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Nat Lipstadt Sep 2019
the woven intercept

the crescendo soft ascending,
commandeers our riveting,
we do not surrender, taken, nonetheless,
our deference to an elegant wand wave,
combo hopeful and all encompassing, the helplessness

both well understood

the progression higher, steady on,
a rapture going to a defined ending,
concluding voyage occluded, for now,
but the setting sun rays us a plan, a path,
teasingly, soto voce lips moving, “this way”

follow on the unsteady water

restraining resistance failing, flailing weakly,
it is both early morning and late afternoon,
the light warms, but each, a timbre different,
the pitch and intensity tho one and the same,
yet, order confused, still, we are given-in

giving in unwillingly

absolution unrequested, but awarded anyway,
shelter from the storm of safe and warm,
children begin first school day, but adults
know better, beginnings full of risks unforeseen,
the season changes, normalized, but would be refused

if we could

the waiver offered, the woven intercept read,
emotional intelligence so fragile, on and on,
sidekicks, lovers, connected by a dotted line highway,
the space between permitting anything we want,
but contradictories say, wanting everything, impossible

but the viable solution singular

how do we leave it then? we leave it thus, clarified,
separation is a kind of attachment, voidable, when,
kissing comes calling, from all around the world,
the crescendo ends, we each have read the intercept,
it concusses, interpretations differing, yet we don’t care

lying through embracing lips


our tune is a mismatched matching,
a vision ending and yet anew hatching,
this is love, understanding, undefinable, undefeated,
a changeling definition, paths possessing multi-endings,
loving is the unceasingly, desirable imperfect struggling

unique, singular just like everyone else’s

9/4/19 9:07am

nml
(she'll know)
death wants more death, and its webs are full:
I remember my father's garage, how child-like
I would brush the corpses of flies
from the windows they thought were escape-
their sticky, ugly, vibrant bodies
shouting like dumb crazy dogs against the glass
only to spin and flit
in that second larger than hell or heaven
onto the edge of the ledge,
and then the spider from his dank hole
nervous and exposed
the puff of body swelling
hanging there
not really quite knowing,
and then knowing-
something sending it down its string,
the wet web,
toward the weak shield of buzzing,
the pulsing;
a last desperate moving hair-leg
there against the glass
there alive in the sun,
spun in white;
and almost like love:
the closing over,
the first hushed spider-*******:
filling its sack
upon this thing that lived;
crouching there upon its back
drawing its certain blood
as the world goes by outside
and my temples scream
and I hurl the broom against them:
the spider dull with spider-anger
still thinking of its prey
and waving an amazed broken leg;
the fly very still,
a ***** speck stranded to straw;
I shake the killer loose
and he walks lame and peeved
towards some dark corner
but I intercept his dawdling
his crawling like some broken hero,
and the straws smash his legs
now waving
above his head
and looking
looking for the enemy
and somewhat valiant,
dying without apparent pain
simply crawling backward
piece by piece
leaving nothing there
until at last the red gut sack
splashes
its secrets,
and I run child-like
with God's anger a step behind,
back to simple sunlight,
wondering
as the world goes by
with curled smile
if anyone else
saw or sensed my crime
ThingsWillChange May 2014
Inspired by Wendy Mass' Every Soul A Star

I stare up at the deep blue sky,
At the sun and moon up so high,
A pitch black mass,
A hot yellow gas,
Float side by side,
Then they collide,
Casting the moon's silhouette,
So I begin to forget,
Of all the difficulty,
There was previously,
And began to accept,
I decided not to intercept,
Then he slipped his hand into mine,
And I felt just fine.
A poem inspired by Wendy Mass' Every Soul A Star.
Aaron LaLux Sep 2018
"Can we make love,
at least a couple more times,
before we never see each other again?”,

Her voice is soft,
sweet,
almost innocent,
and adds an aphro-ambiance,
to the incessant crash of the ocean waves in the background,

her pleading eyes,
intercept my retreating lies,
it can be so hard to argue with the truth.

I am all out of excuses,
as we lay naked as the day we were born,
in this bed at this beachside bungalow in Baja,
clouds gathering outside for the coming post sunshine storm,

two tainted souls,
in a rare moment of purity,
as we lay there I can not lie here,
I can not tell her I will see her again,
I can not tell her everything will be okay,
I can not tell her I love her,
at least not in the same way,
as she loves me,
which of course is unconditionally,

we’ve just made love,
and as she’s mentioned,
possibly for the last time,
and though she wants to make love again and again,
until we both grow old,
wants and realities can compete in this existence,
and in this moment is where they both meet,

“Can we make love,
at least a couple more times,
before we never see each other again?”,

she asks me again,
shaking me from the depths of my thoughts,
she pulls my submarine from the dark depths,
and shakes me out to dry in the sunlight of her attention,
her question,
comes with a hint of offense,
honestly no offense was meant,
at least not from me,
it’s not that I was ignoring her in that moment,
at least not completely,

it’s just that it’s difficult for me to stay in the moment,
when the past keeps dragging me back,
and the future keeps pushing me forward,
and there’s a needy media monster that doesn’t want to be ignored,

where were,
we,
where have we gone,
and what has become,
of the innocence in which we were born?

We lay,
naked as the day we were born,
in this bed at this beachside bungalow in Baja,
clouds gathering outside for the coming post sunshine storm,

nothing covering our skin,
except a thin layer of post *** perspiration,
for even though the sun has already set,
the humid heat still sits there,
like the soon to be cloud covered moon,
that hangs lazily in the sky,
seeming neither amused nor moved by our human drama.

Her question,
is reasonable enough,
and she is,
beautiful enough,
so why,
when she asks,
“Can we make love,
at least a couple more times,
before we never see each other again?”,
can I not say yes?

Well,
for one,
I respect her too much to lie to her,
plus lying to such an honest question,
would seem so taboo,

reason number two,

they say,
we do not choose love,
they say,
love chooses us,
and I do not love her,
even though I may want to,
I do not love her,
because she is not the one Love had decided to choose,

I do not love her,
as amazing as she is,
even if I should love her,
for she is everything a mortal man could ask for,
she is,
a gorgeous and successful model,
with a sharp and receptive mind,
a big heart,
and maybe most importantly,
an undying devotional love for me,
so logically,
I should love her,

but love is not logical,
love is as passionate and irrational,
as the weather here in Baja,
one moment shining bright with clear skies,
the next moment dark and ominous with gathering clouds,

so when she asks me,
“Can we make love,
at least a couple more times,
before we never see each other again?”,

I simply say nothing,
for what can I say,
how can I explain the irrational,
how can I say the one word,
that will break her heart open,
then watch that heart break right in front of me,
how can I say “No”,
to the one question,
that the girl that has said “Yes”,
to my every question,
asks me?

So I say nothing,
I simply open this writing book,
as these skies open above us,
and write down these thoughts upon these pages,
as the desert rains fall down upon us,

I write this poem,
as we lay naked as the day we were born,
in this bed at this beachside bungalow in Baja,
as the incessant crash of the ocean waves in the background,
adds to the aphro-ambiance,
of this bittersweet moment in time,
so that even when I am gone,
and she is gone,
and we are gone,
these words,
from these thoughts,
will live forever,
immortalized in this verse,
forever resting,
somewhere in the collective psyche,
of our unified broken hearts,

as we lay there,
as we mutually mourn,
all that has been loved,
and all that has been lost,
in this impermanent moment called Life,

and she asks,
"Can we make love,
at least a couple more times,
before we never see each other again?”,

∆ Aaron LaLux ∆
My new book (Was a best seller) is now available FREE here: www.scribd.com/document/388173677/The-Holy-Trilogy-Volume-2-Mandalas
vinny Sep 2016
they all became numbers
with no distinctive features
it's how your brain learned
to differentiate creatures

kept a few hanging around
as long as they were able
a small collection of bulls
mulling in your stable

now even the stragglers gotta bail
i'm the last without fail
maybe the best curve fit
more than a digit

a quadratic equation
expressed exponentially
fading into infinity
a non linear *****
resembling lost hope

   reduced to a few  
secrets well kept:
parallel lines
never intercept
Dogs take new friends abruptly and by smell,
Cats' meetings are neat, tactual, caressive.
Monkeys exchange their fleas before they speak.
Snakes, no doubt, coil by coil reach mutual knowledge.

We then, at first encounter, should be silent;
Not court the cortex but the epidermis;
Not work from inside out but outside in;
Discover each other's flesh, its scent and texture;
Familiarize the sinews and the nerve-ends,
The hands, the hair - before the inept lips open.

Instead of which we are resonant, explicit.
Our words like windows intercept our meaning.
Our four eyes fence and flinch and awkwardly
Wince into shadow, slide oblique to ambush.
Hands stir, retract. The pulse is insulated.
Blood is turned inwards, lonely; skin unhappy ...
While always under all, but interrupted,
Antennae stretch ... waver ... and almost ... touch.
All night the dreadless Angel, unpursued,
Through Heaven’s wide champain held his way; till Morn,
Waked by the circling Hours, with rosy hand
Unbarred the gates of light.  There is a cave
Within the mount of God, fast by his throne,
Where light and darkness in perpetual round
Lodge and dislodge by turns, which makes through Heaven
Grateful vicissitude, like day and night;
Light issues forth, and at the other door
Obsequious darkness enters, till her hour
To veil the Heaven, though darkness there might well
Seem twilight here:  And now went forth the Morn
Such as in highest Heaven arrayed in gold
Empyreal; from before her vanished Night,
Shot through with orient beams; when all the plain
Covered with thick embattled squadrons bright,
Chariots, and flaming arms, and fiery steeds,
Reflecting blaze on blaze, first met his view:
War he perceived, war in procinct; and found
Already known what he for news had thought
To have reported:  Gladly then he mixed
Among those friendly Powers, who him received
With joy and acclamations loud, that one,
That of so many myriads fallen, yet one
Returned not lost.  On to the sacred hill
They led him high applauded, and present
Before the seat supreme; from whence a voice,
From midst a golden cloud, thus mild was heard.
Servant of God. Well done; well hast thou fought
The better fight, who single hast maintained
Against revolted multitudes the cause
Of truth, in word mightier than they in arms;
And for the testimony of truth hast borne
Universal reproach, far worse to bear
Than violence; for this was all thy care
To stand approved in sight of God, though worlds
Judged thee perverse:  The easier conquest now
Remains thee, aided by this host of friends,
Back on thy foes more glorious to return,
Than scorned thou didst depart; and to subdue
By force, who reason for their law refuse,
Right reason for their law, and for their King
Messiah, who by right of merit reigns.
Go, Michael, of celestial armies prince,
And thou, in military prowess next,
Gabriel, lead forth to battle these my sons
Invincible; lead forth my armed Saints,
By thousands and by millions, ranged for fight,
Equal in number to that Godless crew
Rebellious:  Them with fire and hostile arms
Fearless assault; and, to the brow of Heaven
Pursuing, drive them out from God and bliss,
Into their place of punishment, the gulf
Of Tartarus, which ready opens wide
His fiery Chaos to receive their fall.
So spake the Sovran Voice, and clouds began
To darken all the hill, and smoke to roll
In dusky wreaths, reluctant flames, the sign
Of wrath awaked; nor with less dread the loud
Ethereal trumpet from on high ‘gan blow:
At which command the Powers militant,
That stood for Heaven, in mighty quadrate joined
Of union irresistible, moved on
In silence their bright legions, to the sound
Of instrumental harmony, that breathed
Heroick ardour to adventurous deeds
Under their God-like leaders, in the cause
Of God and his Messiah.  On they move
Indissolubly firm; nor obvious hill,
Nor straitening vale, nor wood, nor stream, divides
Their perfect ranks; for high above the ground
Their march was, and the passive air upbore
Their nimble tread; as when the total kind
Of birds, in orderly array on wing,
Came summoned over Eden to receive
Their names of thee; so over many a tract
Of Heaven they marched, and many a province wide,
Tenfold the length of this terrene:  At last,
Far in the horizon to the north appeared
From skirt to skirt a fiery region, stretched
In battailous aspect, and nearer view
Bristled with upright beams innumerable
Of rigid spears, and helmets thronged, and shields
Various, with boastful argument portrayed,
The banded Powers of Satan hasting on
With furious expedition; for they weened
That self-same day, by fight or by surprise,
To win the mount of God, and on his throne
To set the Envier of his state, the proud
Aspirer; but their thoughts proved fond and vain
In the mid way:  Though strange to us it seemed
At first, that Angel should with Angel war,
And in fierce hosting meet, who wont to meet
So oft in festivals of joy and love
Unanimous, as sons of one great Sire,
Hymning the Eternal Father:  But the shout
Of battle now began, and rushing sound
Of onset ended soon each milder thought.
High in the midst, exalted as a God,
The Apostate in his sun-bright chariot sat,
Idol of majesty divine, enclosed
With flaming Cherubim, and golden shields;
Then lighted from his gorgeous throne, for now
“twixt host and host but narrow space was left,
A dreadful interval, and front to front
Presented stood in terrible array
Of hideous length:  Before the cloudy van,
On the rough edge of battle ere it joined,
Satan, with vast and haughty strides advanced,
Came towering, armed in adamant and gold;
Abdiel that sight endured not, where he stood
Among the mightiest, bent on highest deeds,
And thus his own undaunted heart explores.
O Heaven! that such resemblance of the Highest
Should yet remain, where faith and realty
Remain not:  Wherefore should not strength and might
There fail where virtue fails, or weakest prove
Where boldest, though to fight unconquerable?
His puissance, trusting in the Almighty’s aid,
I mean to try, whose reason I have tried
Unsound and false; nor is it aught but just,
That he, who in debate of truth hath won,
Should win in arms, in both disputes alike
Victor; though brutish that contest and foul,
When reason hath to deal with force, yet so
Most reason is that reason overcome.
So pondering, and from his armed peers
Forth stepping opposite, half-way he met
His daring foe, at this prevention more
Incensed, and thus securely him defied.
Proud, art thou met? thy hope was to have reached
The highth of thy aspiring unopposed,
The throne of God unguarded, and his side
Abandoned, at the terrour of thy power
Or potent tongue:  Fool!not to think how vain
Against the Omnipotent to rise in arms;
Who out of smallest things could, without end,
Have raised incessant armies to defeat
Thy folly; or with solitary hand
Reaching beyond all limit, at one blow,
Unaided, could have finished thee, and whelmed
Thy legions under darkness:  But thou seest
All are not of thy train; there be, who faith
Prefer, and piety to God, though then
To thee not visible, when I alone
Seemed in thy world erroneous to dissent
From all:  My sect thou seest;now learn too late
How few sometimes may know, when thousands err.
Whom the grand foe, with scornful eye askance,
Thus answered.  Ill for thee, but in wished hour
Of my revenge, first sought for, thou returnest
From flight, seditious Angel! to receive
Thy merited reward, the first assay
Of this right hand provoked, since first that tongue,
Inspired with contradiction, durst oppose
A third part of the Gods, in synod met
Their deities to assert; who, while they feel
Vigour divine within them, can allow
Omnipotence to none.  But well thou comest
Before thy fellows, ambitious to win
From me some plume, that thy success may show
Destruction to the rest:  This pause between,
(Unanswered lest thou boast) to let thee know,
At first I thought that Liberty and Heaven
To heavenly souls had been all one; but now
I see that most through sloth had rather serve,
Ministring Spirits, trained up in feast and song!
Such hast thou armed, the minstrelsy of Heaven,
Servility with freedom to contend,
As both their deeds compared this day shall prove.
To whom in brief thus Abdiel stern replied.
Apostate! still thou errest, nor end wilt find
Of erring, from the path of truth remote:
Unjustly thou depravest it with the name
Of servitude, to serve whom God ordains,
Or Nature:  God and Nature bid the same,
When he who rules is worthiest, and excels
Them whom he governs.  This is servitude,
To serve the unwise, or him who hath rebelled
Against his worthier, as thine now serve thee,
Thyself not free, but to thyself enthralled;
Yet lewdly darest our ministring upbraid.
Reign thou in Hell, thy kingdom; let me serve
In Heaven God ever blest, and his divine
Behests obey, worthiest to be obeyed;
Yet chains in Hell, not realms, expect:  Mean while
From me returned, as erst thou saidst, from flight,
This greeting on thy impious crest receive.
So saying, a noble stroke he lifted high,
Which hung not, but so swift with tempest fell
On the proud crest of Satan, that no sight,
Nor motion of swift thought, less could his shield,
Such ruin intercept:  Ten paces huge
He back recoiled; the tenth on bended knee
His massy spear upstaid; as if on earth
Winds under ground, or waters forcing way,
Sidelong had pushed a mountain from his seat,
Half sunk with all his pines.  Amazement seised
The rebel Thrones, but greater rage, to see
Thus foiled their mightiest; ours joy filled, and shout,
Presage of victory, and fierce desire
Of battle:  Whereat Michael bid sound
The Arch-Angel trumpet; through the vast of Heaven
It sounded, and the faithful armies rung
Hosanna to the Highest:  Nor stood at gaze
The adverse legions, nor less hideous joined
The horrid shock.  Now storming fury rose,
And clamour such as heard in Heaven till now
Was never; arms on armour clashing brayed
Horrible discord, and the madding wheels
Of brazen chariots raged; dire was the noise
Of conflict; over head the dismal hiss
Of fiery darts in flaming vollies flew,
And flying vaulted either host with fire.
So under fiery cope together rushed
Both battles main, with ruinous assault
And inextinguishable rage.  All Heaven
Resounded; and had Earth been then, all Earth
Had to her center shook.  What wonder? when
Millions of fierce encountering Angels fought
On either side, the least of whom could wield
These elements, and arm him with the force
Of all their regions:  How much more of power
Army against army numberless to raise
Dreadful combustion warring, and disturb,
Though not destroy, their happy native seat;
Had not the Eternal King Omnipotent,
From his strong hold of Heaven, high over-ruled
And limited their might; though numbered such
As each divided legion might have seemed
A numerous host; in strength each armed hand
A legion; led in fight, yet leader seemed
Each warriour single as in chief, expert
When to advance, or stand, or turn the sway
Of battle, open when, and when to close
The ridges of grim war:  No thought of flight,
None of retreat, no unbecoming deed
That argued fear; each on himself relied,
As only in his arm the moment lay
Of victory:  Deeds of eternal fame
Were done, but infinite; for wide was spread
That war and various; sometimes on firm ground
A standing fight, then, soaring on main wing,
Tormented all the air; all air seemed then
Conflicting fire.  Long time in even scale
The battle hung; till Satan, who that day
Prodigious power had shown, and met in arms
No equal, ranging through the dire attack
Of fighting Seraphim confused, at length
Saw where the sword of Michael smote, and felled
Squadrons at once; with huge two-handed sway
Brandished aloft, the horrid edge came down
Wide-wasting; such destruction to withstand
He hasted, and opposed the rocky orb
Of tenfold adamant, his ample shield,
A vast circumference.  At his approach
The great Arch-Angel from his warlike toil
Surceased, and glad, as hoping here to end
Intestine war in Heaven, the arch-foe subdued
Or captive dragged in chains, with hostile frown
And visage all inflamed first thus began.
Author of evil, unknown till thy revolt,
Unnamed in Heaven, now plenteous as thou seest
These acts of hateful strife, hateful to all,
Though heaviest by just measure on thyself,
And thy  adherents:  How hast thou disturbed
Heaven’s blessed peace, and into nature brought
Misery, uncreated till the crime
Of thy rebellion! how hast thou instilled
Thy malice into thousands, once upright
And faithful, now proved false!  But think not here
To trouble holy rest; Heaven casts thee out
From all her confines.  Heaven, the seat of bliss,
Brooks not the works of violence and war.
Hence then, and evil go with thee along,
Thy offspring, to the place of evil, Hell;
Thou and thy wicked crew! there mingle broils,
Ere this avenging sword begin thy doom,
Or some more sudden vengeance, winged from God,
Precipitate thee with augmented pain.
So spake the Prince of Angels; to whom thus
The Adversary.  Nor think thou with wind
Of aery threats to awe whom yet with deeds
Thou canst not.  Hast thou turned the least of these
To flight, or if to fall, but that they rise
Unvanquished, easier to transact with me
That thou shouldst hope, imperious, and with threats
To chase me hence? err not, that so shall end
The strife which thou callest evil, but we style
The strife of glory; which we mean to win,
Or turn this Heaven itself into the Hell
Thou fablest; here however to dwell free,
If not to reign:  Mean while thy utmost force,
And join him named Almighty to thy aid,
I fly not, but have sought thee far and nigh.
They ended parle, and both addressed for fight
Unspeakable; for who, though with the tongue
Of Angels, can relate, or to what things
Liken on earth conspicuous, that may lift
Human imagination to such highth
Of Godlike power? for likest Gods they seemed,
Stood they or moved, in stature, motion, arms,
Fit to decide the empire of great Heaven.
Now waved their fiery swords, and in the air
Made horrid circles; two broad suns their shields
Blazed opposite, while Expectation stood
In horrour:  From each hand with speed retired,
Where erst was thickest fight, the angelick throng,
And left large field, unsafe within the wind
Of such commotion; such as, to set forth
Great things by small, if, nature’s concord broke,
Among the constellations war were sprung,
Two planets, rushing from aspect malign
Of fiercest opposition, in mid sky
Should combat, and their jarring spheres confound.
Together both with next to almighty arm
Up-lifted imminent, one stroke they aimed
That might determine, and not need repeat,
As not of power at once; nor odds appeared
In might or swift prevention:  But the sword
Of Michael from the armoury of God
Was given him tempered so, that neither keen
Nor solid might resist that edge: it met
The sword of Satan, with steep force to smite
Descending, and in half cut sheer; nor staid,
But with swift wheel reverse, deep entering, shared
All his right side:  Then Satan first knew pain,
And writhed him to and fro convolved; so sore
The griding sword with discontinuous wound
Passed through him:  But the ethereal substance closed,
Not long divisible; and from the ****
A stream of necturous humour issuing flowed
Sanguine, such as celestial Spirits may bleed,
And all his armour stained, ere while so bright.
Forthwith on all sides to his aid was run
By Angels many and strong, who interposed
Defence, while others bore him on their shields
Back to his chariot, where it stood retired
From off the files of war:  There they him laid
Gnashing for anguish, and despite, and shame,
To find himself not matchless, and his pride
Humbled by such rebuke, so far beneath
His confidence to equal God in power.
Yet soon he healed; for Spirits that live throughout
Vital in every part, not as frail man
In entrails, heart of head, liver or reins,
Cannot but by annihilating die;
Nor in their liquid texture mortal wound
Receive, no more than can the fluid air:
All heart they live, all head, all eye, all ear,
All intellect, all sense; and, as they please,
They limb themselves, and colour, shape, or size
Assume, as?***** them best, condense or rare.
Mean while in other parts like deeds deserved
Memorial, where the might of Gabriel fought,
And with fierce ensigns pierced the deep array
Of Moloch, furious king; who him defied,
And at his chariot-wheels to drag him bound
Threatened, nor from the Holy One of Heaven
Refrained his tongue blasphemous; but anon
Down cloven to the waist, with shattered arms
And uncouth pain fled bellowing.  On each wing
Uriel, and Raphael, his vaunting foe,
Though huge, and in a rock of diamond armed,
Vanquished Adramelech, and Asmadai,
Two potent Thrones, that to be less than
he stands paces searches out windows feeling headache considers no matter who you are where you live we all come from same place a ****** he scribbles all i hear is *****, ***** ***** ***** new york ***** california ***** nordic ***** parisian italian spanish british irish japanese polynesian ***** ***** from all over the world ***** next door new ***** at work all the foxy ******* running around town ***** whipped pussyfooting ***** juice ***** lips colors flavors aromas squirters gushers hairy ***** ******* pierced ***** droopy swollen wet dry irritated itchy incontinent stinky ***** we are a nation of ***** obsessives he imagines Federal Bureau of ***** as an FBP agent he can show badge civilly detain any female especially those with thick dark eyebrows or difficult to decipher yet trained eye can discern fat lips within his authority to direct her to expose ***** excuse me ma’am but your eyebrows warrant examination of your bush please assume position this won’t take any longer than is necessary sometimes certain detainee’s inspections require unrestricted scrutinyhe thinks why don’t governments militaries realize power of *****? instead of inventing employing weapons of mass destruction why not use ******* to distract ****** young male soldiers? imagine furry rabbit rockets with pink twitchy noses floppy wet lips darting through air shooting everywhere distinctly resembling smell taste warm ***** yet fatal mechanisms that could attach **** **** consume who could resist? probably someone would come up with ***** defense system (PDS) which would intercept scudding ******* before they reached intended targetshe wakes up early disorientated turns on tv commercial TUMS blares in groggy dyslexic state by mistake he reads backwards sees **** on tv questions what is this place i lived in? america fat turkey on map with brains in new york city *** in d.c. paw in miami stomach in midwest ******* in california nested on egg over mexico he writes i envision statue of liberty alive real beautiful woman little children tumble run around her giggling laughing innocently playing hide and seek with her gown then some bigger older men approach offer her gifts to pull up her dress do other things she appears startled at them refusing to accept their crass proposals men continue to bring more gifts promise her things despite her cold-shoulder suddenly she appears worried perhaps she is thinking about someone special maybe her family men’s offers keep piling higher eventually she breaks down accepts their proposals men gather around her very close i cannot see what they are doing but can hear whispering conspiring heavy breathing then i see her hand reach out all at once she spills burning torch catching fire to gown
LJW Feb 2014
I've given poetry readings where less than a handful of people were present. It's a humbling experience. It’s also a deeply familiar experience.

"Poetry is useless," poet Geoffrey ****** said in a 2013 interview, "but it is useless the way the soul is useless—it is unnecessary, but we would not be what we are without it."

I was raised a Roman Catholic, and though I don’t go to Mass regularly anymore, I still remember early mornings during Advent when I went to liturgies at my parochial school. It was part of my offering—the sacrifice I made to honor the impending birth of the Savior—along with giving up candy at Lent. So few people attended at that hour that the priest turned on only a few lights near the altar. Approaching the front of the church, my plastic book bag rustling against my winter coat, I felt as if I were nearing the seashore at sunrise: the silhouettes of old widows on their kneelers at low tide, waiting for the priest to come in, starting the ritual in plain, unsung vernacular. No organist to blast us into reverence. No procession.

Every day, all over the world, these sparsely attended ceremonies still happen. Masses are said. Poetry is read. Poems are written on screens and scraps of paper. When I retire for the day, I move into a meditative, solitary, poetic space. These are the central filaments burning through my life, and the longer I live, the more they seem to be fused together.

Poetry is marginal, thankless, untethered from fame and fortune; it's also gut level, urgent, private yet yearning for connection. In all these ways, it's like prayer for me. I’m a not-quite-lapsed Catholic with Zen leanings, but I’ll always pray—and I’ll always write poems. Writing hasn’t brought me the Poetry Jackpot I once pursued, but it draws on the same inner wiring that flickers when I pray.        

• • •

In the 2012 collection A God in the House: Poets Talk About Faith, nineteen contemporary American poets, from Buddhist to Wiccan to Christian, discuss how their artistic and spiritual lives inform one another. Kazim Ali, who was raised a Shia Muslim, observes in his essay “Doubt and Seeking”:

[Prayer is] speaking to someone you know is not going to be able to speak back, so you're allowed to be the most honest that you can be. In prayer you're allowed to be as purely selfish as you like. You can ask for something completely irrational. I have written that prayer is a form of panic, because in prayer you don't really think you're going to be answered. You'll either get what you want or you won't.

You could replace the word "prayer" with "poetry" with little or no loss of meaning. I'd even go so far as to say that submitting my work to a journal often feels like this, too. Sometimes, when I get an answer in the form of an acceptance, I'm stunned.

"I never think of a possible God reading my poems, although the gods used to love the arts,” writes ***** Howe in her essay "Footsteps over Ground." She adds:

Poetry could be spoken into a well, of course, and drop like a penny into the black water. Sometimes I think that there is a heaven for poems and novels and music and dance and paintings, but they might only be hard-worked sparks off a great mill, which may add up to a whole-cloth in the infinite.

And here, you could easily replace the word "poetry" with "prayer." The penny falling to the bottom of a well is more often what we experience. But both poetry and prayer are things humans have learned to do in order to go on. Doubt is a given, but we do get to choose what it is we doubt.

A God in the House Book Cover
Quite a few authors in A God in the House (Howe, Gerald Stern, Jane Hirschfield, Christian Wiman) invoke the spiritual writing of Simone Weil, including her assertion that "absolutely unmixed attention is prayer." This sounds like the Zen concept of mindfulness. And it broadens the possibility for poetry as prayer, regardless of content, since writing poetry is an act of acute mindfulness. We mostly use words in the practical world to persuade or communicate, but prayers in various religious traditions can be lamentations of great sorrow. Help me, save me, take this pain away—I am in agony. In a church or a temple or a mosque, such prayerful lamentation is viewed as a form of expression for its own good, even when it doesn't lead immediately to a change of emotional state.

Perhaps the unmixed attention Weil wrote of is a unity of intention and utterance that’s far too rare in our own lives. We seldom match what we think or feel with what we actually say. When it happens spontaneously in poetry or prayer—Allen Ginsberg's "First thought, best thought" ideal —it feels like a miracle, as do all the moments when I manage to get out of my own way as a poet.

Many people who pray don’t envision a clear image of whom or what they’re praying to. But poets often have some sense of their potential readers. There are authorities whose approval I've tried to win or simply people I've tried to please: teachers, fellow writers, editors, contest judges—even my uncle, who actually reads my poems when they appear in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, where he used to work.

And yet, my most immersed writing is not done with those real faces in mind. I write to the same general entity to which I pray. It's as if the dome of my skull extends to the ceiling of the room I'm in, then to the dome of the sky and outward. It’s like the musings I had as a child lying awake at night, when my imagination took me to the farthest reaches of the galaxy. But then I emerge from this wide-open state and begin thinking about possible readers—and the faces appear.

This might also be where the magic ends.

• • •

I write poetry because it’s what I do, just as frogs croak and mathematicians ponder numbers. Poetry draws on something in me that has persisted over time, even as I’ve distracted myself with other goals, demands, and purposes; even as I’ve been forced by circumstance to strip writing poetry of certain expectations.

"Life on a Lily Pad" © Michelle Tribe
"Life on a Lily Pad"
© Michelle Tribe
At 21, I was sure I’d publish my first book before I was 25. I’m past my forties now and have yet to find a publisher for a book-length collection, though I've published more than a hundred individual poems and two chapbooks. So, if a “real” book is the equivalent of receiving indisputable evidence that your prayers are being answered, I’m still waiting.

It hasn’t been easy to shed the bitter urgency I’ve felt on learning that one of my manuscripts was a finalist in this or that contest, but was not the winner. Writing in order to attain external success can be as tainted and brittle as saying a prayer that, in truth, is more like a command: (Please), God, let me get through this difficulty (or else)—

Or else what? It’s a false threat, if there’s little else left to do but pray. When my partner is in the ICU, his lungs full of fluid backed up from a defective aortic valve; when my nephew is deployed to Afghanistan; when an ex is drowning in his addiction; when I hit a dead end in my job and don’t think I can do it one more day—every effort to imagine that these things might be gotten through is a kind of prayer that helps me weather a life over which I have little control.

Repeated disappointment in my quest to hit the Poetry Jackpot has taught me to recast the jackpot in the lowercase—locating it not in the outcome but in the act of writing itself, sorting out the healthy from the unhealthy intentions for doing it. Of course, this shift in perspective was not as neat as the preceding sentence makes it seem. There were years of thrashing about, of turning over stones and even throwing them, then moments of exhaustion when I just barely heard the message from within:

This is too fragile and fraught to be something that guides your whole life.

I didn't hear those words, exactly—and this is important. For decades, I’ve made my living as a writer. But I can't manipulate or edit total gut realizations. I can throw words at them, but it would be like shaking a water bottle at a forest fire; at best, I can chase the feeling with metaphors: It's like this—no, like this—or like this.

So, odd as this sounds for a poet, I now seek wordlessness. When I meditate, I intercept hundreds of times the impulse to shape a perception into words. Reduced to basics, the challenge facing any writer is knowing what to say—and what not to.

• • •

To read or listen to poetry requires unmixed attention just as writing it does. And when a poem is read aloud, there's a communal, at times ritualistic, element that can make a reading feel like collective prayer, even if there are only a few listeners in the audience or I’m listening by myself.

"Allen Ginsberg" © MDCArchives
Allen Ginsberg
© MDCArchives
When I want to feel moved and enlarged, all I have to do is play Patti Smith's rendition of Ginsberg's "Footnote to Howl." His long list poem from 1955 gathers people, places, objects, and abstractions onto a single exuberant altar. It’s certainly a prayer, one that opens this way:

Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy! Holy!

The world is holy! The soul is holy! The skin is holy! The nose is holy! The tongue and **** and hand and ******* holy!

Everything is holy! everybody’s holy! everywhere is holy! everyday is in eternity! Everyman’s an angel!

Some parts of Ginsberg's list ("forgiveness! charity! faith! bodies! suffering! magnanimity!") belong in any conventional catalogue of what a prayer celebrates as sacred. Other profane elements ("the ***** of the grandfathers of Kansas!") gain admission because they are swept up into his ritualistic roll call.

I can easily parody Ginsberg's litany: Holy the Dairy Queen, holy the barns of the Amish where cheese is releasing its ambitious stench, holy the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Internet. But reading the poem aloud feels to me the way putting on ritual garments must to a shaman or rabbi or priest. Watching Patti Smith perform the poem (various versions are available on YouTube), I get shivers seeing how it transforms her, and it's clear why she titled her treatment of the poem "Spell."

A parody can't do that. It can't manifest as the palpable unity of intention and utterance. It can't do what Emily Dickinson famously said that poetry did to her:

If I read a book [and] it makes my whole body so cold no fire ever can warm me I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only [ways] I know it. Is there any other way.

Like the process of prayer—to God, to a better and bigger self, to the atmosphere—writing can be a step toward unifying heart, mind, body, universe. Ginsberg's frenzied catalogue ends on "brilliant intelligent kindness of the soul"; Eliot's The Waste Land on "shantih," or "the peace that surpasseth understanding." Neither bang nor whimper, endings like these are at once humble and tenacious. They say "Amen" and step aside so that a greater wordlessness can work its magic.
From the website http://talkingwriting.com/poetry-prayer
When the end of eternity arrives, you shall be by my side awaiting the dawn.
The Sun rises bringing newfound hope to the denizens of a light and airy realm,
Our spirits reanimate, rejuvenate, resurrect; intercept weariness of heart.
Doves above the high plains carry our love across the infinite sea of the Universe.

Stars and twinkling celestial bodies swirl around the center of all creation.
Pianos, my threnody has become a source of lament and bemoaning but in time a love song will revitalize a deadened soul with a deprivation of cosmic oxygen.
I want you to breathe newfound air into my nostrils, fill me to the brim with your breath of life, toxicity to the bones.
Being able to stand in your midst will be an impossibility.

My knees will give out and as I fall to ground you will tightly grasp my hand and pull my body into yours.
“Amplify my heartbeat with the sound waves of your voice.”
“Ensconce within the warmth of my body, feel the heat rise when we begin to caress each other softly.”
My blood becomes frigid smoke when I’m in your midst.

Nothing but cold heat courses through my body.
I’m frozen, stuck in a cube of time and space where you and I reside in comfort and abysmal enamorment.
-Ardent passion-
This is where my heat lies.

The inferno that burns beneath my wary skin is a tempest of sequestered affection.
“I’m afraid to be touched.”
You are the element of freedom.
You are the most sought after and desired material in all creation.

The materialistic nature of this world has accosted me with a cannonade of ****** bullets, pleasing in a forbidden way…
Gazing upon you with my eyes is a sin.
A transgression.
But the platinum heart in your possession is my desire.

Daffodils and roses surround us in a floral sphere; a yellow tinged bubble..
We transcend gravity and float above the ground.
-Fragrance-
An aromatic barrage of iridescent fumes intoxicates us as we rise past the stratosphere, mesosphere, troposphere, and conscious- sphere.

Being with you is a higher plane of existence where your every breath is vital to my survival.
Magic courses through my veins when I hold your arms around me.
Aqueous bombs descend from my eyelashes when you depart.
A deluge of tears has accosted me.

My body contorts and I crawl into a corner; this is my cloister of trials.

Those seemingly eternal eons during which I endure the withdrawal symptoms of your narcotic love…
Maybe you’re a hallucinogenic?
Lying on the cold and sobering concrete floor beneath me, I **** my thumbs in the fetal position.
I’m an infant after you vanish in the thick and noxious puff of smoke that lingers long after you are gone.

You are a master of the arcane.
You are nothing short of extraordinary.
Even when you disappear it is nothing short of awe-inspiring.
I feel the love spells from your tome of seduction blast my fragile spirit till’ I begin to lose my sight.

I clench my forehead with the back of my skull pressed against, being caressed by these sanguine reds walls that seem to cave in.
I can’t hold my head up any longer.
I lie in darkness as chaos consumes my soul.
The murky and dank ambushes me from the corners of an unknown dimension.

I’ve slipped into an unknown land.
A myriad of ravens with ebony wings surround me until I am no longer visible to another human soul.
They latch onto my skin, grapple onto my thighs, weigh me down with despair and push me six feet under.
When all is dim and lost?

I realize this is figment of the imagination, a fabrication…
I realize this is all a dream.
A dream of what could be.
A dream of a narcotic love.

I have yet to jostle that unknown creature who lurks at the threshold of the limitless skies.
When I reach the stars in my spaceship of galactic love then I will find you.
Obscurity runs amuck in the dimension that I now reside in.
Dark clouds loom above the skies…

The sun is nowhere in sight.
A storm is brewing as lightning begins to crash.
In those brief seconds of illumination I am bombarded with visions of your face.
The complexion of your skin, the feel of your flesh beneath my fingertips.

I hope that your touch will unbind me, loose me from the disillusionment that I’ve been threatened by all my life.
I beseech the heavens to shackle me with iridescent chains to the stars so that gravity will never pull me away from my dreams.
I will hang above the terrene never plummeting down the sea of the skies, never being incinerated by the blaze of freefalling down the atmosphere.
You will be my reward.

That glowing gift box with a celestial wrapping.
A diadem with the most extravagant gems and diamonds shall be waiting for me beneath the cosmic plastic wrapping and the golden ivory box that surround this gift.
When I open it, this crown shall begin to levitate and a human silhouette made of light shall begin to transfigure itself from naught beneath it.
Skin will slowly attach to your luminescent body.

Your metacarpals and phalanges will appear.
Your ribcage will expand and a platinum heart will begin beating within it’s confines.
-The heart that I’ve always wished for-
I will finally be able to gaze upon your face.

I will hold onto and never let you go.
We will grow old together and when we near the end of our lifetime, we shall become nebular gases.
We will then become one with the Universe.
The remnants of our love will last everlastingly even after the spark of passion is long gone, when our corporeal vessels no longer exist in a physical form.

“I don’t…I have nothing else to say but that I will be waiting.”
“I will wait for you to materialize in my midst.”
“My heart ails for you but my malady will dissipate once you arrive.”
“Every heartbeat leads you and I one step closer to one another.”

“You will be my remedy, my panacea of love.”
“I love you but I don’t even know who you are!”
“The reason why is unknown to me.”
“I will be waiting darling.”

“I will be waiting for your earth-shattering kiss.”
When the ground beneath us begins to crumble, we shall plummet beneath the lithosphere and asthenosphere till’ we reach the core of the planet.
We shall become the inferno beneath the ground.
Our passion will burn so brightly, so fervently, that an eruption will take place above the surface of the ground.

The world will know that when we make love, the air will be ignited.
Our passion shall heat up the Universe.
You will be in my Universe  and you will be my Universe…
Maybe then?

-I’ll become yours-

To my Future Lover, to my moon, sun, and stars, to my Universe,
By, Iridescently Efflorescent
Stephan Jul 2016

Quiet echoes bring the night of cricket song and firefly
as masks of clouded abstract shades intercept
Foaming colors take the eye to moments of shadowed dreams,
crimson plumes beneath a starlit canopy
Footing soft on dry grass down paths not yet worn,
wandering along fence line silhouettes

A golden sphere, above mature pecan trees appears as curtains lift
igniting the northern sky in beaconed majesty
Slowly puzzle pieced mist clears and bursts of color,
rainbows of dark bands announce the arrival
as this evening’s lunar show begins amidst
heavy sighs and mesmerized smiles

Soft in splendor, basking in myth,
the full moon, distant yet touching the soul
This night is shared, beyond horizon’s glare
and focused thoughts of two places, two hearts, one sky
Whispers follow beams of ancient descent, silently finding her,
hoping she will sense and know…that it is this moon that is ours
Sarina Aug 2013
Roses are hidden in buckets
a child could put one in her hair, a child could
create sandcastles up to their knees with
such. Yet these

creatures do not use his or her thorns
to intercept the road from garden to factory lines.
Funny to think one's skin shall

became tainted by something
that sleeps in peace right outside. Then, I think
about packing man into a bottle of mist
and would like to harvest my love's breath.
Venusoul7 May 2014
What can I say?
This Tendered Theme
Sliced Me up this Way

Although this Injury
Be self Sustained
Extremity on Display

Tendered Themes to Do
Sensitively
Rearrange my Attitude

Keep me right on Track
Must I Confess?
Intercept & Mirror Back

Images Promising
See again~The
Violence of Blossoming
Making some room to Grow
anastasiad Nov 2016
Normally during the two-factor validation approach the one-time pass word is needed to make sure that anyone id. The following safeguards authentication by way of looking for numerous considerations to be attained which include something understand and something you might have. Something you understand remaining a person's common account information then one you may have currently being your OTP or maybe one-time pass word. However for the duration of ****** of the one-time private data any nuller could possibly however intercept the data to gain entry in case the OTP is not provided for a great out-of-band community.

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The only method to become a little more protected when you previously implement a great out-of-band OTP with regard to two-factor authorization is if it's a zero influence alternative. No presence authentications enable the one-time security password to get sent without leaving every locate with the authentication or even username and password at the rear of on the gadget. Finally obtaining this certification approach from net or maybe circle based strikes.

http://www.passwordmanagers.net/resources/How-to-Cleverly-Use-the-NSIS-as-a-ZIP-Password-*******-54.html ZI­P Password *******
Jiawen 张 Oct 2017
He is an exponential function.
Small rate of change at the beginning,
But he grows fast when he reaches a certain age.
    
I am a function of a straight line.
A big constant ***** since the beginning,
But I also have a y-intercept way bigger than zero.
    
Let our age be the inputs,
And our maturity be the outputs.
At year zero,
We didn’t know each other.
We didn’t know we would cross each other one day.
      
We have been working so hard.
We have been living in different countries.
We were like two parallel lines,
Which would never meet each other.
    
But at year 20 for me,
And at year 30 for him,
We finally crossed each other,
And we were smart enough to find our intersection.
      
We are still growing into different directions,
Because that probably will be our only intersection.
But we only need that one intersection,
Because we are all independent now.
We don’t need other people to input data anymore.
#MathMajor
km Dec 2010
Alone;
Intermitted silence
Has a sound
Of nothingness
It exists in its
Non-existence
In the very same
Way as you and I
As we realize we
Are only objects
In other’s worlds;
Only noise to
The ears that
Intercept us
We exist in
Nothingness
When we exist
As sound does
In silence
Rights of the author
Its 8:30 in the AM
The Corn Moon
is being routed by a
Manassas cloud bank

NPR be barking
Irma this, Irma that
my tremblin Rav4
stuck in the rush
is idling behind
a pair of gray hairs
spewing
leaded premium
out the back
of a big old black Buick
sportin Florida tags

inching north up I95
I’m relieved to be
a thousand miles
ahead of the
monstrous *****
denuding Barbuda
deflowering the
****** Islands
and threatening to topple
the last vestiges of
Castro’s Dynasty
by disrupting upscale
bourgeois markets
for cafe Cubanos,
cool Cohibas and
bold Bolivars

she’s a CAT 5
counterclockwise
spinning catastrophe
churning through
the Florida straits
bending steel framed
Golden Arches
shaking the tiki shacks
gobbling lives
defiling tropical dreams

the best
meteorological minds
on the Weather Channel
plug the Euro model
to plot a choreography
of Irma’s cyclonic sashay

they predict she’ll
strut her stuff
up a runway  
that perfectly
dissects the  
Sunshine State
ransacking
the topography
venting carnage
like battalions of
badly behaved frat boys,
schools of guys gone wild
sophomores, wreaking havoc
during a Daytona Beach
spring break
droolin over *******
popping woodies at
wet tee shirt contests
urinating on doorstoops
puking into Igloo Coolers
and breaking their necks
from ill advised
second floor leaps
into the shallow end
of Motel 6 pools

but I’m rolling north
into the secure
arms of a benign
Mid Atlantic Summer
like other refugees,
my trunk is
filled with baggage
of fear and worry
wondering
if there’re be anything
left to return to
once Irma
has spent herself
with one last
furious ****
against the
Chattanooga Bluffs of
Lookout Mountain

Morning Edition
Is yodeling a common
seasonal refrain
the gubmint is
just about outta cash
congress needs to
increase the debt limit

My oh my,
has the worm turned
during the Obama years
the GOP put us through a
Teabag inspired nightmare
gubmint shutdowns
and sequestration
shaved 15 points
off every war profiteers vig
it gave a well earned
long overdue
take the rest of the week off
unpaid vacation
to non essential
gubmint workers
while a cadre of
wheelchair bound
Greatest Generation
military vets get
locked out of the
WWII Memorial on the
National Mall

this time around
its different
we have an Orange Hair
in the office and there's
some hyper sensitivity
to raise the debt ceiling
given that Harvey
has yet to fully
drain from the
Houston bayous

the colossal cleanup
from that thrice in a
Millennial lifetime storm
has garnered bipartisan support
to  clean up the wreckage
left behind by a
badly behaved
one star BnB lodger
who took a week
long leak into the
delicate bayous of
Southeast Texas

yet we are infused
with optimism that our
Caucasian president
and his GOP grovelers
now mustered
to the Oval Office
will slow tango
with the flummoxed
no answer Dems
to get the job done

pigs do fly in DC
Ryan and McConnell
double date with
Pelosi and Schumer
get to heavy pettin
from front row seats
beholding droll  
Celebrity Apprentice
reruns

The Donald, Nancy and Chuck
slip the room for a little
menage au trois side action
transforming Mitch and Paul
into vacillating voyeurs
who start jerking their dongs
while POTUS, and his
new found friends
get busy workin
the art of a deal

rush hour peaks
static traffic grows
in concert with
a swelling  
frenetic angst
driving drivers
to madness
terrified
they won't
get paid if
the debt ceiling
don't rise
they honk horns
rev engines
thumb iPhones
and sing out
primal screams

unmindful drivers
piloting Little Hondas
bump cheap Beamers
start a game of
bumper cars
dartin in and out
of temporary gaps
uncovered by the
spastic fits and starts
of temporary
decongested
ebbs and flows

A $12 EZ Pass
gambit is offered
the fast lane
on ramp
has few takers
just another
pick your pocket
gubmint scheme
two express lanes
lie vacant
while three lanes of
non premium roadway
boast bumper to bumper
inertness
wasted fuel
declining productivity
skyrockets
the  wisdom of
the invisible hand doesn't
seem to be working

DOJ bureaucrats
In Camrys and Focuses
dial the office
to let somebody
know they’ll
be tardy

gubmint contractors in
silver Mercedes begin
jubilantly honking horns
NPR has just announced that
Pelosi and Schumer
joined the Orange team
the rise in the debt ceiling
will nullify their 15%
sequestration pay cut

NPR reports the
National Cathedral will
deconsecrate two hallowed
stained glass windows of
rebel generals R E Lee
and Stonewall Jackson
it's a terrible shame that
the Episcopal Church
will turn its back on the
rich Dixie WASPS
who commissioned these
installations to commemorate
the church's complicity
in sanctifying the
institution of slavery,
WWJD?

as I ponder
this Anglican
conundrum another
object arrests my
streaming consciousness
upsetting an attention span
shorter and less deep
than the patch of oil  
disappearing under the front
of the RAV as I thunder by
at 5 MPH

to the left I eye a
funny looking building
standing at attention
next to a Bob Evans

I’m convinced
Its gotta be CIA
a 15 story
gubmint minaret
a listening post
wired to intercept
mobile digital
confabulations
from crawling traffic
inching along
beneath its feet

this thinking node
pulsing with
intelligence
reeking with
counterintelligence
the tautological
contradiction
guarantees the
stasis of our
confused
national consciousness

strategically positioned to
tune into the
intractable Zeitgeist
culling meta code
planting data points
In Big Data
data farms
running algos
to discern bits
of intelligence
endeavoring to reveal
future shock trends
knows nothing
reveals less

the buildings cover
is its acute
conspicuousness
gray steel frame
silver tinted glass
multiple wireless antennas
black rimmed windows
boldly proclaim
any data entering
this cheerless edifice
must abandon all hope
of ever being framed
in a non duplicitous
non self serving sentence

the gray obelisk a
national security citidel
refracts the
fear and loathing
the sprawling
global anxiety
our civilization's
discontent
playing out
in the captive
soft parade
ambling along
the freeway jam
imobilized
at its stoop

Moning Edition jingle
follows urgent report of
FEMA scamblin assets
arbitraging Harvey and Irma
triaging two
tropical storm tragedies
and a third girl
just named Maria
pushed off the Canaries
and is on its way to a
Puerto Rico
homecoming

while
gubmint  bureaucrats
anxiously push on
to their soulless offices
the rush hour jam
has peaked
my WAZE
is having a
nervous breakdown

next lane over
a guy in a gold PT Cruiser
is banging on his steering wheel
don’t think this unessential worker
will win September's
civil servant of the month award

Ex Military
K Street defectors
slamming big civie
Hummers
getting six mpg
lobby for a larger
apportionment
of mercenary dollars
for Blackwater's
global war on terror

Prius Hybrids
silently roll on
politely driven by
EPA Hangers On
hoping to save
a bit of the planet
from an Agency Director
intent on the agency's
deconstruction
the third 500 year hurricane
of the season
is of no consequence

obsolete
GMC Jimmy’s
are manned by
Steve Mnunchin
wannabes
the frugal
treasury dept
ledger keepers
pour good money after bad
to keep the national debt
and there clanking
jalopies working

driving Malibus
DOL stalwarts
stickin with the Union
give biz to GMC

nice lookin chicks
young coed interns
with big daddy doners
fix their faces and
come to work
whenever they want

my *** is killing me
I squirm in my seat
to relieve my aching sacroiliac
and begin to wonder if my name
will appear on some
computer printout today?
can’t afford an IRS audit
maybe my house will
be claimed by some
eminent domaine landgrab?
Perhaps NSA
may come calling,
why did I sign that
Save The Whales
Facebook Petition?

The EZ Pass lane
is movin real easy
mocking the gridlock
that goes all the way
to Baltimore
a bifurcated Amerika
is an exhaust spewing
standing condemnation
to small “R”
republicanism  

glint from windshields
is blinding
my **** is hurtin and
gettin back to Jersey
gunna take a while
GPS recalcs arrival time

an intrepid Lyft driver
feints and dodges
into the traffic gaps
drivin the shoulder
urging his way to the
Ronnie Reagan International
I'm sure
gettin heat from
a backseat fare
that shoulda pinged
an hour earlier

Irma creeps
toward the Florida Keys
faster then the
glacial jam
befuddling congress

I think I just spotted
Teabag Patriot
Grover Norquist
manning a rampart
bestriding a highway overpass
he’s got a clipboard in hand
checking the boxes
counting cars
taking names
who’s late?
who’s unessential?

man
whatta jam we're in

Music Selection:
Jeff Beck: Freeway Jam

Orlando
9/21/17
jbm
written as im stuck in jam headin back to jersey
touka Nov 2021
a lone something in the sky
flies near, just by mischance
dazed by the smog,
bowing
and diving
downward
into the parting, cracking,
quaking
bellowing of tar
from the firy, sputtering lungs of these alps
eons worth of cries released in mere mouth-ajar gasps
of the earth diverging and converging
into the debt of always running clean,
running me
always downward,
as in the deep
deep
tessellations of rock
I become.

too still for my own good,
I guess –
another voice on the ash-flow tuffs of
breath to fill the mosaic
of sinewy
stripe-patterned goodbye and bygone
plating into the deep,
deep,
deeper caverns of the unseen sea
slipping off the mantle, an accident with intention,
as an echo caving downward into  

nothing,

nothing,

more

nothing

polluting the depths from the palisades,
scripture rupturing lowshore into
surrounding tissues like
igneous stone
dreams of clinks ringing,
of noise
a voice
on the ash-flow tuffs
in the always running-clean water
the purity of which I intercept,
the clear-ness of it;
a sinners window.

through what's left,
I see the clam
another mouth for and of the sea
unseen,
the pearl
as unsoiled as ever
Arlene Corwin Sep 2017
I woke up thinking about this.

         A Thought About Loyalty

I’ve been thinking about loyalty:
A many-sided world of nuances,
The subtle differences.
We all know it means faithfulness,
A sticking-to devotedly.
Unfurled it shows its nasty sides,
The negatives that worry me:
Allegiance and adherence -
-Ism’s steel prepared to go to war
Against all criticizers,
-Isms’ others
Carving up the brotherhood
Of man.
Not for nothing
That a missile system drawn
To sense and intercept an enemy:
Is named the Patriot:
A system to annihilate.

I worry ‘bout obedience,
Compliance and submissiveness.
I like reliability, dependability,
Dedication if it’s not perverted
Duty, if it leads to thought,
A moral sense,
An ethic that agrees with life;
Loyalty without the strife.
Loyalty to think about.

A Thought About Loyalty 9.10.2017
Nature In & Of Reality; Out Times, Out Culture II;
Arlene Corwin
Loyalty . what is it?  Good and bad, as always
Joel A Doetsch Feb 2019
Max didn't even want to be there.  His coworkers had invited him, and he hadn't had an excuse handy.  

In truth, Max's coworkers didn't want him to be there, either.  They had secretly hoped that he wouldn't come.  Everyone else was going, though, so they felt bad not asking.  Now they wished they hadn't

Here he was, though, sitting around a table in a seedy local pub, waiting for "The great Garbo: Magician and Hypnotist".  Probably just another hack who was filling time between kiddy birthday parties.  The show was supposed to have started ten minutes ago, but hadn't, and now Max was being forced to socialize with people who he spent a great deal of effort trying to avoid most of the time.  It was crap, and he wasn't happy about it.

In truth, Max was very unhappy in general, but in a way that his brain was unable to put into concrete words.  He'd been unhappy for so long, in fact, that he didn't even recognize that he was unhappy.  He had just long ago come to the conclusion that the world was unpleasant, and he was the only person who understood that.  Everyone else was a foolish prat who could barely keep from being distracted long enough by the next shiny toy to notice.

He regarded his mostly empty beer that he had been nursing.  He heard his co-workers talking about some new superhero movie when the lights finally dimmed and a man walked onto the beer-stained stage and threw his cape (the **** had a cape!) dramatically over his shoulder.  "Good evening, my fine ladies and gentlemen!  I, the Great Garbo, welcome you.  You may have seen so called 'magic' before, but I promise you that when you leave here tonight, you will be filled with awe and wonder!"

Max yawned, rather loudly, to glares from his co-workers, as Garbo continued his spiel.  He looked lazily around the room, hoping to catch the eye of the waiter for another drink.  If he was going to be forced to watch this swill, he was going to at least be liquored up.

By the time Max looked back towards the stage, Garbo had wrapped up, and was starting.  He began with a number of standard tricks with rings and never-ending handkerchiefs.  Each time, Max would mumble something under his breath.

"...Obviously had it up his sleeve"
"Trick ring, there's clearly some sort of mechanism there"
"...had that deck set up before"

Meanwhile, his co-workers shushed him as they attempted, in vain, to enjoy the show.

Soon, though, the magician got more creative, juggling a set of ***** that turned into doves, which then flew back into his hands as ***** again.  Then he turned his entire coat from dingy black to a brilliant  red with a wave of his hand.  Max remained steadfast in his desire to remain unimpressed.  Surely this was some sort of electronic trickery.  He stifled another yawn, then decided to go to the restroom.

He got up, and tapped one of his co-workers on the shoulder.  Was it Reed?  Or James.  His co-worker looked at him warily.  "Hey James, I need to take a ****.  Need to get through".  He looked annoyed.  Must've been Reed.  "Can't you wait until the act is over?".  Max rolled his eyes, and then mustered up as much sarcasm as he could (which was quite a lot). "I'm sure the 'Great Garbo' won't miss me.  I'll just be a minute".  Reed (yes, definitely Reed) sighed and got up to pull his chair back so Max could get out.  Max picked his way through the surprisingly large crowd towards the bathrooms, not apologizing on the way, when he heard a voice.  "You sir, you would like to volunteer, would you  not?"

Max turned, and Garbo was looking at him expectantly.  He hadn't heard what Garbo had been talking about. He recovered his wits and responded "Nah, I'm sure one of these simpletons would love to, though".  From the crowd where he had left he heard someone yell "Oh come on, Max, maybe he can hypnotize you into having a sense of ******* humor".  Max gave the finger in the general direction of the voice, earning him a few boos from the crowd.  Garbo put his hand up to calm the crowd.  "Come now...Max, is it?  Surely you've been impressed with some of the show tonight?".  Max scoffed.  "I'm impressed that you're able to make a living off of parlor tricks", he said, before turning back towards the bathroom.

"Max, I think you need to come up here"

Max suddenly stopped.  He felt like he had been going somewhere else...but that couldn't be the case, he was supposed to be going onto the stage.  He turned and amiably made his way up the few stairs

"Now Max seems to be unimpressed with the show.  Shall I show him some real magic?"

The crowd clapped

Max wondered how he'd gotten on stage.  He had been going towards the bathroom....he needed to...

"Max, you seem unhappy to be here.  I think I know what'll cheer you up, though."

Garbo reached into his pocket, and pulled out a small rubber ball.  

Max suddenly came back to himself.  "I don't know what drugs you gave me to convince me to get up here, but this show is over and I'm leaving.  I'll be sure to let the police know that your show relies on your audience being high"

Garbo grinned a toothy grin as Max walked away, and then spoke right before Max got down the first step, dragging each word out carefully.

"Who's...a...good....boy"

Max stopped and considered this.  I mean...he certainly wasn't bad.  There was certainly room for improvement, for sure, but he wasn't bad, so he must be good.  He slowly turned and stared at Garbo, and was surprised as his mouth started moving.

"I am."

Wait. What?  Max's mind reeled and his eyes widened in fear, but he did not run.  His legs didn't want to move.  His eyes seemed to be locked onto the ball.  That looked like a really nice ball.  He wanted it.

Garbo took a step forward.

"Who's a good boy"

This time Max answered more confidently.  "I am.  I'm a good boy"

The crowd clapped and whistled, though they weren't sure what they were seeing.

Garbo moved the ball back and forth, and Max watched it intently.  
He wished Garbo would throw the ball.

"Who's a good boy!"

"Me! I'm a good boy!"

"Whosagoodboy!"

"I am!  I am!  I'm a good boy!"

Max had fallen down on all fours at this point, though he barely noticed.  Everything seemed to be growing in size.

"Who's a good boy!"

I am!  

"Who's a good boy!"

(I am!)
Woof!

"Do you want the ball?!"

(Yes! Yes, throw the ball!)
(Oh god, what's happening?!)
Woof! Woof!

"Do you want it?!"

(Make it stop!)
(Yes! Throw it!)

Max could smell so many things, now.  He smelled the beer, he smelled Reed's aftershave.  He smelled the strangeness that Garbo reeked of.  Garbo scared him, but Garbo also had a ball.

Garbo finally relented and threw the ball, and a yellow streak flashed by him as an excitable Golden Retriever ran to intercept it.

Max picked up the ball in his mouth and stood proudly.  There was still something scratching at his brain, though, and he couldn't figure out what it w--what had happened?  Everything was wrong.  He couldn't stand up.  Max wanted to yell for help, but to do that he would need to drop the...

...ball!  He had the ball!  The man who threw it was calling for him.  He ran back towards the man, who pointed at the ball.  The man wanted the ball, but Max didn't want to give it back.  It was his ball.  Suddenly, the man had a treat.  Max dropped the ball and took the treat.  He heard a loud sound and he turned to see...

..the crowd.  The crowd was up on their feet cheering.  His mind filled with fear again as he realized that something was terribly wrong.  He felt wrong, everything looked and sounded and smelled wrong.  He was a....

"Good boy, Max.  Good boy!"

Max received a pat on the head, and the scratching at the back of his head faded a little.  "Crate, Max", said the man, pointing to a small crate at the edge of the stage that several people in the audience could have sworn wasn't there at the start of the show.  Max ran to the crate, where he found a bone and a squeak toy, which he bit into to hear the satisfying noise that it made.  Laughter echoed from the outside of the crate as the man closed the door.

"Everyone, a round of applause for my assistant Max!"

Suddenly Max resurfaced.  He was acutely aware now that he was in a cage.  Fear gripped him.  Surely his co-workers had noticed!  He strained to look through the bars of the crate.  He spotted them, and they were applauding excitedly.  He saw, with trepidation, that his coat was no longer on the chair where he'd left it.  He had been erased from their memories.  A guttural terror crept up through his stomach which became a frightened whimper as the sound was forced through his new snout.  No one seemed to hear him.

Max lost track of time, but eventually the show ended and everyone left.  They wouldn't remember what happened, only that they were left with a feeling of awe and wonder upon leaving.  They wouldn't remember Max.  At this point, Max was curled up in the back corner of the crate, unwilling to move even as Garbo opened it, reached in, and started scratching his head.  

Suddenly, as if the final structural support of a dam had been breached, the endorphins from the scratch overwhelmed what remained of Max.  He was filled with the warmth of something he had been unable to feel his whole life.  His tongue lolled out of his mouth and he started panting excitedly.

Max was happy.
This one popped into my head a few nights ago.  I don't fashion myself a horror writer, but this one creeped me out as I was writing it, and I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.
Justin Lai Apr 2017
They built me, standard-grade,
But with one crucial chip missing.
While other models are made
Programmed for social networking.

Laughter and jibes, except
This variant groping in the dark.
Much signs to intercept,
Machine simmers, overheats, sparks.

Every version upgrade,
Alas, still just one step behind.
Patience in every trade;
Stranger, if you could be so kind...
I've ran out of computer metaphors xD
When the dunes turn to jazz
And the grains dazzle in the moonlight
The scorpio circle mating-dance
No straight paths
For a desert snake
No chance for a fragile man.

No refuge for the Citizens of Eden
Newton's hand would deter The Fall
Intercept gravity's apple
And the ceilings of the world
Would be far lower.

The earth is the ocean oasis
Panoramic, oceanic, vast
The desert dunes of space expands
The wood bends; the paper folds;
Objects collide; the tempest storms
And whips the sand.

The dunes turn to jazz
The Mystic Rose and the Magnolias dance
The desert hand expands, expands, expands
Raw power.

The Dunes Turn to Jazz
And the humans cower.
Marshal Gebbie Sep 2010
Borne abreast a  Valkerie
Astride the crested steed,
Ascending high to maelstrom
Where fear transcends the greed.

Where the very fire of being
Elevates the spirit's quest
And the steel of high endeavour
Puts all good men to test.

Where the visceral is torture
To the threshold of the strain
In engaging guts and tolerance
To intercept the pain.

So vanquish all the vanities,
Banish all the loud
For the wonder of endeavour
Is what makes we people... Proud!

Marshalg
Victoria Park Tunnel
24 September 2010

A poem for my
Darling daughter,
Robin
..Who turns
Sweet forty two
Today!!
Patrick Clark May 2010
Maybe it started going down Peasley Canyon Road. I can't recall.
****.
Maybe it started with not giving, or not wanting to.
No matter really, that act was over, the lines were out and the curtain drawn.
It's funny what the mind drags up
on it's own.
Mine drags up things like lost telescopes, looked thru
and cracked plastic leather , that hadn't
yet.
I knew how that man on TV felt who had only months to live, as I had only weeks.
Only two.
So...I gave you my blue apres-ski sweater, too big, a ring I still wear, too big to0 and my love, that I suppose wasn't.
On the plane away it was like a mixer gone crazy inside me...part staying, part going.
Of the part that went along I lost or had it removed with drill parades and dope lectures, fighting fires you can't loose and paper targets.
Very surgically.
Letters to you had phrases like 'smashed psyche' (which I still can't spell) and 'never let go'.
Bunk beds can be fun until they're made of steel and draped with woolen blankets and someone's legs from Alabama.
One of my friends at camp turned me on and I became the barracks Dylan, I'm not sure whether Thomas or Bob.
After a hundred years and eleven weeks it ended
and started.
A nice lady at the airport gave us all the only ****** shot we'd e had in eighteen hundred hours.
I'd called, prior to leaving and you were there at the end of that in-and-out mouth that blows the people out and ***** them back in after the fuel
I'd grown tired of walking up that ramp in my dreams but that time, I left no tracks at all.
A blue dress with ruffles round the neck and those patterned nylons then the rage. I read a few days ago that holding hands feels good even in this day and age.
Send that lady a rose.
Two weeks can last 20 minutes, I know.
Then started the back and forth of school a thousand miles away and painful phone call and Conni ,signed with a circle above the i.We split and mended a couple of times and I read the Harrad Experiment and I got a purple note from Conni and I called to say... I'm not sure what.
Hello...goodbye.
Time went by and so did school.
I remember walking across this field in San Francisco and being depressed by how long it took for fifteen minutes to pass when one considered four years.
I flew home to you that weekend and was duly dropped from school the next.
I asked for some dreamed of tug boat in Puget Sound but got instead a minesweeper in Japan. We'de done the front seat and hurried basement tango and I called Conni to say
well, I'm not sure what.
Hello
Goodbye
Stairs and glass and a clutching you and a sick me.

October 10th, Nineteen Sixty Eight
A hand, a car, a reading, a letter, a truck, a plane, a train and another reading.
I think there were only five or six lines to it but it was enough.
No yo-yos, no pick me up and put me down again...ok?
OK, I love you.
A friend named Green, a hundred talks sometimes with wine, sometimes not. Letters and business calls to you, cycles with no keys and McGaha, Clarence BM1, unit of issue one each, houses and no overnights, Lt. Cris Curtis and no-trouble dissension, the Maharishi and July and you and me and you and me
The Astronauts made it and we did too,  by the gate to the new lake
"A small step for man, a giant leap for mankind."
He was almost right.

June 21st Nineteen Seventy
The shrink never seen and you in Southern California at four in the morning and the Kona Hotel.
Burning ears and imagined heavies sent to intercept us at the infamous glass door.Not the first time but the best time.
Flying home together you gave me the window seat and your hand, all I needed.

November 15th  Nineteen Seventy
Sea-tac Motor Inn, coffee and toast and love.
I'm glad you didn't come down cause Ed was there and he was bad enough at saying goodbye.
Calls to you from Hawaii and Kwajaline and Guam and islands no one ever heard of but fish and me.

T minus 180-179-179-177
ad infinitum
Goodbye Subic Bay, goodbye
Tricks to keep away reality like tapes from home and **** in the old man's coffee cup. Jokes told and re-told till we all re-laughed.
Who ever heard of Sea Detail at 3:30 in the morning?
Me, thank God.
Friend Green was gone from Hawaii too, so I left on the first plane. SoCal again as the news media calls it, two days of debriefing then
out
I can't remember if I took a bus or a cab to the airport nor can I really recall which gate or even if you were there.
I guess I start at the tunnel yelling "OUT, I"M OUT!
I don't know if it started going up Peasley Canyon road or down.
Sam Temple May 2015
recollecting collections projecting selections injecting protection infection dejection
dyslexic narcoleptic rejecting dejections ******* complexion complicating interjections
perplexed inspectors intercept pterodactyls relaxing in backpacks extracting disillusion
contortionist philanthropist dejected transgression implementing eradications of moss buying patrons
eclectic perfectionist rests limp-wristed whispering disparaging remarks to the wait staff
trombone percussionist impressed and impoverished gravelling wistfully mimicking Rickles
I sit half disheveled grinding my wisdom teeth feeling the fleeting muse sitting in disbelief –
Sam Knaus Oct 2014
I always thought I knew what love was.
Then I met you.
You could reach places of my soul
that even I didn’t know existed,
each smile was another reason to live,
Every time you laughed
I fell more in love.
every time I looked into your coke-and-whiskey eyes
each pant after a kiss carried a thousand poems
about those eyes in it.
You gazed at me like an artist
would admire Van Gogh,
you held me like I was the answer
and for a while, I thought I was, with
Your fingers pressing into my hips
in a way that I later found out
was to intercept the thought of your hands
on her hips.
You played me
like I was the last cello on earth-
but not in a good way.
And I know it’s pathetic,
but you’re the heaven
and the earth to me,
because you were the only person
that could make me smile the way you did.
It was supposed to be just ***,
but I’m in love with you-
present tense.
I want to lay in bed with you
under sparkling blue Christmas lights
strewn out across my walls like everything
I never thought I could say
but found the opportunity to,
I want to kiss your scars,
I want to fix your broken hearts with
duct tape and a song,
and I want to admire every inch of your body
because it’s perfect,
even if you don’t think so.
I want to do things to you
that I’ll never have the opportunity to do again,
because while everything about you
wrecks everything about me
in what I thought was
the best possible way,
I turned out to be a rebound.
A substitute
for a girl who gave you a murky puddle
just big enough to catch the reflection
of you two hand in hand,
while you drowned me in the clearest ocean
I could have given you.
Dara Brown Dec 2014
i may be jump starting
into a fast play here
but this ain't no ordinary game
i’m playing,
i ain't got no geechee tricks
up my sleeves
or a curve ball in sight,
with you
it’s just me and my straight pitch

so imma throw it to ya
like this

i’ve been traveling
across the court
waiting for you
to be wide open
for me to free throw
this to you

i love you
man

did you see that pass?
that shot i made
all the way
from half court?
you gonna
catch it &
come over here
slam dunk it
like i want you to
or let these words
rebound off your chest
like a third rate player
with uncoordinated hands?

cause right now
its the third down
in the last quarter
baby
& you still don’t see
how much yardage
you have gained
&
I'm still waiting
for you to
intercept me

dontcha know,
i wanna do
more than
just sack you?

but
don’t get it twisted
this isn’t some obsessed
lovesick fan
aching & destined
to show up
at your door
like a groupie
unannounced
cause
i’m not about to chase you
this ain’t track &
i don’t run after nothing
that can’t catch up to me
first

but ****, don’t you know
i’ve got words for you papi
like goaaaalllll
& oyeeee
i might let you play
in my centerfield
but only if you can come
kick it hard enough

i wanna know
how do you
wanna
play this game?
Michael P Smith Mar 2013
As the Sun has its place
In the clear, halcyon sky
Your mind resides here
Please don't resist to comply
Intercept each divagated thought
Interconnect with my waves
Vibe with my presentiment
Upon each other, we're slaves
"Hooked" on each other's hooks
As our conscious rocks and cradles
Sharing minds as we flutter
Animated fantasies, but no fables
I think the way you think
You coast adjacent to my vibe
Our mental surrounds each other's
Mine and yours, a dear circumscribe
We entwine as a tightly woven braid
Entangled upon a common bond
We savor of our intuitive thoughts
Your every move, I'm surely fond
Enriched with pleasurable closure
In summer's embrace, we wallow
In this psychological playground
My angel, your position is hallow
We're two minds that amalgamate
Gratified with not one discrepancy
Only our mutual brains keep subtle
A deep, infrangible, sweet telepathy..

© Michael P. Smith
Pax Oct 2013
I cry because I needed to be
to release something in me.
Every tear brings moist to my dried lands.
For I, a mere man
seems so damage, yet so normal
or perhaps just fragile, easily breakable
and sometimes emotionally unstable.

You laugh because it’s fun,
Looking on a dreaded face
saying such a waste
then disregarded for my bitter taste.

I smiled an emptied smile
I laughed a pretend laugh
That’s my response to your jokes
As if it didn’t hurt
For I don’t want to upset you with my unpleasant retort

In time I learned to tolerate the vicious screams of my thoughts
Then mold them into candles
Hold them near, embracing it as part of my soul
And burn each shameful experienced into smokes
Now wrap with melted wax
Relax in this shell I created
a prisoner of my own doing
It’s ok, I am fine
I am strong enough to accept
enough will to intercept
the flooding negativity
with my passive cry for unity
and through my spacious heart,

the pain is bearable.


*© Pax
Alex Burns Jun 2012
They have tried to conceal our love,
they've thrown up roadblocks, and smokescreens
to keep us from finding each other again,
but yet we always do. Our love has its own radar.
I can sense your heart beating, like an angelic drum
through the haze, and I know you can always hear the love
in my voice, even through the harsh foul static.

Even when you cannot respond, I know you know
my love is always glowing, like a lighthouse in the night.
Guiding you back to my harbor of eternal affection,
where my lips never tire of sounding the horn of our happiness.
I have stumbled for women before, like a blind man descending stairs.
But I never fell, until I tumbled head first into the bottomless pool
of your beauty. The only waters in which I would gladly drown,
have drowned, only to be rescued and resuscitated by your kisses.
  
Those who do not speak the language of our love, point their antennas our way,
they intercept our transmissions, but their code books are missing the pages
that explain how such emotion can be decoded. They only catch the grand communique,
always missing the short, but ever so loving messages, that come in daily
over the teletype of passion. Feverishly at this very moment, they wrack their brains
wondering at the deeper context of our words, but their is no hidden meaning,
behind the expression of affection. Love is its own context, and if they cannot translate it
then they are the ones at fault, not us. We have our own frequencies, and wavelengths.

Our Love shall always ring out in the darkness, even if we have to switch channels,
It will be there, to comfort us, and relieve the ache of our longing. I already have enough
in this world. Let them have the rest. All I need is our tiny daily broadcast, all I need is...
Our love.
I am back my love, It wont be long, until I kiss you once again. It's a long drive from Edinburgh to our home, but every moment is electric, because I know I am returning to you.
Liliana Jaworska Oct 2014
Stormy darkness emerges from your wide open eyes .
Dark clouds are coming.
The whistling wind of your words is druming in my ears.
Planes of tears pouring on unshakable ground.
You put on today dress woven with rain drops
and gloves sewn from fog.
Sky-blue color of your eyes transfigured in livid.
I see no difference between night and day.
Let disappear's your loud anger.
I would like to see the horizon and sun.
The heavens melted with the ground.
I hear the noise of too bluntly spoken words.
I'm ready to scream with fear of lightning of your complaints
but this is not middle of the night to wake up someone.
Storm and leaden sky reigns in the valleys and on the hills,
do not let to sleep at night.
You go too far, my love.
Time for me, I need to intercept umbrella.
R Saba Nov 2013
playing cards, flinging numbers on the table
conversations leading nowhere
and i sit on the outside, watching us
and analyzing the game
i see your head tilt, i see your mouth crack
wide open and speak
and i see the words, read their shape
and watch the colours fade in the air
to match the grey of today
and i wish that i could reach out
and touch them, try to brush
the colour back into your voice
but instead
no matter how hard i try
the words are stale, the cards are bent
by the time they reach my ears
and land lightly upon the inside curve, soft and dark
still nice, still present
and i guess i don’t mind the lack of colour
besides, i know that if i really wanted to
i could move closer and catch the words
catch your voice
as it leaves your lips
and intercept it before it can fade
taste the colours instead
and it’s nice to know i have that option
so i stand here and watch this interaction
watch the card game, hearts and spades
and analyze each move
black and red and white
and colourful
just waiting for the game to end
viewing things through a different lens, and then the game ends
Guido Orifice Oct 2016
After all, poetry is a savage calling.*
-Edel Garcellano

Let poetry be an interstice.

Say, an intervention to the gap of loneliness. Depressive. Let bitter medicines dissolve or, madness will make its ultimate call.  Convulsive patterns of mental spasms. Schizophrenic impulse hitting the nerves.

What is known to be rational flees. Enough to learn from the burning of its wings and Youth.

Say, pulling a magic trick under the hat. You know you are being fooled but why enjoy such spectacle or, better enjoy than masking the truth.

Say, a glimpse through an interstice—from Whitman’s poetry.

An intervention to the rashness of day. An intercept to the chaos of the soul. A reminder that we are not assemblages forever desiring.

A poetry fumbling to the course, enough to welcome the rain of sad realizations.

“The task is heroic. Poetry is a minor matter” (E. Garcellano) – an intervention/interstice, the negotiator to the ultimate task of poetry.

We are savage gods. We feed on the detritus of truth, those are, lies.

Consider this poetry as an epitaph. To the disremembered victims of El Sidro. We dealt the cards of fate. We intervened to live. We pierced our stones to their hearts so cold.

Darwin’s prophesy always reminds us that in every epoch there are some interventions we cannot avoid. After all, we are his favorite animal.

We are gods feeding on loneliness. We are agnostic souls entangled in caves of shadows.

Say, are we forever trapped in the compulsive dimensions of ourselves? In love, for example.

To answer this question is the task of poetry.

Let poetry be an interstice.
Nat Lipstadt May 2019
late May, “sheltering in place,”
the perfection of the day, a descendant
of thousands of years of predecessors,
the elements in concert, expert-wise in the ways
of coordination of sky, wind and ocean caressing
to make poems come so easy, just breeze pluck ‘em

but this heart lies heavy in the noisy stillness,
for one intercept repeats itself,
all ready already, wrote of that, many times prior,
all the parimutuel betting/writing combinations
user exhausted, each one shouting, too late,
you wrote that in such and such a place, in a time,
vague recalled under a name since forgotten

eyes are the poem title generator random,
but all asterisked, seen that, done that,
wrote that, passages that are passengers
trying to hop aboard without paying,
the fare is no fair, and the style gone quaint,
no one wants to read the regurgitated,
my rapacious pen^^^ has stolen them back anyway

my pen now, flat on desk, good only for grocery & scratching off
my countless to-write, to-do lists,
but poem writing conspicuously absent,
this my last until, my corneas transplanted, my heart-ticking
to the beat of someone else’s drumming, but, no wisdom confession,
not what I expected from my retiring “freedom days”

did my share, and periodically one of you reminds me,
of the oldies, and the semi-smile that whispers across my drying lips
says did I write that, see the place + time denoted,
saying yes, here is proof of the when and where, and hints even
of the why, but the whys and wherefores, all crossed off,
the run is over, was a good one, but this time pride will not go
before the fall, for here it is springtime and the spring in the step,
does not launch more than an inch, ground bound, and when,
you no longer can soar, it’s time to say no more

and my old friends come to sing me to rest,
Joni reminds me I have no river to skate away on,^
my feet can no longer fly, lyrics like old honey, stuck no pouring,
Bobby closes my shop, with a young man’s prophecy,
knowing it is the hour that my ship has come in...
and though my moment is in this second, perfection, thinking,
peace to you all, remembering that peace is an unceasing changeling,
my piece is spoken, been trying to leave but this is it,
“it’s all over now baby blue”^^



“Oh, the time will come up
When the winds will stop
And the breeze will cease to be breathin'
Like the stillness in the wind
Before the hurricane begins
The hour that the ship comes in”^^

Shelter Island
Memorial Day Weekend 2019
hani aqil Mar 2018
negative b plus/minus square root b² minus 4ac over 2a, the quadratic formula;
the numbers don't lie.

10th June, 2002; my birth.
the numbers don't lie.

when y equals to 0 you can find
the x-intercepts;
the numbers don't lie.

#03-04; my unit.
the numbers don't lie.

I am better than everyone but
1
person in this room;
the numbers don't lie.

when y equals to a times (x-h)² plus k,
(h,k) is the vertex;
the numbers don't lie.

157 cm; my height.
the numbers don't lie.

negative b over 2a,
the axis of symmetry;
the numbers don't lie.

16th April, she told me she would love me forever,
23rd May, we kissed,
14th February, she told me to leave her forever;
glassy-hearted valentine;
the numbers don't lie.

negative b² minus 4 times a times c,
the discriminant;
the numbers don't lie.

43 kg; my weight.
the numbers don't lie.

my value is exponentially depleting but
I am still better than 7 out of 10 of you;
the numbers don't lie.

when x equals to 0 you can find
the y-intercept;
the numbers don't lie.

3 times, my drowning attempts failed;
the numbers don't lie.

I think my days are numbered;
I don't lie.

— The End —