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vircapio gale Jun 2012
love-energy swinging toward bitter blows:
a father’s pride becomes a son’s,
he becoming bitter becoming hatred
in the midst of love abused,
a civil fight for freedom failing in the eyes of youth:
these minds of ours turn wildly—
change to the beat of unknown drums
and death knocks us up
pregnant with a new generation of hate,
of goals to love: the obliteration of hate’s mother,
but question on, worship your mind,
build a shrine of doubt and find
darkness emerging as a deeper shade of black
knowledge? knowledge?
myths laid upon us through the perspectival dimming of language
no one’s fault? societal pressures
no cause for blame? survival instincts
no source of evil? history has a gun to their head. . . .
no use for these words? meaningless.
dialogue, yes, for the birds,
the carrion of hope
once the breeding stops
and lets the precious journey start:
down the cesspool of quasi-oblivion,
where we’re all a minority of one,
grasping for meaning in an abyssm of phantasmal foundations.
words, words, the excuse of words;
when father’s left no ground to walk on,
the son sits there digging
ditches for the death of systems
holes in the fabric mother wore,
tears in the existence we thought we knew.

what is this about? question marks
swerving away from sour truth
bleeds the nonsense through the flesh of what we love
and dying, dying, hate becomes a source of love,
guilt projects a softened heart
kneeling down now
outside, but wanting in.
affirmed, dejected.

[OR
are they swerving away from faith
simply a defense against the actions to take
ontic procratstinator! hear me now!
safety is the goal behind every measure
seek danger and you run the dangers of comfort,
seek comfort, and delusion becomes your handmaid.]

for knowledge of past dogma is dogma too
and the heart pumps it anyway;
for existence is. O heart, your sutra
flows nimbly on into eternity,
but you take this life and live it now,
the rhythm born of a mystery,
sacred to the foolish,
sarkin to the wise—
and the dancing wise man
birthing a new enigma
travels on into the depths of the ordinary
with a smile and a bow,
a hop-skip like Nietzschean
melodrama.

I can write it once for fun,
twice for accuracy,
thrice for fame and ten more for shame.
Do you want to know what it’s about
or do you want to figure it out?
the game of pride makes fresh
the fish of mental seas;
but truth is less cozy;
dagger in your existential eye.

no conclusions to be embraced without the whim of faith?
no art show game gripe to win but for the game of taste?

this bout goes on, this Bout goes on! oh how I wish my mind was lacking!
but no! the sacrifice, but the sacrifice,
pigs of Aristotle knew no quarrell,
no such quarrell.

when does such a poem become a forced effort?  when will I stop questioning myself?
where is this urge to destroy originate?
what ******* language am I speaking in when I think?
what and why,
who the but questions, questions
falling spiking holes in teh floor of contentment
or is it laziness: should I tak emy e pick now or wa itf ort he rig htto **** newith mystic alllllllllllll certainty from be yo ndt he fen ceof lan gua ge.

why go back? why try?
the difference between communication and self-indulgent writing is the effort to conform to the extent necessary for the sharingof truth... and so nobility demands conformity, however long it takes and however wonderful it may be in the mean time to simply spill my fingers across the trypesu ritre lia shjkk e a A b B i IG load o f ***... as if the hiddenness of deconstucted language masked my immaturity as a poet, as a person, as a thinker, as a wallower in shame.  as a Man. as a *** machine. as a weak creature. as a creature of potentially great accomplishments but small ***** at the present, as a person hiding from the said for fear of having to live up to it, as one who doesn’t believe his words half the time, even noe, ever noer rht all suiooos  dhjhjh tuof rhty w arbif trya dfyoudng huddkkfkd fmdmf dfdlililhkjga wyeruipok smmm tuhtuth dgfhg dagdh f dhajkdf  fuduudjjd fh d hdhhd bit b not n tno totot t ototot  read read read read read read read read read reda dnrenadkf leadsd fhdus duig hgjhdf dh sdmf sialdihf duf dreioan ign udfin the dh diguicse of hjtkjh heioa never heros heilike hte  e9a 1 1 ih kj n h ogma doifj hedOLvever otitoto the  ososososririrroow ww dance waiting at the librasyer renckjh c concon con iejr a  goodo excucse to t constraint no nt rot th even dfhight hwith th d dear on the all ndklfn eh fh searching thioart worthless buthen I find htheihadf htis hivoih Valid dfkdljhf jhkajh yea it s i kjh Lavlls ishn Vadildld meaning ngon woven into nonesense nd fnidoijifj bJar in Tennessiossdnohf  a freww few deletes and the important words become clear however taxing on an hypothetical reader from the future in which I do hope to become g”reat” half-heartily,  though for show.  .  .and the experience of writing is revealed through the laziness, or tiredness, of a recent graduate trying to write something meaningful after a summer of passion and *** and drugs and resentment toward the family and the sad economic advice given him.
Donall Dempsey Aug 2024
TALKING TO THE DEAD

she traces the ogham
with a tiny fingertip

dead stone
living lichen.

"And the man who made this is
. . .dead?"

"Ohhh long before the long long ago!"

"If I stretched my voice out into a shout...
. . .would he hear me?"

"No, love. . .
silence would

swallow your words."

"Even his ghost is
. . .dead?"

"Even his ghost is
. . .dead!"

I teach her her
name in Ogham.

She traces it with a stick
in the sand.

The long dead ghost
smiles at her efforts.

His voice stretches into a shout
that reaches my little girl's hand.

Her hand listens
to the invisible voice.

He teaches her.
She resurrects him.

Both of them living
in this one moment.

*

Ogham is an alphabet that appears on monumental inscriptions dating from the 4th to the 6th century AD, and in manuscripts dating from the 6th to the 9th century. It was used mainly to write Primitive and Old Irish, and also to write Old Welsh, Pictish and Latin. It was inscribed on stone monuments throughout Ireland, particuarly Kerry, Cork and Waterford, and in England, Scotland, the Isle of Man and Wales, particularly in Pembrokeshire in south Wales.

The name Ogham is pronounced [ˈoːm] or [ˈoːəm] in Modern Irish, and it was spelt ogam and pronounced [ˈɔɣam] in Old Irish. Its origins are uncertain: it might be named after the Irish god Ogma, or after the Irish phrase og-úaim (point-seam), which refers to the seam made by the point of a sharp weapon. Ogham is also known as or ogham craobh (tree ogham) beth luis fearn or beth luis nion, after the first few letters.

Ogham probably pre-dates the earliest inscriptions - some scholars believe it dates back to the 1st century AD - as the language used shows pre-4th century elements. It is thought to have been modelled on or inspired by the Roman, Greek or Runic scripts. It was designed to write Primitive Irish and was possibly intended as a secret form of communication.

While all surviving Ogham inscriptions are on stone, it was probably more commonly inscribed on sticks, stakes and trees. Inscriptions are mostly people's names and were probably used to mark ownership, territories and graves. Some inscriptions in primitive Irish and Pictish have not been deciphered, there are also a number of bilingual inscriptions in Ogham and Latin, and Ogham and Old Norse written with the Runic alphabet.

On a pilgrimage to Glendalough and we stopped off to have a pint at a pub in Hollywood, Wicklow where in that pub a burnished copper ogham was on the wall...this sparked the poem. With a poem ya just never know where y'are going and you just go along for the ride and memory does the rest along with a bit of wrestling with words...those pesky vairmants.

— The End —