Dear Poet Friends, Torin Galleshaw from Charlotte NC, a Member of this Site, had requested me to compose about the Rise of Third *****. Therefore, I have commenced with the causes for its Rise in my Part One posted below. Planning to compose Part Two with ******’s Blitzkrieg campaign of Poland later. It is unfortunate that I am unable to post related Maps & Photos for better appreciation of my Readers! Such options are not available for us here! However, I have managed to post a copy with maps & photos in the E-mail ID of my friend Torin!  Kindly give comments only after reading this researched work of mine, during your spare time.  Thanking you, - Raj, New Delhi.

            STORY OF SECOND WORLD WAR – PART ONE
                            RISE OF THE THIRD *****
                                       By Raj Nandy

                                  INTRODUCTION
In this part I shall mainly deal with the causes leading to the Second World War,
Which had also created favourable conditions for the rise of Third ***** under ******.
The word ‘*****’ derives from old German word ‘rihhi’ meaning ‘realm’;  
But is also used to designate a kingdom or an empire in a broader sense.
Historically, the First ***** was the Medieval Holy Roman Empire which lasted till the end of the 19th Century.
While the Second ***** was the First German Empire from 1871 to 1918, when dynamic Otto Von Bismark had united all of Germany,
Which ended with its defeat in World War One and birth of the Weimar Republic.
The Third ***** refers to the **** German Empire under ******, Which lasted from 1933 till 1945, for twelve traumatic eventful years!
Historians opine that the ending of a war is equally important as
its beginning;
Since the causes for the start of a war is often to be found embedded in its ending!
The First World War came to an end on 28th of June 1919 as we all know.
With the signing of the Treaty at Versailles by the German Foreign Minister Hermann Muller and the ‘Big Four’.  (Britain, France, America, & Italy)
Yet it is rather ironical, that this Peace Treaty of Versailles, considered as President Woodrow Wilson’s ‘brain child’,
Had sowed the seeds of discontent resulting in the outbreak of the Second World War, and Adolf ******’s dramatic rise!

Though several causes are attributed for the outbreak of the Second World War by our Military Historians.
Let me try to summarise those causes which are considered to be more relevant.
Commencing with the harsh Treaty of Versailles, the British and French Policy of Appeasement, followed by Hyperinflation and the Great Depression of 1929, and failure of The League of Nations to maintain peace;  
Are relevant factors which collectively combined resulting in the outbreak of the devastating Second World War, scarring human memories for all time!
But not forgetting ******’s forceful and persuasive eloquence which mesmerised the Germans to rise up as a powerful Nation once again.
Since ****** promised to avenge the humiliation faced by Germany following the Treaty of Versailles,
Which was drawn up with vengeance, and dictated by the victorious Allies!

THE  ARMISTICE  AND TREATY OF VERSAILLES:    
Armistice means a truce for cessation of hostilities, which provides a breathing space for negotiating a lasting peace.
Now the Armistice ceasing the First World War was signed inside the railway carriage of the Allied Supreme Commander Marshal Foch, in the Forest of Compiegne,
On the 11th of November 1919, sixty km north of Paris, between the victorious Allies and vanquished Germany.
But in the meantime naval blockade of Germany had continued, and the German Rhineland was evacuated and partly occupied by the combined Allied troops!
Release of Allied POWs interned civilians followed subsequently; And the Reparations Clause of monetary compensation was strictly imposed on Germany!
Now, following a wide spread German Sailor’s Revolt towards the end of October 1918, Emperor Kaiser Wilhelm-II had abdicated;
And on the 9th of November Friedrich Ebert, as the new Social Democrat President of Germany, authorised his representative to sign the Compiegne Armistice.
We should remember here that this Armistice seeking cessation of hostilities did not stipulate any unconditional surrender;
And the signing of the Armistice by the German Social Democrats, was considered as ‘a stab in the back of the German army’ by majority of the Germans!
These issues get repeatedly mentioned by Adolf ****** in his eloquent speeches subsequently,
To arouse the spirit of German Nationalism, and resurgence of the ‘Master Aryan Race’ of the Germans, - in Germany!

The Versailles Treaty was signed on 28th of June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand which had sparked World War One.
Let me mention few aspects of this Treaty which was detested by the Germans!
Germany lost 13% of its land, 12% of its people, 48% of its iron resources, 15% of its agricultural production, and 10% of its coal, following its implementation!
German army was reduced to 100,000 men, its Navy reduced to 36 ships with no submarines, its Air Force banned, and its union with Austria forbidden.
Now to use a Shakespearean phrase the ‘unkindest cut of all’ came in the shape of Article 231,  the ‘War Guilt Clause’ of the Versailles Treaty,
Which provided the legal basis for the payment of war reparations by Germany.
The reparation amount of 132 billion gold marks (US $33 billion) to cover the civilian damage caused during the war, now had to be paid by Germany!
Thus the humiliation, resentment, and the virtual economic strangulation following the Versailles Treaty,
Was exploited by extremist groups such as ******’s **** Party.
And in the decades to follow, ******’s Nazis would take full control of Germany!

NOTES: Following Versailles Treaty, Alsace-Lorraine captured by Germany in 1870 was returned to France. The SAAR German coalfield region was give to France for 15 yrs. Poland became independent with a corridor to the sea dividing Germany into two. Danzing, a major port in East Prussia, became a free city under the League of Nation. Finland, Lithuania, Latvia, & Czechoslovakia became independent. Industrial area of German Rhineland, forming a buffer zone between Belgium &France,was
demilitarised.

WOODROW WILSON’S  14 - POINT PEACE INITIATIVE  & THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS:
American President Wilson was an idealist and a visionary, who in a speech to the US Congress on 8th Jan 1918,
Introduced a 14 Point Charter as a platform for building global peace, based on the principles of transparency, self-determination, and Democracy.
But for the first time in US history, the Republican-led US Senate rejected this Peace Treaty, and prevented America from joining the newly created League!
The US Senate wanted to retain its sovereignty without external entanglements;
Free from the League of Nation’s political dictates in its foreign commitments!
The Irish immigrants refused to support Wilson's Fourteen Points because Wilson was concerned about stopping WWI, rather than forcing the British to set Ireland free.
Many Jews also refused to back Wilson, since he was paying too much attention to the War, and not enough to the Balfour Declaration of 02 Nov 1917, -
Which promised an Independent Jewish State with a distinct Jewish identity.

The League of Nations had emerged from Wilson’s 14 Points on the 10th Jan 1920, with its HQs at Geneva, Switzerland, but it had no peacekeeping forces those days!
The League had failed to prevent invasion of Chinese Manchuria in 1932 by Japan;
Italy’s invasion of Ethiopia in 1935; annexation of Sudetenland and Austria by Germany!
The Axis countries Germany, Italy, and Japan, withdrew from the League subsequently.
Thus the League of Nations was disbanded in 1946 officially!
But President Wilson’s ceaseless efforts for global peace did not go unrecognised,
Since on the 10th of December 1920, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize!
While his disbanded League of Nations, as the first global humanitarian organisation,
Continued to survive in spirit with the establishment of United Nations Organisation on the 24th October, 1945.

ECONOMIC CAUSES - FOLLOWED BY THE GREAT DEPRESSION OF 1929 :
Germany emerged from the First World War with loss of 25,000 square miles of territory;
Loss of seven million inhabitants, and a staggering debt imposed by the Versailles Treaty!
The Wiemar Republic, after abdication of Emperor Kaiser Wilhelm-II  to Holland,
For the first time in German history, established a Democratic Constitution with Friedrich Ebert as its first President.
But The Republic first had to consolidate itself by squashing the Spartacist Revolt of January 1919 led by the extreme Leftists, and inspired by the Russian Bolshevik Communists!
The Freikorps, in March 1920, an Ex-Soldiers Rightist Group, tried to overthrow the Wiemar Republic with support of their Rightist allies and their own veteran troops!
This was soon followed by a Communist attempt to takeover of the Industrial Rhur;
But fortunately, all these uprisings against the Republic were effectively subdued!
But the 33 Billion Dollars of Reparations hung over the Wiemar Republic like the legendary ‘Sword of Damocles’, followed by the Great Depression of 1929;
Coupled with the ‘Policy of Appeasement’ practised by the British and the French;
Became the most important causes for ******’s expansionist ambition and his short- lived meteoric rise to fame!

GERMAN PAPER CURRENCY & HYPERINFLATION:
Gold Mark was the currency used by the German Empire from 1873 to 1914 only.
But to pay for the costs of the ongoing First World War, Germany suspended the gold standard, and decided to fund the war by Borrowings entirely,
Hoping to pay back the loans after Germany achieves Victory.
But having lost the war, and faced with a massive debt imposed by the Allies,
Exchange rate of the Mark against the US Dollar steadily devalued and declined!
Papiermark became the German currency from 04th August 1914 onward, when link between the Mark and gold reserve was abandoned,
In order to pay for the ongoing expenses of the First World War with paper marks, which was constantly being printed!
But later after the war, when the London Ultimatum of May 1921 demanded payment of war reparations in gold or in foreign currency only,
Even more paper marks got printed by the Republic to buy those foreign currency !
By December 1922 hyper-inflationary trends emerged, when the US Dollar became equivalent to 7,400 German Marks, with a 15-fold increase in the cost of living !
By the fall of 1922 when it became impossible for Germany to make further payments,
The French and Belgium armies occupied Germany’s Ruhr Valley area, its prime industrial region!
French and the Belgians hoped to extract payment in kind, but a strike by the workers of the Ruhr area their hopes belied!
The Wiemar Republic printed more paper notes to pay and support the workers of the Ruhr area,
When hyperinflation had peaked at 4,210,500,000,000 German Marks, to a US Dollar!
Paper currency having become worthless, some form of ancient barter system began to be used instead!

STABILISATION OF GERMAN ECONOMY WITH ONSET OF  THE GREAT DEPRESSION:
Following the hyperinflation Chancellor Josef Cuno’s cabinet resigned in August 1923,
When Gustav Stresemann became the new Chancellor of Germany.
Stresemann’s Government had introduced the Rentenmark as a new stable currency,
To end the hyperinflation which had plagued Wiemar Germany.  
Rentenmark was backed by real goods, agricultural land and business,
Since gold was not available in a beleaguered German economy those days!
When One Rentenmark was equivalent to One million, million, old German Mark;
While One US Dollar was equivalent to only 4.2 Rentenmarks.
Though Stresemann’s Government lasted for 100 days only, Stresemann continued to serve as the Foreign Minister in successive Coalition Governments of the Republic,
Till his death in the month of October 1929, but working for the betterment of Germany all the while!
His ‘Policy of Fulfilment’ stabilised German economy with a 200 Million Dollars loan from America under the Dawes Plan in 1924,
Which had also ensured the evacuation of France from the occupied Ruhr area, with their future reparations payments ensured.
Stresemann’s signing of the Locarno Pact in London on 1st Dec 1925 with France, Belgium, Great Britain, and Italy, was considered as his achievement and a feat!
Since it made Germany to enter the League of Nations ensuring stability and peace;
While the Noble Peace Prize was awarded to Stresemann for his efforts in 1926!
Later, the Young Plan of 1929 further reduced German reparations payment by 20%, while extending the time frame for the payments to 59 years!
But following a sudden Wall Street Stock Market Crash in late October of 1929,
The American Banks were forced to recall money from Europe and the Young Plan;.
Which created acute financial distress when unemployment soared to 33.7%  in Germany in 1931, and quickly rose to 40% during the following year!
Lausanne Conference was held in Switzerland in 1932 by Great Britain, Germany, and France, to further reduce the War Debts imposed by the Versailles Treaty.
But in Dec 1932, the US Congress had rejected this Allied War Debt Reduction Plan completely.
However, no further payments were made by Germany due to the Great Depression;
And by 1932, Germany had paid only 1/8 of the total sum required to be paid as per their pending wartime reparations!

NOTES: Rentenmark was issued on 15 October 1923 to stop the hyperinflation in Wiemeer Germany. Reichmark was the currency in Germany from 1924 to 20 June 1948 in West Germany , when it was replaced by the Deutsche Mark; but had continued in East Germany until 23 June when it was replaced by East German Mark.
During the Stresemann Years of Stability from 1924 to 1929, (prior to the onset of the Great Depression), with help of American financial aid, created more housing & production in Germany. Dada & Expressionist Art forms flourished, followed by modern architecture; also the Philosophy of Existentialism of Thomas Mann – influenced the Western culture. Paul Whiteman's Band for the first time brought in American Jazz to Germany, and Jazz signified the liberation of German youth and women folks of the younger generation generally. But the US Stock Market Crash had unfortunately ended this short lived euphoria, and as it soon became a global phenomena!                                


FAILURE OF THE WIEMAR REPUBLIC & THE GREAT DEPRESSION WHICH BENEFITED THE NAZIS:
Last Days of Wiemar Republic:
Ever since Otto Von Bismarck that ‘Man of iron and steel’, united Germany into a single Empire in the year Eighteen Hundred & Seventy One,
For the first time a Constitution for a Parliamentary Democracy was drawn up in August 1919, in the eastern German city of Wiemar.
Wiemar was the intellectual centre of Germany associated with musicians like Franz List, and writers like Goethe and Schiller.
The Wiemar Republic of Germany which had lasted from 1919 till 1933 had seen,
20 different Coalition Governments, with frequent elections and changing loyalties!
Due to a system of proportional representations, and the presence of very many political parties those days,  
No single party could obtain absolute sole majority in the Reichstag Parliament!
The longest Coalition Govt. was under Chancellor Bruning, which had lasted for only 2 years and 61 days!     (From 30 March 1930 to 30 May 1932)
Now, to understand the reasons for the failure to maintain a Democratic form of Government by the Wiemar Republic,
It becomes necessary to monitor its ‘dying gasps’ during its closing years so to speak!
Since faced with the economic depression Chancellor Bruning had worsened the unemployment situation by adopting stringent and unpopular measures!
Thereby having lost popular political support, Bruning with the approval of President Hindenburg, invoked emergency powers under Article 48, to survive his last few months and years!
During the years 1931 and 1932  it is seen, Bruning had used this Emergency Clause 44 and 66 times respectively!
Thus his so-called ‘Presidential form of Govt.’ had undermined Wiemar Democracy!
If Burning was the ‘Republic’s Undertaker’, now remains a debatable issue of History!
But Burning’s vigorous campaign made Hindenburg to get re-elected as the President;
Thereby he had removed the defeated Adolf ****** out of the Presidential race!
Therefore, later when ****** became the Chancellor on 30 Jan 1933, Bruning had very wisely fled from Germany!

Following Bruning’s resignation in May 1932 came Chancellor Papen’s ‘Cabinet of Barons’ consisting of individuals who were not members of the German Reichstag!
While in the election of July 1932 ******’s **** Party won 230 seats, making it the largest party in the Reichstag.
But ****** refused to form a coalition with Papen, because he wanted to become the Chancellor himself !
Now General von Schleicher advised President Hindenburg that the German Army,
Would not accept Papen’s use of Article 48 to remain as the Chancellor of Germany!
Therefore following Papen’s resignation, Schleicher took over on the 04th of December 1932 as the new German Chancellor.
Schleicher tried to restore a democratic form of government to get the Wiemar Republic back on its feet.
But in the ensuing political power struggle Papen wanted to take revenge on Schleicher for his removal from power and defeat.
So Papen persuaded Adolf ****** to become the Chancellor, and retain for himself the post of Vice-Chancellor.
In doing so, Papen mistakenly thought that he would be able to reign in the self-assertive Adolf ******!
Papen finally made President Hindenburg agree to his proposal, and on 30th of Jan 1933,
****** became the New Chancellor, with approval of the President!
A month later a sudden fire in the Reichstag made ****** invoke Article 48, in order to squash the suspected Left Wing Communists;
But while doing so, the Press was muzzled, and many Civil Rights of the German people were abolished, inclusive of their right of assembly and free speech!
****** acted swiftly, and by passing the Enabling Act on 23 March, 1933, armed himself  with dictatorial powers for enacting laws without the approval of the Reichstag whenever necessary!
Thereby ****** threw Democracy to History’s wasteland most unfortunately!
Following the death of Hindenburg on 29 June 1934, ****** combined the powers of the President and the Chancellor, and became known as the FUHRER!
Historians generally agree the Enabling Act of 1933, as the date for establishment of The German Third *****.

THE POLICY OF APPEASEMENT AND GERMAN AGGRESSION:
The horrors of trench warfare with the rattling of machine guns and bursting of poisonous nerve gas shells,
Even after 20 years remained fresh, in the minds of all World War One participants!
Therefore, it was natural for British and French Prime Ministers Neville Chamberlain and Edouard Daladier initially,
To grant political and material concessions to an aggressive Germany, for the sake of peace and stability.
Thus the diplomatic stance of Appeasement between 1935 and 1939 followed by the French and the British, was mainly to avoid another dangerous armed conflict!
But the trusting Mr. Chamberlain had underestimated ******, who had served in the German Army as a Corporal, winning the Iron Cross during the last Great War!
****** was not afraid of war, but wanted to avenge the Treaty of Versailles and its punitive dictated peace;
And also establish for the superior German Aryan race a lasting Third *****!
Therefore, having consolidated his power as the Fuhrer along with his trusted **** Party cronies, he withdrew from the League of Nations in October 1933.
Introduced conscription in March 1935 in Germany, and embarked on a mission to rebuild a new modernised German Army for combat on land, air, and sea!
In March 1936, in another open violation of the Versailles Treaty, ****** re-occupied the demilitarised Rhineland, followed by a Treaty of Alliance with Japan and Italy.
The much desired Anschluss (or merger) with Austria, the country of birth of ******,
Saw the German Army in March 1938, triumphantly and peacefully marching into Vienna!
Now with the Munich Conference of 19 September 1938, this Policy of Appeasement is said to have reached its climatic peak!
The Sudetenland area, consisted of 3 million Germans were made
to join Czechoslovakia when the frontiers were drawn in 1918-19,
Much against the wishes of the Germans!
When ****** wanted to annex this Sudetenland area, Britain, France, Germany and Italy, met at Munich to diffuse an explosive situation peacefully.
It was agreed at Munich that once Sudetenland joins Germany, ****** will not invade Czechoslovakia and honour the terms of peace.
But on 15th March 1939, in violation of the Munich Agreement, ******’s army invade and occupied Czechoslovakia, thereby openly flouting the Policy of Appeasement!

NOTES: ******’s desire for ‘LEBENSRAUM’ or ‘increase of living space’ for the Germans, commenced with his ‘Border Wars’, which soon turned into a Global War because of the ‘appeasement policy’ of the Allies. ****** had secured his Eastern Front with a treaty with the Stalin, since fighting on two fronts would have been very difficult for the Germans.

Now when ******’s army invaded Poland on 1st of September 1939, it became ‘the last straw on the camel’s back’ for the Western Allies!
Committed to the Anglo-Polish Defence Pact of 25 August, 1939, both Britain and France declared war on Germany,
Which I propose to narrate in Part Two of my Second World War Story.  
The Policy of Appeasement no doubt gave some time for Britain, to regain its depleted military strength,  but Adolf ****** had viewed it as a sign of weakness!
With Russia and America initially as non-participants, ****** became more confident and arrogant!
Thereby turning his border wars into a global conflagration lasting six long years.
When the use of advanced technology, resulted in greater loss and casualties;  
Which was followed by the holocaust and unprecedented human suffering!
I would like to conclude my present narration with a poem by English soldier-poet Seigfried Sassoon, who participated in the First World War on the Western Front.

DREAMERS  -  by Siegfried Sassoon
Soldiers are citizens of death's gray land,
Drawing no dividend from time's to-morrows.
In the great hour of destiny they stand,
Each with his feuds, and jealousies, and sorrows.
Soldiers are sworn to action; they must win
Some flaming, fatal ****** with their lives.
Soldiers are dreamers; when the guns begin
They think of firelit homes, clean beds, and wives.

I see them in foul dug-outs, gnawed by rats,
And in the ruined trenches, lashed with rain,
Dreaming of things they did with ***** and bats,
And mocked by hopeless longing to regain
Bank-holidays, and picture shows, and spats,
And going to the office in the train.
…………………………………………………………………………
Thanks for reading patiently, from Raj Nandy of New Delhi.
  *ALL COPYRIGHTS ARE WITH THE AUTHOR ONLY

Negotiating with ******

You can't.
Even if,
He disguises himself as
Bashar-al-Assad,
Taliban,
Al Shabaab,
Hassan Rouhani,
Or that ole mass murderer,
Now not such a bad guy,
We could left him alone,
Cause he didn't have WMD,
Saddam Hussein,
He just mass murdered,
The old fashioned way.

They thirst for the blood of mine.
And when satiated, they will come for you.
There will be no Mass said
Over our mass graves.

Do not pretend to lead,
When all you seek is avoid.
The historians will seek you out
And label you coward, Chamberlin.

Shall we meet at the soccer stadium
Called Ghazi, for some ice cream
And a public execution or two?
Let's make it a woman, for the extra satisfaction?

A perfect place, conducive for relaxed negotiations!

Woe us/me, when our moral compass points only
Downward,
Into the bloodied earth,
Where we will soon enough be buried too.

Let me tell you what society will tell you:
Increases your chances of getting a job,
Provides you an opportunity to be successful,
Be a lot less stressful,
Education is the key.

Now let me tell you something your parents will tell you:
Make me proud,
Increases your chances of getting a job,
Provides you an opportunity to be successful,
Your life will be a lot less stressful,
Education is the key.

Now let's look at the statistics,
Steve Jobs - net worth seven billion R.I.P,
Richard Branson - net worth four point two billion,
Oprah Winfrey - two point seven billion,
Mark Zuckerberg, Henry Ford, Steven Spielberg, Bill Gates
Now here comes the Coup de grâce,
Looking at these individuals, what's your conclusion?
Neither of them in being successful,
Ever graduated from a higher learning institution.

Now some of you may be like,
Money is only the medium by which we measure worldly success,
And some of you even have the nerve to say
"I don't do it for the money."
So what you studying for?
To work for a charity?
Need more clarity?

Let's look at the statistics:
Jesus,
Muhammed,
Socrates,
Malcolm X,
Mother Teresa,
Spielberg,
Shakespeare,
Beethoven,
Jesse Owens,
Muhammad Ali,
Sean Carter,
Michael Jeffrey Jordan,
Michael Joseph Jackson.
Were either of these people unsuccessful... or... uneducated?

All I'm saying is that,
If there was a family tree hard work and education would be related,
But school would probably be a distant cousin,
Because if education is the key,
School is the lock,
Because it rarely ever develops your mind to the point where it can perceive red as green and continue to go when someone else said stop.
Because as long as you follow the rules and pass exams your cool,
But are you aware that examiners have a checklist,
And if your answer is something outside the box then the automatic response is a cross,
And then they claim that school expands your horizons and your visions,
Well tell that to Malcolm X who dropped out of school and is world renowned for what he learn in a prison.

Proverbs 17:16
It does a fool no good to spend money on an education,
Why?
Because he has no common sense.
George Bush. Need I say more?
Education is about inspiring one's mind,
Not just filling their head,
And take this from me because I'm an 'Educated' man myself,
Who only came to this realization after countless nights in the library,
With a can of red bull keeping me awake till morning,
Another can in the morning,
Falling asleep between piles of books that probably equates to the same amount I spent on my rent,
Memorize equations, facts and dates,
Write down to the letter,
Half of which I would never remember,
And half of which I would forget straight after the exam,
Before the start of the next semester,
Asking anyone if they had notes for the last lecture.
I often found myself running to class,
Just so I could find a spot on which I could rest my head and just sleep without making a scene,
Ironic because that's the only time I ever spent in university chasing my dreams.
And then after nights with a dead-mind,
I'd den find myself in a queue of half-awake students, zombies,
Waiting to hand in an assignment,
Maybe that's why they call it a deadline.
And then after three years of mental suppression,
And frustration,
My "Proud Mother" didn't even turn up to my graduation.

Now, I'm not saying that school is evil and there's nothing to gain,
All I'm saying is: understand your morals and re-assess your aims,
If you want a job working for someone else then help yourself,
But then that would be a contradiction because you wouldn't really be helping yourself,
You'd be helping somebody else,
There's a saying that is: if you don't build your dreams, someone else will hire you to help build theirs.

Redefine how you view education,
Understand it's true meaning,
Education is not just about regurgitating facts from a book,
Or someone else's opinion on a subject to pass an exam,
Look at it.
Picasso was educated at creating art,
Shakespeare was educated in the art of all that was written,
Colonel Harland Sanders was educated in the art of creating Ken Tucky Fried Chicken.

I once saw David Beckham take a free kick,
I watched as the side of his Adidas-sponsored boot hit the patent leather of the ball at an angle,
Which caused it to travel towards the skies as though it was destined for the heavens,
And then as it reached the peek of it's momentum,
As though it changed it's mind,
It switched directions.
I watched as the goalkeeper froze,
As though reciting to himself the laws of physics,
And as though his brain was negotiating with his eyes,
That was indeed witnessing the spectacle that was the leather swan that was swooping towards it,
And then reacted,
Though only a fraction of a millisecond too late,
And before the net of the goal,
Embraced the Fifa-Sponsored ball as though it was the prodigal son returning home,
And the country, that I live in, Erupted into cheers,
I looked at the play and thought,
****,
Looking at David Beckham,
There's more than one way in this world to be,

An educated man.

Peace.

Shortly after 3pm on September 29, 31-year-old Olivier Rousteing strode through the shimmering, fleshy backstage area at Balmain's Spring 2017 Paris Fashion Week show. Along the marble hallway of a hôtel particulier in the 8th arrondissement, long-limbed clusters of supermodels were gamely tolerating final applications of leg-moisturiser, make-up touch-ups and minutely precise hair interventions from squads of specialists as fast and accurate as any Formula 1 pit-stop team. The crowd parted as Rousteing swept through.

Wearing a belted, black silk tuxedo and a focused expression that accentuated his razor-sharp cheekbones, Rousteing resembled a sensuous hit man. Target identified, he led us to the board upon which photographs of every outfit were tacked.

We asked him to tell us about the collection (for that's what fashion editors always ask). "There is no theme," said Rou­steing in his fast, French-accented lilt. "No inspiration from travel or time. The inspiration is what I feel, and what I feel now is peace, light and serenity. I feel like in my six years here before this, I have tried to fight so many battles. Because there is no point anymore in fighting about boundaries and limits in fashion. Balmain has its place in fashion."

And the clothes? "There is a lot of fluidity. A lot of knitwear, lightness, ponchos. No body-con dresses. But whatever I do, even if I cover up my girls, it is like people can say I am ******. So this is what it is. I think there is nothing ******. I think it is really chic. I think it is really French. It is how I see Paris. And I have had too many haters during the last three years to defend myself again. So, this is Balmain." And then the show began.

Star endorsements

Under Rousteing, Balmain has become the most controversial fashion house in Paris. Rousteing has attracted (but not bought, as other, far bigger houses do) patronage from contemporary culture's most significant influencers. Rihanna, all the Kardashians, Kanye West, Taylor Swift, Miley Cyrus, Beyoncé, Justin Bieber – a royal flush of modern celebrity aristocracy – all champion him.

Immediately after this show, in that backstage hubbub, Kim Kardashian told me: "I thought it was very powerful…I loved the sequins, and I loved all the big chain mail belts – that was probably my favourite."

Yet for every famous fan there is a member of the fashion establishment who will sniff over coffee in Le Castiglione that Rousteing's crowd is declassé and his aesthetic best described by that V-word. The New York Times' fashion critic Vanessa Friedman reckoned this collection appropriate for "dressing for the captain's dinners on a cruise ship to Fantasy Island". At least she did not use the V-word. When I once deployed it – as a compliment – in a 2015 Vogue menswear review that declared "Rousteing is confidently negotiating a fine line between extravagance and vulgarity", I was told that Rous­teing was aggrieved.

The fashion world's ambivalence towards Rousteing is a measure of its conflicted feelings towards much in contemporary culture. Last year Robin Givhan of the Washington Post wrote of Balmain: "The French fashion house is always ostentatious and sometimes ******. It feeds a voracious appetite for attention. It is anti-intellectual. Antagonistic. Emotional. It is shocking. It is perfect for this era of social media, which means it is powerfully, undeniably relevant."

Since joining Instagram four years ago Rousteing has posted 4000 images and won 4 million followers. The combined reach of his audience members and models at this Balmain show was greater than the population of Britain and France combined. Balmain was the first French fashion house to gain more than 1 million followers, and currently has 5.5 million of them.

Loving his haters

As digital technology disrupts fashion, Balmain's seemingly effortless mastery of the medium galls some. Last year, the designer posted an image of a comment from a ****** follower to his feed. It read: "Olivier Rousteing spends more times taking selfies for Instagram than designing clothes for Balmain." Underneath, in block capitals, he commented "i love my haters".

Rousteing can be funny and flip – doing a video interview after the show, I opened by asking, tritely, how he felt. He replied: "Now I feel like some Chicken McNuggets with barbecue sauce, and then some M&M;'s ice cream."

When at work, however, that flipness flips to entirely unflip. The previous evening, at a final fitting for the collection, Rousteing had paced his studio, his face a scowl of concentration, applying final edits to the outfits to be worn by models Doutzen Kroes and Alessandra Ambrosio. The 30-strong team of couturiers working in the adjoining atelier delivered a steady stream of altered dresses.

"We are ready," he said from behind a glass desk in a rare moment of downtime. "This a big show – 80 looks – and I want a collection that is full of both the commercial and couture. But it's smooth too. All of the girls are excited about the after-party and interested in the music. And eating pizza." In the corridor outside Gigi Hadid – this season's apex supermodel – was indeed eating pizza, with gusto.

The fitting went on until far beyond midnight; Rousteing, fiercely focused, demonstrated the work ethic for which he is famous. When he was studio manager for Christophe Decarnin, his predecessor at Balmain, the young then-unknown was always the first in and last out of the studio. Emmanuel Diemoz, who joined Balmain as finance controller in 2001 and became chief executive in 2011, says that his hard graft was one of the reasons he was chosen to succeed Decarnin.

"For sure it was quite a gamble," says Diemoz. "But we could see the talent of Olivier. Plus he understood the work of Christophe – who had helped the brand recover – so he represented continuity. He was a hard worker, clearly a leader, with a lot of creativity. Plus the size of the turnover at that time was not so huge. So we were able to take the risk."

Clear leader

Which is why, aged 24, Rousteing became the creative director of one of Paris's best known – but indubitably faded – fashion houses. In 2004 it had been close to bankruptcy. In 2012, Rousteing's first full year in charge, Balmain's sales were €30.4 million and its profit €3.1 million. In 2015, sales were €121.5 million and its profit €33 million. Vulgarity is subjective; numbers are not.

Rousteing, who is of mixed race, was adopted at five months by white parents and enjoyed an affluent and loving upbringing in Bordeaux. "My mum is an optician and my dad was running the port. They are both really scientific – not artistic. So I had that kind of life. Bordeaux is really bourgeois and really conservative, I have to say."

After an ill-starred three-month stint at law school – "I was doing international law. And I was like, 'oh my God, that is so boring'" – he did a fashion course that he managed to tolerate for five months.

"I found that really boring as well. I just don't like actually people who are trying to **** your dream. And I felt that is what my teachers were trying to do."

Obsessed with Gucci

Following a three-month internship in Rome – "also boring" – Rousteing became fascinated with Tom Ford's work at Gucci. "I was obsessed, obsessed, obsessed. Sometimes the press did not get it but I thought 'this is like genius, the new **** chic'. Obsessed, full stop."

He wanted to work there – "that was my dream" – but applied to every fashion house he could, and found an opportunity to intern at Roberto Cavalli. "They took me in from the beginning. I met Peter Dundas [then womenswear designer at the brand] and he said you are going to be my right hand – and start in four days."

Rousteing counts his five years in Italy as formative both creatively and commercially, but when the opportunity came to return to France in 2009 he leapt at it. "Christophe said he liked my work and that he needed someone to manage the studio. So two weeks later I was here. I loved Balmain at the time, when Christophe was in charge. It was all about rock 'n' roll chic, ****, Parisian. And he was appealing to a younger generation. You can see when brands become old but Balmain was touching this new audience. I always say Christophe's Balmain was Kate Moss but mine is Rihanna."

When Decarnin left and Rousteing replaced him, the response was a resounding "who?". His youth prompted some to anticipate failure.

"It was not easy at all. Every season I had the same questions." Furthermore, Rousteing (who has said he thinks of himself as neither black nor white) was the only non-white chief designer at a Parisian couture house. In a nation in which very few people of colour hold senior positions, his race may have contributed both to the establishment's suspicion of him and to his powerful sense of being an outsider.

'Beautiful spirit'

As he began to build a personal vernacular of close-fitted, heavily jewelled, gleefully grandiose menswear – fantastical uniform for a Rousteing-imagined gilded age – for both women and men, that V-word loomed.

"They asked, 'But is it luxury? Is it chic? Is it modern?' All those kinds of words. But you know there is no one definition [of fashion] even if people in Paris think there is. And, I'm sorry, but I think the crowd in fashion are those who understand the least what is avant-garde today."

In 2013 Rihanna visited the studio, met Rousteing, and reported all with multiple Instagram posts. "You are the most beautiful spirit, so down to earth and kind! @olivier_rousteing I think I'm in love!!! #Balmain." :')"

Rousteing met Kim Kardashian at a party in New York – they were drawn together, he recalls, because they were both shy – and was promptly invited to lunch with her family in Los Angeles.

An outsider in the firmament of old-guard Paris fashion, Rousteing was earning insider status within a new, and much more influential, supranational elite. He points out that Valentino, Saint Laurent and Pierre Balmain himself "were close to the jet set of their time. What I have on my front row is the people who inspire my generation".

From them, he learned a new way of doing business. "I think it was Rihanna and the music industry that first understood how Instagram can be part of the business world as well as the personal. But in fashion? When we started it was 'why do you post selfies? Why do we need to know your life, see you waking up, see you working? Why don't you keep it private'. And I was like 'you will see'."

Rousteing cheerfully declares his love for Facetune – "I don't have Botox but I do have digital Botox!" – an app that helps him airbrush his selfies and tweak those ski-***** cheekbones.

Reaching new population

From his office around the corner from Rousteing's, Diemoz adds: "When Olivier first proposed Balmain use social media, our investment in traditional media was costing a lot. Here was an alternative costing less but bringing huge visibility. It has been successful, quite rapidly…we decided to be less Parisian in a way but to speak to a new population. A brand has to be built around its heritage but we are proposing a new form of communication dedicated to a wider group of customers."

The impact of that strategy became apparent in 2015, when Rousteing and Balmain were invited to design a collection for the Swedish fast-fashion retailer H&M.; Within minutes of going on sale – and this is not hyperbole – the collection, available at vastly cheaper prices than Balmain-proper, had completely sold out. In London, customers fought on the pavement outside H&M;'s Regent Street branch. "Balmainia!" blared the headlines.

You have to move fast to get backstage after a Balmain show. I was out of my seat and trotting with purpose even before the string-heavy orchestra at the end of the catwalk had quite stopped playing Adele.

Rousteing had taken his bow merely seconds before. Still, too slow: I ended up in a clot of Rousteing well-wishers stuck in a corridor blocked by security guards. A Middle Eastern woman against whom I was indelicately jammed looked at me, laughed, shook her head, then said: "We pay millions for a fashion house – and then this happens!"

In June, Balmain was bought for a reported €485 million by Mayhoola, a Qatar-based wealth fund said to be controlled by the nation's ruling family. As so often with Rousteing-related revelations, some declared themselves nonplussed. "Why Would Mayhoola Pay Such a High Price for Balmain?", one headline asked. Yet Mayhoola, which acquired Valentino four years previously for $US858 million, might have scored a bargain.

Clothes key to revenue

Despite its huge, Instagram-enhanc­ed footprint, Balmain is a small, lean and relatively undeveloped business. Most luxury fashion houses today – Chanel, Burberry, Dior, et al – will emphasise their catwalk collections for marketing purposes but make most of their money from the sale of accessories, fragrances and small leather goods like handbags and shoes. One of the big fashion companies makes a mere 5 per cent from its catwalk clothes.

At Balmain, by contrast, clothes bring in almost all the revenues. If Balmain had the same clothes-to-accessories ratio as its competitors, its overall annual income could be more than €1 billion ($1.4 billion).

The company is moving in that direction. New accessory lines are in the pipeline. "Now we have to transform that desire into business activity," said Diemoz. "Sunglasses, belts, fragrances, the kind of products that can be more affordable."

The first bags should be available in January, as will a wider range of shoes, and then more, more, more.

Six days after his show, on the last day of Paris Fashion Week, I returned to the Balmain atelier. Apart from two assistants, Rousteing was the only person there – everybody else had gone on holiday to recover from the frenzy of preparing the show, or was busy selling the collection at the showroom around the corner.

Rousteing sat behind his desk in the empty room, wearing slingback leopard-print slippers, sweatpants and shades. "I am not even tired! I am excited. Because there are so many things happening – and I can't wait."Read more at:www.marieaustralia.com/red-carpet-celebrity-dresses | http://www.marieaustralia.com/formal-dresses-adelaide

Welcome to the world of Sci-fi
horror like a risky affair we
have all been courting,
but now it is really here.
And of course the reality is always  
far worse than the movie.
Like an alien attack or abduction
there is a flash of bright white
light.
As hot as the center of the sun
those underneath vaporize
into nothing.
Their remains like ghostly shadows
burnt into the scarred ground.
And as we drop deeper into hell
we find in terror
the devil runs out.

Survivors blinded, burnt, crawling,
moping and moaning as we find
ourselves living in a desert like
Zombie land.
An earth once full of life falls through
space like a discarded match burning
itself out.
Of course I can only talk for myself
as you maybe able to hold a flame
against an innocent child or old lady.
But if not maybe you should not,
like genocide be supporting it.  
Thousands screaming and crying but
I am sorry there no hospital and there
will be no ambulance coming.

So with Little Boy
such a friendly name
like the boy playing down the park.
Well 40 thousand died an hour after
that one was dropped.
Now imagine something 30 times as
strong something they call the
Ivy King,
king of the apocalyptic land.
And now imagine their latest celebration
they call Castle Bravo 1000 times
more powerful.
How many millions tens of millions
could that ****
Bravo bravo bravo.

But these are just numbers what if they
all each had a name like
Nikolai or Emiko
sorry maybe it would be better if
we did not give them a foreign
name maybe call them
Jenifer or John.
So do really want to give our
government permission to drop
a bomb like Hiroshima or Nagasaki.
Perhaps they would be safer if they
changed there cities names called them
something like Manchester or Birmingham.

Naughty boys boasting about their
conquers sit around tables playing
their poker bluff.
While injecting a fear into their
enemies heart they mind their p's and q's.
As they pretend to be civilized
but at the same time threatening
an annihilation.
Just so they may get the
Upper hand
A gas pipe or
Oil rich land.
But I don't want my life to be
someones negotiating tool.
So stop playing your silly game of
chance because if you loose the whole
worlds is gone.
Please someone tell them
this is really not a game.

I hope the world has realized more
bombs does not make it safer.
Maybe you think it is money well spent
or maybe like me you think it could be
spent curing cancer or the environment.    
Any on a personal note
I really do hope  
they give up trident.

Lawrence Hall 2d
Negotiating Toilet Paper
Lawrence Hall
Mhall46184@aol.com
LogoSophia Magazine – A Pilgrim’s Journal of Life, Literature and Love
Fellowship & Fairydust (fellowshipandfairydust.com)
https://hellopoetry.com/lawrence-hall/
poeticdrivel.blogspot.com

                                    N­egotiating Toilet Paper

The escort carried three rolls of toilet paper
As she walked me to the classroom area
One each for Dorm A, Dorm B, and the guards
Some fellows walked casually along the path

“And you guys know how to walk single-file”

“Yes, ma’am”

“Yes, ma’am”

“Sure thing, ma’am”

And thus in silence they formed that single-file

“One roll of toilet paper per prisoner per week
Sometimes it’s just not enough,” she said
“We had a meeting on it; I told the guys
Sometimes administration just doesn’t get it”

Dignity, like treaties, can be broken
In many ways

Written by
Lawrence Hall

all of these bees
stung my eye lashes
that must be it
my mouth drips honey
and the bees die
at my patent feet
the bee grave yard
littered at 495 longitude
my rib cage broken
into white candy chunks
food for dead bees
my eye lashes stung
heaven honey droplets make
the bees sticky cremation

Aloft upon some distant shore
The seabird sets her wings to soar
The salt sea tang of crested breeze
Or howling gale of winters freeze,
Through oceans, mountainous or not
Or sea Sargasso flat and hot,
In dancing wavelets sparkling clear
Where hunted mackerel school in fear,
Where natives in their dugout boats
Caste out their nets and balsa floats,

That tiny bird will soar adrift
Negotiating each wind shift.
One wonders how a thing so small
Can fly against the wind at all;
But sweep she does and plunge and veer
In gracious symmetry to steer
Across the oceans vastness too,
To land right there, right next to you.
In squawking lightness, dancing swings
Sea bird alights ….and folds her wings.


Marshalg
Mangere Bridge
8th. December 2007

Do not negotiate with the terrorists of your heart.
For they are malicious and do not understand the anguish you experience day to day. Your heart is not to be played with, nor is it fair you play with hearts that don't belong to you.

Do not negotiate with argumentive terrorists known as individuals. They thrive on your will to break and snap like a sugar stick. Remain calm and smile, it kills them inside.

Do not negotiate with pessimistic terrorists known as your mind. You are beautiful, you are not fat, you do not have a stupid laugh and 99.9% of the time, it's going to work out in the end.

Do not negotiate with passive terrorists who will not take a stand. If they choose to live their live like that, that is their choice, do not hang up on the worries of others. Do what makes you happy first and foremost.

Do not negotiate with spineless terrorists who hide in the shadows of others. One day they will realise, but you cannot tell them. So let them be.

Do not negotiate with emotional terrorists who hide many secrets. They will tell you when they are ready. Do not force information out. You are not a terrorist.

Remember that you are everything different to the terrorists.
Remember free thought is your greatest gift.

Do not negotiate with terrorists who use the misery of others for profit. Help the unfortunate, you will never know when you'll make someone's day. 20p can change the world.

Do not negotiate with the children of terrorists. Children can be cruel. Yes. But should the opinion of one child make a difference to you. No.

Do not negotiate with the terrorists of your soul. Do not let them guide you into unhappiness. Those who have, you can read the lines in their faces; they're permanent scars. Be brave, be bold.

Finally. Do not negotiate with yourself. You know what you want, who you are, what makes you tick, what makes you cry. Do not question yourself.

i arrived
early enough
to be comfortable
in my seat as
the patient and
impatient alike
shuffled the aisle
negotiating the overflow
of flaring elbows
protruding feet
and cumbersome torsos
a waltz of
dismissive apology
their only hope
to find their place
without inconvenience
yet with little interest
in whether they might
inconvenience
other passengers
along the way

watching
as a man
recently evicted
from the seat
he had evidently
not booked
surveys the nearby
empty spaces
his mind churning
an internal gamble
of which one
might promise
the longer period
   of peace
before the rightful
owner arrives
he knows
he will need
to relocate
once more before
his journey's end
at some point
unknown to him
but predetermined
nonetheless
despite this
he settles down
in a seat marked
"reserved"
and closes
his eyes

If you brush my words with butter,
and put them on a roasting rack,
or better yet, why not spit them,
and string them on a brassier's stake,
you'll always get a tasty serving of
"I love you" warmly presented upon your plate.

===

* No greeting cards were printed subsequent to the composition of the above lyrics, but the poet is open to negotiating first print rights with one or more eco friendly greeting card publishers.  Product must contain at least 50% post consumer fiber.  Native labor input would be a plus.

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Life flows through the doors,
Dispersed by the ceiling fan,
A makeover for every patron,
The waitress serves a second chance.

Ex-husband but current parent,
Negotiating with a teenage daughter,
Two untouched lunch plates,
As the gap grows further and further.

Central focus being on a book cover,
Held by an E.R nurse still in her scrubs,
The waitress tries to decipher a meaning,
All while wiping leftovers from table tops.

The calender on the wall says Friday,
And in walks a sundress along with a button down,
Two steaks and a red rose,
Right up comes the waitress with a dinner to astound.

Beginnings and ends in motion,
The clock cues for the 40-something man,
In the far corner he sips his black coffee,
Forlorn eyes of a widow staring at a wedding band.

Wiping beads of sweat from her forehead,
Retying her hair into a secured knot,
Exhaustion slowly kicking in,
As she refills the coffee ***.

The college girl strolling in with her book bag,
Smiles with pity at her as she gives her order,
She thinks of how her minimum wage must look,
But her love for her job makes her smile never falter.

Days are something treasured,
Every hour, a different movie plays,
She collects all those stories,
With the tip left after the customer pays.

RINGS of iron gray smoke; a woman's steel face ... looking ... looking.
Funnels of an ocean liner negotiating a fog night; pouring a taffy mass down the wind; layers of soot on the top deck; a taffrail ... and a woman's steel face ... looking ... looking.
Cliffs challenge ******; sudden arcs form on a gull's wing in the storm's vortex; miles of white horses plow through a stony beach; stars, clear sky, and everywhere free climbers calling; and a woman's steel face ... looking ... looking ...

I'm truly blessed
to be counted
amongst the
trooping pilgrims
walking dusty roads,
negotiating rocky
Himalayan trails
on the way
to the mountain top.

Together
as brothers
and sisters,
we traverse
precarious paths,
strengthening
each other,
bucking up,
getting a
second wind
to make that
final push
to scale the most
jagged boulders
that lie nearest
the peaks.

I'm heartened
to see
Dorothy Day,
Mahatmas Gandhi,
The Dali Llama,
Nelson Mandela
and Johnny Cash,
trooping along side me;
keeping me in step
as we press on to
the promised land.

If I get hungry,
Dorthy will
serve me soup
to feed my
spirit.

If I get lonely,
Mahatmas will
muster up a posse,
freely welling from
salt of the earth
to walk with me.

If I take a
wrong turn,
The Dali Llama's
smiling eyes
and sage
advise
will get
my feet
back on the
right path.

On this
tiresome journey
if my will begins
to falter and my
commitment wanes,
Nelson will remind me
to endure the trial
with the grace
of fortitude.

And if we enter
dangerous canyons,
filled with the
cacophony of
boisterous hate,
The Man in Black
will strum his
guitar to quell
the angry noise
and fill our hearts
with loving harmony.

We're on our way
to Freedom's Land
and some believe
we're almost there.

We can see
Martin looking
over those last
jagged ledges,
he's got a prayer
of encouragement
on his lips,
and he's waving
Mrs. Liberty's torch,
showing us
the way,
guiding us
home.

Music Selection:
Sweet Honey on the Rock:
Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around

MLK Jr. Day
1/16/12
Oakland
jbm

there is a woman
who drives
the bus I take to school in the morning
I always wonder, more often than not
why she works on a bus
it must be tedious and boring
running the same route over and over again
dealing with girls like me
who
more often than not
forgot their money
she is pretty, young
wears expensive sunglasses
but she drives the high school bus
full of loud, rude kids
instead of something
she would find more
appealing.
but maybe she likes the repetition, the change
the power of driving us each day
maybe she relishes our little lives
in her hands
which grip the steering wheel
as she navigates the streets
maybe she enjoys the challenge
of wide turns and
negotiating her way through the streets like
an overweight pedestrian
on a busy sidewalk

I see the cockroach
caress the counter next to a brewing
*** of coffee, striking a chord of
crystaline sweetness,
that God and Satan could both agree upon.
In the living room,
my best friends are killing each other,
kissing each other,
falling in love,
snagging,
splitting stitches,
chalk outlines,
black mail,
and hopes for a resurrection
swirl and spin with the scent
of perfume
and coffee beans.
My phone lights up with a message
asking for some real advice,
my response is to get a new religion,
and wait for the bombs to fall.
Outside
light pollution fills the sky,
an eerie day that just won't die,
negotiating with eager streetlights,
and all-night diners.
On the corner
of 23rd and Western,
a dancing grinderman,
a homeless woman with a snaggletooth smile,
and their prize of a monkey
are cutting the night with desperation croons,
and delightful foresight.
Just past the construction on the east side of the city,
a one-legged, heathen named James W. Green
is finding solace with
a defeated, overthehill harlot,
going to and fro in a motorized sanctuary,
and grabbing change from her coin-dispensing hips.
I discover a pen embedded in the carpet,
I spend the rest of the evening split
between Midnight Man poetry,
and dictating divine apocrypha,
while once bright-eyed friends of mine
mourn over marriage, self-medication strategies,
and scrape the bottom of the barrel
with their tongues to ensure it's tangible.

There are people in this world, and I don't mean to preach
I am exercising my rights, and my freedom of speech
Opinions will be expressed, but there's not much I can teach
Except these people drain the land, all ******* like a leach

If your a copper lover, and you like the boys in blue
Politics may float your boat, perhaps you don't have a clue
Royalists could take offence, you know what you should do
a WARNING from this moment on, I wouldn't read if I we're you

Just forget about crap brexit, it's the British who will pay
Who cares about a ******* deal, or if we go or stay
We never had no interest, with that ***** Theresa May
Her cabinet is full of ****, but they've always been that way

We don't need any governors, trying to take our land
Or politicians trying to rule, with their unruly hand
A state for every president, all thinking they are grand
And local law enforcement, I can not ******* stand

All people in authority, treat the rest of us like flops
The civil servants are not civil, nor are the ******* cops
Their issued with a uniform, and believe they are the tops
Illegal **** and seized drugs, are shared in bent cop shops

You could get a thrashing, locked behind that steel cell door
Or mowed down in a pursuit, or beaten to the floor
They get away with ******, and a hell of a lot more
In case you did not realise, Police have immunity from the law

Never mind Ladies and lords, in a world of pure desire
The deception of constabulary's, and the monarchy's a liar
They all adopt god statuses, it could be even higher
Escort them to the Wicker Man, sacrifice them in the fire

The Governments they ruin lives, their footsteps where dirt soils
Our leaders are unscrupulous, every country's left in spoils
Prime minister's winding up the world, in continuous loops and coils
The queen should go and **** herself, along with all the royals

A horses **** springs to mind, as well as ugly trolls
When I see that Prince Philip, and Camilla Parker Bowles
Charlie boy well what a ****, dragging Diana through the coals
Their the spongers of the state, all living of our tolls

Just take a look at palaces, and look at where we dwell
We're treated like we're second rate, and we all ****** smell
They stick their noses in the air, and you can always tell
That we're seen as the common folk, and we can go to hell

When seen in the public eye, you know they are looking down
They're no better then anyone else, underneath their royal gown
Why are they put on pedestals, and made jewels of the crown
And live in places that could house, half an ******* town

Who cares about false visits, who cares where they have been
Their only trying to look good, their not really all that keen
Flood victims and tsunamis, well they just want to be seen
We don't want the tossers sympathy, and ******* to the queen

Isn't she just too **** old, she should be abdicating
The rest of them can *******, their all so aggravating
Higher aches no one needs, because they are segregating
We're categorised into a class, and there is no negotiating

Disband the current monarchs, because they are out of season
The Tudors should've been the place, to put a royal freeze on
Why are they the privileged ones, there isn't a good reason
They are all above the law, and maybe that's high treason

All successors to the throne, they never had a spine
I'd rather be a *******, now the crown has lost it's shine
When there's marriage on the table, their not likely to decline
Has Meghan Markle ever been, The Bride of Frankenstein ?

I knew you were an actress, take a look at yourself now
You are like Kate Middleton, your just another royal sow
Is William a pig ******, he's reared three swine's but how?
Perhaps Harry's had a bit of  Kate, and bred that stupid cow

Because a prince just came along, and it was you they plucked
Was it the thought of royalty, when in you were then ******
Does aristocracy have its folds, are they all neatly tucked
The only job you have now, is lay down and get ******

Can I make one suggestion, now please don't take offence
You don't have to reproduce, with these two smarmy gents
Do you feel obligated, to mix in with their scents?
Or because you're now a royal, you have free tax and rents

Never mind the cushy jobs, when your in the special forces
Send William to the front line, after his training and courses
Why should our country pay, for all their false endorses
Is Margaret part of their clan, or one of the sad horses

The Duke of Edinburgh's award, why didn't he just pass
Sarah Ferguson was a commoner, and from a different class
Did Andrew like her freckles, did they extend down to her ***
She wasn't all that bothered, once behind the palace glass

Celebrities tolerate her majesty, they must have some endurance
Those poor ******* on that show, the Royal Variety Performance
Britain's Got Talent has it's winners, I hope they have insurance  
They're there for the prize money, not for the royals assurance

A variety of royalty, but there not all that enticing
So many bent police officers, who take small cuts from slicing
We don't want dodgy minister's, collecting and over pricing
It's a constabulary of governments with too much royal icing

(Pedro said,)


When we cross this line between friendship and hostility,
We need a lot of attraction to save our marriage
And to compensate for what's lost; a betrayal facility,
Thus, is created; '' '' Miguel says that something to disparage



(Carla continued,)



Is the contradiction between spouses, which can be useful
When your partner becomes a thought of your consciousness
Evolving in meditation; our passion of love is truthful,
When we understand the things that are discrepant or less



(Carla continued,)



Familiar; Miguel suggests that the idea about
The perfection can be continued in another marriage,
Which can be performed after the divorce; ’’ ‘’ Bella said that, no doubt,
These tensions being teased by some *** led to zero and disparage.



(Replied Pedro. He continued,)



Miguel and Bella needed each other's opinion
Without expressing any certain aspect of their
Divergent thinking; Miguel could hold dominion
Over your heart because you were vulnerable and too fair.



(Pedro added,)



You took care of your beauty to maintain this attraction,
In our relationship, but your beauty caught his attention,
Because Bella didn't give him too much satisfaction.''
''Her love was based on sense and sensibility rather than



(Carla continued,)



Reason and emotion; ’’ ‘’you've made an effort to have a precise
Grace; you use flowers for your body bath while poetry can clean
Your soul; you eat less and move more than others; so, take this advice
And be natural like Eve; you know what I mean.''



(Replied Pedro. Carla replied,)



''I wanted to prevent this tragic end- the infidelity.
Miguel told me that we had never been together as soulmates
While you had thought that my ideas had meant the absurdity
Of the perfectionism; '' '' you pushed me to the betrayal gates



(Pedro continued,)



In order to separate me from Beatrice; every time
I left home, you were wondering if I would do this or not.''
''Our marriage was approved by God; from children we hear His chime,
And your relationship with Beatrice will come to naught.




(Carla continued,)




Miguel was better than you because he chose a platonic
Way to betray his wife; I've just been humiliated
While negotiating my love with Beatrice; so chronic
Were her manners to discourage me, but I've communicated



(Carla continued,)


With you against odds; Miguel had been in search for other
Soulmates; Then, he could admire Bella; God didn't give them
Kids but they didn't divorce 'cause she wanted to be a mother.
In an impure marriage, there's a betrayal I can't condemn.’’



(Pedro said,)


'' The sin is the occasion for grace while bringing repentance, ''
'' The sin can only diminish this hope to comprehend
Our Lord while we can return to the position of acceptance
Through the pure procreation; without name or end



(Carla continued,)



Is the suffering of our children, and they are innocent;
I lost the idea of perfection while you were living
In sin; the darkness led you to self-destruction; now, ignorant
While living in anger and passion, you need His forgiving.



(Carla continued,)



Being like Bella, I have chosen the human sacrifice.''
''This perfectionism is an illusion and, in reality,
We die all; we are all sinners to give up the paradise.
On Earth, to find the original perfection is a fantasy.



(Pedro continued,)



We can't be rescued. I prefer the peace of my mind
To this fight for salvation; I prefer an ephemeral,
Pleasant life instead of it; '' I understand that you're still blind.
That's why I have a deep relationship with Christ, in general.



(Carla continued,)



I'm forced to accompany you in an aimless journey-
A vagrancy; you forced me to accept this new reality
That would change my destiny; the devil is your attorney.''
'' A need for a sinful freedom lies in your normality.



(Pedro continued,)



You end up ignoring the devil in front of death.
Don't forget that you stay in a haunted house; '' ''I'm searching
For some viable solutions and for the heaven's breath.''
To be a mother is a reality; I'm fighting



(Carla continued,)



To save my family; '' ''your moral awareness leads
To unhappiness and anger; '' ''you provoke me to fight
To keep you while using sarcasm to banish all my needs.''
''This method keeps my rivals at bay; '' '' you insult me despite


(Carla continued,)



My faithfulness; you use this jealousy to make me love you
Unconditionally; '' '' Christianity can't bring the man
To the initial Eden; so, love me as I am, though
I'm not your Adam, Eve! '' ''Pedro, I am your woman! ''



(He embraced her and started to make love with her after so many years.)


(To be continued…)

Poem by Marieta Maglas

I walk along with my many thoughts, negotiating through the heavy crowd. When simply by chance I raise my eyes, as the masses parted, and there you were. While having you my sights I lost track of my steps, and as your image drew closer my mind stood still. My path to you was cleared of all the moving bodies that no longer mattered, as if fate wanted your beauty to never leave my sight. I now find myself standing within my voices reach to your ears, so I call your name. The moment your eyes found mine I lost my breath. Your beauty was as I remembered and your voice, the sweetest symphony I’ve heard as your lips moved. I found myself lost, within a moment lost in time. A sensation long forgotten now flowed through my body as we exchanged words. The crowd no longer exist, the sounds of a mall full of life, no longer reaches my ears. I find myself trying to move on to my destination, but I long to remain with you. The minutes march on unnoticed, for as you spoke nothing else mattered. But as I walk away I smile, only because we have just experienced a moment lost in time. A moment that may have been lost, but will never be forgotten.

children should be seen and not heard Odysseus is not a complainer he keeps quiet he is taught to choke his voice swallow his hurt Mom and Dad are always arguing at one another raising their voices fighting he endures his parent’s criticism follows their orders he is trained to be obedient no negotiating his parents inhabit a surface world of strict protocol everyone laughs but it is a pretend way to dismiss what is actually occurring as long as they say i love you to each other then everything is accorded technically all right no matter how dysfunctional or painful the truth existence is a difficult challenge often overwhelming Mom and Dad push Odysseus in directions he does not want to go instead of surrendering to their wills he acts in response in fact a whole personality is being formed based on his reactions and having nothing to do with who he truly is how he actually feels he feels frightened by the world stressed by all the expectations put upon him in many ways he is way too sensitive crippled by his own sensitivity self-betrayed by his thin-skinned hypersensitivity he stays in his bedroom with the door closed he paints or plays with toy soldiers and watches TV he does not know where Penelope is maybe she is in her bedroom Penelope means everything they share secrets and conspiracies and a common enemy in Mom and Dad Penelope is the only one who recognizes his predicament sense of helplessness anxiety pain she is more nurturing than Mom Penelope and Odysseus have a special connection share a common or similar reference of perception Odysseus desperately needs to believe in his parents maybe Mom and Dad do not understand and assign unfitting advice maybe Mom and Dad do not support him in ways he needs but they are still his parents he values believes looks up to them they rooted that in him even if it is out of fear rather than respect he will always venerate Mom and Dad no matter what Odysseus wants to make his parents proud he loves and needs them Mom is an important person always on the go planning dinners dashing out the door gossiping on the phone buying and returning clothes getting them altered going to the hair salon meeting with the girls for lunch she is a busy lady and has a lot of friends Mom is more concerned about how things look than what is actually going on with her children parenting is a secondary concern to Mom’s hectic agenda of social popularity deep inside Odysseus believes Mom loves him he needs to believe that he paints a red heart on white sheet of paper and writes inside the heart in brown colored pencil MOM when he turns it upside down he reads WOW he reasons whether it is out of obligation or guilt or a mother’s tendency Mom loves him he does not understand but he is grateful secretly Odysseus is hurting bad his feelings are easily upset more and more he experiences a disturbed point of view he tries to ignore it  sometimes his thoughts run to morbid extremes he wonders why he cannot just accept and get along often he wants to be good and get better other times he wants to destroy himself things are chaotic and troubling at home he wishes he or his family would die his teachers complain he is a dreamer with behavioral problems he does not excel academically after eighth grade Mom and Dad are notified their son is not to return to Harper Mom cries to the school Principal in his office begging him to let her son stay the Principal refuses Dad lights a cigarette and exclaims to hell with Harper we’ll find Odys a better school Odysseus tells Mom he is going to be known someday not like celebrities on TV rather recognized for some great achievement Mom believes him and never stops believing in Odysseus

(Dedicated to Eric Onyebuchi Jibero)

What an excruciating blow
You have dealt me!
A brute's uppercut offloaded
A smashing hit delivered
Like a monstrous boxer
Desirous of fame
With an amateur to tame
At this one bout too many
Wherein you have hit me below
The belt as a sadist deriving joy
From my anguish
And relish
From my enormous loss

Oh mower,
Nay hewer,
Can't you feel anything?
Can't you see?
Can't you reason for a while
With your prey?
Can't you pause to ponder
Just for a brief moment
So you can take a good decision
Choosing the right tree to fell
Instead of bringing down a mere
Sapling with your obedient saw?

Why deal sweeping blow
On a mere rookie?
Can't you distinguish
Between the ripe and the unripe?
Between the hen and the chick?
But hawks like you can pick
Meat amidst bones as Moses
In a basket amidst bulrushes
Of Nile to spare from Pharaoh's
Infant-eating sword
And in wisdom did you wait
Patiently to visit Methuselah
At the zenith of hoary hair

Master of double standards
Eyes gorged
Conscience seared
Heart cold like frozen chicken
******* dry and drooping
Like a hag's
A ruthless scorpion
That stings even babes

Rampaging ravager
Notorious brigand
Marauding machinery
Eliminating without scruple
Whoever you choose
Whose hireling are you?
God's or Satan's
Or both?
A blank cheque you flaunt
To cash as you wish
But can't you condescend to a negotiating
Table when a mere sapling is marked
For a cutting down?

Being a professional boxer
Long in this senseless trade
You should have seen the heap
Of pain you would leave
In my heart by this cruel blow
Against a budding amateur whom
You have served voracious earth
Whose stomach is a leaking tank.

The sunflowers are in full bloom as we see
scattered borders crossed over with bomb filled broken dreams

Now, stop and think
We may never hear the raindrops fall again, while the lost children lead us through the scorched fields with their soft spoken pleas

Their desperate sighs rise from across the airwaves left depleted in uncertain scriptures, the forces pull back and a shattered town breathes

The sunflowers are in full bloom surrounded by visions etched in our minds of destruction and death dissolved

Now, stop and think
Sitting on burned out rooftops, we see the tortured fog of war covering up the lifeless soldiers that tatter the streets below, no more bombs or sirens blaring
One confused soldier yells, "Why are we here?!!!"

The sunflowers are in full bloom negotiating through peaceful serenity, identities clashing with unrestrained intensity

Now, stop and think
Open your eyes in the time of a desperate calling, unite as one and let the sunflowers continue to grow wild and free

I have declared a detente
After negotiating a truce.
My head is a no-fly zone;
The bombadier chutes stay shut.
I sat at the table
With my privy council,
And we have signed an accord.
Peace in my time.
Peace in my mind.
Forget, to forgive;
Forgive, to forget.
It seeps unmeasurable,
Infectious,
Air borne as a nucleur summer.

Wonthelimar, in the last transmigration that he planned from Nyons in the cavern on the eastern side of the Rhone, surrounded himself with mountains that dwarfed them with promiscuous caves of the Eygues. From these buckets as a margin of power and go referring to the nocturnal wind of the Pontias; created his fundamental tool of attraction of the Mementos de Cartography of the Seleucids, decomplexing the logistical notions of the Diadocos after having resuscitated and liberating Alexander the Great from a Cartesian Underworld in the manner of apocryphal late Aristotelianism, mechanizing existential dualisms of Hades with formulas and psychotropic and geometric tricks, licensing them theologies of habeas corpus, coexisting in the first instance with Etréstles de Kalavrita who would establish the term of definitive transmigration of Alexander the Great, so that between the Diadocos and Wonthelimar they would contend the final and disciplinary action to revoke the high arrest, transhuming the sovereign as Macedonian next to the Hexagonal Birthright finally very close to Saint John the Apostle and Vernarth in the vicinity of the Megaron Spilaion Apokalypseos.

The generals of Alexander the Great shared his legitimate Ark without royal titles, they were Perdiccas, Antipater, Craterus, Eumenes de Cardia, and others like the satraps who came to be proclaimed as kings; Antigonus, Ptolemy, and Seleucus. Residing the most substantial in this parapsychological saga in Vernarth; his brother Etrestles de Kalavrita who seconded and predestined his monolithic and constituent sovereignty of Polis, for the purpose of ruling and raising his Kopis and Xifos in the independence of aldehyde and alcoholic carbonyl residues emanated from the ferment of the Backhoi and Nepente, depositing LSD in substantial amounts. to align himself with Seleucus, and materially present himself in the sphere of Patmos as two representatives of both empires, one ancient Christian and the other Panhellenic, placing himself in that totalitarianism of Seleucus over that of Alexander the Great who was splendid in the cosmogony of a king similar to David of Judea, solvent and illustrious in the conception of Apological dynasty and identity, of Zeusian roots and of eternal numeral politics. In the quantitative of the champion of Alexander the Great revived on Patmos, the Mashiach of Gethsemane will continue to be deified with such a signature of both in ****** skies in two absolutist emperors and of dogmatic differential Pythagorean, propagandizing both dynasties with domains in regencies and different latitudes of the conceptual decision. Base, to refute proposals to follow them in part of anti-Alexandrian perplexities or opposed to marginalizing himself from following them after they abandoned him in Babylon. This was sensed in the confrontation between both forces of univocal polarization, for the good of one and the bad of the other of having to distract them from the proposal to enlist and harass dethroned kings on purpose from their deaths and revive them in others than in their own court of observers and bosses, they will only exist in the empty temples and idols without dates to know to avoid and in prevailing dates that will not happen.

Seleucus says: “Khaire my Commander…, unite the divine sanctuaries of Apollo, and take up the harangue of Tel Gomel with us disunited and lost by you. This dating will remain in the offices of reforming Macedonian armies and we will both command our generals in the Panhellenic dynasty, overall the heavenly armies that you will ever have here with fragile oracles confusing your divine blood! "

Wonthelimar, already manifesting from Nyons, lightened his Bucephalus bases, having a great somatic affinity with the bridles of Alexander the Great's steed, unraveling here a great mystery in his parapsychological regression directed from the cavern of Chauvet.

Wonthelimar says: “I have been confined with early Neolithic alloys, here I have dwelt livid among all your intrepid adventures channeling the axons and sketches of manifestations of superior cause and effect of correspondence of the ages and their Aeon and paleo-uncrossing precessions of you and your new death, from the Ardeche river together with Medea and Hypnos, among all of them being aerial, visionaries and northern lights who traveled to my redoubt to spray them in river waters, on the night of Agios San Ioannis. The gorges that swallow the seal of the Pontias, make rivers form with their name since the bulk of their waves of gusts are grandiloquent and robust like a gaseous river that becomes hydrological in larynxes where the wind is astonished when entering the concavity that it is wasted in its nature of time and qualitative content. Unusually I have been the progeny of organisms of rapture and cytological drama, in each one that is represented in these walls in which they are trapped next to me as tricks, and radiocarbon tricks by these vicissitudes, and of their actions that have dated my radiation of radioactive carbon in these caverns and so-called fourteen carbon spaces, for more than fifty million radiometric years. I lived here with my parents until as a child I stayed with my godmother, but one day my father did not return. From that moment on I became after the anticipated axial carbon, to keep myself as a torch in the caverns to see where no one was light but me, only of someone who was more than a dawn to illuminate what they wanted to know in my organic depressions, my trident of dating and carbon, by my parents and I in incisive philanthropy staining all the walls detesting the otherness that made me move towards a Wonthelimar; with dated apparitions and curtains that behind them always like gargoyles appeared before Hypnos, and then Medea, taking me as a child with her hands. When they left, I was left alone and patiently waited for them, when they did not return in the harsh winters they would send me Gerakis Falcons, to deal with your pain my lord Vernarth. In this field, I live, but now I am on my way to grasp the horns of the ibex, which took me to their lair with their goat colonies to give me milk and ursid ***** herbs that shielded me from a lethal genre, although not every day. Remain so. The lord that you will be now is the reflection of the bodyguard along with his ibex that will cordon off your rebirth after leaving the traces and rods of your bone marrow, spleen, and glandular that now belongs to me, to take you to the coldest waters that run inside me since the last ice age. The interference of the Diádocos tried to convince Alexander the Great, this is already a new rock piece to represent him in numismatics, walls, and ceramics in a predominant and complacent way of historical, shamanic record and of astonishing parapsychological fold that I have projected on the walls of Chauvet without your consent "

The new turn from Nyons to Patmos was one of the seizures and ecstatic agonies, for a former little prodigy boy and son of an Íbez and a Bucephalus named Wonthelmar, who comes to rescue the entelechies of someone who was an ignorant man who carried in his arms his divine death, without knowing that before she was eternal life waiting for her in the Katapausis, after building the Megaron and negotiating with Seleucus the evolutionary stylistics of the resurrected Alexander the Great in the flames of the candle enlisted in the night lanterns and united with Saint John the Theologian. Seleucus' talks will be one of the stubborn and ****** visits to persuade and catechize his major general, in periods that do not elapse in real-time, and that will be the fatal fate of his obstinacies because Vernarth was already a prodigal son of the Duoverso-Universe., whose basal was unparalleled in attacking their ideals and hegemonic settlements of the material of minimal cause and effect, a wonder of worthy to lean on invisible gods who at a great speed never seen before..., trafficked in front of every gap or shoulder of their destiny, wandering under a pendulum of a sword and under the support of the farmer, who held prey and meat between a lightning bolt and an elder that supports him, cushioning all earthly sufferings, even more coming out from the silence and the most hidden isolation of those who dare to release from the vaporous darkness of Chauvet, Wonthelimar, already forging paths and ups and downs from where no one comes or goes.

As a child I did not know whether it was the act itself or the knowledge that I was the receptacle for malevolence and cruelty that made me so vulnerable. At first I thought it was God's punishment for something I had done. I took an inventory, desperately seeking the deed that triggered the retribution. But I could not identify a single act. Even my accumulated errors, transgressions and unkindness’s did not exact the cost. Then I understood: if I could not isolate a deed, or pattern of deeds, commanding the punishment, it must be me. It is not what I did. It is who I was...a fundamentally, intrinsically and irredeemably bad little girl. I negotiated my adolescence and early adulthood with the mathematical symbol for "less than" (<) attached.

I would like to be able to write that I am no longer negotiating my adulthood with the same mathematical symbol attached. But that would be a lie. It is pervasive. It is formidable. And if I do not keep it contained, I am so afraid it will be debilitating….I've been down that road a time or two. At times it has enveloped me, penetrating my pores and drowning everything essential and vital inside.

Undisturbed, it is docile, sated. But aroused by even the slightest hint of beauty or strength or grace it is a painful reminder that I am...somehow...contemptible...that I am still fundamentally, intrinsically and incorrigibly...what? Flawed, imperfect & bad? You may say, "But we are all flawed and imperfect. And our flaws and imperfections make us more interesting...more truly beautiful...more human." And perhaps you are right, but this inexorable deprivation makes me somehow subhuman... less than human...permanently broken. I am a receptacle for malice.

I skillfully deflect praise directed my way, an effort to soothe the inescapable conflict inside. Moderate praise induces a subtle twinge of embarrassment; more effusive praise incites the consuming and agonizing feeling that I am irreparably damaged, hopelessly broken. It has contaminated, compromised and diminished every accomplishment, soiled every success. People sometimes tell me that I am humble and that it is an admirable trait. But the modesty and humility they identify helps me to mask the mortification stirring inside. I have gotten so good at hiding it from others that I have nearly learned to conceal it even from myself.

At least that is what it feels like...right now.

I want to see Jesus.
Not the storybook one in the white robes with the blue eyes,
the dark-eyed Jesus, brown-skinned and stained.
I want to see Jesus the man who was God
the man whose feet were *****
whose sweat dripped as he sawed the wood with Joseph,
whose hair fell into his eyes as he bent over his work.
I want to see Jesus whose lean back was muscled from years of hard labor
whose hands were rough from handling raw timber,
who could have fought the soldiers and won because he was fit and able
but who didn't because that wasn't the plan.
I want to see Jesus strong, respected by men, honest and capable,
used to negotiating prices, smiling and confident.
I want to see Jesus the man who loved his mother
and followed her instructions even when he would have preferred not to.
I want to see Jesus the man who was God
when he walked through the crowds who loved him,
disappeared from those who would harm him
and strode across the water as though it were land.
I want to see Jesus the man
who gave up his healthy, well-liked, successful life
to become the savior of the world.
I know God--
invincible, maker of heaven and earth, almighty, omnipotent, omniscient, always with us.
I want to know Jesus
who came to earth
just because he loved me.