"journeyman" poems
claude: battles tabletop.
reaches for maple syrup, into breakfast,
& breaks down puking.
the girlfriend/abortion situation.
the cash
& cream corn.
smells of deeper spring.
grandma & her bible.
to pray.
to eat lunch.
to television &
honey blunt the relief of a sunday night.
lily: into decay.
into dark days of her america.
detox: she breathes on vapor. sweet leaf.
sweats the heat & dead-dreams off. off on wavelengths &
resonance::: sound therapeutics,
at 528.111 hz,
enhanced dream frequency. she falls
into bliss. into
unopened codons & the rigor
of vibrational analog.
love cassette.
achilles: wheelchair-bound & boning
still. gripping ***
the girl & couch.
the couch & modern warfare.
old warfare: harvest of limbs.
he crawls across the lawn to pick strawberries.
thumbs the dirt for entrance
to another world. smokes a jar
of roaches, as monument
to his second generation revival.
cool.
wallace: & the zebra jeep.
red rock monkeywrenched billboards & the ****** of flame upon milk factory.
chemical factory.
fertilizer bomb///return/
to town & grotto.
porch-light wood & breath of bong-rotation.
the babylon journeyman,
embroiled in plots against the order.
to simply disappear.
to portal away.
Apr 20, 2014
Apr 20, 2014 at 7:29 PM UTC
The rigger journeyman was city bred,
But Cumberland was in his bones,
He saw the hills above the doors,
He saw the fells above the roofs
And when the great pain came,
His eyes belonged to them again.
By Ruskin Street he stopped to choke
At forty six, his wife beside,
My father's line revealed to me,
A farming, rigging family tree.
His place of death recorded so,
Not 'in' or 'at' but 'by' they wrote,
Impressionistic, vague, but true,
Or careless hand for riggers, who
In city great of small account
By Ruskin Street,
Out for the count...
The journey ends
And Benson, male,
No sails will mend.
Jul 6, 2013
Jul 6, 2013 at 8:04 PM UTC
Journeyman Pictures
Will take you on a journey
The DVB journalists
Jailed and tortured
They showed the military
Shooting at protesters
They hid on the balcony and filmed
They got footage
Of the Japanese journalist
Who was shot by the military
Another journalist
Helped make
An award winning
Documentary
About the devistating
Cyclone that hit Cambodia
In 2009
He was captured and jailed
For years
He had promised to write
The girl he met
From his documentary
But could not because
He was jailed
He made his own guitar
While he was
Wrongfully jailed
He is a good man
He just wanted to show
What the people were going through
Now he has been released
An executive from DVB media
Came to talk
With the Burmese officials
In 2009
About having their own
Official office
Some of the journalists
Have spoken out
About how they
Were tortured
Things are improving
Although it is a process
I hope DVB succeeds
And is not pestered
Or persecuted by the government
Any longer
This poem is dedicated
To the journalists
Who went through
Great hardships
To show the injustices
Of their government
Who wanted to document
What the people
Went through
After the cyclone
Oct 15, 2015
Oct 15, 2015 at 4:09 PM UTC
I care not what the sailors say:
All those dreadful thunder-stones,
All that storm that blots the day
Can but show that Heaven yawns;
Great Europa played the fool
That changed a lover for a bull.
Fol de rol, fol de rol.
To round that shell's elaborate whorl,
Adorning every secret track
With the delicate mother-of-pearl,
Made the joints of Heaven crack:
So never hang your heart upon
A roaring, ranting journeyman.
Fol de rol, fol de rol.
2k
In the seat with the split window,
black cold metal blocked the road ahead,
the sliver of window from the seat infront of me
clouded and beaded with cold rain.
I'm only aware of what's passing me now --
what I've already passed.
None of it feels real, though.
The trees and roadside ditches seem to jump
like an old film
like thousands of pictures flashing in sequence.
The rain streaks making the scene flow not quite right.
A few seats behind me painted nails trace an empty smile
on the condensation.
Thousamds of raindrops rolled behind
two blank eyes and one hollow smile.
Yet,
the image never beaded and melted away,
even as she started to cry.
I watched the wind pet small waves
onto window puddles,
and flinched as pothole vibrations cut it apart.
As we lerch forward --
perhaps for a red light --
the puddle would run to an unseen place,
a place I could not see yet.
Apr 30, 2014
Apr 30, 2014 at 11:53 AM UTC
Bring me to the blasted oak
That I, midnight upon the stroke,
(All find safety in the tomb.)
May call down curses on his head
Because of my dear Jack that's dead.
Coxcomb was the least he said:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
Nor was he Bishop when his ban
Banished Jack the Journeyman,
(All find safety in the tomb.)
Nor so much as parish priest,
Yet he, an old book in his fist,
Cried that we lived like beast and beast:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
The Bishop has a skin, God knows,
Wrinkled like the foot of a goose,
(All find safety in the tomb.)
Nor can he hide in holy black
The heron's hunch upon his back,
But a birch-tree stood my Jack:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
Jack had my virginity,
And bids me to the oak, for he
(all find safety in the tomb.)
Wanders out into the night
And there is shelter under it,
But should that other come, I spit:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
1.6k
CRAZY JANE AND THE BISHOP
BRING me to the blasted oak
That I, midnight upon the stroke,
(All find safety in the tomb.)
May call down curses on his head
Because of my dear Jack that's dead.
Coxcomb was the least he said:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
Nor was he Bishop when his ban
Banished Jack the Journeyman,
(All find safety in the tomb.)
Nor so much as parish priest,
Yet he, an old book in his fist,
Cried that we lived like beast and beast:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
The Bishop has a skin, God knows,
Wrinkled like the foot of a goose,
(All find safety in the tomb.)
Nor can he hide in holy black
The heron's hunch upon his back,
But a birch-tree stood my Jack:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
Jack had my virginity,
And bids me to the oak, for he
(all find safety in the tomb.)
Wanders out into the night
And there is shelter under it,
But should that other come, I spit:
The solid man and the coxcomb.
1.5k
I know, although when looks meet
I tremble to the bone,
The more I leave the door unlatched
The sooner love is gone,
For love is but a skein unwound
Between the dark and dawn.
A lonely ghost the ghost is
That to God shall come;
I - love's skein upon the ground,
My body in the tomb -
Shall leap into the light lost
In my mother's womb.
But were I left to lie alone
In an empty bed,
The skein so bound us ghost to ghost
When he turned his head
passing on the road that night,
Mine must walk when dead.
1.4k
Within walls the humdrum echoes
footsteps magnify into monsters
so do journeys untaken, unplanned.
Step by step conquest is mastered
in real motion forward
mountains climbed
distances measured with hard muscle
counted in steps -one by one.
Nothing impossible
to the journeyman
No yardsticks to measure success
even God is a step closer.
Meditate dreams in sequence
until nirvana nears
at the journeys end
and reincarnations materialise
step by step.
Walking on the wild side
lengthens the shadows of darkness
until we fail to see the light
that will lead us back to the beginning
to the first step from where we started.
Step by step
in rhythm with the heartbeat
we all work through life
and onwards into eternity.
Author Notes
Step by Step. ' He who wants to walk the whole world must take his first step'
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved.
Apr 19, 2014
Apr 19, 2014 at 1:46 AM UTC
From the ores of the mine comes this hunk of steel
transported and heated with vigorous zeal
expertly pounded in the heat of the deil
to ensure is strength is all but sealed
After cooling, the blade becomes a sharpened wedge
as lasers trace a name, then begin to dredge
packed and shipped with a solemn pledge
In a soldiers hands, this will be a victorious edge
Leather is tanned and cut to make the knife a rest
and is handed out to one of America's best
As the blade embarks on its woeful quest
It's owner will be safe with it at his chest
Jul 4, 2011
Jul 4, 2011 at 7:21 PM UTC
the voyage of innumerable miles
furnished strength, of a thousand sails
guiding each yonder the reach
off to a boundless expanse
of the new tomorrow
in countenance
with arms outstretched
to tolerate contentment
to acclimate to the average
and want for far less
smiling
Nov 21, 2020
Nov 21, 2020 at 11:19 PM UTC
I'm in a doldrum of love
where no wind distrupts the silence
in the middle of the sea without waves
where my passion outweighs my patience
in the place without life nor death
where the fruit and the seed shares no deed
in a doldrum of love
where the departure is further than the arrival
Oh the doldrum of love
where the wind has died to be born
in the maddening calm before the calm
where my end isn't that of a journeyman
in the ocean where the time has sealed its heart
where I wait for the end
holding the breathless body of my hope
i'm in a doldrum of love
where i cannot find my way out.
May 29, 2017
May 29, 2017 at 4:43 PM UTC
The girl is a girl
Only like the moon to earth
The oasis to dunes
Breeze to the tropics
Love to the desolate
Warmth to the shadows
music to the lost
path to the journeyman
Fingers to the hair
Lips to the want
All of this and some more
The girl is my girl...
Feb 16, 2019
Feb 16, 2019 at 2:06 PM UTC
Blue eyes, but only for me-
Standing fast, holding their ground.
Fluent in every single one of my
languages,
Except
French...
**** you, Magician.
Jan 19, 2015
Jan 19, 2015 at 3:56 PM UTC
Twenty hours to develop a skill,
Not become an expert but a will
and a way to make sense and play,
do with finesse, an aptitude that stays,
to build
upon the
hours of
basic ability,
A knack.
Not twenty hours out of twenty four,
Nor ten thousand hours of the master
craftsman, or journeyman too.
Measure each moment, on a stop watch,
hurry not to or from, savour time as your
very own,
not on loan,
neither a
borrower
or a lender
be, of time
dedicated
to your betterment,
better me not,
and bless my soul,
if twenty hours is the time,
one hour a day would be sublime,
success is merely a fortnight away,
if you have the foresight to stay the course!
For Twenty Hours.
Feb 11, 2015
Feb 11, 2015 at 12:32 AM UTC
Theo pushed further
than the usual merry go round,
hungering for lucre
a pound sign today and clarity afterwards,
breathalyized for sanity
supporters parched by their
concession,
his club outbids on wanted;
a journeyman for a quarter
of the repress.
Jan 2, 2013
Jan 2, 2013 at 5:50 PM UTC
Yesterday was a winter road
with frosty figures lining up
to dam a young soul to limbo,
not quite hell but purgatory.
Now they all change
their gory stories
so they can feel better
and in their tales
they make themselves
sainted knights.
But we outsiders
know the harsh facts.
We do not make ourselves
the heroes of our tales
but journeyman
of varied skills
seeking the truths
and speaking it to
despite how painful
it might feel.
Nov 18, 2016
Nov 18, 2016 at 5:41 AM UTC
Ten years at a thousand hours each,
and I am a Master,
of what I have achieved,
am I an Artisan,
who has designed much and created much beauty but never seen the same in others,
am I a published Writer,
who has only imagined lives instead of lived them,
am I a Journeyman,
who has not traveled beyond a skill set,
all, late and
too realize,
no one person can do it all alone, as much as each thinks they have done.
For every Master
Artisan
Writer
and Journeyman
who has gone on before, has given to you of themselves
what you thought you possessed alone.
©DWE102013
Oct 26, 2013
Oct 26, 2013 at 1:07 AM UTC
I keep seeing
Alot of times
Many times
I have seen
Kurdish soldiers
Dancing in a circle
Singing a song
In 2003
They looked joyful
With their brothers
And even though
I couldn't understand
The language
I enjoyed watching
And then I watched
Many videos
About conflicts
Between Jews
And Palestinians
Man
Has many problems
So many conflicts
This one over land
So childish
The human race
And I'm no expert
On these matters
And I don't like
Taking sides
But it is
The Palestinians land
And an occupying force
Will always have
To rule by force
Suspecting grandmothers
Children
Is it just a crying child?
The IDF forces
Have to suspect everyone
I would like the Jews
To have a homeland
It just should be much smaller
Taking over
The Palestinians land
There will never be peace there
An ongoing war
Very sad
I took a journey
Journeyman pictures
Its amazing
To see what life
Is like
In other countries
Most people just want
To live in peace
Man seems destined
To repeat the same mistakes
And I saw a child soldier
In Monrovia Africa
Fighting with a group of men
And I saw the sunset
On a beach at
The Gaza strip
Beautiful landscapes
And terrible times
How can a place
So beautiful
Be filled with such
Violence and destruction?
Human beings are foolish
Be at peace
Live by the sword
Die by the sword
Live by the gun
Die by the gun
Maybe in my life time
Americans will get a taste
Of what life is like
In these poorer nations
As we become
A poorer nation overall
Troubling times
Not a stable place
This planet
I think of a world
With loving
And caring women
Where the gun
Was never invented
I'm lucky
I'm spoiled
I'm lazy
I don't work much
That's fine by me
I walk around
In a big garden
I'm tired
Of life
It is tiring
The monotony
The boredom
A bunch of desires
A ****** urge
Eat again
Work once in a while
I'm poor
I don't care
Please put money
In my account
I can't afford
These expensive bills
Are we changing
Are we becoming
More loving people?
Some are
But humanity
As a whole
No, we aren't
Apr 16, 2016
Apr 16, 2016 at 3:08 PM UTC
The journeyman of sounds;
A welder of the pain.
From the land of abundant treasures
And alternative domains.
Dyed black mops.
A youth spent alone —
In a room full of darkness,
Save for your glowing tones.
Just another gutterball outsider,
But the star of the dejected.
Your poems sung of promise —
We ask: why were you not protected?
Roads “long and weary”;
You were just as lost as us.
I guess that’s why you were lifted:
To The Highway you were ******
Now no more Black Holes,
Nor Seasons of “endless winters”.
And no more Curses —
Your side free from thorns and splinters.
Although I never really knew you,
You helped encourage me to tread.
I’ll do my Jesus Christ Pose.
For you Heaven isn’t Dead.
Nov 29, 2019
Nov 29, 2019 at 4:11 AM UTC
“Come in and sit down”
said the celluloid voice,
smooth as silk.
Cautiously I stepped
through the TV screen,
to take my place.
“I will show you a world”
it continued,
“That bears no relation
to what you consider as
REALITY.”
The air around electrified,
as the set was powered to life.
Beautiful bodies playing on a beach,
running into the foaming sea;
sun ripening skin, bleaching hair;
Then, from nowhere a can appears,
elixir of every surfer, sun worshipper.
Somewhere in the distance
a distinctive throaty roar,
the romantic throb of a Harley;
ridden by a pair of jeans
giving identity to,
some muscular male *****
A dream of America
and freedom.
Slow moody blues solo
hangs in the air;
a guitar talking to a journeyman,
familiar but not remembered.
Every note sustained, holding breath,
then carried by a riff
from a bottle of bourbon.
Outside the set
beautiful bodies are burning up,
through a hole in the ozone.
(Too many limousines and Harleys)
The alcoholic looks on, wide eyed,
trying to see a way in,
really believing there is one.
Jul 10, 2019
Jul 10, 2019 at 1:40 PM UTC
She waits. Her hands,
weaving, unweaving.
Lovers' entreaties
curling her ears.
The suitors yearn for skin on skin.
Not a single one gets in.
Still her fingers,
working, unworking.
Waiting for her husband,
the twenty year journeyman.
The lovers renew their pleas.
"Just you wait," she
tells her hands,
fingers weaving, unweaving.
****** and Wisdom
will settle the score."
Soon, all weaving ended.
Her husband's arrows
darkened the air.
The suitors died for skin on skin.
Not a single one got in.
Dec 16, 2016
Dec 16, 2016 at 2:32 PM UTC
There's no retirement
When there is no career
And all this fuss
About money
I find it quite queer
I can barely support myself
But that's okay
I'll rely on the
Goodwill of others
And put "hard work"
Off another day
Dollar isn't
Worth much anymore
The grid goes down
And life will be
A big chore
What would
You like your last
Experience on earth
To be?
I just want
A female friend
To love
And hug me
Apr 24, 2016
Apr 24, 2016 at 2:19 AM UTC
For a brother, and dad,
for the truest of friends.
Pure of spirit, purely glad,
Journeyman into the bends.
The sun rises in his mind,
As it sets into his heart.
And when the moon rises in TJ,
Civility will fall apart.
Dec 5, 2019
Dec 5, 2019 at 11:53 PM UTC
Last night... they fumbled. Stumbled,
failed, ending in her disappointed hope.
'Why do you not lust me?' She asked him
but his sorrow was too much to bear
and he slowly faded away, leaving
her cold and empty.
He is doomed. He bears the shackles
of indifference on one hand. Love on the
other. They cause a hesitation so strong...
no arrogance cam ever overcome it.
So he falls to his knees and screams in
anguish. 'Help me Cre'Atus!' But wind only
answers with a breeze and the occasional
furore.
He hears her calling his name from another
world. His saddened sigh is enough to lay waste
to entire countries, but he goes, a little
slowly. A little hesitantly. Hoping she
will still exist when he gets there.
May 5, 2018
May 5, 2018 at 11:17 PM UTC