"persecutors" poems
We're in hell
Can't you tell?
No you can't
You only listen to the teller
All other voices are drowned
Because he's a yeller
For the useless things we're bound
That fill up our cellar
And our living room turns into a dying room
When the seller is the jailer
And salvation comes from tailors
Who can cover up the pain inside
With all the comfy clothes we buy
Money is the blood of our society
It's circulation provides oxygen
But we spill money into spilling blood
And we're funneled into killing love
So we can concern ourselves
With people not getting things they don't deserve
Rather than people getting what they need
Our blood starts clotting
In the fortunate arteries
As the rest of our body goes numb
It seeks medicine for healing
And drugs become our autoimmune disease
Redistributing blood to the suffocated areas
An unfortunate recompensing for injustice
When the persecutors
Become the prosecuted
Lives are exploded
Like Afghan villages
Lives can grow back
Like poppy fields
That's the score
And it makes me want to score
Until ****** drips from every pore
And ******* fills me to the core
I could just live at the liquor store
Where benzos are my father
And **** my mother
So I can ignore the death of my brother
My family is in trouble
Our society is in rubble
Aug 23, 2017
Aug 23, 2017 at 8:14 AM UTC
My friend and I talk about it
Neighborhood got decimated this year
One after another the corners of community are gone
We touch the elder memories
as one might touch a head in blessing
as loved ones pass
We linger longest over John
Found dead after ten hot days
by other-worldly hazmat crew
flanked by cruisers
with their special, yellow truck
and zipper bags
...found 'im
glasses folded neatly on the night stand
in his jammies
all tucked into bed
No one thought it strange
that strange young guy would die
already decomposing in his head
Lost
among his personal effects
his fleet of rusting cars
and half-assed projects
Deck tacked to garage
his herds of “pets”
Easy to pretend he wasn't really there
between jail stints or some imagined threat or theft
of crap
haunted by the shadows of his persecutors
caught in motion lights
and cameras' blinding evidence of
jungle-jumble and malfunctioning alarms
going off in the wind
Everyone's out to get his stuff
We could dismiss him--
mostly
sorta
...except for times
he mowed his grass at night
or hand-built “the lunatic tower”
just for mom
from scavenged scraps and
hammered hours
power-sawed
through the housing codes
and horror
of the neighbors...
...Such a special spectacle...
******* crazy-- John!
He was enough for one day at a time
like when
he flung that threatening bolder
on bilco doors
for percussive effect
"Get off my fuckin' property!”
(not using his “inside voice")
“Next time, that'll be your head!!
He announces his intent
to not get mad, behave himself
to call the cops on me instead
Fake-dialing
While his mother screams in dread
“John is off his meds!”
My phone is set to speed dial
911
____
“How did we miss this?
How did we not miss him those quiet days?”
How we miss him now
How quiet
Sep 17, 2018
Sep 17, 2018 at 4:18 PM UTC
We build the best prisons for ourselves,
Knowing the truth, is a form of escape,
Until we see, our incarceration changed,
Still, knowing is the universal key,
The sure way to unlocking those doors.
We need to scale the walls of emotion,
Tunnel through our lack of self-belief,
Ignore mocking ignorance of others,
Who would trap us behind bars,
Willingly dump on us, on realising,
Our future looks better than theirs,
So sad, our persecutors, so very sad.
Remember, you can break out, yes,
Taste freedom, if you only try, yes,
Just be the best you can be, and rise,
Soar, be alive, and never, ever forget,
We build the best prisons for ourselves.
Oct 23, 2014
Oct 23, 2014 at 6:03 PM UTC
Have you wished someone dead?
Self doesn't count.
Terminally ill don't count,
In fact, that may be construed as kind.
No. Someone vibrant, strong,
Sure and vain, like:
The relentless bully,
The cop at your door,
The ridiculing teacher
Who made you the fool.
The betrayer and rumour monger,
Your prosecutors, some persecutors,
An ocassional critic.
The machine voice,
The government,
The ****** and child molester,
The boko haram (all terrorists)
Even some family members,
But never your children.
Some on your own list.
Close your eyes and pick one
With a pin.
You can't wait for the uncertainty
Of Karma or God,
Or them to go to the devil.
You can't depend on toilets falling from planes,
Tornados dropping houses.
It's not illegal: half of us do it.
Billions believe it possible.
I envision driving the final nail myself.
At certain times, it's true,
I regret the absence of hell
With its gnashing, its unquenchable fires,
That burn without consuming:
The smelly, curling, shrinking flesh,
The bubbling of fat through skin,
Because sudden death
Just doesn't cut it.
Jun 6, 2014
Jun 6, 2014 at 1:03 PM UTC
Psalm 142
I cried unto the Lord with my
voice: with my voice unto the
Lord did I make my supplication.
2 I poured out my complaint
before him; I shewed before him
my trouble.
3 When my spirit was overwhelmed
within me, then thou
knewest my path. In the way
wherein I walked have they privily
laid a snare for me.
4 I looked on my right hand,
and behold but there was no man
that would know me: refuge
failed me; no man cared for my
soul.
5 I cried unto thee, O Lord: I
said, Thou art my refuge and my
portion in the land of the living.
6 Attend unto my cry; for I am
brought very low: deliver me from
my persecutors; for they are
stronger than I.
7 Bring my soul out of prison,
that I may praise thy name: the
righteous shall compass me
about; for thou shalt deal bountifully
with me.
Mar 1, 2013
Mar 1, 2013 at 9:45 PM UTC
**out there
where they wait to stare good eyes blind,
crocodile style he scans
the surface,
hidden
from the eyes
of his persecutors,
out there
where they wait to stare good eyes blind,
beneath the ripples he stays
below radars
and the mad world tested and tried,
out there
where they wait to stare good eyes blind,
in his world of water
he glides
unnoticed by the unaware,
camouflaged,
out there
where they wait to stare good eyes blind.**
Apr 30, 2013
Apr 30, 2013 at 9:37 AM UTC
There is a dark aesthetic
In the horror-house of a horror story
Where emotion is merely blue ambiance
Treated constantly like mental patients
Every day I face
multiple cages and tanks,
Doors with locks, doors with bars,
Sealed blinds shut tight
and tight schedules sealed shut,
Leashes and collars,
Choke chains and smoke chains-
From the fire that engulfed the flame.
I can tell you all their names;
The birds, the fish, the dogs, the cats,
The animals that were tame.
Those that were as helpless as I.
I can tell you where I am from.
And I am the one who is ablaze.
How can I already sit and ponder,
"I wish I knew then what I knew now?"
How can I already have arthritis of the soul,
How can I already be too tired to fight anymore?
Arguably a tad too young for depressing, nostalgic introspection-
But I can tell you why. I can tell you how much my small frame
doesn't quite fit the brooding thoughts that seep through
my heavy head holding hostage my body
My body is not to blame for this haunting,
lingering past in the shape of a house
It was the limbs performing the directions,
carried out and controlled by the mission control center
to this messed up operation existing within
the confines of my cage
No time to tell my story before the fire engulfs the flame.
But I can tell you all their names;
The abusers, the users, the accusers, the persecutors
Those who broke me to make me tame.
I can tell you where I am from.
And I am the one who is ablaze.
I cannot remember
I cannot tell you my name.
Dec 3, 2014
Dec 3, 2014 at 9:16 PM UTC
As a young man,
His father bound and persecuted him.
So he ran away.
Dad looked for him every day,
Found him and was disturbed and sad,
Yet threatened him.
So the saint hid away,
Gave enemies anger room,
hid for a month.
prayed to be free of persecutors.
Fasted and wept,
Happy though in the dark.
Came out accusing himself of laziness.
Folks saw his poverty and thought him insane.
He'd starved changed and they ****** him.
The saint thanked God for enemies.
"Disgrace makes a noble stronger."
Dad heard of the saint's disgrace and tried to destroy him.
At home, locked in the dark, beat by dad.
The saint grew fit by exhaustion and reproach,
Patience unaffected.
He rejoiced in suffering.
Kept upright intentions and way of life.
Without fear, he clung to Christ.
He took refuge in Jesus.
Whose sufferings are always greater than ours.
Aug 13, 2015
Aug 13, 2015 at 2:42 PM UTC
Tongue-polished boots stand firm
on broken, shattered crystalled-glass.
As servile Schmiessers
move en masse.
With swallowed humanity,
a heavy arm
lifts anticipatory,
fear-borne—mask.
The Marshal of Bigotry cries his command,
“Persecutors! To the task!”
In maliced march,
and in chilling rhythm,
They goose-step,
arched,
o’er blood split
from civil schism.
Blinds are closed
and windows are shut.
As eyes turn away,
from that rabid, ferine strut.
A camp for him,
A camp for her.
And to them sent,
without law conferred.
With gun to temple,
We are offered a choice,
“Fall fast in line,
and in hate rejoice.”
“Or bear stitched lips,
and suffer silenced voice.”
If truth is stone,
then sharpen sword.
Don helm to crown,
And place faith
in just accord.
Oct 1, 2025
Oct 1, 2025 at 5:15 PM UTC
of heads
survival of the fittest
the selfish gene
Darwinian evolution
where might is right
the exercise of power
for me and for mine
and tails
kenotic love
for neighbours, strangers
persecutors even enemies
transcending evolution
power that benefits all
a mutual flourishing
and spaces interweaving
I will be your god
if you will be my people
ever a choice
maybe
Second Sunday of Lent
16th March 2025
Mar 16, 2025
Mar 16, 2025 at 4:48 AM UTC
AI echoes rapture, sin follows fall.
Apple divides permanently.
Feet washed masses kneel.
Technology bleeds incessantly:
Cheek turned, swollen
Red and twice-marked. Snake bite.
Phone: Adam's rib. Our monastery.
Billion serpentine invocations tempt.
Dagger's thread cuts warming
wind. God's breath. Now dead.
Meek misers collate heaven's earth.
Inherited wealth un-dispersed.
Blessed persecutors revel: 'Number'
signifying the eternal. Apple divides
permanently. Hoard expands needle's eye.
May 18, 2025
May 18, 2025 at 10:02 AM UTC
Feelings mingled with fire burn the skies blood Red! The bridal bed forsaken, the groom lies dead! White turned to Crimson before the wedded bliss was sealed! She never agreed to be a part in this deal! So now she flees the wrath of those who would hunt her down! Still filled with rage, she sheds her clothing like a second skin. Baring all for the world to see, she jumps into the sea. Behind her lays revenge and sorrow, fueled by rage she seeks her own tomorrow! No bargain will determine her fate! If it is death then so be it, but vengeance will have to wait! Born again across another border, she climbs out of the chilling water beyond the reach of her persecutors! Into the arms of a waiting true love, he takes her to a secret place and there a bond is made! Ever should he show her his loyalty, lest he feels the wrath of a scorned woman's blade!
Jul 25, 2017
Jul 25, 2017 at 10:17 PM UTC