"megalopolis" poems
Elan that lifts me above the clouds
into pure space, timeless, yea eternal
Breath transmuted into words
Transmuted back to breath
in one hundred two hundred years
nearly Immortal, Sappho's 26 centuries
of cadenced breathing -- beyond time, clocks, empires, bodies, cars,
chariots, rocket ships skyscrapers, Nation empires
brass walls, polished marble, Inca Artwork
of the mind -- but where's it come from?
Inspiration? The muses drawing breath for you? God?
Nah, don't believe it, you'll get entangled in Heaven or Hell --
Guilt power, that makes the heart beat wake all night
flooding mind with space, echoing through future cities, Megalopolis or
Cretan village, Zeus' birth cave Lassithi Plains -- Otsego County
farmhouse, Kansas front porch?
Buddha's a help, promises ordinary mind no nirvana --
coffee, alcohol, ******* mushrooms, marijuana, laughing gas?
Nope, too heavy for this lightness lifts the brain into blue sky
at May dawn when birds start singing on East 12th street --
Where does it come from, where does it go forever?
May 1996
4.6k
MUMBAI
The monstrous maddening megalopolis;
Obscure and replusive
yet inviting.
Home to a billion- mirage seekers,
who
withstand,endure &nurse;
their dreams
behind the fringes of misery:
waiting for their turn
lest
chase and collapse
at the door frame of a metaphor !
Apr 16, 2014
Apr 16, 2014 at 3:56 AM UTC
i belong to the daybreak
when humans with sleepy eyes
and mousy morning hearts
are brave enough to face
the scarily mundane world once again.
i belong to nature
to the hidden wonders of the world
there's unknown modern hanging gardens of babylon
and the secret sanctuaries
where the teenagers of the megalopolis
go to rest.
i belong to the ocean
in the deepest trenches
no man has seen
where it is quiet and still
and darkness reigns supreme.
i belong to outer space
in the galaxies who are
strangers we'd like to know
there's dark matter that swirls
space dust coalesces
and stars are born to die all over again.
i belong to the rain
when the sky cries and
the typhoons turn to drizzle
the water runs through
empty houses and thrift stores in the gutters
and on and on, to underground,
to God knows where.
i belong to the night
to the time when the busiest people
submit to slumber
but a few who are not
bothered by lightyears
sit by their windowsills
to watch the stars.
*i belong to the world
and the world belongs to me.*
Jul 11, 2016
Jul 11, 2016 at 9:31 PM UTC
(6W)
Sleep my children, you, not forgot.
Postscript:
Lured you here under false pretenses
What matters six or ten or
Nine eleven,
When each word enervates the midnite senses.
Through chance or fate,
You, selected on that date,
Thy names inscribed,
A select few, a chosen tribe.
In a megalopolis,
Where hurry and rush,
The hallmarks of the populace,
A city oft condemned as heartless,
Your place, your alphabet unique,
Permanently preserved.
Rest easy then,
Tho our names will be dust and forgot,
You individually, collectively,
Will be remembered eons on.
No need to economize,
Tears, the numbers of words,
Draw some comfort, tho minimized,
Your names, this day, all recalled,
Thus I bless you,
As you bless us,
Sleep my children, you, not forgot.
Sep 12, 2013
Sep 12, 2013 at 3:16 AM UTC
When my grandfather starts his career
He was engaged in field to measure and tilling of land
To get return out of it;
Once he said, ‘my father use to visit river every morning
To gather something for the day”!
My father, use to travel on bicycle
From village to town in morning and back home in the evening
He fetches his substances to support us!
When I start of my own
Migrated from village to town then from town to city,
Derived sustenance,
Up bring all whom I care!
Now my son
Prepare to migrate from city to megalopolis
To gather gen, awareness
To make an understanding
and to navigate in the ocean
towards placing himself on a marked point!
Feb 28, 2015
Feb 28, 2015 at 2:23 PM UTC
Ocean: When you are legendary
Utopia of lost Atlantis
Sunken city asleep
Under pillars of larimars
Plato’s wisdom once bestowed
Untold magic and sacred stones
A surge of madness, whips of rain
Battling down the hull of a boat
From beneath the profound chaos
The Kraken, furious, emerges
The ship is wrecked, turned into dust!
Ocean: When you are awe-ful
A breeze flows, ***** sea gloats!
What a beautiful mess- debris floats
With a quest for vengeance
Opposing swells are relentless
Casting spells on the defenseless
The ocean is endless, it's stupendous
Guarded by deep clouds - tremendous
Dreams drown staring at these clouds
Feels proud, someone from the deep down
A half-asleep Kraken screams loud
Ocean: When you are ritualistic
Fresh and salty energetic waves
Diving the dreamer into a megalopolis
Of scaled goddesses performing a ballet
Invited to a very cruel and festive banquet
Colorful, an aquatic aurora borealis of blood
In which the mythical mermaid sings
Skimming her ******* a pendant of aquamarine
She is Pacific, lustrous and libertine
Her voice enchanting the remotest sea-temple
On the surface, the waters suddenly turned red
Ocean: When you are watery hell
On the horizon, the wide blue yonder scribbled
A storm surge, the dreamer lost urge
Hope purged and dwindled, waves got stained
Silently an atrocious maelstrom wiggled
There the sea-temple stood naked and belittled
Resonating to the sound of an unheard curse
From the inside of the mermaid's purse
An enigma, a blank verse - unfathomable
Making the deep not amicable yet diverse
The ocean is inhabitable still, unnavigable
Written between December 17, 2019 and January 17, 2020
Cc Jordan Rains and cc Appoline Romanens
Jan 23, 2020
Jan 23, 2020 at 5:57 AM UTC
Out of sorts
At least I am out
New sort of me
In a new part of town
While the same old doubts
Whip about
None of this was here before
Not that I knew of
It certainly did not
Spring forth
Out of the blue
It just feels that way
Unplanned
Yet inevitable
Steel and glass monoliths
Shatter and break
The tarmac
What was
Once a barren streetscape
Neglected opportunity
Now is a grand opening
From desolate
To prescient
A megalopolis
Of mindfulness
That reflects back
The question
What do you want
These vessels
To be
Window dressings
All this
Brand newness
An exercise
Is not an exorcism
Just
A rebranding
Of emptiness
Sep 6, 2017
Sep 6, 2017 at 8:10 PM UTC
part of my job (a love poem)
<>
checking in & on you, part of my job, I explain,
need a status update, re and about what’s new,
on the flora and fauna studded moors, how’s the traffic in Mumbai,
have the Prince and Princess come to visit your nearby island,
how’s that pendant I sent hanging, still cracked, letting letters in,
the curfew imposition getting in the way of your poetry writing,
tell me what it is like to be a young man in Morocco, need your input,
do you know that I love imagining being in love with you, so exotic,
while I hunker down in a bunker, forty story concrete stories on
a gra-nite island,
wondering how you pass your Sunday morning, in bed, in church, in your head,
seeing poem fireflies coming from the beach, how your language takes, enraptures,
captures my cellar pulses electrifying, I am yours unbidden and I forgiven & unfortunate,
swimming on the West Coast beaches, pools and eddies, rip tide currants & currents,
******* me into your world and the fun, the challenges of loving you from afar
do you know that I love imagining being in love with you, so exotic,
locating your presence on the grid, illegally concocting our ionic physics connections
in ways you remain so unaware and me, dancing delighted on the edge between
blurting out how I feel about you, you, in France, and foreign lands, all over,
when you read this, do the hairs sudden tickle, sensing my presence, when grasping
you hand, kissing your neck, do you regain/retain consciousness of my affection,
plain hard and drawn to you, sans affectations, and we walk in contented silence
on country lanes, beach trails, crowded ***** megalopolis city stained small streets,
and now that you know that I feel so much desire to grasp you in my adoration hands,
will you accept that a man’s love who you have never seen can be so willful strong
that
you know that I love imagining being in love with you, so exotic, and the pleasure of it
grows stronger daily when you send me words that infect me with subtlety severe ****
and now I go, the slipping and sliding into the land of having checked in on you,
where my job is to love you from afar
8:41AM Sunday March 15th twentyfolded twice
Mar 15, 2020
Mar 15, 2020 at 8:54 AM UTC
"The arrogance of man is thinking [the economy] is in [their] control,
and not the other way around."
[And, silent,]
"Somewhere in [the] sands of [time]
A shape with [monkey] body and the head of [the many],
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again, but now [we] know
That [two decades] of stony sleep
Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards [Megalopolis] to be born?
"You have no idea what's coming"
"The top of a [social] ecosystem, [a monster for all intents and purposes.]"
"...a monster?...
no...
A god!"
Nov 19, 2022
Nov 19, 2022 at 5:43 PM UTC