"legitimized" poems
Yes, I'm a girl and I'm not trying to justify my body language nor am I positioning the rights of a feminist on the top, but
Yes, I was questioned always, even when I was right.
Subservience was legitimized as my trait ever since I felt this world.
Every time when I was buckled under by his lecherous eyes, I was asked to adjust my dupatta well.
Every action of mine substantiated the height to which I'll hold the name of my family.
I was asked to cross legs while sitting, speak amicably, yet not solitously.
Every time I'd to hide my period stain like a ****** blot.
I was asked to gallop my cramps because letting it out is a bitter sin.
Yes, I get my body scanned by their lewd gaze day in and out even when I put my baggiest of clothes on.
Yes, I'm a girl, and I have beautiful synonyms, call me maal, patola, bomb, ***** *** or a girl? May be, let yourself decide.
Yes, I'm questioned on the extension of the Roti's that I make and the smiles that I couldn't fake.
Yes, I'm a girl and I'll stand, and question your authority if it calls for, call me stubborn. Okay!
Remember, I'm a girl, and if you accuse me of being a feminist if I know, and can raise my tone up and against your authority, humanism needs to be checked then.
-APARAJITA TRIPATHI
Jul 24, 2018
Jul 24, 2018 at 10:13 PM UTC
Being human can be incredibly painful
But to be human...to truly feel like a realized human being
is to feel powerful...is to feel an out-of-body experience
because we realize that we are beautiful, brilliant...
and deserve to feel what it means to
TO BE FULLY HUMAN and nothing less.
That our dreams, our aspirations, and our capabilities
cannot be restricted by artificially constructed restrictions.
And because of that we cannot allow under any circumstance
for the humanity of anyone to be negated.
That every inhale we take without helping legitimize the humanity of one more,
Is further securing the chaos which threatens our own.
That to love another human being,
no matter how strange or familiar, difficult or easy
Is to really understand the profoundness of our own humanity...
Is to love ourselves.
And because of that we cannot fathom a world
Where anyone is negated the ability to love.
Whereby the consciousness of our fullest potential
Understands no artificial restrictions
Knows no terror, war,or attack that can silence the eternal soul of its truth
And can only conceive of a world where everyone's humanity is legitimized
Aug 19, 2013
Aug 19, 2013 at 1:13 AM UTC
There's a room somewhere,
locked fast behind an unassuming door
looming grey-brown at the end of a
misshapen corridor.
Inside, the relics of a time lost in time
to time.
A mitt, engraved with the counterfeit signature
of a ballplayer whose name once rang a bell,
smelling of adolescent sweat,
still dusted with sandlot crumbs,
a reminder of those ground *****
that sped by too fast to field,
those fly ***** just out of reach,
suspended in a June twilight
lost to time.
Ribbons and awards and certificates,
signed by leaders of puny regimes
paved and repaved over,
proof of a world before this,
an era of (now) perceived achievement,
legitimized, glorified by Old English type
printed on recyclable stock paper.
Ticket stubs from blockbuster flops,
receipts of a linear plotline:
Drama, comedy, a budding romance -
Temporarily amusing on such a spacious screen
but ultimately unfulfilling;
the plot peters towards the end.
Lost in time the boy cries out
with no one left to answer but the man
who, as quietly as he entered it,
exits the room,
as always, leaving the door just ajar,
enough to muffle the shrieks of a little boy
chasing an invisible horizon.
Oct 23, 2012
Oct 23, 2012 at 8:46 PM UTC
of chocolate moons,
dried, well-preserved seascapes,
A-Tisket, A-Tasket
none of which he had ever seen,
understood,
but nonsense alliteration garners
fast and vast attention of the interned masses,
for somehow easier to comprehend
the silly notions of what does not exist,
chocolate moons, dried, well preserved,
museum-quality wet seascapes and word-plays
that require no Hail Mary passes or penitence
so let us rose compose of frosted flaked flowers
of folklorish hobgoblins,
ice cream coated,
of Crunch 'n Munch Sweet Gourmet Popcorn,
a ConAgra "Food" grown only on
Arizona highway-crossed landscapes,
where babies, snatched from above, into moving cars,
taken from, then to, the lost and found
of kidnapped earthlings
are awaiting your reading pleasure
if nonsense pleases,
nonsense scrip'd and delivered,
all we aim for is temple offerings
of what crowd-pleases,
around the tepee fire
we peyote ancestor tales
mostly glorified white men's defeats, legitimized,
ignoring the concentration camp existence and
USDA excess garbage food,
a god, with love, delivers
the components of sewing needles,
a hole and a little sliver of silvered steel,
stitch word worshipping poets into frenzies
of imagined images that cake bake the crowds
with football arena'd pleasures,
their brains all the while,
being measured for a casket,
A-Tisket, A-Tasket,
this poem making
perfect sense to those
who sleep no more
Apr 29, 2014
Apr 29, 2014 at 8:30 PM UTC
i do not believe in holding things in.
that is how bottled messages collect on deserted beaches,
how unaddressed letters begin filling desk drawers,
how unanswered questions spill over into one word midnight conversations.
communication was created for a reason,
verbal expression and languages formed in order to allow humans to connect.
when did words become so disconnected,
a way to fill space, a burden, something that has to be done.
when did silence become louder than heated debates,
texts become more crucial than ‘working it out’ over coffee,
media posts become more legitimized than countless apologies for the same god ****** thing over and over again.
who taught us to swallow our inner conflicts and emotions?
who said expression was weak and suppression was strong?
who taped our mouths and allowed our finger tips to take over,
a society of silence and screens?
May 11, 2015
May 11, 2015 at 12:00 AM UTC
The Doped Olympics
Why don’t they simply create a new branch
And call it the Doped Olympics?
By the laws of semantics
It soon would come into language, legitimized:
Youth forgets past.
Soon the word would have lost its original shame,
While the name of the game
Would be guilt-free and blame-free,
And those who would qualify
Could have drug deliverance, muscles defined, bodies divine.
If they dropped dead at forty
At least they’d have entertained millions,
Fulfilled their ambitions,
Made lots of folk rich
And set records untold.
Let those few or many spend hours in training;
Let chemists develop concoctions so new
That the pole-vaulter flies,
The sprinter’s a jaguar,
The shot put is sent into orbits of space,
The long jumper jumps twenty meters
While men become fierce
And the women grow beards,
Which gives all of the chemists new projects to work on.
A yes to the ***** Doped Games.
The Doped Olympics12.2. 2004 revised 1.27.2016re-revised 7.25.2016
Our Times, Our Culture II;
Arlene Corwin
Jul 28, 2016
Jul 28, 2016 at 7:45 PM UTC
let me rant awhile
for what good it may do
to open the valve
if only briefly
for as one wave
after another
of sheer indignity
is reported
survivor guilt
courses through me
yet even this
was not mine to choose
for I don't happen to
have been born
Jewish
or black -
and that doesn't make me
more -
or less -
worthy of dignity
but I can observe closely
what it is like
to be pilloried
and persecuted
for one's peaceful contacts
and communications
holding personal beliefs
at odds with a regime
and a rage
courses through me
on contemplating
'man's inhumanity to man' -
though written long ago
that the world would be so,
where hatred would replace
kindness, love, empathy
I deplore the way
an ideology
of one disturbed,
possessed person
can lead to millions
donning a uniform,
henceforth labelling
one sector of humankind
'persona non grata'
to be mercilessly pursued
in legitimized genocide,
even savaging
little children
frightened lads
caught on the run
made to hold arms
for food
mamas with babes in arms
forced to watch them
dashed to pieces
then buried alive underground
their infant cries still heard
while their mothers were ***** -
as beleaguered, beautiful Estonia
was brought to it's knees...
and I weep and rant
feel knives in my gut
blood pulsing swift -
then take hold of myself
seek to understand,
if that be possible,
even a smidgen
of such distorted thinking
to delve into the mind
of a hateful deviate
for but a moment
and remain intact
so I scan his written mantra
and come to see that
all deeply held convictions
must have at its core
RESPECT
lest it attract the weak
and easily led,
or those forced into submission
seeking to simply stay alive
and they find themselves
taking part
in a forest fire
of polluted propaganda
a flood of merciless
devastation,
while their deluded leader
continues to spout forth venom
in the distorted notion
that they would actually
be acting in society's
best interests
or worse still:
'in the name of God'
(Acts 5:39;
Hosea 4:1-3)
Feb 16, 2019
Feb 16, 2019 at 5:30 AM UTC
Its hard to be serious
Around emo *******
Always so furious
To the point of delirium
Screaming and crying
Like nobodies hearing them
But they loud and clear
And i just don't ******* care
Above and beyond
That **** already aired
When i dared to be a man
Brushed my shoulders
And cleaned my hands
Broke up the boulders
And cleared my head
For the next test
And bled for the best mess
I could organize
And legitimized
What i could
But oh what i would give
To be there again
To feel misunderstood
And give a ****
Before this fish on land
Sprouted hands
And demanded
Control of everything
To feel at home
I miss feeling alone and unknowing
I miss being lost
I miss being found
I miss the pain
The moment
Most profound
I miss the sound
Of my heart pounding
When a future lover comes around
I love the nouns
The verbs
The words
Rolling out a lovers mouth
When the block
Was a world
And we hurt
Ourselves for love
Bled for love
Anything for love
For love
Is forgotten
Of begotten imagery
Fading into a city of blocks
Cities in flocks
Flocks in droves
Droves in a world
And worlds
Clumped into galaxies
And everyone
Just keeps getting
Further and further
And further away
Until out of view
May 15, 2013
May 15, 2013 at 9:46 PM UTC
Astonishing.
Amazing.
How Brilliantly Blind.
How could you see so clearly?
Yet be walking,
talking,
acting
With no vision.
No direction.
Selfishly stumbling
No where.
You got it,
head on,
one nail drive.
BAM
Except not the right words.
But the cry was evidently heard.
The point made,
Message Found Home.
So where the reaction?
Where the care?
As if it matters...
Do you even still read?
Am I attempting to communicate with a
Wall?
Either way
I'd like to say
Thank You
and
**** You.
Though which the stronger sentiment?
Don't Care.
Whichever makes you feel better.
I could list all the reasons to
Thank,
Shake your hand,
express gratitude.
Those uplifting,
generous,
Soul searching, and
Questioning
Rise to Self
Expressions
That which you do not know you
Employ.
Is Not Deserved.
Would not be
Recognized.
Legitimized.
Just shrugged off.
Not taken to
Heart.
So those words exist
as Wind
Whistling through your life,
waiting for you to pay attention.
Make sense of that noise,
Take comfort in the frigid air.
But you won't.
So
I won't.
Finally.
Oct 1, 2013
Oct 2, 2013
Oct 2, 2013 at 3:54 PM UTC
The Doped Olympics
Why don’t they simply create a new branch
And call it the Doped Olympics?
By the laws of semantics
It soon would come into the language, legitimized:
Youth forgets past.
Soon the word would have lost its original shame,
While the name of the game
Would be guilt-free and blame-free
Free, and those who would qualify
Could have drug freedom, build muscles defined,
And have bodies divine.
If they dropped dead at forty
At least they’d have entertained millions,
Fulfilled their ambitions,
Made lots of folk rich
And set records untold.
Let those few or those many spend hours in training;
Let chemists develop concoctions so new
That the pole-vaulter flies,
And the sprinter’s a jaguar,
The shot put is sent into orbits of space,
The long jumper jumps twenty meters
While men become fierce
And the women grow beards,
Which gives all of the chemists new projects to work on.
A yes to the ***** Doped Games.
The Doped Olympics12.2. 2004 revised 1.27.2016
Our Times, Our Culture II;
Arlene Corwin
Jul 10, 2016
Jul 10, 2016 at 11:02 AM UTC
it was unreal and
yet not special at
all
I knew what she clutched in her hands
I knew what she was giving to me
it was simple:
the days tip
just seven dollars
but having it in my hands
changed everything
it made my effort real
it legitimized my existence
I had worked
I had earned something
I had no longer needed to doubt
so I counted it
and I counted it again
and I put in my pocket
and can’t bear to look
at it now
what if it’s not real?
what if I overslept and
dreamt it all?
but reaching into my wallet
I see the seven dollars
nestled there
and
stop my doubting
what a day
Jul 19, 2012
Jul 19, 2012 at 11:51 PM UTC
pulverized by desolate winds;
brutalized by ungodly kings;
capsized by the violent waves;
neutralized by the scorpion’s sting.
terrorized by the thoughts of morrow;
legitimized by a trademark of sorrow;
authorized to live in vain;
generalized - like the streets,
and the boroughs.
synthesized by the alchemy of remorses;
romanticized… like the dark horses;
mesmerized by the notion of vengeance -
hypnotized by even darker curses.
digitized by the ways of future;
mystified by metrics, and conjectures;
specialized in the pursuit of reality -
'civilized' by the grand architecture.
Dec 23, 2024
Dec 23, 2024 at 1:16 AM UTC
you’re not used to this is how you testify?
woe to thee who asked for ease to be denied!
since you’re better than others and cannot believe otherwise
i have no sympathy if that’s your reply
i don’t care if you’re levitating insufferably high
everyone deserves respect regardless of how stratified
kindness isn’t stupid, it’s beautifully dignified
if you can’t see that then you’re unqualified
to be of those I declare compassionately legitimized
if you were truly great you wouldn’t resort to abuses
you’d be who you are no matter how many uses
and while i believe in doing what one so reasonably chooses
my sympathies are immune to your pompous excuses
May 19, 2020
May 19, 2020 at 9:27 PM UTC
Every 4 years I post this, hoping that the message, although lighthearted, will come forth.
The Doped Olympics
Why don’t they simply create a new branch
And call it the Doped Olympics?
By the laws of semantics
It soon would come into the language, legitimized:
Youth forgets past.
Soon the word would have lost its original shame,
While the name of the game
Would be guilt-free and blame-free,
And those who would qualify
Could have drug deliverance, muscles defined, bodies divine.
If they dropped dead at forty
At least they’d have entertained millions,
Fulfilled their ambitions,
Made lots of folk rich
And set records untold.
Let those few or many spend hours in training;
Let chemists develop concoctions so new
That the pole-vaulter flies,
The sprinter’s a jaguar,
The shot put is sent into orbits of space,
The long jumper jumps twenty meters
While men become fierce
And the women grow beards,
Which gives all of the chemists new projects to work on.
A yes to the ***** Doped Games.
The Doped Olympics12.2. 2004 revised 1.27.2016re-revised 7.25.2016 Our Times, Our Culture II; Arlene Corwin
Feb 24, 2018
Feb 24, 2018 at 12:41 PM UTC
improving our collective lives, one pandemic poem at a time...
<>
*a stray-dog-thot that bites my ankle,
saying ouch, you see a poem here?
it’s 1:14AM on a Sunday and generally I see at this generalized
pre-dawn, can’t sleep pleistocene period, non-extinct poems
roaming everywhere.
but the pandemic on my mind and giving me pause to wonder
how much can I love, and a questioner-poet needs and desires an answer,
post haste, pre apocalyptic.
S. travels for two days by airplane to fulfill a promise
only to find out, upon arrival, the promise made is
pandemic cancelled.
but the-promise-I-made silently, to her, faraway, that she never heard,
for why, stir-up-the-ruckus, asking for a visit from the evil eye,
if she falls ill, coming back to me, is stone cold stolid, no cancellation policy,
I will:
nurse her, brush her hair, anticipate the achey need normal, before she can ask,
hold my body’s warmth full and frontal, a cooling blanket for heated times,
retrieve her ***** tissues from the floor and make lousy jokes about her lousy aim.
and what I wrote, “improving our collective lives, one poem at a time,”
is here institutionalized, organized, galvanized, mesmerized,
legitimized and lionized,
proving only that stray-dog-thots @nite, they bite,
hard immediate, and that
later is never better
she would say,
“what would I do without you, my children so far away,”
my reply instanced, nuanced, instantaneously, non-Amazon delivered with a double frosted eye twinkle, no-extra-charge,
“hey! that why I get the big bucks, god’s love to deliver!”
she, a profound atheist, snorts with practiced derision, which is fine,
cause I see the welling, tear droplets, laced with viral virus communicators, smiling weakly, asking, instructing a cure:
“play for me some Janis and some Joni, some Mozart and Mahler, climb in beside me, my old man, let us, let us rock our gypsy souls, drinking a case of each other.”*
who could refuse such a invitation... to become the plasma of the sun’s corona, if only for a moment
<>
1:38am Sunday March 15th, Twenty Twentyfold
Mar 15, 2020
Mar 15, 2020 at 1:55 AM UTC
I was wrong then. and now condemned to rewriting the same small repertoire.over and again
until they feel legitimized by their own histories-
I caught you off guard the other day. I told you about my dead ex-friend that I never hated as much as she wanted me to.
you told me it was fine.
Apr 29, 2015
Apr 29, 2015 at 1:08 PM UTC
Getting Loonier But Freer
Sitting in the bathtub come prepared:
Pen and pad squared off,
Ready for the spinoff
Boring or imploring
Phrase, theme, word
To make inspired this not tired,
Not yet batty lady
Who, in dotage her,
Is sounding more and more like Lear
(not king – the other one)
Using words in play from fun
To pleasure those with fun-ny bone
Or anyone come close –
With dose of looniness and freedom.
Each thought legitimized – seen through her eyes -
She writes as if the script were scripture,
Thought brought down from god-knows-where,
She, prepared to edit if she must,
Every bit writ down on trust.
The paper pad is soaking wet,
Words dimmed and saturate.
Time to get out of the tub,
Dry hair, the ***
And superficially skin deeply
Watch the evening’s mediocre,
Scary, all too interruptedly TV.
(For TV’s actually for money,
Not for me, or them’s that’s like me.)
Pity!
Getting Loonier But Freer 11.6.2017
A Sense Of The Ridiculous II; Bath Book II;
Arlene Corwin
Nov 7, 2017
Nov 7, 2017 at 6:09 AM UTC
cemented all through out
the decades, this living
and the eight hours a day,
debts, bills
and essentials
for sustaining stability
led masses blinded,
resigned to the facts
and engraved in their veins
the blood of slaves.
the man-made monster
to rule us all now legitimized
with man-made laws
that were bent in shape
to keep it perpetually running,
and us as the moving parts
who have nowhere to run
cannot do anything about it.
and all heads can say nothing more but 'tis the way it is'
and are afraid to have their possessions taken
piece by piece
when they have nothing
to begin with.
why is it such an
impossible feat to fair
the system and its cycle?
you see, hear and smell
the oppression,
lives imprisoned
or taken with no
trace of ****** hands
but only for
the greater good as they say?
if i have the ability
to explode all parts of my flesh
before all this,
before our powerlessness
over it,
before our troubled minds,
before our weary beat-up
bodies,
before the people they raise
just because they have
money,
before the unseen,
the unheard,
the unspoken horrors
kept by the authorities,
in the name of the
father, the son,
Nietzsche,
and of the raw people of
the earth,
may my rain of flesh
and the words
that comes along
with it pierce the void
blocking our people's
senses.
Jan 19, 2018
Jan 19, 2018 at 3:16 PM UTC
Do you see what I see
can you
even know what I know
can you
see the hypocrisy of liars
cons and morons
who now turn on their Leader
and fight amongst themselves
crying cease-fire
injustice and atrocities
when selves sames
in their own backyard
have legitimized a burglary
and attempts at extortion and intimidation
and our vituperate selves sames have orchestrated
and conducted
the most vicious campaign of bullying, vilification,
harrassments, smears, misrepresentation,
libelous slander and toxic distortions
not to mention varied contraventions of basic human rights,
against one lone innocent brown man
they urdained to 'wipe out' a blameless man
because they possess the power to do as they please
Telling themselves
that is Democracy in modern today
Do you know
You can fool some of the people all of the time,
and all of the people some of the time,
but you can not fool all of the people all of the time
and do you know that Politics is a con game for scammers
liars, self-serving opportunists and narcissists
and
Scarlet Fever is a selective contagion
that is resistant to the antibiotics of truth,
fairplay, intelligence and commomsense
Nov 2, 2023
Nov 2, 2023 at 9:36 PM UTC
The blood red wine of
pomegranates,
seeping into marigold
sheets of desire
political fires,
in need of quelling
telling,
a kingdom broiling over
in anticipation
expectation,
of a life barging in quickly
swiftly,
one night of passion
the melding of lives
legitimized,
a royal heir needs
to come into the fold
or heads will surley roll
Apr 11, 2018
Apr 11, 2018 at 6:45 PM UTC
By: Cedric McClester
Trump the diplomat
All that was missing
Was his top hat
Trump the negotiator
Negotiated what we
Had before, nothing more
North Korea waited
And he capitulated
They promised to
Denuclearize
But where or when
We’ll have to surmise
Will continue to be
A big surprise
Meanwhile we conceded
What they needed
They needed to be
Legitimized
And we gave them that
You realize
With little from them
In return
Because Donald Trump
Refuses to learn
He considers the summit
A huge success
But in reality
It was so much less
Trump placed North Korea
On an equal plane
But they’re a nuclear threat
Just the same
Cedric McClester, Copyright © 2018. All rights reserved.
Jun 12, 2018
Jun 12, 2018 at 3:30 PM UTC