"placebo" poems
The First-Born Blues
Sara L Russell 22nd August 2014 20:59 revised 27th Aug 2014, 13:58
So I bite down on bitter words
and I eat my humble pie
for those who will not understand me
Until the day I die.
self-pity's for the birds,
where the golden egos fly;
if you will not understand me
should I bother to ask why?
So you know I'm always me
and I never will be her
and you know she's gone forever
things can't be the way they were
I survived, unworthily
though you think I should concur
that death struck out unfairly
- should have taken me, not her.
So I wear my comfort cross
and I carry my cross of woe -
each a spiritual placebo
from the God I used to know;
and an eerie sense of loss
follows everywhere I go
for this poor downtrodden ego
that you always overthrow.
Aug 22, 2014
Aug 22, 2014 at 4:06 PM UTC
you can hear the echo via Zizek the Slovak,
well, attire me in slavic myths and
i'll be mumbling purrs in mud too
for a helium bubble to become a comedian,
i know a jittery ******* addiction
when i see one...
if one thing the catholic schooling system
taught me was how to avoid
sniffing glue and how to recognise
a Freudian apostle - still, with all
the hippy **** you'd think
sniffing glue was what Ukrainian existentialism
prescribed with paracetamol,
catholic education just said: no no.
**** me it's the late 90s and we're talking
post-Chernobyl antics...
but that's how i see the left, leftist politics,
the right
utilises prefixes and suffixes in the
old stance of simple pre- pro-
anti-
qua-
-so so...
the left? oh they're right in there...
their prefixes are
Marxist-
liberal-
Hegelian-
whatnot...
they don't
use abstract prefixes,
their prefixes
are concrete,
they want the porridge in their mouth
to ensure a slur that never comes,
among a range of onomatopoeias they argue
from the perspective of the hushed and ushered crowd,
via one observation: Stalin clapped after a speech
to enjoin with the crowd, a real big brother,
****** never clapped, a sitting-duck method;
i'm not advocating, but by a proxy placebo dynamo
experimenting, it's called experimenting with
thought rather than practising with will,
former no chance of footstep evaluation for
cult status imitable -
the left intellectual
has no rubric of thought concerning to and fro -
it has to be concrete layered and a shut off
perfect architecture without fault -
it can't be what it is -
con-
has to be conservative
pro-
has to be socialist
you once said legitimate
transparency - but you didn't say legislation -
well, the left understood it as legislation,
the right too wanted legitimate transparency -
the green party said we could have neither
but could have the replanting of a thousand
oak trees with a Robin Hood placard on the first
oak tree replanted in Sherwood Forest...
b. ~ d. ~... shot ~100 bent arrows into a bullseye -
hurrah! hurrah! maid marian lost her virginity
too! to a broomstick rather than maradona's
fingernail toothpick!
at an essex market the cockney shouts (out of
place): *** yer courgettes! *** yer courgettes!
ta fa a pudding! ta fa a pudding!
*** yer cucumbers! tooth firth 'un!
Apr 20, 2016
Apr 20, 2016 at 9:50 PM UTC
Honesty today
equates
with the sale of reality
legally and expediently
as a placebo
for propaganda.
Jan 5, 2015
Jan 5, 2015 at 12:39 AM UTC
It is nothing,
a mordant of the soul,
an elixir, a panacea, a placebo
for my lesions, there in the thistle, grows
our drastic garden of red posies and hyacinths,
such little things, on the verge,
lilting as the decorum begins to bobble
and slump sideways, and murmur,
on Mondays I can swallow the octave
of your absence, tendrils and all,
red quince limbs parting from the deluge
and in its wake, the wreckage
of black pumpkins and purple corn, hanging
pendulum at our door,
the Autumn lights summon a lavish song to harvest,
thirty seven colours in the brocade you gift me,
tangled and heavy the years upon my bones
begin to spur and flower
into cunning disruptions,
and stratify upon my body like rinds of ricepaper,
vellum for another wish
in the complacent burial of mango flesh,
listen,
as my song liquefies,
drowns you, inundates
each alveoli, and our love
in the swallowing gush, perched,
begins to shudder,
devoured by its symmetry,
stem cells all akimbo
in the shallow pitch of days
bound in a nostrum of wine and liquorice
it is nothing, really,
a mordant for the soul, a tulle filament
twitching in a raincoat of lightning....
Oct 21, 2012
Oct 21, 2012 at 4:35 PM UTC
You grabbed my arm
and pulled me out
of Hell? No, only my mind.
A cheap knock-off.
False control to heal the soul,
How ingenius.
You gave a new name to Amanda Munro,
Through it all, you were my placebo.
Never tell me of this false cure,
let me believe the lies.
Oct 23, 2011
Oct 23, 2011 at 5:53 AM UTC
i am the controlled group
i expected interferon and
i got a saline injection
hepatitis c is the
monster
hiding under my skin
i've called for 300,000 favors
from faceless friends - IRC, IRBs, dietitians, physicians
to try to cheat the system
and to cheat the 4 horsemen
harbinging my own internal apocalypse
"If they don't give me anything,"
I began calmly to my wife;
"the scars on my guts will generate another
Chernobyl out of frustration;
out wanting to see my son graduate."
my white blood cell count is 3
and i will wreck this study
go to mexico
and buy as much real medicine
as i need to survive
rudely refusing the FDA's
50% miracle drug
the ingenious intravenous
sugar pill
i only have 3
white blood cells
circumventing valuable scientific knowledge
is not off the table
i will walk away in slow motion
after saving my liver from
hepatitis hellfire horse jockeys in lab coats
with the entirety of clinical research
burning behind me
Jan 1, 2014
Jan 1, 2014 at 8:02 AM UTC
Hitchhiker
My passenger seat
Her eyes tear up as
She talks about
Placebo happiness
And the
Digital pineapples
She never wanted
As a girl
About how the world really
Should have been a square
Then nobody'd ever fall off
And more people could care
About how nothing ever makes sense
Up here
And that she doesn't believe in
Calling a piece of dirt
A home
And how in my heart I feel that
She's perfectly
Batshit crazy
And that she could be the one
How everything seems okay
Every time she breathes out
And
In
And I'm stunned
As she gives me a look so
Delicate it shatters like
Glass against industrial
Cold tempered
Steel
And the moment she says
"Thanks for the ride, But I can't stay"
This fifty mile fairytale of ours just
Ends.
Jul 23, 2015
Jul 23, 2015 at 11:22 AM UTC
Tamed not
I cannot believe in this beating so much
Let rot
We need to calculate this, we’re *******
You Lady Laz-
No, you my Plath
With your heart in reverse
Your hand on mine
On the relation gears
Your lover and his shadow’s near
You cruel shrew
You insatiable cage of bones
******* like a goddess at daybreak
I do love you.
This, my confessional
This, my pornographic revival
Eat me
**** the air out of my
Thin second coming
**** the miracle marrow
Of my bones, make a soup
Say a spell, yell, melt.
A mouth like a witch
Hands for my itch
Bit chiseled by bit
Us, lower in an atmosphere
Hidden from the house on the hill
Hands full of placebo-sex-pills
Tiny wrists shaking in fear
Tamed not
The muddied housewife
The war plot
The trapped door trigger shot
God is love
Love is biochemical
Love is the bathroom stall
Holes everywhere
In the walls
In everyone
In the suspension
I cannot believe
In at all
Mar 27, 2011
Mar 27, 2011 at 10:52 AM UTC
My friends a hypochondriac,
doctor twice a week.
He looks so strong and burly,
but feels so sick and meek.
He heard there is a cure out there,
that heals what ails him so.
I just don't have the heart to tell him,
he's taking a placebo.
My friend is big and mighty,
and the sugar pills do work.
He says he's never sick now,
no aches, and nothing hurts.
I'm happy for him, really,
though I wish he'd known much sooner,
that sugar pills have what it takes,
to heal the kids of boomers.
Our parents taught us to be weary,
as they had had no means,
to heal themselves in the time of war,
when they were all just teens.
But times have changed, and we can now,
heal most every sickness.
But still there are hypochondriacs,
needing sugar to cure weakness.
Dec 5, 2014
Dec 5, 2014 at 3:10 AM UTC
those mistakes were never the same,
snowflake, snowflake,
i melted in the touch of your cold cold heart.
i see you frantic, romancing the stars,
show me the world again, my gentle penpal and my proudest critique,
we circled the landmarks until you made me heart start to beat.
I’m petrified of the ride, this gifted one way system,
my commitment to you is beautiful true.
i pictured destruction - i couldn’t function in ways,
years and years, days and days, it was peace at last, if only you knew.
a thousand friends and a million faces,
the snowball effect melted me snowflake mallow.
you were right all along, i was spun from the whirlwind of your world.
give me Disney love now or nothing at all.
i’m all yours now my sweet princess,
theres no contest or battle just a universe of you.
the placebo effect is so far from the truth, an uninhabited land - i belong here with you.
theres only one question that remains unanswered.
snowflake don’t ever change. x
Oct 19, 2015
Oct 19, 2015 at 4:50 AM UTC
Do I believe
There's been a breakthrough
With some significant findings
Through time-released research:
Using study groups,
Control rats,
And free range monkeys?
The announcement's delivered
By a team of thesbians,
And once I was convinced,
I took a decisive step
To get the Japanese water filter.
I almost felt philanthropic
Knowing third world countries
Benefit from my purchase.
I was, I think,
Deceived by a soporific placebo.
Aug 1, 2015
Aug 1, 2015 at 6:06 PM UTC
[ final, before flight ]
learnt through dusty feet
and stomachs growlin’ their
dyin’ growls. days and weeks
with leakin’ roof, and
nature’s bountiful army
marchin’ on and through.
candle-lit synthetic canvas
absorbin’ fired raditation,
*** upon baked ground
starin’ at drunken fire pit –
conversed two hours, and
with dawn one side meld’d
in the dancin’ orange and reds.
walk’d macadame, in full June
the tar bubbled to the surface
and patch’d holed soles –
surfaced skin, turn’d black.
graveyard of gypsum;
burnt out child’s playground;
horse protectin’ territory, or life;
pawnin’ everything not bolt’d down –
death of materialism,
birth of a **** off mentality.
bought Black-and-Milds so to
reroll a few cigarettes,
save wood tip for later use.
save everything for later use,
stash everything for later use.
stab’d in stupidity and
made to mend the wound with
worries of:
will i use this hand again?
[ C ]
cryin’ for Annie, cryin’ out,
knowin’ she will return without
my concern. knowin’ she’s
probably rummagin’
through some neighbor’s house.
cryin’ out. cryin’ out.
lyin’ down on pallet’d floor,
gettin’ usher’d out so
she could ****
[ A ]
mouse detectives on VHS,
an awkward glance at left –
all the signs, none of the glory.
misdirectin’ for no reason,
reappearin’ without reason,
disappearin’ for every reason.
[ T ]
road impart’d day’s heat
through all the night, and
moon lit unknown paths.
cryin’ out, peddlin’ faster,
carryin’ weight in
hope at final penance.
no penance.
[ O ]
an artist’s rush,
turn’d paper to masterpiece
with seemin’ lack of effort.
stole heart, keel’d in, cast off to
placebo girl in roomate’s bed.
- - - abrupt ending
Dec 28, 2012
Dec 28, 2012 at 3:43 AM UTC
Subject of forced indoctrination
Given a placebo of hope
And made to look at society
Through artificial eyes
Just another disfigured mind
Molded through the
Systematic eradication
Of constitutional freedoms
Walking with a knife in your spine
And shackles on your head
And the force-fed propaganda
Giving a false notion
Of a peaceful reality
Is this what you want?
Step away from the wires of captivity
The Automated Deity of our future
Be one with yourself
Be reborn
Not recreated
May 2, 2014
May 2, 2014 at 1:17 AM UTC
last time I saw you,
I sunk into film
until my eyes were deep enough
to see that off-white show flickering
in the distance.
over and over again,
the leading male’s heroine
with red lips and sharp shoulders
stuck the needle in the bend of her arm
until her windows were worth a quarter each
and her bubble gum
was infected.
yes,
your cinematography is gripping:
I can almost see what she doesn’t want you to know
I can almost see her mother’s first chance
to become her father’s last chance
at owning a pick-up truck
with blankets in the back
and two dimes and a nickel
worth of whatever you are now.
lady,
this placebo effect
has gone too far.
you are not the main attraction
to this drive-in,
your name should only be in lights
when you want it to be.
May 25, 2015
May 25, 2015 at 6:07 PM UTC
I'm by the window on the 5th floor
the view can only be described
as average
the clouds were in my head before
now they glide above the
hard stone bridge
observed from the window floor
alongside a placebo pill
and a bevarage.
Aug 9, 2021
Aug 9, 2021 at 11:19 PM UTC
Love should come with a warning label
Telling us to look before we fall
Reminding us there might be no one to catch us
Before we risk it all
Love has many side effects
Not being able to think clearly,
Drawing hearts in notebooks,
An increase in insecurity
Love is an addicting drug
That should be used with caution
Love can mess with your health
It can make you obsessive and compulsive
The most dangerous think about love however
Is when you finally find your Romeo
You'll never know if his love is true
Or if you received a placebo
Mar 16, 2014
Mar 16, 2014 at 11:34 AM UTC
She accepted
the crayon
and drew
a transparency
to step across
the mirror.
Living on
horizons
long forgotten,
she sprang from fire,
her love affair,
a tale of fairy.
The baobabs grew,
feeding on her,
shredded the glass.
A darker night
devoured the moon,
diluted her crayon.
Then came the day after.
She rose
and drew a crayon.
She accepted lucidity
feeding on transparency.
She took a step.
Jul 21, 2014
Jul 21, 2014 at 8:40 PM UTC
Blister packs and Auld Lang Syne,
the rain-dance in the rain-forests
where no one keeps time;
the maypole, the bar stool,
the sunstroke pilgrimage;
the Superbowl commercial,
the secret raiding of the fridge-
all conforming to some routine
of half-comfortable bliss;
we stumble blindly through
our blueprint futures-
we borrow our happiness.
The truth is out there
if you look within:
the circadian rhythm,
the central nervous system;
the clamour of your mind
in the face of chronic stress.
The Lenders are out
in the crowds now,
with their placards of high-interest
amongst the indifference
of the street-meat vendors,
the numbered tables at the bar;
we spoil ourselves in the reach
of the so near's;
that we forsake all of the so far's.
Jul 18, 2015
Jul 18, 2015 at 10:19 AM UTC
advertising has changed so much
in capitalism,
it's a form of existentialism,
while the french philosophers
abstracted in coffee shops
english existentialism took to
constantly advertising people,
they're not cheese grins and tampons
and toilet product quickies...
they're literally full time adverts,
they do that thing called blogging in video...
it's a strange existentialism,
it's a plagiarism of c.c.t.v.,
the new medium of advertising requires
constant consumer surveillance with those clowns
getting gifts from companies, talking about
getting them and pushing them on...
advertisement literally became a movie picture
akin to Hollywood... the internet age
gave us advertisement actors who
advertise with so much existential angst they
have to encompass each and every day
as wroth advertising - and confuse people
with mundane issues akin to dentistry
and take-away menus that they're not doing...
what they're actually doing;
*a friend in need is a friend indeed,
a friend with **** is better,
a friend with ******* and all the rest
a friend who's dressed in leather...*
(placebo's pure morning).
Mar 6, 2016
Mar 6, 2016 at 7:54 PM UTC
If I lose you after all, after this fall
After the leaves change and death fills the air
I'll just lie to myself and say you were just research for the secret book I'm narrating in my head
Internal observer, on the inside looking out
Taking notes somewhere in my cerebral cortex
Somehow without my consent the neurons fired them into my heart
And it was supposed to help me breathe but it has only become more difficult
A carefully executed experiment but apparently I have
Fallen victim to my own placebo effect
Is it real if I believe it is?
Is it like thinking happy thoughts in order to fly
What would prove as compelling evidence
I have to remain objective until
A positive correlation is made and solidified and
Thrown in my face
Maybe it's the way your Claddagh ring is still turned on its inside
And I don't know if that means you already belong to someone
Or if you think that means you belong to no one
Who understands all this fleeting symbolic **** anyway
Who really understands anything at all
Sep 13, 2010
Sep 13, 2010 at 1:44 PM UTC
pasty white ghosts haunt
the corpse blue cornfields of Iowa
whispering wisps of smoke
shimmering shadows of the past
setting the pace for the rat race
that is the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election
senators billionaires doctors
frauds liars fools
campaigning for selection in an
archaic and outdated
form of governance
witness the spectacle
the orgastic worship
of solipsistic oligarchs
bloated by their own
sycophantic rhetoric
it's just another form
of all-American
entertainment
each orator's charismatic adage
froths forth from a
throat like a grave
pragmatism throttles hope
as we stoke the fires of
self-indulgence and neglect
the fact that we acquiesced
as another deceiver stole votes
we're choking on placebo pills
every ballot cast is another act of apathy
escapism pleading vainly for a
savior to rescue our sick society but
these hands didn't evolve so we could
collect a representative to lead us
blindly into one fiasco after another
these fingers penned
humanity's symphonies and
these calloused palms have
toiled for years under an apathetic sun
we learned to make love
using our fingertips and
with these fists
we could chart a new path
but only if we raise them in
defiance
our only chance is leaderless resistance
Feb 1, 2016
Feb 1, 2016 at 12:05 AM UTC
Wired within us by nature or nurture we feel this thing
The one that stops the clock, mind and rewrites decision codes
The strong get weak at it and sometimes it uplifts the weak
Even when you say no, build defense walls, and inject yourself with a universal immunity drug, it disregards all.
Is it unstoppable or we're just yet to find the solution.
The antidote to it has been more of a placebo
Do we even need a solution at all for something that all who don't have want to have?
Maybe yes, cos the ones who land in the wrong jails of it cry out for freedom
Nobody seems to have the help
When it knocks and you ignore, it keeps knocking with persistence unimaginable
It gets frustrating and exciting sometimes to know it is love knocking again
May 8, 2017
May 8, 2017 at 10:26 AM UTC
We really didn't need
another study
into the Placebo Effect,
but it
made the researchers
feel better.
Jan 25, 2017
Jan 25, 2017 at 4:21 AM UTC
With a pocketful of medicine,
And an optimistic air,
I set out to cure the world.
I had no idea, when I first set out,
Just how far my journey would take me.
I had dreams of dragons,
Heroic battles, and the vast expanse
Of the seemingly endless sea
Racing through my mind.
My friends, not knowing the true
Reason for my adventurous ways,
At first tried to discourage me;
Convincing me that to help myself;
To put myself above all others,
Would be, if not nobler,
Then at least more sensible.
Ah! My friends! Did you not realise,
That you were just encouraging
My foolish deeds more so?
For me, true happiness lies
In the smiles of others, and
The joys I inspire.
I find no pride in accomplishing
Deeds that fulfill other needs;
Diplomas and job offers
Sail over my head, and I
Pay them no heed.
Such accomplishments should be
Left (in my opinion), to kings,
And emperors, and others
Who I pay little regard to,
Who find such happiness
At receiving a scrap of paper
With not a jot of poetry on it.
I remain of the servile class.
By my own admission and actions,
I shun those who would have me
Believe that my past life,
The one in which I ruled,
If not the world, than at least
The part of it I so ignorantly knew,
Was a happier one.
So far there have been no dragons,
Save for the ones I carry with me
In my imagination,
The heroic battles I fought
Have been with no-one but myself,
In the recesses of my mind,
And the vastness of the ocean,
Carries itself, past the distant shore,
And into the hearts of those I love.
As I reach into my pocket,
I find the goods I carry to be
No more than sugar pills-
A placebo of the mind, that
I am told is good for nothing
By learned physicians, who know
Far more on the subject than I.
Thus I find myself in this foreign land,
With nothing but my optimistic air
To see me through.
I wish no more than to lend my hand,
And show others that I care.
Tell me; Is that a placebo too?
May 18, 2016
May 18, 2016 at 9:13 AM UTC