"prints" poems
From Alan Lomax to the commercial art and now the money machine.
At the turn of the century; when sound recording 1st became available to the masses, recording a song was an opportunity for folk to reach out; and tell the world something up front and personal.
It meant that people were able to put themselves on “The record” A way of leaving a permanent audio statement, an epitaph, an audio sound bite immortalising ~ life, mood, emotion captured and bottled for all eternity.
(A medium that conveyed messages from artists and storytellers of all kinds)
A recording was also a great addition to "The family album" something more tangible, a window to a real person, with a real life, a message and a point of view; a legacy, a blast from the past.
Few people expected sound prints to be re-designed, homogenised, formulated, copied, repackaged and that art and the message would be played over and over again by new artists in the form of "cover music" or that the style of the messages would become secularized, seperated into distinctive groups, or constrained by an elite clique or commercial genre.
Labelling and streamlining art & music mostly benefits the commercial art & music industry; and no longer the artists and creators.
I've no problem with good business, or the multi-billion pound industrys that have gained commercial success.
However the process of mass homogenisation, product synthesis, marketing, streamlining and then packaging fashion, sound and synthetic culture to sell a product, leaves very little room for creative people to just be creative.
A medium originally open to many for self expression, a historical record, an archive, a voice, a personal message;
Is now just a vehicle for advertising and perpetuating a genre of nonsense, so much so that there is now more white noise immortalised than messages.
To re-cap ~ I Think that creativity and expressionism; like story telling conveys moods and messages from the present and past!
Artists and musicians should have the opportunity to create and produce more information than they copy; thus creating a richer more colourful tapestry, whilst not devaluing the message of their predecessors!
Purcy Flaherty.
Jan 9, 2018
Jan 9, 2018 at 10:38 AM UTC
A brisk pace set makes my heart beat so fast
The thrill of the run means I feel no pain
With every step onward, strong as the last
I'm lost in my head with the drops of the rain
Wet as the puddles my feet slip into
I glide through the air, floating on pride
The prints in the ground show where I've been through
The grin on my face shows where in my mind
I love the feeling you get on a run
When nothing else matters but what you see
The sights I notice before I am done
The feeling of such raw intensity
The passion inside burns the creator
But I save its hot embers for extinguishing later
May 23, 2010
May 23, 2010 at 6:01 PM UTC
A pair of lily white wings
dangling in the dappled moonlight esprit;
hang entangled as silken spider web
draped in the sweet Magnolia tree
From beneath there was no way of knowing
why a pair of abandoned wings lodge mislaid
One could not help but wonder how high
one might fly with cherub wings
But these callused feet tread far below the treetops
too high up from roots to climb
No telltale tiptoe prints cavort to be the talebearer
No feathered traces scattered all around
A hearken say, tickle-footed as a ladybug,
hold forth in a breeze brushed ear
Not completely undoubtable heed spoken;
a language bestow from another ether
softly breathe a whisper'd sigh:
"Behold the wings of a fallen angel;
uplifted by love's amazing grace
Lost alone in a moonstruck blindness
an angel flying too close
to the ground
~
Jesse
Mar 8, 2018
Mar 8, 2018 at 3:05 PM UTC
Millions, trillions
And more and more
None of our finger prints are same
None of our retinas are same
Why do we limited to a group
All of our bloods are Red
And every heart has four chambers (arteries and ventricles)
Common oxygen to breathe
Why we are bounded to one group
Everyone has birth from womb of a mother
Every heart pumps the blood
But
Why we are confined to one group
We are humans
This was the only group
We had with us
Unity in diversity is what we want
It should not be limited only for sayings
We should follow this
Jun 23, 2014
Jun 23, 2014 at 12:40 AM UTC
I remember the history well:
The soldiers and politicians emerged
With briefcases and guns
And celebrations on city nights.
They scoured the mess
Reviewed our history
Saw the executions at dawn
Then signed with secret policemen
And decided something
Had to be done.
They scoured the mess
Resurrected old blue-prints
Of vicious times
Tracked the shapes of sinking cities
And learned at last
That nothing can be avoided
And so avoided everything.
I remember the history well.
2
We emerged from our ******* mounds
Discovered a view of the sky
As the air danced in heat.
Through the view of the city
In flames, we rewound times
Of executions at beaches.
Salt streamed down our brows.
Everywhere stagger victims of rigged elections
Monolithic accidents on hungry roads
The infinite web of ethnic politics
Power-dreams of fevered winds.
The nation was a map stitched
From the grabbing of future flesh
And became a rush through
Historical slime
3
We emerged on edge
Of time future
With bright fumes
From burning towers.
The fumes lit political rallies.
We started a war
Ended it
And dreamed about our chance.
Fat fish eat little fish
Big ones arrange executions
And armed robberies.
Our ******* shapes us all.
I remember the history well.
The tiger’s snarl is bought
In currencies of silence.
Eggs grow large:
A monstrous face is hatched.
On the edge of time future
I am a boy
With running sores
Of remember history
Watching the stitches widen
Waiting for the volcano’s laughter
In the fevered winds
Hearing the gnash
Of those who will join us
At the mighty gateways
With new blue-prints
With dew as seal
And fire as constant
And a trail through time past
To us
Who remember the history well.
We weave words on red
And sing on the edge of blue.
And with our nerves primed
We shall spin silk from *******
And frame time with our resolve.
________
Source:
http://www.universeofpoetry.org/nigeria.shtml
17.4k
It’s a coloured and shaded broad daylight.
Bring me my hourglass, my paintbrush.
Keeping a timepiece, how soon my brush
strokes become finer it is not the task.
Try once more, strike a fine chord in time,
ever ticking but doesn't make a sound!
Let’s read the small prints, the shadow lines
on the pitch of the slit sun shines!
A dark spot in the light, some dotted lines
on a blank paper, however witty you might
describe it, count on the tweeting birds
short and cute, singing in the open air.
Light and dark the two tallies, ins and outs.
The times come and go, flowing fine.
For now, let’s take a look inside.
Tint and shade nor tone them now.
Zoom in and out, just watch them as they are.
This cool sleek shade on the sunny slate
is it a shadow, or some quivering curly hairs
or are these reflections of flocking clouds,
diligent sea eyeing deep down on the ground?
Read the small prints, shadows in the daylight,
before the show is wrapped up.
And down the evening pool, the sun
parts away with the black swan.
May 23, 2017
May 23, 2017 at 9:11 AM UTC
I listen to them as they mouth your name;
and I see
how deluded,
how hypnotic,
how enchanted and consumed
they talk of your ways and,
how the stars in their pupils beam with a radiance of such pure awe.
Your words hang loose off the tops of their tounges and their lips drool in your glaze.
Your lazy features, your so electric but so infuriating charm -
sends them mindless, locks them in your illusion.
So it’s then
I try to burn every
sheet of paper which ink prints your presence,
inside these desperate shelves which fold upon each heartstring.
My ears attempt to block it out.
Instead they replay every song
that has ever left your lips.
And my eyes deceive me as they scatter
a particle of you on every surface of life I encounter.
My mind echoes every laugh you created in my streams.
Then I paint every colour you ever erupted within me,
in thick black.
As they mouth your name,
every trace of you with anyone but me,
causes my hands to pull through my gut,
and hammer down any of these ******* deceptive daydreams
that you have me trapped me in.
And then so easily, one by one,
debris of my heart crumble like rain
down your window,
down each vein.
Apr 7, 2018
Apr 7, 2018 at 6:45 PM UTC
Drowning inside hands.
A fluorescent chime.
Skin scrubbed radiation.
Force-feeding plastic and sugar and flesh.
Pushing and pulling until tendons flail weathered
Up. And. Down.
Up and down upanddown until the store of powders, prints, nails tumble out carmine and is sobbing
gagging on a high chair.
The candied calculator like heart-shaped pupils and sticky soles.
Opaque ID’s and strands of you abandoned in navy sheets.
Shoulder tassels taught on Adam’s apple.
Love stitches bedding and hollows bodies.
Love lights the West and lines waste baskets wet.
Love is a little girl vomiting into a lion’s den.
May 5, 2015
May 5, 2015 at 4:36 PM UTC
i'm jealous of the last cigarette you smoked
that it got to soothe your pain
that it got to make itself at home in your lungs
because i couldn't soothe your pain even if i tried
and i can never leave finger prints on your skin again
i can never feel you again
and i'm jealous of the bed sheets you hung yourself with
they got to feel your warmth
because they got to cease your pain
and even if i tried i couldn't do that either
and your gone
and you're never coming back to say your final goodbye
and that's when i knew the cigarette meant more to you than me.
jealousy
May 28, 2014
May 28, 2014 at 9:18 PM UTC
LEAVES of poplars pick Japanese prints against the west.
Moon sand on the canal doubles the changing pictures.
The moon's good-by ends pictures.
The west is empty. All else is empty. No moon-talk at all now.
Only dark listening to dark.
10.8k
When you were a phosphorus angel
There was almost light,
And your glow became like the Fallen.
When you were holding my hand
Your prints took over
Mine, like a stolen identity...
Willingly.
And I was,
Because you were my existence
In the abyss,
And your luminous spirit a breath
Underwater.
And you were the storm
That I left the shelter for,
A little grey can go a long way
In a rain of sorrowing embers.
I was the reconstruction
Of your project,
Rebuilding is never easy
But you stayed til I was me again.
Life is big,
But so little in time,
I am because you were,
I was because you're gone.
Apr 25, 2016
Apr 25, 2016 at 10:21 AM UTC
while I may do you perfectly. the snow angels on gasoline st., did you
see them? All of the houses were dripping wet too, one girl with gold laces on her leopard shoes wore red plastic pants; totally soaked to the bone.
to train ourselves to brave the heat of each others' bodies as we awaken in one small bed, one small blanket. the both of us yawn. it's so fun to make waffles but neither of us like to eat preference. I love you to death but prefer to brush my teeth alone- one tooth at a time.
embrace your new t-shirt, even though not everyone enjoys a good show of a flock of crows. hand drawn indie wicker-hipster prints. coffee by the pint. you crack me up like vitrifying glass sheens of the individual bubbles in a bubble bath or the ****** glazed eyes of the monsters' eye while a shark attacks.
creaky sounds of bodies mapped by fingers, tickled tummies rippled by listening to witch house singers. you crack me up, count chocula. It's Saturday, I love to laugh while laying down. everybody's funnier when they're laying on the ground. we toast to ghosts.
luminous lengths of birthday candles
lickediddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddddd d 0 y0urself as best you can
May 11, 2014
May 11, 2014 at 3:55 AM UTC
The brush is still in the garage
on the cold, cement floor
beside the empty tin of paint,
its sides eternally dripping
with a dried, buttercup hue.
The walls which we smothered with color
are faded, now riddled with children’s earthy hand-prints
after a day in the mud. A mess to us,
the results of battles, safaris,
and space travels to them.
I could paint over the marks,
start over fresh and show off to friends.
But I think I’ll let it be.
No longer the bright yellow of a sun trapped in a painting,
these four walls have still brightened many days.
There has been roaring laughter,
divided by a few screaming matches
that have made the dog whimper.
This room has seen much of our lives,
and life cannot be painted over so easily.
So it stays. The color will always be buttercup to me.
Jul 16, 2014
Jul 16, 2014 at 1:21 PM UTC
Purple was the color of the shirt you wore when we first met
Purple was the color of the flowers you brought for me on our first date
Purple was the color of the sky when we first kissed
Purple was the color ink you used when you wrote me love letters every week
Purple was the color of the hickey on my neck
Purple was the color of my dress and your tie at our first school dance
Purple was the color you left my skin after our first fight
Purple was the color of hand prints around my thigh, on my back, neck, stomach
Purple is the color shirts I started wearing,
hoping we could go back to the first day we met,
when you wore
a purple shirt
Oct 21, 2015
Oct 21, 2015 at 12:24 PM UTC
Freezing a glance
Wind cuffs down-white heliums
Sweeps contrails
Separates cirrus across the moon
Cresting wave tormented
wind against steel
movement in movement
sprays of hair
Blizzard of petals from the apple
Furious snow
drifts off— garage roof
Fog that haunts the river on the coldest nights
_____________
The walk across the alley
took—
so long—
A lifetime from the doorway
of someone else’s impatience
Prints of motion
record the loss
a single set in snow
But there!
on the icy, shoveled surface of night
lies the snowflake of a bird
impossibly molted
Song of a feather
caught—
Flailing! Helpless!
More than lovely for its lying there!
Lying there!
Mar 12, 2017
Mar 12, 2017 at 6:38 PM UTC
They weren’t all cut from the same cloth
*vilified tenders of the iron *****
some were lovers
(or lucid dreamers)
stage romantics
hidden behind jackboots
and skull caps
and switchblade seams
Caste members of a forlorn pack
counting their patchwork and deeds
conjuring up demons
around the console
filling their dreams
with radio reds
and dusted quarries
and faded sepia prints
Brass knuckles
and marches of the few
lightening bolt cracks
from a chilling blood moon
death’s dark specter
cold and ominous looms
the cobalt sea swells
near the nestled, and lost
Clubhouse at Kiusta
Jul 29, 2017
Jul 29, 2017 at 12:15 PM UTC
'Look at Me', so self absorbed in outward looks and latest fashion.
With disregard for inner peace, selfless thought, and kind compassion.
Piercing ears, with holes so big they look like they're starting to melt.
Trousers about the knees; showing off pants, clearly in need of a belt.
Cheap plastic toys bought without thought, of which so quickly we tire,
Relationship failing to last without love and once all consuming desire.
Throw away gadgets and electronic connections, with all life's worth we trust.
But when they are broken, will never be fixed; just casually tossed to the dust.
Mealtime no longer a social or family affair, at a table with fork and knife,
Check-in's a must so 'friends' will know that you're having a really great life.
No album prints of family snaps and childhood memories that last,
It's all about selfies, and sharing on line with 'friends' that human connections bypass.
Dec 8, 2015
Dec 8, 2015 at 5:25 AM UTC
your fingerprints are on my heart and i haven't quite been able to get rid of them at all
it's been six months and i owe my current boyfriend an apology because **** i don't love him
i never asked for these lingering prints and i've tried so hard to get rid of them but tears did not wash them away, and loneliness did not erase them. now im learning that a heart in new hands will not cover your marks either and to my boyfriend, i'm so incredibly sorry, but you're not him
Oct 23, 2014
Oct 23, 2014 at 11:51 PM UTC
Oh! mother where are the snow falls of yester years?
Where are the great king Ashoka and the world master Sankaracharya?
Where is the ujjayani that was immersed in the literary effluence of
The great dramatist Kalidasa?
Where is the light that shone from the piercing eyes of the warrior
Queen Rudrama Devi and the Goddess Durga?
Where are the snow falls of yester years?
Where is the buzzing sound of the bees that came from the corridors
Of the great king Shajahan? Where are the echoing sounds of the war monger
The sword Thikkana?Where is the gallooping white horse climbed by the unconquerable warrior queen of Jhansi Lakshmi Bai?
Where are the snow falls of yester years?
Where is the fire that emanated from the broad shoulders of
The inimitable king and connoisseur of art, Sree Krishna devaraya?
What happened to the living breaths of Balachandra, the young warrior
And brahmanaya, The great warrior and social reformer?
Where are the snow falls of yester years?
Where are the kings, the great poets, the warriors, the chaste queens?
Where have they gone?
Where are the foot prints of the golden wings of time that fanned and fled?
Oh! Mother, Where are the snow falls of yester years? Where are the snow falls of yester years?
Sep 25, 2011
Sep 25, 2011 at 1:10 PM UTC
I reminisce too much.
Besides, what else is there to do?
Remnants of the past, fragments
Still squirming in my conscience
In some vague room
A flicker of my smile, a candle, a black robe
And my button down shirt
Laid across the floor for you to step on
And you carefully tip toed
To catch me in time, but I wasn't falling
The seasons have passed exceedingly slowly
But now, I am smiling again
My nights are somehow less tormented
It is beautiful today and I have things to do
But before I leave and conquer the week
I pause, if only for a moment, in this sun lit room
I touch the French window
And leave you behind, one last time
Like shabby finger prints on unstained glass
May 18, 2016
May 18, 2016 at 3:01 AM UTC
dark hearts lost down dusty path
her soul within inches of my grasp
why must our time be numbered
when we see the angels weep
ill show you solitude
my finger prints were missing
when I washed away the sin
do you fear the things that may be
I turned my back on the crowd
dont turn your back on me now
I ask you your ***** ways
and you felt strange
I gave you everything you want
and then you run away
you always run back my friend
and let me feel your soft hand
the sound of buckels and metal ring
from this chilly automobile
take in the passion of the night
and bask in the warmth you fe
Feb 27, 2015
Feb 27, 2015 at 4:09 PM UTC
At last the secret is out,
as it always must come in the end,
the delicious story is ripe to tell
to tell to the intimate friend;
over the tea-cups and into the square
the tongues has its desire;
still waters run deep, my dear,
there's never smoke without fire.
Behind the corpse in the reservoir,
behind the ghost on the links,
behind the lady who dances
and the man who madly drinks,
under the look of fatigue
the attack of migraine and the sigh
there is always another story,
there is more than meets the eye.
For the clear voice suddenly singing,
high up in the convent wall,
the scent of the elder bushes,
the sporting prints in the hall,
the croquet matches in summer,
the handshake, the cough, the kiss,
there is always a wicked secret,
a private reason for this.
6.8k
*Getting out from the waves
She walked away to the rice bran haze
As the summer heat drove the sands mad
I knew what she had gone for.
She would hunt it like a child any day
A few seashells if came her way
My skin burning and eyes dust borne
Moments all to herself she desired alone.
On the distant shoreline when she was a speck
Stirred me a tremor then a rumbling quake
What if so happens she is gone too far
Turned a sea nymph to return never!
The tides were falling weaving a lull
The sun slanted on the wings of gull
I rose up to find sand prints of her trail
She bloomed like a hope in her handful of shell!*
Apr 7, 2014
Apr 7, 2014 at 3:41 AM UTC
It was when his finger prints left marks on my coffee cup
in that Starbucks he politely gave me my warm hazelnut
I remember how I got a little struck of his height
he made me look at him like I am gazing at the stars
It was his 'hi' that painted my crooked smile
followed by a simple question, "what's your name?"
God, he's so cute in that black t-shirt and snapback
I sounded like a ****** when I speak my name out
It was his vibe and a little of his laugh
that got me re-arranged a space in my mind for him
as he threw compliments with the same amount
of every single thing I like about his consuming eyes
It was a bye-bye that evening where it started to rain
and I counted his steps as he walked away from me
along with the ticking clock for his first phone call
cause he stole my every attention until I stumble and fall
Aug 12, 2015
Aug 12, 2015 at 12:20 AM UTC