A slim smooth man
Every step being his command
His fashion statement being high in demand
But his distinction being pinstripe
Pinstripe always dressed fresh like a spring ripe
Assortments had to be just right being black and white or white and red pinstripes
Pinstripe had all the hype
He got his name from dancing at many clubs
A woman’s remembrance to think of
The minute Pinstripe entered any room it was always greetings of what’s up
His shoes were of quality brand
Every inch of Pinstripe and everyone knew he was the man
Pinstripe’s hair was combed with his hair being shown
The tie became a creation and conversation piece of don’t hate just appreciate
Every woman married or single wanted to dance with Pinstripe
Each moving dance step was a woman’s date being met
Pinstripe had that certain swagger
From that first sip of wine
A cigarette just before he would dine
Pinstripe knew how to pass the time
He was the dress code, but never ate alone
It was his personality in having the woman melt like butter
Pinstripe was definitely like no other
He was the mainstream being a name
He was persuasive and had game
But who was going to blame?
Getting attention was the precision at direct aim
The bull’s eye being any woman that had a fishing rod and a net, however, it was Pinstripe being the catch of the day, and being the best bet.

Crazy passion fast deep soul kiss warnings word breathe reckless love devastated desk art struggle pinstripe attempts drunk ghost lost wind beauty hunger soul smile elegance latte knowing containment bond ink shallow identity measure chaos stumbling darling life dance frenzy sweat hole paper haunted only dreams ****** vandalized scars Achilles proceedings bare deep still pain inside lied courts darkness wind step empty rocky soul whisper eyes alone wrapped inside Athens love smile abuse truth lies time mind  bungalow knowing liar violated Pandora’s entanglement flashbacks ****** self-preservation private suit weakness baklava hide lips ******* played deserve hold earth destruction haunted coffin judgment dreams hands eternity sleep  sunset lips hidden kissed desire champagne stars taint lovers fallen what **** PR glistening intense echoes seeing taste depth care finally beach rolling salt binding heat lost quietly resumed park come believe myself arms world you skin love stranger now

I’ll not take your time, beyond what the need,
To relate to you a story and deed
As there’s no one else to plea this decree …
For just I survived, don’t you see.

I’m an old man, with a mind full of mist
But details of that night in my mind still exist
As vivid and clear, both sharp and exact
No, no mist there – all of it’s fact!

When I was young, and adventure routine,
With excitement and newness still unforeseen
I was eager to spread my wings to the world
And seek more adventures as those wings unfurled

Within my long travels I happened to meet
Two other men, with friendships replete
One was named Beckett, the other one Flynn
And better friends there never have been.

Beckett was tall – an athletic type
While Flynn, the scholar, more of pinstripe
Pinstripe or athlete – it mattered not
It was our essence together and that which it wrought.

Engaged were we in all daring do
High on the mountains, and under seas, too,
We crossed dry deserts, and jungles of green
And other adventures there in between.

We’d been together, t’was our sixth year,
And still our adventures made us cohere
To every madness – to every rave …
Until we decided to enter The Cave.

We discussed the encounter and planning for weeks
And assembled equipment – some new, some antiques
Until at last the day it arrived …
And our excitement?  It still there survived.

The map we used, was bought from a guide
Who told my friend, Flynn: “Don’t go inside”
When he had learned of our journey’s intent:
To enter The Cave, and begin our descent.

The guides’ words, had given us pause
We had thought: What was his reason or cause?
But … dismissed were his words of advice
We had each other … and that would suffice.

With ropes and lantern-hats and other such gear
It was into The Cave we then disappeared.
The light from our lanterns speared into the dark
We spoke very little - made no remark.

Onward, downward, in blackness we went
Placing out markers for our later ascent
The sounds of our footsteps, and scraping of walls
Reverberated ‘round us – as echoed recalls

In about six hours, or maybe ‘twas more
We encountered water upon The Cave floor
And there all around were beautiful shapes
Never were seen such gorgeous landscapes

Stalactites, stalagmites and mineral mounds
And dripping water with its’ “plopping” sounds
Pinks, violets and shades of green hues
And small salamanders made their debuts

We found a small dry spot and then we assessed
This was a place we could stop now to rest.
I turned up my lantern, and took off my hat,
When Beckett said: “Hey.  Did you just hear that?”

I moved not a muscle, and my ears went to strain.
All I could hear were the droplets, like rain.
Then from The Cave’s bowels came a loud din
I continued to listen – then heard it again.

We looked at each other, but said not a word
Confused and startled by what we’d just heard
It wasn’t a moan, it wasn’t a gasp
But more rather like a guttural rasp

One thing was certain, it wasn’t of stone
That could create sounds while standing alone
T’was our discussion, from which to derive:
The source of the sound was something … alive.

Then from The Cave’s deepened black hole
Came again sounds from a source with no soul
The sound was menacing, and one I despise,
I watched the fear grow within my friends’ eyes.

Instinctively, we three then moved as one
In that instant – our re-ascent had begun
I had been last in the line coming down
Now I’d be the first to reach the “above-ground”.

Quickly my feet in the lead, lead the way
Flynn, right behind had nothing to say
My friend Beckett, brought up the rear
And in that position had the greatest to fear

The lamp on my hat pierced through the black
And I looked for our markers to lead us back
To save our strength, nothing was said
Again - the loud sound that filled me with dread.

The sound became louder and closer it be
And I moved faster through the black before me
I could hear Flynn’s breathing, so close behind
I tried to concentrate on the markers to find

Somewhere behind me, then snarls I heard
Loud and vicious, run together and blurred
Close … so close … the beast was so near
Adrenalin rushed through me to react to my fear

T’was then I was hit with an overpowering stench
The smell caused my stomach to turn and to wrench
The odor blew past me, and I knew t’was the breath
Of the Beast of The Cave – its’ oder of death.

I was near running, but down on all fours
Sweat was streaming from all of my pores.
Then I heard those terrible screams
The ones I keep hearing in all of my dreams

It was Beckett I knew in his shocked agony
Midst the snarled snapping of jaws I can’t see
I heard bones cracking and squishing of flesh
And the fear within me gave new strength afresh

My fingers were raw from grabbing the rock
But on moving forward my mind had its’ lock
My stomach still queasy from the stench of the beast
I knew it was finishing its’ beastly feast

I knew, too, t’was only a matter of time
When the beast would return - I had to climb!
I heard Flynn say: “IT’S COMING AGAIN!”
Again was a surge of my fear deep within.

I heard once more the beast from behind
And fought the panic taking over my mind
Something heavy struck against The Cave’s walls
The kind of sounds that ghastly appalls:

A scraping of talons of heavy clawed feet
Caused my heart to double its’ beat
I had the feeling that Flynn lagged behind
I screamed my urgings loud and maligned:

“Flynn!  Flynn!  Catch up to me!”
But took not the time to look back and see
For the beasts’ crashing against The Cave’s face
Told me it neared – and was re-gaining the race

My knee hit a rock, and my balance was lost!
I fell to the ground, and then feared the cost
In losing the time in scrambling free
Again sheer panic stabbed into me.

In less than an instant, Flynn was there too,
His face in my light was of a strange hue
And as he helped me get back to my feet …
Flynn turned around – t’was The Beast there to meet.

The stench overwhelming, but the sight was much worse
There standing before us: The beastly curse
Of overlapping scales in shades of dark gray
The rest of its’ body concealed in umbrae

But its’ eyes … its’ eyes … I’ll never forget
Rheumatoid yellow, and deeply inset
Its’ reptilian lids blinked just one time
‘Fore its’ lips peeled back - revealing the slime

Glistening yellow over dagger-like teeth
Then oozed from its’ mouth to fall there beneath.
The beast reared up, then we saw its’ claws
Sharp and deadly within its’ forepaws

Towering above us, no sound the beast made
On beams of our light had his gaze stayed.
Unexpectedly Flynn then turned and faced me
… With less blinding light, the beast could again see

Why Flynn had turned I never will know
For the beast bit him in two, at his torso
And I was looking at Flynn – direct in his face
When the beasts’ bite his life did erase.

I screamed, and instantly away did I run
Away from the beast, and dead companion
Through the price of Flynn’s life, more time had been bought
To reach The Cave’s entrance – the goal that I sought

Running wildly, several times did I fall
Toppling did not my mission forestall
The beast I knew still somewhere behind
Drove me on forward with my frantic mind

I heard its’ clawed talons scraping the wall
And prayed I’d not again stumble and fall
Then, up ahead, a small opening I viewed
And I saw my chance, with hope there exude

Twelve feet … six feet … then it was three
But the beast and its’ stench was there behind me
I dove through the rock opening, scraping my head
But better that injury than ending up dead

I was elated, and about to rejoice
I then heard a scream – it was my own voice!
In my leg erupted intense blinding pain
Looking down I saw the bloodstain

My leg, through the opening, still was stuck out
There was but split-seconds, before I’d lose it no doubt
I pulled my leg back, and in but a flash
My shoe was removed by a clawed talon slash

I crawled back from the opening, then I could see
My wound was deep, from ankle to knee
Then suddenly through the opening came
A clawed talon whose aim was to maim

I quickly withdrew out of its’ reach
As claws shot through the openings’ breech
The opening too small, for continued rampage
And the beast began then to voice its’ outrage

It’s deafening roars assaulted my ears
Echoed Cave chambers and in my mind did adhere
I began attending unto my grave wound
Knowing I now was no longer marooned.

T’was another hour ‘fore I crawled out The Cave
But many days ‘fore I’d shed the shockwave
Of what had transpired, and what I had seen
And my damaged leg was lost to gangrene.

Now sleep evades me, for my horrible dreams
Show beams of light, and unearthly screams
Of Beckett and Flynn and The Cave we were in
I know tonight, I’ll re-live it again.

So, now you’ve the story, you’ve heard the deed
I swear is the truth I’ve herein decreed
And Beckett and Flynn are enslaved in their grave
And I lost my leg to the Beast of The Cave.

i love you when we're alone
because you eviscerate me in front of your friends
but alone you kiss the veins in my arms
press your small hips into my hips & sigh into my neck
& blink so slowly that i can hear your eyelids whispering

you won't hold my hand in public
because you blatantly want to seem available to other men
but when it's only you & it's only me
we lie on our backs letting the summer rain collect in puddles
in our bellybuttons & you swear to god
there's only one way this can end

you say i can't meet your parents
but everything i do reminds you of your father
that tall strong man of your childhood
singing sinatra to your mother in the kitchen
just like i do when i sneak behind you &
tickle your neck with my tongue you're
giggling as i carry you like a bride
into your bedroom for naptime or playtime

you only miss me when you're by yourself
like a flower hidden in a fenced-in backyard
but you ignore my texts most days
because when your friends are around you're busy
dancing toward the sun & lying to them
about where you spent last night &
the blueberry pancakes you ate for breakfast
you don't mention the ticklish new rib spot i found
or the quiet music we make together at night
or the stars we wished on with our pinky fingers tied together

i love you most when we're sticky asleep alone
you humming in turquoise ******* snuggled into my armpit
with your warm hand melting into my chest
& me in the pinstripe boxer briefs you bought with
my arm under and reaching for your exposed breast

Keen little neons
playfully jump around, colliding with her mind
and she sits there, legs crossed, her ***** aroused,
but it gets doused as the Wall Street pinstripe type walks by
she utters a sigh, looks at the sky, the ending's nigh, and it's night.

Skyline looks pretty
beams and lighted apartment block kitchens and real pop-up ads,
them keen little neons,
her eyes flicker like those hanging lights in horror films,
perpetuate fear, the skeletons are in the clear.
I told you, you schmuck, the end is near.

Noon, I’m next in line behind an old man.
“I want to withdraw fourteen dollars,” he says.
The teller, a young woman with a soft sweater, says
“There’s only—let me check—yes—fifty-two cents.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.” She tilts her head. “Sorry.”
The sorrow is genuine.
He wears a pinstripe suit, frayed,
wafting an odor of smoke and earth.
A smartly folded handkerchief, breast pocket,
has a dark stain. His silver beard
is neatly trimmed.

On one wall above the safe is a giant
mural of teamsters driving a stagecoach.
The man says, “There might be—”
“No. It’s always the same.”
For a moment he closes his eyes,
a slow blink while indignities of a lifetime pass.
Without a word, the young woman slides a sandwich
over the countertop through the teller window.
“Blessings on you,” the man says with a nod,  
and he walks away with a limp.

I cash my check, a big one
from three days of messy labor
for a matron of the horsey set.
“He lives by the creek,” the teller says
without my asking. “Under a bridge.”
Outside the bank, in the parking lot of glistening cars,
I look around for the pinstripe suit, the silver beard.
I might offer the man something.
He might refuse to take it.
Anyway, no matter:
he has disappeared like the last stagecoach.
Only the blessing remains.

“Ever since I started this job and anyone asks how I’m doing, I always say, ‘I’m great!’ ” Maayan Zilberman excitedly explains. And why shouldn’t she? The former Lake & Stars lingerie designer, who has since founded confections lineSweet Saba, happens to have the sweetest career around. Concocting a literal visual feast out of her Park *****, Brooklyn, kitchen and Fort Gansevoort Meatpacking pop-up shop, the Israeli-born polymath uses her background in sculpture and a biting sense of humor to create her vibrant, indulgent delicacies. Think sugarfied tubes of lipstick, rap mixtapes, and Rolex watches—with their raw handiwork and dead-on wit, these in-demand pieces match Zilberman’s equally enticing wardrobe. Hardly barefoot in the kitchen, Zilberman teeters about in her workspace in vintage Betsey Johnson Mary Janes, while throwing on a customized Adam Selman pearl-laced apron to protect her Prada skirts andProenza Schouler knits. Here, the dazzling candymaker reveals how she has always been more En Vogue than grunge, why she never forgoes a perfect press-on manicure, and her plans on taking Sweet Saba herbal.

From Jerusalem to Vancouver

I was born on a kibbutz, where the first clothing I had was a mix of unisex hand-me-downs, so I was given a pretty blank slate. When I lived in Jerusalem we were surrounded by several sects of Orthodox communities, and the fabrics associated with each group were inspiring to me. During those years, designer brands were becoming popular, and the only place I was seeing this was in the shuk [market] where one could find imitation Calvin Klein and United Colors of Benetton next to tzitzit and shawls. I think it was in the early ’90s that I first understood how to mix my ethnicity with fashion and food.

Also, one of the most influential books of my childhood was Color Me Beautiful, which the women in my family took very seriously. I learned at the age of 6 that I was a “Winter” and haven’t veered off course since. I still have the book and love to pull it out at parties. Later in high school in Vancouver, grunge was the big trend and there wasn’t much room for my sensibilities in that environment—even when I wore my Revlon Blackberry lipstick and grunged out with irony. I was always far more En Vogue and Versace than the Pacific Northwest could handle.

Taking Cues From ’90s New York City Street Style

When I first got to New York, when I was 15, one of the first things I discovered was all the music I could get on Canal Street. I used to buy mix CDs from girls in monochrome outfits and big name-plate earrings. They pointed me to Fulton Mall in Brooklyn, and that’s where I finally got pants that fit right and jewelry that reflected my personality—a departure from the stuff I’d received for my bat mitzvah.

A shift in style for me meant a tougher, more confident look, where a short skirt is a reference to an era, not a call for attention. Music and lyrics played a big part in teaching me about how to dress and how to feel feminine. I had a Versace quilted skirt that I wore a lot—it made me feel like the supermodels in the ad campaigns: Cindy, Claudia, Stephanie, et cetera. I also had a Jean Paul Gaultierdouble-breasted pinstripe suit that I’d wear casually. In fact, I’m still wearing most of my clothes from those days: Betsey Johnson floral dresses, Donna Karanbodysuits, a metallic Byblos pouf skirt, and a grommeted Pelle Pelle jacket.

Lingerie Beginnings

I studied sculpture at the School of Visual Arts, and for a year at the San Francisco Art Institute my major was “new genres,” a very ’90s thing. Right after I graduated from SVA, I did an artist residency with Ilya Kabakov at the Fondazione Antonio Ratti in Como, where they also manufactured some of the world’s most beautiful silks. A tour of their factory opened my eyes to a potential dip into fashion, but it wasn’t until I met a pair of women in New York City that same year looking to start a lingerie brand that I took a chance on garment design. I bought a bunch of bras and took them apart and figured out how they were put back together. I cofounded The Lake & Stars in 2007 with the desire to make a brand that was in line with the story I wanted to tell as an artist. Lingerie was a tool, a structure that gave me rules so I could tell a sci-fi tale while inherently delivering romance and *** appeal.

read more:http://www.marieaustralia.com

www.marieaustralia.com/short-formal-dresses

Arise Great Britain, swell wi pride
this is no time tae split, divide,
a hero needs us on his side
a man apart
Brave Osbourne comes wi manly stride
and lion heart

When danger ca’s, he stauns and fights
He’ll haud the baddies bang tae rights
Nou in their een he sees the whites
and yells, “Attack!”
He’s got oor mojo in his sights –
He wants it back!

Let’s cheer his valour tae the roof
Condemn the wans wha’d cry him couff
And pray oor Geordie’s bulletproof
As on he flies
Then fit him wi a parachute
and wave guidbye.

This GM perfect Tory clone
need not rely on un-manned drone
He’ll tackle ISIS on his own
their fight dissolve
His pores squirt pure testosterone
his eyes, resolve

Just watch the baddies turn and flee
as George, wi patriotic glee
wreaks vengeance for democracy
a one-man dojo
And cries, “Come, Britain, flock to me,
and feel my mojo!”

Or mibbes we should check this twice.
Although the image may be nice
The blood we risk on his advice
may never stop -
But Geordie will not sacrifice
one ****** drop

These profiteering pinstripe ******
wha ken no life but politics
Are no the first tae play these tricks
while deals are made
Why no just wave a crucifix
and shout “Crusade!”

So hooses burn and horror grows
A stream o misery outflows
While braggard Geordie struts and crows,
"Ye want a fight?"
I’d dump him on Damascus road
tae see the light

Ye plot the death o innocents
Tae score yir points in parliament
Yir fascist mocking o dissent
it suits ye well
George Osbourne, ye're a proper gent
**** ye tae hell.

Hi . . . This is about the kinds of people who work in corporate big money office buildings . . . Imagine them at lunchtime, how they interact and picture the scene in any . . .

Busy little bistro

Sharp - sharks - circle - the - pack
Pinstripe finned and eager
Snapping their snacks back with ease
Points to prove with nothing to lose  
No cracks in their creases
They're keen to return to the fray.
These boys play with girls
Aren't yet uncles with nieces
Just unproven throwaway pieces . . .
In shiny  . eat ***** . suited up . Chelsea boots
Bidding for ***** with cute looks and loot
Touting with confident ***** . . .
As mobile as their smart devices
Loose

Next . . . ?
And fresh from a mornings abuse
And fifteen years of fear . .
Beleaguered older shirts sit . .
Flogged dogs with weak barks
Parked packed into packs.
Tongue tied ties tied together
Safety is numbers
Get each others backs
These partially satisfied cats
Know today is NOT their day . .
That was yesterday . . .
Obliging lives and mortgages
The reasons why they stay

Passing Cabs cruise . . .
Seen it all before.
Sat in the back a high class *****
Glazed eyes glancing away  
From her play-away payday
Nibbles in the boardroom . .
Napkins . . for the dribbles
A working lunch for this Girl
Her money-shot a wrap without applause
Was just a  . . . pause  . . . between paws . .

Then Dora on reception
John, who minds the door
Evie in the IT room
Or dave . . who buffs the Marble
Sparkles glinting in the floor . .
And the guards . . who guard . . what exactly . . ?

All of this . . ? Networking . . !!!
Everybody's selling something
It doesn't quite stink
But it definitely smells
A little high

As time whiles by
Seems this
Is the state of our nation
And in this state
Defines our aspirations
And yes . . this state's a splinter
Taunting my imagination . . .
Do I stake my place within this game
Or sit in observation
Commentating on a race
Where human nature fakes it's place
Where people sit as players
Yet no one wears their own face

White collared men in pinstripe suits sit casually across from one another,
completely indifferent.
They discuss ways to obtain power and how to silence the opposition.
The opposition being women.
Power being the rights to our own bodies.
These are the men who make laws against abortion to disguise their ulterior motives.
Trump’s America they call it.
Where belittling women is somehow a “trend”,
Where this type of thing has become “okay”.
Where the women’s rights movement has been threatened time and time again.
All of this,
In efforts to silence our war cries.
But here’s the thing about us that even history seems to have forgotten.
We Are Women.
Our mothers have been crafting our battle armour since before we were born.
Gave it to us the day we were first interrupted in the middle of a sentence.
They told us to be brave, to be bold, to be unapologetic.
To speak our truth and remain strong even when we feel utterly defeated.
You see,
We don’t really do submissive.
Won’t sit back and let you do as you please.
Rather,
we’ll continue to challenge your authority.
Make you wish you kept your laws off our bodies in the first place.

To those who continue to undermine our capability,
I say to you this.
This body, is my own.
This body, is power.
In fact,
I don’t blame you for being afraid.
Because you and I both know that this body is capable of things so extraordinary that only God Himself can envision them.

You can try to silence us,
To take away our voice.
But we will only grow stronger,
Grow louder.
Angrier.
You will hear us
And you will listen.
My body,
My rules.

Her fingertips loosed the glass
bottle, which had
of late
gathered rain like the
hands of paupers.

Glitter in a heartbeat.
to be collected by old battered shoes
or car tyres
and streetwise magpies.

it joins a city evensong
this oceanic roar of nothing
fusing chords of cars and smoke
and lonely dogs
with hacks
and throngs
of perambulating suits
and suitors
trampling athwart broads of concrete
As swifts in summer.


We swim in it
through open atriums
and barren rooms of
magnolia and magnolia and magnolia.

All the while if you look harder
you see through chinks a sepulchre
in each greying tower
ranging higher and higher still.

Machines and machinations
stacking life upon life to
build pyramids
to gaudy kings
in pinstripe or herringbone.

Flumes of fumes ***** like floods
Into and out of train stops
and bus stands.
Circling lungs like hungry crows.
Crows which haunt
Bombed out chapels made new
resuscitated with waxen ivy
and ivory lilies.

And the leaves of saintly oak trees
chatter in shrinking crevices of green
story telling
Of how people and things grow old.
And you can walk these streets
And dive too like cormorants into
The platitudes of city living.

Soaked to the skin in sound
to tell your story
like the shards
of a broken bottle.

it was that i was. gurgling a valorous *** of cells at the bottom
of the notched brick habitat of sickly algebra. and i and. with all
the dirt meticulously skeletal. trenchant chaotic lips blathering
skinny vocal animals. the smooth monkeys pinstripe about the
square in my needle city. well and i am an we. with your habitual
pocket of blood and dust in correct lumps small and large proportionately
spitted on your ideal, at my hips your hips(hand in hand). we walk
bythe specific straights towering sky breakers hollering reflective
skin. the neon electric residue of light smacks my eyelets. and
some ****** **** with the night air agreeably. but i,m a yours
and only. yes. so let's make some drips of clear tremulous benedictions
to this vibrant lovely hell

Sunday morning and I’m tucking
piano sonatas in my skirt.
He’s setting the gun and I’m
making peace blankets.
He is war.
I am I am I am air.

Tuesday night and he’s floating
candles on lily pads off the canoe.
I’m wetting my feet.
He’s rowing soundlessly
dreaming of geography
and I’m hitching my skirt
to jump into the water.

His pinstripe jacket looks better
on the floor
Wednesday afternoon
he’s apologizing but I’m too late
pressing my lips to the door
I throw open
the IamIamIam air prayer
he’s apologizing but
setting the gun
clicking in ammunition
aiming aiming at my heart…

When he pulled the trigger
I bet I bled music notes.

it’s not that i hate film literary film adaptations, but only one adaptation made me want to read the book: stendhal’s the scarlet and the black (starring ewan mcgregor and rachel weisz).*

i don’t in a respective romanic auditorium
with toga donning senators
walking to egyptian flutes from the cleopatra’s entourage
gleaming old fames as to prove the pyramids
and sphinxes were above in the hierarchy of awe
to the iodine and hod on papyrus,
to give these localities the respectable aura of re-,
i take to hammock’s kenotic and burial’s untrue:
the former feeds the northern feel of autumnal london
suburbia and the latter the southern quarter,
but never mind that, it’s already minded and eerie.
i watched the screenplay adaptation of empire of the sun today,
i have to say, i was jerking up the thought
of salty rain rather than acid rain on the environmental
perfusion surprise - so i ****** a jamaican fake on the hopscotch bonnet
mascaraed on the eyes, or the romantic tears of cutting an opinion,
but honesty... honesty! three scenes made me push my
manhood away from the stench of molten iron of the army:
the was the protagonist sang the song of the kamikaze
just after they downed a shot of koji and started singing
just after doing the flap-your-hands-in-the-air-like-you-just-don’t-care
salutations of encouraged nihilism.
it’s the editing part of the film, how the boy’s voice overpowers
everything else and becomes “monotone” against all other sounds,
the dignity of the boy’s enviousness and admiration
for the kamikaze... even in captivity! by god, what a scene!
the other scene that haunted me to near tear
was when the prisoners entered the cemetery of hoarded
valuables by the japanese upon invasion of shanghai
and taking from notables the jewellery chandeliers and cars
(pianos too): after seeing the prisoners familial in captivity
exchanging cabbage heads for cigarettes
proving what the world would be like without the existence of money...
i thought of the familial “humbling” of the people in captivity,
and the sheer haunt of the same prisoners returning
to a world they so dearly lost - in that each to his own
piano and mercedes benz, that neo-tribalism of earn earn spend
frivolity and self-interest that democracy prescribes
allocating us each a tomb of fancies (and sometimes the odd *****).
but the most striking thing became apparent - in these
japanese prisoner of war camps... the prisoners didn’t wear uniforms...
i can understand if those in power adorn uniforms,
but the oddity of the prisoners not having uniforms is quite
positively giggly sinister... given the fact that the other sinisterness
is when there’s a prison camp and those in power
wear uniforms and those imprisoned are also tailored for.
i see a major libra of power in all this,
for if the prisoners are not tailored for denoting their collectivisation
as in status of prisoners... then there’s a certain freedom in all of it,
like on the grander scale, in society, where the politicians,
the overseers only wear suits and the communities differentiate
themselves with hawaiian floral tattoos on t-shirts and tourist slogan ones too:
it’s almost as if the ultimate leniency of power was being exercised
not having to wear prisoner uniforms in the japanese pow camps,
unlike the pinstripe ones of auschwitz - as some collectivisation
of guilt within ideological framework rather than the opposite:
wrong place at the wrong time.
the last tear i got? well the music on the credits reel pulverised
by the images of a son re-recognising his mother by touchy touchy.
conclusively? better on your mother’s *** and able to cook too
than on the cooking *** of a wife and with two left hands preferring
the hot topic of takeaway or restaurants - hunter gatherer died -
me belly full of berry - how is it that **** sapiens is also called
**** perderus awhile the tortoises saturated achilles with peace and thought
and no chance of martian glory telling him of zeno’s paradox?

The cold sun beats
on gold pinstripe pants.
Between the same fingers
that grip a pen
a physical form of smoke;
cancerous, like divisive rhetoric
dictating dialogue between
red and blue threads; white
in the middle turned
a depressed gray.

Stand, stare at
a  stale banner;
salute 50 blank stars,
the right choice
follows like a thief
with forlorn hands for feet.
Dead in the water,
Freedom drowning, shouting
in a salty blue tune.

The sun watches from
its godly golden throne.
Out, uttering among  
waves of stars,
speaking with nothing to say.
Freedom sinks to the
depths of Hell
as if but smoke
trying to make waves.

We wrote our names on the beach in animal bones
as a vivisection, on our love.
there, she’s whispering into shells
into their Fibonaccian, trumpeted, dresses
and full-cheeked into a razor clam flute.
I, too, gave my blood to grease our domestica
and hung names on stars over the nighttime sea
always accompanied as I were
with the shark-eye, death, of her looks.

We dressed up the walls of home in black and pinstripe,
filled the place up with lit and lightless places,
Shadowboxed, shadowfucked, and silently argued.
Spent hours inside, laying floorboards
and then laying on them
to stare at the sodium lights
and discuss the inkblots on our eyes.
We vivisected our lives,
and splashed it on the walls
and carved it into the carpets.

We set alight to christmas trees
when the kids were sleeping upstairs.
We dressed in each-other’s reddening horror
and answered the door.
Valentines day was full of bone bouquets,  
the gripper rods grew through the carpet
so on them we danced.
I prayed for the first time in the first year
and every one hit me subesquently
like I was its anvil.

I should have gone to war.
Because it makes forever shorter
things can only happen right now.

I watched everything in our domestica,
like when the static moved off the television
and played on the window
gutting me of my escape.
The smiles hung on our faces like lupus,
We had people round,
we cooked and coughed and choked
And their faces peeked round from the doorframe
and laughed.

The domestica lives
only to be a bit of fun,
but in the very same span of time
that decided to **** the birds on my windowsill
and my children’s love for me
and my dexterity.
We’ve happened to the whole world too
I promise you, my love,
my little hospice fire,
my flat tire at night at nowhere,
the lie you recognise means it’s over,
A field of a thousand three-leaved clovers,
the brightest night when you’re hiding,
your heart attack on holiday,
your bloodstained bed sheet
And sleep, whilst outside
the sleet and snow makes every emergency
harder to get to, and still the morning
much more beautiful.
I, you, we happened.

I watched you turn into

A punching bag

Until the sand worked to settle in pit of your stomach

It’s the kind of love so heavy and jagged now

Like a kidney stone that you thought would never pass

Until it passes

Painful and ******

And you think

“How could such a small thing like that

Hurt me so badly”

And you finally understand forgiveness

Like the pinstripe scars on your back

You have to feel the metal leave you

Before you can let anything go

And you have to remind yourself

Someone is always going to love you

Despite your broken record

Skipping at the spot where

Your song hits its chorus

You have to remind yourself

That eventually

The thin metal fibers will

Find the next groove

And then you can groove

Into the beat breakin’ happy

Of your constantly confused smile

And settle your doubts

Into the arms of someone

Who doesn’t have all the answers

But knows exactly when to hold you

You have to remind yourself

How often the right thing to say

Is sitting between a bitten lip

And deep breath

And finally a smile

A laugh

A tear

Don’t offer answers to the questions you never wanted to be asked

Don’t tan the leather

Of the thickest parts of your skin

Even punching bags break

Don’t hang your head to watch

How your feet pace towards the end

The end is always gonna be there

And remember

Someone

Is always going to love you

It was long years ago, I took the fifteenth day
to suffer hour on hour, the usual way:

Deduce the bottom line in dollars, even cents.
It makes no sense, no sense.

And even worse the guilty pang -
The overwhelming  sturm und drang
that one day soon, the pinstripe suit,
the man that makes my machinations moot

will tap tap tap on my metaphorical door
and I will be at liberty no more!

Cosmic Ball

Dressed in a suit of pinstripe stars,
He’s discussed war and played chess with Mars,
Far, in foreign solar systems,
He chuckles with their planetary distortion,
He’s gambled for the diamonds of Neptune,
Bowled infinite starlit lanes with Jupiter,
Witnessed sacred scry’s and change from Saturn,
Witnessed lies, severed ties,
Much he has seen, he who walks starlit skies,
Martini’s of primordial soup,
With a scoop of star,
Shared in lieu of chaos, with Venus,
Knocking back a few, so far,
He’s raced Mercury around the sun,
Every lap done, feeling victory, whether he’s lost or won, praises they sung, harmony rung,
He’s sat on the surface of Sol, sunglasses dawned,
Other then growth and to learn he has no defined goal,
Just playing a role,
Breaking energetic chains,
And immortal bars,
He slow dances with a myriad of stars,
Celestial bodies of divine will, power, grace,
Orbiting around him in suits, silk, suede nylon and lace,
All dancing to a distant interstellar song,
A long distant echo of light,
A throng of stars creating the constellations mighty heights,
A universe locked in constant cosmic push and pull,
Never empty, never full,
He reflects, riding the back of a wild cosmic bull,
Riding back to mother, back to varied perspectives of what is true,
Back to a planet of green and blue,
Till the next invitation come queue,
To another night in primordial stew of sights and seeings,
Another quaint Ball with fantastic cosmic beings..

Pinstripe Suit

When I'm an old lunatic I shall wear a black and white pinstriped suit
I'm trapped inside the prison walls
That used to be my mind
The wallowing woman that I used to be
Has long been left behind

There are times I'm quite alert
My memory’s still intact
Then there are days when I shall disappear
And no it’s not an act

With an anesthetic air to it
The squeaky doors
My mind flows like a never ending pit
And creaky carpet bare floors

The halls as silent as a morgue
Pill meals to which I never want
They're like a cardboard box that kicks you numb
My old memories still do haunt


Blindly walking the paths laid out for me
When I'm old I shall be completely crazy
I'll scream and shout loudly to make sure you hear me clearly
I'll ramble on and on about my past times
When suddenly I am old and start to wear black and white pinstriped suits

It’s fifteen below
And a fat buck lurches,
Spindle legged, four pointed,
And cardinal -
Fishtail and brake.

I don’t trust this road.
I don’t trust these tires.
I don’t trust these ditches,
Smoothed and driven with snow.

I’m a six-layered pig at the wheel -
Unsleek unchic -
But I’m warm, **** I’m warm,
And the road slides like pinstripe
On white gabardine.

And the waning moon,
The waning moon,
Low in the rise,
Gibbous and garish,
Scabbing a cloud,
Spills the whole thing blue.

I don’t trust the red eyes of mailboxes,
Always willing to dive the grill.
I don’t trust the farmer
That lives on the hill,
Behind the blue spruce line,
Behind the blue flickered window,
Counting on futures,
Clumsy as mittens,
Still as the finger drift
Thudding the glide
Like dull scissors
Snagged in gridded giftwrap guides.

I still taste the coffee
Down under the tar.

I trust my smokes.
Yes, I trust my smokes.
I trust my hat. I trust my boots.
I trust I’ll never find my roots.
I trust the jumpers, there in the trunk.
I trust every single roadkill thunk.
I trust every knuckled ill-advised ride
To tell me yes, oh yes, I'm alive, I’m alive.

Rapt by prognosis, sterile elocution
Acute halitosis, banal delusion
Digital notice of distant retribution
Thrombosis will move you before revolution

Brash adolescent right-side part,
Strand obsolescence, abstract art
Pinstripe filaments, two turned backs
Bowed in benevolence, borrowing slack

Hieroglyphic ruminations,
Plastered protestations.
Muscle memory incantations,
Aquifuge of patience.

Future shock, feminists ride-centaurs
Skin-tan hedonists reside-indoors
Tin-can telephone spinal chord,
Sings-an injured semitone final word

40 years since you were a punk

The colorful lighted Rockefeller Center Christmas tree
Thousands of tourist who want to see
Radio City Music Hall with the Rockette’s heels in the air
New York City at Christmas time, which no other city can compare
The department stores with their individual window Christmas Themes
The philosophy of Christmas in knowing what it means
I just got a news bulletin that Santa has been seen wearing a business suit
It wasn’t the red and white
It was Santa looking like an Executive in pinstripe and had a handkerchief like a handiwipe and was smoking a pipe
It was a superior brand from Saks
However let me think back
There was some assortment with both Bergdorf and Saks
Santa was seen shaking hands with the Mayor Of New York
This was a sight too see
But this is between the reporter and me
Yes it was Santa with a whole new business attitude
But there was a candy cane pin attached to his lapel on his suit
That was an attire to sweeten a business deal to pursuit
I can’t believe Christmas is almost here
Everything will be hung with special loving care
Those misfortunate will surely get a share
Christmas in New York City
Coldness in your nose
A look on your face as a perhaps in suppose
Then a surprise of a Christmas ornament engraved with your name
Special preparation being the aim
Look its snowing and lets have a game
Our hearts filled with joy and our minds concentrated on tame
As the sun goes down
The night becomes with all the stars around
A night to fall asleep and eyes closed in a sandman’s trap of bound
Finally sleeping with quiet and nowhere is a sound.

There is a narrative
uninformative
which is not surprising,
those talking have their fingers in
too many pies,
so many lies,
their eyes being greedy eye up
the needy
wonder what they can take,but
you can't break what's broke and
some of these folk are in bits.
There are some ***** out there with
the pinstripe air who think that
they're the 'dope'

Strutting Out

I love wearing a well tailored suit.          
Strutting in my sartorial repute.              
Crisp spread shirt collar, matching tie                
And dimpled half Windsor knot
All with puffy pocket square to eye.                                                                                

Dark navy with a faint pinstripe                    
Two button coat and Four button sleeve
Blood red silk lining type                            
British tailored elegance to perceive
Slacks cut just a half inch to the back
Stepping out lady on my arm



Copyright 2014
Richard L Ratliff

If you ask my grandmothers
they’ll say my father was a jazz man
in a pinstripe suit

When I pull up to the faded
yellow house with the worn smooth
stairs and a screen door
snap, sunflowers stoop
by the apple orchard heavy
with ants’ sweet bliss
where the day buzzes dry
but the nights are getting cooler now
the girls come running
and I hold their softness close,
breathe in the beating promise of rolling
thunder rousing wild rain
on window pane
cold winds rise, leaves will fall
velvet silence settles
foghorns blow
and inside there is music—
the kind to throw my arms
toward heaven and laugh
out loud
and there he is twinkling, fingers trip
happy across pale keys
old bones forgotten
rhythm shivers free
and we sing
we sing till there’s no breath, until my face
irons smooth, my heart
swells true

Autumn changes air to music
and music is
my home

If blood could talk instead of bleeding
we'd be needing more
if blood could walk instead of flowing down the streets in Palestine
that would be a sign
to walk away,
but it lays lightly in the veins,down the drain,
these times surely are the times insane.
what gain inflicting sorrow, pain that numbs the brain,
more blood dripping down the drain,
blood that never knew the reason why the sky rained
death upon the children,hear them cry,
One more Jerusalem?
God knows we've had enough of them and
still the men in pinstripe suits pick up the guns and shoot
to ****,
another will of God?
how odd that God is love yet death rains down from up above.
When will free will decide to override this never ending tide of man the beast?
can we at least have a moratorium on war
I'm all for
that.

Awake too soon, to a dusk dusty with blue linings, not knowing what is shadow and who is foe, a precursor twilight sky and a dead city, still asleep. The cold that is felt, the concrete, the breeze, the metallic neglect or indifference, seeps in--not into Our shrapnel skin, but deep into the soul's being.

It feels like I am an infant that has been discarded and unwanted, and having not been found, losing a voice and a will to expect more than the stench of a life at the bottom of the heap of a garbage bin... I wake too late to catch myself... And like a babe I was ignorant of these fine lines, with edges of asphalt, blacktop streets so easy to break anyone walking it's tightrope... It's all fun and games until you lose all sight, although many who bed the sidewalks, calling it their mistress, know that it is not a blindness of the eyes, but something more, that we forgot to heed and keep a mindful thought...

Awake at the witches' hour, and already the voices are gathering their laughter and insults, all I wanted was another hour or more of stillness of nothingness, in sleep I find non existence, unless a nightmare or a dream reminds me of the reality outside... How can it be that scarecrows, or an inanimate thing as this, passed by without a second look, how can it feel so much, and suffer more? How can a nothing no one knows or cares for, flotsam, minutiae rock, possess more hell than the devil knows, all the wars and cancer, lifeless and painfully so...

then I recall all the sudden, the shuddering of my bones gripped by the winter wind, I remember that it was life I was to pay --attention to, or off a ******/wagon, pay checks are as long gone as the dinosaurs... How can we keep our eyes open and be mindful of life's beautiful *******, when all we look for is numb and a means to ****** the emotions that are alien to our own selves? When it's all breaking News and nothing's good enough but surrender and suicide... Then I recall the rumbling of life in my belly, and how empty truly feels similar to being wounded in battle / the field of grey and iron a constant reminder... We are nothing without the paper, the cash money, green / I forget what color trees use to be , when a vagrant's hunger is appeased when the Cheshire smoke floats away -- the pain of waking up too late or early... A twenty is still black and silver foil to me... The trees round here are barren or dime sac dubs, I want to defy my lungs when I recall the breeze, whipping lashes of ice ... Go **** a tree, my straw will suffice (I recall breath and beauty, falling down the pinstripe straws, the hollow of undead uncaring, the engine hum of bleak and ****** heat..) but winter always comes...

I remember that the **** is all the same, even completely wide aware with eyes dry but deeply pleading to go blind. Tell me how can a corpse of this scarecrow begin to cry, thus being somehow alive, too cowardly to succeed... Suicide is a name of a 40 oz. whenever he happens a happy dream.

Awake too early before the sun, I sit facing the west and feel the fire behind me... A rooster crows and all th world's voices scream to hate me.
Most times it's so loud with such weight of being nothing, the pain of empty, i buy black and I fall where I stand and pray to die in my sleep... Where ever it is I think I am... I mumble recalling nothing...still lost and forever needing...