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Whilst the nights look like his lips;
He, Vladimir, that I once loved,
And love still now, when I sleep;
And miss now, when I weep.

Whilst the skies look like his eyes;
He, Vladimir, that hath but left,
My soul at the rage of Leningrad;
His goodbyes then erased my heart.

And when I look into the sun, apart;
I cannot but see the naïve Jakarta,
Trembling and groaning and moaning by its heat--
that its brown rain is not too sweet.

And when I gaze into the sea, the ocean;
The sandy scene turns evil bliss,
With a vile scent that rips, and burns--
A part of me that was pleased.

And when I stare at the heat, and its meat;
My souls collapse, they cannot meet,
There are hazards in its singing;
Violence in its newborn spring.

Wha else is sweet but Vladimir’s hand;
There was art then, like that in the rain,
What cold I felt, but that of love--
The feelings then, were more than enough.

What else is love but Vladimir’s eyes;
That my mercy rises to live again,
What is triumph, what is victory;
And all, without my Vladimir in me.

What else is laugh but Vladimir’s gaze;
In there are so much laughter, and idyll,
The ones that speak--the grass feels,
The ones I sought from East to West!

What else are tears but Vladimir’s mad;
What is in love but my own joy;
A joy that is too sad, and now immune--
To this untouched love, the worlds’ tune.

Give me back, o my Vladimir to me;
He was too sweet, that I could not see--
And with a smile he opened my heart
To the cold curtains of Leningrad.

Bring me back, my Vladimir to me;
Tell the whole world look to look vintage,
For my flesh not to carry my age;
And for the Heat not to be seen.

And how can I but not love Leningrad?
With its water, sonorous past--
The magnolia tree there hath friended me;
And which sounds so sweet but she?

And how can I but not love Vladimir;
For his orotund and resonant clauses,
That the birds lakeside loved to hear
Beside the beds of daffodils and roses.

The grandiose melodies, I hear;
Those reminding me of his Light, and sleep--
The ones my heart turned to see,
And were so sweet as his lips.

The ornate feelings, I have here;
The feelings looking short and weird;
But the obedience of life, and Fate--
That we cannot reject, now or late.

The florid roses, and their music
They made my Vladimir looked too sleek;
And so clean as his sea of blue eyes;
Trembling my heart, soaking my nights.

The unsung chords, the lovely song
But nothing lasted a night, nor long;
My Vladimir hath gone from his dreams;
Nor could my other days see him.

The unheard love, the black poetry
That I writ here, oft’ with passion;
That my heart can again be free,
From this longing, from such poisons;

The unspoken, unwritten love;
My Vladimir hath yet to see,
That I hath not once left my thought
of him, and what Leningrad is to be;

The unsorted, untold stories;
I hath not forgiven my own sorry,
I cannot think behind the cold breeze--
My Vladimir might be there, might see me.

The pompous cheer, the fake chills
None is too genuine, and yet;
Why are those all Leningrad can feel,
Why do them make my hearts sad?

The painted hills, the brown forests
Why my heart cannot be at rest;
And why Leningrad can be scandalous
At the most obedient of times?

I cannot see you, but I still hear
Your moonlit voice that I feel near;
And your steps that made me sleep
Ringing loud in my soul so deep.

I cannot hear you, but I still feel
You are about me, my Vladimir;
And why this love seems so blue
Because ‘tis genuine, ‘tis true;

I cannot feel you, but I still sense
That such love too is insane;
That sanity too is my friend,
That we shall meet, and love again;

I cannot sense you, but I still see
That my heart seems to go that far;
To you, to bring you back to me
To our unsung hours in Leningrad.

I cannot see you, but I listen
To the city that makes love fair;
And the story that brought us there,
If only you could be here.

I cannot see you, but I recall
The loveliness there, down the halls;
And the forest--as we walked along,
And stopped by to hear their song.

I cannot see you, but you are here;
Calling out to me that you are near;
And to you, I shall come out
To say my love once more, out loud;

I cannot see you, but you are true
And without you, all hath been blue;
To be with you again, in my heart
To be back in love with Leningrad.

I cannot see you, but you are there
And your love makes Leningrad so fair;
To be your star, and your moonlight
To be in your arms at the gliding night.

I cannot see you, but you love me;
And your love shall make me see
To be my sky, and my rainforests;
To put my clouded heart to rest.

I cannot see you, but you want me
As much as love itself is true;
And as much as Leningrad is to be
As much as our love can be, anew.

I cannot see you, but I want you
And your time as much as mine;
You make me insane, and blind
You are unreal, but then true;

I cannot see you, but I love you
So much as Leningrad anew;
And your heart is what I have here;
And your song is what I hear.
INSTEAD OF A PREFACE

During the frightening years of the Yezhov terror, I
spent seventeen months waiting in prison queues in
Leningrad. One day, somehow, someone 'picked me out'.
On that occasion there was a woman standing behind me,
her lips blue with cold, who, of course, had never in
her life heard my name. Jolted out of the torpor
characteristic of all of us, she said into my ear
(everyone whispered there) - 'Could one ever describe
this?' And I answered - 'I can.' It was then that
something like a smile slid across what had previously
been just a face.
[The 1st of April in the year 1957. Leningrad]

DEDICATION

Mountains fall before this grief,
A mighty river stops its flow,
But prison doors stay firmly bolted
Shutting off the convict burrows
And an anguish close to death.
Fresh winds softly blow for someone,
Gentle sunsets warm them through; we don't know this,
We are everywhere the same, listening
To the scrape and turn of hateful keys
And the heavy tread of marching soldiers.
Waking early, as if for early mass,
Walking through the capital run wild, gone to seed,
We'd meet - the dead, lifeless; the sun,
Lower every day; the Neva, mistier:
But hope still sings forever in the distance.
The verdict. Immediately a flood of tears,
Followed by a total isolation,
As if a beating heart is painfully ripped out, or,
Thumped, she lies there brutally laid out,
But she still manages to walk, hesitantly, alone.
Where are you, my unwilling friends,
Captives of my two satanic years?
What miracle do you see in a Siberian blizzard?
What shimmering mirage around the circle of the moon?
I send each one of you my salutation, and farewell.
[March 1940]

INTRODUCTION
[PRELUDE]

It happened like this when only the dead
Were smiling, glad of their release,
That Leningrad hung around its prisons
Like a worthless emblem, flapping its piece.
Shrill and sharp, the steam-whistles sang
Short songs of farewell
To the ranks of convicted, demented by suffering,
As they, in regiments, walked along -
Stars of death stood over us
As innocent Russia squirmed
Under the blood-spattered boots and tyres
Of the black marias.

I

You were taken away at dawn. I followed you
As one does when a corpse is being removed.
Children were crying in the darkened house.
A candle flared, illuminating the Mother of God. . .
The cold of an icon was on your lips, a death-cold
sweat
On your brow - I will never forget this; I will gather

To wail with the wives of the murdered streltsy (1)
Inconsolably, beneath the Kremlin towers.
[1935. Autumn. Moscow]

II

Silent flows the river Don
A yellow moon looks quietly on
Swanking about, with cap askew
It sees through the window a shadow of you
Gravely ill, all alone
The moon sees a woman lying at home
Her son is in jail, her husband is dead
Say a prayer for her instead.

III

It isn't me, someone else is suffering. I couldn't.
Not like this. Everything that has happened,
Cover it with a black cloth,
Then let the torches be removed. . .
Night.

IV

Giggling, poking fun, everyone's darling,
The carefree sinner of Tsarskoye Selo (2)
If only you could have foreseen
What life would do with you -
That you would stand, parcel in hand,
Beneath the Crosses (3), three hundredth in
line,
Burning the new year's ice
With your hot tears.
Back and forth the prison poplar sways
With not a sound - how many innocent
Blameless lives are being taken away. . .
[1938]

V

For seventeen months I have been screaming,
Calling you home.
I've thrown myself at the feet of butchers
For you, my son and my horror.
Everything has become muddled forever -
I can no longer distinguish
Who is an animal, who a person, and how long
The wait can be for an execution.
There are now only dusty flowers,
The chinking of the thurible,
Tracks from somewhere into nowhere
And, staring me in the face
And threatening me with swift annihilation,
An enormous star.
[1939]

VI

Weeks fly lightly by. Even so,
I cannot understand what has arisen,
How, my son, into your prison
White nights stare so brilliantly.
Now once more they burn,
Eyes that focus like a hawk,
And, upon your cross, the talk
Is again of death.
[1939. Spring]

VII
THE VERDICT

The word landed with a stony thud
Onto my still-beating breast.
Nevermind, I was prepared,
I will manage with the rest.

I have a lot of work to do today;
I need to slaughter memory,
Turn my living soul to stone
Then teach myself to live again. . .

But how. The hot summer rustles
Like a carnival outside my window;
I have long had this premonition
Of a bright day and a deserted house.
[22 June 1939. Summer. Fontannyi Dom (4)]

VIII
TO DEATH

You will come anyway - so why not now?
I wait for you; things have become too hard.
I have turned out the lights and opened the door
For you, so simple and so wonderful.
Assume whatever shape you wish. Burst in
Like a shell of noxious gas. Creep up on me
Like a practised bandit with a heavy weapon.
Poison me, if you want, with a typhoid exhalation,
Or, with a simple tale prepared by you
(And known by all to the point of nausea), take me
Before the commander of the blue caps and let me
glimpse
The house administrator's terrified white face.
I don't care anymore. The river Yenisey
Swirls on. The Pole star blazes.
The blue sparks of those much-loved eyes
Close over and cover the final horror.
[19 August 1939. Fontannyi Dom]

IX

Madness with its wings
Has covered half my soul
It feeds me fiery wine
And lures me into the abyss.

That's when I understood
While listening to my alien delirium
That I must hand the victory
To it.

However much I nag
However much I beg
It will not let me take
One single thing away:

Not my son's frightening eyes -
A suffering set in stone,
Or prison visiting hours
Or days that end in storms

Nor the sweet coolness of a hand
The anxious shade of lime trees
Nor the light distant sound
Of final comforting words.
[14 May 1940. Fontannyi Dom]

X
CRUCIFIXION

Weep not for me, mother.
I am alive in my grave.

1.
A choir of angels glorified the greatest hour,
The heavens melted into flames.
To his father he said, 'Why hast thou forsaken me!'
But to his mother, 'Weep not for me. . .'
[1940. Fontannyi Dom]

2.
Magdalena smote herself and wept,
The favourite disciple turned to stone,
But there, where the mother stood silent,
Not one person dared to look.
[1943. Tashkent]

EPILOGUE

1.
I have learned how faces fall,
How terror can escape from lowered eyes,
How suffering can etch cruel pages
Of cuneiform-like marks upon the cheeks.
I know how dark or ash-blond strands of hair
Can suddenly turn white. I've learned to recognise
The fading smiles upon submissive lips,
The trembling fear inside a hollow laugh.
That's why I pray not for myself
But all of you who stood there with me
Through fiercest cold and scorching July heat
Under a towering, completely blind red wall.

2.
The hour has come to remember the dead.
I see you, I hear you, I feel you:
The one who resisted the long drag to the open window;
The one who could no longer feel the kick of familiar
soil beneath her feet;
The one who, with a sudden flick of her head, replied,

'I arrive here as if I've come home!'
I'd like to name you all by name, but the list
Has been removed and there is nowhere else to look.
So,
I have woven you this wide shroud out of the humble
words
I overheard you use. Everywhere, forever and always,
I will never forget one single thing. Even in new
grief.
Even if they clamp shut my tormented mouth
Through which one hundred million people scream;
That's how I wish them to remember me when I am dead
On the eve of my remembrance day.
If someone someday in this country
Decides to raise a memorial to me,
I give my consent to this festivity
But only on this condition - do not build it
By the sea where I was born,
I have severed my last ties with the sea;
Nor in the Tsar's Park by the hallowed stump
Where an inconsolable shadow looks for me;
Build it here where I stood for three hundred hours
And no-one slid open the bolt.
Listen, even in blissful death I fear
That I will forget the Black Marias,
Forget how hatefully the door slammed and an old woman
Howled like a wounded beast.
Let the thawing ice flow like tears
From my immovable bronze eyelids
And let the prison dove coo in the distance
While ships sail quietly along the river.
[March 1940. Fontannyi Dom]

FOOTNOTES

1 An elite guard which rose up in rebellion
   against Peter the Great in 1698. Most were either
   executed or exiled.
2 The imperial summer residence outside St
   Petersburg where Ahmatova spent her early years.
3 A prison complex in central Leningrad near the
   Finland Station, called The Crosses because of the
   shape of two of the buildings.
4 The Leningrad house in which Ahmatova lived.


First published Sasha Soldatow Mayakovsky in Bondi
BlackWattle Press 1993 Sydney.
Cedric McClester Aug 2019
By: Cedric McClester

Leningrad Lindsey
And Moscow Mitch
One’s a chameleon
The other a-*****
It’s hard to figure out
Which one is which
They both have a tendency
To position switch

Leningrad Lindsey
And Moscow Mitch
Make a hell of a pair
You must admit
One’s been enchanted
The other has a glitch
But both ‘em tend to
Favor the rich

Leningrad Lindsey
And Moscow Mitch
Speak in unison
In perfect pitch
On behalf of the interests
They hope to enrich
With a snake oil like
Smooth sales pitch

Leningrad Lindsey
And Moscow Mitch
Are enough together
To give you barber’s itch
Call me what cha wanna
Even a snitch
But they’re both on a wagon
Without a hitch













Cedric McClester, copyright © 2019.  All rights resrved.
Jim Davis Apr 2017
In the last
three decades,
after we became one,
I touched
amazingly beautiful things,
horribly ugly things,  
unbelievably wondrous things

I touched nature's majesty;
hued walls of the Grand Canyon,              
crusty bark of the
Redwoods and Sequoias,
live corals of the
Great Barrier Reef,
dreamlike sandstone of the Wave

I touched magical and strange;
platypus, koalas and
kangaroos Down Under,
underwater alkali flies and
lacustrine tufa at Mono Lake,
astral glowing worms
in the Kawiti caves

I touched holy places;
Christianity's oldest churches,
the Pope's home in the Vatican,
Hindu and Sikh temples and
Moslem mosques in India,
Anasazi's kivas of Chaco canyon,
Aboriginal rocks of Uluru and Kata Tjuta

I touched glimmers of civilization;
uncovered roads of Pompeii,
fighting arenas of Rome,
terra cotta armies of Xian,
sharp stone points of the Apache,
pottery shards from the Navajo,
petroglyphs by the Jornada Mogollon

I touched fantastical things;
winds blowing on the
steppes of Patagonia,,
playas and craters of Death Valley,  
high peaks of the Continental Divide,
blazing white sands of the  
Land of Enchantment

I touched icons of liberty
and freedom;
the defended Alamo,
a fissured Liberty Bell,
an embracing Statue of Liberty,
the harbor of Checkpoints
Alpha, Bravo, and Charlie

I touched glorious things
made by man;
the monstrous Hoover Dam,
an exquisite Eiffel tower,
a soaring St Louis Arch,
an Art deco Empire State Building,
the sublime Golden Gate Bridge

I touched sparks from history;
the running path of an
Olympic flame just off Bourbon,
the last steps of Mohandas Ghandi
at Birla House before Godse,
******'s Eagle's nest and the
grounds over Der Führerbunker

I touched walls of power;
enclosed rings of the Pentagon,
steep steps of the
Great Wall of China,
untried bastions of
Peter and Paul's fortress,
fitted boulders of Machu Picchu

I touched strong hands;
of those conquering
Rommel's and ******'s hordes,
of cold warriors of
Chosin Reservoir,  
of forgotten soldiers of Vietnam,
of terrorist killers of today

I touched memories of war;
the somber Vietnam memorial,
the glorious Iwo Jima statue,
the cold slabs at Arlington,
the buried tomb of USS Arizonians,
Volgograd's Mother Russia  

I touched ugly things;
shreds of light in
Port Arthur's prison,
horrible smelly dust
in the streets from 9/11,
ash impregnated dirt
in the pits at Auschwitz

I touched oppressed freedom;
open ****** plazas
of Tiananmen Square,
smooth pipe and concrete
of the Berlin Wall,  
tall red brick walls
of the Moscow Kremlin

I touched constrained freedom;
heavy ankle and
wrist slave chains
in the South,
little windows
in Berlin's Stasi prison,
haunted cells in Alcatraz  

I touched remnants of madness;
wire and ovens of Auschwitz,
stacked chimneys and
wooden bunks of Birkenau,        
Ravensbruck, and Dachau,
the tomb of Lenin,
toppled Stalins

I touched hands of survivors;
of Leningrad's siege,
of German POWs and
of Russian fighters
of Stalingrad's battle,
of Cancer's scourges  

I touched grand things;
deep waters of the Pacific and Atlantic,
blue hills of Appalachia,
towering peaks of the Rockies,
high falls of Yosemite Valley,
bursting geysers of Yellowstone,
crashing glaciers of Antarctica and Alaska    

I touched times of adventure;
abseiling and zipping in Costa Rica,
packing Pecos wilds and Padre isles,
flying nap of earth Hueys to Meridian,
breaking arms in JRTC's box,
fighting Abu Sayyaf, and Jemaah
Islami in Zamboanga City

I touched through you;
wet sand beaches of  Mexico and Jamaica,
mysterious energy of the monoliths of Stonehenge,
rarefied air in front of the
Louvre's Mona Lisa,
ancient wonders of Giza,
Egypt's tombs and pyramids

We shared soft touches;
drifting in Bora Bora's
surreal waters,
joining hands camel trekking the
Outback's dry sands,
strolling along Tasmania's
eucalyptus forest trails

basking in swinging hammocks
under Fiji's bright sun,
scrambling in
Las Vegas' glittering and
red rock canyons,
kissing under the
Taj Mahal's symphony of arches

We shared touching deep waters;
propelled in gondolas
through the city of canals,
Drifting atop Uru cat boats on Lake Titticaca,
Swooping in jet boats
up a wild river in Talkeetna

Racing in speed boats
around Sydney's great harbour,
skimming in pangas in Puerto Ayora,
paddling the Kennebec for
East's best petroglyphs,
cruising Salzbergwerk's underwater lake

We touched scrumptious things;
Beignets and chicory coffee at DuMonde's in the Big Easy,
Hot *** with sesame sauce
in the walled city of Xian,
Peking duck, dimsum, scorpions,
snake and starfish on Wangfujing Snack Street

We touched delicious things
Crawfish heads and tails at JuJu's shack
and ten years at Jeanette's,
Langoustine at Poinciana's, Fjöruborðinus and Galapagos,
Cream cheese and loch bagels
at Ess-a' s in the Big Apple

I touched your hand riding;
hang loose waves of Waikiki,
a big green bus in Denali's awesomeness,
clip clopping carriages of Vienna, Paris,
Prague, New Orleans, Krakow,
Quebec City, and Zakopane,
the acapella sugar train of St Kitts

We shared touching on paths;
the highway 1 of Big Sur,
the Road of the Great Ocean,
the bahn to Buda and Pest,
the path to the North of Maine,
the trail of the Hoh rainforest,
and time after time, the way home

Yet,
I could spend
the next three decades,
in simple bliss,
having need for
touching nothing,
other than you!

©  2016 Jim Davis
A poem I wrote last year for my wife!  Posted now since it matches the HP' theme for today - "Places"
When the Nazis besieged Leningrad it became a terrifying hell.
Everyday **** planes bombarded the city many times.
As time went on Leningrad was increasingly destroyed.
People and children were starving and malnourished.
**** troops blocked the supply of food , fuel and medicine.
The fate of the people and children in Leningrad was truly terrible.
Many died slowly and painfully.

Now history is repeating itself again.
Gaza has become the new
Leningrad in the third millenium.
A much worse hell and too terrible to be repeated again.
This terrible history is truly sad to repeat itself.


April 2025

By Alvian Eleven
r Jul 2014
I am wheat
I cry, I cry
Again
You leave your dead
At my feet
Oh why, oh why

At Gettysburg
We cried
Again, again
They rose and died
Below our stalks
They lie, they lie

From Stalingrad
To Leningrad
One million dead, one million dead
The Panzers came
Wheat fields aflame
They burned, they burned

And once again
You leave your dead
Ukraine, Ukraine
Oh, Putin's shame
The innocent lie
In wheat, in wheat.

r ~ 7/19/14
\¥/\
  |    Malaysia Air Flight 17
/ \
David Ehrgott Nov 2014
Leningrad in the spring of '81
Now that was a spring break
Sans the Florida girls
Three nights there
Two more in Moscow
The hotel room in Leningrad
Two whole days of *******
The bosses wife
And the knocking on the doors
By the military dependents
"Keep the noise down,
Knock that off" they plead
"Don't you know what time it is?"
I have no other memory of Leningrad
Because I never got to see any of it
The best time I ever had

in Moscow, the buildings, so grand
I just wanted to take a picture
and was surrounded by guards with
guns
Really big men with very big guns
Upon a pat down the KGB found
A pack of cigarettes on my person
"American Marlboros" he exclaimed
While passing them out to his buddies
"Here, try one of ours" he states
while offering a Russian version
of the same product/not the same product
I choked on it "see" said the cop
"You Americans RICH"

Comrades, have you seen him?
The great imperialist
The man who will destroy us
I have enough treasures from the past
to last me longer than I need, or want.
You know as well as I . . . malevolent memory
won't let go of half of them:
a modest church, with its gold cupola
slightly askew; a harsh chorus
of crows; the whistle of a train;
a birch tree haggard in a field
as if it had just been sprung from jail;
a secret midnight conclave
of monumental Bible-oaks;
and a tiny rowboat that comes drifting out
of somebody's dreams, slowly foundering.
Winter has already loitered here,
lightly powdering these fields,
casting an impenetrable haze
that fills the world as far as the horizon.
I used to think that after we are gone
there's nothing, simply nothing at all.
Then who's that wandering by the porch
again and calling us by name?
Whose face is pressed against the frosted pane?
What hand out there is waving like a branch?
By way of reply, in that cobwebbed corner
a sunstruck tatter dances in the mirror.

Leningrad, 1960
Mateuš Conrad Aug 2018
.university was such a bad idea... i'm starting to think... isn't university the place where only women and rapists are admission worthy?! forget the men... you're on your own!

              gorgeous lisp...
Fionna
from Fraserburgh...
worked in
a nightclub to
pay for a mandolin,
and play her maggie may...
outside her window...
her sweetness imbue of
honey and the letter G
stumbling into a "stutter"....
and?
one detail...
she loved
queen's innuendo...
the ooh ooh bit
and the otherwise
Spanish rodrigo
in-between composer...
i left Edinburgh...
because my heart was
not into it...
  my eyes were...
but in my heart...
    i was not standing on
an island, but an iceberg...
       too many English
private school educatde kids...
too much interconnected
meritocracy bargains...
said via grandfather earned
ditto position through
the connectivity of his, father's
father...
   no...
              i won't have that
*******... hanging before
me like a carrot, while
i play the donkey...
  sorry... no...
    shouldn't have lied
about your mother being your sister,
and your grandmother being
your mother...
     then?!
Leningrad would
have made sense!
thankfully?
        it still doesn't!
and doubly thankful for it
that i am, in saying:
it, never, will!
Nat Lipstadt May 2014
an old familiar,
an adversary of the first degree,
when we wrestle,
me and this god
disguised as an angel disguised as man,
the door to where we tangle,
clicks shut with a perceptible oval sounding,
a trumpet announcing commencement of the festivities,
that we are
Occupado

no stray observers permitted in,
the room entrances locked,
someone's two hands upon each temple,
(cannot be mine, for)
inside we combat literally,
"mano-a-mano"
hand to hand,
word to word,
gradually, continuously,
up close and personally,
one on
One

over the course of a lifetime,
each battle named,
famously borrowed and thus recorded,
Agincourt, Waterloo, Gettysburg, Leningrad, Ðiên Biên Phú,
for the record keeping purposes of our unforgiving ******-
historian

the rules of engagement somewhat flexible,
biting, choking, eye gouging,
kicking when down, not just legal,
encouraged, no holds barred,
when we wrestle,
the dirtier the
better

take turns declaring a victor,
for that matters little, truly,
just a record keeping notation,
the battle and its aftermath,
the waves of pain inflicted,
the casualty count engorged,
is the greatest glory,
dans une manière de
parler

though sent away the children,
our earthly goods,
designating them purportedly,
non-combatants observers,
yet 'no rules' meant
they could be accidentally drawn in,
non-combatant status does not prevent them
from being freely captured or
killed

the conflict ongoing,
no one ever calls for a truce,
for both unequal adversaries know,
no quarter will ere be given,
and though the tide shifts,
each individual battle produces as always,
a winner and a
loser

noisy affairs,
long after the battle,
the slain yet scream,
perhaps I am confused,
perhaps it is the day's survivors,
announcing that sadly,
they are still
alive

it must be the latter,
for here I am writing and recording,
and though alone,
I hear an ever growing louder,
gouging sine wave scream piercing,
daring my soul to leave my wracked
body
for though mortal wounded,
I am therefore
both dead and alive,
but which more so,
none can surely
say

this conflict remains
unconcluded
the pain in my hip, now
everywhere,
my Jacob, now, Israel,
marker
so visible even if itself,
unseen

3:59am
"The same night Jacob arose and took his two wives, his two female servants, and his eleven children, and crossed the ford of the Jabbok. He took them and sent them across the stream, and everything else that he had. And Jacob was left alone. And a man wrestled with him until the breaking of the day. When the man saw that he did not prevail against Jacob, he touched his hip socket, and Jacob's hip was put out of joint as he wrestled with him. Then he said, “Let me go, for the day has broken.” But Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.” And he said to him, “What is your name?” And he said, “Jacob.” Then he said, “Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed.” Then Jacob asked him, “Please tell me your name.” But he said, “Why is it that you ask my name?” And there he blessed him. So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, saying, “For I have seen God face to face, and yet my life has been delivered.” The sun rose upon him as he passed Penuel, limping because of his hip. Therefore to this day the people of Israel do not eat the sinew of the thigh that is on the hip socket, because he touched the socket of Jacob's hip on the sinew of the thigh."
—Genesis 32:22-32

For Maria, in her voice...
Kenny H Jun 2013
I have never experienced death around me
Not once.
I have yet to go to war,
I haven't even seen an animal get run over
By a speeding oaf trying to get home on time.
Yet, death occurs every second
Almost every second.
Why is it that I have not seen it then?
I should count my blessings and not look in a mirror.

My grandfather definitely saw death.
I called him Pop, he was in World War II,
I wasn't old enough to ask him about such troubles.
Then again, would I ask him about them now?
Would he dare speak the unspeakable
The harshness of war,
The noise all the cacophony,
Buildings, architecture, torn down,
Beautiful cities once covered with life,
The bright colors of Venezia the somber rain of London
Destroyed in an instant.

I don't think I'd have the ***** to **** someone,
I question my own loyalty to my country
Would I fight to protect my home,
Or would I hideaway in another country,
Or claim I am a racist?
(I think that only works when you have to do jury duty,
But I think I would try anything, sadly.)
Hal Loyd Denton Jan 2012
Eternal Anaheim

Somewhere in the dark back streets of the big easy this scene opens a dope addict slumps in the chair by an old filthy bed in an old
Seedy hotel this last hit was his last to many trips the highs that were no better than the siren call of the ****** of the deadly
Godless streets a mockery a disgusting counter life contrasted with having a loving wife and a family now the needle dangles from
A dead used up body and all the time the sacred book, open its cover the twin doors of grace and love outwardly they open the very
Portals of glory speaking of highs your first steps on arrival the mountains surrounding the holy city on the peak the great Sequoia
Down the mountain then the Redwoods then the Cedars they not only are in stands but they have designs formations each has an
Esthetic quality a mood some darker blends into lighter a virtual mosaic that reflects the thoughts your thinking you can walk down
The mountain enjoying finding the right footing or you can do a slow floating glide and take out the hassle at the bottom the foot
Hills begin again trees but now they not only speak to the senses of the mind and eyes but the heart feels an inner talking and aliveness
That wasn’t known about trees before flowers are dispersed there are a sea of them high ones short ones they have continuity of flow
Should I say mind blowing well this is a true high isn’t it then the low lands flat lands which ever you prefer also your choice they can
Be moors shires or better mist filled with the hint of Gwendolyn and Sir Lancelot Camelot awaits my dear friend beyond in rings and
Diamond splendor gardens on the order of the hanging gardens of ancient Babylon or the royal gardens of Leningrad or Paris touched
With living scenes of Monet, Matisse, Renoir or Van Gough’s french country side then the orchards every fruit especially Pomegranate and figs apples
So sweet you can hardly resist dancing along as you enjoy its heavenly taste then the fields where the heavenly corn grows that they
Make the true angel food manna from the corn as high as the angels themselves seven to eight feet tall just a hint of green left here
It is translucent clear as glass to your ears comes the sound of mighty tumults of water coursing ever swiftly to the Crystal sea follow
It to the walls this bejeweled linear spectacle bluest Sapphire reddest rubies gold leafs they appear as strawberries Grandma should
Like that Emeralds now I like Onyx first its bands or white then it has practically all colors for you to view these are all the size
Of a locomotive is that Walt Disney at the throttle all the children will say it is and then the gates of perfect pearl the streets that start
From them is translucent purist gold feel left out sometimes I’m writing about your inheritance its in his last will and testament what is a
Place that isn’t defined by the wafting smells the Jolon Mission is made special by the wafting scent of Lilac that pervades the grounds
Here Manna cakes and cookies for a start but it says the master will feed the bride with a masterful banquet just go in your mind to
Grandmother’s kitchen or the smell of pancakes when dad used to cook them but you really have to stretch so the restaurants you
have visited with closest friends and loved ones add them all up then multiply by a thousand your getting close now for the city’s
Infrastructure the shops I mean I can’t believe that they will not have at least some that will be dotted with the whimsical huts and
Fiery tale feel like those in Carmel California then throw in some adobe architecture from New Mexico some Italian bistro or just stands
With pizza as the roof why not well the mansions are left and the most important the glorious throne and He who will set there as we
Lay our crowns at his feet joy singing his look of love and acceptance will be worth everything I have tried to describe back to our
earthy home there are prisons full of our children friends that are prisoners of other vices just as bad as the ****** they are going to
lose not only heaven but their souls that have been paid for in blood, agony and undying love reach them it’s a little bit of heaven down
here Merry Christmas
Edna Sweetlove Jun 2015
Dmitri Shostakovich woke up feeling sad
In his home town of Leningrad;
The naughty Nazis were shelling his lovely Russian city -
So, for consolation, he ****** ******* his wife's left *****.
Tony Luxton Nov 2015
The first round is celebrities,
probably a knockout for me.
Most people I could mention would
be lucky still to be on pension.

My geography now is history.
Leningrad has already been purged
but where have they put Calcutta?
Oh! Calcutta - the internet I suppose.

I'm told that trivia and me don't fit.
Still, not much does these days.
Pass the cocoa and Rich Teas, please.
anthony Brady Sep 2019
We thought it would come, we thought the Germans would come,  
were almost certain they would. I was thirty-two,
the youngest assistant curator in the country.
I had some good ideas in those days.

Well, what we did was this. We had boxes  
precisely built to every size of canvas.
We put the boxes in the basement and waited.

When word came that the Germans were coming in,  
we got each painting put in the proper box
and out of Leningrad in less than a week.
They were stored somewhere in southern Russia.

But what we did, you see, besides the boxes  
waiting in the basement, which was fine,
a grand idea, you’ll agree, and it saved the art—
but what we did was leave the frames hanging,  
so after the war it would be a simple thing  
to put the paintings back where they belonged.

Nothing will seem surprised or sad again  
compared to those imperious, vacant frames.

Well, the staff stayed on to clean the rubble
after the daily bombardments. We didn’t dream—
You know it lasted nine hundred days.
Much of the roof was lost and snow would lie  
sometimes a foot deep on this very floor,
but the walls stood firm and hardly a frame fell.

Here is the story, now, that I want to tell you.  
Early one day, a dark December morning,
we came on three young soldiers waiting outside,  
pacing and swinging their arms against the cold.  
They told us this: in three homes far from here  
all dreamed of one day coming to Leningrad  
to see the Hermitage, as they supposed  
every Soviet citizen dreamed of doing.  
Now they had been sent to defend the city,  
a turn of fortune the three could hardly believe.

I had to tell them there was nothing to see
but hundreds and hundreds of frames where the paintings had hung.

“Please, sir,” one of them said, “let us see them.”

And so we did. It didn’t seem any stranger  
than all of us being here in the first place,  
inside such a building, strolling in snow.

We led them around most of the major rooms,  
what they could take the time for, wall by wall.  
Now and then we stopped and tried to tell them
part of what they would see if they saw the paintings.  
I told them how those colors would come together,  
described a brushstroke here, a dollop there,  
mentioned a model and why she seemed to pout  
and why this painter got the roses wrong.

The next day a dozen waited for us,
then thirty or more, gathered in twos and threes.  
Each of us took a group in a different direction:  
Castagno, Caravaggio, Brueghel, Cézanne, Matisse,  
Orozco, Manet, da Vinci, Goya, Vermeer,
Picasso, Uccello, your Whistler, Wood, and Gropper.  
We pointed to more details about the paintings,  
I venture to say, than if we had had them there,  
some unexpected use of line or light,
balance or movement, facing the cluster of faces  
the same way we’d done it every morning  
before the war, but then we didn’t pay
so much attention to what we talked about.
People could see for themselves. As a matter of fact  
we’d sometimes said our lines as if they were learned  
out of a book, with hardly a look at the paintings.

But now the guide and the listeners paid attention  
to everything—the simple differences
between the first and post-impressionists,
romantic and heroic, shade and shadow.

Maybe this was a way to forget the war
a little while. Maybe more than that.
Whatever it was, the people continued to come.  
It came to be called The Unseen Collection.

Here. Here is the story I want to tell you.

Slowly, blind people began to come.
A few at first then more of them every morning,  
some led and some alone, some swaying a little.
They leaned and listened hard, they ******* their faces,  
they seemed to shift their eyes, those that had them,  
to see better what was being said.
And a **** of the head. My God, they paid attention.

After the siege was lifted and the Germans left
and the roof was fixed and the paintings were in their places,  
the blind never came again. Not like before.
This seems strange, but what I think it was,
they couldn’t see the paintings anymore.
They could still have listened, but the lectures became  
a little matter-of-fact. What can I say?
Confluences come when they will and they go away.

MILLER WILLIAMS
Mike Essig May 2015
How far is it really from the murdered children
dead in the snow at Wounded Knee
to the crows eating the frozen eyes of German soldiers
before the gates of Leningrad?
How far from the hanging flesh of Hiroshima
to the piles of bodies at My Lai?
I have watched the news for 50 years
and it all seems like reruns to me.
So on the advice of a frisky, fearless wise woman
I stopped and now although death and destruction persist
I am free to concentrate on the things that matter to me.
Anyway, if the world ends, someone will let me know.

  ~mce
RLA
Culpoetry Mar 2014
The city offers me nothing
but mortal mortar and soulless stone.
Destiny summoned me here:
to Nature, my forgotten home.

We voted against a union
and were met with derision
For all whom had hailed
a vengeful decision.

Within the distant dreams
of a broken ghostly soul.

His cryptic mind's silver lining
Weaving a fable left unforetold.

My inner voice is translucent
with rays of light, shining through
like a silhouette over water.

Echoes over my hometown
A fleeting feeling amidst the cold.

You said something, but
Your words meant nothing.

Shadows over Leningrad
Shostakovich's theme.
Shadows over Sochi
A conservative dream.

"Thou shalt not give into the gimmicks."

"An urban fox as a metaphor for societal shunning."

"Commerica & Collaborative Chaos"
"A Friendly Fascist"
micropoems and scraps of writing from my twitter and tumblr
Dawnstar May 2019
in my crown dream
i am a captain
i sail the seas
from age to age

blindly i wait
for't all to happen
still i am just
an icthiophage

aftermorrow i can see my fate
to rot in a cell or burn at the stake
the fruits that i ate were paltry and poor
an' i won't grow above five-foot-four

i've been way out, way far
over the top and across the line
paris, dubrovnik, leningrad
drop the pictureframe and let us unwind

mother can you tell me
how am i to carry on?
life is a jungle
entangled as the amazon

living in a coma
sheltered thoughts and faltered dreams
life as a loner
ain't much use in questioning....

on top of old smokey
eagles fly up and sing me to sleep
on top of the beat, the world is complete
the fire dies down and dark jupiter frowns

singing way out, beyond the stars
reaching the limits of venus and mars
half-glazed, half-mad
trying is lying the dying i've had
Quiet Despair

In a besieged town
In Syria
Snow falls
People starves
Children die
We are powerless
Against
Those who are
Wrong
And those who are right
Snow falls
Silently on
Quiet despair
I think of
Leningrad
James Falkener May 2018
Weakness is there to be exploited.
You learned fast, you saw the siege grow.
Abandoned, alone, countries disembowelled;
You scheme on which way to go.
Once home you rise as the shadow that can –
Fierce loyalty has benefits to come.
Quietly, the wolf, in your sheepskin coat
Plans to undo all that’s been done.
Leningrad’s voice became Yeltsin’s debt
Their safe passage guaranteed your gain.
Control reaches out - your life long advent -
As you tighten that belt from Baskov Lane.
Mateuš Conrad Jun 2018
half of it is not even supposed
to be made tangible,
or even "intelligent",
but rather entertaining
onomatopoeia,
   searching for the sort of lettering
to excavate
      the most:
         perplex sound;
   with reiterated fatial expression
best summed by: huh?!
e.g. so you say your
grandmother is a mother...
and your mother...
                  is your sister?!
and your uncle... is "actually"
your brother?!
                   my grandfather
has dementia...
     that doesn't give me allowance
to call him: ***** ******* Wonker...
does it?!
James Falkener Mar 2018
Weaknesses are to be taken advantage of.
You learned fast, you saw the siege grow.
Abandoned, alone, countries disembowelled;
You scheme on which way to go.
Once home you rise as the shadow that can –
Fierce loyalty has benefits to come.
Quietly, the wolf, in your sheepskin coat
You plan to undo all that’s been done.
Leningrad’s voice became Yeltsin’s debt
Their safe passage guaranteed your gain.
Control reaches out - your life long lament -
As you tighten that belt from Baskov Lane


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Putin
Mateuš Conrad Apr 2022
autobahn limbo:
lima bravo 5 5 5...
Harvard ha 6...


i woke up in a benevolent mood...
i rarely give money to paupers... only yesterday...
or the day before that: yesterday
i arrived at Romford at 12am from Putney
Bridge... sort of exhausted from dealing
with coworkers: i still don't understand
the tactic Emma is employing giving me
the ***** looks... then again flirting
with me... some... ******* underlying mental
health issues...
what is it with these women
my own age? i'm supposed to be the one
that's ****** up... but i look around...
**** me: what a bleak horizon...
almost as flat and boring as:
"adventure" in Belgium...
          ******* Swedish pop songs...
exported into the anglophone "hemisphere"...
maybe it was worthwhile that i was
a hermit throughout my 20s...
   coming back out, to meet people aged 35....
i'm of the "constipation": you what?!
o.k., o.k. i've had my fun in the brothels
but this is just getting silly...
#metoo...
                 you what?!
               i must have been living in an alternative
ulterior dimension...
   it's called the English articles procession...
i don't think i'm THE devil... just A devil...
one of many....
        so i i woke up in a benevolent mood...
two paupers... i cycled hangover feeling feverish
and like a **** thrown out onto a beach
to sun-bathe...
             you what?!
          yeah... felt like just that:
i don't need no hallucinogenic drugs...
when i get dementia... when i get dementia..
and there she was... a Roma-esque beauty...
i asked her... you want anything?
oh... just a Dr. Pepper... walked in... got my whiskey
and Pepsi... right... Dr. Pepper...
but it costs me £1.75... is she vegetarian?
why did i ask myself? well...
there's a meal deal... £3 for a drink... a "meal"
and a snack... for i bought a chicken bacon Caesar wrap...
Maltesers...
     as i walked out... in my mind: swerving...
ice-skating... asked her... are you vegetarian?
she said no... well then... here you go...
and all it cost me £3... for a god-bless-you...
good feeling... Charlie Dickens style good feeling...
honestly... if i had more... i'd freely give it up...
i just don't need it...
   i own enough... to be honest... i actually own
too much...
    but i can't be collective in the case of ownership...
selective...
what's that biblical quote:
ask... and it will be given?!
   no?
           minutes later i was buying a bottle
of cider and getting some cash-back...
another pauper... professional... faking it?
whatever... i wish i had children that i could
be defensive about... then again: no...
want anything? oh yeah... just some chocolate...
only yesterday the Royle family were munching on
some Crunchy chocolate bars...
so i bought him that... and told him while
giving it to him: the best choc-ah-bloc you'll
ever eat...
                     days like this... who needs to compete
with other men for status or women...
i feel like... skidding... feel like a diarrhoea...
but at the same time... hell... i just fed someone...
and she has one of those plump... Roma...
squish... smiles... you just want to bite them...
tease them a little... she reminds me of Priy'ah..
         that's how i love ***... it's the longing...
it's the forgetfulness that sometimes sprouts...
you remember all the tender parts of the body...
the soft parts surrounding the collar-bone...
   the funny parts of elbows and knees...
          the altar of a woman's thighs and...
       oh... oh... all that's in the inner crevices of her
works...
                      no... don't mention her hands...
i've tried... i can pick up a basketball with one hand...
obviously my phallus looks tiny in my own
hands:
funny... all those guys... taking ****-picks
just after having *******... oh no... they're not
taking them prior...
      women's hands are the most ******...
technically... to get some "whereabouts"
i'd have to... cut off my pinky...
i'd be left with 4 fingers...
            such cute little geisha blooms of bone...
i look: i want to eat... those hands up...
esp. if the woman in "question" isn't white...
   copper-neck... camel-jockey...
             ivory: Kenyan... plump buttered up
silver in the moonlight...
              right... i'm gearing up...
                     need to manifest an increase of stamina...
if my ******* "girlfriend" is texting me...
the time's right...
i've earned enough money in the past month...
time to revisit her...
         no more high 3 on the throne of thrones...
****... ****... *******: sure...
but no *******...
            better prep up... after all... if i'm going to
spend £120 for an hour's worth...

so she sends me a message asking whether i'm
alright: more like: have you forgotten about me?
of course i haven't...
but let's be honest: i don't *** to becoming boring...
something married people get bored of...
mind you: i don't want to have too much of it:
just in case i have to turn to role-play...
kinks... latex... glory-holes fetishes...
can we keep it kosher: the sort of ******* that
translates as: i really missed you?!
oh my god... she looks even better in daylight without
any make-up... what a gorgeous Turkish cougar
of a woman...

                         i'm pretty sure the women i work with
don't know anything about my brothel antics...
which is good... because... why would i want
them to know?
  
the German: Hessen... fans from Frankfurt didn't
disappoint... they came like all German people
come: like a horde...
  their fanaticism is more admirable than that
of the English football supporters...
i walked past them... they gave me the eye...
the sort of: giving me the eye of: oh look!
ein von uns...
                     one of us!
              
   funny that... in German 1 is also A...
a indefinite article... but also... an anzahl...
       number...

sure... obviously i was giving breaks to Muslims
breaking their fast... but with the Germans 'ere...
it felt like the good old times...
when Lyon fans visited... eh... zee Fwech...
it's not the same... but when the Germans come...
from the federation that isn't Saxony...
from the Hessen land... or elsewhere...
ever heard of the Anglo-Bavarians?! me neither...

i feel... at home... in Europe...
even today i was working with this guy... nervous as hell...
Finland? it really was a one word question...
no, no... close though... he replied...
Lithuania... i'll let him know some other shift we'll
do together...

czołem bracie!
            čołem bratku!
kaktos brolis!
          i.e. hey brother...
   kaktos: using the forehead to greet someone...

even in this poly-ethnic England that's
more London than England...
i felt... finally! pagaliau! schließlich!
at home in the right sort of cold...
i just needed the Germans to come to England
and behave like Icelanders...
hoo! hoo! clapping in unison...

why would i hate the Germans?!
           all the other ethnicities that are not associate
with Europe suddenly fizzled out of my
"concern"... Ramadam my ***...
                      i started talking to his... oh... this is a coy
one... ginger... beauty... has a flimsy blonde mustache...
freckles... light ginger hair...
i seriously don't mind...
she was really ******* reserved about me...
i could see it in her eyes...
finally i pulled her off... we started chatting...
her kids are studying Spanish...
they want to give it up... but i tell her: don't let them!
if they learn it, acquire it...
that's all the South American potential...
or tell them to learn German... after all:
English and German are cousins... the grammar is
pretty much the same... how you order words
in a sentence...

i just picked up... alles güt?!
ar du haben eine güt цeit?!

      i just wanted this woman know... a little bit of something
about myself... like...
i do have interests in foreign languages...
if she wanted to ******* with me to Poland...
i could speak for her... very "fluently":
well... natively...
         but what sort of woman would ever follow
Roxette day-dream?!
   i think i must have chewed that chewing gum
until my jaw felt sore...

remind me... why am i here? per se?!
if i'm not here for the fame... i must be here...
trying to make a conquest within the confiens of mythology...
i must be spelling it out... one person at a time...
to one person at a time...
  i'm not here for fame... i see it now...
fame associated with mortality... with the living..
no... no... i'm here for something more rarer...
i'm looking for acknowledgement after i am dead...
i want that: very much so...
i want to become famous... posthumously...

           it's a long project... es ist ein weit projekt...
fair enough: in English:
a pair... an antenna...
that N... which is shoved between vowels...
but... in Deutsche...
ein... eine...         that added vowel...
how does that work? i'm yet to speak
to someone who might erzählen (zu mich)...
i see a load of Germans... ooh! ooh!
fancy that!
         they're congregating...
no Zeppelins then?!
    
   wohl! nein Spaß wenn Deutsche
    do nicht kommen mit irgendein Zeppelins...

kommen! kommen!
lassen mich sehen du!  

but i can't really explain how it feels when seeing
these continental folk congregate:

   was inbrunst! was... lebengewalt!
i was truly standing there: pitch-side...
gobsmacked... ich war verblüfft...
         i sort of wanted to join them... i was itching
to go among them and chant their Frankfurters'
chants...
    well... because in England: diversity is our
strenght...
                    vielfalt ist unser stärke...

i was sort of reminded of the time when Europe
entertained those Nomads that spoke some
Hebrew... later mingled Hebrew with Deutsche
and out popped a ******* child that was Yiddish...

everyone comes here... this great continental funnel...
this bottle neck... they come... mingle...
and then they later leave...
   while those that remain and have always remained
are stuck by being struck with the sentence:
what the **** just happened?!

maybe that's my "problem": i see ethnicity before
i see race... like with this Lithuanian guy...
i seriously thought he was Finnish...
he sort of reminded me of looking like the lead
singer from the band HIM... Ville Valo

i did mention it to a coworker... oh look...
        der große schwarm!
maybe i should put more effort into this tongue...
no disrespect to the English language
but... German sounds softer...
English harsher...
   a bit like the inverse of: Russian sounds soft
while ****** sounds harsh...
it just sounds like... home...
          
       ein herц... ein wirbeln von luft...
              mund von der wald...

it's these conjunctions, the German definite articles...
hypothetically there's that for der
there's the for die
   there's that for das...
          i mean: there's der for that
there's die for the
   there's das for that...
    
                          you seriously cannot not be envious
when you see Germans en masse... spirited
with a commonality: for a bienenstockgeist
(hive-mind)...
                            i was struck with: neid... envy...
i wish i could belong like that...
within an in-group...
                       scheiße!  aber suchen bei mich!
i'm stuck with the ******* circus of the world...
alles zungen kam zu Loon'dune...

          seeing them like that... i find the hyped-stress
on individualism in the Anglo-Sphere slightly...
putting it mildly... debilitating...
all i wanted to do was go among the Hessen
and start chanting alles mit uns!
or alles von uns!

                i mean: how can i belong in a society that's
fixated on a global agenda... that eternal project
of monotheism... it's... seltsam... weird...
after the fiasco of the Turm von Babel... you'd think...
the opposite ought to be true...
the evil urges of the demiurge point in the other
direction...

                  but once more we've come together
as a "species" and once more we're trying to work
together... obviously the writings of Moses are
primarily metaphorischindikatoren:
you can't read them literally... anyone who reads
them literally has no poetic-sensibility...
no imagination... just like the flood did happen...
well... given the ice age and the melting of the ice...
sure... it did... mind you: we were drawing dragons
before we discovered dinosaur bones...
giant fire breathing lizards... fire being the representation
of what happened to these giant lizards...
supposedly a meteor struck the earth...
boom... imagine if that meteor struck the moon
and destroyed it... no tides... no water... blah blah...

i.e. i was never a big fan of Bill Hicks' humour...
or H'american humour in general,
unless it's by a black guy... i'm all into all that race
baiting... but me? something along the lines
of Eddie Izzard... Lee Evans...
                           maybe i'm just exhausting this sitting
that i've spread over two days...
     it has become such a collage and i'm starting to
smell a little like cologne... rye cologne...
or is that wheat? the main ingredient in whiskey?

well... that happens... at first reading
Human all too Human didn't present itself as spectacular...
but on second reading... wow!
probably his best work! it all makes sense now...
esp. since i'm reading it in English rather than ******...
too much of the teenage rebelliousness
goes into reaching for Nietzsche...
    i guess the best gateway to understanding him
is by reading some Heidegger...

ich bin einfach: begeistert mit Deutschedenken!
i am simply: enthralled with German thinking...
you couldn't: you wouldn't say as much
about about English thought...
          i just can't stomach it... it's too pragmatic...
it's too easily bound to problem solving...
it's hardly inquisitive...
it's a shepherd's mentality...
   keep everything organised... categorically proof...
phonetically, though? a ******* minefield...
loopholes of spaghetti everywhere...
   back "home" you never hear of the condition
that's dyslexia... you did hear of...
literate or illiterate... but there was no middle
ground... of dyslexia... i.e. / e.g. dyslexic:
good with numbers... **** with letters...
           katakana? or Chinese ideograms?!

(ich) sehen,
               hören,
                      wittern,
                           schmecken,
                                         fühlen...

aber! aber! da ist ein sechste! "sinn"...
   the totality of which translates itself into written
language... gedanke!
     or rather: denken! thinking!
strange... i can think about my liver...
but my liver doesn't think about me...
i can think about my brain... but my brain doesn't
think about me...

it's... deshalb a sense!
you think i'll learn Deutsche proper if i smuggle
in some German wörter:
from time zu zeit?! well... i'll have to remember:
bring in the Cyrillic TSA: ц -
  because i'm pretty sure i've just spotted an
exception on pronunciation...
it's not цoo... but it's most certainly цeit...
it's "actually" zoo... i'm itching to put an umlaut
on that U of ZU...

      i'm ageing... chances of me learning a third
language proper are impossible...
i can only dream about it...
         i'm already entrenched with the language
i was born with and the language i'm writing in...

but i simply can't stop admiring the Germans...
unlike the English... i too have had my share of grief
"borrowed" from these people...
but seeing them congregate like that...
easily swayed... you can't simply stop... mouth agape:
ehrfurcht!

                ich wunsch ich war ein unter du... alles von du!
i was clearly born in the wrong tribe...
i clearly was moved to the wrong tribe...

loch in der borden!
     wolken in der himmel!
                    bäume in der wald!

you could really arm these fellas up... and march them
into suicide missions and they'd be like:
fair enough...
          i guess that's what Leningrad must have
been like...
              
i can't exactly love my native tongue...
the noblemen of my camp sort of became lazy...
disrespectful to themselves...
and their people...
                              **** them: it's that easy...
i pledge no allegiance to either England or Poland...
i'm a three thinker...
as long as the Latin script is employed...
i tried the Greek i tried the Katakana and the Cyrillic...
i became cross-eyed...

well... not with the Greek...
    Cyrillic was always... paupers' Greek for me...
how Greeks destroyed the Glagoliic script...
it was so beautiful... almost... no... it was almost!
no... it wasn't Arabic... it was Glagolitic...
it was itself in how it was crafted...
nothing is going to come across as practical as
Latin: though: that's already known...
since Latin was the only language employed in
creating the internet... no?!

i do feel sorry for the natives though...
    for me... i'm "going elsewhere"... i'm always going elsewhere...
i'm not going back "home"...
Haiti?! Kenya with the ivory beauties...
Turkey... i'm definitely going to Turkey
to pick up Khedra that ol' raven haired witch...
the best **** in all of... whatever...
    i'm not staying in England: at least my mind
isn't... and my body is not returning to Poland...
i'm ******* off... i want to entertain a Turkish harem
of thirsty women...
   i want to "return" to the Mamluks of Egypt...
i want to be in the ranks of the Janissaries...
                          you know... in cultures where masculinity
is celebrated: not simply shunned...
in my mind i'm already there...
to hell with dating single mums...
raising someone else's children...
if i were a prospect for a Cesar... being a foster parent...
perhaps... otherwise? too expensive...
    
i'm clearly not doing this ****...
culture's all awry...
             it's such a cryng shane though....
       how un-available women have become...
                well... people have lived through worse...
and still managed to: tragen an!
                              
geringste von ihr kümmernis      

                            leben kurz: leben liebend!
das ist alles!
                        live short: live loving.
Lawrence Hall Mar 2018
From Le Chansons de Volga File Clerks Rouge
© 1962 by Les Chansons, Leningrad

O sing a song of reproduction
Accomplished by electrical induction
As workers’ hands insert the paper
Deep into the magic vapor
Chanting without a fuss or stink,
“Yo, **, ** and a bottle of ink!”
Ions charge the chemical toner
Unless there’s none, ‘cause it’s all goner
Or even worse – if there’s a jam
And then the worker yells out (“Goodness!”)
But with a wrench and a mighty shout
Like that ol’ Czar, the jam is OUT
The Committee decrees a Print Command
This is their red-star’red demand
And out comes the paper, newly free
Fresh from a cartridge in a… (There! See?)
By Good Comrade Worker, Ivan-on-the-Spot
Alas, the message is for him to be…

                                                            ­         shot
Fumbletongue Sep 2018
Of all the things I've snorted
Which truthfully aint' many
The one that left me thwarted
Red pepper flakes a plenty

As they passed beneath my nose
Just as I inhaled
To my sinuses they arose
Which they promptly nailed

At first it seemed not so bad
The calm before the storm
Seized just like Leningrad
For communist reform

Just like that, a simple whiff
My nose a raging fire
Running water I did sniff
This situations dire

To the freezer I am going
To end this burning grief
For neither ******* or blowing
Brings any kind relief

Time to try a frozen ****
And see if I can numb
So I grab two ice cubes
And follow this rule of thumb

Hold them under water running
Until sizes that will stow
Pat yourself for your cunning
Then shove them up your nose
The entire time this was going on in my  effort to clear my passages my 16 year old daughter stood idly by laughing as I cried. I totally would have done the same. The ice cubes helped. A LOT
Yenson Jul 2019
First world recitals
oscillating first world minds
with oh so dainty first world problems
comic strips entertainers in grand autos pixels
the satiated famished building reality with Lego bricks
looking for pep-ups in shake-downs and power in cornflakes
the puff dragon armies sails on the good ship Boaty Mcboatface
the legless revolution is afoot remember to all bring your sunscreen

First world flaccid raconteurs
expendable variants from the Hall of gainful prosperity
the Gospel choirs singers of the malignant tumors in Capitalism
with sharp blazing french loaves readied by the odeon Deimos God
now on war-path First World Calveries in nappies n the Morning Star
in solidarity blighters will tussle and scream war cry in MacDonalds
utilizing advanced war techs like back stabbings and long range lies
the esteemed War correspondent produces reports of unrequited love

First world problems
disenchanted, bored vanguards seeking lost identities
ignominious raggle-taggles and sea-less shipless amoebic pirates
mama's simple Simons, Leningrad's finest fronting the lines of battle
our Wigan warriors without skulls and contents never mind a scrum
from basements, chairs, pubs and PCs this war for Stalingrad rages
An Alpha male from the third world who walks the walk looks on
The Theatre Royal Haymarket could'nt do a better farce than this
First World Problems by the people for the people and Prime fools
Maryam Apr 2020
if I had a pistol
black, unused
the first pellet would slash your skin
it would clumsily diffuse
my custom poison with your sins

I do not believe I’m mad
but Dr.__ disagrees
I’d walk home from Leningrad
but I’m afraid I’ll miss my knees

I’d walk home from any place
my momma’s voice keeps me alive
I take my pills 6 times a day
some people live, I just survive

I will walk home
discalced and drenched
( i left my raincoat on the bridge)
prepared to see your red fists clenched
(the one where suicide’s bewitched)

I will walk home
despaired and hopeless
seeking love I myself can’t birth
and your counterfeit “condolence”
I need not, for what it's worth

I will walk home
but where’s such place?
I’m running after broken dreams
can a compass help my chase?
it points to south- and that's within
Johnny Noiπ Oct 2018
33 minutes 33 minutes; New trampling for the new bishop; Homelessness, trash ||||| Diana Apollo 1,1,1, Venice: Jorge,  Rana. Showroom's new project 100 (1500) d. He is being asked to start. 500 passengers for the BBC. Because it is not cold at night,  FOOD Hep C, experiment, graffiti zucchini
How to find a woman in the park; 33 and 33; I know you robbed the bishop's hat ||||| 1.1.1 Diana Basket Apollo London: The George. 100 starts a new project to bring the people of the 500 passengers (1,500 people). That is a good thing.
Hepatitis, sexually transmitted diseases, the use of memory ladies pumpkin gay graffiti on park activities, said too much water cove to increase Christopher go free. Seneca head. Written by Simon AWR - Social t in Asia Why is that ordinary people? Murdoch: Aaron secret, the secret of terrorism St. FIFA, the overall effect of an old enemy. Last month it released? Next we treat animals out of the women's bride, John, ILLINOIS, Sweden, renin-Tado. Gregory, a classic restaurant if you want to relax and Asia Asia factory in Belgium with Gregory, 10 new platinum! Lx are for him. Payment ceremony A new level of machine: "What is this?" The other deaths in water is convenient and comfortable, I lost. He lived Berlin According to the film in Germany. Did not see to the work of the shapes with attractive embroidery. Internal seat. || 1, New Jersey, New Jersey 1 What? You can see the faces and texts published in Spain. New Jersey, New Jersey, USA, Alpha Alaska magazine "Answer". download 100500100100
A new city was born out of the city. I am proud
Generically refers to Bark, is embraced Bark, coffee, please ... The new R & R bread fresh new snake, 1100 grams of protein and protein and all the information is available to my wife. And Apple's lawyers. This, for example, is often the operating system's language. | Currently in Kiev, New Jersey, New Jersey | | | | | | | | | Bradyfarcertcc box output ||
                  Covetous and homosexual, Jesus Christopher Hull spoke clearly,
The sample of insurance is growing in the most dreadful water.
Marshall leader. The Sysgem Christian writes to AWR, ||
The 'Illinois' home is social welfare in Asia.
I wrote enough time for ordinary people, so why NAME?
  Secret Secretary
                              Aaron's runner did not find any mistakes in the game.
Panic FIFA Football, Total Shootout,
Ole Enemy has traveled for a year. Last month is off!
                                        The lion is like a bridal lion,
from Sweden in Linington, Illinois, from Leningrad to Tordadio,
Look for members of the wild swords of the two women.
If you want Big Gaburla Gururtle to come to rest on the land,
all for the ten new Asians, and Asian and Belgian herbs,
Gregory's dining outfits! You must do Westgate.
Pattern: Exercise
                                   The new machine level Yes "What's this?"
Born from all other women. I feel like I'm carrying pond water.
I was living with Abraham in Berlin
But in Germany, he loves me and says he loves me.
They cannot see the speed during the operation.
The chair moves. || 1, New Jersey, New Jersey 1 What?
According to Geo-Moon (Geo Meng),
you can view the published publications in Spain.
"Answers" in Los Alamos and El Paso magazines,
magazines sold in New Jersey, New Jersey, USA.
Loading 100 500 100 100 A new community was born out of town.
I feel proud. Flame, Shake, Blend, Coffee Bar, Short Interpretation,
Please Wait, Away ... New Bird Cake, The New Snake:
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We have information available for my husband and me. I will be Apple's attorney.               In many languages, there are examples of operating systems. Currently in Kyiv, New Jersey, New Jersey, | | | | |
About the Salam 33 minutes 33 minutes; New trampling for the new bishop
Basket for homelessness ||||| Diana Apollo 1,1,1,        Venice: Georgie, Rana.
The new project Showroom 100 (1500) d. Begin.|
500 passengers at the BBC. Because it's not cold,
FOOD Hep, experimental graffiti zucchini;
How to get a woman in the park who
Covetz homosexual Jesus. Christopher Owl explicitly stated
The insurance sample grows in the most terrifying water.
                       Leader of Marshall, Simeon wrote to AWR
                       "Illinois" is social social life in Asia
                       I've written enough time for ordinary people, so why?
                       Mystery of Aaronic Epistles Nothing Found Secret.
                       Panic FIFA Football, general beat, OLD
The enemy went a year. The last month is turned off!
The lion is like a bride, from Linden, Illinois, Sweden, Lenin to Tadduo
Search for wild beasts from both women.   If you want to rest on Gourds, Gourdes on earth, go get 10 new Asian girls,
Asian and Belgian plants, and Gregory's restaurant outfits!
You must do Westgate. Formula: Exercise; New machine level
Yes "What is this?" Born from all other women.
I feel that I have lost water in the pond. I lived with Abraham in Berlin,
But in Germany he says he loves me. They do not see the speed during surgery. The seal is embedded. || 1, New Jersey, New Jersey 1 What? According to geometry, you can view the published texts in Spain. In New Jersey, New Jersey, USA, and in Alpha, Alaska magazine's "Answer". Loading 100 500 100 100 New communities were born outside the city.
I feel proud Flame, Bark Bark, Cafe, Interpretation, Please Wait ... New New Cake, New Snake, News and R & R have 1100 grams of protein, information for each available to my husband and me.
I will be an Apple lawyer.     There are many examples of operating systems
in many languages. Currently in Kiev, New Jersey, New Jersey, | | | | | | | | | About the Bradyfarcertcc Slam box ||33 minutes to 33 minutes;
I know that he robbed the new bishop; Since no ceiling |||||        Diana basket 1,1,1 Apollo, London: George Rana.    The new showroom Project 100 (1500) d. Begin. 500 passengers to the BBC.
|
Because it's not cool;
FOOD Hep C, is the experience, which is female
so as to be in the park of graffiti zucchini,
Homosexual activity is noted,                        he had Covetz Christopher Owl
Free sample of water increases greatly.
Leader of Marshall. Simon wrote AWR
        "Illinois" social social life in Asia
I am come a time is enough for the ordinary people, and why?          Nothing Found Murdock: the mystery of the Aaronic,
Secret for St. FIFA itself in terror, general beat OLD
In the enemy. Last month it off!   And just like a bride from Linden, Illinois, Sweden, Lenin is Tadduo
                                                    Then I shall ask of the beasts by the women.
If you want to rest Gourde Zloty on the ground for 10 new Asian, Asian and Belgium plants, Gregory outfits in the restaurant! You do the Westgate.
The formula Exercise
                                                  The new machine this level, "What is this?"
Born from all the other women. Water lame, and paralyzed me feel lost. I lived with Abraham in Berlin,|
Germany say mainstream. I do not see the speed during surgery.
Embedded in the seat. || 1, New Jersey, New Jersey 1 What? The geometry, and you can see the texts published in Spain. New Jersey, New Jersey, USA, in alpha Alaska magazine "Answer". 100 500 100 100 loading
A new communities were born outside of the city. I feel proud
Branches, bark! bark! café, Please ... New Interpretation of new loaf
of bread, a new Serpent, R&R in 1100
News and grams of protein,
information is available for each of my husbands
and me.  And it will be Apple's lawyer. There are about many things,
examples of the languages ​​of the majority of the operating systems. Currently in Kiev, New Jersey, New Jersey | | | | | | | | |
                                     Bradyfarcertcc gets slammed out of the box ||
Eshwara Prasad Jul 2020
Moscow to Leningrad
by train,
Alone.
Eye catches something
Fancy.
Journey aborted.
New dream begins.

— The End —