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Paul Butters Jul 2014
For seventy or more years TV
And radio ruled the world,
Along with telephones.
But then computers made their mark,
Soon followed by mobiles, Smartphones,
Ipads, Bluetooth, Wifi and who knows what?
In no particular order.

So herds of sheep migrated
Into Cyberspace
Even Myspace!
Then on to Planet Facebook
And Terratwitter.

We talk with people we’ve never met,
And meet folk with whom we’ve never talked.
It keeps us occupied I guess,
And gives relief from stress.

These images that yet fresh images beget,
I’m sure Yeats would agree.
I tolerate these adverts flashing in my face
And soak up knowledge to my solid mental grace.

A world of wonders beckons in
The depths of Cyberspace,
And as a Nerd before they were invented,
I have to say I’ve truly found my place.

Paul Butters
About modern things.
Cné Dec 2017
“T'was the night before Christmas ...”
and Santa was busy.
The reindeer were antsy
the elves in a tizzy.

The missus was tending
the ovens like mad
And turning out cookies
to make children glad.

The wood chips were flying
the sawdust was thick
The workshop was bulging
with toys from St. Nick.

Contractors from Sega,
Nintendo and Sony
Were working on games
(and a robotic pony).

Iphones and Ipads
(with virus removal)
Were packed in their boxes
and stamped "Elf Approval".

Last minute touches
were added with flair
While elf stylists tended
to Santa's white hair.

Elf tailors were making
some last alterations
To Santa's red coat
and his waist tribulations.

The weather was fair
as the weather-elf stated
The routes were approved
and departure was slated.

Bells had been polished
and harnesses buffed
While repairs were addressed
for the hoofs that were scuffed.

The antlers were festooned
with ribbons and bells
And the reindeer were covered
with elf flying spells.

The clock approached
midnight as Santa was seated.
The countdown began
as the flight crew was greeted.

H-hour neared
and the tension was growing.
Outside it grew cloudy
and then, began snowing.

But Santa just grinned
as the weather-elf winced.
"Don't worry, my friend.  
Our time has commenced."

For the weather was nothing
to Santa's conveyance.
His reindeer and sleigh
were immune to"delay-ance".

With a whirl of his whiskers
and a flick of his wrist
The reindeer were launched
in a flash of white mist.

And I heard him exclaim
through his teleport ray:
"ALERT TSA. Tell 'em
I'm on my WAY!"
Rae Slager Jan 2015
We belong to Generation Z
We are objects
Mass produced, labeled, and sold
We are facebook, instagram, twitter
The fear of corporate America that we may define ourselves
We are molded, whittled, eroded
Down to a sliver of what could have been
We are given castles in the sky
And heads in the clouds
We are given smartphones and iPads
Our eyes are looking down
We are potential, opportunity, the future of the nation
But there's no future for this robotic generation
Anais Vionet Aug 2023
I love spending nights on the lake.
Once the oven-like sun disappears,
things get suddenly quiet, except for
the occasional hoot of an owl, crickets, frogs
and the soft lapping of the lake on the boat.

When the moon rises above the pines
the sky lights up, like a fireworks bloom,
its reflection is brushed, in scatters on the lake,
giving insubstantial moonlight a sharp substance
not unlike a fractured, undulating, glittery lace.

This evening, there’s a rumble, stage left, off to the west,
and a thunderstorm’s growl, like a wolf on the prowl.
The wind was picking up, so we began battening down,
stowing things in the galley and taking in the flag. The wind,
had become almost solid with its insistent and restless energy.

The question, with these daily, southern, summer thunderstorms
is whether you’re going to catch the edge of it or get the full onslaught. The doppler radar, of my iPad weather app indicated the monster was headed right for us.

Just as our phones, watches and iPads began chirping
with National Weather Service, “Severe Weather Alerts,”
Charles asked, “You two still want to stay?” His voice fighting
against the stiff wind as he watched the tall pine-tree tops bob,
like boxers, afraid of the far off lightning flashes in the sky.

“Of course!” I chimed in, wearing a grin, I LOVE boat storms!
“Lisa, there’s a storm on the way but we’ll stay on the boat, ok?” I asked, trying to English the question with both a sense of adventure and nonchalance. Lisa, of course, followed my lead, saying, “Sure.”
“It’ll be ill,” I assured her.

Charles nodded and leapt to the dock, replacing the gunwale rope lines with longer dock rods to distance and secure the boat (lowering front and back anchors too).

“We’re staying,” Charles walkie-talkie’d Carol (his wife) below in the staterooms where she was probably making the beds. “10-4” she replied.
I love her, she’s so game for anything. While Charles worked, Lisa and I sealed the upper deck from cockpit (helm) to transom, putting up sturdy plexiglass windows and closing the transom doors.

Charles came aboard just as we turned up the air conditioning and thick raindrops started falling. Having finished our work, we looked up and the moon was gone, hidden by dark clouds that writhed like some angry, mythical, steel wool animal.

The rain went from a delicate pitter-patter to a generous applause and finally, a steady torrent. We felt it initially pass over us from port (left) to starboard (right). The wind whistled, like a giant’s breath, rocking the boat, alternately, in two directions. It was wonderful.

The far-off thunder had become intimate, bomb-like and personal, with its Crack-k-KA-BOOM! Every time such a concussion rocked the air, the boat and our teeth, I cackled, with joy, like Poe’s Madeline Usher, the madwoman in the attic.

“HOW DO YOU LIKE IT!?” I yelled to Lisa, but she made an ‘I can’t hear you,’ sign. Carol, who’d been working the galley, produced yummy tuna-fish sandwiches, potato chips and milk. We played a dominoes game called ‘Mexican Train’ until the rain stopped, then we watched ‘Jaws’ on the fold-down TV. Lisa had never seen it!

The boat had rocked, lightning had flashed, the cutting wind howled and the thunder boomed, but it was the clawing rain, like a tiger trying to break into the boat, that made it an unforgettable night on the lake.
My parent’s boat is Tiara-43LE
Jerry Joseph Dec 2012
Who on Earth were these people
From the past, who made sense
Of a world without iPods, iPads or plumbing?
What’s up with those towering minds of yesteryear?
From where did they come and how come?
Goethe standing so tall
Voltaire you tower!
And bend over Beethoven,
I can’t reach your low five.
What grant of Gods favor gave them sight?
Awesome mighty minds of the past.
Descartes, I think so you are,
So smart that I think I am not.
Galileo you saw heaven before I had eyes.
Einstein, Da Vinci, Archimedes
You and your kind will all live forever,
Men will stand upon your shoulders
And then die.
I love to read the writing of the great minds. It makes me feel so small, so inconsequential. I try to understand, I read more books that explain what I've read. Then it dawns on me. I am inconsequential. I'm OK with that. Thanks to the human genius of the past there's really never been a better time to live....
Grey Dec 2019
My life is like an iPad, once so full of energy and light.
Once so quick to learn, to play, to grow.

And then –
Broken.
Cracked.
Unfixable.

The light flickers out.
Abandoned.
Forgotten.
Worthless.
Replaced.

Because
Why would anyone see something in it?
Why would anyone try to mend the unmendable?

Right?
Nat Lipstadt Sep 2013
Pocketbook

Transformational intercepts,
messages to the brain.

Time babe, it's time,
to take a next step.
change the bulb
to a higher power.

100 watts insufficient to light
the forward motion of a
Great Leap Forward,
like in a prior writ, when,
limitation awareness
was a borderline crossed.

Like learning to walk without tottering;
We probably don't know we passed a line,
invisible to ourselves,
but all clear to everybody else,
on that special day, one,
that just came and went:
when you could no longer leave home
without a pocketbook


We were accessorized with body parts
most useful to make our way thru life,
but our exterior-designer
neglected to provide pockets knowing
full well that fashion acessorizing
was more that just a way to carry tools;

Individuation, maturation, needed,
a way to communicate I've arrived

Ain't no child no more,
double negatives
a thing of the past,
cause once you leave the
comfort of the abode with
handbag corpuscles inhaled,
from that day onwards,
you could no longer:

Walk these feminine streets,
leave home,
without a pocketbook,

Judgement day becomes
Every day, nowadays, so,
when from the cave you emerge,
and face the world:

Gonna need what ya gonna need,
to negotiate the way through,
don't matter what's
inside your handbag
or your head,  
if you are eight or
eighty eight,
you know,
you believe, you need
in handbags,
as much as you believe in god

I am incomplete,
my body undressed for all to observe
If I walk down the street
after that day,
that came and went,  
when you could no longer
leave home without a pocketbook


Amusing ditty,
nah that's not my speed,
this is a treatise on
serious matters,
when changes in our lives occur,
when we earn a stripe on our sleeves

Pilgrim progress to
a feeling of vive la difference!
who I am is not who I was,
awoken from a previous dream,  
marks on my body will come,
some wanted,
some unwanted,
some happily dismissed
like the curse of braces

Free at last,
free at last to forget
a painful child's past,
sometime it's losing,
sometimes it's adding on,
but for sure, the day I changed,
was the day,
when you could
no longer leave home
without a pocketbook

Oh boys,
don't think you are excluded
from this rite de passage,
I'm one of you and I know
what we kept secreted
in our over stuffed wallets.

Ain't referring to our student org. card
or the emergency folded twenty
Dad gave you in case,
somehow you got
on the wrong bus and
ended up on the
wrong side of town
where bad things
could be found,
somewhat more easily.

Like the comic book store,
next door to the tattoo parlor,
next to where the
Nice Jewish Boys
where never supposed to go,
and the Stars of David and crosses
were removed discreetly prior to arrival,
like Portnoy foretold in
Technicolor detail.

I know you well recall
that bar mitzvah party, school dance,
When the bottles fell to the floor
unbroken, spinning, pointing to you,
When you realized it was that day,
When you could no longer
leave home without a wallet

Times they don't change
all that much,
and pocketbooks now called
Handbags I am told,
and year old babies play
with iPads like they were
born knowing how!

but I ain't impressed that much,
cause I know that it may  
come sooner as the world changes,
there still,  always be,
a day of  painful,
transformational,
generational passing,
when indelible, invisible
birthmarks somehow
became both visible and erased.

Though they may
come different ways than they use to,
in case new parents need guidance,
**It is still that day when
their little girl,
can no longer leave home
without a pocketbook
An oldie, when I wrote longer than long poems
what am I...
if the mere color of my skin
smears fear, suspicion and dread
in the heads of perfect strangers...?

what am I...
if I feel the need to
recede to a sanctuary within  
my very own black skin
allowing the familiar stranger
sharing the elevator
to exhale
and set  her bundle of apprehension,
perceived and imagined,
aside
for the ride...?

what am I...
if I instinctively
hide my black eyes
in the screens
of iphones and ipads
avoiding icontact when isolated
with nervous strangers
lest I inflate the balloon of anxiety
to panicked proportions....?

creating that space of comfort
for all nervous strangers in my life
becomes my obsession...

and I switch lanes
by night
crossing to the other side
of  streets with dim lights
lest I collide head-on
with trepidation personified
in the eyes of perfect strangers...

and I ditch the hoodie
for a crew neck sweater
by abercrombie and fitch
lest some slug with a 9mm gun
profile me as a ****
and defy order, rhyme and reason
to exercise his license to ****
in the still of a rainy night in florida
with no credible witness
in sight...

what am I...?

~ P
(7/18/2013)
Golden Ratio Jun 2010
My head swells,
with the words of wisdom,
implanted into my Cerebral Cortex.

Security Level:
Administrator.

The signal:
Never interrupted.

My hair;

my face;

my clothes.

My principal behaviour,
controlled.

My…

Volition;

Desire;

selection…

foretold,

by the scriptures of the box,
and the writings on the wall.

Ipods;

ipads;

mobile phones.

I need a new three piece suite,

so I’ve been told.

My head continues to swell,
to a monumental size,
and I feel my feet lift from the earth,

gently,

so gently…

lifting me to the skies.

As I float with acquiescence  surrender,
over the roof tops of consumption,
I gaze at all the shadows;
their cadaverous minds.

Poor souls.

I continue on my journey;

my pilgrimage of enlightenment;

my odyssey of comprehension;

my voyage of realization.


Many miles pass,
and my head declines in size.
I start to lose altitude;
and I debark...

safe,
but with cleansed mind.

The view is humbling,
and as I look down,
I behold a flower.

I sit beside it.

I admire it.

A true example,

of Design.
elizabeth Mar 2016
I found my light
in not doing what's expected of me,
but in doing what's best
for a 7 year old
who lost his baby sister
and his train of thought
when counting to 20
because iPads download games in seconds
but it feels like years he's watching an ad
depicting guns and blood and dying and
every time he points a finger at a friend
the law tells me
I have to call his mom
who has no response to
"I just didn't feel like doing math today,"
but musters up every ounce of energy
she doesn't have
to expel one weak statement-
"We must do what is expected of us."

They tell me that restraint
is 3 seconds or more
of student resistance
and teacher persistence
but while my hand never touches him
my words wrap around his legs
telling them to stop pacing
and they cover his mouth
telling it to stop singing
and when he cries in the hallway
at 9:52, screaming,
"I hate this school,"
I cannot explain to him
how lucky he is
to be surrounded by adults
who fake a high tolerance
for his constant fidgeting
so instead we sit in silence
until his anger runs out
and my heart rate slows
and we are ready to try again.
Later, he hugs me.
I do not pull away.
This is not restraint.
Zulu Samperfas Dec 2012
Fatigue is setting in giving my affect a kind of relaxed
hereness, because there is very little energy for anything else
Tomorrow remains a mystery, but there will be a battle, I know
the forces will arrive, armed with ipads or paper or their phones
and their judgemental brains of varying sizes and capacities
I am tired, and I need to avoid the unecessary confrontation and most
especially desist from worrying about anything that isn't happening in the moment
the battery is low,  I have no grenades only a small shield and that's
not really enough to battle with, and really, I've always been out armed
and totally outnumbered and overpowered and yet somehow I'm still here
through sheer cleverness.  But I make mistakes and there is so little power left now at
the end that I must be shrewd and watch them like a lioness watching a herd of gazelles
Cole Apr 2016
Pencil and paper turn into stylus and screen;
our world is industrializing like we've never seen.
Manufacturing products out left and right,
and soon enough our prototypes will join in the fight.
Are we possibly producing more than we can consume?
Do we understand that technology could lead to our doom?
Convenient, oh sure, as we just sit here and get fat.
We have iPhones, and iPads, but no eye contact?
The air is getting dirtier and unhealthier per day,
and we believe the government when they say it's okay.
Do we not realize how much harm we're actually doing,
even though a better world is what we're pursuing?
Lily Lacroix Sep 2012
What happened to those days
when you work to live
and not live to work.
When a slice of pizza cost a dollar
and people fell in love in person, not online.
What happen to those days
when every other movie wasn't about
a vampire, an alien, or a zombie
but were based on real life.
What happen to those days
when people would discuss articles in the paper
instead if ignoring each other on the train
with their iPads and Kindles.
I miss those days
because life isn't the same without them.
Nat Lipstadt May 2013
You ask me how I find the time,
But time is not the issue,
For they, are all prepared, needing only recognition,
For they, are all in readiness, needing only composition

I see a toddler swaying, see him to disaster lurching,
Somehow avoided with last second seer-like swerving,
Ten times in a ten foot walk across a patio,
My eyes code red at the incredible risk/reward ratio,
It is nature at it most incredible, miraculous, ordinariness

A young girl of ten wears a pocketbook across her forearm,
In the style of an elderly woman, as she plays with Barbie,
Tho her body immature, her psyche, says note my
Iconology, her accoutrement, texts a message subtly,
I am preteen, I am near woman, treat me accordingly

Dueling iPads in bed is a poem in my head,
rhymes accurate of screen reflections of an
X factor that stimulates my cerebral cortex.
Verbal ointment that I posses can't fix a flat tire,
but sets me up for a personal review, self awareness
Gone mad and with finger, on gas station floor,
In the grime, words are realized/written concretely,
what my heart speaks freely

Within each day, miracles present themselves,
Gauntlets thrown, note them well and be justified,
Visions, external to my physical self,
Yet product of internal chemical reactions
That blow through my veins, swirling,
Word leaves, on a November weekend,
Windswept from a thousand directions,

So you ask me how I find the time,
The question proper be amended,
How do the times find me,
How do I know them,
And why, do I share them
Mitchell May 2012
The knife sharpens itself
By a naked hand
Gripped by the thoughts of home
And happenings
Of Matthew's killings

Since in the own self
Accountings are remembered
Politely thinking that
Everything you've seen so far
Is a game

There is nothing
That is not your own
And Oh My God
There is once a place
That you know now
There is something you are up against
Yet you don't know what it is

Marching roves
Of men with the geeks and their money
Sweat trickles from the
Leather books of their
Leather shredded souls of the ******
And here the stone piles lay
The guts of a revolution
Paid off with nothing
But the blood of the brain washed equipped

So
The swearing of news
Of lands split apart by differences
Arms themselves with theories
Ways of living
Separation of man to man

And business
Is as loud
And as quick
As the shot
From a gun barrel

We are lead by
Monsters
So in turn
We are only minions
Of Monsters

Preceding in a
Discovery
Of an old enemy that
Swears that blood
Would never be
Thicker then their hate

The blasts
Begin
As the age of man
Is dressed
In fresh spilt
Sin

And there is the check of the
Young solider at his stone hedge fund
We wheeze for the riches
Of the looks of the great scholars
And lepers of the lost celebrities
Going through all
Of the way things are and the way
Things will be and the present step
We all seem to be obsessed with taking

Walk to the gates of the pearly gates
Sounds of bullets and scream to be heard
Our name, our humaneness, dampens
As we flatten on the torn apart dusty stone
Caught with one eye on the ground, their
Ears bent to hear any kind of sound

Excuses let not alone in warmth an hot bullet
Where former life lived now shows but death
We men, hot in our hurry to correct one another
Excuses everything where we should excuse nothing
And in blood He bathes in bullet casings
A former shell of the man after heathen he hath killed

Though pressed on silken angels wings where
We seek refuge for forgiveness after pleasure
Released' are we when the light is shone upon us
Each word to be released is to be sent to heaven
Our brothers, nodding to the likeliness of our worth
Sees their eyes within the pupils of us, our own brothers

Thunder where the proud is not equal
We marked nothing that could not be fought
Good or bad was not the answer we sought
For we only sought justice in the eyes of good men
We know not how to do too little or too much
We only turn our eyes to the home of our good selves

To the hawk the family runs away from its own mother
She tidies as bullets **** by in their boys imagination
To spread your wisdom is to also spread your disease
Seek the seed of of your turmoil, see you spread your knowledge
To the youth you produced you wished could be free of your curse
The night touches the lips of the innocent as the moon eclipses
Temporal breaths form on the authorities that swear their allegiance

Where time cries we see the shallow man weep their **** of time
The hallways echo with their cries of selfish uselessness
Preciousness shows light on His eye whose end is inevitable
The clapping senate, in their circle, their suits, their wives with sherry
Make no conversation to the people for their wounds are too deep
The people - with their lack of voices - show their mouths with no sound
As the greying suits like the bones within the earth clap to their own accomplishments
The laughs, those haunting laughs, are heard faintly over the lapping of forgotten blood

What must we say of custom but that it is boring
We make the throne to it as we see the revolutionaries toss stones at it
They who hold their essence, their truth to it
Sacrifice their children - later in vain - for the cause of it
Dear custom, you are the one who holds the red hot chain of control
Not the Devil or God or Tyrant or Executioner or Law Men
Ney! We must see that custom is the crutch of all Men
Unwilling to step foot on grounds which they know nothing of
Here - on these mysterious grounds - lays a life better than the last
Here lays a life not afraid of time or change of the ill effects of history
Here stands Ahab and his ship sailing for the mighty ****

In place our God's shed only their light on the one's that resemble themselves
Picked out to present the gift they have been sharing for eternity
The lights shine bright on the eye's of the one's of the camera
Lo' the mud is still ***** lined with a sickness that tries not to be forgotten
We wheeze for we are human yet the God's provide no cure
We die only to be tossed back into their pool of games
They who plays by the rules is imprisoned in a losing game
Rules, a shackle and chain, all presented by the creator of the frame

Prepare for the soft spoken telling of the charging of the army
Our men, sword to sword, relishes their hate in the blade
How deep can a man hate when they **** every innocent soul around them?
We pass through sheds of shifting christian childish light that cries
Time pleases of the Shakespearian wears that hold a truth who shouts "Not now, not now!"
Soothing ourselves with the honored number of the royalty that swears
To be mixed with the minnows of the common man to be a unholy injustice
Man turns to God and man turns man into the dirt with which they march on

And in the breath of a love of mankind
An innocence whose mess could bring you tears
And a thankfulness that only bears the strength to show Her fear
We are made of the same blood, the same muscle, the same skin
Yet we fight to the death just to see who will turn up on top and win
Can the hill of our ego's ever be conquered?
Where is our peaceful hill that many wish to live and wander?
Bloodshed is apart of mankind
But there is another side
One that is washed in the ***** pebbles of a forgotten city
And the waves of a mysterious endless ocean
There we will find our answer but I'm going back to
A place I've never been before
Where the piano player plays whatever He wishes
And the midnight wind grants me
A couple of moonlit kisses

Oh the politics of theatre
No, my mistake!
The theatre of politics!
We ask to say this when the cue lands
And the mass of man claps or
Boo's, swearing that with either
There is nothing to lose
We are the mob of the Roman empire
With ipads, ipods, the internet and smart phones
Technology tells us who we think we are
Yet
We are still the stinking rats in the stands
Gnawing on the priced bronze haunches of pig
Chewing dirt with flesh and flesh with dirt
Imaginations as wide as the forehand can stretch
Thinking that a glass based GPS system sets us apart
(They did it with paper and parchment)
Spiraling towards a repetitious existence

I wish not to be human
Yet
I am cursed
To be so

To be apart of
What I will be
Forever

Forces me

To favor the good
Within myself

Within
All of us
Edna Sweetlove Oct 2015
Ah! 'twas so many moon ago
When I met young(ish) Diana
- Known as ***** Di to her friends
Because of her willingness
To gaily **** almost anyone
Provided he was well-hung and sweet-smelling.

Ah! Delightful Bracknell New Town,
Dormitory zone par excellence,
And home to dear little ***** Di,
A paradise where I fully intended
To sleep with her (and much more)
On our very first romantic date.

I felt a bit of slight extravagance
Would ensure a good bunk-up
So I checked out the GFG
For a reasonably priced
Candle-lit Italian restaurant
Within a 10 miles radius.

After a rather tasty nosh-up
We repaired to her proletarian home,
The very first time yours truly
Had ever been in a Council flat,
(and I was a bit anxious about
leaving my Audi A6 Turbo in the street).

As we headed for the bedroom
She asked me conspiratorily
To keep my ******* voice down
As her eleven year old ******* son
Was hopefully fast asleep, doped up
On a generous dose of paracetemol.

O how lustily we two copulated!
Indeed more than merely that;
How I took full advantage of
Her other delightful apertures;
One could safely say that
No holes were barred that night.

We were just in the middle of
Session numero quatro
Involving a vigorous *******
Bit of backdoor love-action,
When the bedroom door opened
And in walked little Reginald.

He said naught but only gaped
To see Mummy in flagrante delicto
(mercifully we were in the good old days
before mobile phones and iPads,
or else our ***** coupling
would have made the rounds of Year 5).

Oft times have I wisely considered
What impression that visual treat
Might have made upon his growing mind:
Was he emotionally scarred to find
His dear Mama was a total slapper
Who liked a bit of uninhibited botty-fun?

I doubt it - but I shall ne'er forget his cry,
So revealing was it of the mores
Of the aspiring lower classes:
*"For Christ's sake who's banging your fat **** this time, Mum,
Can't you keep the noise down, for once?
I've got ******* school in the morning."
Anais Vionet Oct 2023
It’s Sunday afternoon and several of us, Leong, Sunny, Anna, Lisa and her new BF Dave (well, he isn’t ‘new,’ he’s 26) and I are watching an NFL football game. The Eagles vs the Jets.

There’s a platter of wings, fries, celery and dips on the low-white table for grazing and everyone’s multitasking while watching the game. Leong, Lisa and I on iPads, Anna, and Dave are on laptops and Sunny has a book.

I’m rooting for the Jets, although they’re the underdogs and given little chance. Dave’s for the Eagles, he believes they’re SuperBowl bound and he may be right.

After every good Jets play, like a first down, or defensive tackle or a score, I start snapping my finger - like the dancing Jet hoodlums in ‘West Side Story’ and sing:

“When you're a Jet,
you’re a Jet all your life
all your kids will be Jets
and even your wife.”

When I did it the first time, Dave chuckled. Lisa patted his arm, saying, “You’ll get used to it.” I’ve only done it twenty or thirty times since then and everyone’s ignoring me.

“I could be a songwriter, you know,” I said, “just give up this life of college drudgery and hang with T-Swift”. No one denied my obvious talent.

A huge Eagles lineman bust through the Jets o-line, throwing QB Zach Wilson to the turf, “Jeez,” Anna said.
“That guy’s not an Eagle,” I protested indignantly, “he’s a condor.” I was hoping for a flag but none were thrown.

“I want some steak”, I announced suddenly, to no one and everybody, switching subjects as quickly as a brain synapse fires.
“Do you know,” I reasoned extemporaneously, “that a diet of nothing but healthy prime-rib or ribeye steak can practically eliminate the chance of coming down with mad-lettuce-disease?”

“Mad-lettuce-disease?” Sunny asked, looking up from her book with a smirk.
“Middle America,” I began, Leong groaned and Lisa rolled her eyes at Dave, who smiled.
“That’s where all our vegetables come from,” I said, “the red states on the electoral maps,” I clarified even further.

“Well, how can we explain simple, decent, hard-working people falling in love with a lying, craven, reality-TV huckster like Trump?” I asked rhetorically,  looking around for an answer. When no answer was forthcoming, I supplied it:
“Mad-lettuce-disease!” I proclaimed, “Those people are eating the ‘vegetables’ they grow!” Giving the word ‘vegetables’ the same scorn I might lavish on ‘cigarettes’.

“If we all just stuck to a healthy, all-steak diet, ‘Mad-lettuce-disease’ would fade away and America would be saved.” I concluded, like a lawyer finishing a summation to a jury.
I expected applause, or at least a few “Amens” but there were only a few grunts and maybe a chuckle.

On the screen, the Jets defense broke through the Eagles o-line and quarterback Jalen Hurts, under pressure, threw an interception. I jumped to my feet yelling,“YES!” and begin snapping again:

“When you're a Jet
you’re a Jet all the way
from your first sorry breath
to your last dying day”

I love football, and the Jets won!
Ellis Reyes Oct 2014
Slate skies
Stinging rain
No rainbows today.

Wicked laughter
from darkened houses
terrifies.

Defenestrated neighbors
Swing from ragged ropes
Tattered clothing
Exposes inhuman things

Soulless creatures
Skulk and lurk
patiently waiting
for beating hearts

Broken gravestones
hide terrified children
clutching iPads.
Fading light in a dark, dark
world
The product of a poetry challenge laid down by 6th grade English students. They gave me the words Thursday, rainbow, donkey, defenestrate, and iPad and I was challenged to write a creepy poem incorporating those words.
Mary Gay Kearns Jan 2019
Lemon drops and Jam face
Were two rather unusual little girls
They spent their days in a tree house
In their rather small garden
With a single white rose
And an upturned flower ***
With a plant called the ‘Bride’
An unwanted Christmas present
Yet to be planted by their father.

The two old cats had recently died
Which created a few weeks of sadness
And a house without paws or biscuit
Trays and an empty end of the couch.
Christmas now over the girls took
Some toys to the tree house
Including their iPads and drawing paper,
Pens etc...

Lemon drops had long fair bunches
And was very thin with big blue eyes
She did not like new foods and spat
Them out sometimes she was always
Drawing funny people and loved fluffy
Animals. She had a papier mâché
Enormous ladybird on her bedroom wall
She wanted to be an artist when older
Like her two grandparents.
Grandma Mary had bought her a Sasha
Doll which she had dressed once
In silver pixie boots and a red school
Dress, blue hat and cardigan.
They both loved each other.
Daddy was her best toy.

Jam cheeks bounced about with
Long golden ringlets and a big happy
Smile. She wore baby suits and a striped
Floppy hat in yellow and black.
Mummy was getting
Her some shoes to wear to avoid
Wet feet in the garden.
She loved eating her food
And made people laugh
Including mummy who she
Kissed and cuddled a lot.

To be continued...

Love Mary Grandma xxxx
Sally A Bayan Sep 2015
(Just some passing thoughts)

What if.....
...the midnight blue firmament remained midnight blue?
...dawn didn't come...the sun didn't even peep...
...the lamp posts remained bright with light
...because the hours seemed to have stopped
...because the night.....didn't want to end

what if...
...everyone got tired of the night
...dreamt, and wished for a bit of light
...bonfire flames became too much for the eyes
...they burned nonstop, like those in a funeral rite
...as if waiting for the dead one to soar
...even with the wind blowing, temperature was hot
...everyone was awaiting the sun---
...the true light of day

What if...
...electricity did not return...gone permanently
...there'd be no more cell phones, ipads
...laptops, desktops, nooks and kindles
...there would be nothing...of these gadgets
...no more appliances to make life easier

But, what if...
...light came back
...we had sun...and moon...and stars
...yet we could not speak, like we speak today?
...no papers and pens...just rocks and pointed objects?

Where would you be?
where would I be?
how would we be?

Would you be one holding a club?
dressed in your off shoulder attire of animal skin?
would your hair be long, uncombed, messy?
would your house, be a cave?

Would my hair be rudely grabbed by a man
to show the rest that he owns me?

Instead of cats and dogs, would our pets
be big, long necked creatures that eat trees?
would they be friendly enough to be patted?

Would we ever know of a blood moon
apart from a blue moon, or a yellow crescent?
would we ever know of mars? jupiter?
would we still remember our own earth?
the way life used to be?

How would we be?
where would i be?
where would you be?


Sally

Copyright September 4, 2015
Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
***written one misty...rainy, rainy September night...***
Colette Aug 2014
We draw a line,
to which we fully accept,
that our future will be scary.

We, the people of tomorrow,
are no longer afraid,
of images of war-bounded victims,
or even ****** scenes of murders and rapes,
as they are far too negatively common.

Technology would come first before our very own lives,
forgetting the true meaning of life,
friendship and relationship bounded without faces and proper communication of spoken words.

Money would be everything,
a source of good and evil,
we would either bath ourself in luxuries,
or live like ants being stomped upon.

Families would have communication breakdown,
as we face the screen of our gadgets,
never seemingly to leave it even for a moment.

The countries' economy bounded to the damp,
as we slowly run out of natural resources,
yet we never seem to care,
living still as if this crisis is a passing stone.

Our earth,
mother nature dies,
as chemical and radioactive takes over,
we all falter the line of sickness,
and depending on machines than herbs.

What would be of a world without care?
A world of climbing trees and running around the park is gone.

Empty lands now become tall skyscrapers or a high-end shopping complex,
playgrounds are now found on our iPads.

Never will the future generation experienced the joy we all grew up to as a child.
No more singing in the fields with our guitars,
No more running freely at open area.
No more water games and fun ***** activities to which our parents would scold us when we play.

We would all hold our heads up high,
thinking we're superior.
When in reality,
we are all coming to an end.

The future is scary.
And we would watch it pass us as if nothing much has changed.
A sudden fear of the future.
Anais Vionet Jul 2022
The sun seemed to rise slowly, almost hesitantly, this morning - a yellow syrup pouring into a deep, dark blue sky. The air is hot and thick, like a low viscosity liquid. We’re going out on the boat this morning and when you have 9 passengers and crew, everyone’s toting something.

Kim and Bili have towels and a shoulder bag of sunscreen lotions and repellents, Charles has a cooler with everything needed to make breakfast omelets on the grill (the eggs have been pre-beaten, the veggies pre-chopped, the cheese grated, the meat diced).

Anna and Lisa are toting a cooler of sodas buried in ice. Leong has the “dry box” with phones, Nintendo switches, kindle readers and iPads. Leong’s rolling a luggage rack of textbooks, Sunny has a large coffee thermos, and Sophy has a bag with dry clothes for everyone.

The girls are practically running over each other in their eagerness to be last onboard because the first two get to towel the night’s condensation off everything.

I carried the lunch cooler full of Chick-fil-a sandwiches, but my main job is to check the indicators and disconnect the dockside water, drainage and electrical feeds as Charles takes the helm and begins his “preflight” before he fires up the Mercury 500-hp engines. I know we’re a “go” when he turns on the underwater lights - that’s my signal to cast off.

The engines roar to life and then purr as we slowly pull away from the dock, we girls greasing ourselves up with sunblock. The air conditioning begins to help but picking up speed is what finally breaks the hold of the oppressive heat.

As we exit the marina Charles opens-up on the throttle and that’s always a thrill. We usually ski first, before the lake gets crowded, and lounge later.

Sunny, Leong and Anna like to sit in the bow, refreshed by occasional lake spray and the wind-whipped cool. Leong likes to sit in the cabin, like Charles’ copilot while the rest of us recline on lounges facing rearward to watch the skiers.

Our summer mornings have passed like this, launching around 6 am, skiing, then swimming, studying and getting off the lake before the noontime “heat advisories” and afternoon thunderstorms.

Later, I’m relaxing in the shade, having just gotten out of the lake, and I’m on my iPad.

“What are you writing?” Anna asks.

“Oh, I write poetry and stories - mostly stories these days but there is some occasional poetic recidivism.” I say.

“You write poetry?” She repeats, as if shocked, “I didn’t think there were any poets left.”

“Well,” I say, “Most poets died, in the early flames of science, trying to prove the pen was mightier than the sword, but there are still poets around - they live in cities where they’ll try and wash your windshield if you stop at a traffic light, and they’re frequently mistaken for the homeless - or they may actually be homeless.”

“Can I read some of your writing?” She asks, after waiting through my long joke.

“Absolutely NOT.” I answer.
BLT Marriam Webster word of the day challenge: Recidivism: a relapse to undesirable behavior.

slang:
moto = hot
my dream house



you see my dream house is just by lake burley griffin

and as you walk in there is a coke machine at the top of

a big escalator, and at the bottom of that escalator there

are two doors, 1 door is the offices where people work and

on the other side there is my front door and i know it sounds like every

young persons fantasy, but as you enter, it was like, well the first thing you

see is the hat rack in front of the first door to the gymnasium which had a treadmill and a rower and a bike

and as  you walk further you enter the lounge room where there is

a nice comfy corner lounge and a LED TV and a big stereo where you can

listen to your favourite music and as you walk further, there is an internet station

where the computer is an apple with iPads and iPhones  and the internet server was

iinet wireless broadband, and as you walk further on, you see the kitchen where they had a built in

dishwasher and stove and fridge, and it had all the latest kitchen gadgets that money can buy, yeah

that sounds so cool and it has built in hot and cold water jets as well as normal tap water, and as you

walk further you see the bathroom with a shower sink and toilet with a clean air contraption, to get rid of

oopsy smells, and the bedroom was right near the other side window looking over the wonderful startrack oval

but i can’t see in because of the grandstands around it, and there was a walk in wardrobe which rarely got

messy, and i had round the clock help with cleaning and cooking, yeah this is absolute paradise, but it will

always remain just a dream house
dan hinton Aug 2015
I
I thought that it would last my time –
That children would always read books
There would always be fields and farms
Where whippersnappers would climb
Where they would run and play in brooks
I knew there would be false alarms
II
But I never thought the malaise would spread this far
Kids not knowing what it is to be out in the air
What it means to use their mind and creativity
Just plugged in to their DSs and their Ipads in the car
Kids rooted to sofas, couch potatoes in the chair
Somehow I always thought their innocence would be free
III
There is always another day, just
As there will always be another excuse
Why we cannot go outside to play
Just sit glued to the idiot-box if you must
Passively watch this world of abuse
As our generation becomes stupider day by day
IV
Don’t write a poem or read a new book
Don’t go and sit out in the sun
The malaise is spreading and infecting us all
The crowd is young and beauty, but rooked
Rooked of their youth, it’s done
As they sit and stare at a screen in a stall
V
This really is what Orwell said, 1984
A world of computers and screens
Before I ***** it, the whole boiling will be bricked in
Nobody wants to play chess any more
A logged on generation, logging up through their teens
First cyber slum of Europe, a role it won’t be so hard to win
VI
Facebook, VK, Kikitalk, Instagram – a world that doesn’t exist
Just a world of fast past insubstantiability
****-eyed spelling and refute of grammar
And yet we let these kids get on with their imaginary bliss
We buy them the latest gizmos just for pacivity
And when we ask what’s to be done? You stammer
VII
We, the older generation, who knew a world better than this
A world of trees, and parks and streams
A world of old values, an idyllic pastoral
But with all pastoral, a world that can no longer exist
A world that can only reside in our dreams
Today’s world is ‘fast or nothing at all’
VIII
And I feel sorry for those kids, really
They never got to run around with a stick as a gun
They’re just getting angrier, as the malaise takes hold
Manifesting itself through boredom so easily
And then they go out and buy an AK-471
Oh well, most things are never meant, we’re told
IX
It seems, just now,
To be happening all so very fast,
For the first time, somehow
I feel that good values aren’t going to last.
Love In Hiding Mar 2015
we said we wanted to be painters, and we wanted to paint the world as we see it,but we can’t paint worth **** and then we wanted to write because we needed someone to understand but no one under stood the words we uttered so in printed words it  dissipated because they didnt seem legit, and we said we wanted to live as artist, and we wanted to the world to be  our canvas and that we didn’t want anyone to tell us a thing. We wanted to be in bands who wrote soundless music with bare hands and posted them on sites that only the “great new age.” would download onto their iPads. We were inspired by artist and freelancers and wanted to live there and be there but we ended up nowhere because wherever that world is, doesn’t exist. Our religious parents spoke to live in a certain stance, but we felt awkward between the priers with people with folded hands and closed eyes. So we felt like nothing, and then we were between nothing.

We thought we’ve better abandoned a religion who told us that we could not hold hands under the name of a Man who would in exchanged for our love we had for each othre he would burn our skin over and over in a pit because who were we to fall in love?

We thought we’ll find ourselves in otherworldly gods and goddesses, statues of morphed species, and none of this took us off our feet.  We were floating space cadets and lost souls and people who were messed up in some way or another.

In other words we refused to live for each other, our individual belonged to printed posters, artistic words and longing.

What do we have to give back?
Gaby Comprés Jul 2017
here we are.
drinking coffee at 9 pm.
i am reading poetry
and you are making lists about lists.
here we are.
trying to fill the distance between us
with something.
i do it with comfortable silence,
but you start talking to me
about how iPads could replace computers one day and about iOS eleven
and i nod my head and smile to myself
because i see you
and what you're trying to do:
trying to shorten the distance
the way you know how
and instead of nodding again
i tell you how my friend is selling her phone
and how i don't know
whether to buy it or not
because the storage space
is the same as my phone's
and while you talk to me about cameras and megapixels and iCloud space
the space between us is smaller.
keissy Apr 2014
i looked at the mirror and i see nothing important,
i just see me ,thats it ,thats all i see,
im NOT important,!!!!
i dont see nothing special on me,
every one have something good,
i dont,
they got good phones,beats,tablets,ipads,iphones,
i dont,,,,,,
that dosent make me different tought,does it?
no cuz material is not important!!!
maybe if i get an iphone ill be important,
they be laghing at me cuz i dont got one,
whats the difference tough?
im a human,im a person,
now i look at the mirror and i see my reflection,
wich it reflects a stong person a person who have a lot show,
if you dont wanna see that person then dont do it but thats all it matter
live comments
Geovanni Alfaro Jan 2013
Do you believe in aliens?
We live among you.
We are here to stay and live life like you do.
Fulfill the American Dream
Our parents dreams.

Our parents sweat hasn't come with any earnings.
They toil and toil from dawn to dawn
Just to put food on the table.
But its a fable.
Because they pay the bills and waste money on gas,
there is no room for new shoes, sweaters or iPads.

Illegal we work for cheap labor
Equality has put our freedom under the table.
(because there is none)
Ignorant and lied upon
Politics are the same.
Reading fake literature to make me a little less insane.

America hasn't progressed because of immigration.
Pass the laws, make things happen,
It's our only medication.  
Let us fortify this melting ***
and help the kids help their parents
who have sweated blood.
Just for a little sensation..
It's not
the fascists with their guns.
Or the Democrats with their bumper stickers.
Or the boomers with their Facebook.
Or the leftists with their Twitter.
Or the toddlers with their iPads.

It's not
the billionaires with their minimum wage.
Or the landlords with their land.
Or the hospitals with their bills.

It's not
the ocean with its plastic.
Or the forest with its fires;
no....

The worst part of living in this boring
post-modern nightmare dystopia
is that even the ******* drugs
are poisoned now.
Gabriel Dec 2013
As the sun passes a million brighter stars, there seems to be no illumination, for space is all black, but when the curtain is pulled back, we can see as if we produce a similar articulation. And as galaxies collide, and gloriously divide, into life more vibrant than ever, to see a nebulae derived from the very death of those bodies.  

But then back on a small planet, the most ridiculous enchantment, this third rock that travels so precarious in its position. With what seems like little transition, but always on the brink of extinction, although never any closer then the day before.

The endless hopes of irresistible dreams, often holding us till we scream, till we breath the air of reasoning, wisdom, truth to find the greater meaning which is offered up as proof. Cause no matter the tools you trade with, or how you chew the fat, the space around you remains black, until the curtain is pulled back.

We search the world for meaning, for universal truth, but we forget to look in front of us, its underneath our boot. The ant that moves your dirt around, the cockroach that shares your food, you shouldn't search for meaning when God treats you like a stool.

A black hole will take the light and never give it back, and this is the same as when murderers attack, for they steal a life and never give it back all things are found in nature, just check your docket stack. But then people are as bright and warm as the sun, and some have the gravitational pull of the largest planets, giving us balance.

The sun was the start and is the end of our glorious existence, which we will never see in our blink of a pittance of life. But the spirit, the soul, that will journey on to systems more bright, we see there is no curtain in sight and we are on an endless flight, where we rise above our spirit.

To a harmonious place with love as the only exchange rate, and hate is left for obvious reasons, but often annoyed, that people have so little joy, in merely gazing up into the ever after. And while ipads are fun, and google sky map has it by the ton, your eyes...are the best judge of amazing.

Look up!!
Nat Lipstadt Jul 2016
You ask me how I find the time,
But time is not the issue,
For they, are all prepared, needing only recognition,
For they, are all in readiness, needing only composition

I see a toddler swaying, see him to disaster lurching,
Somehow avoided with last second seer-like swerving,
Ten times in a ten foot walk across a pool's patio,
My eyes code red at the incredible risk/reward ratio,
It is nature at it most incredible, miraculous ordinariness

A young girl of ten wears a pocketbook across her forearm,
In the style of an elderly woman, as she plays with Barbie,
Tho her body immature, her psyche, says note my
Iconology, her accoutrement, texts a message subtly,
I am preteen, I am near woman, treat me accordingly

Dueling iPads in bed is a poem in my head,
rhymes accurate of screen reflections of an
X factor that stimulates my cerebral cortex

Verbal ointment that I posses can't fix a flat tire,
yet sets me up for a personal review, a self awareness,
Gone mad, I am, and with finger, on a gas station floor,
In the grime, words are realized/written concretely,
what my heart speaks freely

Within each day, miracles present themselves,
Gauntlets thrown, note them well and be justified,
Visions, external to my physical self,
Yet product of internal chemical reactions
That blow through my veins, swirling,
Word leaves, on a November weekend,
Windswept from a thousand directions,

So you ask me how I find the time,
The question proper be amended,
How do the times find me,
How do I know them,
And why, do I share them

<>*

May 21, 2013
Nigdaw Jun 2019
The air was different back then, somehow lighter, less heavy metals floating around and nuclear sunsets I suppose. I was born in the 60's but the 70's are my era, long hair, flares, large collars and music that still haunts today. What you need is children to amalgamate past, future, present. With their mp4's, downloads, (records and CD's old hats no one's wearing anymore ) tv box set binges, live pause, catch up, iPads, iPhones, igiveup. Technology speaks to them in so many different tongues and guises, the world has shrunk down to "someone is typing" messages from the other side of the world, nay the universe, friendships based on snapchat, facebook, twitter that don't even have the decency to start with a capital letter, Skype, facetime, with people you don't even have to 'know' coming round wanting tea and outstaying their welcome, instead hanging back in the ether waiting for the right moment the right meme to slot into the conversation. I sit and let it all wash over me, a tide ebbing and flowing long into the night, stretching time zones and bedtimes to the limit,  in fact talking beyond bed, those waves never sleeping always whispering, I share music and photographs that are things from my life, they will never understand beyond the boring stories I tell them, a fount of useless information that flows, analogue from the corner of the room, the old man, the old days, you never had it so good, I am in awe, everything new, all to discover, everything to play for, world  full of possibilities, not the same old 9-5 humdrum waiting for the weekend so we can pretend to be free again, it's all happening now. I enjoy these moments as an observer, no need to join in just sit and smile, with an occasional LOL or amusing emoji. My daughter bought Hotel California on vinyl the other day, I'm still in there, somewhere.
I wrote this as a kind've rant one night after an evening sitting in my living room with everybody talking, but not with each other.
Ben Coleman Dec 2011
Cut the trees and drain the lakes,
Burn up everything we know
For iPads. That's what progress takes:
Cut the trees and drain the lakes
(Ignore the tempests and the quakes)
And as the garbage mountains grow
Cut the trees and drain the lakes,
Burn up everything we know.
Austrslia has great tracks on the way to Adekaide


The Indian Pacific runs on a track
On the way to Perth via Adelaide
You see some great towns like Bathurst
And Lithgow and even Broken Hikl
On the way to Perth via Adelaide
We have a bumpy ride through the
South Australian desert
While little Tommy Mistleton
Leave half hid dessert
Yes, after he went to Broken Hill
And the train nearly left without him
On the way to Perth via Adelaide
Then Mr and Mrs Mistleton wanted to get
Off in Peterborough to catch a bus to Coober Pedy
And then they get a bus back
To Peterborough to get back on the train
On the way to Perth via Adelaide
You see, you get a bumpy, bumpy ride, man
Yes, it can be cool, you know
You eat breakfast, lunch and dinner on the train
And then to fill in time, man
We get out our iPads and watch some crap on TV
After Adelaide we went further on and when we
Reached Nullarbor we looked out
The window to have a look
And, you bet your ****** oathe man
We were impressed, oh yes, we were
And when we reached Perth, yes we were glad
Because we met interesting people and
Now we can call them friends, you see
On the way to Perth via Adelaide
On the Indian Pacific, train
Oh yes we were
Will May 2018
The wooden doors swing open, creaking as they do.
Books litter the walls, tables, and chairs.
Bestsellers filled with politics, celebrities, and dieting.
The "Classics" eisle is all but abandoned.
Shakespeare, Steinbeck, The Bronte Sisters, and more.
Books filled with elegant phrases, heartbreaking last words, and timeless prose.
I run my fingers along their spines, walking past the gravestones.
Reaching the music section, I smile and wander forward.
So many memories to be found.
Mozart, Beck, Chopin, Hendrix, the list goes on.
So many artists here, preserved through a dead medium.
CD's no longer hold a special place in the world, along with the books housed nearby.
As I walk to the entrance, now an exit, I see rows of newspapers.
Yet another reminder of times gone by.
Staring at the building, about to enter my car, I realize something.
This place is a graveyard for old things.
While the world has moved on to Kindles, iPads, and mp3s, this place has not.
That's why I'll come here until the day it to, is buried.
For the record, I love all the mentioned mediums. Physical books are something I hope never go away.

— The End —