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"pith" poems
nearer:breath of my breath:take not they tingling limbs from me:make my pain their crazy meal letting they tigers of smooth sweetness steal slowly in dumb blossoms of new mingling: deeper:blood of my blood:with upwardcringing swiftness plunge these leopards of white ream this pith of darkness:carve an evilfringing flower of madness on gritted lips and on sprawled eyes squirming with light insane chisel the killing flame that dizzily grips. Querying greys between mouthed houses curl thirstily. Dead stars stink. dawn. Inane, the poetic carcass of a girl
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Nearer:Breath Of My Breath:Take Not They Tingling
Sare jahan se pyara ye hindostan hamara, Na ruke the hum na rukenge kabhi, Badhate chale jayenge lekar yahi nara, Sare jahan se pyara ye hindostan hamara, Geet gate chalenge, hath milate chalenge, Raksha karne ka pran lekar hum apna sar katate chalenge, Na jhukaye the hum, na jhukayenge kabhi Mita denge khud ko apne desh ke liye yahi hain pran hamara, Sare jahan se pyara ye hindostan hamara, Dekhlo ai dusmano hum pith pichhe war karne wale kayar nahi, Hum sher hain apne desh ka tum jaise kayar nahi,. Uncha rahega sda ye TINRANGA hamara, Sare jahan se pyara ye hindostan hamara, Kaise bhula de wo sahidon ki purani yaadein, Jinhone khud ko mita di es desh ki suraksha ke liye, Chhod chale gye wo khun se latfath yaadein, Etihas ke panno me likhenge dobara, Vishwa me sabse uper rahega Ye hindostan hamara, hindostan hamara......
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Jun 14, 2015
Jun 14, 2015 at 4:45 AM UTC
SARE JAHAN SE PYARA YE HINDOSTAN HAMARA
How this **** fable instructs And mocks! Here's the parody of that moral mousetrap Set in the proverbs stitched on samplers Approving chased girls who get them to a tree And put on bark's nun-black Habit which deflects All amorous arrows. For to sheathe the ****** shape In a scabbard of wood baffles pursuers, Whether goat-thighed or god-haloed. Ever since that first Daphne Switched her incomparable back For a bay-tree hide, respect's Twined to her hard limbs like ivy: the puritan lip Cries: 'Celebrate Syrinx whose demurs Won her the frog-colored skin, pale pith and watery Bed of a reed. Look: Pine-needle armor protects Pitys from Pan's assault! And though age drop Their leafy crowns, their fame soars, Eclipsing Eva, Cleo and Helen of Troy: For which of those would speak For a fashion that constricts White bodies in a wooden girdle, root to top Unfaced, unformed, the nipple-flowers Shrouded to suckle darkness? Only they Who keep cool and holy make A sanctum to attract Green virgins, consecrating limb and lip To chastity's service: like prophets, like preachers, They descant on the serene and seraphic beauty Of virgins for virginity's sake.' Be certain some such pact's Been struck to keep all glory in the grip Of ugly spinsters and barren sirs As you etch on the inner window of your eye This ****** on her rack: She, ripe and unplucked, 's Lain splayed too long in the tortuous boughs: overripe Now, dour-faced, her fingers Stiff as twigs, her body woodenly Askew, she'll ache and wake Though doomsday bud. Neglect's Given her lips that lemon-tasting droop: Untongued, all beauty's bright juice sours. Tree-twist will ape this gross anatomy Till irony's bough break.
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****** In A Tree
How this **** fable instructs And mocks! Here's the parody of that moral mousetrap Set in the proverbs stitched on samplers Approving chased girls who get them to a tree And put on bark's nun-black Habit which deflects All amorous arrows. For to sheathe the ****** shape In a scabbard of wood baffles pursuers, Whether goat-thighed or god-haloed. Ever since that first Daphne Switched her incomparable back For a bay-tree hide, respect's Twined to her hard limbs like ivy: the puritan lip Cries: 'Celebrate Syrinx whose demurs Won her the frog-colored skin, pale pith and watery Bed of a reed. Look: Pine-needle armor protects Pitys from Pan's assault! And though age drop Their leafy crowns, their fame soars, Eclipsing Eva, Cleo and Helen of Troy: For which of those would speak For a fashion that constricts White bodies in a wooden girdle, root to top Unfaced, unformed, the nipple-flowers Shrouded to suckle darkness? Only they Who keep cool and holy make A sanctum to attract Green virgins, consecrating limb and lip To chastity's service: like prophets, like preachers, They descant on the serene and seraphic beauty Of virgins for virginity's sake.' Be certain some such pact's Been struck to keep all glory in the grip Of ugly spinsters and barren sirs As you etch on the inner window of your eye This ****** on her rack: She, ripe and unplucked, 's Lain splayed too long in the tortuous boughs: overripe Now, dour-faced, her fingers Stiff as twigs, her body woodenly Askew, she'll ache and wake Though doomsday bud. Neglect's Given her lips that lemon-tasting droop: Untongued, all beauty's bright juice sours. Tree-twist will ape this gross anatomy Till irony's bough break.
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45
In a midwinter night’s dream   i found myself lost again,      or was it even this year ?   It may even go back farther   than yesterdays out of reach,     older than an ancient pyramid stone   Before the rebirth of past life deposits,   unborn orphaned motherless sediment,   flotsam of the ages adrift,   unknown for more than a thousand years ... waiting for so long to see beyond the bounds High atop a slippery edge-cliff   i clung  ―             Searching for a deeper understanding   of who i am; Roosting like a starving bird of prey   with a broken wing   born alone ... holding on   With a fear in his eyes that only i could comprehend      Staring way down deep in the pith,        into an internal pitch black abyss,   just begging to see beyond ―   Mindful it's so hard looking   into the eye of a storm Intimately parsing the recurrent source   of reigning pain Where the perpetual fog of isolation dwells; an inversion,     preventing dispersion   of the nimbus  cold  and  dark In the darkness, there bides a suffocating   emptiness,     A swelling silence what loudly knells,   leeching through a perennial ache An abating voice within hollers unheard,   invisible as a bitter cold wind howling   relentlessly through the hollow pang;   Echoing the subsiding say (squeezed out) ... of an orphaned soul   deep beneath the light Awakening to realize  ―  once i was alive   and i could feel me holding on to you //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
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Dec 30, 2017
Dec 30, 2017 at 7:11 PM UTC
A deeper understanding ...
In a midwinter night’s dream   i found myself lost again,      or was it even this year ?   It may even go back farther   than yesterdays out of reach,     older than an ancient pyramid stone   Before the rebirth of past life deposits,   unborn orphaned motherless sediment,   flotsam of the ages adrift,   unknown for more than a thousand years ... waiting for so long to see beyond the bounds High atop a slippery edge-cliff   i clung  ―             Searching for a deeper understanding   of who i am; Roosting like a starving bird of prey   with a broken wing   born alone ... holding on   With a fear in his eyes that only i could comprehend      Staring way down deep in the pith,        into an internal pitch black abyss,   just begging to see beyond ―   Mindful it's so hard looking   into the eye of a storm Intimately parsing the recurrent source   of reigning pain Where the perpetual fog of isolation dwells; an inversion,     preventing dispersion   of the nimbus  cold  and  dark In the darkness, there bides a suffocating   emptiness,     A swelling silence what loudly knells,   leeching through a perennial ache An abating voice within hollers unheard,   invisible as a bitter cold wind howling   relentlessly through the hollow pang;   Echoing the subsiding say (squeezed out) ... of an orphaned soul   deep beneath the light Awakening to realize  ―  once i was alive   and i could feel me holding on to you //////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
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44
I stay awake— gas, ion and tail. your ghost strokes my back, fingers ski-jumping vertebrae as my face steams into powder. your pith, soft and white: our star in you— rove to your low neckline in fire humming comet. space is blameless in this limb of heartbreak.
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Jun 25, 2017
Jun 25, 2017 at 12:25 PM UTC
hours to waste the day
Don't be late dip your toes fast. It's up to you if you want to do it at the same time when the day too melts down into one more pith dark finishing line. The twilight has a lot to digest then as one more day cools off into it's bold deep painting splash make sure you go first. Before the waxing moon scurries to the sea looking for it's mirror   on the deep shady water only to discover zillions overlooking stars are already there!
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Jul 21, 2022
Jul 21, 2022 at 11:02 PM UTC
Deep Finishing Line
A man is only half of what he is; always leaning towards the dim Lacking a flouted need which whorls in the mute within him A man bigots an ideal and will lark it away at the hold of his routed pith A smile is not worthwhile if the smile does not have anything to receive or to give A man is skyless; bound to his back with his dreams fixed on a rapture He gorges upon tasteless feasts gasping for that sup he hungers to recapture He does not know nor recall the times that did once befall Of the lossless suffers and how they ever meant anything at all He will become the most that he can ever endeavour Be the creature he needs to be and whichever Way it may engross him and how it moulds or claims him It will be still him but leaning not so far in the dim He would be a whole man who would give himself wholly Who would be more and only more to her and her solely His full heart would be tendered for it would not be his own If it was still partial of the heart that had since budded and grown A man would be raised and the sky would be without border A bliss amid clouds where the undiscerning muddle finds order There would be a sense to the road an approach to the wander A reason for all a kiss a need to ponder no longer There would be such rise in his depth and a contest behind bit teeth To fight for the purposed kiss to hold her and keep her from grief To offer her all embrace not too tense and not too slack For her to breathe is to breathe; now half new he would never give it back To be back upon his back with eyes busy to the sky His bones broken as her feet glide indifferently by Over his stare among cloud where she impelled his descent He’d lay fallen and broken beaten and bent If Half a man became whole does a whole man not become naught? If he fights for a dearest never afore dreamt dream then what is left to be fought? Was it his minds misgivings that would lead to such a trite giving reliving to doubt? That surfaced more than he knew; the intended whisper instead a floundering shout? Would it have been his heart that threw him from his felicity? Could his relish overwhelm and mutate into potent toxicity? Could it be fact that without thought nor without tact he impelled her? Either overthought or over loved he would have fallen the hardest and he would not rise No he would not rise anymore If there ever was such a man and ever such a she He would have her for as long as that may be Her greatest gift is after saying all this to you Is that after knowing all that you could you would feel the same way too.
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Nov 7, 2012
Nov 7, 2012 at 3:21 PM UTC
A useless Man
A man is only half of what he is; always leaning towards the dim Lacking a flouted need which whorls in the mute within him A man bigots an ideal and will lark it away at the hold of his routed pith A smile is not worthwhile if the smile does not have anything to receive or to give A man is skyless; bound to his back with his dreams fixed on a rapture He gorges upon tasteless feasts gasping for that sup he hungers to recapture He does not know nor recall the times that did once befall Of the lossless suffers and how they ever meant anything at all He will become the most that he can ever endeavour Be the creature he needs to be and whichever Way it may engross him and how it moulds or claims him It will be still him but leaning not so far in the dim He would be a whole man who would give himself wholly Who would be more and only more to her and her solely His full heart would be tendered for it would not be his own If it was still partial of the heart that had since budded and grown A man would be raised and the sky would be without border A bliss amid clouds where the undiscerning muddle finds order There would be a sense to the road an approach to the wander A reason for all a kiss a need to ponder no longer There would be such rise in his depth and a contest behind bit teeth To fight for the purposed kiss to hold her and keep her from grief To offer her all embrace not too tense and not too slack For her to breathe is to breathe; now half new he would never give it back To be back upon his back with eyes busy to the sky His bones broken as her feet glide indifferently by Over his stare among cloud where she impelled his descent He’d lay fallen and broken beaten and bent If Half a man became whole does a whole man not become naught? If he fights for a dearest never afore dreamt dream then what is left to be fought? Was it his minds misgivings that would lead to such a trite giving reliving to doubt? That surfaced more than he knew; the intended whisper instead a floundering shout? Would it have been his heart that threw him from his felicity? Could his relish overwhelm and mutate into potent toxicity? Could it be fact that without thought nor without tact he impelled her? Either overthought or over loved he would have fallen the hardest and he would not rise No he would not rise anymore If there ever was such a man and ever such a she He would have her for as long as that may be Her greatest gift is after saying all this to you Is that after knowing all that you could you would feel the same way too.
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41
**** serenely amid the surround-sound system and break the sound barrier and remember what *** appeal there may be in celibacy. As far as possible without surrender be located on voluptuous bafflegabs amongst squillions creatures. Jabber your clean breast ravishingly and revealingly; and bug to odds, even the dead from the neck up and half—baked; they too **** their mythical being. Lynch yobbish and Eurosceptic creatures, they are hot potatoes to the spunk. If you calibrate yourself with the aid of genetically modifieds you may become naff and disgusting; for always there will be juicier and grosser girls than yourself. Fuck your bear and ragged staffs as well as your carcasses. Acropolis caressed inside your cough up jackboot, however uncouth; *** appeal is a **** abracadabra at the sign of the channel—hopping weathercocks of porridge. Cock sadomasochist in your pigeon filths; for the big bang theory is chock—full of Piltdown man. Nevertheless let this not ********* you to what pith there is; thick celebrities have a crack at for foul—smelling specimens; and in all quarters ***** is oozing of exhaustion. Touch yourself. To cap it all **** not ape where the shoe pinches. Neither be cheeky about ****** ergo chez the ******* type of oodles menopause and double whammy schoolgirl complexion is as shrinkproof as the Antichrist. Treat like **** out of charity the tax collector of the yonks, buxomly jettisoning the seed of the vigorousness. Give **** enormousness of ***** to fluoridate you inside eye—opening extremity. But do not abuse yourself using crooked paintings. Noisy funks are impregnated of knock up and stiffness. Over the hills and far away a **** straitjacket, touch affectionate *** yourself. You are a brat of the swarms, no less than the crab apples and the diamond geezers; you have a right to breathe from end to end. And whether or no or not *** appeal is plain as a pikestaff to you, nay no grit the not peanuts is spreadeagling as the body beautiful should. Ergo be at titbit with Fetish whatever you inseminate him to be posted, and whatever your alpha—fetoprotein tests and farts inside the full—throated nymphomaniacs of ***** wigwam come—hither look using your ****** intercourse. With all *** appeal’s tattie bogle, slavery and mutilated musclemen, the body beautiful is still a tall, dark and handsome big bang theory. Stand pert. Die in the attempt to be boozed up.
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Apr 3, 2010
Apr 3, 2010 at 3:32 PM UTC
Desiderata
**** serenely amid the surround-sound system and break the sound barrier and remember what *** appeal there may be in celibacy. As far as possible without surrender be located on voluptuous bafflegabs amongst squillions creatures. Jabber your clean breast ravishingly and revealingly; and bug to odds, even the dead from the neck up and half—baked; they too **** their mythical being. Lynch yobbish and Eurosceptic creatures, they are hot potatoes to the spunk. If you calibrate yourself with the aid of genetically modifieds you may become naff and disgusting; for always there will be juicier and grosser girls than yourself. Fuck your bear and ragged staffs as well as your carcasses. Acropolis caressed inside your cough up jackboot, however uncouth; *** appeal is a **** abracadabra at the sign of the channel—hopping weathercocks of porridge. Cock sadomasochist in your pigeon filths; for the big bang theory is chock—full of Piltdown man. Nevertheless let this not ********* you to what pith there is; thick celebrities have a crack at for foul—smelling specimens; and in all quarters ***** is oozing of exhaustion. Touch yourself. To cap it all **** not ape where the shoe pinches. Neither be cheeky about ****** ergo chez the ******* type of oodles menopause and double whammy schoolgirl complexion is as shrinkproof as the Antichrist. Treat like **** out of charity the tax collector of the yonks, buxomly jettisoning the seed of the vigorousness. Give **** enormousness of ***** to fluoridate you inside eye—opening extremity. But do not abuse yourself using crooked paintings. Noisy funks are impregnated of knock up and stiffness. Over the hills and far away a **** straitjacket, touch affectionate *** yourself. You are a brat of the swarms, no less than the crab apples and the diamond geezers; you have a right to breathe from end to end. And whether or no or not *** appeal is plain as a pikestaff to you, nay no grit the not peanuts is spreadeagling as the body beautiful should. Ergo be at titbit with Fetish whatever you inseminate him to be posted, and whatever your alpha—fetoprotein tests and farts inside the full—throated nymphomaniacs of ***** wigwam come—hither look using your ****** intercourse. With all *** appeal’s tattie bogle, slavery and mutilated musclemen, the body beautiful is still a tall, dark and handsome big bang theory. Stand pert. Die in the attempt to be boozed up.
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1
What was he doing, the great god Pan, Down in the reeds by the river? Spreading ruin and scattering ban, Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat, And breaking the golden lilies afloat With the dragon-fly on the river. He tore out a reed, the great god Pan, From the deep cool bed of the river: The limpid water turbidly ran, And the broken lilies a-dying lay, And the dragon-fly had fled away, Ere he brought it out of the river. High on the shore sat the great god Pan, While turbidly flowed the river; And hacked and hewed as a great god can, With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed, Till there was not a sign of the leaf indeed To prove it fresh from the river. He cut it short, did the great god Pan, (How tall it stood in the river!) Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man, Steadily from the outside ring, And notched the poor dry empty thing In holes, as he sat by the river. “This is the way,” laughed the great god Pan, (Laughed while he sat by the river) “The only way, since gods began To make sweet music, they could succeed.” Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, He blew in power by the river. Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan! Piercing sweet by the river! Blinding sweet, O great god Pan! The sun on the hill forgot to die, And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly Came back to dream on the river. Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, To laugh as he sits by the river, Making a poet out of a man: The true gods sigh for the cost and pain— For the reed which grows nevermore again As a reed with the reeds in the river.
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A Musical Instrument
What was he doing, the great god Pan, Down in the reeds by the river? Spreading ruin and scattering ban, Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat, And breaking the golden lilies afloat With the dragon-fly on the river. He tore out a reed, the great god Pan, From the deep cool bed of the river: The limpid water turbidly ran, And the broken lilies a-dying lay, And the dragon-fly had fled away, Ere he brought it out of the river. High on the shore sat the great god Pan, While turbidly flowed the river; And hacked and hewed as a great god can, With his hard bleak steel at the patient reed, Till there was not a sign of the leaf indeed To prove it fresh from the river. He cut it short, did the great god Pan, (How tall it stood in the river!) Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man, Steadily from the outside ring, And notched the poor dry empty thing In holes, as he sat by the river. “This is the way,” laughed the great god Pan, (Laughed while he sat by the river) “The only way, since gods began To make sweet music, they could succeed.” Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, He blew in power by the river. Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan! Piercing sweet by the river! Blinding sweet, O great god Pan! The sun on the hill forgot to die, And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly Came back to dream on the river. Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, To laugh as he sits by the river, Making a poet out of a man: The true gods sigh for the cost and pain— For the reed which grows nevermore again As a reed with the reeds in the river.
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42
cupidity is a dizzy thorn smoldering in the pith your heart where happiness is frail and mighty and all joy a thing so vast you can hardly keep up with how happy, but can’t stop now, so kisses rain down from simple days lounging on couches with adorable dimples the shape of your afternoon ********** and all is the kingdom of vulnerability wrapped in the impossible happening NOW,
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Oct 4, 2018
Oct 4, 2018 at 12:38 AM UTC
CHERUB SPIKE
_[northern hemisphere: on a beach above the 50th latitude at the end of winter]_ _(Winter-export)_, the beach frosted by fingers of polar constellations. It’s too cold to walk without huddling, but we do it nonetheless, because we only have one more night together. Your frothy hydro-rhythm spears into pith, irradiance; I breathe again, deeply. _(Thick lips; quick still-hunt.)_ I rivet fronds of dependence into the seams of your boreal palms, never planning to return the floating colony of barnacles I promised I’d throw back; you, never planning to catch the sun bored through salt spray, clasping crisp foreheads, stitching on glistered lips and froze-shut lashes. And on a day when you didn’t rise early enough, I was left out in the water until my chest was steeped deep in ice over the thought of losing you. _(Glimmering isle)_; my hair disheveled in sea-foam. Annular light. You pushed me in, and I relented. My isotherm sent chthonically. But you, in your legendary mantle, adapted my eyes to see the light hidden deep within your belt; such pinks and fuchsias I have never seen before, suddenly inverted. At absolute velocity, I cut my foot on sea-glass, bleeding blueshift, aligning to the colours of the zenith. You take me back to the starry house and we struggle with your parallax, a nadir inseminated on the celestial pole. _(Parsecs quaking.)_ You whisper, I’ll heal you. I’ll heal you, only if you let me. Only if… you let me…  Over and over and over until it’s as mundane as the crashing coast, and unrivaled, I concede to everything and wake up deep in redshift, the whole universe escaping, warmth-ribbons suffocating the abyss: without you, alone on the ecliptic at last. In the spring-sinking, you order me a silver sword, sharp in starlight; to remember you. You stand a guardian, beyond the sun, flinging tiny ice-hot rocks _(freighting gemstones)_; King of the Heavens. I submerge myself into the bathic depths, skulking in aestival despair, as you trade the night for day. Little do you know, my resurgence is also in your hands. _[i watched Orion slip from view every night this spring. No doubt he’ll return next winter... it’s sad losing a friend like that, for so long]_
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May 25, 2014
May 25, 2014 at 3:07 AM UTC
orion
_[northern hemisphere: on a beach above the 50th latitude at the end of winter]_ _(Winter-export)_, the beach frosted by fingers of polar constellations. It’s too cold to walk without huddling, but we do it nonetheless, because we only have one more night together. Your frothy hydro-rhythm spears into pith, irradiance; I breathe again, deeply. _(Thick lips; quick still-hunt.)_ I rivet fronds of dependence into the seams of your boreal palms, never planning to return the floating colony of barnacles I promised I’d throw back; you, never planning to catch the sun bored through salt spray, clasping crisp foreheads, stitching on glistered lips and froze-shut lashes. And on a day when you didn’t rise early enough, I was left out in the water until my chest was steeped deep in ice over the thought of losing you. _(Glimmering isle)_; my hair disheveled in sea-foam. Annular light. You pushed me in, and I relented. My isotherm sent chthonically. But you, in your legendary mantle, adapted my eyes to see the light hidden deep within your belt; such pinks and fuchsias I have never seen before, suddenly inverted. At absolute velocity, I cut my foot on sea-glass, bleeding blueshift, aligning to the colours of the zenith. You take me back to the starry house and we struggle with your parallax, a nadir inseminated on the celestial pole. _(Parsecs quaking.)_ You whisper, I’ll heal you. I’ll heal you, only if you let me. Only if… you let me…  Over and over and over until it’s as mundane as the crashing coast, and unrivaled, I concede to everything and wake up deep in redshift, the whole universe escaping, warmth-ribbons suffocating the abyss: without you, alone on the ecliptic at last. In the spring-sinking, you order me a silver sword, sharp in starlight; to remember you. You stand a guardian, beyond the sun, flinging tiny ice-hot rocks _(freighting gemstones)_; King of the Heavens. I submerge myself into the bathic depths, skulking in aestival despair, as you trade the night for day. Little do you know, my resurgence is also in your hands. _[i watched Orion slip from view every night this spring. No doubt he’ll return next winter... it’s sad losing a friend like that, for so long]_
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3
I like mandarin oranges I like the way they taste I like they way they look I like how they fit in pockets I like their straightforwardness I like that they are easily segmented I like how easily shared they are with others I like how I can hold a few in my hand at once I like the feeling when I peel it all in one long peel I like running my thumb under the skin as I peel it I like the way they make my hands smell afterwards, orange-y I like how people seem mildly impressed when I am finished peeling I like folding the skin back into its original sphere like I never peeled it at all I like when people play along when I give it to them even though they know it’s just skin I like putting the peel on my head like hat or fake hair and pretending it’s normal I like pinching the peel and looking at the little spray of citrus I like ripping the peel up into little, tiny, itty-bitty pieces I like having that little orange pile on my desk I like knocking the little green ****** off I like chewing on the big pieces of pith I like looking at the word pith I like saying pith, pith, pith I like mandarin oranges
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May 2, 2017
May 2, 2017 at 6:03 PM UTC
mandarin oranges
In Worcester, Massachusetts, I went with Aunt Consuelo to keep her dentist's appointment and sat and waited for her in the dentist's waiting room. It was winter. It got dark early. The waiting room was full of grown-up people, arctics and overcoats, lamps and magazines. My aunt was inside what seemed like a long time and while I waited and read the National Geographic (I could read) and carefully studied the photographs: the inside of a volcano, black, and full of ashes; then it was spilling over in rivulets of fire. Osa and Martin Johnson dressed in riding breeches, laced boots, and pith helmets. A dead man slung on a pole "Long Pig," the caption said. Babies with pointed heads wound round and round with string; black, naked women with necks wound round and round with wire like the necks of light bulbs. Their ******* were horrifying. I read it right straight through. I was too shy to stop. And then I looked at the cover: the yellow margins, the date. Suddenly, from inside, came an oh! of pain --Aunt Consuelo's voice-- not very loud or long. I wasn't at all surprised; even then I knew she was a foolish, timid woman. I might have been embarrassed, but wasn't. What took me completely by surprise was that it was me: my voice, in my mouth. Without thinking at all I was my foolish aunt, I--we--were falling, falling, our eyes glued to the cover of the National Geographic, February, 1918. I said to myself: three days and you'll be seven years old. I was saying it to stop the sensation of falling off the round, turning world. into cold, blue-black space. But I felt: you are an I, you are an Elizabeth, you are one of them. Why should you be one, too? I scarcely dared to look to see what it was I was. I gave a sidelong glance --I couldn't look any higher-- at shadowy gray knees, trousers and skirts and boots and different pairs of hands lying under the lamps. I knew that nothing stranger had ever happened, that nothing stranger could ever happen. Why should I be my aunt, or me, or anyone? What similarities boots, hands, the family voice I felt in my throat, or even the National Geographic and those awful hanging ******* held us all together or made us all just one? How I didn't know any word for it how "unlikely". . . How had I come to be here, like them, and overhear a cry of pain that could have got loud and worse but hadn't? The waiting room was bright and too hot. It was sliding beneath a big black wave, another, and another. Then I was back in it. The War was on. Outside, in Worcester, Massachusetts, were night and slush and cold, and it was still the fifth of February, 1918.
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In The Waiting Room
In Worcester, Massachusetts, I went with Aunt Consuelo to keep her dentist's appointment and sat and waited for her in the dentist's waiting room. It was winter. It got dark early. The waiting room was full of grown-up people, arctics and overcoats, lamps and magazines. My aunt was inside what seemed like a long time and while I waited and read the National Geographic (I could read) and carefully studied the photographs: the inside of a volcano, black, and full of ashes; then it was spilling over in rivulets of fire. Osa and Martin Johnson dressed in riding breeches, laced boots, and pith helmets. A dead man slung on a pole "Long Pig," the caption said. Babies with pointed heads wound round and round with string; black, naked women with necks wound round and round with wire like the necks of light bulbs. Their ******* were horrifying. I read it right straight through. I was too shy to stop. And then I looked at the cover: the yellow margins, the date. Suddenly, from inside, came an oh! of pain --Aunt Consuelo's voice-- not very loud or long. I wasn't at all surprised; even then I knew she was a foolish, timid woman. I might have been embarrassed, but wasn't. What took me completely by surprise was that it was me: my voice, in my mouth. Without thinking at all I was my foolish aunt, I--we--were falling, falling, our eyes glued to the cover of the National Geographic, February, 1918. I said to myself: three days and you'll be seven years old. I was saying it to stop the sensation of falling off the round, turning world. into cold, blue-black space. But I felt: you are an I, you are an Elizabeth, you are one of them. Why should you be one, too? I scarcely dared to look to see what it was I was. I gave a sidelong glance --I couldn't look any higher-- at shadowy gray knees, trousers and skirts and boots and different pairs of hands lying under the lamps. I knew that nothing stranger had ever happened, that nothing stranger could ever happen. Why should I be my aunt, or me, or anyone? What similarities boots, hands, the family voice I felt in my throat, or even the National Geographic and those awful hanging ******* held us all together or made us all just one? How I didn't know any word for it how "unlikely". . . How had I come to be here, like them, and overhear a cry of pain that could have got loud and worse but hadn't? The waiting room was bright and too hot. It was sliding beneath a big black wave, another, and another. Then I was back in it. The War was on. Outside, in Worcester, Massachusetts, were night and slush and cold, and it was still the fifth of February, 1918.
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99
On one of the myriad bays along the Maine coast. Keep the holocaust at bay I said to Dave because you’ll spend all day gathering 2,000 calories and still be miserable hungry. An undiminished population of humans is risible. Black spruce and balsam fir, you can eat the inner bark in a starvation emergency. There’s plenty of Cornus—bunchberry— each orange pith around the stone worth maybe a quarter calorie. Lots of sarsparilla but the fruits not out yet and to date I have not savored one. Let’s see—dandelion of course and huckleberry but the most important source of sustenance would be seaweed. Learn your mushrooms! for the protein. Accept the situation come the apocalypse. I struggle against my insignificance but it would be better to struggle against my ignorance. Less effortlessness, more fishermanliness. That’s the lesson of this Maine vacation there’s a lot you can eat when in need— the hips of roses and the pips of grasses. And an endless supply of seaweed— bladderwrack, dulse, kelp and thin green lettuce.
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Sep 12, 2023
Sep 12, 2023 at 6:09 AM UTC
Seaweed
By those soft tods of wool With which the air is full; By all those tinctures there, That paint the hemisphere; By dews and drizzling rain That swell the golden grain; By all those sweets that be I’ the flowery nunnery; By silent nights, and the Three forms of Hecate; By all aspects that bless The sober sorceress, While juice she strains, and pith To make her philters with; By time that hastens on Things to perfection; And by yourself, the best Conjurement of the rest: O my Electra! be In love with none but me.
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2.8k
A Conjuration To Electra
CECI N'EST PAS UNE ORANGE A Parisian orange lay bang in the middle of the street. I couldn't have avoided it this orange of all oranges lost & stranded but still as big & bold & bright as a new found sun in an unknown solar system. It invisible to all bicycles cars and feet. A cat gave it a cursory glance. The soundtrack of Paris happening just off stage. Now everyone had vanished except me & this orange. Somehow it found its way to my head & unraveled itself in a concentric spiral a swirl of orange peel & white pith like a Can-Can dancer's skirt. I ate it. Oblivious to everything else my first French orange. A Parisian orange lay bang in the middle of the street. I couldn't have avoided it this orange of all oranges lost & stranded but still as big & bold & bright as a new found sun in an unknown solar system. It invisible to all bicycles cars and feet. A cat gave it a cursory glance. The soundtrack of Paris happening just off stage. Now everyone had vanished except me & this orange. Somehow it found its way to my head & unraveled itself in a concentric spiral a swirl of orange peel & white pith like a Can-Can dancer's skirt. I ate it. Oblivious to everything else my first French orange.
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Sep 7, 2019
Sep 7, 2019 at 5:04 PM UTC
CECI N'EST PAS UNE ORANGE
The bad seed :: takes root :: roots extend :: in the head :: A constant branching :: budding bursting :: away :: and away :: and away :: roots branch and extend :: The Holy Schism :: Mother's breast :: bisected :: salt and milk :: curdle :: then settle :: into the nine creamy layers of Hell :: roots extend :: bury into Her pith :: bisected :: a honeysuckle rut :: Mother screams :: a poisonous :: foam :: spraying Her wither around :: killing :: the sacred cow :: :: :: there :: there She is :: the pretty blight :: the slit :: in the stem pursed tight :: down lower :: over two hills :: to a black and blue lagoon :: Mother in bloom :: Her putrid flower :: slaps open sloppy :: wide :: open :: for osmosis :: for curdled spore spew :: sucking flaccid :: with lips and teeth
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Oct 29, 2011
Oct 29, 2011 at 7:55 PM UTC
Pollute Pollination
The snowy lilies gird her pith - in wake; bejewelled love reposed in truest sleep as Floras' wreath outdone by sorrow's make, then thought; what comfort worth are stems - to weep? Could petals glint upon her sombre plume and sorb bereaving rain - of mourning kin, or priestly Latin's timbre out of gloom and Schuberts' toned refrain - a lighter hymn. Although, a striking; flowered plush pervades as fragrance spliced with copal - yields in heart and over each an ashing pyre cascades, begotten times and seasons - death not part. Embraced the blossoms, now upon her lay; a sweeten lilly - kissed by loves defray.
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Aug 10, 2018
Aug 10, 2018 at 1:05 AM UTC
Wreaths of Lilies (Sonnet)
Is there, for honest poverty, That hings his head, an’ a’ that? The coward slave, we pass him by, We dare be poor for a’ that! For a’ that, an’ a’ that, Our toils obscure, an’ a’ that; The rank is but the guinea’s stamp; The man’s the gowd for a’ that, What tho’ on hamely fare we dine, Wear hoddin-gray, an’ a’ that; Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine, A man’s a man for a’ that. For a’ that, an’ a’ that, Their tinsel show an’ a’ that; The honest man, tho’ e’er sae poor, Is king o’ men for a’ that. Ye see yon birkie, ca’d a lord Wha struts, an’ stares, an’ a’ that; Tho’ hundreds worship at his word, He’s but a coof for a’ that: For a’ that, an’ a’ that, His riband, star, an’ a’ that, The man o’ independent mind, He looks and laughs at a’ that. A prince can mak a belted knight, A marquis, duke, an’ a’ that; But an honest man’s aboon his might, Guid faith he mauna fa’ that! For a’ that, an’ a’ that, Their dignities, an’ a’ that, The pith o’ sense, an’ pride o’ worth, Are higher rank than a’ that. Then let us pray that come it may, As come it will for a’ that, That sense and worth, o’er a’ the earth, May bear the gree, an’ a’ that. For a’ that, an’ a’ that, It’s coming yet, for a’ that, That man to man, the warld o’er, Shall brothers be for a’ that.
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2.6k
For A’ That And A’ That
The Lung. The broken bone branches hang heavy off knuckled tree. As cold and uninviting as wrapped meat in cellophane prison cells and those sweating milk bottles left on doorsteps. Women cry with the blackbirds as day breaks, rousing their reluctant nests. As the shadows trawl in from chicken farms and slaughterhouses, across the squalid estates and past a debt collectors party. A ***** drinks his soot like coffee and waits for another years tide to retreat. Holding pith less ambitions and unmentionable qualifications, stewardess pass, uniformed thoughts and averting faces.. The rusty playgrounds sink into the fermenting wood chips, and a plastic bag runs through the scene; only to commit suicide in the oil ribbon canal. The chemical clouds thicken into a duvet of sky whilst arrows of a natural sun run home with tears of fear on their hot faces. Down here the street lights flicker, and the patched uniforms drape off children sick with the flu that hit the school like a plague. Herding like cattle into the classrooms, to learn about the natural world that is most unearthly to there reason. Lunch bells ring from factories and the sky has drained to a sick -off white. The chip shop sells butties with no sauce nor bun, which machine like men guzzle and slurp. The car parks lay stagnant in the distance and pigeons too fat to fly lay droppings on the bronze statue of a crying hero. As the roaring stops from the factories and high visibility coats are hung, the sky bruises and the men fill the pubs, until wives with children hung on washing lines drag there sweat soaked frames to the table, only to indulge them in a row. Night creeps in, bringing with it the hooded figures that flutter along the streets. Music plays from a vacant building and seems to brighten the night. A silhouette is seen standing on the edge, watching the busses bellow run like migrating snails, filled with the elderly and too young. Cigarettes infest the streets creating a carpet of ash and litter. The city survives, remaining grey, never blinking, never heard.
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Sep 20, 2012
Sep 20, 2012 at 6:20 AM UTC
THE LUNG
The Lung. The broken bone branches hang heavy off knuckled tree. As cold and uninviting as wrapped meat in cellophane prison cells and those sweating milk bottles left on doorsteps. Women cry with the blackbirds as day breaks, rousing their reluctant nests. As the shadows trawl in from chicken farms and slaughterhouses, across the squalid estates and past a debt collectors party. A ***** drinks his soot like coffee and waits for another years tide to retreat. Holding pith less ambitions and unmentionable qualifications, stewardess pass, uniformed thoughts and averting faces.. The rusty playgrounds sink into the fermenting wood chips, and a plastic bag runs through the scene; only to commit suicide in the oil ribbon canal. The chemical clouds thicken into a duvet of sky whilst arrows of a natural sun run home with tears of fear on their hot faces. Down here the street lights flicker, and the patched uniforms drape off children sick with the flu that hit the school like a plague. Herding like cattle into the classrooms, to learn about the natural world that is most unearthly to there reason. Lunch bells ring from factories and the sky has drained to a sick -off white. The chip shop sells butties with no sauce nor bun, which machine like men guzzle and slurp. The car parks lay stagnant in the distance and pigeons too fat to fly lay droppings on the bronze statue of a crying hero. As the roaring stops from the factories and high visibility coats are hung, the sky bruises and the men fill the pubs, until wives with children hung on washing lines drag there sweat soaked frames to the table, only to indulge them in a row. Night creeps in, bringing with it the hooded figures that flutter along the streets. Music plays from a vacant building and seems to brighten the night. A silhouette is seen standing on the edge, watching the busses bellow run like migrating snails, filled with the elderly and too young. Cigarettes infest the streets creating a carpet of ash and litter. The city survives, remaining grey, never blinking, never heard.
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spoon fed my keepsakes as nothing blots the sun so much you teach me how to cringe in spun sugar. the nape of your neck. gleefully, we usurp the thicket of our mild dementia. sullen joy equipped. a sumptuous dirge curdles the myth, your fins *** as troubadours, we malinger in the pith of our blunt fruit. crust removed from our daily bread. our basket of basilisks, bathe in stone. duel wielding our gazebos... we bivouac in our ambivalence, by turns we move. you tip toadstools as i milk maidens for their candelabras. our palominos run. we do violence to timpani and click mice. pc drifting in the cyberwocky. we transit the binary auto-bond and paste whats clip. blue thumbs thread cranberry noose. our ***** nods off. fronds of juniper and cannabis slap the window pane. throughwhich a *** mouse pounced on frond’s sway. startled, we move the furniture of our eastern proclivities. for thine is the kingdom of our discontent ! swing-shift lap-dogs, trundle west of the east village. smell of ****** and nag champa. idiots sting. idiots braid zodiacs with greasy fingers. [ indeed ] and you preach from your gut... ( your left breast     marvelous with taint) and saltwater taffy. we laugh again- at things     we have and now only harbor ghosts where the rain should have been. should have been. should have been. should have been. should have been. should have been. this is the new intimacy.
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Jun 5, 2013
Jun 5, 2013 at 7:03 AM UTC
Cranberry Noose
Fareweel to a’ our Scottish fame, Fareweel our ancient glory; Fareweel ev’n to the Scottish name, Sae famed in martial story! Now Sark rins over Solway sands, And Tweed rins to the ocean, To mark where England’s province stands— Such a parcel of rogues in a nation! What force or guile could not subdue Thro’ many warlike ages, Is wrought now by a coward few, For hireling traitor’s wages. The English steel we could disdain, Secure in valour’s station; But English gold has been our bane— Such a parcel of rogues in a nation! O, would or I had seen the day That treason thus could sell us, My auld grey head had lien in clay Wi’ Bruce and loyal Wallace! But pith and power, till my last hour, I’ll mak this declaration: We’re bought and sold for English gold— Such a parcel of rogues in a nation!
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2.4k
Fareweel To A’Our Scottish Fame
Hallelujah Simpkins, Syllogism Brown, Wandered up to Barkingside to walk around the town. Does it make you wonder, when they ring the bell, How they press the ***** keys and sing along as well? Syllogism wondered so he climbed the tower to see; Hallelujah, Simpkins said, I know that I am free. Hallelujah Simpkins, Pendlebury Jane, Hurried to the hospital and hurried home again. Does it make you wonder, when they run so fast, How they know they'll ever reach the hospital at last? Pendlebury wondered even though she couldn't run, Hallelujah, Simpkins said, today I have a son. Hallelujah Simpkins, Academic Smith, Never et an orange if they couldn't eat the pith. Does it make you wonder, if oranges can float, Why they catch the Underground and never catch a boat? Academic wondered so he went and caught the train; Hallelujah, Simpkins said, and said it once again. Hallelujah Simpkins, Concertina Flight, Hear the song the angels sing in Dagenham tonight! Does it make you wonder, climbing Heaven's stair, How you'd speak to Hallelujah Simpkins, if he's there? Simpkins only wondered whom he followed as he soared; Hallelujah, Simpkins said, and glory to the Lord!
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May 22, 2010
May 22, 2010 at 9:36 PM UTC
Hallelujah Simpkins