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kirk Feb 2018
Offensive words are not offensive if you analyse the meaning
Why are these words taboo why do they deserve a screening
All language is perspective there's no word that needs redeeming
Rude words are quite essential they don't need a purge or cleaning

Otherwise how would we describe thing's that are part of evolution
Certain words are always used so what is the solution
Don't be offended when they are said even with a substitution
I don't think what's classed as filthy words is offensive or pollution

Thousands of years these words have been used so why even be offended
If we are not supposed to use these words why have they been invented
Just because they are deemed rude and some are then resented
No one has to be prudish because that's not what is intended

People are preprogrammed because they are linked to a ****** act
But isn't that just natural and a periodic fact
When certain words are spoken we're expected to react
There's no need to take offense when it's knowledge that is lacked

People should embrace these words not hide behind a misdemeanour
There is no need to sensor these words or make them any cleaner
If you consider history there was nobody much keener
We may think attitudes have changed but really their just meaner

The ****** act is littered with so called offensive words
But sometimes these are toned down to the bees and birds
Words altered to metaphors by all the prudes and nerds
If they are offensive then why are babies born in herds

Offensive words are not offensive it's okay for self expression
If you want to say these words then its hardly a regression
Don't be put off by closed minds or anyone's aggression
Centuries old of ancient text should not cause anyone depression

If you want to say **** me then that's perfectly okay
And if you want a **** up your **** then just do it that way
There's no shame if you like ******* **** or if you ******* gay
And you like *** which most people do then say what you want to say

If someone calls you a ***** or **** well so ******* what
Their only ****** jealous because they haven't got what you have got
It's up to you how you express yourself when you ***** the honeypot  
Or if your ***** is well used then it must be ******* hot

If you want to go for a slash it's okay to say ****
If you prefer to say **** instead of ***** well it is what it ****** is
There's nothing wrong with saying **** its not for me to diss
It doesn't matter if your a ****** I'll just give your **** a kiss

So ******* to the prudish and **** all the pretence
There is no reason not to use these words there not really that intense
All words are there to be used without any caused offence
Stop taking offence with certain words there's no need to be so dense

These words are not offensive and there is nothing to fear
Don't sit on the fence when they're used year by year
Please reconsider your position even if its at the rear
words considered to be rude are something to hold dear

Offensive words are not offensive and let me tell you why
Open your mind to these words all you have to do is try
You don't need to be offended lets dispense with the outcry
Explanations of these words may make you laugh or sigh

**** or ******* is fun and also the act of copulation
If nobody had a **** we would have a depleting population
Where would the human race be or the next generation
Or a fun part of you life if we ceased in life's creation

An **** is just your bottom the part that allows you to sit
Its even an outlet for excess waste but that parts really ****
If your *** is your **** side then I'll have a steak in it
And the good thing is it isn't far from your **** or ****

It's okay if you have a **** its only *** relief
Being a ****** is not that bad despite the miss belief
Its up to you if you want to yank on your own hard sheaf
Don't take any notice of the ******* it only causes grief

**** is considered to be worse but I'm not sure about that
All it is, is a vaginal tunnel or a sweet tasting ***** cat
What is so bad with a ladies **** don't be a ******* ****
Cos most men desire re-entry to cover there cocked hat

******* is not offensive it's just a childs fathered ***** dad
Having a **** is okay in fact you will be glad
There's nothing wrong with **** its just a **** that you have had
If you think Offensive words are offensive then you must be mad
Stevie Nov 2020
So I guess the world is screaming that we need to end Racism and Offensive words and Labels, but what happens when a piece of writing from someone who is seeing the whole world screaming about one thing, but yet acting normal just after a few weeks of it hitting the social media and media outlets.

So I decided to write this including all the Racial and offensive terms that I could research and put them in a list, If we are to discuss and try and make things better, then why should we be scared to be called racist or evil for pin pointing stupidity out because everyone else whether upset, angry or hateful towards someone or a community, even a group and let see how many people lie about not using any offensive or racist term online or in person, even if you thought it and not even said it.

Cause thinking the offensive or racist term/word also makes you just as bad of a person that speaks the words.

"

A Fair amount of Research when into this, and it a good way of explaining,
How we all see each other and every single person on this planet.
This was written to prove that everything is offensive,
that no one is every in a situation that is similar, but in a situation where histories are different,
But yet, if you are offended by this, trust me, I bet you even use some offensive, racial terms and labels to describe someone you hate or don't like,
So what makes you different from me or the next person who is classed as offensive.

Labels, Stop,
Labels, Go ahead,
Labels, all the others,
Go ahead and write them,
Fabric, paper and on skin,
Just let the labels sink in.


All Races and Enthics Racial Terms that are Labels, Not only Blacks and White's.
You're Racist,
You're a Ngger,
You're a ******,
You're 8 Mile.
You're a Albino,
You're a Bean Dipper,
You're a Beach N
gger,
You're a Baijo.
You're a *****,
You're a Guati,
You're a Beanbag,
You're a Border N*gger,
Border Hopper,
You're a FOB,
You're an Curry Muncher,
You're a Desi,
You're a Dot/Dot Head,
Here Dotti,
We are at war with the Crunchies,
The Whacky jinglies,
You're an Irish Cat Licker,
Are you actually an F.B.I,
You're religious, you ***** Mackerel Snapper,
Look at all these Irish Indian Narrow Backs,

All Other Labels,
You're a puff,
You're a *****,
You're a ***,
You're a *****,
You're so Ratchet,
You're an illegal Alien,
Hey we both gay, but that no ****,
*****, **, ****,
You're Bisexual - that just straight privilege,
You're a ******,
He, She, Never mind you just look like cousin IT,
You're a ****, ****, Never mind I can see you're a *****,
You're stupid, thick, dumb,
Just a fat *** that just chubby and overweight,
******* hell, you're crazy, lost the plot,
You are ******* disturbed, bat **** crazy, Psychotic *******,
You're a bible thumper, that explains the homophobic ****,
You're a Fundie, God botherer,
Bible Basher, you know God is a child thrasher,
You're a *****,
You're small are you a ******,
You look like you're apart of DC/Marvel a ******* Mutant,
Eww what is wrong with your face are you a Mongol,
That just hysterical so you must be *******,
everyone is a ******* Imbecile.
Xan Abyss Nov 2014
No Justice, No Peace
If we can't get it from the Court
then we'll take it from the Streets
No Justice, No Peace
**** the Police
and what you believe!

Whatever happened to Revolution
Being the American way?
When your voice remains unheard
For which you suffer every day,
Your life is constantly stepped on,
Your rights keep getting taken away,
And in spite of the lies they spin to protect your oppressors,
You still keep the rage at bay
Because you are not
Above the Law
and neither is anyone else.
So taking matters into your own hands
Isn't going to help.
You entrust the justice system
to do what it's supposed to
Even though you know it never has
and is probably never going to.
But if you haven't done anything wrong and the Law doesn't serve you,
and only seems to defend the people who've already hurt you,
then honestly I think it's insane and completely absurd to
not only expect the People not to react,
but to honor a *curfew
.

*******
Do you hear us yet?
*******
Oh, it's inappropriate?
You don't wanna talk about it?
You don't wanna think about it?
You don't wanna deal with it?
Well guess what?
Nobody ******* does, nobody ******* would, nobody ever ******* could.
But for the people who don't look like you -
Aryan Beauty Standards
Hair of Gold, Eyes of Blue
Fair-skinned, light-skinned
European skeleton,
It was never a choice they had.

Oppression doesn't pick you
Based on qualifications
Any more than Privilege does,
If you think this case
Is not about race
You better check your Privilege, cuz.

I love my home, America
But I hate what it's become
Land of the greedy, home of the afraid
Kingdom of the Loud and Dumb
****-shaming, victim-blaming, race-hating, race-baiting
Sensationalization of the worst crimes in the nation
Religious intolerance, homophobic misogyny, blatant racial discrimination
Can't get with it, can't hang
At least not in the lynch mob sense
I am blown the **** away
at the grievous absence of common sense.

So when they lit those flags on fire
in the center of the town
I understand, and I can't blame them
the flag is truer up in flames now
And if they so decide to burn
the city to the ground,
I understand, and I can't blame them
I would wanna burn it down

*No Justice, No Peace
If we can't get it from the Court
then we'll take it from the Streets
No Justice, No Peace
**** the Police
and **** your Beliefs!
This is about what you think.
Keone L Friesen Jan 2014
In her eyes you can see death himself smiling back at you telling you a date. She has no clue i say in my mind, not but one clue!. She goes with him only wanting his eyes, they're bodies soon lay in **** sweat.
            The wind cooled off the room, and soon everything was quite. Hello? sounds a faint voice of a british school girl in search of her Rolling stone father. He left with cold war and the silence lasted long. Her tender eyes met his one day, old and frail. He died knowing she stood for everything she stood for; Love,hate,war,fight, *** and the slightest thought of Homosexuality, yes ADONAL Homosexuality.
         She walked the lonesome evening with the icy fear of death but it hit her other wise- she died hopping to find her old father humble and beautiful in the night. HEaven smelt of jazz and Claire de lune, the gods played Mingus for days and then some rock and roll, HA! devils music they called it.
         Where are we? and god said, you are in my hunting ground for bad men wanting the clouds. sure its a beautiful place but its hot here, its uncomftorable for me. Please believe me like all the other poor ******* who did. All those idiots and stupid folk queers, rapists, phycos , Negros and the Notorious white man himself… believe me. How else would you live without dying? this gives me comfort for all else is but a ******* lie and a promise i have made to you, i will not die? *******. Is this why we have religion? to comfort man from the thought of death?
       Stop breathing on me.
Arizona Indigo Jan 2013
I apologize for my thoughts and my actions

But you must understand that I am what they call a man.

And no matter how perfect any woman thinks iam,

I might as well be nonexistent.

For women are the most alluring, sinful ,angelic animals on earth.

I am simply bewitched by your existence.

I can not resist directing an ******* daydream,

Every seven minuets.

The being of your facts,

Makes me want to fall to my death beneath your feet

Something about those hills

That makes my teeth want to sink into my lips.

That voice makes me want to do one thing:

Hear it moaning.

No matter how hard I attempt to be an angel,

My devil enduringly conquers.

We refuse to admit that a

woman is stronger than a man.

We could easily succeed

in having a human being develop

Inside of us and painfully ****** it out of a diminutive hole

Nine physically and emotionally draining months later.

“We could probably do it better than you can.”

We just act ignorant and

Heedlessly assume what is logical;

However, in the reaction center,

that every man denies,

lives the manifest verity that:

Women.

Are.

Stronger.

To be born into a stormy emotional spectrum

With color and darkness

Alone shelters the truth for you.

Fact: A man does use his small head much more often then

His actual head, simply, because men don’t know how to use it.

How convenient it is to be born with two heads.

let its roots anchor into your minds and consume your conscious.

-Arizona
older poem
Robert Ronnow Aug 2015
Basketball stands for war or battle.
That's why I think about the players'
personalities, in my foxhole or squad.
Danny and Ben are fast and smart. Dan
especially can pass making him master
and commander. To defeat them as we did
is very satisfying. Ben's five year old son
is intelligent but distant. Disdains to answer
my question Why are you you?
                                                       But I'm not here
to catalogue the men's personalities.
I like them. But each of us has moved on
many times, when  _______  suddenly died
the games went on with hardly a mention
and his name has since been forgotten.

But even this, absolute mortality
of not just our bodies but our names
and souls is not what I came
to talk about. Yesterday, between games,
I asked Joe how Molly his daughter likes
the high school. He mounted an impassioned
defense of reading as the indispensable skill
when I suggested math, the scientific method
and history are essential too.
                                                 Also between games
Bob diffidently asked why my kids are bald.
I was moved by the care he took to satisfy
his curiosity, concerned the subject might be
difficult. He's a political science teacher so
I took the opportunity to ask What ails
the republic? Of course I answered myself
wanting mostly to hear myself talk about Iraq
and how empire is self-correcting. For once I was amusing
I thought, treating the subject with a light touch
heretofore lacking.

But none of this is what I came to say.
A new guy, very big and strong, a
bulldozer under the boards with a good
outside shot if needed got into a dispute
with the other Bob who likes to tell people
what to do sometimes, about an offensive
foul Bob called which we almost never do.
The new guy said If you can't take it don't
play under the boards which is what I say
when I'm ****** and don't give a ****.
Bob said You've been pushing and shoving me
all day. I said He doesn't want to be
pushed and shoved which got a wry
smile out of Danny as I put the ball in play.
Sara Jul 2018
My heart is whole
but it has sharp edges.
It got wet on my sleeve;
now, it hangs from my necklace

-round like a pendant; hurt hangs
round my neck with a vengeance:
like a lighthouse on a dark night,
blinding sailors. It’s offensive.

It draws them near like a siren's call,
but the sky bleeds red at the first sign of morning.
The captain is certain he'll lock land at dawn,
but does any siren ever sing a song without a warning?
Red sky in the morning, sailor's warning; red sky at night, sailor's delight.
Mateuš Conrad Nov 2016
before i pull this one out of my *** (again - listen, these words are not coming from either head or heart, it's best to pull them from the bowels, a gut-wrenching-feeling is more potent than that "something" that "something" delusional pulled from a clenched heart... as far as i know, the brain is incapable of emotions, it doesn't understand them, and since it doesn't understand them: it ridicules them)... which brings me to point:

(a) perhaps the idea of a soul is out-dated... why wouldn't it be, 21g worth of breath does not equal a soul... hence the autopsy of man, each detail studied seperately, the cardiologist knows the heart, the neurologist the brain etc., but some items work in a solipsistic mode... the heart is robotic, automaton pump queen (and not the kind of pump you'd get from Shveeden) - thump thump thump! come to think of it, most of our bodies are robotic, automated... lucky for me: i don't have to think about the heart doing what it does, it just per se does it... i'm not even sure i'm gifted with the a.i. brain functions... but there's an underlying principle that governs all of these items... some call it the self... i prefer: the Σ ultimatum... some would call it soul... but there has to be something akin to the Σ ultimatum that allows me to become detached from this body, while at the same time be bound to it: high blood pressure, heart attack on the horizon... take the high blood pressure pills... ****... what was (b)? oh... yes...

(b) i'm sorry, virginity doesn't cut it for me, lucky me that it was isabella of grenoble that allowed me to move aside from: god, prior to losing my virginity.... roxette: do you feel excited, you're still the one (shanaia twain), fade to black - metallica... i was such a romantic before i lost this dreaded curse... i was a romantic... 19th century style romanticism... but you really can see past this sort of romanticism unless you haven't ******... these days the right complains about cultural marxism: plenty of things to complain about... it makes as much sense as a pickle in a dollop of custard... or cooking with pale indian ale to make a stew: bad idea... wine, brandy, cider? fine... beer? terrible idea to cook with... but unless you haven't lost your virginity, you can't see what cultural marxism chose as its opponent: cultural darwinism... you know how little you hear about darwinism outside of the english speaking world? zero to none, yes, it's an accepted fact, but this fact does not permeate outside of the fact per se, the fact contains itself and the whole subsequent narrative because subconsciously stored... no other people than the people who found it ensure there are subplot proof statements of a reconfirmation of the validity... the whole social science bogus trap of rating people on looks... contradicting the meritocracy of that old Socratic saying: let me be as beautiful on the inside as on the outside... if you haven't ******: you're still the same old romantic i was at puberty... once you ****... well... cultural marxism dwarfs... yes yes it's there... so? but at the same time you can at least appreciate seeing the antithesis: cultural darwinism... the romantic needs to die the most carnal death via experience... all my ideals were shattered, this perfection of woman... i very much liked the idea / not even the ideal of a woman... but when the idea fizzled out and there was no ideal to begin with... i saw cultural darwinism for the very first time and... it was as ugly as cultural marxism so heavily criticized by the conservative right of the west... so... i decided to walk the middle ground, ignoring both sides (of the argument).

(c) i wouldn't have come up with a point see, unless my favorite square schematic didn't pop into my mind, Kantian, as ever: the best philosophy is the antithesis of English pragmatism and overt-politicisation, so it has to be German, ergo? i will not explain these terms, i figured: if i nail a decent example to fit each category, that's enough: since you can then visualize the concept via the example:

analytical a priori                           synthetic a priori
there's a need to throw                   learning
a ball at                                                to throw a ball
a target                                                 at a target once
                                                            ­  the need has been
                                                            ­  established...



synthetic a posteriori                    analytical a posteriori
there's a  need to                           perfecting to throw
      throw a ball at                               a ball at a target
a target, in order
to perfect this need...

                                            baseball..­. cricket...
at least: that's how i define knowledge of something
simple without having to use mathematics
that Kant used to explain... 2 + 2 = 4...
mathematics isn't exactly a man's best friend
at explaining philosophy...
you write philosophy that alligns itself
to mathematics... no wonder: moths in books...
yawns, unfinished works...
i found that sports work just as well
as mathematics... and you have the already
primitive objects to work with...
rather than pseudo-objects: i.e. numbers...
the abstracts of perception: i'm actually 6ft2...
not 6ft1... karolína plíšková is 6ft1...
       as noted when watching her today...

  i'll admit, i'm always a bit shaky when it comes
to this sqaure, whether it's over-simplified,
notably the top left corner: analytical a priori,
i'm always of a mindset that wants to associated
this definition with: analytical a- priori...
  i.e. borrowing from atheism:
    to analyse something without there
being a prior to example...
               analysis without a prior example...
i guess that's the mojo of science... the driving force...
back to sports... bow and arrow...
   tools: target...
       whether a bow and arrow and a deer
to begin with...
or a hand and ball and a wicket to end with...

there's a need to throw                  
a ball at a target...

            and cricket was the precursor of
baseball, but prior to cricket?
   there was archery...
              and prior to archery...
   there was forever a fundamental need,
e.g. to go from point X to point Z...
   see... as much as Kant wanted...
   numbers don't really solve the "problem"
of explaining something: algebra would be
better suited... x + y = z...
                    with numbers either hovering
above, or below (in the instance of chemistry's
subscript)...

talking of squares... sūdoku...
well, if at any time the french were to receive a hard-on
in terms of inventing something,
the english: rugby, cricket, football, tennis...
the french really did read some of the hebrew
qabbalah literature, as i am doing...
magic squares...
       the secular version of this puzzle
first appeared on july 6, 1895 (the modern version)...

it came to us from India and China...
again... why do western cultural darwinists
always tell our genesis from
the perspective of: "out of Africa"?
aren't there elephants in India?
            i will not believe i originated in Africa,
i'm not an "out of Africa" sorry state of
incompetence... i place my origins in
the sub-continent... at least that's where my
current language originates from...
the great migration across the Siberian tundra,
rather than some African savannah...
after all the Bangladeshi and the Sri Lankans
(the tear of India) resemble burnt cinnamon
in tone, some even as dark skinned as
east africans...
   if the germanic people want to stick to
the "out of Africa" narrative (notably the English):
let them have it... i place my origins in
India...

   never mind, now i'll write a name's dropping
history of how july 6th, 1895 happened...
the "magic" squares...

    from either India or China (chess from India)...
moschopulus of contantinople
  introduced them (the "magic" squares)
in the early 1400s... apparently ancient qabbalists
had knowledge of them
  (so... a trip well spent)...
                             rabbi joseph tzayah (1505 - 1573)
magnum opus: responsa...
             rabbi joseph castro: avkat rokhel...
tzayah in jerusalem wrote his major work
Evven HaShoham (the onyx stone) - 1538 -
   a year later the book: tzeror ha-chaim discussing
the Talmud: he never really bothered about
the Zohar...
               the hebrai word for "letters": otiot...
divided into two:
                         tav aleph (a line of aleph)
and tav yod (a line of yod)...
                   one is to never concentrate
upon the keter within the realm of the sefirot...
hence the matisyahu expression:
   king without a crown...
                         one example of a "magic" square
later dictated into a 9 x 9 newspaper puzzle?
      2     9     4
      7     5     3
      6     1     8     (up down across = 15...
my date of birth? 15th may 1986,
no coincidence, just stating an oblivion's
worth of a "point)... 15 x 3 = 45...
   and that's about as significant as any
                               insignificance can be...

album of choice?
    old horn tooth - from the ghost grey depths...

and without even associating the arabs
to the hebrai practice of gamatria,
i once inquired an old pakistani (who tried to convert me)
what: Alif, Lam, Meem
implied in the opening of the al-baqarah sutra
implied?
   he replied: god knew...
        so i thought, you don't know what
alif (letter) what lam (letter) and meem (also a letter)
means? you have to search for god
for the answers? good look making me into
a proselyte... mind you:
if the jews abhor proselytes,
while the muslims are so so oh so *******
welcoming... isn't that a tad bit suspicious?
how can a muslim convert me
when he can't explain to me what
alif lam and meem implies at the opening
of al-baqarah?!
            let's play some hijāʾī order game...
and the three letters...
       28 letters in total...
alif (28), lam (6), meem (5)...
    i'm not even going to go into the gamatria
mental gymnsastics related to any
"significance"...
   point was made upon the question being
asked... if a muslim tries to covert you...
and he can't explain to you
the significance of alif lam meem at the beginning
of al-baqarah... they're letters...
well... how is he going to explain to you
what's bothersome about those letters
to begin with? ALM... does that imply: zakat?!
to give alms? zakat being one of the pillars
of islam?
  **** me... i haven't even converted
and it would appear: i know more than the person
who tried to convert me!

.i. Yuri Gagarin and the yo-yo

if ever the potency of a "keyboard crusader"
existed, it's now -
   i can dangle a mouse above a bear-trap
and tell an elephant of a phobia concerning
mice any day of the week,
          when in fact i'm talking about
a mousetrap: nothing more.
     hence the exaggeration in the imagery
comparison:
        or it begins with a story told in the 20th
century:
             when women put down their mascara
brushes, men put down their swords:
never mind the voice in the wilderness:
       mind the voice in the crowd -
there's absolutely no reason to speculate
urbanity and tribal environments without
addressing, or regressing the crowd,
or as i like to call it: what Nietzsche said,
minus the Wake... but now inclusive of the wake
and the Bacchus cult of fun fun fun.
            the Wake in condor terms?
we congregate praying for something to die...
      i don't pretend to be whatever
that sachet of concrete-Cartesian labels entitles me
too:        for the most part
        people say 'i am' without a thought to
govern the rain shaman telling you what thought
is required to 'be', oh, a very old ontological
stipend: you need people to experience a collectivisation,
a herding, a "bound together" sort of mentality
before the critic arrives and says: well, that's not
what i'm really about.
                    a bit like the **** firs, mouth second
debacle...
                but what heart they had, our predecessors!
what heart!
             they'd wage war over a woman,
a Helen,
                  would you wage a war against
the feminist version of Helen these days?
would you pluck a Scottish thistle over an English rose?
      true: you might be a bishop
and of lesser rank... but would you wage a war
over the women of these days?
my **** is in a pickle jar anyway! we have become
a *** of a species unburdened by an obligation...
             finally! we can become eternal bachelors
sort of ******* that we're here, and hear less and less
of sayings about the "things that matter".
            you know what vile? really really vile?
oh i know my contemporaries when i bother to
hear them talk, oddly enough never bother when they
think, i'm quiet content with a Godot stage of
a park bench and an old man as my company,
      i know Douglas Murray,
               i know the wild-eyed Icke,
but a thing that concerns me is why: the safety room
parallel to the leftist thesis of offensive speech
was put in play when a discussion took off
concerning feminism, between milo yiannopoulus
and julie bindel - that's like saying:
ask a pederast to talk for a heterosexual man
with a woman safe-space...
                                no one wants to hear
the heterosexual side of the argument....
  you'll sooner see heterosexual intellects have their
marriages come undone then get paired with either
side of the argument...
     little richard is in the pickle jar anyway,
and he's not coming out...
                it's a bit like ****** for dummies....
       hence i have to succumb to violence without
the glory, tongue waggling blah blah
when i'd gladly take a weapon and shove it into
a shattered cranium bone: had i the ****** chance to
do so!
           no heterosexual is taken seriously:
and won't be:
    of a woman to be like a rosy cushion on which
i can lay my head after the darkly toils of
    roofing, or laying bricks, or excavating the sewers...
no! let the Chinese do that:
the basic argument of slavery, although imported
therefore ****** ******* fine.
                         cryogenic fathers,
      pickled *****:      where's the middle in all of this?
     a coconut just fell from the Boddhi tree:
money!           and those that defend it,
don't know squat about the tribalism of squatters!
but hey! they have the ****** stage!
         i have a bench when someone approaches me
and talk, doing the best thing possible:
               knitting opinions -
i don't want the truth of opinions: i want a sweater,
or a pair of socks! that's metaphor for something
different altogether.
  keyboard crusader? really? can i ask you for
directions to the high street, in every single town
across the country? i can't find one!
         no one hears a heterosexual argument
on the various topics: because there isn't one -
                     as of the end of the 20th century,
working classes in the west striving to ensure
there is something mundane to do during the day
and kick back with the family in the evening
are the "inferior" neanderthals: who
haven't jacked into discovering a 3D reality
of what's otherwise a 2D computer screen and
aren't hooked on #crack;
honestly, so much debating ought to be opera,
and so much opera ought to be debating -
    ah: that famous tingle of utopian paradoxes
never in duality, but always in dichotomy.
   keyboard crusader?
really? i thought people were always moaning
about how many emails they receive:
   and never a single postcard from, say,
someplace like Venice?
           it's still early days,
                   and already we're brewing enough
cliches to replace all known nouns in
    the surrogate mother that's the dictionary
of our completed version of a soul -
if ever to be experienced upon meeting the omni-vocabulary;
jigsaws, i know my idiosyncratic version
of events, he says photosynthesis within parameters
                            of photon deconstruction of hydrogen;
'cos' it's sub; d'uh! i say god i say this perfected
version of nearing telepathy - you say god i hope you
don't mean satan's clause - great anagram to frighten
children with: the Babushka surprise of a Pumpkin head
laughing it's way toward: how easy life would be
if we had all that time to think it through as being hard,
rather than that mortal fleetingness in both thought
and body.

ii. Macbeth

it really dawned on me, when i was watching the film
Macbeth (2015) -
            there was an eeriness to it, a near perfection
of Shakespeare on screen...
           honestly? i'd rather read Kant early on in life
while i have the vigour, and leave old age to Shakespeare...
but it truly was eerie all over the place.
      i do recall seeing Romeo + Juliet
          and reading the script, and imagining the fallacy
of word for word translation from theatre to cinema
of the script: the narrator a news channel anchor,
and everything said, word, for, word.
that film with DiCaprio as Romeo and Claire Danes
as Juliet - it just felt itchy, uncomfortable -
                            Shakespeare, word for word, on screen?!
     (surprise, then astonishment, not !? or astonishment,
   then the surprise, because: it didn't really work);
and it didn't! you can't adapt Shakespeare to the screen
and put everything in! i noticed it at that ******
generous scene in Macbeth concerning the battle
of Ellon... so i was like like... this isn't typescript...
(and thank **** it isn't) -
you can't depict Shakespeare word for word,
to be honest, Macbeth (2015) is the only worthy
translation of Macbeth (the text) into Macbeth (the movie);
all this scientific exactness in previous examples
like Romeo + Juliet, the Merchant of Venice
and a Midsummer's Night Dream don't work,
it's their precision making,
     a theatre cast can take it, but a cinema going crowd,
with all these cutting and copying and repasting
    succinct moments? it doesn't work!
maybe because there's no actual narrator in the staged
examples? narrator as a necessary character understudy:
surely Puck and the news anchor are there:
don't know about the Shylock scenario...
           but these screen adaptations didn't work for me,
too rigid, too formal... in the case of Macbeth?
finally! the long awaited piquant version of Shakespeare:
all that matters, and the rest is thrown into
poetic technique: imagery, metaphor,
                everything that's necessary can be given grammar
as image and not word!
       want an example? from the text...
the Royal Shakespeare
  from the text of Professor Delius
  and introduction by f. j. Furnivall, ll.d.
         vol. v (special edition)
Cassell & Company, Ltd.

        sure, it feels like a Roman Polanski moment
akin to the 9th Gate scenic affair of a bibliophile
fetishist, and it is:

     ... (the only enemy of enso poetry
is the bladder) ...

well the screen play first:

banquo: what are these?
macbeth: live you? or are you aught
                          that man may question?
       speak if you can - what are you?
1st witch: macbeth! hail to thee
                    thane of Glamis!
2nd witch: macbeth... hail to thee,
       thane of Cawdor!
3rd witch: all hail Macbeth! that shalt be king in-after.

but such disparity, such **** as if once
of Lucretia, then of the authority,
for i have before me the original composition:
which is not worth cinema -
nonetheless, a **** takes place:
an assortment for the abdication of a king:
or as ever suggested: the wrong footed path:
never was tossing a coin in a gamble
that of tossing a crown into the air
for a court jester to appear less amusing
and more scolding.

act i, scene iii: post the battle of ellon...
  if ever the refusal to give up Greek myth,
then Macbeth's witches
      and Perseus' Graeae -
                            or naturalise a myth:
like you might not naturalise a strengthened
economy.... canonise the nation
with Elgin Marbles - Elgin: less than
what's said to be the exfoliation of the Aegean -
a municipality somewhere in Scotland:
west of Aberdeen, on the Northern Sea's
battering of the coast...
but word for word? or how to write Shakespeare
into cinema?
                 herr zensor must come into play -
you have to bypass imagery in poetic tongue
and relay it with actual images, a direly needed
necessity:

just after the three witches arrive,
enter Macbeth and Bonquo...

   Macb. so foul and fair a day i have not seen.
Ban. how far is't call'd to Fores? - what are these,
     so wither'd and so wild in their attire,
that look not like th' inhabitants o' the earth,
   and yet are on 't?
             live you? or are you aught that man may
question?

                  (how word for word, but the words
waggle from a different tongue, namely that of
Macbeth, and not that of Banquo, hence
italicised).
                   continuing:
       you seem to understand me,
by each at once her choppy finger laying upon her
skinny lips: - you should be women, and yet your
beards forbid me to interpret that you are so.
Macb. speak, if you can - what are you?
         the witches. all hail, Macbeth!
     hail to thee, thane of Glamis!
         all hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, thane
of Cawdor!
         all hail, Macbeth! that shalt be king hereafter.
            
so does he really belong on the psychoanalytic
couch? is he really that necessarily wonton of talk?
  Cawdor v. Gondor - it's an ongoing narrative.
but is he in need of a couch?
                 what sort of talk is talk when
in fact the only talk that's need to be said is the talk
of man's sexualised naturalisation for strife,
and here: as if knocking on a door:
you want to simply hear the onomatopoeia of
the Kabbalah in a woman gasping for breath
while puny Jewish boys under strict rabbinical
studies study?

                mama, take this badge from  me,
i can't use it, anymore,
            it's getting dark, too dark to see,
feels like i'm knockin' on heaven's door -
      my big mouth and man as a piston
                                               Ferrari acrobat


(even the soundtrack is a shrill, a strangulation
variant of higher pitch of the bagpipes -
not that braveheart ****** of whisking out
a song like for the love of a princess addition to:
  and can i have a madonna to boot too?
it's piercing, a whale sonar above refrigerator
white noise hum for the new age Buddha -
and that's because all the poetry has been excavated
  to suit cinema: not theatre).

and this is the first adaptation of Shakespeare i actually
could stomach...
     the genius was in how Macbeth spoke the lines
of Bonqua - so the character didn't start smacking
the narrative ****** in terms of solipsism:
even Shakespeare can be attacked on this front...
        if in the movie Banqua said all that was in
the typescript: the film wouldn't have worked...
i don't know what the big deal is with Lady Macbeth:
i thought that in the olden days
Macbeth suggested to King Duncan that:
can i leave the warring if you **** my wife?
i can go on the contract that you **** my wife
and i stop serving you?
      first impressions: strange English.
well, i'm sure she's important as it might be said:
within the programme of Orthodoxy,
            but never catholic (metadoxy) tradition of
saying: way hey! ensnare the mare in a funfair!
       and play the game: pin the tale on the donkey!
heads or tails?      it looks pretty damnable
     in the first place: as all honesty hogs to pout and
***** a hoggish sneeze out of the story.

iii. shaken, not stirred

and indeed, how many a times
did not a neon blossom sprout,
thinking it might rattle an oratory
with an oak in autumn, and behold
a swarm of leaves descend -
not out of passing ease,
but out of wishful thinking
that some indentation might be made:
with whom the hands of will reside,
and yet: to no gratifying effect,
to whatever atomic-centralisation
dream, be that ego or be it hydrogen
(lending hands: so too
electric or thus negative, neutral and
thus proto) - shake foundation
and give a revising repertoire of
              the covering dust humanity
that once made famous: never
again to learn the humility of the start;
        to whatever centric dream that
does not waver in demands of orientation,
be it father (sun), son (shadow)
  or the holy spirit (night) -
  make them earn! be obscure!
            or simply say: in the community
of the stated congregation:
  i find all to be as night,
   and safer that plague the father:
  i am not akin to the shadow:
                   but the shadow in mirror.
so, a centric dream that does not
waver in demands for orientation,
has ever or will be enthroned in man's
heart as the stability of Sabbath's demands
       for less, oh so much less to agitate with!
as too, when the ancient appliances
were adorned by countless demands of
mimic, so too our modern
fibbles are to stage a usurping of
such things demanded and their mimic;
for with such disclosure does all fate
of anewed become burdened in what
history could be: shaken,
rather than simply a stirring of the void,
nothing more than the unburdening
of sweetening a cup of coffee, of that and
the layers: or bitter at the top, drank
through toward the sedimented sweetness -
and all that: hoping i could have retained
that silver spoon lodged in my ***
          when i first met her and thought about
consolidating marriage: so fresh, eager prune
of the flesh embodiment as first
    watered ash, then entombed in marble
and the eternal... ah
               but it was all just the faintest of dreams;
so lumberjack sleep ensued,
                      as did a kindred worth ethic:
we are a long way from Eden...
      there is but the idyll of the absurd fruition of
albreit macht frei... or a redefinement of
such stakes as: what occupies our days?
                    if not war, if not disease,
if not the Chinese... what does, occupy our days?
Kurt Philip Behm May 2024
The coach signaled timeout and called the team to the sidelines.  There were eight minutes left in the biggest game of their lives, and they would be playing for three minutes with a severe disadvantage.  They had committed a succession of penalties within a span of less than 60 seconds, and they would now be playing without three men on the field.  In lacrosse this is referred to as ‘Man Down.’  

Usually it’s only ‘One Man Down,’ or at the most, ‘Two Men Down,’ but few watching that day had ever seen a team go ‘Three Men Down.’  This meant that their star goalie T.J. Braxton was only going to have three defenders in front of him instead of the usual six.

T.J. had been playing great, but he now had to play for two minutes with three men missing in front of him and then the third minute still missing one. It was going to seem like an eternity.  The coach looked over at T.J. and he was standing off to the side by himself not wanting to either look or talk to anyone during the intermission.  The coach understood this behavior because he had been a goalie himself and decided to leave T.J. alone — totally immersed within his own thoughts.

As they did the cheer to break the huddle, it was for their goalie …”1, 2, 3, Go T.J.”  What would happen now brought more pressure than any goalie should ever have to withstand.  Even going just ‘One Man Down’ would in many cases result in a goal for the other team.  Going ‘Two Men Down’ almost ensures the other team a goal, and anything beyond that just puts your goalie at the mercy of the shooters on the other team.

    And Tonight There Would Be No Mercy To Be Found

T.J. already had 18 saves up to this point with only half a quarter left to play in regulation. Saves are when a goalie either blocks or deflects an offensive shot from the other team. He had only let in three goals all game, and the score was tied at 3-3.  

Pennhurst was a powerful public school with large and fast athletes.  They had not been playing lacrosse as long as T.J.’s private (all-boys) school, Haverland Academy, but their natural athletic ability and inner toughness were making up for any experience lost.  

T.J. would have to defend his goal missing three men in front of him for two minutes and then missing one man for the next sixty seconds.  It was his team’s possession coming out of the timeout, and it was all they could do being so shorthanded to even get the ball across the mid-field line.  The coach’s tactic was not to shoot the ball now but to stall and to try and take as much time off the clock as they could until they could get more players back on the field.  T.J. stood rock solid in the center of the ‘crease’ in front of his goal and looked squarely at the goalie at the other end of the field. The ‘crease’ was the large circle surrounding the goal that no offensive player from the other team could enter. He seemed to not be following the ball and his coach wondered what was going on inside his head.

Playing goalie is 80% mental, and he was hoping his star goalie wasn’t going to have a melt down when his team needed him the most.  T.J. would normally be very active inside his own goal shouting instructions to the defensemen in front of him and trying to best position them for the oncoming attack.    

               Something ‘Seemed’ Different Tonight

T.J. had entered a new zone, one that he had never been in before, and one that only he could understand.  As Haverland’s lead attackman charged the opposing goal, the ball fell out of his stick. It was immediately picked up by the opposing goalie and ‘cleared’ to a midfielder standing outside and to his left.  The midfielder made one more pass to an attackman, and the ball was coming T.J.’s way with only three defenders in front of him to help stop the charge. The ball was again passed to one of their senior captains and their strongest midfielder.  

He juked left as he faked a pass and then as he cradled the ball wildly, he headed straight toward T.J. in the goal.  When he got within fifteen feet of the goal he stopped, set his feet, and with a violent and twisting motion fired an overhand shot across his right shoulder at the ground two feet in front of where T.J. now stood.

T.J. was now eighteen and a half and had been playing goalie since he was seven years old.  He had seen and defended almost every kind of shot and from every angle in those eleven years. He had just never had to do it before with almost no defense in front of him.  As the shot left the midfielders stick, T.J. reacted.  He took two steps forward and was able to scoop the ball out of the air at ankle height before it was able to bounce off the ground. Bounce shots were more difficult to save, and his accumulated instinct and experience allowed him to get this one and at least for now keep the score tied at 3-3.

T.J. ran behind his own goal toward the end line. With the ball in his stick he was trying to take time off the clock.  Only one opposing player chased him, and he was able to do a 180-degree spin, avoid that player, and run back out in front of his goal.  He then cleared the ball, the entire length of the field, to a midfielder standing in the far left corner.  T.J.’s team had the ball within thirty feet of the opposing goal with only two minutes left to run in penalty time.

T.J.’s offense decided it was time to step up and play big.  They managed to take a full minute off the clock with uncanny passing until the referee finally called stalling and gave the ball back to the other side.

As the ball came back in T.J’s direction, two of his penalized players retook the field.  They were now playing with only a ‘one man down’ disadvantage and for only sixty more seconds.

The opposing team set up in a perimeter in front of his goal passing the ball from man to man and then behind T.J.’s goal in an attempt to unbalance a still weakened defense.  As the ball went behind the net, T.J. rotated inside the crease never taking his eye off the ball.  He thought they were setting him up for something sneaky because his fundamental blocking skills on normal shots were so strong. More than anything he didn’t want to give up a cheap goal, and he wouldn’t have to wait long to find out that his suspicions had been correct.

As they passed the ball back and forth behind his goal, an attackman turned and tried to lob the ball over the back of the goal, and T.J.’s stick, to an opposing midfielder who was charging the front of the goal from about twenty-five-feet away.  They were hoping to catch T.J. mesmerized in what was going on behind the net and then reverse field and go in the one direction no one ever expected — over the back of the goal.  

It didn’t work!  As the ball left the midfielders stick, T.J. jumped high in the air and intercepted the pass in the shooting strings of his goalie stick.  He then spun around and ran directly to the out of bounds line to his right. It was beyond the defensive box, and he stood there waiting for someone to challenge him.  He was again trying to take precious seconds off the clock to get his team back to full strength. Although a goalie, T.J. was the fastest player on his team and that speed was like money in the bank to a team that was struggling and in trouble with time running out.

He managed to get the penalty down to twenty two seconds before he finally dished the ball off to another long stick defender and then quickly moved back in front of his goal.  That defensemen got across midfield just before another penalty would have occurred for not advancing the ball.  With only seventeen seconds left on the penalty, the offense passed the ball to the four corners looking for a man who was ‘hot’ (open) who could take the shot and finally break the tie.  With only three seconds left in the penalty their best attackman, John Erasmus, took the ball in his stick and with his left hand fired a side angle shot at the right side of the goal.  It was a great shot, but their goalie made a heroic save. He was also a senior and had transferred into Pennhurst two years ago from a Lacrosse powerhouse school in northern Maryland.

With both teams now at full strength, the ball went back and forth for the final five minutes with very few shots taken at either end.  The ones that were taken were weak and from great distance, and both goalies easily picked them up and started the ball going the other way.  Each shot was critical now because the game was tied with time running out.  Possession was more important than losing the ball to the other team by taking a poor shot.  As the lights shone brightly high above the scoreboard, time ran out in regulation.  The game would now go to sudden death overtime, and it would become about the strength of the face-off men and how hot each goalie was going to be.

    It Was Now About The Face-Off Man And The Goalies

In sudden death, the first team to score wins!  No second chances here it’s do or die time, and everything is amped up to an entirely new level.  Many times, the winner of the face off at midfield wins the game because everything is geared towards that one shot, and the pressure on the opposing goalie is tremendous.  Unless the goalie can isolate himself in a ‘zone of invincibility,’ the chances of blocking a shot in overtime due to a lost face off are not very good.  Just like in the NFL, where the coin toss often determines the winner in overtime, the face-off is like that coin toss only with skill and not luck determining the winner.  T.J. thought back to all the coaches and mentors that had brought him to where he was standing tonight.  They were all somewhere up in the stands, and they were all living and dying with him tonight in the goal.

      T.J. Decided That Tonight It Would Be About Life

The Captains met at the middle of the field as the referee explained the rules of sudden death.  All who were listening thought that the term was aptly named.  They shook hands again and ran back to the huddles on their respective sidelines.  Both coaches gave their overtime strategies to their teams, and they did one more cheer before retaking the field.  Both face off men walked slowly toward each other at the center mid-field line and stared each other directly in the eye.  

The physical disparity between the two players at mid-field was huge.  Haverland’s best face off man, George Arle, was 5’6’’ tall and 160 lbs. Pennhurst’s face off man, B.J. Radford, had been an All-State quarterback on the football team and was 6’3’’ and 225 lbs.  Although Lacrosse was not his primary sport,  he had played it for the last four years and by anyone’s account he was a ‘stud player.’  The skill in taking face offs is unlike any other in Lacrosse.  It’s more similar to recovering a fumble in football or picking up a loose five-dollar bill dropped on the floor in Penn Station in New York.  It’s uncontrolled mayhem with the skill to do it only evident to those who have been there. And it’s those players who know painfully well what it takes to win the fight for the ball.

Although T.J.’s face off man George had had a good season, he always struggled against players that were that much bigger than him and usually lost the ball.  The ref. positioned the ball between the two boys sticks who were both crouched down and ready at mid-field.  The whistle blew, and George lost the ball as B.J. picked it up and charged right over George’s left shoulder.  He was headed in a straight line right toward T.J. who was standing fixed and ready in front of his goal.  B.J. passed the ball to a midfielder who kept it only a second before passing it to an attackman who was off to the right of the goal.  The attackman looked to his left and faked a pass to his right.  He then spun around and with all his might fired a bounce shot on an angle from the right facing side of Haverland’s goal.  

T.J. stepped forward, scooped the ball up on the first bounce, and in one fluid motion flipped the ball out to a defenseman on the left perimeter. This player cradled it inside his long stick as he took off down the sideline and across midfield.  The defenseman made a pass to a middie on the extreme other side of the field who then passed to an attackman. This man ran around behind the net and came out on the other side in front of the goal, shot the ball, but it went wide right.  The other team was closest to the ball when it went out of bounds, so it was Pennhurst’s possession, and it was coming back T.J.’s way.

Their goalie cleared the ball left to a long stick defenseman, who in turn made a long pass directly to an attackman, and the ball was once again in the oppositions stick less than thirty feet from the goal T.J. was defending.  This attackman had no intention of passing.  He put his head down and charged straight ahead toward T.J.  As his coach was screaming at him to pass, and it the midst of five defensive players, he fired off a shot.  It came at a side angle, and, with all of the players surrounding the shooter, it was hard for T.J. to see the ball come off the kid’s stick.  

When T.J. finally did see the ball, it had passed the head of his stick, and he was just able to get a piece of the ball with the bottom of his shaft. It was just enough to deflect the ball upwards and over the goal and into the chain link fence fifty feet behind the crease.  On instinct alone, T.J. ran after the ball and being closest to it when it went out of bounds, he picked it up in his stick and slowly walked forward. This gave his midfielders time to transition back up to the other end of the field.

T.J. was living on borrowed time.  Making one save in overtime was huge, but making two, and one with only the shaft of his stick to save it all, was stretching the limits of whatever luck the team had left.  T.J. easily passed the ball to an unguarded defenseman who ‘walked’ the ball up-field and then tossed it to a midfielder just in front of the offensive box.  

The offensive box is the restrained and shorter ‘boxed-out’ area right in front of the goalie and where most shots are taken, and most goals are scored. The midfielder made a pass to his left to an attackman, who tried to make a long looping pass across the face of the box, but it was intercepted by one of the oppositions long stick middies and passed quickly to another midfielder as it transitioned back again towards T.J. This time the ball was coming straight at T.J., and it had taken less than five seconds to get there.  His team was not set yet and this charge could be the end of it all.

T.J.’s team had been caught napping in an uncharacteristic moment of uncertainty.  Pennhurst’s top midfielder again had the ball, and he was charging at T.J. who had only two players set and not the normal six in front of him to play defense.

Surprisingly to T.J., this player then made a pass to the extreme right corner and that attackman ran behind T.J.’s goal giving his defense more time to reset.  This player then made a pass to the left side, and it was once again in the stick of their best midfielder, Matt Makritis.  Midfielders, or Middies, as they’re often called are many times the best athletes on the team.  They have to play both offense and defense and run the entire length of the field while their shift is on. Makritis was a high school All-American, and he was charging at full speed toward the left front facing side of T.J.’s goal.

                       T.J. Was An All-American Too!

T.J. was also an All-American and had recently been on the front cover of ‘Inside Lacrosse Magazine’ and featured as the #1 player coming out of High School Lacrosse that year.  He thought to himself that all of that press would be meaningless if he allowed this shot to go in.  The opposing midfielder continued toward the crease unguarded, got within ten feet of the goal, and fired point blank at T.J.  No fancy bounce shots or behind the back this time.  This shot was straight at T.J.’s head, and from less than ten feet away. T.J. caught the ball in the fat part of his goalie sticks net.  It didn’t stay there though.  The power of the shot caused it to come out of his stick, in what is referred to as a rebound, as it rolled ten or twelve feet out in front of the goal.

A second midfielder then picked up the ball, and not lifting it from the ground, fired a shot right back at T.J. This was more like a golf shot than a lacrosse shot, and T.J. struggled to see from which direction the ball was coming.  As the ball came back at T.J. at a severe angle, headed toward the left backside of the net, he stretched his body out like a goalie in the NHL.  Doing a full split in front of the net, he was able to get a piece of the ball with his right cleat and deflect the ball off to the left side of the goal. As the ball rolled harmlessly toward the far side of the endline, the referee blew his whistle.  The first three-minute overtime period had ended.

    They Had Survived Sudden Death For Three Minutes

Both teams huddled tightly with their coaches and trainers.  This time though, T.J. didn’t leave the crease at all.  He was leaning against the goal with his back turned to the field. It was almost as if he was talking to someone you couldn’t see and totally immersed in a world of his own.  There are several times in a man’s life that define and underline not only who he is, but who he will then become.  This was one of those times for T.J.

                                 And He Knew It

Both teams wearily took the field.  The pressure of an extremely tight game, and then surviving one overtime period, had taken its toll.  As the face-off men bent low and readied for the ball, T.J.’s back was still facing the field.  When he heard the whistle blow he spun around and it was like someone twice his 6’2’’ size was playing goalie.  He seemed to fill the entire net with his presence and there was an ‘aura’ coming from him that surrounded the entire defensive end of the field.

Once again, George lost the face off to the All-State quarterback and star midfielder, B.J. Radford.  This time however, the look on B.J.’s face was different.  Although fairly new to Lacrosse, inside his chest beat the heart of a champion.  He almost stepped on George as he picked up the ball and headed straight over the mid-field line and directly at T.J.  This senior captain had no intention of passing, and he was going to ‘ice’ the game for his teammates and fans.  B.J. was not known as a great shooter but more for his defensive skills. He was a great athlete though, and this charge was not to be taken lightly by anyone on the defensive end of the field.  

                 B.J. Knew This Was His Moment

Without stopping or setting his feet, he raised his stick above his head and shot the ball toward the right corner of the net at over ninety miles an hour.  T.J. saw this one all the way and caught the ball in his stick.  He then ran out of the goal and passed B.J. who was still coming his way as he charged past him and headed straight down the field.  T.J. was out of the defensive box and headed toward the mid-field line.  He was looking at nothing in front of him except the opposing goalie who was now staring at him with an incredulous look on his face inside the opposing crease.

Everyone there that night had their mouth’s open in awe.  No one expected the goalie to ever make the final break, and no one watching had ever seen a goalie possessed with such speed.  The other team was in awe too and just kept watching him run. They were all guarding open men who they were sure T.J. would eventually pass the ball to.

                                  He Didn’t Pass

When he crossed the midfield line, the fans went wild and stood up.  One of his midfielders had the presence of mind to stay back behind the midfield line so that an offsides wouldn’t be called.  In Lacrosse, you always need at least three men back plus the goalie in the defensive end.  Once T.J. crossed midfield, one of the midfielders had to stay back.

T.J. approached the offensive box in front of their goalie with only one thing on his mind.  He had been acutely watching this kid all day and he had noticed one thing.  This was a fundamentally sound and ‘play up’ goalie and one would who would rise to the occasion when the heat was on.  He had transferred into Pennhurst only two years ago and based on his great skill, he had gotten them this far.  He had one weakness though that T.J. had observed — he couldn’t handle the off-speed shots, especially over his left shoulder.

The left shoulder is opposite the goalie stick’s head if you’re right handed. In his case, the only weakness that T.J. had seen,
other than his struggle with off-speed shots, were those directed high up and left.  Like a changeup in baseball, the off-speed shot often confused the goalie’s timing and could cause him to over or under react at just the right time.  T.J. continued to charge the goal.

By this time, two defensemen from Pennhurst were running from both sides to get to T.J. before he could shoot, but his speed was too much.  As he approached the crease from the right side, he raised his stick above his head.  He threw his lower right elbow at the goalie as if executing a shot.  His stick-head never moved, but the goalie bit on the fake.  He waved the head of his stick high right and then easily lobbed the ball over the Pennhurst goalie’s left shoulder.  The referee blew the whistle — the game was over —and T.J.’s team had finally won.

The other goalie dropped to his knees and then put both hands on the ground in front of him.  T.J. went over and picked him up saying: “You may have lost on the scoreboard tonight, but you never gave up. I’m proud to have played against you.”

Haverland had just won the State Championship, and most watching said it was the greatest goalie performance at any level that they had ever seen.  T.J. was voted ‘Most Valuable Player’ of the game. In the fall, he would be off to a top 10 Lacrosse University where he would major in Criminal Justice and take his goalie skills to an even higher level.

T.J.’s coach told him after the game that you can play lacrosse for your entire lifetime and never be able to play or recreate what you just did.  His future college coach, who had been in the stands watching, came down on the field and put his arm around T.J. after the game and told him the same thing.  He went on to say: “T.J., I had my whole speech ready before you went into overtime.  I thought I might have to come down here and tell you that although you lost — you lost really well.

   T.J. Did Not Want To Believe That Losing Well Was Really Possible!

“You had made all those heroic saves throughout the game for your team, and if you had to lose, it would have been a great way to do it.  The only problem with my prepared speech is that you didn’t lose. As I watched you in the goal with your back turned to the field as the second overtime period started, I said to my assistant coach Dave, who’s over talking to your folks, that our new and future goalie is in a zone that few can ever get to.  He will not be scored on again tonight.  Tonight, and for however long this game lasts — he is truly invincible. And I don’t believe I’ve ever used that word to describe a player before.”

Many years passed and one day T.J got an email from his old high school coach.  The coach told him that once again his school, Haverland, would be playing for the State Championship and he wanted to run his pre-game speech by T.J. before his boys took the field.  It was short and to the point.  What he wanted to tell the boys was: “It wouldn’t be the number of players on the field but who those players were and what was coming from inside their hearts that would make all the difference.”  He then went on to tell the story of T.J. in the State Championship Game that took place over ten years before.  

Some of the boys had heard the story, but all were in awe listening to the emotion and passion in their coach’s voice as he retold the story again.  It was like replaying that game with the current Haverland players and right before the most important game that most of them would ever play.  

Haverland won the State Championship again that day and many of the boys said that it was the pre-game speech about T.J. and his team’s overtime victory that fueled their desire and commitment to make it happen.  It was also a close game, and with two minutes to go the score was again tied. Five times during the game they had gone ‘one-man’ down but had only allowed one goal to be scored during those five uneven possessions by the other team.  Haverland was then able to strip the ball from their opponent twice in the final two minutes and convert both into scores — ending the game at 7-5.

Along a lonely hallway in the back of Haverland’s new athletic center hangs a plaque with the story of that night so many years ago.  But to T.J., and all the members of that legendary team, the thing that hangs highest — is their refusal to lose.

The possibility of being invincible would stay inside T.J. and all who were there to watch him play that night. He learned that at the end of the streak where luck ends, sometimes you have to enter that zone …

                                 And Just ‘Will It’ To Happen.
Enough with the stains.
You're offensive, period.
Born with half a brain.

Logic trumps feelings?
Men are better. Then, women.
Drowning in being.

Can't control themselves,
shopping for trinkets and toys,
crap to fill the shelves.

Desperate for love.
Insecure, pathetic things.
Who do I speak of?
This is a concept piece. A series of 4 provocative haiku, meant to make you think.
Designed to be difficult for men to read aloud without sounding like an *******.
Without careful attention to punctuation, some lines are misinterpretation-bound:
for example, "Your offensive period" and "men are better than women".
My intent was to suggest disrespect to women, though men are the real target here.
Dedicated to ******* misogynists, who are more insecure than women ever could be.
howard brace Sep 2012
He'd been conceived in Flamborough, so his little sister assured him some eleven summers ago, which was a tad hard for Rocky to swallow, she was a whole eighteen months his junior and then some... and at that age, well... what did she know, she was only a kid, "on this very rock" River insisted, kicking her heels in delight, "next to this very rock pool" they were both sitting beside, "one sunny afternoon eleven years ago..." and that was how he came by the name of Rocky... she taunted as the rest of the colourful story unfolded... and that she had it all on the best possible authority... although the more she thought about it, had she meant concealed... she wasn't quite sure now, it was all so very confusing at her tender age but thought it sounded close enough not to matter too much and that she would just wait and see which way the wind blew.
        
     It was conceivably an ill wind that blew no one any good that day, especially if you were a boy and just happened to be sat by a rock pool next to your little sister...  Having just taken a well earned drink from a neighbouring rock pool, Sockeye the floppiest Springer Spaniel this side of the Pecos decided that he was going to dig a hole and that he would be digging it deep, then changed his mind mid-dig and decided to have a more down to earth back scratching wriggle instead... then promptly flopped over and slid into the hole... life was sweet.  Now covered from nose to tail with every species of deceased shore life usually found frequenting the high water mark Sockeye, in a blinding flash of canine inspiration judged it would be in everyone's best interest were he to have a really good shakedown which always appeared to go down well on these occasions... and give everyone a good peppering, just so they could see exactly what they'd been missing all their lives.  

     "A rock of all places, for goodness sakes..." and what's more, it was this rock, "Yuk..." he jumped up and wiped his palms on the back of his jeans in disgust, then onto his tee-shirt, then sat back down again and began exploring his left nostril in quiet contemplation before finally jambing his hands back into his pockets... what in Heaven's name had his parents been thinking of..? what on earth was his little sister talking about..? and more to the point, what in fact did conceived mean..?  these were the questions that were uppermost in Rocky's mind as he poked an exploratory stick into the rock pool...  a baby crab marooned by the tide scampered sideways beneath a large pebble and stuck one beady eye out at him... Rocky's sister, seemingly in a world of her own, much like the baby crab sat on the edge of the noteworthy rock kicking her heels, an innocent smile curled the corners of her mouth as she quietly hummed a little song of tuneful bliss to herself and considered what further mischief she could possibly pass her brother's way.

     Rocky tossed a piece of driftwood over his sisters shoulder at a nearby flock of seagulls, squabbling over what appeared to be a discarded bag of fish and chips... Sockeye, simply knowing that his little master wanted to play a game of fetch gambolled after the stick, his ears flying courageously in the still Summer air and burst, amid a melee of feathers into their midst, only to romp back moments later, the stick all but forgotten in the excitement but now proudly sporting the derelict bag of leftovers and the odd splash of guano, his tail lolloping magnificently from side to side... and for the moment at least, leaving the fratching seagulls wheeling noisily overhead and to go about their daily business without further interruption... as for Sockeye, it had been a no contest situation.

     After fourteen years of valiant endeavour his father... Red, so named for his vivid shock of wiry hair, was still engaged in man's eternal struggle to win his significant other half's approbation with the manful art of deck-chair assembly, beach barbeque and other significant gentlemanly pursuits, all while strutting his manly stuff, sporting top of the range beach wear in accordance with the social etiquette of the previous decade... his masculine paunch slumping gallantly atop his waistband...  

     After the same fourteen terms of domestic servitude and the same thirteen identically overlooked anniversary cards a certain someone had no intention of allowing another certain someone to forget so much as one of them... his better half, so she insisted would ride rough shod, administering her own brand of justice at every given opportunity, in much the same way you'd brandish a royal-flush on poker night... or better still, a loaded revolver... and that she personally carried the burden of every ill-fated card that Lady Luck had dealt strung about her neck like Adam's original sin on Judgement Day.  

     Red much preferred the shorter, more condensed name of Rock for his son, rather than the longer more protracted Rocky, as he struggled with the wood and canvas lounger badly trapping the mound of his thumb in the process, "Aaargh...!!!" plunging his throbbing hand deep into the cold, soothing rock-pool "aaah...!!!"   Still marooned by the tide, the baby crab stood poised and ready for action as it considered giving this latest intrusion a good offensive nip, then hang on spitefully as it gave Red the final withering once over with the same baleful eye it had successfully used earlier.

     Acknowledging her husbands misfortune with a perfunctory grunt as she rummaged in her beach-bag for the thermos, she refused to be drawn in where thumbs were concerned right now, after all with his DNA sequencing she was convinced he could probably grow a new one within the month... whilst Tina, well... she was just plain worn-out... but still rejoiced in telling anyone who cared to lend a sympathetic ear in her direction... and who in turn was more than happy to listen to the woes of others and went somewhere along the lines of... 'and had she heard any more of poor Mrs Dorey's lingering martyrdom recently..? you know, the downtrodden lady who lives in the next street but one... and how they would all miss her when she was gone... and how she couldn't wait...' and as rumour had it, neither could her husband...

      Feigning to be otherwise engaged, Tina... as her husband, now blowing frantically on his mangled thumb, stumbled backwards over the half erected lounger and with a spine jarring "Ooomph...!!!" landed squarely in Sockeye's subsiding earthworks... professed total disassociation with the entire fiasco as she plunged her nose even deeper into the overdue library book she'd purposely brought on holiday for just such an occasion, making it perfectly clear that she was a tourist and furthermore, planned to stick with the same itinerary once they returned home... and that while she was here, she did not under any circumstances wish to be disturbed, the notice was clearly displayed hanging from the door handle... but if anyone should, then whoever it was did so at their own peril... and she was keeping score... although a mangled thumb she luxuriated, with the same roguish smile curling the corners of her mouth as the one normally found playing around her daughter's... was equally as heart warming.

      All Tina wanted was one week of uninterrupted peace and quiet in Flamborough, preferably with a certain someone out from under her feet then spend what might pass for several undisturbed hours sitting quietly by the rock pool comparing notes on eye makeup and the feminine merits of pedicure with the little crab who, still marooned by the tide was now sat busily knitting four pairs of matching leg warmers in the cool, still water but that was only if that certain someone... a shrill  "AAaargh...!!!" somewhat more desperate than the first, ****** itself upon the as yet unaggressive afternoon as it gyrated across the warm Jurrasic rock and recoiled out to sea... "now where was I", twisting her book uppermost "oh yes..! someone was going to pay..." only now it was going to be sooner rather than later, but only if that certain someone didn't finish the seating arrangements before the Sun disappeared and drift into some backstreet tea-room before all the lemon cheesecake sold out, or was that she reflected, simply too much to ask.

     It was his Surname that Rock found so objectionable, or it had been right up until his little sister's enlightening disclosure, now it was both names Rocky disliked, it would have been far kinder had Rock Salmon been sandwiched between sliced bread and given to Sockeye... who's solemn duty, from the first mouthful to the very last, was to gaze up beseechingly from beneath the kitchen table  and devour anything that passed his way, even the postman had to be quick about his business or have his arm follow the mail through the letter box... then Sockeye would just smack his lips and help himself to seconds.  

     All Rocky's mum had thought about for the last fourteen years was seconds... every last solitary one of them since she'd suffered with an infection of matrimonial neurosis which had deprived her of common sense and her maiden name, from Chovey to that of Salmon and how with hindsight she should have taken an Aspirin instead, wedlock she asserted was everything the name claimed to be and was without doubt the worst move she'd ever made... and what's more was seen as a bad move in whoever's wedding album you just happened to be paying your condolences to.

     Rocky would never be so fortunate on that score, unlike his sister he was stuck with Salmon for good, his grandma-Ann by all accounts had been dead set against the union from word Go and saw his father as someone who would always be out of his depth in whatever rock pool he found himself in, swimming against the tide as it were, rather than going with the flow... and it appeared that Rocky, almost eleven years into a life sentence, was about to flounder in the same murky undertow as the rest of the Salmon family... only he couldn't swim.

     "There"! her husband exclaimed "all finished... better late than never eh', who fancies trying it"? his wife luxuriated over the words 'better late' and wondered whether her new earrings, her latest acquisition would complement formal mourning attire.  Red dusted off the palms of his hands with the certain knowledge of a job well done and cautiously took one step back, looking with justifiable pride at the outcome of his manly exertions of the last two hours, this was what holidays were all about he declared, one man pitted against insurmountable odds...  His wife meanwhile was getting to grips with more odds of her own than you could safely expect to shake a stick at... her husband being one of them.  

     Having gathered her offspring with the promise of verbal earache if they didn't... and finished packing the beach-bag, Tina finally located Sockeye peering out from the shade of an adjacent rock, wisps of feathers poked tellingly from the corners of his mouth, his tail beating mischievously on the shingle decided in one further blaze of canine brainstorming, as Tina attempted to slip his collar on that a game of tag would just about round the day off nicely... Tina then devoted the next ten minutes chasing him amid unrestrained salvo's of cheering from the rest of the family... then bid goodbye to the little crab who, still marooned by the tide waved a friendly pincer in return... and trusted that she wouldn't have too long to wait for the next rising tide back home, then she slid off the rock with a corrosive... "the deck-chair attendant would have shown you" she snapped "and don't forget the deposit when you take them back" then double checking that she landed squarely on his foot she marched past, her floral sun hat jammed resolutely on her head at what she considered a jaunty angle with her equally jaunty, angular children scrambling in hot pursuit, back in the direction of their lodgings.  

     "Woof "..? said a bewildered Sockeye, bringing everyone to an abrupt halt... and with paws the size of place-mats, he wasn't going anywhere he didn't want to... he hunkered down with a look of hurtful accusation on his face, "oh yes you are my lad"! said his mistress "I've met your sort before" and knew exactly where to place the toe of her dainty size-5 as Sockeye, digging his heals in even further created swathes of canine furrows up the beach, leaving her husband the unwitting holder and in sole possession of the overlooked guest-house keys... and somewhat resigned to clean up his own masculinity and dismantle the recently assembled, now redundant deck-chairs by himself... as for Tina, well... she'd had quite enough excitement for one day thank you very much.

     Morning register was always the worst he thought, as they trooped back along the shingle beach, Rocky making surprisingly good furrows of his own... but the rest of the class loved it and saw it as the highlight of each day... Rocky's form teacher, despite showing a brave face was always hard pressed to avoid bursting into hysterics every time she worked her way down the register to the letter 'S' and would attempt to bypass it altogether, jumping from 'R' to 'T' and just prayed that no one else had noticed, but it hadn't taken the class very long to point out her oversight and... "please Miss" they'd all chant "we haven't had Salmon all week" and while the rest of the class were having convulsive fits, Rocky would elbow the lad sat at the next desk in the ribs... and promptly get one hundred lines for his trouble... thank goodness it was school holidays.  Why couldn't they have been given respectable names like Seymour Legge, Rock wondered, who sat over by the window or perhaps the teachers pet, Anna Prentice or even, Robyn Banks at a pinch, but definitely not what they'd been given and certainly not Salmon, they were the most hilarious names he could imagine and if someone was looking down on them right now he thought... then they had a very unique sense of humour indeed and Rock said so... "why" his little sister asked sweetly, "what's wrong with River Salmon".

                                                      ­                         ...   ...   ...*

a work in progress*                                                        ­                                                              240­6
Mystery Man Jul 2014
The white man, can't say the word "*****". They say because its offensive, it's rude, but I know the real reason why. I know, because that's what I am; a ******. Born as a ******, lived as ******, I know why the white man can't say the word ******. They say that it makes no sense for the blacks to use this insulting, disgusting term for themselves, but only because they don't know the true meaning. We bear the name as a scar, as a reminder of what we fought, of what we were. We bear the name as a reminder of our ancestors, and their long hot days in the cotton fields, picking until their finger tips were raw with blood, whipped until their skin was indistinguishable from the raw fleshy pulp that was their aggravated flesh laced with the crimson nectar of their veins. We bear the name, to remind ourselves, that even amidst all this we lived. We fought our way through the darkness of the tunnel. We bear our scar, to remind us, to remind you, that we survived, that we are survivors. I bear the name, I bear the scar of a ******. That is why we call ourselves the name ******. It is our word of honor, our mark of surviving. The white man is not worthy enough to call me a ******.
CK Baker Jan 2017
Leg off the table
you red face recruit!
put on the offensive
and break down
the bolted door!
you are the soul saver
the peddle maker
the calibrator
with colored handbills
and front line
rhetoric

join the masquerade
in ivy league style!
politicking with
cunning guile
invisalign smile
blackened vile
bleeding the funnel
with gold plate omega
and crocodile shoes

get on stage
and dance you fool!
you are the headline maker
the pantomime juggler
the compromised closer
pull out that 5 page review
(bullet points only please)
and polish those weathered lines!

did you give it your all?
the door tags
and pleasantries
the tidings
and clippings
the irrevocable claims
and postured blames
all those impressionable basics
put to the test?

you know the call
(straight from
those cold academics)
the pie chart gurus
and contract killers
(complete with bone in finger)
whipping their
frenzied crew
in an all night
charade

old yellar
and the gatekeeper
sure seem amused
(sharpening their inquest
behind closed doors)
firing up the shiit storm
with those hostile priicks
and a slew
of insatiable
cures

there’s laughter from the back room
the dripping nose
and wavering hand
the cut white lines
and checkpoint tales
the pipeline romance
and lacking form
(of a basic essential
character!)

soundboard
and narratives
for logging time
slouching on the
steel case
over moot points
ready to play
the 3 weight
butter card
(if need be)

might I remind you
it’s only an inquiry
(with a slight hint of concern!)
surely no
malfeasance
or deception intended
so step back from
the melt down
and cut to the chase!

headlines to breadlines
penthouse to outhouse
those immoral pursuits
have taken their toll
(haven’t they?)
madman or rogue
(you take your pick)
for the scores
and tabulations
are final

shame on you
for the foul play
the bold hypocrisy
and order desk games
the back stabbing blames
and spurious names
just sign on the dotted line ~
this banter
is killing me
Susan Hunt Jul 2012
CHAPTER ONE: THE DEMISE OF A YOUNG GIRL SEPTEMBER 1975


I had not seen my father in over two years when he showed up at my mom and step dad's condo. He had a slick knack of disappearing when laws were broken and he was wanted for questioning. He had an even better ability to re-enter when the heat was off.

My father owned three nightclubs in Oklahoma City. His first was the Silver Sword, and then he opened The Red Slipper. After he met his second wife, they together, opened the Jade Club.

All were successful, but the Red Slipper had a reputation. On a rare occasion, my dad would take me with him to open up the place. At first, it scared me. It was so dark in there. But as the lights came on behind the bar, I fell in love with the atmosphere.

Bobby Orr’s hockey stick hung on the wall, along with an endearing note from F. Lee Bailey. At six years old, all I knew was that they were the objects that made my dad beam.

I learned to play pool by standing on a phone book. I watched the colorful smacking ***** bounce around the most beautiful color of green I had ever seen. Chalking the stick was a chore, but after nearly poking my eye out once, I soon caught on.

It was a struggle to climb up on a barstool, but it was worth the effort. I sat at the bar and had lunch: popcorn, pretzels, peanuts and Pepsi.

As I grew older, I saw less and less of him, until he became a stranger, drifting in every once in awhile.  Every few weeks or so, I would come home from school, and see his car in the driveway.

This always shot fear and excitement through me. The air of unpredictability always made me want to ***. Unfortunately, most of the time, we were locked out of the house for a few hours, so I would have to *** in the back yard or at the neighbors. We waited on the stairs for the front door to open. And it always did, by my mom. She usually looked satisfied and serene but other times, I saw dread and sadness on her face.

Ever since I could remember, my dad had been a string of disappointments for me with a few indescribable moments of pure enjoyment mixed in between He could be kind, funny and like a real dad sometimes, that was the dad I missed. I tried to hold onto those experiences, even though he was such a mean ******* most of the time. But mostly, I just didn't know him.

Their divorce became final around the summer of 1972, but that didn't stop my mom from loving him. I don't know why, but she chased him frequently, going out to bars with her friends, trying to get a glimpse of him, and maybe more.

The last time I’d seen my father had not been pleasant. When I was thirteen, he broke down the door to our apartment and went straight to my mother’s bedroom. The noises were terrifying. The screaming, and punching sounds were followed by my mother’s whimpering, begging, groveling.

"How dare you do this to me, Patsy!? And behind my back! You could have at least told me!"

My dad had bailed himself out of jail that night. She promised him she would never seek alimony or child support again. Her lawyer was wrong. It wasn’t worth getting killed over.  

Shortly after, he had to leave the state. It had something to do with a low-level mob deal involving an insurance fraud. Too bad, it involved burning a building with someone in it. My dad became nothing but a memory, which faded away over time.

**

Alcohol and tobacco were constants in my family, so when my older brother, Tim, started smoking at ten years old, I don't remember much protest from anyone. I was seven and when my sister Abby, turned ten the next year, she also started smoking.  All the older kids were smoking cigarettes. I wanted to be cool, so I puked and coughed as I practiced. By the time I was ten, I too, was inhaling properly.  Around that time, I was introduced to *** by my sister's boyfriend. It did help my mood, somewhat, but it wasn't enough.

By 1974, I was using drugs from my sister’s boyfriend. John was a true drugstore cowboy. At first, he committed burglaries, which were easy at the time. There were no sophisticated electronics to stop someone from cutting a hole in the roof of a pharmacy. It took only minutes to pry open the safe that contained the narcotics. Then it took maybe another minute to fill a pillowcase full of every variety of amphetamines, barbiturates, valiums, etc.

It wasn’t long before I graduated to using morphine, ******* and then overdosed on Demerol. My stepfather sent me to a treatment facility in Tulsa Oklahoma, about one hundred miles away from Oklahoma City. The Dillon treatment center didn’t accept clients under age of sixteen but made an exception with me. I was a walking-talking disastrous miracle...or a miraculously saved disaster.

They figured that since I was fourteen, the sooner the better to start my road to recovery. Apparently, they didn’t condone sneaking *** and valiums in to the facility. I was kicked out of Dillon after about a month.

I came back home and laid low. I went back to Hefner Jr. High and enrolled back into the ninth grade. I quietly picked up where I left off, going back into business with John. My job was to sell the safe stuff; valiums, seconols, white bennies, ***, etc.


Summer came; I turned fifteen and had developed a tendency to over test my wares. I overdosed and nearly died in the hospital several times, which had led to my current predicament. Nobody knew what to do with me.

In August, I entered the tenth grade...for two weeks. I was expelled, (you guessed it) for dealing drugs. I was on homebound teaching twice a week with little supervision. My mother worked, my step-dad, **** ,worked, and I was home all day. However, I was not just sitting idly around. I was into enterprise.

**

In September, I overdosed again. I was quickly killing myself and my mother didn’t know what to do to stop it. That is why what happened was not my mother’s fault. But it wasn’t my fault either.

I never figured out how he knew where we lived. My mother moved over at least fourteen times in between the time I was six and twelve years old. Yet, here he was, at our front door, with his undeniable ‘ah shucks’ charm. His modesty was convincing. His timing was incredible. My mother stood frozen, her mouth agape. **** took the lead. He placed himself between my mother and father.

“You must be Gary Don, my name is ****; I’m Patsy’s husband." **** had never met my dad, but he'd heard enough about him to surmise who was standing at the door.

"Um, yeah, I'm Gary Don, it's nice to meet you ****", he said; as he offered a friendly hand shake to ****.

"I hope I'm not interrupting you, I was just in Duncan with my parents and they suggested I stop by and talk with you before heading back west. It's about Susie....

"Yes, Patsy said you called yesterday. We weren't expecting you this soon, but it's no problem. Why don't you come in and tell us what your plans are? Patsy, honey, would you mind putting on a *** of coffee?”

This unfroze my mother and she scurried to the kitchen. I was still in shock at seeing my dad’s face. I retreated to the staircase, but poked my head around and caught him glance at me. I flew up to the landing. I could easily escape up the rest of the stairs to my bedroom.
I was small enough to remain hidden on the landing, and heard the conversation between my mother, my dad and ****. **** was the classiest, most even-tempered adult I had ever encountered. I wished I could stop hurting him and my mother.  

My mother sat down two cups of coffee on the dining room table where my dad and **** sat. As she retreated a few steps back into the kitchen, **** politely probed my dad. My dad had the right answer for every question.

He swore he was a completely different person. He had changed. He had no hard feelings, instead he was back to help. He was remorseful for being an absent father and he wanted to make things right. He was back for a reason. He had heard that I was in trouble with drugs and school and he felt guilty for that. He had the answer to my problems. He was so convincing, so….humble, almost shy.

As I listened, I began freaking out with fear and excitement. I always wanted my dad. The last time I tried to live with him, it didn’t work out; he sent me back to my mother’s after a month. Now my dad wanted me! He wanted to save me, take care of me!

He lived by himself now. He was the manager of The Palace Restaurant/Hotel in the little town of Raton, New Mexico. It was a refurbished hotel, built over a century ago The ground floor was an elegant bar and restaurant. He was making very good money, he paid no rent and he had an extra room for me.

With a population of 6000, it was not a place to continue a lucrative drug business. Also, he would enroll me into the little high school and I could get my diploma. I could work in the restaurant in the evenings where he would keep his eye on me. Then, there was the horse. He would buy me a horse. And on and on and on.

The logic and sincerity of his argument was convincing. So there it was. An hour later, my bags were packed. I was going to live with my father in New Mexico.

That’s how in September 1975, my father whisked me away from my home in Oklahoma City, under the guise of saving me from my own demise. I was stolen and held captive in Raton, New Mexico for what seemed like forever.

My dog, Baron was coming with me, I refused to go anywhere without him. He was a tiny black and tan Dachshund. I got him free when I was fourteen, when I got back from Tulsa. To me, he was priceless. He was my best friend. He couldn’t have weighed more than ten pounds, but his heart was huge.

I talked to him about everything and he consoled me by nodding, and licking me on the cheek non-stop…or he would admonish me through his expressions and demeanor. I had lived with Dachshunds since I was seven, so understood their language pretty well. Baron understood humans better. We developed a rare communication that worked well for both of us.
Herman, our older dachshund had greeted my dad cordially. Baron couldn’t figure this out, he expressed his apprehension. He looked at me and conveyed,

“Well, if Herman isn’t worried, I guess it’ll be Okay, right? Right, Susan?”

I was sorry I didn’t have an honest answer. I did my best to settle him.

“Sure, this’ll be fun, a whole new adventure!”

As we drove West, toward the Texas panhandle, Baron kept the conversation going by his curious interest expressed by wide eyes and attentive ears. My dad amazed him with his knowledge of history, geography, geology, astronomy, world geo-politics, weather, music on the radio, literature, mechanics, religion and countless other topics. I knew he was faking his fascination with my dad. He knew he was doing me a favor.

There was not a dead moment in the air. An occasional “really?” expressed by me was enough to keep my dad’s mouth running. I was thankful for that. It kept my attention away from my jangle of emotions. As we drove through the night, I was conflicted, scared, excited, happy and worried. I didn’t know where I was going, or who was driving me there.

My dad’s jovial demeanor comforted me. He made The Palace sound like the perfect place for his little princess.

When we arrived, it was late, after 10pm., Baron was exhausted. I stood on the corner and looked up. I gulped. The three-story building was like an old gothic castle. It was a huge rectangle with the front corner cut back with a fifth wall about ten feet wide. This provided the entrance with two giant oak doors. Baron was less than enthused by its foreboding appearance. I had to agree.

Dad ignored my hesitation. “Come on, you’re going to love this place!”

He pulled open one of the oak doors, which had to weigh at least five hundred pounds. I was hesitant, but thirsty. Baron’s squirming had started to annoy me. I went forward filled with adrenalin.

The initial entrance was a small round foyer with a domed ceiling of cut glass. It was about six feet round. As I stared up at the beautiful little pieces of color, I heard my dad chuckle.

“See? I told you, there’s no place like this!”

Then I saw the true entry to the bar, a set of small bat winged doors that swung back and forth. He pulled one of the doors back, beckoning me forward. He looked down at me with a tender expression.

“Welcome home, honey, this is home now.”

As we entered the bar, I was dumbstruck. Baron was not. I stepped back in time, to 1896, into The Palace Hotel.

The bar took up half of the first floor of the hotel. It was the most captivating centerpiece of the establishment. The mirror behind the bar was the longest continuous piece of reflection glass in all the states, the brochure proclaimed. A brass foot rail extended the length of the long cherry oak bar A few feet behind was a waist high railing just like the saloons in old John Wayne movies.

The carpet was a deep royal red interlaced with black swirly patterns. Bright golden paper covered the walls. It was smooth and shiny with raised curly designs made out of felt or maybe even velour. God, I just wanted to reach over and run my fingers across it!  

The wall opposite the bar had windows that were quizzically narrow and impossibly tall. Lush maroon velvet drapes adorned them, parted in the center to provide a view of the quaint town just beyond the sidewalk.

I looked up at the ornate ceiling, which seemed a mile above me. It was covered with tiles of little angels that all looked the same, yet different. The angels danced across the entire ceiling until it curved and met the wall. I got dizzy looking at them.

“You can’t find ceiling tiles like that anywhere! My dad grinned. “They’re covered in pure gold leaf!”

I didn’t know what pure gold leaf was, but the word ‘gold’ impressed me very much.

He introduced me to the staff. I l blushed when he said; “This is Susie, my favorite little girl!” I had never heard that before. The whole crew greeted me warmly, all smiles and friendliness.  

I always paid attention when Baron got nervous but I chose to ignore him. I jostled him in my arms. My stern look at him stopped his squiggling, but his look back conveyed that I was clueless.

I, however thought, Okay, I have died and gone to Heaven! I was enchanted. My fascination with this magical setting made me feel happy; I was in the neatest place I had ever seen. I’m going to love it here!

On the first night, my dad led me around the ground floor. The restaurant was as elegant as the bar. To the rear of the restaurant, there was a large commercial kitchen. Off the rear of the kitchen, he showed, me a short hallway to the back exit. To the right, a huge staircase led to the two upper floors of dilapidated hotel rooms. A manager’s apartment had been converted from several hotel rooms connected together on the second floor, just above the entrance to the hotel.

We ended up back in the bar and sat at a table for two. Crystal, the head bartender stayed on for a little while longer after the rest of the staff were allowed to go home.

Sitting at the table, he ordered Harvey’s Bristol Cream Sherry. I had never had Cream Sherry before, but it tasted like candy with nuts and I had no problem going through numerous rounds in a very short time. I was hungry but I was too nervous to eat.

Baron, however, was ravenous. My dad fed him little pieces filet mignon and French bread with real butter. He played cute for my dad, sitting up and begging. He jumped up, putting his paws on my dad’s leg, wagging his tail like crazy.

I was a little befuddled until I caught his sideways glance that said, “I do not like this guy, but I gotta eat, I’m starving. You’re the one falling into his into his trap, not me.”

Ouch. “Baron, sometimes I wish you would shut the hell up.”

After having his fill, he settled into a wary sleep on top of my feet. I never worried about losing Baron. Where I went, he went, period.

I wasn’t aware when the bartender left. The bottle was on the table before I knew it; he kept my glass full. I was five feet tall and weighed 106 pounds. I had a lethal level of alcohol pulsing threw my entire body…and I had my daddy.

I was in a haze. Actually, it was more of a daze than a haze. My vision was
Susan Hunt Jul 2012
CHAPTER ONE: THE DEMISE OF A YOUNG GIRL SEPTEMBER 1975


I had not seen my father in over two years when he showed up at my mom and step dad's condo. He had a slick knack of disappearing when laws were broken and he was wanted for questioning. He had an even better ability to re-enter when the heat was off.

My father owned three nightclubs in Oklahoma City. His first was the Silver Sword, and then he opened The Red Slipper. After he met his second wife, they together, opened the Jade Club.

All were successful, but the Red Slipper had a reputation. On a rare occasion, my dad would take me with him to open up the place. At first, it scared me. It was so dark in there. But as the lights came on behind the bar, I fell in love with the atmosphere.

Bobby Orr’s hockey stick hung on the wall, along with an endearing note from F. Lee Bailey. At six years old, all I knew was that they were the objects that made my dad beam.

I learned to play pool by standing on a phone book. I watched the colorful smacking ***** bounce around the most beautiful color of green I had ever seen. Chalking the stick was a chore, but after nearly poking my eye out once, I soon caught on.

It was a struggle to climb up on a barstool, but it was worth the effort. I sat at the bar and had lunch: popcorn, pretzels, peanuts and Pepsi.

As I grew older, I saw less and less of him, until he became a stranger, drifting in every once in awhile.  Every few weeks or so, I would come home from school, and see his car in the driveway.

This always shot fear and excitement through me. The air of unpredictability always made me want to ***. Unfortunately, most of the time, we were locked out of the house for a few hours, so I would have to *** in the back yard or at the neighbors. We waited on the stairs for the front door to open. And it always did, by my mom. She usually looked satisfied and serene but other times, I saw dread and sadness on her face.

Ever since I could remember, my dad had been a string of disappointments for me with a few indescribable moments of pure enjoyment mixed in between He could be kind, funny and like a real dad sometimes, that was the dad I missed. I tried to hold onto those experiences, even though he was such a mean ******* most of the time. But mostly, I just didn't know him.

Their divorce became final around the summer of 1972, but that didn't stop my mom from loving him. I don't know why, but she chased him frequently, going out to bars with her friends, trying to get a glimpse of him, and maybe more.

The last time I’d seen my father had not been pleasant. When I was thirteen, he broke down the door to our apartment and went straight to my mother’s bedroom. The noises were terrifying. The screaming, and punching sounds were followed by my mother’s whimpering, begging, groveling.

"How dare you do this to me, Patsy!? And behind my back! You could have at least told me!"

My dad had bailed himself out of jail that night. She promised him she would never seek alimony or child support again. Her lawyer was wrong. It wasn’t worth getting killed over.  

Shortly after, he had to leave the state. It had something to do with a low-level mob deal involving an insurance fraud. Too bad, it involved burning a building with someone in it. My dad became nothing but a memory, which faded away over time.

**

Alcohol and tobacco were constants in my family, so when my older brother, Tim, started smoking at ten years old, I don't remember much protest from anyone. I was seven and when my sister Abby, turned ten the next year, she also started smoking.  All the older kids were smoking cigarettes. I wanted to be cool, so I puked and coughed as I practiced. By the time I was ten, I too, was inhaling properly.  Around that time, I was introduced to *** by my sister's boyfriend. It did help my mood, somewhat, but it wasn't enough.

By 1974, I was using drugs from my sister’s boyfriend. John was a true drugstore cowboy. At first, he committed burglaries, which were easy at the time. There were no sophisticated electronics to stop someone from cutting a hole in the roof of a pharmacy. It took only minutes to pry open the safe that contained the narcotics. Then it took maybe another minute to fill a pillowcase full of every variety of amphetamines, barbiturates, valiums, etc.

It wasn’t long before I graduated to using morphine, ******* and then overdosed on Demerol. My stepfather sent me to a treatment facility in Tulsa Oklahoma, about one hundred miles away from Oklahoma City. The Dillon treatment center didn’t accept clients under age of sixteen but made an exception with me. I was a walking-talking disastrous miracle...or a miraculously saved disaster.

They figured that since I was fourteen, the sooner the better to start my road to recovery. Apparently, they didn’t condone sneaking *** and valiums in to the facility. I was kicked out of Dillon after about a month.

I came back home and laid low. I went back to Hefner Jr. High and enrolled back into the ninth grade. I quietly picked up where I left off, going back into business with John. My job was to sell the safe stuff; valiums, seconols, white bennies, ***, etc.


Summer came; I turned fifteen and had developed a tendency to over test my wares. I overdosed and nearly died in the hospital several times, which had led to my current predicament. Nobody knew what to do with me.

In August, I entered the tenth grade...for two weeks. I was expelled, (you guessed it) for dealing drugs. I was on homebound teaching twice a week with little supervision. My mother worked, my step-dad, **** ,worked, and I was home all day. However, I was not just sitting idly around. I was into enterprise.

**

In September, I overdosed again. I was quickly killing myself and my mother didn’t know what to do to stop it. That is why what happened was not my mother’s fault. But it wasn’t my fault either.

I never figured out how he knew where we lived. My mother moved over at least fourteen times in between the time I was six and twelve years old. Yet, here he was, at our front door, with his undeniable ‘ah shucks’ charm. His modesty was convincing. His timing was incredible. My mother stood frozen, her mouth agape. **** took the lead. He placed himself between my mother and father.

“You must be Gary Don, my name is ****; I’m Patsy’s husband." **** had never met my dad, but he'd heard enough about him to surmise who was standing at the door.

"Um, yeah, I'm Gary Don, it's nice to meet you ****", he said; as he offered a friendly hand shake to ****.

"I hope I'm not interrupting you, I was just in Duncan with my parents and they suggested I stop by and talk with you before heading back west. It's about Susie....

"Yes, Patsy said you called yesterday. We weren't expecting you this soon, but it's no problem. Why don't you come in and tell us what your plans are? Patsy, honey, would you mind putting on a *** of coffee?”

This unfroze my mother and she scurried to the kitchen. I was still in shock at seeing my dad’s face. I retreated to the staircase, but poked my head around and caught him glance at me. I flew up to the landing. I could easily escape up the rest of the stairs to my bedroom.
I was small enough to remain hidden on the landing, and heard the conversation between my mother, my dad and ****. **** was the classiest, most even-tempered adult I had ever encountered. I wished I could stop hurting him and my mother.  

My mother sat down two cups of coffee on the dining room table where my dad and **** sat. As she retreated a few steps back into the kitchen, **** politely probed my dad. My dad had the right answer for every question.

He swore he was a completely different person. He had changed. He had no hard feelings, instead he was back to help. He was remorseful for being an absent father and he wanted to make things right. He was back for a reason. He had heard that I was in trouble with drugs and school and he felt guilty for that. He had the answer to my problems. He was so convincing, so….humble, almost shy.

As I listened, I began freaking out with fear and excitement. I always wanted my dad. The last time I tried to live with him, it didn’t work out; he sent me back to my mother’s after a month. Now my dad wanted me! He wanted to save me, take care of me!

He lived by himself now. He was the manager of The Palace Restaurant/Hotel in the little town of Raton, New Mexico. It was a refurbished hotel, built over a century ago The ground floor was an elegant bar and restaurant. He was making very good money, he paid no rent and he had an extra room for me.

With a population of 6000, it was not a place to continue a lucrative drug business. Also, he would enroll me into the little high school and I could get my diploma. I could work in the restaurant in the evenings where he would keep his eye on me. Then, there was the horse. He would buy me a horse. And on and on and on.

The logic and sincerity of his argument was convincing. So there it was. An hour later, my bags were packed. I was going to live with my father in New Mexico.

That’s how in September 1975, my father whisked me away from my home in Oklahoma City, under the guise of saving me from my own demise. I was stolen and held captive in Raton, New Mexico for what seemed like forever.

My dog, Baron was coming with me, I refused to go anywhere without him. He was a tiny black and tan Dachshund. I got him free when I was fourteen, when I got back from Tulsa. To me, he was priceless. He was my best friend. He couldn’t have weighed more than ten pounds, but his heart was huge.

I talked to him about everything and he consoled me by nodding, and licking me on the cheek non-stop…or he would admonish me through his expressions and demeanor. I had lived with Dachshunds since I was seven, so understood their language pretty well. Baron understood humans better. We developed a rare communication that worked well for both of us.
Herman, our older dachshund had greeted my dad cordially. Baron couldn’t figure this out, he expressed his apprehension. He looked at me and conveyed,

“Well, if Herman isn’t worried, I guess it’ll be Okay, right? Right, Susan?”

I was sorry I didn’t have an honest answer. I did my best to settle him.

“Sure, this’ll be fun, a whole new adventure!”

As we drove West, toward the Texas panhandle, Baron kept the conversation going by his curious interest expressed by wide eyes and attentive ears. My dad amazed him with his knowledge of history, geography, geology, astronomy, world geo-politics, weather, music on the radio, literature, mechanics, religion and countless other topics. I knew he was faking his fascination with my dad. He knew he was doing me a favor.

There was not a dead moment in the air. An occasional “really?” expressed by me was enough to keep my dad’s mouth running. I was thankful for that. It kept my attention away from my jangle of emotions. As we drove through the night, I was conflicted, scared, excited, happy and worried. I didn’t know where I was going, or who was driving me there.

My dad’s jovial demeanor comforted me. He made The Palace sound like the perfect place for his little princess.

When we arrived, it was late, after 10pm., Baron was exhausted. I stood on the corner and looked up. I gulped. The three-story building was like an old gothic castle. It was a huge rectangle with the front corner cut back with a fifth wall about ten feet wide. This provided the entrance with two giant oak doors. Baron was less than enthused by its foreboding appearance. I had to agree.

Dad ignored my hesitation. “Come on, you’re going to love this place!”

He pulled open one of the oak doors, which had to weigh at least five hundred pounds. I was hesitant, but thirsty. Baron’s squirming had started to annoy me. I went forward filled with adrenalin.

The initial entrance was a small round foyer with a domed ceiling of cut glass. It was about six feet round. As I stared up at the beautiful little pieces of color, I heard my dad chuckle.

“See? I told you, there’s no place like this!”

Then I saw the true entry to the bar, a set of small bat winged doors that swung back and forth. He pulled one of the doors back, beckoning me forward. He looked down at me with a tender expression.

“Welcome home, honey, this is home now.”

As we entered the bar, I was dumbstruck. Baron was not. I stepped back in time, to 1896, into The Palace Hotel.

The bar took up half of the first floor of the hotel. It was the most captivating centerpiece of the establishment. The mirror behind the bar was the longest continuous piece of reflection glass in all the states, the brochure proclaimed. A brass foot rail extended the length of the long cherry oak bar A few feet behind was a waist high railing just like the saloons in old John Wayne movies.

The carpet was a deep royal red interlaced with black swirly patterns. Bright golden paper covered the walls. It was smooth and shiny with raised curly designs made out of felt or maybe even velour. God, I just wanted to reach over and run my fingers across it!  

The wall opposite the bar had windows that were quizzically narrow and impossibly tall. Lush maroon velvet drapes adorned them, parted in the center to provide a view of the quaint town just beyond the sidewalk.

I looked up at the ornate ceiling, which seemed a mile above me. It was covered with tiles of little angels that all looked the same, yet different. The angels danced across the entire ceiling until it curved and met the wall. I got dizzy looking at them.

“You can’t find ceiling tiles like that anywhere! My dad grinned. “They’re covered in pure gold leaf!”

I didn’t know what pure gold leaf was, but the word ‘gold’ impressed me very much.

He introduced me to the staff. I l blushed when he said; “This is Susie, my favorite little girl!” I had never heard that before. The whole crew greeted me warmly, all smiles and friendliness.  

I always paid attention when Baron got nervous but I chose to ignore him. I jostled him in my arms. My stern look at him stopped his squiggling, but his look back conveyed that I was clueless.

I, however thought, Okay, I have died and gone to Heaven! I was enchanted. My fascination with this magical setting made me feel happy; I was in the neatest place I had ever seen. I’m going to love it here!

On the first night, my dad led me around the ground floor. The restaurant was as elegant as the bar. To the rear of the restaurant, there was a large commercial kitchen. Off the rear of the kitchen, he showed, me a short hallway to the back exit. To the right, a huge staircase led to the two upper floors of dilapidated hotel rooms. A manager’s apartment had been converted from several hotel rooms connected together on the second floor, just above the entrance to the hotel.

We ended up back in the bar and sat at a table for two. Crystal, the head bartender stayed on for a little while longer after the rest of the staff were allowed to go home.

Sitting at the table, he ordered Harvey’s Bristol Cream Sherry. I had never had Cream Sherry before, but it tasted like candy with nuts and I had no problem going through numerous rounds in a very short time. I was hungry but I was too nervous to eat.

Baron, however, was ravenous. My dad fed him little pieces filet mignon and French bread with real butter. He played cute for my dad, sitting up and begging. He jumped up, putting his paws on my dad’s leg, wagging his tail like crazy.

I was a little befuddled until I caught his sideways glance that said, “I do not like this guy, but I gotta eat, I’m starving. You’re the one falling into his into his trap, not me.”

Ouch. “Baron, sometimes I wish you would shut the hell up.”

After having his fill, he settled into a wary sleep on top of my feet. I never worried about losing Baron. Where I went, he went, period.

I wasn’t aware when the bartender left. The bottle was on the table before I knew it; he kept my glass full. I was five feet tall and weighed 106 pounds. I had a lethal level of alcohol pulsing threw my entire body…and I had my daddy.

I was in a haze. Actually, it was more of a daze than a haze. My vision was
Dorothy A Mar 2012
The tired, old cliché –life is short—is probably more accurate than I would care to admit. With wry amusement, I have to admit that overused saying can be quite a joke to me, for I’ve heard it said way too many times, quite at the level of nauseam. Often times, I think the opposite, that life can be pretty **** long when you are not satisfied with it.

I am now at the age which I once thought was getting old, just having another unwanted birthday recently, turning forty-seven last month. As a girl, I thought anyone who had reached the age of forty was practically decrepit. Well, perhaps not, but it might as well have been that way. Forty wasn’t flirty. Forty wasn’t fun. It was far from a desirable age to be, but at least it seemed a million years off.

Surely now, life is far from over for me. Yet I must admit that I am feeling that my youth is slowly slipping away, like sand between my hands that is impossible to hold onto forever. Fifty is over the horizon for me, and I can sense its approach with a bit of unease and trepidation.

It is amazing. Many people still tell me that I am young, but even in my thirties I sensed that middle age was creeping up on me. And now I really am wondering when my middle age status will officially come to an end and old age will replace it—just exactly what number that is anyway. If I doubled up my age now, it would be ninety-four, so my age bracket cannot be as “middle” as it once was.

When we are children, we often cannot wait until we are old enough, old enough to drive when we turn sixteen, old enough to vote when we turn eighteen, as well as old enough to graduate from all those years of school drudgery, and old enough to drink when we turn twenty-one. I can certainly add the lesser milestones—when we are old enough to no longer require a babysitter, when we are old enough to date, when girls are old enough to wear make-up, or dye their hair. Those benefits of adulthood seem to validate our importance in life, nothing we can experience firsthand as a rightful privilege before then.

Many kids can’t wait to be doing all the grown-up things, as if time cannot go fast enough for them, as if that precious stage of life should simply race by like a comet, and life would somehow continue on as before, seemingly as invincible as it ever did in youth. Yet, for many people, after finally surpassing those important ages and stages, they often look back and are amazed at how the years seemed to have just flown by, rushed on in like a “thief in the night” and overtook their lives. And they then begin to realize that they are mortal and life is not invincible, after all.

I am one of them.

When I was a girl, I did not have an urgent sense of the clock, certainly not the need to hurry up to morph into an adult, quite content to remain in my snug, little cocoon of imaginary prepubescent bliss. It seemed like getting to the next phase in life would take forever, or so I wanted it to be that way. In my dread of wondering what I would do once I was grown. I really was in no hurry to face the future head on.  I pretty much feared those new expectations and leaving the security of a sheltered, childhood, a haven of a well-known comfort zone, for sure, even though a generally unhappy one.

Change was much too scary for me, even if it could have been change for the good.

At the age I am now, I surely enjoy the respects that come with the rites of passage into adulthood, a status that I, nor anybody, could truly have as a child. I can assert myself without looking like an impudent, snot-nosed kid—a pint sized know-it-all—one who couldn’t impress anybody with sophistication no matter how much I tried. Now, I can grow into an intelligent woman, ever growing with the passing of age, perhaps a late bloomer with my assertiveness and confidence. Hopefully, more and more each day, I am surrendering the fight in the battle of self-negativity, slowly obtaining a sense of satisfaction in my own skin.

I have often been mistaken as much younger than my actual age. The baby face that I once had seems to be loosing its softness, a very youthful softness that I once disliked but now wish to reclaim. I certainly have mixed feelings about being older, glad to be done with the fearful awkwardness of growing up, now that I look back to see it for what it was, but sometimes missing that girl that once existed, one who wanted to enjoy being more of what she truly had.

All in all, I’d much rather be where I am right this very moment, for it is all that I truly can stake as my claim. Yet I think of the middle age that I am in right now as a precarious age.

As the years go by, our society seems ever more youth obsessed, far more than I was a child. Plastic surgeries are so common place, and Botox is the new fountain of youth. Anti-aging creams, retinol, age defying make-up—many women, including myself, want to indulge in their promises for wrinkle-free skin. Whether it is home remedies or laboratory designed methods, whatever way we can find to make our appearance more pleasing, and certainly younger, is a tantalizing hope for those of us who are middle aged females.

Is fifty really the new thirty? I’d love to think so, but I just cannot get myself to believe that.

Just ask my aches and pains if you want to know my true opinion.

Middle age women are now supposed to be attractive to younger men, as if it is our day for a walk in the sun. Men have been in the older position—often much older position—since surely time began. But we ladies get the label of “cougar”, an somewhat unflattering name that speaks of stalking and pouncing, of being able to rip someone apart with claws like razors, conquer them and then devour them. There is Cougar Town on television that seems to celebrate this phenomenon as something fun and carefree, but I still think that it is generally looked at as something peculiar and wrong.

Hugh Hefner can have women young enough to be his granddaughters, and it might be offensive to many, but he can still get pats on the back and thumbs up for his lifestyle. Way to go, Hef! Yet when it comes to Demi Moore married to Ashton Kutcher, a man fifteen years younger than her, it is a different story. Many aren’t surprised that they are divorcing. Talking heads on television have pointed out, with the big age difference between them, that their relationship was doomed from the start. Other talking heads have pointed out the double standard and the unfairness placed on such judgment, realizing that it probably would not be this way if the man was fifteen years older.

Yes, right now I have middle age as my experience, and that is exactly where I feel in life—positioned in the middle between two major life stages. And they are two stages that I don’t think commands any respect—childhood and old age.      

I’ve been to my share of nursing homes. I helped to care for my father, as he lived and died in one. I had to endure my mother’s five month stay in a nursing home while she recovered from major surgery. I have volunteered my time in hospice, making my travels in some nursing home visitations. So I have seen, firsthand, the hardship of what it means to be elderly, of what it means to feel like a burden, of what it means to lose one’s abilities that one has always taken for granted.  I’ve often witnessed the despair and the languishing away from growing feeble in body and mind.
There is no easy cure for old age. No amount of Botox can alleviate the problems. No change seems available in sight for the ones who have lost their way, or have few people that can care for them, or are willing to care for them.  

I think time should just slow down again for me—as it seemed to be in my girlhood.

I am in no hurry to leave middle age.
Onoma Sep 2018
chin resting on two palms,

sprouting totemic archetypes

of good-evil.

watching this passing away...

this double take on: creation/

preservation/destruction.

how moved, how unmoved--

can one become?

one becomes.

scratch to scar the surface, and

existence won't wear signs of

struggle.

though wisdom kills indiscriminately.

your thunk betrayed you with a

breeze.

the latest, of a series of offensive odors.
JM Mar 2013
******, addiction.
Baby ******, ******.
Self **** your own soul.
Tom Sutton Aug 2011
I say to you,

That to those you hate.

Give them a hug.

Not because they wont know what to do,

Or it’s confusing or peaceful

But because if you throw a punch, they might punch you back,

And with the retaliation in mind, giving a hug seems the best plan of attack…

I know I’d prefer a cuddle to a thump or a smack.

So hug them.

If you do hopefully they wont know what to do back to you

And ******* their mind by simply being kind

Is well, **** it.

It’s awesome.
Mateuš Conrad Sep 2016
one - i don't understand why saying "it's the 21st century" is somehow seen as a compensation for 20 centuries of our inhumanity, or a case of: only improvements reside in us - seems just as false to say - men can overcome angels, as stated by the first Christians... yeah, we can do miracles with technology and ultra-secular communication dynamics - discarding the existence of such beings resulted in hen parties with plastic wings and halos... what a great method to discard such being, and subsequently appropriate their features, if ever needed, but altogether unnecessary... two - that disrespecting heterosexuality aligned with the power of science has made it altogether a pointless endeavour in re-enacting the monogamous nature of swans: if we can breed the many perversions, ahem, deviations, we surely require en equal share of respect, before science undermines any deviations into an economic format of breeding pure heterosexual contingencies... three: who the hell said i was throwing anyone off a roof? i was just curious about the slack pressurising the alias big brother / grey matter dictator into teaching us language, then to later make us into a Koranic cyclops or having to sway one side, but not the other, teaching us vocabulary in school, but robbing us of a fluidity of language beyond school, in society... any rational man would say: just teach me the knuckle, the stone and the stick to express my manners... because, to be frank, i'm not into faking being civilised, just teach me to be a barbarian from the start, don't dangle the magic carrot in front of my eyes when it's a fake... teach me the barbarism you want to suppress later on in life: i'm not into being Dolly 2.3419, and an attache to a sheepdog for herding purposes to take it up the **** and shut up: because a member of Parliament did it to me aged 14; for example.

subjectivity is doubled attacked, it's not the merely rationalist
approach of an objective side of things,
i could understand tiresome efforts
Chinese politics while walking
the tourist plot on the great wall -
in a society that's seismically acknowledging
social or whatever coherence,
i find it a bit of limbo of paraphrasing
trans - or trans-physics, or the active
way to usurp metaphysics, by deviating
from thought as an activity, and more
how words are sense datum co-ordinates
that are like dictators: because it just, feels,
funny, and, offensive. ***** vocabulary,
that's what i call it... after a while you concentrate
on what ****** you off, first the educational
autocracy teaches you a vocabulary,
then come the St. Thomas' terrorists with:
you need to revise your vocabulary...
like **** that'll happen, you don't own
language, i don't own language, you're
little fascist agenda to censor such awoke
the boy that was supposed to wake Barbarossa
from his slumber with the cry: crows! crows!
a cloud of crows! funny how the eagle is a
failed emblem for empires, and the crow isn't...
mind you, the English succeeded with
an empire half-and-half: a lion and a unicorn...
i'd guess as much with a monkey and
a centaur, or at least a Cerberus - something
mythical - well, sure, the Poles are attacked
in Britain... but ever hear about the Scot
being attacked in an English village?
a Scot was attacked just the other day,
because kilts were deemed offensive...
so trans-gender is good, meta-gender is:
had a wee t'ink 'bout it...
   robots start with the pronoun use: one...
royalty start with the pronoun use: we...
                 and in between we have paranoid
they and we... and insecure you and i -
or as e. e. cummings would have it:
    *i say no world
                 can hold a you
   shall see the not
             because
  and why but
                          (who
        -
true, but as much of not is entanglement
              with knots - or ought to tries -
  to not or to knot and be -
                              Shakespeare also said:
  funny how i was born neo-liberal,
millennial tattooed - and fake-left...
   i hear the right is a tsunami of focus these days,
all the generation Z are buying into
obstructing gay-marriage, and are adamant
   on not abusing pronouns - hence the current
revival in grammar school education in England -
they don't drink, i.e.: taking psychopathic gambles,
they're prone to social-media overdoses
rather than succumbing to excess ecstasy and palpitation:
i had 190 "friends"... let's just call them vantage points...
   sheered that social media sheep: only 13 left...
but at least objectivity outright says:
       subjectivity is subhuman, science taught us
that subjectivity is the fire between two flint stones,
all in all necessary - but objectivity said:
             two flints! two flints! no fire!
what attacks subjectivity is not objectivity,
it's satire... to humanise everything: good or bad,
with a standard of humour... well... telling a sad
joke to later tell the same sad joke by satirising it...
punch in a face; because there are only so number of
things that are funny in life... the English language
doesn't seem to understand that even the odd chance
of black humour, will not lift the spirits of those,
who, quiet frankly, don't want to be humoured...
the only humour left is not to provision the public
with barbaric satire, sometimes empathy will do,
because it's emphatic humour,
   it's Godot's roundabout humour: the shared experience.
laughing for the sake of laughing is
             a cry from apathy's lost interest in
being pardonably dasein - laughing at all the truthful
autobiographic desecrate is apathy's last
chance to impress: but how foul it all sounds by then...
   the western version of buddhism suddenly feels like
  a taste of pears in november: not sour, not bitter...
just maggoty foul - yucky goo
                  of a plum-shaded rouse of the skin
tinged hue after contact with knuckle and knee.
  but they attacked a ******* Scot in an English village,
because of a kilt...
                                   he knows the strand of ganging up
in hyena numbers and then the celebratory drink
of compensating conscience - they'll sooner accept
     a trans-gender dunno'h than a hot-blooded
heap of tartan - ever ask the homosexuals what
they think of St. Thomas' gospel?
              i think: too much, too early, too innocently.
and if they tell you: speak differently!
they will, i'm ****** sure they will want to
control your grammar without any specialisation -
you'll wonder: summer in Syria?
                     because as racism goes,
they attack the difference, and the difference is only
skin deep, like they did with the Afros of Kentucky,
the Kentucky Afros will spring right back,
    because the abuse was only skin deep,
therefore their soul was enlarged, and they'll
play the blues, and the jazz, and rap, and break-dance...
but if the abuse goes to the depth of soul...
in that it's soul-deep...
                                and because it's white v. white...
it will ferment, and nothing positive will come from it...
no jazz, no blues... nothing of cultural importance...
   it will be haggled in the political market
to the point where both sides will find it utterly
unbearable: and then start to sheer their skins...
        you won't get anything from this soul-deep
attack... if the holocaust is what it felt like,
            then this is a minor post-holocaust episode,
a reminder...
                          and by god, i thank god
for the fact that the Picts are involved -
                                                            whe­re to now?
O Imperium Gladstone paraphrase?
                            it will be hard to beat the unicorn -
all empires donning the eagle duly fail -
centaur and a frog? maybe next time.
Abby McMichael Jul 2010
Please, try not to take offense
To the fact that I dislike your fence.
It really does not make much sense
To react in such defense.
You ask why, and I will commence
Explaining my distaste for your fence.
Torin Aug 2018
xspacexpotatox 1h
Racism is a lie, your people hate us naturally lol just look at the way you’re responding................ and us “black people” are supposed to be the ignorant ones.... whew
xspacexpotatox  1h
Look at the affliction and persecution. There’s a reason why your ancestors put chains around our necks. It’s because the Bible said it would happen ****
xspacexpotatox  1h
So do me a favor, go learn a bit more. I’m not even gonna laugh at your ignorance, I’ll pray for you. Have a nice one.
Torin Galleshaw  1h
oh so your jewish friend is the authority on this? what does he know about zionism? seems you got your mind made up man. good for you
xspacexpotatox  1h
I want to know why you feel so threatened lol
xspacexpotatox  1h
I won’t let the hate reach me man
Torin Galleshaw  1h
wow, racism is a lie then u stereotype all white people IMMEDIATELY after you say that. ignent? i really wanted to give you a chance bro. but you have been very abrasive this whole time, immature and incredibly offensive. i dont know where in the bible it says that. or, if as i remember when i went to ce williams middle school as a young kid in a poor part of charleston south carolina where i also learned a test can be racist because the only person that did well on it was me, the white kid. ive felt black racism towards me all my life. do you know the history of the celtic people. yeah, slaves were given food to eat, my people died in gutters in the cold because of no mc hiring practices. ever heard of britain, do you know who irelands neighbor is. have you heard of the potato famine, do you know why it happened? william wallace?
systematic opression for over 800 years.

most important part and key difference between us, besides the fact thta your better than me because you are black, but. you claim im so ignorant im not worth your time, essentially. i think your so misguided i would love to show you the actual way to god and heaven. brother, you need it.
xspacexpotatox  1h
Bro you lose don’t message me anymore
Torin Galleshaw  1h
and dont claim im acting like im threatened, first thing, you dont know me. youre acting nearly militaristic on this ****. young malcom X wanna be. im cool tho, you robably never knew someone as chill as me.
maybe we could talk without resorting to personal attacks tho. thats a good sign you are losing an argument.
xspacexpotatox  1h
What’s your point? Mines is simple. I get what I learned from college text books and the Bible, the knowledge coincides and that indicates who my people are.
Torin Galleshaw  1h
do you know of the talmud?
do you know what it is?
do you realize that it contains the only visual description for jesus?
do me a favor, before you try to come at me with some more weak **** why dont you go and see what the talmud has to say about it
thank you brother
xspacexpotatox  1h
Was the visual description a white man? If so I’m not interested
xspacexpotatox  1h
I’m a young black man that’s been taught all his life, all I know is truth.
xspacexpotatox  1h
I’m not that arrogant, I offered you edification and once I edified you rejected. lol I’m not supposed to be nice and open to you.... I know who my oppressors are.
xspacexpotatox  1h
“GOD” said “and I know the blasphemies of those that say they are Jews and are not” you’re disrespecting my ancestors
Torin Galleshaw  1h
thats the thing only a truly awoken spiritual person will ever recognize. in a past life you were a tiny asian woman bro, you were a fat white guy, you were a cat fucj it. so rn your black. soul dont got color. recognize bro. i dont wanna big boy you on this, but i can. and i will if i have to. or maybe you would either A. apologize for your offensive and rude behavior, or B. and my preferred choice we could ACTUALLY converse. you say you got proof, cite it priest boy
xspacexpotatox  1h
Bro, my ancestors were beaten, *****, hung, fed to alligators, shot in the streets, literally broken. Imagine having your family heritage stripped from you, your language and books taken from you.. You’re not hearing me out, you’re trying to prove yourself to be what I am and I can’t let you think that’s okay. I’m OG. I teach people. So far I’ve learned nothing from this conversation. I’m proud of the beatings my people took to get here, and I definitely don’t agree with the whole “you were a white or Asian person in the past life” because that makes no sense. My family is “BLACK”, besides that my moms great grandmother was mixed, and were STILL predominantly “BLACK”. I come from “BLACK” people, therefore I am a HEBREW ISRAELITE, and I know this for a FACT!
Torin Galleshaw  49m
Bro, my ancestors were beaten, *****, hung, starved for hundreds of years, shot in the streets, forced to fight in the civil war after arriving here form ireland starving, (one of the most effective brigades, you see many of the soldiers had to fight in wars against the british already)literally broken. Imagine having your family heritage stripped from you, my last name is not the last name my great great great granparents had. it was too ethnic, it was changed, your language and books taken from you. do they speak celtic in ireland?.. You’re not hearing ME out, you’re trying to prove yourself to be what I am and I can’t let you think that’s okay
xspacexpotatox  42m
Oh you guys are actually mention in the battles you fought?! **** there’s no documentation of anything “African Americans” did in the wars we helped win! Atleast you guys got decent credit
Torin Galleshaw  37m
bible told me you just have to accept his love, jesus's love, but even buddahs love, and john the baptists love, and all of gods great prophets. bible taught me that without their love i can never really love any one.
xspacexpotatox  35m
If you believe in the most high, fine with me. That’s all I have to say.
Torin Galleshaw
Torin Galleshaw  33m
yes, there is documentation of both slaves ad freed black men fighting on both sides actually, believe it or not
Torin Galleshaw  32m
https://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/blacks-civil-war

"Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letter, U.S., let him get an eagle on his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pocket, there is no power on earth that can deny that he has earned the right to citizenship."

Frederick Douglass

xspacexpotatox  28m
I never once believed the history teachers in school, I always challenged them because I know that American History is *******. Just like whatever filth you’re trying to show me will only bore me like the teachers bored me in school. I served in the US Army. I did my time for white america and I refuse to go back lol



Matthew 6:10-14 thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven, give us this day our daily bread, And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors,And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.
Nicole Bataclan Jan 2015
Excuse-me,
Was that offensive to you?
I was just pointing out
Something obvious.

Oh dear,
If it were clear
I am sorry to disappoint
It was so smart I missed your point.
Chapter XXI
Hegira to Patmos

They dropped their moorings from Cala Cogone early, when the tide seemed to be separated from the waters like a head distanced from its body. On a lavish and romantic day they went to Genoa, to continue the logistics of the trip to Piacenza. During the trip Etréstles was stretched out in the bow under a Sun that seemed to be fearsome as it was a digestive task that would make him ingest his own dream, which perhaps he aspired to be more than a journey. While he slept, at the helm Etréstles dressed in a black robe and the comrades also sleeping with dreams that they painted with sign gestures on their faces.

Dream of Etréstles: "With the memory off-center ..., I was still in Izzana, dancing by the clouds on gray tulles of the layers of the sky that tried to stop being a Kingdom without a Crown and Sword". They glimpsed the stones melting and turning into gauze juxtaposed to the aerosolites that unfolded from the Sorcery, landing on the hands and heads of Vernarth and Himself. As he continued his dreamy journey, he dialogued with the auxiliary legate of his own dream. “He tells her that he sees them beyond where their liturgies collide. They cross eroding the vanished and itinerant reason”. He gets up and takes the moorings of the ship and ties them to his neck. Then everyone cooperates to walk along the edge of the ship, which all moved barefoot. This is how I would wake up!

Vernarth tries to wake him up, shakes him, but doesn't wake up. And when he tried to avoid him from sleep, he saw that he had the moorings around his neck, along with two Unicorns who were escorting him and were looking towards infinity, auspicious that Genoa was already coming in front of their horns. The others began to wake up and ate reclining, almost as if without any desire to get up from the deck full of self-sliding linen, which allowed everyone to pass their own meals, including those that were semi-consumed rolling on the deck. Etréstles,  transferred the dream to Vernarth, once he went to his bedroom to rest before they touched the roadstead at the foot of the homonymous promontory, 36 km from Genoa.  Portofino, close to the hydro form of the Portofino Regional Natural Park.  Being able to find different entrance doors through S. Rocco, Portofino Vetta and Nozaregoino  that led you to paths with different levels of accessibility and landscape. On the route of the path that traveled from Northwest to Southwest on the same promontory, he received the full beauty of the Mediterranean vegetation, with its beautiful pines, bluish and clean waters of the Mediterranean, which filled his lungs and especially his stem, which silenced of peace to those who accompany you through this interesting and beautiful Natural Park with deep blue eyes.
Vernarth is wrapped with two layers of linen and stands in between eclipsing each of the Unicorns. They pass her horn through her pectoral, as if wanting to insinuate affection. But her propitiated gesture was to crown her with the Power of her phalanx, the impetus in Gaugamela, an Onyx Crown, to lighten the burden of sleep and wake up before reaching the shores of Genoa.
Calling in Genoa, they all descend in a separate part and say goodbye from afar, gesturing with their hands. Their ramblings revealed multi-level radiographs of the resolved aura that invited them to an enclave hostel, to re-enter the world of their daily chores. The Unicorns who would return back to Sardinia stayed on the ship that was in the blue bay. They positioned themselves at the bow one and at the stern the other, to lighten the sails and return to Izzana.

Vernarth and Etréstles walked with their bags, letting go of their feet towards La Via ** Settembre, they travel in an east-west direction, next to Corso Italia, the promenade that runs along the promenade, which is one of the favorite places to reform the destination of Piacenza. From this road they moved near the adjacent carriage station to the Caruggio neighborhood in Sottoripa. Here they entered an inn to eat and drink liqueurs made from natural herbal recipes and sweet citrus, some fish with bread, sauce and Genovés sourdough. to satisfy their hunger.
They had dinner and opened the exit to the terminal. Before, they went to the Ponte Monumentale where the church dedicated to Santa Rita is, called Iglesia de la Consolación, whose entrance, at the level of the old streets, is slightly lower than the current street. They pass a porch and enter. "Almost like a grand cloister sensation they perceived during their stay, as if centuries had passed, but which never ended in the wanderings of any secular period. It was the impression once entered and soaked on this road, which still remains active. From this original cloister, the invocation of images on the sides placed towards the church towards Via ** Settembre, as well as the closed portal in the market access plaza on Via Galata, recur, while the other two sides are they completed attractions to admire when the eastern market in Genoa appeared before them ”.

When they entered, the masks were passed over the bones of their faces, indulgent towards both faces of the visitors, under a freshness of gravitational atmospheric fragrance, perhaps from the connected baptismal font or the lateral nave or the three naves separated by square pillars illuminating them. This is where Vernarth places his right hand on his forehead and his mouth, as a sign of catechesis detached from The Vault, the central nave and the counter-facade that were painted in fresco in 1874 by Giuseppe Isola, after reading about the intertextual verifying thus Vernarth. (Visioni dell'Apocalisse, Gloria di Nostra Signora della Consolazione and Giuditta rientra trionfante in Betulia), while Etréstles frenziedly admitted the frescoes through the side aisles that are the work of Giovanni Quinzio at an angle close to him. Observing everything, he was already indoctrinating to reprint new vigor to enter Piacenza triumphantly and head to the Region of Patmos. Giuseppe Isola's fresco was the great motive that struck his reason for being where he was to continue the threads upon threads of his lineage as the great Commander of the troops of Gaugamela and his Phalanges. Here is the church in its first tune with the duty of limitlessness before its steps to dominions that will make it recover their powers, from where they were first seen dressing in the clothes of an innocent child.


In the apse, there was the choir singing baroque pieces, and followed by elaborate wooden stalls from the 17th century. In the Altars on the left, on the Fifth Altar, Etréstles, captures a simultaneous vision. From that moment when it was the disappearance of this Santa Maria della Pace church, which could have been one structure on top of the other, perhaps in ruins but if the columns could go further from where their originals are born. Until then both had separated from each other, and they would meet again here in the apse, where they never lose sight of each other again, to turn towards the exit that required them to leave the sacred precinct. In the terminal, a grayish float awaited them, with silver trim on the edges of the structure, at the top of the front roof it said "Where you must never go and be". It was just the transport of an allegorical float. They were theatrical traveling artists, who had places available for travelers to Piacenza. The one that they just approached to move to the home, where they had to register at their own will and rejoin this excellent session "Parapsychological Regression".The Trebbia valley, a few kilometers from Piacenza. Vernarth noted that a shaft of the chariot made a strange sound. To which he notified the driver, telling him what he caught on the rear axle of the carriage. They go down to inspect all; not being able to detect anything that it would suppose would be an anomaly of filming of the instrumental east. Etréstles sees that some steeds were grazing on some meadows and he tells them all. Vernarth warns him and immediately heads to them. It reaches only a sorrel that was running its tongue over its hoof. The others flee. Vernarth approaches, and notices that he had a wound in his left hoof, noticing that in the center there was a strip of Green color, He takes his leg, and examines it. He takes out his dagger and begins to remove the stake that was inserted into his damaged leg. The others were gone, restarting the trip to Piacenza. Etréstles managed to climb a steed, and followed him - The float remained without them supposedly to arrive safely at Piacenza. But at 5 km, before reaching the city they are struck by a lightning bolt from a sudden storm. What misdirects his route - the passengers were left intact, only fatally suffered the loss of the driver. (It was verified by Vernarth when he arrived at his home in Piacenza).   As  Vernarth rode fast in the storm, trying to catch up with the carriage. Stress them towards the same to reach their brother. They rode propagating the pastures that passed near the forests of Val Trebbia. When the storm intensified instantly, it was wise to take refuge and wait for the flood to decrease. They were always close to each other. Etréstles about 18 km from Vernarth, they did not know it, but the horses sensed each other. They already distinguished, that they were close to each other, but it was necessary to take care of the horse, and have to check its hoof again. He checks it and notices that it had a green stripe in the four parts, like a pigment already placed concentrically in the middle of each hoof.


Ellipses Gaugamela - Final War
Vernarth bids farewells farewell. Once the Achaemenides are surrendered, he prepares to review them. Walk with Alikanto across the ****** plain. Reviewing his five hundred dead and three thousand wounded, he goes to recirculate in the footsteps of the attack, manages to see lead as a sentinel gathered wounded horses, but not serious. He approaches him and says Khaire; asking what unit they came from. He tells them of the Hosts of the command of Hefestion. The sentinel tells him, that he was enraptured by the fact before his eyes to see that all the horses of the line of Hefestion, Alexander the Great and Vernarth, to fascinate him that they had a green stripe on his left hoof. Wedge riders are formed, lining up the stable, towards the court of the guards and Macedonian monarchs. She dismounts from Alikanto and checks the chestnut trees, managing to insinuate that it could be Medea's ploy of the smiling charm towards her Hetairoi dancers, whose elite had bracelets on each leg on each chestnut. Also with the offensive weapon, they acted as the Macedonian's personal guard. Vernarth recalled that, before starting the offensive, with his blessed Xifos he inflicted light wounds on the left foot of his Phalanges in the act of "overtaking them before being stained by the enemy"

Vernarth says: Here is the cavalry that has received so much praise for «hammer» in the strategies, because it crushed the enemy units retained by the «anvil» or the «phalanx» that I had to command and lead the charge, intoning the riders. And even more the circumcisions that he gave them before entering combat. With the Hetairoi I was organizing squadrons of 200 to 300 soldiers, while they were checking the chestnut trees. In the campaign, they would ride the best horses, ******* or on the blanket, they were awarded the best weapons available. Each carried his long throwing spear Xyston, accompanied by a Kopis sword, for hand-to-hand combat, which in the interlude would defend his flax and bronze breastplate, with respective protective armbands and helmet, before lightly tackling his aggression . The horses were also partially protected, but not their hooves! I gave them the final instruction by decree to take them to the altarpieces and attend to them, so that they check their left hoof.Thus giving signs of great concern about the green stripe on each of its left hooves. Sentinel Hetairoi, with some of his servants, gather the animals and transport them where they have been ordered to tend and examine them. As the designs collapse over the night in gloomy litanies, Medea bursts into a great green outfit saying:

Medea: Vernarth, rancid are on my memory the potions and designs of those who want to talk about me or offer me in their lust.Where the zeal of anxiety deceives the wishful arms that welcome the victorious pleasure. Hooves are my skeptics and famous decisions, because I am weak in will but not in character. Green is the pouring of my converted powers into the veins of the horses. They were carriers in their eloquent ferocity. Instead of blood, I had sap from the magic vessels that I transferred to them so as not to doubt the doubts. Their object is that a green band was encased in their hooves as a sign of the Hipnos promontory through their Son Clovis, to plunge all the forests of the raging underworld, towards the heart of each "Valiant Hetairoi".


Outside ellipsis / near Piacenza
Vernarth and Etréstles in a post-storm clearing, a soft breeze greets them and they meet again, they greet Khaire! And together they reroute to the empty pastures, which would gradually begin to venture them through the farthest forests of the Val Trebbia. On some brown plains with poor colors that visited him falling as they faded on his mirage. From this unusual crossroads they will supremely perceive the closeness of Piacenza in their breathing.
Now they are in the vicinity of the Cimitero de Piaceza. Then they will have to go home on the Via Giovanni Codagnello, on the calendar of January 2020. The Parapsychological Regression continues.


Piacenza Cemetery, January 20, 2020
Vernarth and Etréstles entered the necropolis long before sunset. They were carrying a cake to celebrate Vernarth's birthday. Night Patrol joined the visit. In particular, they followed a night watch service that was active, trusting their guide Piacenza or the surrounding area, with 3 internal night patrol passages 365 days a year, for the rest of lives beyond all material life, perhaps turned into marble statues.
They hired a special service dedicated to the approved service for 2 people .; They were active during the caretaker's office opening hours (the same opening hours as the cemetery). With this service they overcame difficulties to walk after so much traveling. They leave the green-hoofed horses, now turned into statues. They request authorization from the entrance cemetery offices, to honor their belonging and to please those who visit them on their behalf. In Genoa, after having passed through the exterior without entering, they were ecstatic with the Staglieno Cemetery in Genoa (the most monumental in Italy).But if they enter the Piacenza, where the sanitary monumentality passed through the real function of such an enclosure in the contingency. It was commented by the neighboring offices that the migration of corpses from Bergamos were moved to Modena, Acqui Terme, Domodossola, Parma, Piacenza to carry out the respective ceremonies. Due to the great Viral Pandemic that decimated a great majority of Italian citizens in these areas. Vernarth became aware of the current reality, saw how a gravedigger conversed with the crowds, there was a nurse, a doctor and a prodigal man who concentrated on uploading moods to those who were there, almost like a caster, to relieve them of this transitory despite humanity.
They continue past the pyramidal pines, to the central pavilion. They sit on the edge of some flagstones, and take the cake to celebrate their birthday. They sing a hymn and they both enjoy it lovingly. Etréstles saw that he had a little cream left on his nose and cheekbone, running his hand to remove it. In the instant, the guard calls them; it was time to go because it was time to close the compound. They say goodbye with a monumental hug paying tribute to their brother!


Etréstles says: Honors Vernarth, for your immeasurable Valor! It is a great contribution that we divide our work and commitments. From here I go to the Messolonghi Cemetery. I will only wait for the crescent moon to meet the Charioteer, then leave with him and my beloved Drestnia. My Xifos Sword in my right hand and the head that I cut off in my left hand, in Gaugamela before that rugged fate! Khaire, My honors Commander Etréstles!. It remains in the shadow of some pyramidal pine trees of this sublime night, and then they distance themselves. Vernarth leaves the compound heading towards his house relatively close to the cemetery, on the Via Giovanni Codagnello.


Final session in Vía Codagnello, Piacenza:
Vernarth enters opens the door and everyone is waiting for him. Huge groups of friends, work colleagues, family, their pets, and especially the Parapsychologist, who had commanded this whole great session. They all approach her and in the instant, Vernarth awakes abruptly from the parapsychological session. They stabilize it and check your vital signs. There were many days of this odyssey. His awakening was mediatic, since they were attentive to him to question him and confess everything, but he was clear that his purpose would lead him to the confines of Patmos along with Raeder and Petrobus. It remained only to wait for the tenuity of a simple immortal warrior to assist in the services of John the Evangelist. The parapsychologist says you have to wake up, you can no longer be AND stay here in this temporary tube!
Once he has refused to wake up, he takes the itinerary to return to Macedonia. The visibly worn and stunned parapsychologist demands that he give up and obey his command. The effort was unproductive, only letting himself be carried by the grip of his right hand, taking his other with great vigor to remove it from shamelessness, from whom he does not suppress his pride to who still remains wounded by the swords that bleed his soul in Gaugamela. "Everyone is amazed and resigned !, pointing out that he must have always been in the surroundings of his beloved Macedonia, cutting the bursts of succulent insolence on the same temperate cliffs, where some variation of the sounds of the wind would make him saddle his Alikanto to acclaim the gods who came looking for him ”

Vernarth is engulfed in ambivalence, almost celebrating his birthday and waking up from his parapsychological journey. Both will take place, but the session will continue irrevocably. After a few days close to the first day of the crescent moon, he greeted him from a privileged place on his house Etréstles de Kalavrita who was with the Charioteer in his car and Drestnia, they went in that masterful car to join the chores of the Koumetrium Messolonghi (Editorial Palibrio - USA) .So returning to Messolonghi, to meet his disciples and essences of the foundation of his naturalness.


Hegira to Patmos
On a gray day in July 1820. Piacenza slept under the ambush of the revolution, in Italy there was a situation similar to that of another European nation. Vernarth was preparing his last details with the parapsychologist, to undertake his Hegira to Patmos, since he was a revolutionary and this was of great motivation to emigrate from this constant stage of Wars and sociopolitical processes. Manage to be a participant in this revolt in the Piedmont area. Its ideological axes were liberalism and nationalism. Given that the most affected countries were those of southern Europe (episodes from other areas, such as Germany or France, were much less important), with Spain as epicenter of a movement that extended to Italy and Portugal, and on the other hand Greece; It has been called the Mediterranean cycle as opposed to the Atlantic cycle that had preceded it in the previous generation (the first liberal revolutions or bourgeois revolutions, produced on both sides of the ocean: the Independence of the United States -1776- and the French Revolution -1789- ). As compromised great principalities of much of Europe were banned, it participates in great dissolution of collisions and invasions that involved it. In this way he would liberate his Homeland, especially his province of Piacenza.

Although the "Kingdom of Italy" as such did not exist, there were two great kingdoms that participated in the Revolutions of 1820: the Kingdom of Naples and the Kingdom of Piedmont. However, most of the revolutionary movements were driven by secret societies, such as coal. The Kingdom of Piedmont was also one of the most affected, since it was at the epicenter of Italian nationalism. It was controlled by Víctor Manuel I, member of the House of Savoy and defender of the Old Regime. The monarch had only been on the throne for 6 years, since he returned to Turin in 1814 due to the defeat of Napoleon. Since his return, various factions within the country advocated for a unification of all the Italian kingdoms. The unstable situation of its neighbor, the Kingdom of Naples, caused the carbonarians within Piedmont to revolt in March 1821.

Conclusive Hegira ellipsis to Patmos:
After this great conflict, he orders his parapsychologist to resume his final session in Patmos; he begins the procedure for the era that he had to trespass anachronistically, returning to the era of the Macedonian Empire. The parapsychologist asks him time, place, dates, clothing, customs, and manages to meet his request. He enters the portal, and in the backwaters of Messolonghi he meets Raeder and Petrobus. They were close to this heroic land, Messolonghi in the Gulf of Patras, the capital of Aetolia-Acarnania. Nothing less than in the land of his Brother Etréstles "Koumeterium Messolonghi".


"They all approach the vicinity, pray three times to heaven, and manage to be abducted to the underworld of Messolonghi. When they were snooping through the catacombs, they make out the surroundings of a luminous vault, thus distinguishing a woman passing by with others. It was the beautiful nymph Eurydice inaugurating The Constitution of a new Government”.
Eurydice and the gravediggers worked for the new government to be instituted. They were reviewing the last ground plans that converged on the tenth cemetery.
Eurydice ...: with the absence of Etréstles and Drestnia we will make her awakening continue, whose awakening phase closely relates to her wife.
Grave ...: Where do we start?
Eurydice ...: by the southwestern statue of Ashurbanipal, to pay tribute to Botsaris. Then, we will go up to receive the cordoned off tomb of Bramante and Ghiberti, so that the latter can advise us regarding the work to be erected.
They climb the northeast pavilion to the foundations of a mausoleum. They approach the slab of Ghiberti, who was loosening his fingers, sitting on the shore of a Pyramid-shaped cypress. Bramante vanished into the gray beams of light...

Ghiberti ...: I already know your mission. I am summoned to the Council on the day of the sailors' return. To start, they went to the mines to look for precious stones, stones to build Markos Botsaris.
Eurydice ...: Good! Well, in nine moons and nine suns they will return from the coasts of Morocco, the last docking point, so that they can then return. At the moment they are already warned.
Just back, there was a Lover with her right hand holding her chin.

Inamorada In Love ...: Five centuries ago I awaited my awakening, my lover promised to return ... with these verses...:
"I want to be different,
I want to take you my love...
and tell you that by missing you
there is no greater sadness than not seeing you ...
Forgive me for not coming back...
before my absence caused your death,
Wait for me ... I'm going to tell you ... how I miss you
Along with my immortality of feeling...!  How I miss you...!!

... He still tells me this, but from here, under the embankment of the cemetery I feel that he is far away and I can do nothing. Also, I have it in my memory and one day we will meet here. The Enamorada continues to sit and watch armies of soldiers being thrown into graves, their bodies severed. As she continues; ... there is more life here than on the surface, and the trenches replace the concave wombs, as vessels! As everything here lives, even the flowing and hallucinatory invocations are perceived from the Poets, Alchemists and Astronomers. They make the invisible go in a formidable adventure to the site of their magical hallucinations.
Eurydice ...: Stay on your stone, with your chiffon dress; here you will see the arrival of Etréstles. He will bring news from other lands to answer you. Now dispense if we delay, sadness will fall on the other beings who are being buried and transhumated. The Enamorada remained on the stone with her knees resting on her chest. Eurydice and her assistants went to their rooms. "
All this they manage to witness, and then go in search of Etréstles on the same tenth cemetery floor. Raeder and Petrobus were laughing and at the same time they were impressed, as if wanting to remember him when they have to leave directly from Messolonghi to Patmos, towards the Dodecanese region. In the meantime Vernarth was searching for his brother in all the nearby areas of the catacombs flashing penetrating light, unable to find him. He arrives at the ninth cemetery and is fascinated by a feminine image that would seem like a phantasmagorical chimera ..., it was Drestnia moistening some ferns on some crypts making gestures to see them already grown, even if they had just been planted...!

They approach her intimacy and ask her greetings, Drestnia answers them abstractedly that Etréstles traveled to Patmos to applaud the maiden ceremonies that would be wed in the spring in the nearby meadows. Being able to settle in The Monastery of Zoodochos Pigi, and who later went to the hills of Castelli, as it has been known that everything has been celebrated on a hill that many hundreds of years ago has sheltered our historical fragrances in the unity of the ethereal until the present. Such ruins among some works as well as the Temple of Apollo that will continue to survive with its prevailing mystery not revealed.
Etréstles gives them their congratulations and wraps his arms around Drestnia. They evacuate the cemetery, remaining abstracted in the internal darkness of the catacombs with fewer lights than a feasible twilight of darkness, as if immediately leaving Etréstles to be with him in the spring, shedding light on herself taking them to the Castelli hills, which they would figure in the sweetened exaltation of the pollinations of the nymphs on the maternal and ****** maidens.

They go out and spread their impulses over the promontory of the Koumeterium of Messolonghi with Raeder and Petrobus on Raeder's shoulders. Vernarth invoked the north with her staff where Alikanto would appear with her hooves with greenish stripes.

Raeder says:  Let's go. On those warm currents to follow we will not unite you Vernarth. Smiling, the fantastic boy danced, forming figures that enlivened him to hold on to the legs of Petrobus. They both stared at Vernarth and raised high above the warm clouds. Beneath the Messolonghi miniature, she had Vernarth's sights on them; she was putting reins and her Hoplite tunic, to mount Alikanto. He looks around and makes a big sign to Raeder to follow him to where he was, they suspend themselves and manage to go back to the highest mass of misty airs that would take them against the clock towards Patmos to meet Saint John and Etréstles.
HEGIRA TO PATMOS  /  COPYRIGHT
Ayad Gharbawi Jan 2010
THE STORY OF SARA

CHAPTER 5: THE PARTY IS DESTROYED




The meeting ended and I walked out not knowing my fate.  
  I felt scared for the first time.
  Surely, Omar's people would be coming after me?
  And what about those others whom Omar had just expelled? They will be after my blood too!
  My God, I began to think all over again at his last speech. He demanded the expulsion of twenty five per cent of party members – and God knows what would happen to them, whilst I, Sara, was the chief of the Purification Programme.
Obviously, as the 'leader' of the programme and being 'found' to be a 'traitor', then I would meet the most brutal end?
  Maybe, I was being too paranoid.
  Maybe all this talk about killing was just idle threat used by Omar to intimidate us?
  But I was still scared and I needed to escape.
  I decided to leave my house; but where could I go?
  I knew that that there was no one better than Sanji, but since I did cut him off, where does that leave me?
  Will he accept me back?
  I went to his house and rang the bell.
  The sad fact as that I did not have one single 'friend' that I could depend on!


  Sure enough, there was Sanji.
  "Hi" I said shyly.
  "You're in trouble I assume?"
  As usual, he was right.
He motioned me with a pleasant smile to come inside.
  "I mean, what did you expect from Omar?" Sanji asked me; "Sara you knew perfectly well what Omar stood for: dictatorship and ******. So who's to blame here?"
    "I do?" I replied sarcastically.
  "With respect to Omar, are you seriously going to tell me that no one knew that he was a murderer?"
  I sat quiet.
  I didn't know what to say.
  "Well?" Sanji asked. "You knew Sara; you knew and yet there you were with him, and there you were carrying out his orders. So, who's pretending now Sara?"
  Again, I sat still.
  What could I say?
  To be honest, I didn't feel guilty about what I had done, rather, I was embarrassed because Sanji was right, and I couldn't admit it!
  "Look Sanji," I finally managed to paste some words together, "will you allow me to stay with you?"
  "Of course," the soft spoken Sanji replied. "My God, I know the dogs are out to get you, and I'm not going to leave you on the streets. You didn't have to ask."
  I was so utterly relieved, I broke all the rules, and now I was finding safety, and I couldn't help but hugging the somewhat startled Sanji!



With the declaration by Omar of 'Unrestricted Warfare', the government suddenly, under a newly elected leader, decided to go on the offensive against not only Omar's party but against any so-called 'illegal' party.
  The new Prime Minister was the most serious, straight-forward man that I had ever seen.
  He was determined to remove all the leftist parties and individual leaders based on the law, because, for him, the country had had enough of our ‘disruptions, illegal activities and chaotic actions.
He declared in a speech on the day of assuming office that a new era will now begin in our country.
  "No more of these shadowy, secretive, cult-like so-called 'political' parties, for we shall chase them out and put the guilty ones straight into jail, which is their real homes. I pledge to you, as I did, many times, during my campaign, that we shall not be meek in the face of these disruptive and criminal characters; force will be met with force, and by ‘force’, I mean the law. I solemnly declare to you, the law shall not be undermined by these dangerous, subversive elements within our society. The law shall be preserved, and more to the point, the law will go into action, because, if we do not seriously act, then the very edifice of our entire political and legal establishment will be at risk."
  So, the Pigs were now going to destroy all our parties – and all because Omar brought so much disrepute and disgrace to us. I felt scared from our new Prime Minister, just as I was scared from the gangs of Omar.
  And, yet, strangely enough, I couldn’t help but admire this new Prime Minister!
  How odd and paradoxical of me!
  I knew what attracted me to his character: his force of personality. He was a solemn, self assured man, who simply decided that our country needed bold, swift, decisive action against what he regarded as ‘irresponsible’ elements in our society.
  In that sense, he was completely different from the other Prime Ministers, who treated us, as nothing more than clowns and jesters.
  But, this Prime Minister was really right, when he ran his election campaign, based on his promise that he would get rid of us – and the people enthusiastically approved of his sincerity and seriousness in his determination, if elected, to wipe us out!


  The Prime Minister, continued:
  "And so, I say to you tonight that we too, shall initiate our legally based police action against these criminal gangs – yes, I deliberately call them ‘criminals’, because they are no different from any other gangs, such as, for example, narcotic gangs. For far too long, this nation has been far too patient in putting up with so-called 'freedom of expression' that these so-called parties espouse. Yes, but 'freedom of expression' does not mean inciting violence and destroying public property and randomly killing innocent men and women! I say, and thanks to you, the public, who voted for us to handle and solve this crises, I say to you all, that we shall no longer tolerate this state of utter chaos in our land," and his audience thunderously began to applaud and cheer, "we shall not stand one more minute for this sorry state of affairs. These so-called 'revolutionary' parties have only one principle and that is to create disturbances, mass chaos and ultimately violence. They are nothing but murderous thugs and clearly no civilized society and no self-respecting civilisation on this planet can possibly accept the existence of such criminal gangs and that is precisely why we shall use every legal method to completely eliminate these people.”
  It was obvious to me, that we were no longer ‘popular’ with the masses.
  Otherwise, how did this bold Prime Minister get elected by such an overwhelming majority of the voters?
  No, I had to face the new reality, and that was our movement, was no longer acceptable to the majority of our people.
  And, it was completely our fault, because we began to behave with unrestrained lunacy, by hurting and endlessly insulting, using the most derogatory words against practically every segment of society, and by raging against every type of worker, from the ******* collectors to the managers of factories, and to the owners of any business; by randomly damaging and destroying public and private property, especially what people most cared for, such as their homes, their cars and their businesses; by our endless chaotic riots and marches, that would disrupt and paralyze the business and every other activity – such as hospitals, for example - of an entire city.  And then there were the random murders of innocent people, that we somehow decided were not ‘pure’ enough for us – that really offended our society, as well.


  Then, I noticed, the Prime Minister was still speaking:
“And so, tonight, I appeal to you, the members of these ridiculous, criminal so-called parties. I calmly ask each and everyone one of you, men and women, to quietly leave your respective illegal parties, so as to save yourselves from further prosecution by our noble courts. I am giving you nothing less than twenty four hours to exit from these gangster parties. This will be your last chance to rehabilitate yourself back to decency and respectability. Now, this is my first day in office, and I am proud to be solemnly fulfilling my pledge, that I gave to my people, if elected - and I have been duly elected, and so to my pledge, I remain as faithful as ever. So, let this be my first and last warning to you members of these so-called 'parties': leave within 24 hours or else face the full might of our law, because, soon, all too soon, you shall soon see yourselves, and no doubt, your other comrades, in prison, and you will thereby be assigned to the dustbins of history. I tell you this much, and listen, for those of you who have ears: Your time is up! The murderous chaos that you have perpetrated is over! Resign or be bludgeoned by the forces of decency and morality; no more fear for all our law abiding men and women, who have been for far too long intimidated by the likes of you! Your insane, sick era is over, and I say to you members of these murderous gangsters, and to all you decent, law abiding citizens, goodnight; for, tomorrow you shall see a revitalized nation that is finally safe from fear! Tomorrow, you shall all see a country that abides by proper laws and not a country that seemed to be going down the path of mafia rule!"
  Well, what a speech indeed.
  The time for our chaotic mischief was over.
  
  Obviously, I wasn't a fool; I fully realized that this was the first Pig government that was going to deal with us in a deadly serious manner.  
  Or maybe I'm wrong.
  Maybe this Prime Minister is talking ******* – like all the other politicians.
  Once they get in office, they betray every word they said during the election campaign.
  Well, actually, who knows?
  I felt depressed.
  Was this really the end of our great movement?
  Was it really 'true' the masses no longer 'liked' us?
  And if so, then why would they turn against us?
  After all wasn't our entire epic struggle for the masses? Why would they betray us; we were and are their only saviours and their only salvation, so why would they vote for this avowedly hard line politician and put him in office?
  I was completely confused; what was going to happen to our great struggle?
  Wasn’t our great war for the liberation of the masses from the claws of the Pigs?
  Could it possibly be that all our sacrifices shall now be in vain?
  My God, didn’t the masses, the people realize that we were fighting for them?!
  We sacrificed our entire lives for them, and now they were going to betray us?
  What does that say about Humanity?

      

  Within a few days of the Prime Ministers' speech, it became quite evident that he meant exactly what he intended to do.
  Soon, the police were out in force, arresting anyone involved in the numerous anti-Pig parties.
  All over the country, the police came after every known party member; they were arrested and sent to the police station, to await court.
  The same went for individual known leaders of the party.
  The courts were, themselves, very swift in deciding the verdict, since, I can only assume, it wasn’t that difficult to see if a particular party member had committed a crime or not.
  Presumably, the police had kept numerous files on all of us and on all our individual activities?
  And, I must admit, that I was surprised at how lenient the courts were for the majority of those prosecuted were released as innocent from any crimes.
  Most were acquitted, but for those who participated in acts of public and private property damage, they were given a few months in jail.
  As for those who gave inflammatory, pro-violence, hate filled speeches, like Tony, were given up to one year in jail.

  However, Omar was in no mood to be conciliatory, which also surprised me.
  He went into hiding, rather than surrendering himself.
  He appeared in a televised appearance in front of about twenty of his followers.
  How different the scene was!
  For, hadn't we been used to seeing Omar in front of hundreds of thousands of screaming fans before?
  And now, he was speaking to a mere twenty or so of his followers!
  "Members of our party. Greetings to you all, ladies and gentlemen. Yes, I know that the people who are listening and watching, will be asking why I am not in front of thousand of our party members. You see, I'm aware of what you out there are thinking."
  My God, the leader is happily telling us that his 'knowledge' told him as to what we are thinking, as concerns why his audience is so small.
  And, he looked as if that was a great insight on his part!
  What *******!
  Any fool, would be thinking that!
  "Well, my followers, my true, faithful followers I shall speak the truth. Following our great, revolutionary self-cleansing programme, we discovered, as I, of course, had always predicted, that regrettably, amidst our own so-called 'party members', there existed a huge malignant and spreading cancer. A lethal type of cancer. It was there right in the hearts and minds of quite of few of our so-called 'members'. Once our doctors discovered this fact, which I knew about, I decided to act immediately, ruthlessly and without hesitation. I had to amputate every cancerous form within the party and, I can tell you it was done superbly and with absolute surgical precision! Yes, we removed the cancer successfully, and today, our party members are completely free from any Pig attributes!"
  The small crowd applauded and tried to scream their pleasure, but it was a far cry from his previous speeches when the roar of the audience was deafening.
  Of course, my question was, what was point in what he was saying?
  The fact was that his movement and his followers were now no more!
  Omar was finished; his party was dead, and he’s happily telling us about ‘removing the cancer’?!
  I then noticed, that Omar was still talking:
  "Having cleansed the party, I, Omar, ordered a new type of warfare against the criminal leaders that rule our nation. Of course, these criminals are ruling our nation to its death. That is why we must wage this great, humanistic and eternally just war. I ordered a new phase: the Unrestricted Warfare principle and that meant, in effect, that we shall use whatever means it was necessary to gain the supreme victory. The new government of Satanical vipers now decided to fight us with a new ferocity that was thus far unheard of. In other words, no Prime Minister, has so far used such savage methods in the war.”
  What ‘savagery was he talking about?!
  The Prime minister simply used the police forces to arrest party members, and they then had to face the courts.
  Where was this most unusually ‘savage’ form of warfare?


  I snapped out of my thoughts:
“But do not worry, because we soldiers are used to the most unimaginable viciousness on the part of the enemy, and their sick methods will not repulse us; on the contrary, these inhuman methods of war, will only strengthen our resolve, will and determination to exterminate this enemy no matter what it costs in blood and tears.”
  Again, he was just repeating the same, old slogans, that were completely empty of any worthy content.
  “And so, you ask me, tonight, where are we in this war? Who's winning? I am happy to report to you: that our pure soldiers have moved from battle to battle, from victory to victory; and, all this is thanks to the purity within their hearts and souls.”
  What was he talking about!?
  I felt like screaming and laughing at the same time; for the sheer incomparable idiocy of Omar’s words, made him sound like an absolute professional maniac!
  “You see, only the 'good' can succeed against evil. You cannot beat evil when you yourselves have an army of evil, impure people. No, you see, that is why we are winning the war. Goo
The most offensive word in the English vocabulary
Is a reproductive ***** of the female anatomy

They made my very *** offensive
Turning words into weapons

I refuse to become a derogatory remark
Each and every one of you was birthed by a beautiful *******

The most offensive word in the English vocabulary
Describes the most powerful part of my body
the most offensive word in the english vocabulary
Maggie Emmett Nov 2015
For nine days the artillery barrage
rained down on us
that June of summer in the Somme
machine gunners like me waited
in our concrete bunkers deep in the earth

When the shelling stopped
we rushed to the surface
and began our job of mowing down
the slow walking British Infantry
stoically advancing as if in another war
in another time where they might choose
to die bravely and with honour
a hero fighting for his life
his king and country

But here he dies unknown
by the chance turning of my gun
in his direction at that one moment
and the random number of bullets
left to fire.



© M.L.Emmett
Read at a show at the Art Gallery of South Australia for an exhibition of the etchings of Otto Dix
Revenant Jul 2014
It feels like New Years all over again out here, but my feet don't hurt,
and I'm not chilled to the bone.
There's always been that insurmountable amount of space
b   e   t   w   e   e   n
my body and yours,
and I still want to kiss you ever so badly.
It's misting now, and it's kin to the haze in my head.
I miss you
Kira Nerys Sep 2014
******
A word I have heard a thousand times
A thousand different ways
But has always sounded the same,
Like ignorance

A word that has never left me feeling worthless
Or unloved
Just misunderstood

Even when followed by being thrown into the bathroom stall of a Girl's gym  locker room
Or by the few friends I had left helping me clean up my battered face and the hide the bruises

I have always been proud of the term ****** because even though it was said to be offensive
I was being acknowledged as me

But when the word was spilled by the woman who once rocked me to sleep till I was no longer scared
The woman who has always protected me
It was then that all the pain I ever should have felt
Took a hold of my heart and ran it up to my throat until the pain leaked from my eyes
I was angry
I was sad
And I was scared
Because I knew that word was always followed by violence
And I didn't think that I would be able to walk with my head held high from this one
My face turned red and my blood turned cold and I watched my father defend me
Finally I stopped him and I looked at her
And I said yes, but I'm your ******
Mateuš Conrad Feb 2016
.before i come to the food topics, here's a pet peeve... language... how the pakistanis might / might not be offended by the laziness of the english, shortening their denotation to a prefix: ****-... and i'm like... is that really offensive? with the -stani suffix missing? o.k. o.k., iraq: iraqi... iran: iranian... pakistani: ****- / pakistani... so what about afghanistan? afghan, or afghanistani?! i'm pretty sure it's afghan... a person is afghani and not afghanistani... so what's wrong with ****-? it must be an english-****'stani thing from the 1960s or something... ******* as sensitive as french footballers... this has to be hard-pressed... this instance... because i hardly think it's a racial slur to stick to the prefix and not include the suffix, given the example from afghanistan - just like the "problem" of calling a jew a ***-, borrowed prefix from... yiddish! now for the food:

a. would you trust a skinny chef? i know i wouldn't trust a chef who's also a healthy-eating gym bro maniac, i bet he would never cook with lard or pork trimmings, with that calorie calculator lodged up his head that represents an ******* is not much to go with when taste is prime... 6ft1 253.5pounds, that's where i stand... i would never trust a health-freak to cook for me, let alone all the proofs rattling anorexic examples...

    b. "***** take your shoes off and get into the kitchen!" what a ****** joke, chauvanism rampant... mind you... who the hell said that women belong in the kitchen? they don't... i don't want a woman in the kitchen... i've had two dinners cooked by my fwends' mothers when still in my early teens... 1. over-cooked pasta... my fwends father would pretend to eat the dinner, before driving me home while stopping off at a sikh diner and took to the take-away (cooked by men), another example beside the over-cooked pasta? under-cooked spring potatoes - after all... the men on ships and submarines that kept the other men firing did all the cooking... men can cook... or at least: that's the least they should do... think: organic chemistry experiments...

eating a raw herring
in piquant mayonnaise
of reminiscence of a
granny-smith and pickled
cucumber tickle...
slurping it up into
a workout of the oesophagus
might remind many
of oral ***: but after all...
it's only a raw herring being eaten.

p.s. well perhaps gulping down
a raw oyster does feel familiar
to performing oral *** on a woman...
but since you're not really
chewing the oyster,
or licking it... but gulping it whole...
i can only compared performing
oral *** on a ***** to
                eating a raw herring.

            and why all of this talk of food?
well... what's on the menu for tomorrow?
a bangers & mash stew,
    old recipe from the days of the british
empire... mind you: why did they
call sausages bangers back then?
well, during the war, they put a lot of
water into the sausages...
and when water mixes with warm oil?
bang! bang!

                 'i was five and he was six,
   we rode on horses made of sticks,
he wore black and i wore white,
   he would always win the fight...
   bang! bang!
  he shot me down!
  bang! bang!
                 i hit the ground...
bang! bang!
   that awful sound...
bang! bang!
   my baby... shot me down!'
              (audio bullys ft. nancy s.) -

so obviously i had to take a walk
and buy the key ingredient...
   i.p.a.:
        and when they were stationed
in the raj, and the troops were receiving
provisions...
  the standard beer wouldn't last the trip,
going off...
     and dark port was too sweet...
so indian pale ale was invented:
   more potent alcohol content and brewed
based more on hops than barley or wheat...
bitter: but my god, what a strand of beer,
like your typical irish stout...
   which is why i never figured out
  the bud to be the king of beers...
   fermentation of rice? sure... it's crisp...
but also the sort of toddler **** you'd expect
from rice fermentation:
no body, no *****, no blood,
no palette...
      easy stew:
   sausages,
      onions, garlic, celery, carrots,
                  leeks...
     a bottle of i.p.a.,
   some to degrease the pan the sausages
and veg were fried on, the rest for the jacuzzi...
some water, bay leaf, salt to taste,
   tomato purée and 2tbsp
  of muscovado sugar to bite through
   the extra hops... mash on the side...
                  and an array of veg on the side too...

i still don't know where the idea
that women belong in the kitchen came from:
perhaps when the men were coal-miners,
and when the kitchen wasn't filled
with all the current day appliances
of convenience...
   when women worked as hard in the kitchen
as the men who worked in the coal-mine...
perhaps then, in the early part of the 20th
century... when spaghetti dough was hand-made
at home...
then a woman could take pride in her
house-keeping...
   now? now i guess: the same sort of melancholic
voice bound to nancy sinatra singing...
because once upon a time it was hard
work, running the house...
                       and then "suddenly"
everything became simple...
a man could walk into a coal-mine,
come back home and...
              make himself a decent meal...
  looking at what the english woman buy
in the supermarket?
      couch potato maidens...
       ready meal after yet another ready meal...
things have become so easy
that easy isn't enough...

      let me tell you a culinary ***** of a story...
the scurge of making homemade
ravioli! believe me... once a year is enough...
sure, it tastes great...
                  but once a year is enough.
During my Childhood.
a New Hampshire father of twin boys named Joe taught me that friendship, love, and respect,
meant wrestling.
He was a burly man
with glasses and a salt and pepper beard
Who loved guitar hero, dunkin' doughnuts and Motorcycles.
One day joking to his adult friends I heard:
"I'm a lesbian trapped in a mans body"

Now, Joe did not mean this the way
we think of it in this community.
He was not transgendered.
probablly didn't even know they exist.
He was simply saying.
"I have an attraction to girls who will never love me, because I have a *****,
and Isn't that tragic enough for a punchline?"
Though a young boy,
I identified with that.

In middle school, the media convinced me
that gay boys were getting all the ladies.
So I needed everyone to know I was gay.
that way, they'd be my friends,
and get naked in front of me.
It worked.
However, I still could not get a girlfriend.
And I did not want a boyfriend.
because again, It was all a 10 year old me's
Con just to see girls undress.

A year or two goes by
being gay
To get a girlfriend.
when on the television:
I see Tila Tequila.
A bisexual Bachelorette reality Show.

Wait! I said to my mother.
"I CAN LIKE BOTH?"
"Sure you can! I do.
This one time, aunt spider and I"
"Mom! That's enough."

So in my living room,
Surrounded by fold-out tables
And chicken parmesisan
I pronounced myself bisexual.

I had the best of both worlds! I could watch girls undress, AND have a girlfriend.
This was not relevant however, for a while.
As I still had not developed social skills.

Enter highschool awkward bisexual boy.
I'd never actually been attracted to a man before...
But I wasn't ruling it out.
zero percent of the woman I fell for seemed to like men,
Or more accurately, me.
I was resonating closer to the
"Lesbian trapped in a mans body"
line then ever before.
I probablly asked out every female senior, every girl I grew up with.
every girl who looked at me, to go on a date.
All to be turned down.
Except one.
I entered college with a monogamous Long-term relationship raising A beautiful Nerd girl's daughter.
Seemed like I had it made.
Young parents.
Both bisexual.
Together we flushed out Every kink and curvature of what pleasured us.
Then two years later.
My grandmother died,
I lost my job of four years,
She left me,
taking our daughter with her.
Devastated, I turned to the most destructive of known vices.
Tinder.

I went on first and last date after parking lot hookup after rooftop romance with these girls.
Writing poetry all the while to document my stresses.
I was no longer "A lesbian trapped in a mans body."
If anything, I was a lesbian
Thriving! In a mans body.

This came up at a party once
We were playing rockband when I said it.
A woman spoke up:
"You're devalueing the phrase for transgendered woman who use it!
It's dissrepectfull."
When I tried to explain myself:
That it helped me rationalize
years of rejection
laugh at my own failure.
Build the foundation
for my optimistic attitude
By saying it's not me.
I just like lesbians.
it made my failures a predictable Punchline.

But I was weak.
They convinced me.
I stopped identifying as
"A lesbian thriving in a mans body."
from then on, I was a man.

Years have passed and I've given a lot of love to a lot of people.
Learned a lot about my preferences
Sexually, romantically, personally.

At the momment:
I am a:
Hetero flexible
Polyamorous
Male.

But deep down I know.
Even though I'll never say it.
Because it isn't really true.
Or maybe because it's offensive.
Or maybe because i'm scared.
I'll always be a lesbian
Thriving as a man.
"Hey loverboy," she says. I don't respond.*



A rough draft excerpt from my story, Fictional Truth.



“Hey loverboy,” she says. I don’t respond. I enjoy ignoring her for a moment after I come out of a day dream.

“Hey. Jake. Snap out of it boy. Time to come back to earth,” she says with her usual tone of pleased annoyance. This time I leave the world inside my head and return to reality. Slowly turning my head to the right, I can see those deep blue eyes gazing up. I never get tired of her eyes.

“Come on, you said you’d help me here.”

“Sorry,” I say with a half grin and my best attempt at contrition. I look down to the papers in her lap. Right, math. I was helping her with calculus. She was really very good at math. We were in the same class, but she was two years younger than me after skipping two grades in elementary school.

“This one you just take the derivative of your function and plug in these two values.” I can remember these things effortlessly now, which was a huge accomplishment for someone who doesn't particularly like math.

“See, this is why I keep you around,” she says, those rosy lips that I so adored pulled into a little smirk. She reaches up and kisses me. She always seems to find an excuse to kiss me. “You can go back to daydreaming now.” Indeed I do, retreating back to the dreamscape inside my head. This time I think back to when I met Clara.


I had just arrived on campus, a bright eyed college freshman. There I was, lost in a sea of beautiful women. Small private schools had never been kind to me in that regard. Everything on campus was a wonder. Nobody from my high school had come here and I was very much alone but I didn't mind, I had outgrown most of my high school friends long ago. It was long past time for me to expand my horizons.

I found myself standing in front of a massive glass building. I wasn't past checking my reflection in the glass windows. Had to make sure my hair still looked as good as it did when I arrived. Who knew when I might run in to? Opening the doors I caught a waft of the bookstore smell, unlike anything I expected. At home the bookstores were small, with dusty leather covers that begged to be handled and old people that smelled like coffee. This was completely different. The odor of panicked freshman and newly bound textbooks permeated the air. I decided right then I wouldn't be spending much time there.

There was a long line extending towards the back of the building. Not knowing better, I assumed it was the line I was supposed to be in and slowly made my way to the rear. This would take forever. I pulled out my phone and started on another game of Angry Birds. I had been killing evil pigs for almost five minutes when I began to feel like I was being watched. Sure enough I glanced up to see a large pair of deep blue eyes looking at me.

“You know, some psychologists say that technology is making us less social,” said the girl looking up at me. I couldn't respond. She had straight black hair pulled behind her in a long ponytail. She had a small, perfectly formed nose with what seemed like a sea of freckles on it. Even more freckles danced on her cheeks. She was several inches shorter than me, maybe 5’9” and had on tight jean shorts and a black tank top that exposed only the most tantalizing amount of cleavage.

“So I’m just starting to feel a little uncomfortable with you ******* me with your eyes like that,” she said with the smirk on her face that I would soon come to know.

“Sorry,” I said, a tiny grin tugging at the corner of my mouth, “You surprised me a bit.”

“I’m Clara. This is the point in conversation where you tell me your name.” I liked her already. She had confidence and wit that was both abrasive and attractive.

“I’m Jake, pleased to meet you.” ****, I was smooth, like a wagon over rocks. “Are you a freshman too?”

“Yep. Just got here. I don’t think this line is moving.” I really liked the way little dimples appeared at the corners of her mouth even when she frowned slightly.

“It really doesn't seem to be. At least I have pleasant company,” I said. Oh man I was so smooth! I was really proud of myself right there. Flirting was hard with pretty girls, they seemed to throw me off balance.

“Well, that was the least offensive flirting I've heard all day,” she replied. Good gosh this girl was straightforward. “It’s a good thing you’re cute or I might not have accepted that.” Cute. Okay, I could work with cute. “So you’re in psychology 1000?” she asked.

“Nope, I took that during high school.” I replied. Why would she ask that?

“Well, you’re standing in the psychology book pickup line.” She said with a slightly puzzled look on her face. I definitely was not in psychology.

“Oh, Psychology! I, uh, I thought you said, uh, philanthropy. Nope, I’m definitely in the right line." Okay, that was a lie and I was at least 100% sure philanthropy was not a class. But hey, I was under pressure. She looked at me like I was slightly on drugs but moved on without hesitation.

We talked about various meaningless things while the line crept closer to the back of the store. The stunningly blue shade of her eyes made it very difficult to focus on conversation. When we got to the pickup window, she paid for her book and stepped to the side, watching me. I decided to bow out of buying a several hundred dollar book just to avoid looking like an idiot. I comforted myself with the fact that she might think it was funny.

“Soooo. I’m not really in philanthropy. Or psychology. I just didn't want to stop talking to you just yet.” I said with a sheepish grin. Luckily for me, she laughed.

“Alright then Mr. Jake, what books do you really need? Maybe we can go stand in line again.” I listed off several books that I needed for classes.

“Calculus. I need that one as well. Come on silly.” She turned her back and started walking. I followed right on her heels, a goofy grin plastered all over my face.

That was my first interaction with Clara. We spent the next two hours gathering all of our books, and at the end I carried her rather large pile back to her dorm room. I was promptly rewarded with her phone number and some cookies that her mom had packed.


“Hey. What about this one?” Clara’s voice comes from beside me. I lean over to look at the paper again.

“This time just take the anti-derivative of cosine and solve for x.”

“Oh right. That's the last one.”

“What do you want to do now?” I ask.

“How about we go to your room and see if we can make your roommate uncomfortable enough to leave?” She says with a mischievous grin, bringing those deep blue eyes nearer to mine. She always seems to find an excuse to kiss me.
A rough draft excerpt from my short story, Fictional Truth.

— The End —