fatherless baby Sue-Can't-Say-No
Dole-Day-Tony and mates all on the warpath with street verbosity
Fluff sensibilities and impactless discernment in unity with illiteracy
jeffrey robin Jun 2015
crown of glory

                                                    ( Glory ! )

//             //

strangers movin all around

And in the glory

No
Happiness is found
::

we killed the injuns

                                           ( it is in our        Blood )

We hurt each other

                                                ( and we call it    Love )

:::;

Soldiers movin

Up and down our streets

It must mean something

But we don't know how to think

//


//

Crown of glory

The thorns cut our face

//

we hope that we are wanted

But we know that soon we'll be replaced

••

Know each other !

Before it is too late

Know each other !

And become stronger than Fate

know each other !

And be stronger than Fate
All people born on this continent are natives (locals), ergo: native Americans.
Ken Pepiton Feb 2022
2022 2:04

the VA Webex conference
future, bogus billable hours, a job,
and something to use old sad men for,

measuring, me re assuring, my more
aggressive conserver of self-will,
trained to lead, since learning to read, DID
that not occur, in each boy's life

dread of the cobalt bomb,
constancy of light speed and pituitary assisted
thought speed,
pinging pong responding, thinking we may
think
along similar lines, so, I
decided,

to find a reason to bring to any reasonings,
I recross, as many of my first reasons
are in a framed loom, with four corners,

that bronze on the map coordinates,
marks nothing, four lines dividing states,
grants given the takers and tamers of the land,

whose sons have gone on to inherit this wind.
Imagine that.
Millions of letters aligned in code to readers
of ascii nada mas this exists in a series of events

solid backups, foolproof, we say CFO proof,
in the pre-Y2K IT game, geek veteran deaf,
high-demand HR,

so much so, mucho mucho, skip the queue
step right up
look achew

gotta tale or a story, is that your's that
you're eating?

Oh, my camera is still on I'm talking to me,
in my perifery
a mete-able bit of time delay,

the in, the way, das sein, dime a time

slip on through, think we may
as well
as any, I'd agree, and off we'd go

wild blue yonder, but that,
was no longer than this two weeks,

less, far less, threaded through now,
the real me in this chair,

in the back ground, one of the service's
perks, choose from these the background,
set and setting, photo director's call

Art's call, talent is a tool, shut up,
Intuit, tweak. Test… fo' won't you shut up see

that's me. On TV, in my easy chair,
on a Federally mandated budgeted service,
to me, that allows me eight easy
pseudo-greenscreens sets, one,
defaulted to my subconscious profile,
I'll assume,
that's me. On TV, in my easy chair,
rocking in floor lit wonder in front of
Gobekli Tepi,

and nobody says a word.
Convergence foreseen in the nineties,
has occurred,
much of this sub-mit-sci-o-usly con meat
mind excuses for war,

well, long ago, it became this game,
few lived so long as to need to know
the patience going gives a slow belly
and a liar.

Dancing at the door of the iliad within,
feel free to think, that me.

The camera is on, in text, seeing me
seeing me glance down, my fingers,
pointing from the mirror, not in the mirror

my face me face, same effect, not mirrored
neurons, my neurons, feeding back

way too late to care, no coda queue for me
that is no monkey in that mirror, that is me.

Tvme offers me his right as I offer mine,
omagod that's me. On TV, in my easy chair,

this never gets old, this phase on one of these
fridays, I can do one of these groups.
with some pretty sad sacks, when seen on TV,
I fit right in, with
Gobekli Tepi, floorlit, pre-roof

Real as can be imagined, this world
common old men, commonly share
live talking head time, everybit as
trustworthy as Kronkite spelled with a c.

The c at the center of we in time where u
find sounds form some things that seem ok
if a crow caw does mean something, only that
I heard you, ok, did you hear me I don't know.

That may be life's most enjoyable time
for any idle thought poured into a word,
there, breathe, you have it, I read, read
I said, I can.

I can tell you, partly, how I came to know
I can read:

We lived behind the courthouse
with the machine gun from world war one
and absolutely olympish champs from
army navy and marines, over there
over there,
across my street, is the lawn I play on,
over there,
over there, is the jail for drunk injuns
over there is where I learned the audience

reaction to a Hualapai child, being
evangelized, he was in a mob of snot nose,
rez kids, in the nineties, eh, think about it,

this kid in the crowd looks at me,
and my stunningly ebullient zealous wife,
he says,
my grandpa has never been in jail,
and I think
my grandkids won't be proud of that.

And I'm kinda proud to think of that,
as a test, love your neighbor as clause…

that part you work out, some days amaze,
some days,
right back in the maze,
picking up fragments of prayers we made
effective,

sort of, means, sorting idle words for worth,
is what sorting any thing is for, what it's worth,
or what its worth, that difference,

a breath equivalent,' force of mind to think,
after one another then and now, the
whole life on earth is better 2020 wide,

on the layer where nothing we learn is new,
we passed that so long ago in terms of
jellotime and bulletspeed and thought
godspeed in biblical time

using the stacking of the stories for effect,
the honor to the scribes taken from the brite
sons of the weavers and spinners of yarns,
tenders of tavern, need not apply,

ah, but when the Hans were in, we could test,
life was to be examined, prepare to enter

the gate, and wait for results,
life is that test, still
smallest yes voice says.
Yenson Jun 2019
why seek the route that travails far
in my backyard the pickings are all there
but can't be arsed to oil the wheels
when the main man pays a dollar for nothing
and a roof over blondie and Jason

let the continentals be baristas for my coffee
a sub-continental can offer me a sickie
come to my land and serve I don't say Sir
mate you go earn your keep and do sweeping
my mates are waiting and it cheers all round

so who wants to be the boss of what
down my way equality is living of the scrounge
I take it as I find it and hell I am son of the land
let me sit and write across the sea
send my venting to those blue rinses
better they think they are for effort is merit
better I am with the vandals of the streets

I don't have you don't have
all's equal in war and love
my pain becomes your distress
cos in that grand scheme of things
its power in grubby hands to ruin and rack
let's drink and be merry
like Robin Hood in Sherwood forestry

I may be down here and I am proud
for to all and sundry I am the plank
that you walk on before you fall into the sea
that's my joy
a **** plank but still I count
three cheers for the bottom feeders
one day we will find our way
leave the injuns to run the show
get me a beer and a whole load
of hate
burning hate
my food for my station

— The End —