"pickpockets" poems
The street was dark and so too were my eyes
I walked down the cobble under darkened skies
I walked down the stone, ankle breakers sets
Gamblers in the alleys watching on, making bets
The buildings stand guard on the night for their lords
keeping them safe, open their mouths; in filth pours
Light poles, with dim candles, give hope for safe journey
Dark alley ways steal eyes, make nervous muscles in our sides
Window light, guardian ports, fly catchers, laundry holes
Shines on the street, waiting for me, with it meet
Footsteps creep around edges avoiding sight
But it’s easy to see, all this going on in the night
Out of law exchangers making changes in pocket stuff
50 for the things, that make pigs squeal, illegal deal
Children's eyes are shut, in bed, not here with us
Tucked in warm and tight, not here with the people of the night
Street sweepers weep, we drink, bottles broken at our feet
Bar tab one too many, stumble, mumble, home on the street
Pickpockets delight, puts up no fight, pockets empty when drunk
Bourgeoisie snobs make prison demands! Lock them away tight!
The street, is ***** I know, I do
But this is o.k, with wary watch
For indeed
In the absence of the light
Come the People of the night
Jan 15, 2015
Jan 15, 2015 at 11:35 PM UTC
All the policemen, saloonkeepers and efficiency experts in Toledo
knew Bern Dailey; secretary ten years when Whitlock was mayor.
Pickpockets, yeggs, three card men, he knew them all and how they flit
from zone to zone, birds of wind and weather, singers, fighters,
scavengers.
The Washington monument pointed to a new moon for us
and a gang from over the river sang ragtime to a ukelele.
The river mist marched up and down the Potomac, we hunted
the fog-swept Lincoln Memorial, white as a blond woman's arm.
We circled the city of Washington and came back home four o'clock in the morning,
passing a sign: House Where Abraham Lincoln Died, Admission Cents.
I got a letter from him in Sweden and I sent him a postcard from Norway ..
every newspaper from America ran news of "the flu."
The path of a night fog swept up the river to the Lincoln Memorial
when I saw it again and alone at a winter's end, the marble in the mist
white as a blond woman's arm.
1.7k
1 Iron-bodied, you stand giant;
a thousand feet into the air, rigid
metal swaying in the wind.
2 Neck-breaking,
3 Sears Tower -- world-reflecting, glass-paned --
eclipses you, yet pales in your shadow.
4 Your ironwork: murky, camouflage brown
in the daylight, beautiful only by the twinkling dusk.
5 Prostrated, the multitudes hope to ascend,
flashes melding with the hourly light show --
6 Capture the splendor across the city!
7 L'Arc de Triomphe, Champs-Elysee, Notre Dame, ...
8 Euros squandered in trite gift shops,
9 -- Attention les pickpockets! --
10 Key chains, pens, 4 by 6 postcards...
Miss you loads. Wish you were here.
11 I climbed you. And now? 12 I watch
from Trocadero; fountains alive, illusions in place
but observed from afar, removed; 13 Apart
from the greedy, flocking masses.
14 One day, you will fall, and with you
the congregations that kneel before you
to wait in the line of impatient,
shoving, babbling, 15 Hallelujah tourists.
16 And when your feral echoes
fade to rubble on the crucified pelouse,
17 We at the grand marble square
will blink and miss it and wonder:
18 Were you ever there at all?
Nov 15, 2011
Nov 15, 2011 at 12:04 PM UTC
Disgusted now that America is busted
For voting in sewer rats and gone to bat
For making this into an autocracy,
Working to gut democracy and replace it,
Deface and deforest all of the best
Then sell off the rest of the planet
From the water to the granite
Leaving only inedible gold
Shoved into the the wallets
Of the national pickpockets
And liars while they set fires
And burn down the country
With their hatred and bigotry
Unchecked by the lazy populace
Too stupid to know what danger is
While it is marching into their homes
Making every state a danger zone.
The traitors who own the industries
Hold a gun to journalist monopolies
So that artificial realities are sold
As socialized necessities
To people who prefer tabloids
To history books and crave bromides
For this time it is the Christians
That fiddle while Rome turns to ruins
And ashes surrounded by those who fought
While a complacent half of America did not.
I am sickened at the laziness,
The political father of craziness
Has let this horror happen to this,
The country of which I was always proud,
And sick of how loud the rats are
That they have taken destruction so far
That we may never recover again
And start to elect countrymen
Instead of men to own the country
Without a scintilla of modesty
And treat fine people shoddily
Merely because they can.
Who needs that kind of man?
Dec 2, 2016
Dec 2, 2016 at 6:30 PM UTC
~for Marion~
all poets are junkyard scavenger connoisseurs
who wear suits to Manhattan faculty afternoon tea parties,
broken-in jeans to Brooklyn midnite poetry slams,
regalers, tall tale storytellers, subway words pickpockets
of the extra-ordinary,
claiming innovations but from all saints stolen,
insights inside other's waste,
refusing to acknowledge the true owner's title
by fusing other's refuse.
the original recyclers,
junkyard dog liars,
willful sufferers of the plague of overhearing,
exceptional excerpters of the gems of coal dust noise,
*"Connoisseur of old thoughts
Bound in new gilt bindings"*
them's me.
~
12:37am may eighth
May 8, 2016
May 8, 2016 at 12:42 AM UTC
No, there is nothing quite like
the unadulterated scenes of politicians
as they scream,
like children, when lightning flashes.
Playground politics rule
our great nations!
Beware of pickpockets, in our city streets
dark and bleak
no smile shines here,
why have hope when the trade off is fear?
Don’t get me wrong, not everyone is mean
How should i put it…
Some are just keen?
So steal from the rich to give to the poor
refuse to accept
that new passed law
offering free ice-cream, in the House of Commons
be sure to read the sign:
We don’t serve commoners.
Jul 17, 2013
Jul 17, 2013 at 2:15 AM UTC
Revolving doors are after me,
Brushes from a stranger are pickpockets,
Financiers are after the little man's money,
Bankers are all corrupt,
Politicians are all corrupt,
Everyone has an agenda...
or maybe I'm just paranoid.
Or maybe,
this is a delineation of the deplorable state humanity,
and the world,
has plunged to.
Maybe my paranoia is,
a byproduct
of years of justification and
rational motivation
Aug 21, 2013
Aug 21, 2013 at 12:15 PM UTC
Did you ever realize that you could just get up right now and start walking somewhere far far away and never come home again?
Yes
are you ready? go.
Come with me
ok
What will we bring?
nothing
lets go to California
okay
__________________________________________
we will sleep on the beach and the nights will be warm
and we can walk Venice beach and see all the silly people
and pretend we have money to buy things
we can become master pickpockets
and we will be fugitives
and it will be quite an adventure
someday we will comeback
we will comeback when the soles of our feet are all run down and our backs our heavy with memories of the great adventure we've had. When we arrive, we'll put them in a box, somewhere far in the back of a dusty closet to be saved for a rainy day. Stories to tell our children and our children's children. And when our hands and smiles are wrinkled with age, and the time has come for us to embark on another great adventure, we'll set the old one free and hope that one day, it means as much to someone else as it did to us.
Nov 29, 2012
Nov 29, 2012 at 4:20 AM UTC
how soon do we forget
how we felt?
dealing with emotions
that never left
playing with the hand that
we were dealt
in this game
maybe i'm a sinner
and you're a saint
we got to stop pretending
what we ain't
why are we pointing fingers
anyway
when we're the same?
break up
make up
total
waste of
time
can we
please make
up our
minds
and stop
acting
like we're
blind?
if the water dries up
and the moon stops shining
stars fall
and the world goes blind, boy
you know
i'll be saving my love for you
for you
you're the
best mistake i've ever made
but we hold on
hold on
there's no *** of
gold in the rainbows we chase
i guess time's wasting
tick-tocking
lip-locking
how can we keep the feelings fresh?
how do we ziplock it?
wear your heart out on your sleeve
watch out for pickpockets
i guess to go to distance
we might need to pitstop it
i know love can be a beach with no shore
i count to 10
lost my temper
went back to 4
i know sometimes it's hard to realise i'm the one that you need
i had a dream we branched out
started a family tree
i feel like that everything we do is overdue
you ask why i love your dad so much
he's the older you
i wish that you were happy
i guess that's the one thing i should be providing
couples are only human
except you
i'm only lying to you
when i lie you down
just being honest
when you start as friends
it's hard to say you're never going back
if i'm not the one then i'm the best mistake you ever had
Dec 23, 2014
Dec 23, 2014 at 1:00 PM UTC
A blue door in Paris,
on the streets,
hides behind it secrets,
a knock, to the sharp tap,
allows the entrance of a man,
in what secrets,
does this sonderous doors foreclose,
and holds to its building,
the stories of lovers and tearaways,
that once resided therein,
and lived,
lives either great or poor,
thunderous torrents or gentle drops of rain,
by the blue door,
men and women have met,
they may have left together or apart,
gone in or walked away,
on the grand depart,
a tour de force de France,
London brigands, French vagabonds and German villains,
Spanish pickpockets, Italian bravos and Greek philosophers,
sad fools, great minds alike have stood outside this door,
the tourist, the local, the lost boys,
have found their time taken by this road,
each step a tick of life,
in this smouldering suburb,
this urban chaos and shuddering grassland,
this lawn of cobbled stones,
to the blue door,
of wood and brass,
etched reflections in the frame,
glass captures portraits of those many names,
in the blue door in Paris.
Apr 1, 2015
Apr 1, 2015 at 7:27 PM UTC
a small man dies somewhere
he doesn't make news
they are no news
herds of small men dying everyday.
big men only capture the headlines
big politicians big deceivers
no petty thieves or pickpockets
but swindlers of nations
you are awed by the headlines
the big bold letters
big disasters mishaps
genocide mass extinction
and may miss in one corner
a news of a man of no imprint
a small man's death in small print
*an ill-paid half starved courier
his head crushed by a brick somewhere
not a thief nor a beggar
but looking forever
an address to deliver
going from door to door
with his back breaking loads
on alien bylanes and roads
where someone suspecting him a thief
broke his head with a brick*
the small man in his death
made it to the news
only if you noticed it
from under big prints.
Jun 7, 2014
Jun 7, 2014 at 12:42 PM UTC
ten n' two past three,
my mind slips from it's
domesticated fetters,
flys free into the star stitched night..
wandering, effortlessly
to climes of restless insanity
and step-stoning away from
garnered life.....
....it finds the scurrying creatures,
hovel featured and scrawny
eyes ......beggars @ the feast.
tired of the hide-away life...
wanting just a moment's grace.... a smidge of light...
pickpockets of slumber's ease.
abram, palliard, mendicant.
all asking for alms to ease their plight...
all.... wanting succour in the dead of night.
.....yet, at this time,as the darklight,
thinks and hopes desperately for dawn...
....i find my mind poor.. ....careworn and a cupboard bare and paltry...
...so again my night's thoughts . ..wend their way home hungry and sad....
black and grey wraiths,
of thoughts...... i never really had....
May 27, 2014
May 27, 2014 at 1:30 PM UTC
If you put the question to, say, one Ben Haramed,
He would, as befits a wily old desert jackal,
Find such notions of faith and fidelity quite amusing--
(*Following stars in search of something ephermal,
With no fixed exchange rate?
Will these specks of light find you shelter
Among throngs of shepherds and sundry fools?
Will your mewling, puking infant provide you succor in that cold city
Where no one makes time for you, save the pickpockets or strumpets,
Each of whom would pawn your drum
For a dram or string of brightly-colored beads?*)
And, indeed, if you happened upon a certain wise and well-off trio
Ensconced comfortably in their lodgings several streets distant
From the temporary residence of the object of their pilgrimage
(*It is only fit that we pay obeisance,
But to actually stay in such a place, well...*)
They would certainly forswear any notion
Of the primacy of the gold piece and the blade
But if you caught them in a more comfortable, unguarded moment
You may able to infer quite correctly that,
While they would express themselves more elegantly
Than some rude wilderness bandit,
You could no more expect them
To exchange their coin of the realm for philosophy
Than you would expect the fold and kine
To keep perfect four-four time.
And yet we believe, in spite of the first-hand knowledge
That the descendants of Balthasar and Melchior can elbow their way
Past whomever they choose, and be greeted, all smiles,
By the bank manager, the lawmaker, the chairman of the board
That our works and our constancy
Shall be recompensed at a sound rate of return
(How could it be otherwise, for didn’t Our Story Teller herself,
Through stiffness of upper lip and fealty
To all things bright and beautiful,
Weather the Blitz as beautiful, as inspirational,
As a cross-Channel Joan of Arc?)
If only we are as steadfast as the chant of the Dies Irae,
As unwavering as the straightforward beat of a single drum
Which follows the procession down the main thoroughfare
As we make our final homecoming.
Dec 8, 2016
Dec 8, 2016 at 10:59 AM UTC
The infatigable undefeatable Maurice Brown
Played the tuba down on
First street. Freelanced.
I saw him once spanking that ***
On Mardi gras
Long ago.
I sent him a shot of Bourbon
And a jack back then
So admiring of his
Oomph oomph bellow
His large belly fit that brass
So well.
He was backbone of the street
Musicians marching proud
Through those streets lined
With drunks pickpockets
Ho's pimps and beggars three.
All he cared about was that driving deep sound
The shot brought him
In the needle after
Performing.
I saw him last time ten years ago
Asleep in the gutter down on brown street.
Alone his tuba
Gone.
Mar 10, 2018
Mar 10, 2018 at 10:23 PM UTC
I believe in something greater than I—
Which throws men back to the birth of their skies
and pickpockets labor from the sweater of a women's religion.
I believe in something greater than I—
which gives four dimensions a chance to be visualized
by eyes that have only seen three ways of life.
I believe in something greater than I—
Which was born 14 billion lifetimes ago
but was alive before that.
I believe in time.
And time, and time again.
Nov 10, 2015
Nov 10, 2015 at 8:34 PM UTC
in the valley
referred to
as the church
of aggressive
amnesiacs
a family
of pickpockets
gathers
for a group
picture
only to find
the single
use
camera
forgotten
and the boy
responsible
missing...
I’ll dream
(when I
die)
of all
the sleep
I didn’t
outside
of mother
get
Nov 18, 2014
Nov 18, 2014 at 4:27 PM UTC
where everybody wants your cash to fund their way out
to get high and dry or the fashionable shirt off your back
they will steal your words all out of context
and hail themselves poet of the century
without a second thought
or even a single glance back.
Feb 14, 2016
Feb 14, 2016 at 8:08 PM UTC
I mis-kicked it
got on the District
It
is not the Circle line train
******* up
being chewed up
by the miles of
steel track
and when I'm restless
I see less
become more irritable
until the situation gets
intolerable and I
am plain horrible
I haven't got the patience
to play patience
too impatient and
it's not important
is it?
Now at the Temple
and there's a pain
in my temples,
it's a migraine
on a train
on the District line
what a fine time
I'm having.
Wait a minute
this is the circle line
it must be
I'm at Westminster,
I feel less pain
still getting a migraine
but
I'm on the right line
having a fine time
except for the migraine.
Now at Victoria and
heading to Sloane square
one had better beware
there's pickpockets
that operate
down
in Sloane square.
when I get to High street Ken'
I'll be almost done
touch in at
the design museum
just to see 'em,
the designs I mean
and see the Sun
I missed
getting ****** off
for absolutely no reason
except for the reasons
I was.
May 29, 2017
May 29, 2017 at 12:00 PM UTC
Scarlet flames rain from a broken sky,
On vile murderers, rapists, and pickpockets.
They fall onto stacks of steel, scraping the skies.
Death descends on the hateful, on the lovers,
On the great, the rich, the holy.
The End slices away the poor, the innocent and the good.
Godly fury, Devil's wrath, Fiery heaven and frozen hell.
Call it what you like,
We brought it on ourselves.
Mar 13, 2017
Mar 13, 2017 at 12:01 PM UTC