The cool winter air makes the grass sway like the ocean's waves.
Makes the limbs of trees, both young and old, dance fancifully without care of who's watching.
The brilliant sun, bold as it is, is shy this morn
Only peaking over the icy mountain tops.
The sky is as clear and beautiful as a newly forged glass sculpture.

As I turn around, I see my home,
The furnace still warm from yesterday's work
sits quietly in the center
The bellow, old with use
waits impatiently for it's next push
The anvil, stubborn with age
tightens it's muscles, prepared for the torment of the day
The mallet and hammer, young with ambition
remember the creations so recently forged with creativity
The ground is riddled with steel and coal
The grass here is burnt and covered with the now stagnant embers of the furnace
The walls are filled with the tools of my trade,
all made in this very place.

The day has begun.
I act with repetition as I have so many days and nights prior.
I lay fresh coals upon the furnace
I push the bellow with all my strength
The furnace begins to roar with vigor like a newly awoken bear
I pull new, unworked steel from the bin
Laying the steel upon the fire,
I can see the color change and shift rapidly
I prepare the hammer and mallet for use, and hear their excitement fill this place
Pulling the steel from the fire, I lay it upon the grouchy anvil.
Then I begin my work of creation.
Hammer meets steel,
sparks and embers fly,
steel morphs it's shape,
the day is now warm in this place.

For hours, this process continues
The furnace only grows warmer,
The bellow only grows more worn,
The anvil only tires with work,
The mallet and hammer only become more ecstatic.
Until the creation is complete.

The day is complete.
The wind has all but ceased.
The grass now as still as all the sleeping creatures.
The trees' festival is complete.
The air is now freezing.
The furnace is cooling again,
The bellow is at peace again,
The anvil is relaxed again,
The mallet and hammer are quiet again.

I sit here now, watching the sun retreat behind the lake.
It's setting as colorful as a painting.
My work today is done,
My tools are silent,
My creation is complete.
I too, can now bask in the serenity of the night.

Flicker Shimmer Glow

The brightest star can shine even with thick black velvet draped over it.  
Quartz, lime and salt crystals formed a glass ball.
The dark womb held me, warm and soft.  
My mom called my cries when I was born the most sorrowful sound she had ever heard.  
She said she’d never heard a baby make a sound like that.    
I’d open my eyes in low light until the world’s light healed rather than hurt.  
The summer before eighth grade, July 1992,
I watched a shooting star burn by at 100,000 miles per hour as I stood on the balcony  
while my family celebrated my birthday inside.  
It made it into the earth’s atmosphere
but it didn’t look like it was coming down;
I know it didn’t hit the ground but it burned something in the time it was here.  
The glass ball of my life cracked inside.  
Light reflected off the salt crystal cracks.  
I saw the beauty of the light within.  
Nacre from my shell kept those cracks from getting worse,
a wild pearl as defense mechanism.  
In 2001, I quit my job after they melted and poured tar all over my life.  
All summer literature class bathtubs filled with rose hip oil cleaned the tar.  
That fall logic and epistemology classes spewed black ink all over my philosophy
written over ten years then.  
Tar turned to asphalt when I met someone from my old job for a drink in November
and it paved a road for my life that went to the hospital I was in that December
where it sealed the roof on my life
when I was almost murdered there
and in February after meeting her for another drink.  
They lit a fire at the top of the glacier and pushed the burning pile of black coal off the edge,
burnt red, looking like flames falling into the valley.  
While that blazed the side of the cliff something lit an incandescent light.  
The electricity from the metal lightbulb ***** went through wires and heated the filament between until it glowed.  
I began putting more work into emotional balance from things I learned at AA meetings.  
In Spring 2003, the damage that the doctors at the hospital in 2001 had done
made it harder for light to reflect from the cracks in the glass ball.
I’d been eating healthy and trying to get regular exercises since 1994
but in Spring 2003 I began swimming for an hour every morning .  
The water washed the pollution from the burning coals off
And then I escaped in July.  
I moved to London to study English Language and Linguistics.  
I would’ve studied English Language and Literature.  
I did well until Spring 2004 when I thought I was being stalked.  
I thought I was manic.  
I thought I was being stalked.  
I went home and didn’t go back for my exams after spring holiday.  
Because I felt traumatized and couldn’t write poetry anymore,
I used black ink to write my notes for my book on trauma and the Russian Revolution.
I started teaching myself German.  
I stayed healthy.  
In 2005, my parents went to visit my mom’s family in Malaysia for two weeks.
I thought I was being stalked.  
I knew I wasn’t manic.  
I thought I was being stalked.  
I told my parents when they came home.  
They thought I was manic.  
I showed them the shoe prints in the snow of different sizes from the woods to the windows.  
They thought I was manic.  
I was outside of my comfort zone.  
I moved to California. I found light.  
I made light,
the light reflected off the salt crystals I used to heal the violence inflicted on me from then on.  
The light turned the traffic lights to not just green from red
but amber and blue.  
The light turned the car signals left and right.  
The light reflected off of salt crystals, light emitting diodes,
electrical energy turned directly to light,
electroluminescence.  
The electrical currents flowed through,
illuminating.  
Alone in the world, I moved to California in July 2005
but in August  I called the person I escaped in 2003,
the sulfur and nitrogen that I hated.  
He didn’t think I was manic but I never said anything.
I never told him why I asked him to move out to California.  
When his coal seemed like only pollution,
I asked him to leave.  
He threatened me.  
I called the authorities.  
They left me there.
He laughed.  
Then the violence came.  
****:  stabbed and punched, my ****** bruised, purple and swollen.  
The light barely reflected from the glass ball wIth cracks through all the acid rain, smoke and haze.
It would take me half an hour to get my body to do what my mind told it to after.  
My dad told me my mom had her cancer removed.
The next day, the coal said if I wanted him to leave he’d leave.  
I booked his ticket.
I drove him to the airport.  
Black clouds gushed the night before for the first time in months,
the sky clear after the rain.  
He was gone and I was free,
melted glass, heated up and poured—
looked like fire,
looked like the Snow Moon in February
with Mercury in the morning sky.  
I worked through ****.  
I worked to overcome trauma.  
Electricity between touch and love caused acid rain, smoke, haze, and mercury
to light the discharge lamps, streetlights and parking lot lights.
Then I changed the direction of the light waves.  
Like lead glass breaks up the light,
lead from the coal, cleaned and replaced by potassium,
glass cut clearly, refracting the light,
electrolytes,
electrical signals lit through my body,
thick black velvet drapes gone.  





















Lava

I think that someone wrote into some palm leaf a manuscript, a gift, a contract.  
After my parents wedding, while they were still in India,
they found out that my dad’s father and my mom’s grandfather worked for kings administering temples and collecting money for their king from the farmers that worked the rice paddies each king owned.  They both left their homes before they left for college.  
My dad, a son of a brahmin’s son,
grew up in his grandmother’s house.  
His mother was not a Brahmin.  
My mother grew up in Malaysia where she saw the children from the rubber plantation
when she walked to school.  
She doesn’t say what caste she is.  
He went to his father’s house, then college.  
He worked, then went to England, then Canada.  
She went to India then Canada.  
They moved to the United States around Christmas 1978
with my brother while she was pregnant with me.  
My father signed a contract with my mother.  
My parents took ashes and formed rock,
the residue left in brass pots in India,
the rocks, so hot, they turned back to lava miles away before turning back to ash again,
then back to rock,
the lava from a super volcano,
the ash purple and red.  


















Circles on a Moss Covered Volcano

The eruption beatifies the magma.  
It becomes obsidian,
only breaks with a fracture,
smooth circles where it breaks.  

My mom was born on the grass
on a lawn
in a moss covered canyon at the top of a volcanic island.  
My grandfather lived in Malaysia before the Japanese occupied.  
When the volcano erupted,
the lava dried at the ocean into black sand.  
The British allied with the Communist Party of Malaysia—
after they organized.  
After the Americans defeated the Japanese at Pearl Harbor,
the British took over Malaysia again.  
They kept different groups apart claiming they were helping them.  
The black sand had smooth pebbles and sharp rocks.  
Ethnic Malay farmers lived in Kampongs, villages.  
Indians lived on plantations.  
The Chinese lived in towns and urban areas.  
Ethnic Malays wanted independence.
In 1946, after strikes, demonstrations, and boycotts
the British agreed to work with them.  
The predominantly Chinese Communist Party of Malaysia went underground,
guerrilla warfare against the British,
claiming their fight was for independence.  
For the British, that emergency required vast powers
of arrest, detention without trial and deportation to defeat terrorism.  
The Emergency became less unpopular as the terrorism became worse.  
The British were the iron that brought oxygen through my mom’s body.  
She loved riding on her father’s motorcycle with him
by the plantations,
through the Kampongs
and to the city, half an hour away.  
The British left Malaysia independent in 1957
with Malaysian nationalists holding most state and federal government offices.  
As the black sand stretches towards the ocean,
it becomes big stones of dried lava, flat and smooth.  

My mom thought her father and her uncle were subservient to the British.  
She thought all things, all people were equal.  
When her father died when she was 16, 1965,
they moved to India,
my mother,
a foreigner in India, though she’s Indian.  
She loved rock and roll and mini skirts
and didn’t speak the local language.  
On the dried black lava,
it can be hard to know the molten lava flickers underneath there.  
Before the Korean War,
though Britain and the United States wanted
an aggressive resolution
condemning North Korea,
they were happy
that India supported a draft resolution
condemning North Korea
for breach of the peace.  
During the Korean War,
India, supported by Third World and other Commonwealth nations,
opposed United States’ proposals.
They were able to change the U.S. resolution
to include the proposals they wanted
and helped end the war.  
China wanted the respect of Third World nations
and saw the United States as imperialist.  
China thought India was a threat to the Third World
by taking aid from the United States and the Soviets.  
Pakistan could help with that and a seat at the United Nations.  
China wanted Taiwan’s seat at the UN.
My mother went to live with her uncle,
a communist negotiator for a corporation,
in India.  
A poet,
he threw parties and invited other artists, musicians and writers.  
I have the same brown hyperpigmentation at my joints that he had.  
During the day, only the steam from the hot lava can be seen.  
In 1965, Pakistani forces went into Jammu and Kashmir with China’s support.  
China threatened India after India sent its troops in.  
Then they threatened again before sending their troops to the Indian border.  
The United States stopped aid to Pakistan and India.
Pakistan agreed to the UN ceasefire agreement.  
Pakistan helped China get a seat at the UN
and tried to keep the west from escalating in Vietnam.  
The smoldering sound of the lava sizzles underneath the dried lava.  
When West Pakistan refused to allow East Pakistan independence,
violence between Bengalis and Biharis developed into upheaval.  
Bengalis moved to India
and India went into East Pakistan.  
Pakistan surrendered in December 1971.  
East Pakistan became independent Bangladesh

The warm light of the melted lava radiates underneath but burns.  
In 1974, India tested the Smiling Buddha,
a nuclear bomb.  
After Indira Gandhi’s conviction for election fraud in 1973,
Marxist Professor Narayan called for total revolution
and students protested all over India.  
With food shortages, inflation and regional disputes
like Sikh separatists training in Pakistan for an independent Punjab,
peasants and laborers joined the protests.  
Railway strikes stopped the economy.  
In 1975, Indira Gandhi, the Iron Lady,
declared an Emergency,
imprisoning political opponents, restricting freedoms and restricting the press,
claiming threats to national security
because the war with Pakistan had just ended.  
The federal government took over Kerala’s communist dominated government and others.  

My mom could’ve been a dandelion, but she’s more like thistle.  
She has the center that dries and flutters in the wind,
beautiful and silky,
spiny and prickly,
but still fluffy, downy,
A daisy.
They say thistle saved Scotland from the Norse.  
Magma from the volcano explodes
and the streams of magma fly into the air.  
In the late 60s,
the civil rights movement rose
against the state in Northern Ireland
for depriving Catholics
of influence and opportunity.
The Northern Irish police,
Protestant and unionist, anti-catholic,
responded violently to the protests and it got worse.  
In 1969, the British placed Arthur Young,
who had worked at the Federation of Malaya
at the time of their Emergency
at the head of the British military in Northern Ireland.
The British military took control over the police,
a counter insurgency rather than a police force,
crowd control, house searches, interrogation, and street patrols,
use of force against suspects and uncooperative citizens.  
Political crimes were tolerated by Protestants but not Catholics.  
The lava burns the rock off the edge of the volcano.  

On January 30, 1972, ****** Sunday,  
British Army policing killed 13 unarmed protesters
fighting for their rights over their neighborhood,
protesting the internment of suspected nationalists.
That led to protests across Ireland.  
When banana leaves are warmed,
oil from the banana leaves flavors the food.  
My dad flew from Canada to India in February 1972.  
On February 4, my dad met my mom.  
On February 11, 1972,
my dad married my mom.  
They went to Canada,
a quartz singing bowl and a wooden mallet wrapped in suede.  
The rock goes down with the lava, breaking through the rocks as it goes down.  
In March 1972, the British government took over
because they considered the Royal Ulster Police and the Ulster Special Constabulary
to be causing most of the violence.  
The lava blocks and reroutes streams,
melts snow and ice,
flooding.  
Days later, there’s still smoke, red.  
My mom could wear the clothes she liked
without being judged
with my dad in Canada.  
She didn’t like asking my dad for money.
My dad, the copper helping my mother use that iron,
wanted her to go to college and finish her bachelors degree.
She got a job.  
In 1976, the police took over again in Northern Ireland
but they were a paramilitary force—
armored SUVs, bullet proof jackets, combat ready
with the largest computerized surveillance system in the UK,
high powered weapons,
trained in counter insurgency.  
Many people were murdered by the police
and few were held accountable.  
Most of the murdered people were not involved in violence or crime.  
People were arrested under special emergency powers
for interrogation and intelligence gathering.  
People tried were tried in non-jury courts.  
My mom learned Malayalam in India
but didn’t speak well until living with my dad.  
She also learned to cook after getting married.  
Her mother sent her recipes; my dad cooked for her—
turmeric, cumin, coriander, cayenne and green chiles.  
Having lived in different countries,
my mom’s food was exposed to many cultures,
Chinese and French.
Ground rock, minerals and glass
covered the ground
from the ash plume.  
She liked working.  

A volcano erupted for 192 years,
an ice age,
disordered ices, deformed under pressure
and ordered ice crystals, brittle in the ice core records.  
My mother liked working.  
Though Khomeini was in exile by the 1970s in Iran,
more people, working and poor,
turned to him and the ****-i-Ulama for help.
My mom didn’t want kids though my dad did.
She agreed and in 1978 my brother was born.
Iran modernized but agriculture and industry changed so quickly.  
In January 1978, students protested—
censorship, surveillance, harassment, illegal detention and torture.  
Young people and the unemployed joined.  
My parents moved to the United States in December 1978.  
The regime used a lot of violence against the protesters,
and in September 1978 declared martial law in Iran.  
Troops were shooting demonstrators.
In January 1979, the Shah and his family fled.  
On February 11, 1979, my parents’ anniversary,
the Iranian army declared neutrality.  
I was born in July 1979.
The chromium in emeralds and rubies colors them.
My brother was born in May and I was born in July.

Obsidian—
iron, copper and chromium—
isn’t a gas
but it isn’t a crystal;
it’s between the two,
the ordered crystal and the disordered gas.  
They made swords out of obsidian.  





Warm Light Shatters

The eruption beatifies the magma.  
It becomes obsidian,
only breaks with a fracture,
smooth circles where it breaks.  

My dad was born on a large flat rock on the edge of the top
of a hill,
Molasses, sweet and dark, the potent flavor dominates,
His father, the son of a Brahmin,
His mother from a lower caste.
His father’s family wouldn’t touch him,
He grew up in his mother’s mother’s house on a farm.  
I have the same brown hyperpigmentation spot on my right hand that he has.

In 1901, D’Arcy bought a 60 year concession for oil exploration In Iran.
The Iranian government extended it for another 32 years in 1933.
At that time oil was Iran’s “main source of income.”
In 1917’s Balfour Declaration, the British government proclaimed that they favored a national home for the Jews in Palestine and their “best endeavors to facilitate the achievement” of that.

The British police were in charge of policing in the mandate of Palestine.  A lot of the policemen they hired were people who had served in the British army before, during the Irish War for Independence.  
The army tried to stop how violent the police were, police used torture and brutality, some that had been used during the Irish War for Independence, like having prisoners tied to armored cars and locomotives and razing the homes of people in prison or people they thought were related to people thought to be rebels.
The police hired Arab police and Jewish police for lower level policing,
Making local people part of the management.
“Let Arab police beat up Arabs and Jewish police beat up Jews.”

The lava blocks and reroutes streams, melts snow and ice, flooding.
In 1922, there were 83,000 Jews, 71,000 Christians, and 589,000 Muslims.
The League If Nations endorsed the British Mandate.
During an emergency, in the 1930s, British regulations allowed collective punishment, punishing villages for incidents.
Local officers in riots often deserted and also shared intelligence with their own people.
The police often stole, destroyed property, tortured and killed people.  
Arab revolts sapped the police power over Palestinians by 1939.

My father’s mother was from a matrilineal family.
My dad remembers tall men lining up on pay day to respectfully wait for her, 5 feet tall.  
She married again after her husband died.
A manager from a tile factory,
He spoke English so he supervised finances and correspondence.
My dad, a sunflower, loved her: she scared all the workers but exuded warmth to the people she loved.

Obsidian shields people from negative energy.
David Cargill founded the Burmah Oil Co. in 1886.
If there were problems with oil exploration in Burma and Indian government licenses, Persian oil would protect the company.  
In July 1906, many European oil companies, BP, Royal Dutch Shell and others, allied to protect against the American oil company, Standard Oil.
D’Arcy needed money because “Persian oil took three times as long to come on stream as anticipated.”
Burmah Oil Co. began the Anglo-Persian Oil Co. as a subsidiary.
Ninety-seven percent of British Petroleum was owned by Burmah Oil Co.
By 1914, the British government owned 51% of the Anglo-Persian Oil Co.  
Anglo-Persian acquired independence from Burmah Oil and Royal Dutch Shell with two million pounds from the British government.

The lava burns the rock off the edge of the volcano.
In 1942, after the Japanese took Burma,
the British destroyed their refineries before leaving.
The United Nations had to find other sources of oil.
In 1943, Japan built the Burma-Thailand Railroad with forced labor from the Malay peninsula who were mostly from the rubber plantations.

The rock goes down with the lava, breaking through the rocks as it goes down.
In 1945. Japan destroyed their refineries before leaving Burma.
Cargill, Watson and Whigham were on the Burmah Oil Co. Board and then the Anglo Iranian Oil Co. Board.  

In 1936 Palestine, boycotts, work stoppages, and violence against British police officials and soldiers compelled the government to appoint an investigatory commission.  
Leaders of Egypt, Trans Jordan, Syria and Iraq helped end the work stoppages.
The British government had the Peel Commission read letters, memoranda, and petitions and speak with British officials, Jews and Arabs.  
The Commission didn’t believe that Arabs and Jews could live together in a single Jewish state.
Because of administrative and financial difficulties the Colonial Secretary stated that to split Palestine into Arab and Jewish states was impracticable.  
The Commission recommended transitioning 250,000 Arabs and 1500 Jews with British control over their oil pipeline, their naval base and Jerusalem.  
The League of Nations approved.
“It will not remove the grievance nor prevent the recurrence,” Lord Peel stated after.
The Arab uprising was much more militant after Peel.  Thousands of Arabs were wounded, ten thousand were detained.  
In Sykes-Picot and the Husain McMahon agreements, the British promised the Arabs an independent state but they did not keep that promise.  
Representatives from the Arab states rejected the Peel recommendations.
United Nations General Assembly Resolution181 partitioned Palestine into Arab and Jewish states with an international regime for the city of Jerusalem backed by the United States and the Soviet Union.  

The Israeli Yishuv had strong military and intelligence organization —-  
the British recognized that their interest was with the Arabs and abstained from the vote.  
In 1948, Israel declared the establishment of its state.  
Ground rock, minerals, and gas covered the ground from the ash plume.
The Palestinian police force was disbanded and the British gave officers the option of serving in Malaya.

Though Truman, Eisenhower and Kennedy supported snd tried to get Israel to offer the Arabs concessions, it wasn’t a major priority and didn’t always approve of Israel’s plans.
Arabs that had supported the British to end Turkish rule stopped supporting the West.  
Many Palestinians joined left wing groups and violent third world movements.  
Seventy-eight percent of the territory of former Palestine was under Israel’s control.  

My dad left for college in 1957 and lived in an apartment above the United States Information services office.
Because he graduated at the top of his class, he was given a job with the public works department of the government on the electricity board.  
“Once in, you’ll never leave.”
When he wanted a job where he could do real work, his father was upset.
He broke the chains with bells for vespers.
He got a job in Calcutta at Kusum Products and left the government, though it was prestigious to work there.
In the chemical engineering division, one of the projects he worked on was to design a *** distillery, bells controlled by hammers, hammers controlled by a keyboard.
His boss worked in the United Kingdom for. 20 years before the company he worked at, part of Power Gas Corporation, asked him to open a branch in Calcutta.
He opened the branch and convinced an Industrialist to open a company doing the same work with him.  The branch he opened closed after that.  
My dad applied for labor certification to work abroad and was selected.  
His boss wrote a reference letter for my him to the company he left in the UK.  My dad sent it telling the company when he was leaving for the UK.  
The day he left for London, he got the letter they sent in the mail telling him to take the train to Sheffield the next day and someone from the firm would meet him at the station.  
His dad didn’t know he left, he didn’t tell him.
He broke the chains with chimes for schisms.


Anglo-Persian Oil became Anglo-Iranian Oil in 1935.
The British government used oil and Anglo-Persian oil to fight communism, have a stronger relationship with the United States and make the United Kingdom more powerful.  
The National Secularists, the Tudeh, and the Communists wanted to nationalize Iran’s oil and mobilized the Iranian people.
The British feared nationalization in Iran would incite political parties like the Secular Nationalists all over the world.  
In 1947, the Iranian government passed the Single Article Law that “[increased] investment In welfare benefits, health, housing, education, and implementation of Iranianization through substitution of foreigners” at Anglo-Iranian Oil Co.
“Anglo-Iranian Oil Company made more profit in 1950 than it paid to the Iranian government in royalties over the previous half century.”
The Anglo-Iranian Oil Company tried to negotiate a new concession and claimed they’d hire more Iranian people into jobs held by British and people from other nationalities at the company.
Their hospitals had segregated wards.  
On May 1, 1951, the Iranian government passed a bill that nationalized Anglo- Iranian Oil Co.’s holdings.  
During the day, only the steam from the hot lava can be seen.
In August 1953, the Iranian people elected Mossadegh from the Secular Nationalist Party as prime minister.
The British government with the CIA overthrew Mossadegh using the Iranian military after inducing protests and violent demonstrations.  
Anglo-Iranian Oil changed its name to British Petroleum in 1954.
Iranians believe that America destroyed Iran’s “last chance for democracy” and blamed America for Iran’s autocracy, its human rights abuses, and secret police.

The smoldering sound of the lava sizzles underneath the dried lava.  
In 1946, Executive Yuan wanted control over 4 groups of Islands in the South China Sea to have a stronger presence there:  the Paracels, the Spratlys, Macclesfield Bank, and the Pratas.
The French forces in the South China Sea would have been stronger than the Chinese Navy then.
French Naval forces were in the Gulf of Tonkin, U.S. forces were in the Taiwan Strait, the British were in Hong Kong, and the Portuguese were in Macao.
In the 1950s, British snd U.S. oil companies thought there might be oil in the Spratlys.  
By 1957, French presence in the South China Sea was hardly there.  

When the volcano erupted, the lava dried at the ocean into black sand.
By 1954, the Tudeh Party’s communist movement and  intelligence organization had been destroyed.  
Because of the Shah and his government’s westernization policies and disrespectful treatment of the Ulama, Iranians began identifying with the Ulama and Khomeini rather than their government.  
Those people joined with secular movements to overthrow the Shah.  

In 1966, Ne Win seized power from U Nu in Burma.
“Soldiers ruled Burma as soldiers.”
Ne Win thought that western political
Institutions “encouraged divisions.”
Minority groups found foreign support for their separatist goals.
The Karens and the Mons supported U Nu in Bangkok.  


Rare copper, a heavy metal, no alloys,
a rock in groundwater,
conducts electricity and heat.
In 1965, my Dad’s cousin met him at Heathrow, gave him a coat and £10 and brought him to a bed and breakfast across from Charing Cross Station where he’d get the train to Sheffield the next morning.
He took the train and someone met him at the train station.  
At the interview they asked him to design a grandry girder, the main weight bearing steel girder as a test.
Iron in the inner and outer core of the earth,
He’d designed many of those.  
He was hired and lived at the YMCA for 2 1/2 years.  
He took his mother’s family name, Menon, instead of his father’s, Varma.
In 1967, he left for Canada and interviewed at Bechtel before getting hired at Seagrams.  
Iron enables blood to carry oxygen.
His boss recommended him for Dale Carnegie’s leadership training classes and my dad joined the National Instrument Society and became President.
He designed a still In Jamaica,
Ordered all the parts, nuts and bolts,
Had all the parts shipped to Jamaica and made sure they got there.
His boss supervised the construction, installation and commission in Jamaica.
Quartz, heat and fade resistant, though he was an engineer and did the work of an engineer, my dad only had the title, technician so my dad’s boss thought he wasn’t getting paid enough but couldn’t get his boss to offer more than an extra $100/week or the title of engineer; he told my dad he thought he should leave.
In 1969, he got a job at Celanese, which made rayon.
He quit Celanese to work at McGill University and they allowed him to take classes to earn his MBA while working.  

The United States and Israel’s alliance was strong by 1967.
United Nations Security Council Resolution 242 at the end of the Third Arab Israeli War didn’t mention the Palestinians but mentioned the refugee problem.
After 1967, the Palestinians weren’t often mentioned and when mentioned only as terrorists.  
Palestinians’ faith in the “American sponsored peace process” diminished, they felt the world community ignored and neglected them also.
Groups like MAN that stopped expecting anything from Arab regimes began hijacking airplanes.
By 1972, the Palestine Liberation Organization had enough international support to get by the United States’ veto in the United Nations Security Council and Arab League recognition as representative of the Palestinian people.
The Palestinians knew the United States stated its support, as the British had, but they weren’t able to accomplish anything.  
The force Israel exerted in Johnson’s United States policy delivered no equilibrium for the Palestinians.  

In 1969, all political parties submitted to the BSPP, Burma Socialist Programme Party.
Ne Win nationalized banks and oil and deprived minorities of opportunities.
Ne Win became U Nu Win, civilian leader of Burma in 1972 and stopped the active role that U Nu defined for Burma internationally
He put military people in power even when they didn’t have experience which triggered “maldistribution of goods and chronic shortages.”  
Resources were located in areas where separatist minorities had control.

The British presence in the South China Sea ended in 1968.  
The United States left Vietnam in 1974 and China went into the Western Paracels.
The U.S. didn’t intervene and Vietnam took the Spratlys.
China wanted to claim the continental shelf In the central part of the South China Sea and needed the Spratlys.
The United States mostly disregarded the Ulama In Iran and bewildered the Iranian people by not supporting their revolution.

Obsidian—
iron, copper and chromium—
isn’t a gas
but it isn’t a crystal;
it’s between the two,
the ordered crystal and the disordered gas.  
They made swords out of obsidian.


Edelweiss

I laid out in my backyard in my bikini.  
I love the feeling of my body in the sun.  
I’d be dark from the end of spring until winter.
The snow froze my bare feet through winter ,
my skin pale.
American towns in 1984,
Free, below glaciers the sunlight melted the snow,
a sea of green and the edelweiss on the edge of the  limestone,
frosted but still strong.    
When the spring warmed the grass,
the grass warmed my feet. 
The whole field looked cold and white from the glacier but in the meadow,
the bright yellow centers of those flowers float free in the center of the white petals.
The bright yellow center of those edelweiss scared the people my parents ran to America from India to get away from.  
On a sidewalk in Queens, New York in 1991, the men stared and yelled comments at me in short shorts and a fitted top in the summer.  
I grabbed my dad’s arm.

























The Bread and Coconut Butter of Aparigraha

Twelve year old flowerhead,
Marigold, yarrow and nettle,
I’d be all emotion
If not for all my work
From the time I was a teenager.
I got depressed a lot.
I related to people I read about
In my weather balloon,
Grasping, ignorant, and desperate,
But couldn’t relate to other twelve year olds.
After school I read Dali’s autobiography,
Young ****** Autosodomized by Her Own Chastity.
Fresh, green nettle with fresh and dried yarrow for purity.
Dead souls enticed to the altar by orange marigolds,
passion and creativity,
Coax sleep and rouse dreams.
Satellites measure indirectly with wave lengths of light.
My weather balloon measures the lower and middle levels of the atmosphere directly,
Fifty thousand feet high,
Metal rod thermometer,
Slide humidity sensor,
Canister for air pressure.

I enjoy rye bread and cold coconut butter in my weather balloon,
But I want Dali, and all the artists and writers.
Rye grows at high altitudes
But papyrus grows in soil and shallow water,
Strips of papyrus pith shucked from their stems.
When an anchor’s weighed, a ship sails,
But when grounded we sail.
Marigolds, yarrow and nettle,
Flowerhead,
I use the marigold for sleep,
The yarrow for endurance and intensity,
toiling for love and truth,
And the nettle for healing.
Strong rye bread needs equally strong flavors.
By the beginning of high school,
I read a lot of Beat literature
And found Buddhism.
I loved what I read
But I didn’t like some things.
I liked attachment.  
I got to the ground.
Mushrooms grow in dry soil.
Attachment to beauty is Buddha activity.
Not being attached to things I don’t find beautiful is Buddha activity.  
I fried mushrooms in a single layer in oil, fleshy.
I roasted mushrooms at high temperatures in the oven, crisp.
I simmered mushrooms in stock with kombu.
Rye bread with cold coconut butter and cremini mushrooms,
raw, soft and firm.  
Life continues, life changes,
Attachments, losses, mourning and suffering,
But change lures growth.
I find stream beds and wet soil.
I lay the strips of papyrus next to each other.
I cross papyrus strips over the first,
Then wet the crossed papyrus strips,
Press and cement them into a sheet.
I hammer it and dry it in the sun,
With no thought of achievement or self,
Flowerhead,
Hands filled with my past,
Head filled with the future,
Dali, artists poets,
Wishes and desires aligned with nature,
Abundance,
Cocoa, caraway, and molasses.

If I ever really like someone,
I’ll be wearing the dress he chooses,
Fresh green nettle and yarrow, the seeds take two years to grow strong,
Lasting love.
Marigolds steer dead souls from the altar to the afterlife,
Antiseptic, healing wounds,
Soothing sore throats and headaches.
Imperturbable, stable flowerhead,
I empty my mind.
When desires are aligned with nature, desire flows.
Papyrus makes paper and cloth.
Papyrus makes sails.
Charcoal from the ash of pulverized papyrus heals wounds.
Without attachment to the fruit of action
There is continuation of life,
Rye bread and melted coconut butter,
The coconut tree in the coconut butter,
The seed comes from the ground out of nothing,
Naturalness.
It has form.
As the seed grows the seed expresses the tree,
The seed expresses the coconut,
The seed expresses the coconut butter.
Rye bread, large open hollows, chambers,
Immersed in melted coconut butter,
Desire for expansion and creation,
No grasping, not desperate.
When the mind is compassion, the mind is boundless.
Every moment,
only that,
Every moment,
a scythe to the papyrus in the stream bed of the past.  

































Sound on Powdery Blue

Potter’s clay, nymph, plum unplumbed, 1993.
Dahlia, ice, powder, musk and rose,
my source of life emerged in darkness, blackness.
Seashell fragments in the sand,
The glass ball of my life cracked inside,
Light reflected off the salt crystal cracks,
Nacre kept those cracks from getting worse.
Young ****** Autosodomized By Her Own Chastity,
Nymph, I didn’t want to give my body,
Torn, *****, ballgown,
To people who wouldn’t understand me,
Piquant.

Outside on the salt flats,
Aphrodite, goddess of beauty, pleasure and fertility and
Asexual Artemis, goddess of animals, and the hunt,
Mistress of nymphs,
Punish with ruthless savagery.

In my bedroom, blue caribou moss covered rocks, pine, and yew trees,
The heartwood writhes as hurricane gales, twisters and whirlwinds
Contort their bark,
Roots strong in the soil.
Orris root dried in the sun, bulbs like wood.
Dahlia runs to baritone soundbath radio waves.
Light has frequencies,
Violet between blue and invisible ultraviolet,
Flame, slate and flint.
Every night is cold.

Torii gates, pain secured as sacred.
An assignation, frost hardy dahlia and a plangent resonant echo.
High frequency sound waves convert to electrical signals,
Breathe from someone I want,
Silt.
Beam, radiate, ensorcel.
I break the bark,
Sap flows and dries,
Resin seals over the tear.
I distill pine,
Resin and oil for turpentine, a solvent.
Quiver, bemired,
I lead sound into my darkness,
Orris butter resin, sweet and warm,
Hot jam drops on snow drops,
Orange ash on smoke,
Balm on lava,
The problem with cotton candy.

Electrical signals give off radiation or light waves,
The narrow frequency range where
The crest of a radio wave and the crest of a light wave overlap,
Infrared.
Glaciers flow, sunlight melts the upper layers of the snow when strong,
A wet snow avalanche,
A torrent, healing.
Brown sugar and whiskey,
Undulant, lavender.
Pine pitch, crystalline, sticky, rich and golden,
And dried pine rosin polishes glass smooth
Like the smell of powdery orris after years.
Softness, flush, worthy/not worthy,
Rich rays thunder,
Intensify my pulse,
Frenzied red,
Violet between blue and invisible ultraviolet.
Babylon—flutter, glow.
Unquenchable cathartic orris.  

















Pink Graphite

Camellias, winter shrubs,
Their shallow roots grow beneath the spongy caribou moss,
Robins egg blue.
After writing a play with my gifted students program in 1991,
I stopped spending all my free time writing short stories,
But the caribou moss was still soft.

In the cold Arctic of that town,
The evergreen protected the camellias from the afternoon sun and storms.
They branded hardy camellias with a brass molded embossing iron;
I had paper and graphite for my pencils.

After my ninth grade honors English teacher asked us to write poems in 1994,
It began raining.
We lived on an overhang.
A vertical rise to the top of the rock.
The rainstorm caused a metamorphic change in the snowpack,
A wet snow avalanche drifted slowly down the moss covered rock,
The snow already destabilized by exposure to the sunlight.

The avalanche formed lakes,
rock basins washed away with rainwater and melted snow,
Streams dammed by the rocks.  
My pencils washed away in the avalanche,
My clothes heavy and cold.
I wove one side of each warp fiber through the eye of the needle and one side through each slot,
Salves, ointments, serums and tinctures.
I was mining for graphite.
They were mining me,
The only winch, the sound through the water.

A steep staircase to the red Torii gates,
I broke the chains with bells for vespers
And chimes for schisms,
And wove the weft across at right angles to the warp.  

On a rocky ledge at the end of winter,
The pink moon, bitters and body butter,
They tried to get  me to want absinthe,
Wormwood for bitterness and regret.
Heat and pressure formed carbon for flakes of graphite.
Heat and pressure,
I made bitters,
Brandy, grapefruit, chocolate, mandarin rind, tamarind and sugar.
I grounded my feet in the pink moss,
paper dried in one hand,
and graphite for my pencils in the other.  



































Flakes

I don’t let people that put me down be part of my life.  
Gardens and trees,
My shadow sunk in the grass in my yard
As I ate bread, turmeric and lemon.
Carbon crystallizes into graphite flakes.
I write to see well,
Graphite on paper.  
A shadow on rock tiles with a shield, a diamond and a bell
Had me ***** to humiliate me.
Though I don’t let people that put me down near me,
A lot of people putting me down seemed like they were following me,
A platform to jump from
While she had her temple.  

There was a pink door to the platform.
I ate bread with caramelized crusts and
Drank turmeric lemonade
Before I opened that door,
Jumped and
Descended into blankets and feathers.
I found matches and rosin
For turpentine to clean,
Dried plums and licorice.  

In the temple,
In diamonds, leather, wool and silk,
She had her shield and bells,
Drugs and technology,
Thermovision 210 and Minox,
And an offering box where people believed
That if their coins went in
Their wishes would come true.

Hollyhock and smudging charcoal for work,  
Belled,
I ground grain in the mill for the bread I baked for breakfast.
The bells are now communal bells
With a watchtower and a prison,
Her shield, a blowtorch and flux,
Her ex rays, my makeshift records
Because Stalin didn’t like people dancing,
He liked them divebombing.
Impurities in the carbon prevent diamonds from forming,
Measured,
The most hard, the most expensive,
But graphite’s soft delocalized electrons move.  






































OCEAN BED

The loneliness of going to sleep by myself.  
I want a bed that’s high off the ground,
a mattress, an ocean.
I want a crush and that  person in my bed.  
Only that,
a crush in my bed,
an ocean in my bed.  
Just love.  
But I sleep with my thumbs sealed.  
I sleep with my hands, palms up.  
I sleep with my hands at my heart.  
They sear my compassion with their noise.  
They hold their iron over their fire and try to carve their noise into my love,
scored by the violence of voices, dark and lurid,  
but not burned.  
I want a man in my bed.  
When I wake up in an earthquake
I want to be held through the aftershocks.  
I like men,
the waves come in and go out
but the ocean was part of my every day.  
I don’t mind being fetishized in the ocean.  
I ran by the ocean every morning.  
I surfed in the ocean.  
I should’ve gone into the ocean that afternoon at Trestles,
holding my water jugs, kneeling at the edge.  














Morning

I want to fall asleep in the warm arms of a fireman.  
I want to wake up to the smell of coffee in my kitchen.  

Morning—the molten lava in the outer core of the earth embeds the iron from the inner core into the earth’s magnetic field.  
The magnetic field flips.  
The sun, so strong, where it gets through the trees it burns everything but the pine.  
The winds change direction.  
Storms cast lightening and rain.  
Iron conducts solar flares and the heavy wind.  
In that pine forest, I shudder every time I see a speck of light for fear of neon and fluorescents.  The eucalyptus cleanses congestion.  
And Kerouac’s stream ululates, crystal bowl sound baths.  
I follow the sound to the water.  
The stream ends at a bluff with a thin rocky beach below.  
The green water turns black not far from the shore.  
Before diving into the ocean, I eat globe mallow from the trees, stems and leaves, the viscous flesh, red, soft and nutty.  
I distill the pine from one of the tree’s bark and smudge the charcoal over my skin.  

Death, the palo santo’s lit, cleansing negative energy.  
It’s been so long since I’ve smelled a man, woodsmoke, citrus and tobacco.  
Jasmine, plum, lime and tuberose oil on the base of my neck comforts.  
Parabolic chambers heal, sound waves through water travel four times faster.  
The sound of the open sea recalibrates.  
I dissolve into the midnight blue of the ocean.  

I want to fall asleep in the warm arms of a fireman.  
I want to wake up to the smell of coffee in my kitchen.  
I want hot water with coconut oil when I get up.  
We’d lay out on the lawn, surrounded by high trees that block the wind.  
Embers flying through the air won’t land in my yard, on my grass, or near my trees.  





Blue Paper

Haze scatters blue light on a planet.  
Frought women, livid, made into peonies by Aphrodites that caught their men flirting and blamed the women, flushed red.
and blamed the women, flushed red.
Frought women, livid, chrysanthemums, dimmed until the end of the season, exchanged and retained like property.  
Blue women enter along the sides of her red Torii gates, belayed, branded and belled, a plangent sound.  
By candles, colored lights and dried flowers she’s sitting inside on a concrete floor, punctures and ruin burnished with paper, making burnt lime from lime mortar.  
Glass ***** on the ceiling, she moves the beads of a Palestinian glass bead bracelet she holds in her hands.  
She bends light to make shadows against  thin wooden slats curbed along the wall, and straight across the ceiling.
A metier, she makes tinctures, juniper berries and cotton *****.
Loamy soil in the center of the room,
A hawthorn tree stands alone,
A gateway for fairies.
large stones at the base protecting,
It’s branches a barrier.  
It’s leaves and shoots make bread and cheese.
It’s berries, red skin and yellow flesh, make jam.
Green bamboo stakes for the peonies when they whither from the weight of their petals.
And lime in the soil.  
She adds wood chips to the burnt lime in the kiln,
Unrolled paper, spools, and wire hanging.
Wood prayer beads connect her to the earth,
The tassels on the end of the beads connect her to spirit, to higher truth.
Minerals, marine mud and warm basins of seawater on a flower covered desk.  
She adds slaked lime to the burnt lime and wood chips.  
The lime converts to paper,
Trauma victims speak,
Light through butterfly wings.  
She’s plumeria with curved petals, thick, holding water

GREAT ARTISTS & THEIR IMMORTAL WORKS :
CONCLUDING ITALIAN RENAISSANCE IN
VERSE.  -  By Raj Nandy, New Delhi.

Dear Readers, continuing my Story of Western Art in Verse chronologically, I had covered an Introduction to the Italian Renaissance previously. That background story was necessary to appreciate Renaissance Art fully. Now, I cover the Art of that period in a summarized form, mentioning mainly the salient features to curb the length. The cream here lies in the 'Art of the High Renaissance Period'! Hope you like it. Thanks, - Raj.

                          INTRODUCTION
“Painting is poetry that is seen rather than felt, &
  Poetry is painting that is felt rather than seen.”
                                                        – Leonardo Da Vinci
In the domain of Renaissance Art, we notice the
enduring influence of the Classical touch!
Ancient Greek statues and Roman architectures,
Inspired the Renaissance artists in their innovative
ventures!
The pervasive spirit of Humanism influenced
creation of life-like human forms;
Adding ****** expressions and depth, deviating
from the earlier stiff Medieval norms.
While religious subjects continued to get depicted
in three-dimensional Renaissance Art;
Portraits, **** figures, and secular subjects, also
began to appear during this great ‘Re-birth’!
The artists of the Early and High Renaissance Era
are many who deserve our adoration and artistic
due.
Yet for the sake of brevity, I mention only the
Great Masters, who are handful and few.

EARLY RENAISSANCE ARTISTS & THEIR ART

GITTO THE PIONEER:
During early 13th Century we find, Dante’s
contemporary Gitto di Bondone the Florentine,
Painting human figures in all its beauty and form
for the first time!
His masterwork being the 40 fresco cycle in the
Arena Chapel in Padua, depicting the life of the
****** and Christ, completed in 1305.
Giotto made the symbolic Medieval spiritual art
appear more natural and realistic,
By depicting human emotion, depth with an
artistic perspective!
Art Scholars consider him to be the trailblazer
inspiring the later painters of the Renaissance;
They also refer to Giorgio Vasari’s “Lives Of
The Eminent Artists,” - as their main source.
Giotto had dared to break the shackles of earlier
Medieval two-dimensional art style,
By drawing lines which head towards a certain
focal point behind;
Like an illusionary vanishing point in space,
- opening up a 3-D ‘window into space’!
This ‘window technique’ got adopted by the
later artists with grace.
(Giorgio Vasari, a 16th Century painter, architect & Art
historian, was born in 1511 in Arezzy, a city under the
Florentine Republic, and painted during the High
Renaissance Period.)

VASARI’s book published in 1550 in Florence
was dedicated to Cosimo de Medici.
Forms an important document of Italian Art
History.
This valuable book covers a 250 year’s span.
Commencing with Cimabue the tutor of Giotto,
right up to Tizian, - better known as Titan!
Vasari also mentions four lesser known Female
Renaissance Artists; Sister Plantilla, Madonna
Lucrezia, Sofonista Anguissola, and Properzia
de Rossi;
And Rossi’s painting “Joseph and Potiphar’s
Wife”,
An impressive panel art which parallels the
unrequited love Rossi experienced in her own
life !
(Joseph the elder son of Jacob, taken captive by Potiphar
the Captain of Pharaoh’s guard, was desired by Potiphar’s
wife, whose advances Joseph repulsed. Rossi’s painting
of 1520s inspired later artists to paint their own versions
of this same Old Testament Story.)

Next I briefly mention architects Brunelleschi
and Ghiberti, and the sculptor Donatello;
Not forgetting the painters like Masaccio,
Verrocchio and Botticelli;
Those Early Renaissance Artists are known to
us today thanks to the Art historian Giorgio
Vasari .

BRUNELLESCHI has been mentioned in Section
One of my Renaissance Story.
His 114 meter high dome of Florence Cathedral
created artistic history!
This dome was constructed without supporting
buttresses with a double egg shaped structure;
Stands out as an unique feat of Florentine
Architecture!
The dome is larger than St Paul’s in London,
the Capitol Building of Washington DC, and
also the St Peters in the Vatican City!

GILBERTI is remembered for his massive
15 feet high gilded bronze doors for the
Baptistery of Florence,
Containing twenty carved panels with themes
from the Old Testament.
Which took a quarter century to complete,
working at his own convenience.
His exquisite naturalistic carved figures in the
true spirit of the Renaissance won him a prize;
And his gilded doors were renamed by Michel
Angelo as ‘The Gates of Paradise’!
(At the age of 23 yrs Lorenzo Ghiberti had won the
competition beating other Architects for craving the
doors of the Baptistery of Florence!)

DONATELLO’S full size bronze David was
commissioned by its patron Cosimo de’ Medici.
With its sensual contrapposto stance in the
classical Greek style with its torso bent slightly.
Is known as the first free standing **** statue
since the days of Classical Art history!
The Old Testament relates the story of David
the shepherd boy, who killed the giant Goliath
with a single sling shot;
Cutting off his head with Goliath’s own sword!
Thus saving the Israelites from Philistine’s wrath.
This unique statue inspired all later sculptors to
strive for similar artistic excellence;
Culminating in Michael Angelo’s **** statue of
David, known for its sculptured brilliance!

MASSACCIO (1401- 1428) joined Florentine
Artist’s Guild at the age of 21 years.
A talented artist who abandoned the old Gothic
Style, experimenting without fears!
Influenced by Giotto, he mastered the use of
perspective in art.
Introduced the vanishing point and the horizon
line, - while planning his artistic works.
In his paintings ‘The Expulsion from Eden’
and ‘The Temptation’,
He introduced the initial **** figures in Italian
Art without any inhibition!
Though up North in Flanders, Van Eyck the
painter had already made an artistic innovation,
By painting ‘Adam and Eve’ displaying their
****** in his artistic creation;
Thereby creating the first **** painting in Art
History!
But such figures greatly annoyed the Church,
Since nudes formed a part of pagan art!
So these Northern artists to pacify the Church
and pass its censorship,
Cleverly under a fig leaf cover made their art to
appear moralistic!
Van Eyck was also the innovator of oil-based paints,
Which later replaced the Medieval tempera, used to
paint angles and saints.

Masaccio’s fresco ‘The Tribute Money’ requires
here a special mention,
For his use of perspective with light and shade,
Where the blithe figure of the Roman tax collector
is artistically made.
Christ is painted with stern nobility, Peter in angry
majesty;
And every Apostle with individualized features,
attire, and pose;
With light coming from a single identifiable source!
“Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s,
and unto God things that are God’s”, said Christ;
Narrated in Mathew chapter 22 verse 21, which
cannot be denied.
Unfortunately, Masaccio died at an early age of
27 years.
Said to have been killed by a jealous rival artist,
who had shed no tears!

BOTTICELLI the Florentine was born half a
century after the Dutch Van Eyck;
Remembered even to this day for his painting
the ‘Birth of Venus’, an icon of Art History
making him famous.
This painting depicts goddess Venus rising out
of the sea on a conch shell,
And the glorious path of female **** painting
commenced in Italy, - casting a spell!
His full scale **** Venus shattered the Medieval
taboo on ******.
With a subject shift from religious art to Classical
Mythology;
Removing the ‘fig-leaf cover’ over Art permanently!

I end this Early Period with VERROCCHIO, born
in Florence in fourteen hundred and thirty five.
A trained goldsmith proficient in the skills of both
painting and sculpture;
Who under the patronage of the Medici family
had thrived.
He had set up his workshop in Florence were he
trained Leonardo Da Vinci, Botticelli, and other
famous Renaissance artists alike!

FOUR CANONICAL PAINTING MODES OF
THE RENAISSANCE:
During the Renaissance the four canonical painting
modes we get to see;
Are Chiaroscuro, Sfumato, Cangiante and Unione.
‘Chiaroscuro’ comes from an Italian word meaning
‘light and dark’, a painting technique of Leonardo,
Creating a three dimensional dramatic effect to
steal the show.
Later also used with great excellence by Rubens
and the Dutch Rembrandt as we know.
‘Sfumato’ from Italian ‘sfumare’, meaning to tone
down or evaporate like a smoke;
As seen in Leonardo’s ‘Mona Lisa’ where the
colors blend seamlessly like smoke!
‘Cangiante’ means to ‘change’, where a painter
changed to a lighter or a darker hue, when the
original hue could not be made light enough;
As seen in the transformation from green to
yellow in Prophet Daniel’s robe,
On the ceiling of Sistine Chapel in Rome.
‘Unione’ followed the ‘sfumato’ quality, but
maintained vibrant colors as we get to see;
In Raphael’s ‘Alba Madonna’ in Washington’s
National Gallery.

ART OF HIGH RENAISSANCE ERA - THE
GOLDEN AGE.

“Where the spirit does not work with the
hand there is no art.”- Leonardo

With Giotto during the Trecento period of the
14th century,
Painting dominated sculpture in the artistic
endeavor of Italy.
During the 15th century the Quattrocento, with
Donetello and Giberti,
Sculpture certainly dominated painting as we get to
see!
But during the 16th century or the Cinquecento,
Painting again took the lead commencing with
the great Leonardo!
This Era was cut short by the death of Lorenzo the
Magnificent to less than half a century; (Died in 1493)
But gifted great masterpieces to the world enriching
the world of Art tremendously!
The Medieval ‘halo’ was now replaced by a fresh
naturalness;
And both Madonna and Christ acquired a more
human likeness!
Portrait paintings began to be commissioned by
many rich patrons.
While artists acquired both recognition and a status
of their own.
But the artistic focus during this Era had shifted from
Florence,  - to Venice and Rome!
In the Vatican City, Pope Julius-II was followed by
Pope Leo the Tenth,
He commissioned many works of art which are
still cherished and maintained!
Now cutting short my story let me mention the
famous Italian Renaissance Superstar Trio;
Leonardo, Raphael, and Michael Angelo.

LEONARDO DA VINCI was born in 1452 in
the village of Vinci near the City of Florence,
Was deprived of a formal education being born
illegitimate!
He was left-handed, and wrote from right to left!
He soon excelled his teacher Varrocchio, by
introduced oil based paints into Italy;
Whose translucent colors with his innovative
techniques, enhanced his painting artistically.
Sigmund Freud had said, “Leonardo was like a
man who awoke too early in the darkness while
others were all still asleep,” - he was awake!
Leonardo’s  historic ‘Note Book’ has sketches of a
battle tank, a flying machine, a parachute, and many
other anatomical and technical sketches and designs;
Reflecting the ever probing mind of this versatile
genius who was far ahead of his time!
His ‘Vituvian Man’, ‘The Last Supper’, and ‘Mona Lisa’,
Remain as his enduring works of art and more popular
than the Leaning Tower of Pisa!
Pen and ink sketch of the ‘Vitruvian Man’ with arms
and leg apart inside a square and a circle, also known
as the ‘Proportion of Man’;
Where his height correspondence to the length
of his outstretched hands;
Became symbolic of the true Renaissance spirit
of Man.
‘The Last Supper’ a 15ft by 29ft fresco work on
the refectory wall of Santa Maria, commissioned
by Duke of Milan Ludovic,
Is the most reproduced religious painting which
took three years to complete!
Leonardo searched the streets of Milan before
painting Judas’ face;
And individualized each figure with competence!
‘Mona Lisa’ with her enigmatic smile continues
to inspire artists, poets, and her viewers alike,
since its creation;
Which Leonardo took four years to complete
with utmost devotion.
Leonardo used oil on poplar wood panel, unique
during those days,
With ‘sfumato’ blending of translucent colors with
light and shade;
Creating depth, volume, and form, with a timeless
expression on Mona Lisa’s countenance!
Art Historian George Varasi says that it is the face
of one Lisa Gherardini,
Wife of a wealthy Florentine merchant of Italy.
Insurance Companies failed to make any estimation
of this portrait, declaring its value as priceless!
Today it remains housed inside an air-conditioned,
de-humidified chamber, within a triple bullet-proof
glass, in Louvre France.
“It is the ultimate symbol of human civilization”,
- exclaimed President Kennedy;
And with this I pay my humble tribute to our
Leonardo da Vinci!

MICHEL ANGELO BUONARROTI (1475-1564):
This Tuscan born sculptor, painter, architect, and
poet, was a versatile man,
Worthy to be called the archetype of the true
‘Renaissance Man’!
At the age of twelve was placed under the famous
painter Ghirlandio,
Where his inclination for sculpting began to show.
Under the liberal patronage of Lorenzo de Medici,
He developed his talent as a sculptor as we get
to see.
In the Medici Palace, he was struck by his rival
Torregiano on the nose with a mallet;
Disfiguring permanently his handsome face!
His statue of ‘Bacchus’ of 1497 and the very
beauty of the figure,
Earned him the commission for the ‘PIETA’ in
St Peter’s Basilica;
Where from a single piece of Carrara marble he
carved out the figure of ****** Mary grieving
over the dead body of Christ;
This iconic piece of sculpture which along with
his ‘David’ earned him the ‘Superstar rights’!

Michel Angelo’s **** ‘DAVID’ weighed 6.4 tons
and stood 17 feet in height;
Unlike the bronze David of Donatello, which
shows him victorious after the fight!
Michel’s David an epitome of strength and
youthful vigour with a Classical Greek touch;
Displayed an uncircumcised ***** which had
shocked the viewers very much!
But it was consistent with the Mannerism in Art,
in keeping with the Renaissance spirit as such!
David displays an attitude of placid calm with
his knitted eyebrows and sidelong glance;
With his left hand over the left shoulder
holding a sling,
Coolly surveys the giant Goliath before his
single sling shot fatally stings!
This iconic sculpture has a timeless appeal even
after 500 years, depicting the ‘Renaissance Man’
at his best;
Vigorous, healthy, beautiful, rational and fully
competent!
Finally we come to the Ceiling of the Sistine
Chapel of Rome,
Where Pope Julius-II’s persistence resulted in the
creation of world’s greatest single fresco that was
ever known!
Covering some 5000 square feet, took five years
to complete.
Special scaffoldings had to be erected for painting
scenes from ‘The Creation’ till the ‘Day of Judgment’
on a 20 meter’s high ceiling;
Where the Central portion had nine scenes from
the ‘Book of Genesis’,
With ‘Creation of Adam’ having an iconic significance!
Like Leonardo, Michel Angelo was left-handed and died
a bachelor - pursuing his art with devotion;
A man with caustic wit, proud reserve, and sublimity
of imagination!

RAFFAELLO SANZIO (1483-1520):
This last of the famous High Renaissance trio was
born in 1483 in Urbino,
Some eight years after Michel Angelo.
His Madonna series and decorative frescos
glorified the Library of Pope Julius the Second;
Who was impressed by his fresco ‘The School
of Athens’;
And commissioned Raphael to decorate his
Study in the Vatican.
Raphael painted this large fresco between 1510
and 1511, initially named as the ‘Knowledge of
Causes’,
But the 17th century guide books referred to it
as ‘The School of Athens’.
Here Plato and Aristotle are the central figures
surrounded by a host of ancient Greek scholars
and philosophers.
The bare footed Plato is seen pointing skywards,
In his left hand holds his book ‘Timaeus’;
His upward hand gesture indicating his ‘World
of Forms’ and transcendental ideas!
Aristotle is seen pointing downwards, his left
hand holds his famous book the ‘Ethics’;
His blue dress symbolizes water and earth
with an earthly fix.
The painting illustrates the historic continuance
of Platonic thoughts,
In keeping with the spirit of the Renaissance!
Raphael’s last masterpiece ‘Transfiguration’
depicts the resurrected Christ,
Flanked by prophets

I saw the old man circling the tree trunk
Weather beaten skin, bent gnarled hands
and piercing blue eyes

He seemed to study every knot and crack
in that ancient timber

Then without a word turned and picked up hammer and chisel

The wood chips then began to fly and like confetti on the ground lie soon in heaps some ankle high

Occasionally he would stand back and look but never once a rest he took

Mallet strokes both hard and soft some from under some aloft fell there with unerring skill always busy never still

Long into the night he worked now by the light of an oil lamp and so the tree stump 'neath his hand then became a work of art

At long last he stood and turned to me and said three words " that'll do lad"

I approached to see just what he'd done and there I saw the perfect rose every petal and leaf in place the slender stems in the breeze did sway

With no plan or picture he had made the start
And created the perfect work of art.


So what is creativity? Well that's your next challenge.

No love poems because they've been done a million times. This time something unique

.i left an excess of a B somewhere in here... within the confines of a word giblet... i probably thought: bigger... bouncier... gibblet looked better... and so very far removed from goblet... i'm not going to look for it.

i haven't done much today -
and i don't suppose i will finish this day of
with some grand poo'em...
but one can almost be proud
to have perfected a chicken breast roulade...
the rest of the chicken missing
the butterfly? well... bound to a very
decent soup... clear and not atypical
western cream-soup...
but the roulade! the roulade!
no... you don't beat the butterfly *******
like you might turn to: "sadistically"
for a schnitzel...
you do beat the meat,
but you more or less... press down the mallet
onto the meat, until you reach
the right equilibrium of pressure and
there's that squish-sound / feel of the *******
expanding...

if it was a whole roast chicken:
of course i'd stuff the space between
the skin and the ******* with some thyme
infused butter... to capture the richness...
but this is a roulade...
the stuffing? goats cheese... toasted almonds...
fesh dates... thyme...
i might have just over-balanced
the equation with the dates...
but as i explained to the fussy-eater:
what are you implying that we do not
serve poultry with a sweet attache?
cranberry sauce and turkey?
and as i've learned...

it's best buying potatoes from a turkish
outlet by the 25kg bulk...
from a warehouse where the buyers
walk with bundles of money and do not
use debit card "finger" prints...
the free passing of money is still retained
in some tiers of society...
but the idea, regarding the potatoes is
to poach them from a bath of cold water...
once they start boiling leave them for
five minutes, then turn the heat off
and wait for the bubbling water to stop...
drain them... then leave them on
the already turned-off stove to get rid
of any excess water...
drizzle some chilly infused olive oil
onto the baking tray, place each potato individually...
then drizzle some olive oil onto them...
shove them in the oven when the roulade
is finished...
my first most pristine roulade...
of course you have to pan-fry it to get some
colour... the filling is kept intact given that:
goats' cheese is no mozarella...

it doesn't melt and subsequently ooze out...
and the whole lot should be be done within
the hour... the roulade can be pressured
to go for 25 minutes...
depending on the colour of the tatties...
i still had to take it out and "glitter" it with
a 1:1 ratio of honey and lemon juice...
the remains of this juice i designated on al dente
cooked greens... there was no need
for a dressing...
left-over red cabbage coleslaw...
that helps... sweet chilli sauce with some mayo
and crem fraiche...
it even looks the prettier picture:
leftover but it still works...
***** of a ******* butterfly *******!
of course it was going to spit oil back at me,
i was frying the skin... the fat from the skin
was melting the skin was getting crisp
and mingling with the olive oil fat...
also... it's a myth that the temp. should
read: 165°F... that's really just a circa...
mine read 156°F... and given the time i let
it rest...

oh right... this is not a food blog...
perhaps the moon is just too beautiful tonight
to have to attach words to it?
perhaps my love is better left alone and unused
and it doesn't demand sleeper idealism
for it to be celebrated?
it's cooking food... it's not a hip-replacement
surgery...
when cooking was married to chemistry:
i sometimes miss the laboratory
and the cooking up of esters...
my new found calling is in cooking...
and something i... wouldn't exactly want to earn
money for...

and what is surgery if not elevated butcher's ******>antics? oh no, it's needed...
but the meat is supposed to be raw
from beginning to end...
and if i was only given the chance to recycle
a recipe for a stake tartar...
or sushi... well... it wouldn't be much...
esp. when i come into my own
and cook an indian **** of spices...
but then again... the indians butcher their meat
in their curries...
i've come to some serious realisation...
the indians butcher the meat with their curry sauce...
it comes down to baking the meat...
in order for the meat to still retain its
original juices...
i quiet enjoy that little detail of cook...
in that: i don't remember the last time i was
in a restaurant...

i can't imagine eating while having to talk...
conversation over food is no better
than sitting in field of grazing cows
and their leech clouds of flies all bothersome...
with regards to the quality of the meat....
there is always some excess of meat from
the butterfly ******* before you start moulding
them into a shape that will satisfy it being
rolled...
it's a supreme joy working with a whole
chicken... i sometimes wish i was also the man
who could see the whole procedure of:
and be involved in the slaughterhouse...

oh god... the brute village beheading is
rather uncompromising... one chicken is caught
and beheaded on a stump of wood...
the head still moves with its last remaining
short-circuit tongue extending out of the beak
and the eyes roll... and then all the other chickens
congregate and perform a Kuru ritual of pecking
the blood... sipping it...
that's how killing a chicken in a village
looks like... i can't imagine an industrial scale
precision... but i would't mind...

every time i hear of veganism: the ethical argument
i start conjuring up an antithesis of
cannibalism... which is not exactly edgy given
my catholic background (i haven't been
confirmed, personal choice):
this is my body, this is my blood...
i hear a vegan talk i make a fetish of
imagining cannibalism...
believe me... these limbs look akward...
to begin with... where can you find a *******
drumstick of poultry on it?!
nowhere!

only a few days shy off today i made a most
delightful broth of chicken hearts...
i can't explain how the sight of washing...
oh... around 30 pultry hearts feels like...
given that they're hearts and not the entire chicken...
but as ever... the internal organs are a delight...
pork or poultry liver...
poultry hearts...
poultry stomachs...
cow intestines...

come to think of it... you never really cook meat...
you... curate it... it become a fine art specialist...
for those who turn to veganism or the vegetarian
"alternative": perhaps they never curated meat,
perhaps they simply butchered it?
the chicken roulade of butterfly poultry *******
always came out dry-*****?

after all, wasn't ol' Adoolph the one to say:
'hello mr. carrot, hellooo jew no. 1269230 of
auschwitz'... that's the puberty of my distrust
for vegans... they were never able to
cook meat properly... they probably ate
a decent piece of it served in a restaurant...
but when it came to cooking it themselves...
they would have probably butchered
a pasta and never reached the quality: al dente...
either...
and i'm worried that they can't cook
vegetables al dente either...
so it's back to the gulag of roots overcooked
and turned into mush...

oh i believe that meat is butchered...
but it's from the actual butchery...
it's from a lack of respect in how it's finally
"cooked"... well... curated...
are vegans the sort of people that never
ate a stake tartar... or found the most
arisotractic flavours in the giblet?
oh my god... if you can eat a drumstick
of chicken clean to the bone...
and, like me... sometimes bite off
the budding pulp of the bone for the marrow
gnash?
perhaps that's why i own cats...
delicate courtesans of the table...
a dog would go hungry at this table...
sharpnel of bones and some lurking marrow
in the "shins"... and that's about it...

you can never truly be a vegan...
not unless you repudiate the fact you've only
tasted muscle tissue...
what about the giblets and the cartilege?

every time i would perform oral ***
on a woman i could only conjure up one distate...
this is not a steak done rare...
this is not an oyster...
this is not a steak tartar...
there are "things" pulverising this meat...
there's an unexpected pocket of heat
in this... "thing"...
this is a sensation that lends itself
to the pastry section of my diet...
a warm apple pie... a custard drizzle
over some chocolate sponge...
oh qui qui... the marvels of a bilingual mouth...

if the meat is of good quality....
as the chicken roulade i made today...
and there were leftover snippets...
which i fed to the cats...
and the meat was eaten... in totality...
i was eating good chicken...
cats regarding meat are like...
those ancient jobs equivalent to...
Halotus...
god! give me a chance to own a cat!
i'll name him: Halotus!
he'll be my meat taster...
he'll tell me if i'm eating bad meat...
i'm not a Claudius but...
this cat could very well be the next Halotus!
dogs eat leftovers...

beside this one instance of catching
a female mosquito by the leg
and feeding it to a cat...
the most pleasure i ever received was
when i was preparing a rainbow trout
for grilling...
the head couldn't be used since:
i wasn't planning to cook a base fish stock...
so i plucked those pearly eyes from the head...
and my... what a delight they were...
not me... the cat...
i'm guessing that's the equivalent
of me gulping down an oyster...

female maine **** fascination with dairy
products...
any cream will do... even cheap-oh cheese...
dairylee spreadable...
but all manner of cream whipped...
i've heard of cats being fond of red wine...
i once owned one that was fond
of... olive brine...

again: what's with this need for people to cook
your food? what sort of decency of conversation
can one have when presented with food?
i don't like restaurants simply because:
well i can't exactly cook roadkill...
and shooting at birds is not my kind of thing...
so if i can't catch it and **** it...
i can at least: cook it...
i distrust what i eat that i haven't prepared
myself... notably the hygiene dilemma...

it really is on my head whether i'll catch
salmonella when i sometimes drink a coffee
with a guilty pleasure of mine:
whisked egg-yoke and sugar... on top of the coffee...
that's my problem...
but eating is never a synonym with conversation...
and it's never necessary to loiter and wait
for someone to shove pretenses above
the food in the first instance of: the waiting staff...

i blame the rise in veganism surrounding
the people who never allowed themselves to appreciate
the animal: in total...
there's no fun just sticking to ingesting muscle
protein... first you have to cook it properly...
this chicken roulade didn't have to reach
the internal temp. of 165°F - that's a circa proposition...
at 156°F and allowed to rest is just as good...
because it's an art-form to cook meat...
then again: what's cooking and what's about
to be curated?

the people who turn to veganism are also the people
who never bothered with gibblets...
the liver, the heart, the stomach,
in some cases the intestines...
hence my critique of Islams critique of ol' porky Bella...
this most unique animal...
which you can eat in total...
tenga deep fried pigs ears...
again: the cartilege...
ethics my *** if all you know about a pig is a bore
chop or a **** or... you never get into
the knitty-gritty details of the interior of
an animal... lamb is a stinking meat...
it's hell-rot when the male is slaughtered...

oh right! right! how could i forget the star
pinnacle... poached giblet supreme...
the neck... if you know how to eat a drumstick
down to the bone...
poached poultry neck...
the teeth and tongue wandering around
the crevices of this elongated spine...
i can imagine monkey's extended coccyx
tastes as tender... but only among
the macaques...
otherwise: when what's about to be eaten...
can be elevated to a status of ****** fetishes...
gimps in leather...
when rummaging among so many
boyscouts & aenemic vegans...

i'm yet to taste this, one specific, delicacy...
flaki (flački) is not new to me...
i need to marry a girl from ******* Masovia...
somewhere in the vicinity of Płock...
for i can eat some černina...
duck blood and clear broth soup...
as long as most of the animal is used...
the dogs can have the rest
and so can the vegan ethics society...

but of course this is no an anathema...
or some curated vendetta...
all the roots in the vicinity...
even the fungus... can vegans eat fungus?
are you sure?
what about those "thinking" magic mushrooms
that... if you looked into 1960s:
quick-n-easy philosophy courses...
the fungus is the botanical hitchhiker
that strapped itself to the humanoid brain
and... broadened our horizons and what not...
can you eat the godhead 'shroom?
it might just very well be...
that i'm picking a half-brain half-mushroom
entity in some alcohol to allow myself
to ease a tongue out from
its standard formality of the mollusk...
and waggle waggle waggle brute...

but yes... one is most certainly butchering
a piece of meat when one cooks
a broth... or a curry... unless its a gibblet
of sorts...
to "curate" muscular meat in a broth of a curry...
poaching it to death and worse than death:
dry...
it's about allowing the meat to retain its
natural juices...
how else to enjoy a poultry butterfly breast
roulade - with the natural juices still intact?

- i stopped paying attention to these *******
moralists...
if you have ever figured your way around
cutting off the butterfly of ******* for a roulade...
and you know what it feels like
when you stuff the space between
the meat and the skin of them
with some butter and fresh thyme...
and you're still not circumcised...
well... that's what skin feels like...

how else to reiterate? Ava Lauren is probably
the best example of a brothel beauty...
mandible beauty... something that contorts
and appeals to a perspective of cubism...
wretched beauty of the squashed square
into a pseudo-rhombus contort...
at least doing it from time to time leaves me
without a single buoyancy of thought regarding:
am i having enough, am i not having enough:
and if i'm not having enough -
what are the chances of me contracting some
s.t.d.?

bad beef...
again... juxtaposing a reiteration...
there's something worse than visit a brothel...
there's the... visiting a resturant..
i can't stop thinking about alien,
unwashed hands, preparing my food...
it's already one kick-in-the-***** not having
hunted the food... but to be left ******-over
twice by not having cooked it?!

at least if you know what flesh feels like
between the two crucibles of
death's kiss and man's tongue tease...
you will know when...
you will at least know when...
death comes with its kiss...
and its breath... the meat will turn all
yucky... as if a mollusk decided to prance
upon it in an imitation zigzag...

hence? i have no respect for islam because
islam has no respect for Miss Porky Bella!
seeing how most of the lamb -
except for the kidney in a steak pie
is not wasted...
the pig could feed two african villages...
if done properly...
while a lamb would only serve a pittance
for a poor man of yemen harem...

again: the pig is the enemy...
while not making crab meat a haram is not?
vulture meat... scavenger meat...
that's a: o.k. but the sophisticated nature
of the pig: sophisticated in that:
almost all of it can be eaten...
that so much of it can be you would probably
burp out an oink...
done properly...
the giblets in tow...
pity that such a desert god would never
appreciate the pig becoming a dog on
its truffle hog days...

beside all the arguments...
imagine how the "one true god" goes down
on a platter of those ignorant Beijing folk...
Warsaw testing! Warsaw testing!

pristine my *** when all they ever do
is eat the muscles and never appreciate the detials...
no wonder they become aenemic vegans!
at least butchering a vegetable is less of a concern...
you can almost get away with butchering a root...
it is... oh most certainly it is a shame...
when you can't cook meat properly...

but at least i never feel ever as bad going to a brothel
seeing the sort of people who venture into
restaurants...
i don't like being cooked for, i don't like being
"waited" for...
i don't like this modern orthodoxy affair
of a restaurant... i wish these people
learned something about how meat is: never cooked...
and how... it's always most certainly most necessarily:
curated...

pedantic? perhaps... you should have seen
me in that athenian strip-club with two-clingy *******
either side of me... starwberries in their *****
and we are all fine and giggling...
stealing kisses from prostitutes is: truffle hog
"learning" parabolla...

a date and a "promise" of *** is always
a limp **** affair...
i always want to know whether what i'll be eating
still entertain the existence of salt...
or whether i'll have to find alternatives
of: extracting the juices and finding the right
bites...
because love is long over-due and i'm not going
to butcher it further with whimsical hopes...
my love is a dead love is no ideal...
my love is donning a ball and chain of memory:
i have left the better parts of myself
in the wrong sort of people...
they're hardly coming back...
the people or the pieces of me...

but at least i can attest that:
oral *** and the cool crisp gulp of an oyster
passing the Charon of my tongue...
oysters are only fascinating to eat...
because you always want to concentrate
on the fact that: you're eating something that's still
alive... not even a steak tartar or a sushi slice
gives you that hope and thrill...
unless... you're hoping for some tapeworm
embryo being lodged in the flesh...
which how man can almost arrive
at the conception of foetus and womanhood...
i can't be impregnated: exclusively...
i can't be... pregnant: exclusively...
but i can allow a parasitical tapeworm
to become my new-born-*******-out-abortion...

inclusively... how else?!
i'm also tired of being left immoral by the act
of *******...
not unless you know what not being circumcised
feels like... and what chicken skin feels like...
the people at the restaurants...
a palette disgruntled by minor changes of heat...
and... there's always a very precise detail
when it comes to the temp. of a piece of meat
being cooked... and when it's allowed to epilogue
when resting to ****** with all its juices
left intact...

over-sexed society, are we?
at least doing the one-eyed-bandit's favor
doesn't allow me to ferment...
to pickle such repressive thinking...
itself pitched against: in itself...
and these this Radeztsky March forward...
over-sexed also can imply:
not exactly culinarily-savvy...
these are always twins walking side by side...
and they are always siamese problems...
over-sexed implies...
not cuninarily-savvy...
the better part of this critique is already wide open...
why all these cooking channels,
all these cooking programs?
and all this ****?

can't **** can't cook? broomstick! and to sabbath
with you!
i can't no better comparison...
over-sexed and also: terrible at *******...
******* is terrible to begin with...
you can't exactly quip yourself with
having done some lessons in tango or salsa...
the chances are that the *** turns out to
be a laughable take on tango and
you're going to step on a day-dreaming
dancing partner...
it's exactly what's it's supposed to be:
a gamble at best...
but when you throw in bad cooking?
recipe for disaster... bad dates that begin
in a restaurant and arrive at a black-out
bedroom with cockoon *** under
the bedsheets with you gasping for air!

'god let me out! let me out!'

So time to and move on and goodbye.
Like the strangers we were
in all the time we sojourn together.

unemotional be
for all it is a wistless life,
aeon in aeon:
meetings and partings

****** be the vogue,
mallet-smash the mirrors
them in the halls of
spirited dreams

barefooted walk  on those shards then
red be they tinged, **** if they do
for there is a pleasure in this pain

always like this, rivers that rise
high up in the hills, swelling in the rain
die dry in the heartless dunes

and a piper sounds out the songs
caravans on horizon
that them streams carried
here into their graves

for deep somewhere
subterranean buried
lies a clothed casket
broken heart, sunken dream

so let us move on. you, on,
and I, to my dance
to each their own.

T'was the night before Christmas
And with everything done
The kids were all dreaming
Of Christmas Day fun
The tree was completed
We had wrapped all the toys
When from the basement below
We heard a faint noise
I sprung from the couch
Took off down the stairs
On my way through the kitchen
I tripped on two chairs
I slid down the staircase
To the base of my house
And there with my shortbreads
Was a ****** great mouse
My wife followed close
And then she let out a shriek
She saw me and the mouse
And she started to freak
He nibbled the cookie
and he ran past my nose
right down my torso
Then he stopped at my toes
My wife was still screaming
The mouse didn't care
He continued his running
On under the stairs
I crawled to my workshop
Grabbed the first thing I found
A mallet for pounding
That mouse in the ground
I limped to the staircase
And I swung at the wall
I again lost my balance
And again, I did fall
I put two holes in the riser
Two more in the tread
I was gonna keep swinging
Till that mouse was dead
I broke the one lightbulb
That lit up the room
Now I was worried
I couldn't see...found the broom
I stepped on one end
Squared my self in the sack
I then heard a noise
The mouse had come back
I heard his slight skitter
As he went past my feet
He was off to the larder
For more stuff to eat
I went back to the workshop
Tripping at least three more times
I would finish this mouse
He would pay for his crimes
I grabbed for a lighter
And my large propane torch
I would hunt down this mouse
And his **** I would scorch
I lit up the propane
And I aimed at the stairs
It caught light on the carpet
And I burnt both those chairs
The flames went on upward
The stairs were quite dry
I laughed in hysterics
That **** mouse would fry
My wife had recovered
And decided to run
but, after seeing the flames
She phoned up 9 1 1
The mouse left the building
In fact, he never was found
The house burned in seconds
It collapsed to the ground
And through the whole scene
I just stood there and laughed
At the wreckage before me
And I thought, **** I'm daft
I had ruined our Christmas
And I burned down our house
Over a **** shortbread cookie
And one little mouse
The kids, they got out
And were wrapped up and warm
While I was creating
My own perfect storm
The gifts were all ruined
The house ...all consumed
And over my head
One large question loomed
If I had gone for the shotgun
And shot at the mouse
Would I be still having Christmas
And would I still have a house
My wife came on over
And she gave me a swat
She said "look what you've done"
"you great stupid ****"
I learned a great lesson
and folks ...it is that
Once I rebuild
I will then buy a cat!!!

Today I had a bout of acute-you shyness
one where I try to pretend I don't notice
but have you noticed how difficult it is
when outside idles but inside there's a race

to views like you leaning side to side
on the motorcycle ride slot machine
driving my eyes to sly around your slides
taking them wide as when I was eighteen
I'd look for curves at Southend pier's end
give out stares and start to take in scenes
of free amusement at the Fun Bump arcade

around and around the circuit you rode
I was lapping up your every move
sneaking a view through the coin drop
peeping behind the pinball of Dr Who
prying open the photo booth curtain gap
faux testing the mallet with your strength
playing air hockey with my thoughts
were your short chic bangs a wig?

they sit so still I long for the straights
then swing to one side with a leg
tight vibrant jeans in hairpin bends
ironing out where the centre line is damp
polishing the dashing leather saddle
vibrating with wrist twist contempt
loveliness revving up to red line

exploding in my face with daring
this bike crash heart of mine
please forgive not stopping staring
a race course habit never outgrown

I go too fast and of course I fall
in love as bad as deeply madly
but the fact that it's with you.. well
I have to forgive myself this malady

I'm a side-road heading for a spin
on ways to tell you you're beautiful
dangerously close I risk self harm
imagining that colour of pink and pale
the flush u-turn will be a charm

If I can get you climbing off
hot and flustered
I’ll have done my pit stop job
at once a chance encounter
and a fateful winning score
to let you know you've entered
into being my prize draw

I'll walk away but don't be sore
it's up to you to take it further
but just know one thing more
that if you call me to confirm
and tell me that I’m worth it
I would turn around so fast
the world would gearshift
and wait
but not in neutral
for us

coke cleans the pallet
where's the man with the mallet
heart attack
is like a black
hole in my soul
I'm a troll under a bridge
or a sith
star wars
and easy ******
come together
**** my jedi sword
and get lost in that labyrinth
her ***** I swim

Digging down deep is difficult
So many things these days only skim the surface
Or what we are capable of
No one dares to look inside
Afraid to shovel out the bones buried in the graveyard of memories
Afraid to be paralyzed with the fear that is ever apparent
Cry the tears that are ever evident
Be struck with the burning lightening of anger
Or the shallow mallet of loss
We bury them all so deep
We believe nothing can touch us
There is no way any being on this earth can touch this stone cold iron heart, no one
Then someone comes along
And without knowing, teases out little bits of that heart
Melting it slowly
Leaving us vulnerable once again
Exposed to others
What we wished to avoid in the first place
Sometimes, the person tosses the glass heart aside
Shattering it into a thousand sharp pieces
And other times, they cradle the masterpiece of human desire gently between their hands and place it on a shelf only they can reach
And toss you theirs for safe keeping
A gamble of emotion
An exchange of hearts
Love it is

Feeling all
Embracing all
Fearing not
Love it is...

The eruption beatifies the magma.  
It becomes obsidian,
only breaks with a fracture,
smooth circles where it breaks.  

My mom was born on the grass
on a lawn
in a moss covered canyon at the top of a volcanic island.  
My grandfather lived in Malaysia before the Japanese occupied.  
When the volcano erupted,
the lava dried at the ocean into black sand.  
The British allied with the Communist Party of Malaysia—
after they organized.  
After the Americans defeated the Japanese at Pearl Harbor,
the British took over Malaysia again.  
They kept different groups apart claiming they were helping them.  
The black sand had smooth pebbles and sharp rocks.  
Ethnic Malay farmers lived in Kampongs, villages.  
Indians lived on plantations.  
The Chinese lived in towns and urban areas.  
Ethnic Malays wanted independence.
In 1946, after strikes, demonstrations, and boycotts
the British agreed to work with them.  
The predominantly Chinese Communist Party of Malaysia went underground,
guerrilla warfare against the British,
claiming their fight was for independence.  
For the British, that emergency required vast powers
of arrest, detention without trial and deportation to defeat terrorism.  
The Emergency became less unpopular as the terrorism became worse.  
The British were the iron that brought oxygen through my mom’s body.  
She loved riding on her father’s motorcycle with him
by the plantations,
through the Kampongs
and to the city, half an hour away.  
The British left Malaysia independent in 1957
with Malaysian nationalists holding most state and federal government offices.  
As the black sand stretches towards the ocean,
it becomes big stones of dried lava, flat and smooth.  

My mom thought her father and her uncle were subservient to the British.  
She thought all things, all people were equal.  
When her father died when she was 16, 1965,
they moved to India,
my mother,
a foreigner in India, though she’s Indian.  
She loved rock and roll and mini skirts
and didn’t speak the local language.  
On the dried black lava,
it can be hard to know the molten lava flickers underneath there.  
Before the Korean War,
though Britain and the United States wanted
an aggressive resolution
condemning North Korea,
they were happy
that India supported a draft resolution
condemning North Korea
for breach of the peace.  
During the Korean War,
India, supported by Third World and other Commonwealth nations,
opposed United States’ proposals.
They were able to change the U.S. resolution
to include the proposals they wanted
and helped end the war.  
China wanted the respect of Third World nations
and saw the United States as imperialist.  
China thought India was a threat to the Third World
by taking aid from the United States and the Soviets.  
Pakistan could help with that and a seat at the United Nations.  
China wanted Taiwan’s seat at the UN.
My mother went to live with her uncle,
a communist negotiator for a corporation,
in India.  
A poet,
he threw parties and invited other artists, musicians and writers.  
I have the same brown hyperpigmentation at my joints that he had.  
During the day, only the steam from the hot lava can be seen.  
In 1965, Pakistani forces went into Jammu and Kashmir with China’s support.  
China threatened India after India sent its troops in.  
Then they threatened again before sending their troops to the Indian border.  
The United States stopped aid to Pakistan and India.
Pakistan agreed to the UN ceasefire agreement.  
Pakistan helped China get a seat at the UN
and tried to keep the west from escalating in Vietnam.  
The smoldering sound of the lava sizzles underneath the dried lava.  
When West Pakistan refused to allow East Pakistan independence,
violence between Bengalis and Biharis developed into upheaval.  
Bengalis moved to India
and India went into East Pakistan.  
Pakistan surrendered in December 1971.  
East Pakistan became independent Bangladesh.

The warm light of the melted lava radiates underneath but burns.  
In 1974, India tested the Smiling Buddha,
a nuclear bomb.  
After Indira Gandhi’s conviction for election fraud in 1973,
Marxist Professor Narayan called for total revolution
and students protested all over India.  
With food shortages, inflation and regional disputes
like Sikh separatists training in Pakistan for an independent Punjab,
peasants and laborers joined the protests.  
Railway strikes stopped the economy.  
In 1975, Indira Gandhi, the Iron Lady,
declared an Emergency,
imprisoning political opponents, restricting freedoms and restricting the press,
claiming threats to national security
because the war with Pakistan had just ended.  
The federal government took over Kerala’s communist dominated government and others.  

My mom could’ve been a dandelion, but she’s more like thistle.  
She has the center that dries and flutters in the wind,
beautiful and silky,
spiny and prickly,
but still fluffy, downy,
A daisy.
They say thistle saved Scotland from the Norse.  
Magma from the volcano explodes
and the streams of magma fly into the air.  
In the late 60s,
the civil rights movement rose
against the state in Northern Ireland
for depriving Catholics
of influence and opportunity.
The Northern Irish police,
Protestant and unionist, anti-catholic,
responded violently to the protests and it got worse.  
In 1969, the British placed Arthur Young,
who had worked at the Federation of Malaya
at the time of their Emergency
at the head of the British military in Northern Ireland.
The British military took control over the police,
a counter insurgency rather than a police force,
crowd control, house searches, interrogation, and street patrols,
use of force against suspects and uncooperative citizens.  
Political crimes were tolerated by Protestants but not Catholics.  
The lava burns the rock off the edge of the volcano.  

On January 30, 1972, ****** Sunday,  
British Army policing killed 13 unarmed protesters
fighting for their rights over their neighborhood,
protesting the internment of suspected nationalists.
That led to protests across Ireland.  
When banana leaves are warmed,
oil from the banana leaves flavors the food.  
My dad flew from Canada to India in February 1972.  
On February 4, my dad met my mom.  
On February 11, 1972,
my dad married my mom.  
They went to Canada,
a quartz singing bowl and a wooden mallet wrapped in suede.  
The rock goes down with the lava, breaking through the rocks as it goes down.  
In March 1972, the British government took over
because they considered the Royal Ulster Police and the Ulster Special Constabulary
to be causing most of the violence.  
The lava blocks and reroutes streams,
melts snow and ice,
flooding.  
Days later, there’s still smoke, red.  
My mom could wear the clothes she liked
without being judged
with my dad in Canada.  
She didn’t like asking my dad for money.
My dad, the copper helping my mother use that iron,
wanted her to go to college and finish her bachelors degree.
She got a job.  
In 1976, the police took over again in Northern Ireland
but they were a paramilitary force—
armored SUVs, bullet proof jackets, combat ready
with the largest computerized surveillance system in the UK,
high powered weapons,
trained in counter insurgency.  
Many people were murdered by the police
and few were held accountable.  
Most of the murdered people were not involved in violence or crime.  
People were arrested under special emergency powers
for interrogation and intelligence gathering.  
People tried were tried in non-jury courts.  
My mom learned Malayalam in India
but didn’t speak well until living with my dad.  
She also learned to cook after getting married.  
Her mother sent her recipes; my dad cooked for her—
turmeric, cumin, coriander, cayenne and green chiles.  
Having lived in different countries,
my mom’s food was exposed to many cultures,
Chinese and French.
Ground rock, minerals and glass
covered the ground
from the ash plume.  
She liked working.  

A volcano erupted for 192 years,
an ice age,
disordered ices, deformed under pressure
and ordered ice crystals, brittle in the ice core records.  
My mother liked working.  
Though Khomeini was in exile by the 1970s in Iran,
more people, working and poor,
turned to him and the ****-i-Ulama for help.
My mom didn’t want kids though my dad did.
She agreed and in 1978 my brother was born.
Iran modernized but agriculture and industry changed so quickly.  
In January 1978, students protested—
censorship, surveillance, harassment, illegal detention and torture.  
Young people and the unemployed joined.  
My parents moved to the United States in December 1978.  
The regime used a lot of violence against the protesters,
and in September 1978 declared martial law in Iran.  
Troops were shooting demonstrators.
In January 1979, the Shah and his family fled.  
On February 11, 1979, my parents’ anniversary,
the Iranian army declared neutrality.  
I was born in July 1979.
The chromium in emeralds and rubies colors them.
My brother was born in May and I was born in July.

Obsidian—
iron, copper and chromium—
isn’t a gas
but it isn’t a crystal;
it’s between the two,
the ordered crystal and the disordered gas.  
They made swords out of obsidian.

This is a terrifying tale as told by Ebeneezer Sweetlove, my late cousin*

I remember how I met Edwina all those years ago: and there was none of that "eyes connecting across a crowded room" crap. Well, not in a romantic sense - it was just pure lust. I suddenly realised this woman was staring at me with undisguised desire from the other side of a cocktail party at some boring conference at the five-star Grand Hotel. I was ***** as buggery as my latest girl friend had, just the previous week, committed suicide by jumping to a hideous death off scenic Beachy Head, so I returned the ****'s look with a lethally ****** stare of my own and then licked my lips as vulgarly as possible, indicating I was simply barking for a hot oral session, no holes barred.

The woman I was to know all too briefly as Edwina took the hint and came over and we talked as though we'd known each other all our lives; but even someone as suave as I was a little surprised when she groped me quite openly and shoved her tongue into my earhole, dribbling hotly down my cheek. And then she seemed to go all shy and little girl-like until I sophisticatedly suggested we go out for dinner and then back to my penthouse suite for a night of mind-blowing *******. I have to say I was embarrassed when the head waiter in the little bistro I selected complained when she took off her knickers and gave them to me for a refreshing sniff.

The *** was amazing - Edwina was like a beast on heat, screaming like a banshee while we ****** each other's brains out. Yet, in between *******, she was as gentle and charming as a little ***** cat. Six times I gave her my hot ***** that night: once in her mouth, then four times in the usual place, finishing off with one up her rear end. I was more or less totally drained of my love juices and in need of a good long kip before lunch.

But, tragedy struck: well before the dawn's early, she woke me and whispered she had to go as she had to get home before her husband got back after his night shift from down the sewers - he was apparently in charge of the entire East Sussex sewage system and liked to have an hour long shower every morning to get the stench of ***** off him.

I begged her to stay, saying I would happily pay for a divorce so I could have her with me for always. I even offered to have a contract put out on her sewer rat of a hubby, mentioning that my brother-in-law, Kosmo, was big in the Albanian mafia and owed me a favour. But she said no, I could ******* with my pleas. As dawn grew nearer I could see her becoming ever more frantic to leave and it was only then I realised the truth, having at last deciphered the real meaning of her blood-stained and scabby third ****** and the scarlet 666 tattoo on her luscious **** cheek.

Yes, Edwina was a ***-demon from deepest Hell and thus I was left with only one course of action. Ever so reluctantly, I bravely reached for the sacred wooden stake and mallet that I had carried round in my Dolce & Gabbana crocodile suitcase for so many years just in case of such an eventuality. Sadly I drove the stake into her beautiful ***** with a mighty blow and, instead of the blood which might have been reasonably expected, only a stream of warm **** poured out. Before my very eyes, her corpse disintegrated into a pile of odorous dust. Truly was Edwina a daughter of darkness.

As you may imagine, I had to give the chambermaid quite a hefty gratuity in order to get her to cleanse my room and to bin the evidence, but so grateful was she for the honorarium that she agreed to share my bed the very next night, knowing she would be likely to receive an immense tip of quite another category.

well

your dad



inside something turns

when i see his mallet



still



with the blue tape



i had best



take a photograph

of dad’s mallet

now

so you can see the handle taped

Oi Modi you ******, yes Lalit,
Unpleasant to taste on my pallet.
   Arrogant and so brash.
  You make threats with your cash,
Your face should say 'Hi' to my mallet!

But Modi is right I must say.
The IPL in India should stay.
  They cannot just give in
 To all terrorist's whim.
Life has to go on, come what may.

Lalit K has a tongue and a brain,
Can he use both without causing such pain?
  He works best under stress,
 Well here is a fine mess,
Will he anger again, or refrain?

Tendulkar did something today.
Two hundred runs all in one day!
  Majestic and cunning.
  It simply was stunning.
No bowler could stand in his way.

How Sachin keeps on being humble,
Is enough to make braver men crumble,
  If Modi learned that,
  He'd be less of a pratt,
And my poetry jibes would then stumble.

These two things that happened together,
Were both better than English weather,
  In the passing of time
  One event will decline,
The other, remembered forever.

On my garden lawn,
A croquet field of red *****,
Whoops without mallet.

Her eyes played me
Like soft chords on
An old violin,
And the sound produced
Would never sound as sweet,
As the song flowing from
Your piano key teeth.

There are harmonies in my heart,
And melodies in my veins.
If only you'd strum me
Three times more,
I'd blow into your trumpet lips,
And you'd buzz and you'd hum-
Dancing inside of my kiss.

I'll take this mallet,
And hammer away
At the contours of your spine
Like it were a xylophone,
Your body vibrates-
I flow to the sensual tone.

This is a symphony of few,
An orchestra of two,
And who needs instruments anyway-
When the music is made
by me and you?

PYTHAGORAS planned it.  Why did the people stare?
His numbers, though they moved or seemed to move
In marble or in bronze, lacked character.
But boys and girls, pale from the imagined love
Of solitary beds, knew what they were,
That passion could bring character enough,
And pressed at midnight in some public place
Live lips upon a plummet-measured face.
No! Greater than Pythagoras, for the men
That with a mallet or a chisel" modelled these
Calculations that look but casual flesh, put down
All Asiatic vague immensities,
And not the banks of oars that swam upon
The many-headed foam at Salamis.
Europe put off that foam when Phidias
Gave women dreams and dreams their looking-glass.
One image crossed the many-headed, sat
Under the tropic shade, grew round and slow,
No Hamlet thin from eating flies, a fat
Dreamer of the Middle Ages.  Empty eyeballs knew
That knowledge increases unreality, that
Mirror on mirror mirrored is all the show.
When gong and conch declare the hour to bless
Grimalkin crawls to Buddha's emptiness.
When Pearse summoned Cuchulain to his side.
What stalked through the post Office? What intellect,
What calculation, number, measurement, replied?
We Irish, born into that ancient sect
But thrown upon this filthy modern tide
And by its formless spawning fury wrecked,
Climb to our proper dark, that we may trace
The lineaments of a plummet-measured face.
April 9,

Do we ever forget what we see?
Do we enact what we believe?
Do we arm the spine of our diaries?
To self-detonate to remain drama-free?

Sometimes my intent indents ignorance,
But maybe I've umpired too many bazookas,
And wore out the strength of my remembrance,
Catching rockets aimed at this loser,

Loser?
What are you talking about?
Lost the L in Laughter
Lost the O in Optimistic,
Lost the S in Simplicity,
Lost the E in Expressionistic,
Lost the R in Reality,

So now my soul's succumbed to gravity,
Tragically hatching my apathy with a Whack-a-mole mallet,
A dastardly dressed casualty,
Actually,
I'm trying to reverse the black magic curse and verse my happiness,

A circle speaks volumes.
Revolutionize and tidy up.
Instruction manuals are read automatically.
Privacy parts the talon and now,
how the sky blinks a feather ever so unusually.

Ever wake up in your sleep to your head fully stuck in the sixth sense
stomach of a pillow, and thought to yourself in bed about how much of
a dream it must be to be stuffed turkey?

I haven't.

Or thought to your self made bed how making the bed as an edible
symbol of thanksgiving
is like taking a stand
on a landmine,
for eternity?

I haven't.
I also lie and lay awake to myself.

Although a traveler tends to do all of the above,
below the radar.
A farmer tends too.
Eats an earthquake,
aftershock, rattled rim, pacific clarity, clear the oceans, tremors, tremors,
Noah's ark is a humpback funeral home.
Noah riding a hearse by the hubcap, clean teeth grip.
Noah in my mouth, reciting odd numbers on my taste buds.

Noah licking a polished nail, course matte for me,
three by three, the poor
poor bones of a humpback whale singing sad on a mountain.

You have to wonder about coffins when it's death out.
And water among amidst when your lungs are thirsty.
And since it seems the tried and tested walk has all but run away,
some metal wood rubber leather latex silk wool boxes spit out tickets.

A materialistic downer on uppers levels off at acceptance.
And yeah, smoking will **** you, but this is about me and I need to inhale.
This is not about me, but about you, or was that nature?
The nature of nurturing seems as good a point to start this conversation.
But it's dead end talk to talk in line segments, and well, ****,
it's time for an advertisement:

This cylinder tin is full of everything your life is empty of!
Forget the cost; be content with the contents,
rehearse the ingredients, unload the all and do it again.
Infatuation is hot-air gas inflated in the belly of outer space.
I love the way those stars look and those stars love looking at me.

The cut and paste of our human race is unfairly lopsided.
The northern blade has a tumor the size of misdirection,
the scales are tipped, the whips are tipped, and the weapons are gripped.
Sudan doesn't own scissors; Angola is the axis of axe-less
but their ******* skyline is incestuously bright,
their constellations all make sense,
and their astronauts haven't lifted off, to jump and jive in the very
same sky we share with them.
No, not yet, there are animals to be slaughtered sedimentary still.
Ones with tribal names that come off the tongue like mouth sound effects,
they are almost people, without horns hammered in their heads.

Eating on all fours from a license plate.
Dig in, Donesia.
How is life in amnesia, brain pulp square?
Psychologically disturbed map and memory loss, southwest Asia?
Your address is a long walk, but the **** citizen on the roadside exhibit
is a refreshing remix to our boring, bragging billboards.
And your suffering is art to the skull and cross-bone pale cube galleries
that we call home sweet, home sweet merchandise.
And rest assured, your lack of rest will insure western survival,
North America will steal your toddler corpses
and sell them at the front gates of your orphanage ghettos.
It's the least we can do after gouging out your eyeballs.

I didn't even write this, it was drawn by a blind boy in India.

The black market pencil case people are going to a blow-out sale.
The sales on them and the jokes a bomb.
The jokes on them and the sales a bomb.
The bombs on them and the jokes a sale.
The female holds her breath and suffocates a male.
And the genders collapse in heaps and heaves, recycled and broke
like natural leaves caught in a mythological fighter
jet's propeller.
Like aeroplanes, several even, oddly amount conclusive crash-like.
Like, like, like, if the globe of green and blue were to still be alive
I would colour co-ordinate accordingly, and wear whatever hue
the big bang theory wasn't.
Dust particles getting it on and such.
Finger painting *** with a rag and pan pencil case.

The black market Darwin drawin' is on fire in the pockets of our youth,
elderly lint in same corduroy bent knuckle nameless, places
an introduction to i.v. and a never un-shook from his hinges
living room magazine holder.
So the flinching milli-metricks betwixt our beloved booklets brings
gratification, satisfaction, and eternal life.
And gravity with a runny nose.
Oh, oh!  My first ever and last edit: Make that ******.

So I'm infinite pass-time, tedious rusty grime
and dead llama on the zoo-way.
"Look Ma, a dead llama!"
"No dear, she is just sleeping with her blood out
and cage on".

No more rides for the unknown, let it be known.
Call your superiors, mega-impose their posteriors, an emphasis on
brittle lives.
And chew the fat, chew the fat, **** the marrow, narrow
weight-scale bound in chain-mail, accidental prediction protection,
magnify, mortify, modern sill overdosing on wake pills, horticultural hi.

I am coherent when the setting is all tens, when
the plot is all tens, when the characters are all reaping tens.
The catch is in the ******, looking scared cloth-less elevens.

Judges, what verdict gives you
the right to wig wear an oak arm chair
with an all too obvious worn-mallet-beating-desktop syndrome
bashing your would be innocent until proven rich-boy lashes, err, guilty?

Was that even a question,
or merely a stir-fried rant?

The master chefs are coming after us all in our under garments,
over bridges and mountains and tiger stance wisdom and
we need a Messiah like we need horseshoes on our foreheads.

Mule yoke split on the frying pan of till death do us cook.
Separation nation; a river plain, a barren abstract.
And the artists are painting droplets on their toes,
kissing themselves after a game of Chinese checkers,
determined to squirm sweet nothings while riding
question mark shaped seats from Sweden.

And under a hail of Mary's, Jason's, William's, Susan's, and missiles,
they touch their ankles where they know
nails should be,
extinct.

A circle sounds off,
a sky sounds awful,
a bomb sounds right,
a body sounds circles,
and a circle speaks volumes.

sometimes a private message on the sly
outlasts a poem,
i'm no quack - my prescription list
if a bunch of theories,
i can't the Hippocratic oath even if i wanted to,
which also means a theory here,
or a theory there can't hurt -
it's levitating as a chanced choice of consideration,
in terms such stated, there are
the questions of consolidating the problem
socrates faced as to how confront a unity
of particulars and universals -
well, a mathematical impression
with the prime expression of division would be
a start, a comprehension of units
akin to millimetre, centimetre and mile
would be due a referencing to.

i hardly know what to call the cartesian
subsequence equation -
sartre tried to invert it -
let's say that thinking is an *essence
and being is existence -
drag in newton's causality and einstein's
lack of causality - i do believe
descartes is pivotal in terms of causality
and what existentialism suggested
via sarte: that existence precedes essence
or vice versa - causality i should think -
but if the itemisation of space
as divided enduring placebos of millimetre
and centimetre with each point
as the Freudian id to divide is loosely estimated -
i understand Sartre's argument when
being a revisionist via Descartes -
existence does indeed precede essence -
you learn from your mistakes -
first can existence example itself
before thought (essence) begins its learning process -
indeed it can't be otherwise, intuition
does exist to a cloning zenith reached by animals
who're only vociferous via the medium
of onomatopoeia - ferrous sounds -
but among men there are more enzyme-related
processes to create the Enlightenment from
the Renaissance - the latter an artistic progress
the former the scientific -
study chemistry or physics and philosophy becomes
a playground - biology for some reason
has too many octopus tentacles attached to
obvious things - mutations of Chernobyl to mind -
and history, **** sake's the stone age and the
17th century will deviate far between on the spectrum
of analysis - there is much more bureaucracy from
the 17th century than crude cave drawings from the stone
age - i'm hardly saying it's not plausible
but the time-scale leveraged with boiling a cup of tea
is the worst kinds of distraction - scout's honour,
cross my heart and count to 20 in under 10 seconds.
anyway, for the majority, people are hardly
innovators, a few can claim to be a pure res cogitans
(a thinking thing), since such a being would require
an id scale of division, not necessarily a scale of division
akin to the majority of people, with their
9 to 5 working days, monday through to sunday,
january through to december -
with the latter list of exemplification we're talking
about a res narro / a narrative thing - alt. include
res transloquor (a thing talking over -
a loss of etiquette when talking over older people)
etc. -
           since i find that thinking is primarily
about innovative feats - but most of the time what we
call thinking is actually narration -
a book never written, an idea never materialised -
and the existence of the Buddhist "mindfulness" /
simply not thinking, a full cartesian sum embodiment,
akin to driving a car, a bike, whatever you like.
or i could have written about the news review
articles from sunday: the boo! that's Broadmoor,
the lush living conditions in blocks 2 & 5
and the squalor in blocks 1 & 6...
names include the murderers:
jonathan lowe (aged 52) writing a letter about
the Ritz hotel like conditions in 1898,
croquet and cricket, tea weak beer and gambling,
tobacco luxury and servants via the lesser
fortunate inmates,
william chester minor's addition to the inaugural
edition of the oxford english dictionary (ex-military
surgeon he was),
chippendale bookcases, bathed once a week,
shaved three times a week,
(now you can understand my fascination with
Ezra Pound) - thomas harry a would be assassin
of the p.m. Gladstone of 1893 walking about
the asylum gardens mentioning Gladstone's
last plea with a smile akin to the eager buds of
may appealing to harry's sense of "remorse",
a dutchman who attacked his wife with a mallet
pleading to renter the lunatics' Ritz circa 1895 -
a jack the ripper suspect amongst them -
dr. richard brayn hardly ***** burroughs' dr. benway -
a madman had never so much luck under **** brayn -
but the less fortunate remarked:
'my name is T Perkins, i have been murdered here,
by those that know not what they do,
because they have ether in their heads!'
i'd guess ammonia to add to such a confession,
or skunk ***** to mind the least.
thomas cutbrush was the ripper suspect.
jimmy saville wetted his ***** in the female wards...
can't complain with ******* adolescent girls
why complain about ******* crazed chicks -
Michael Meyers in the room? i thought so,
democracy is the ideal export, people know
jack the ******* by compliments from the toilet's
perfumery as described: strawberry scented,
mm hmm - Kentucky tattooed on my left buttock's
cheek. but boo! a.k.a. Broadmoor is closing,
pristine lunatics on the street - mind you
in the news review they had an article about
seymour hersh - what he called
dum-dum and darth vader of the galactic empire
surround fashion trends of 9 / 11...
joy uu bushy and st. francis cheney -
prior to this poem looking at russian sables in
fur farms going berserker over the size of the cages,
a lynx rummaging in a theory of geometry
walking out lemniscate treading on its own faeces,
and i felt good for the jews
not wearing leather on Yom Kippur -
in their orthodox black attire walking into a
synagogue wearing trainers -
yep, lived next to a synagogue for several years,
a flat above an estate agents...
but of course weddings and mazel tov a rekindled
happy event!
scurrying like rats in an area not allowing pride -
apologies for the comparison,
but Gants Hill wasn't exactly Golders Green,
well the Hanukkha did stand proud at the roundabout,
but then the social project took over
and subsequent evictions proceeded -
Bangladesh came over - and half of Pakistan.

And so
the human heart and the cheap steak
are both made tender
one blow at a time

Wind berates the window panes in angry exclamations
And the walls groan with the intermittent vibrations of my father’s steady blows-
With every other heavy step the leaden strokes of his fury, a loaded roque mallet meets the wall, meant for me.
And deep in my body, white terror (boiler heat)
climbs the stairs in syncopated heart beats.

Daddy, can you hear me in there?

But I think he’s gone,
and I’m running.

Long hallways, deep black, and the crack of his weapon send shrill fear in (fire hose) snakes down my back.

“COME ON OUT, WORTHLESS PUP, AND TAKE YOUR MEDICINE,
BAD LITTLE BOYS HAVE TO TAKE THEIR CORRECTION,”

I think daddy is gone,
This inhuman place took him.

In the back of my mind,
(You’ve got to keep your love alive),
In the back of my mind,
(I know that you tried.)

There always comes the end of the line, and as I beat daddy to the attic by a step, I know I’ve reached mine.
There is nowhere to go.
There is nowhere to hide.

“If my daddy is in there, he knows that you lied!
You’re just a false face, just a big hungry void,
and you swallow men like him to survive.
If my daddy is in there– ”

And all at once, his countenance changed.
A man hollowed by agonized sorrow, he bled,
(Monsters are real)
“Doc, run away quick-”
(And ghosts are too)
“But remember this-”
(They live inside of us)
“Remember I love you.”
(And sometimes they win.)

And I believe him.
I kiss his blood stained fingers,
And vignettes of sweet memories pass between us, fading with the hue of humanity in his eyes-

And I cannot say goodbye.

The mallet ascends to end him-
A coup de grace, a bleak salvation,
So that I can look upon the mangled maw of the awful stronghold that held him.

“Masks off, then,”
It says.

And I grin.

There's an apartment filled with drugs
Somewhere in the past
Where I'd roll around on my rug
With a body of little mass
I was malnourished
And felt like a tourist
I protected embarrassing ****** desires
And felt like I couldn't speak
I thought I'd stay silent until I retired
But the pressure got too deep
I was afraid of what they think
And the Kool-Aid they drink

I made mistakes
And tried to act straight
I felt fake
Which engendered hate
My friends stopped seeing me
After I stopped being me
When everything got too cold
I reached out for somewhere to hold
And grasped a syringe
To erase my cringe

I didn't sleep on a pallet
Or get beat by a mallet
My parents loved me
Isn't that lovely?
I felt pain all the same
I felt like I had fame
And everybody was watching
And grenade launching
I tried to foolishly avoid it
Which proved to be ineffective
I thought drugs might destroy it
Which led to countless injections

I've seen interesting things
Like wives selling rings
To be drug dealer bling
And the constant scheming
Of the get-rich-quick dreaming
These events become boring
After you see girls *******
And homeless people looting up
And pregnant women shooting up
And pulverizing police pulling up
The difference becomes starker
Once things get even darker

My life had no worth
Back and forth
Between rehab and relapse
So much time had elapsed
Life became about learning how one thing leads to another
Like a caring mother who gives birth to two brothers
One is of use to society
For he has proper propriety
The other is a poet
But doesn't know it
He can carve out a peaceful existence
That can be his righteous resistance
He needs to be nurtured
By someone he collides with
Somewhere in the future
At a location to be decided

Take me by the hand,
see me through your placid garden.
Walk with me, St. Mary's.

March me in time to your rhythm;
let me wield the mallet that beats your drum.
Sing to me, St. Mary's.

String my sole into the primordial web
within the black walnut tree.
Lay with me, St. Mary's.

Close my eyes and tilt me back;
dip me into the murky pond.
Baptize me, St. Mary's.

Take me down to the fiery shoreline;
we'll linger beneath the countenance of the rugged cross.
Crucify me, St. Mary's.

Sit me by your mystic grave,
cast a silent earthy veil over me.
Bury me, St. Mary's.

Chip me from the rock, free me of these shackles,
rocket me into the heavens.

Liberate me, St. Mary's.

his hands are gripped tightly around the mallet
ripped koozie foam under his white fingernails

crack-hiss
crack-hiss

he is pounding flat the knots in the tree
until his tender grain sighs bitter bubbles

crack-hiss
crack-hiss

*grow straight, **** it. stand tall.


young but weary were the eyes
that witnessed the desert dawn
and heard the ancient village cries
of sheep and goat and cattle fawn

fatherless, without the skill
to plane and join the wood
used to gather up earths till
steps short of where his father stood

his efforts to drill and plug rough plank
awaited the harvesters scorn
who offered him this one slim chance
to cease the funeral horn

while mother lay in quiet sleep
purloined fresh figs, he stole away
to walk the barren sandy keep
avoiding the words she would not say

he reached the dusty tans and browns
that painted the scorched earth
through dunes and strife and sinking mounds
and fell beneath the suns full worth

so low was he, so lost in spirit
eyed by the death bird, the sharp shinned wing
life’s loud call, he would not hear it
his repose intent on surrendering

then, one last time he raised his head
up from the blistering sand
and spied a vision in coppered red
a fishers boat, perched on parched land

the sight was the spark that fired instinct
that hovers beneath each soul
our hearts homogenous, yet distinct
on chance that one has found his goal

he raised himself with his last strength
and headed for the land locked ship
mindless of the shimmering length
entranced in  dreams shadowed grip


the craft was gray, and far from foam
it’s tethered mast twisted and bent
the hull was gashed, keel and deck undone
from which harbour had this wreck been sent?

the young man reached the sheltered ship
and fell beneath it’s sparse shade
then felt a cup brought up to dry lip
who dreams of water in a desert glade?

the weathered mate was old and broken
much like his stranded  vessel
his words were uplifting, a happiness spoken
his boats plight a small obstacle

whiskered white, crooked in bone
strength hidden beneath frail tendon
the task is great but not alone
could he send the boat, a new sea beckoned

work with me  as we attempt
full sail this craft beneath the windy lair
when labor’s shared, knowledge is kept
my age, your youth and a little repair

why debate the young man thought
events are only but a dream
a chance to practice what he father taught
eye the board, swell the peg, lift the beam

so, that next day in rolling heat
they began their ventured labor
square, line, bit and mallet beat
wood sinew joined with neighbor

and through it all the old man shared
far tales of risk and glory
offered comfort and compared
the mystic with the daily story

the days slipped by, he knew no count
only splintered hands and shoulders weary
their work was slow yet no amount
could turn the craft to sea worthy


a crazed endeavor to sail on land
the bond between us lies untapped
our connection now leads to this command
walk this earth, fulfill the prophets rapt

the sky then shivered, the aura to thin  
and rising from the boat appeared
a red wrapped head o’er charcoal skin
she towered, bright smile adhered

the old man spoke: our love supreme
now walks this ground, w’ no gentle wake
I choose to break the sublime extreme
for I fancy birth, creation’s take

the young man gazed at the African woman
eyes bent upward, she dressed in red calico print
by all that had happened, he began to fathom
a powerful force in her white eyed glint

the work progressed, the craft made whole
guided by only her silent smile
by firelight the young man poured his soul
his laments were heard and felt erstwhile

the day had come to begin the voyage
sun burning high, yet keel on sand
cryptic psalm spoke by the sage
earth and sky bent fully under his command

the blue of the sky fell in shimmered drops
replaced by gray earth shot toward the firmament
transformed to foamy wave from bleak hilltops
the air from dusty pall to green sea scent

cool spray filled breeze under leaded cloud
opened canvas cloth bound with simple tackle
the craft bobbed, new joints groaned aloud
for the sea had fallen to sail the stranded vessel

the young man stared, at heavens new plaque
the red draped figure who steered from helm
guided the boat from tack to tack
crowned and throned in her fresh made realm


the sage was silent, physical sense broken
content to sail the deep brine
sea and sky majestic spoken
new coarse now set,  subject to time

yea ! yea ! celebration is inherent !
laughter emits at the joys of fate !
the young mans laments, gone and spent
fruit, bread, dance, and singing elate !

the journey of these wondrous three
led to adventures, too numerous to here collect
amended the testament and set free
each soul, which when heard, stands boundless to select

steps led to his mother’s mud brick abode
from the young man’s heart, his numinous story leapt
but she knew all, without benefit of being told
and all these things, into her heart she kept

You carve your trade
Above your door
The chisel bright and keen
Looking for work
Like a collie dog
Mallet wagging
Weightless in your hand
Rounding the letters

The letters speak of rowan
Fetched from a'side
A mountain burn
Fed by snow-melt
Even in summer
Hot sun through thin air
Burnishing each day
The wild, burred grain

Adorned with marquetry anemones
Each petal in fine horn
Further etched with pewter
And you will love that sign
The thought of that sign
Even if you never carve a single letter
Nor ever hang it until
You have something to trade

My antidepressants don't work
the way I want them to.
I tried to imagine watching each film
with anyone but you.

Your flickering eyes,
they project the world.
Hidden reels
inside your soul.
There's too many people
inside your bones.
You don't have to be
in your theatre alone.

I forgot how to sleep
under the same ceiling.
I watch movies in the dark
to remember the feeling
that made me confide in her.
My eighties film.
My Winona Ryder.

There's too many people
inside your bones.
You don't have to
be in your theatre alone.

Five after dawn
and your movie's still on.
Christian, **** the popular kids,
because they don't understand
how her brain works,
how her glances steal,
how each death
can't make her feel.

Your flickering eyes,
they project the world.
I watch movies in the dark
to remember the feeling
that made me confide in you.
My eighties film.
My Winona Ryder,
let me forget you.

Maybe you're crazy
with your cleaner.
Maybe each swing of the mallet
made you meaner.
Maybe reality bites because of Heather.
Maybe it scared you that we were in love, together.

Maybe it scared you to stay together.
Maybe it scared you to stay together.

Drop the mallet
Fool the believer
Smash the car into the junction
It's a beautiful motorcrash!!

Blanc oblivion thinly beckons
where riotous heart requests accounting's debt
in solitary thoughts of Gatsby-born yearning seconds
across lantern's green light ambient water's depth

Mallet's chisel chip lines of marble translucence
ordaining Venus's vague and insubstantial essence
passing on near wings of plovers
shore's dashing burst of smooth liquid love

Spilled words all but mingle in measured metre
fleshing forth anatomy of a mannequin's naked plume
disposed to press black key fugitive figures
sprinting sandpiper legs from sand castle spume

-cec

Fashionably Unexpected*


        the devil had arrived but as the sun was at it's peak
the invitation was for nine, but  in the evening
of next week...
he was naked save the toga, and his flaxen locks of gold
and a massive crop of wings, slightly mussed; -
adroitly posed.

i had just been in the garden, plucking apples from a limb
with my pruning shears and sherry
and no clue it might be him....
but there     i stood astounded,    having thought   -
" I  heard  the  bell ? "

and again
by ' Who'd ' Come knocking
on my mallet chain
from Hell.

the devil held a mirror and a silver box, ornate
with the likeness of a lotus and an acorn
on a plate...
the gilding was perfection, and the mirror was opaque
but the fallen one was flawless
as the smile upon
        his face...

and how i broke the silence in my simple garden threads
was to ramble at the Serpent
as I handed him a Jacket.


Amused by my conceit that any custom i condone
were applied with an epoxy
Only carpenters from Rome, that were spotless and
And from Nazareth
with a Father
and a Ghost -
A Mother without Blemish
and Disciples in a grove...
And blessed be
the Mercy of the Lending
of the glue
by the resurrected Handy Man
and  King of
all the Jews !

The Morningstar obliged!  
But held the blazer
in rebuke
He grimaced His Displeasure
And instantly  
for proof
He dismembered my regalia
and assembled it anew
Into such a splendid Toga
There was nothing
I could do -
but simply     step aside
as all  the sting
had let the ruse.

I received the Prince of Darkness
Wearing gloves and dirt and boots