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Mateuš Conrad Oct 2017
i tried to assimilate, oh wait, i did, and i speak better native sprechen than the actual natives, and for that? you get the boot, because some camel jockey egyptian mongrel mixed with iranian blood gets the better of you... i guess the "natives" were fans of the eastern european *******, but not the eastern european males, **** it, i'm coming for the ride; can just see the ****** shouting: ooh ooh! their male counterparts are a'coming! and next thing you know, i'll be asking you to play the ******* banjo, with a toothpick!*

and it was always going to be torrential rain,
suspended in a prelude crescendo
of soulfly's song prophecy...
oh all the hoes come from eastern europe,
just like all didlo moulds come from africa,
gotta perfect that "pleasing of the white
******* honey cougar in plastic too, yo, bro..."
black people don't speak the current
lexicon, they are hyper-evolutionary
with their slang impromptus,
gets annoying after a while,
when you stop keeping track of their
ghettosprechen...
      ******* could have said custard,
meant margarine, but i'd still think of
jungle...
                     ghetto *****, get-a-go!
next time you mention all women of
eastern europe as ******, i'll mention
you in my charcoal wish-yo-were-edible
roasts... **** me... i'd prefer eating a leg
of lamb than a ******; shank.
oh, the word offends you,
but doesn't offend you in a rap limerick?
i.e. ***** ***** bab bab *****?
black people invent too much slang,
too much degenerate use of language,
      i try to keep it straight and universal,
off the orangutans go, talking orange is
the new black...
           i still find it hard to fathom
darwinism, who would be mad to begin
in africa, and end up in the arctic circle,
and no china?! common origins *******...
  tried looking for an eskimo in china,
all i found was, a ******* icecube!
      post-existentialism does exists,
it exists in the form of anglo-existentialism,
i.e. a darwinistic blackmailing...
    21st century existentialism is blackmail,
plain dumb & simple...
   and yes, i have a girlfriend, i call her...
sophia...
       and nietzsche was right:
the ugliest of the ugliest? atheists,
intellectually speaking.
       and why would you ever consider
the pristine sophia / ****** mary if not considering
aspasia, phryne, rahab, theodora,
   to counter philosophy,
   why not craft a:
    philospasy, a philophryny,
       a philorahabu, a philothedorum?
guess what, of the most famous prostitutes,
the contestants are philorahabu,
                     and philothedorum,
and all are famous prostitutes;
then the pristine sophia, my "girlfriend";
philosophy has a deity, that although
deemed pristine, has been touched by
many hands, and many strangleholds of ego,
time to turn this princess into a *****;
and the ones that visited a *******,
will look at those that haven't with curious
eyes.
let's not forget the siamese twin prostitutes
safa & marwa, and the matriarch
and true founder of islam ha-gar -
      the concubine of abraham,
  that ******* mother of islam.... hagar...
you really think men invented the islamic
attire for women?
              who's at the chanel catwalk,
straight men, or gays and women?
       you blame anyone, you blame: hagar...
running between the mounts safa & marwa...
islam, that totalitarian reinvention of
"repentant" / "revised" mode of prostitution...
and as i once overheard an englishman speak,
the niqab? satan's postbox.
- the craft began with treating the world as
solely inanimate, to make it as inanimate as
possible, and interact in it,
   as the sole animate agent, obviously with
the obvious hurdles of animate expressions,
nonetheless, these expressions being
outside the vicinity of integrated animate
actors, working around in inanimate surroundings,
conclusively,
  the "supposed" animate expression regain
their inanimate stratum by a repeatedly
predictable observation of
a prior re similis ad infinitum
  (prior to, again, similar toward infinity).
the point was always to make the world
as inanimate as possible,
    collecting books is a starter,
  collecting cooking utensils another,
the point being, to surround yourself with as
much inanimate reality, as to prove yourself
the animate, the "actor"...
             or more expressively: the puppeteer...
it still bothers me, grinding two prefixes...
the penta-      vs.        the tetra-...
   why? well, we are embodied with five sense,
but there are only four elements...

    vision
audition
gustation                       yes, but there's only
  olfaction
     somatosensation

                    air, fire, earth, water...
      this is almost gagging a schematic,
  we can see fire, earth and water,
  we can hear fire, air, water and earth,
      we can taste...
      we can smell fire, air, water, earth,
we can touch fire, water, earth...

this, by the way is crude...
   and is limited by not adding particular
observations...
   but the ratio 5:4 is in place, akin to
the mad hatter's 10/6 = 0.666...
         and that missing one is: ad infinitum,
might as well call it the lazy eight with 4:5...
since the elements came prior to the senses.

i'm guessing the "fifth element" to compliment
the five senses is a far greater posit than
a sixth sense, in that, this "fifth element"
is a plagiarism of kierkegaard,
  i.e. the "changelessness of god",
namely the eternally immovable object,
an object of constantly perpetuated friction,
so stationary that it moves all things,
which also precipitates into an eternally
recurrent subject matter,
immovable, ergo, inexhaustible.

- and i will die believing that anglo-existentialism
is an argument from the perspective
of blackmail, esp. since it's overtly-repetitive
and unoriginal,
  and if the english found continental
existentialism boring, a continental european
like myself, will find some hidden interest
in this "boring" artefact of time,
   but nothing can redeem repetition,
not even a boring artefact of writing,
   since when reading a boring "effort" of
writing, you can actually wake up,
and yawn...
  but when the same "effort" is repetitive,
you never get a chance to yawn,
you're still asleep, "apparently" enthralled.

- and to give a conclusion...
if an irishman thinks you write akin to
the psychiatric slang of "word salad",
ask him if he has read any james joyce,
if the answer is no, and he replies that he prefers
video game narratives, and has ambitions of
writing a book citing the cliche moonlight sonata
of beethoven... it's one of those times
you can't even laugh, internally, or externally.

- eventuality vs. actuality -
whereby actuality is a reactionary stance
that drags past events into present and future
events...
   whereby eventuality is a liberal stance
that drags past events into a wall,
   the present into a status quo,
  and the future into a snooze button phase
of a clockwork orange.

- no, i don't like this darwinistic blackmail of
continental existentialism,
  this monochromatic monolith...

- better start calling philosophy by its proper name,
philorahabu / philothedorum
(were not underlined on the pixel canvas,
thereby bypassing the oxford dictionary panel
for nuo-verbum acceptance) -
      keep that ****** of yours sophia
in a cage, because your thinking,
like your body, will become contaminated;
but one thing is for sure,
that concubine hagar running between
safa & marwa looking for water...
    can't imagine any other grander matriarch...
a reformed *** slave, who gave birth
to the niqab...
            i really can't imagine jannah
that way... i think it looks like:
1 man + 72 prostitutes,
              and 1 woman + 3 holes stuffed.
Mateuš Conrad Mar 2017
war took mine, i was sold  playing tenchu
on level 6... just before i was to
assassinate this ***, and he practised all
his bow skill in private, then it was made public
by a ninja... i only completed final
fantasy 7
with a walk-through...
i hate the fact that i stuck to
the schooling narrative...
  but hose were the PS1 days,
those days are gone, gone gone gone,
bye bye gone...
                 the **** was that?!
an oscar for best actor at the gladiator premier?!
why isn't more gaming mentioned in poetry?
where is raziel, and the the legacy of cain:
soul reaver, and the story about how he
squashed his brothers:
dumah, melchiah, rahab, and zephon?
oh look: the geek in me!
                 100 years from a youtube video...
i'm bound to do the bristol d'uh and say:
i've never been to south america...
nor ever...
                        me go sort out this avalanche
if that's o.k. with you, hmm?
this is the thrill you get when seeing peoiple
play a reincarnation of gameboy,
i.e. candy-crush saga... if you moved beyond
the PS1 universe you won't get it...
if you remember PS1 games, you'll probably
remember SEGA and sonic,
and age of empires 2, and sim city 3000...
**** me! but you won't probably remember the
weathergirl... who was becky mantin
when this was written...
           odd, that little gray box of saturdays
and sometimes sundays, but definitely
saturday mornings...
                    it gone... and i don't feel like owning
an update of it, because games have become
overtly narrative prone, they only allow thise gameplay
that's too narrated... i switch on the console
and i want mario bros. calculator type of dynamism...
instead i get this really complex story
when i should be reading a book...
   no, really, when did gaming become so
****** engrossing that i try to become distracted by
brick walls?
           when did i or when didn't i take to playing
chess? well... when i started playing dominos
with 6 cigarette stumps and a black hardcover
philosophy book... maybe around then.
books i great, believe me...
but this nook of counter-arcade games?
i woke up at 9am as if about to go to school
and played that japanese fetish for hours...
so much if our culture in nearing the post-20th
century culture was axis... it was almost all japanese...
you can't take that fact out and replace it
concerning: god intervened at Giza and yawned
at chichén itzá...
because you would... still, i thankfully retired
from the gaming experience (when did PS2 come out?
i wanted it for about 2 years and still didn't
get it)...
    1998? 1997?
                      thankfully i get to mention computer
games like novels... SEGA mega drive?
yep, owned that.
                   and yes, i can cite an ATARI,
and ****, **** **** me!
   that original NINTENDO?!
              and that shooting mallard simulation
against a screen of televisions that could
still issue you with van der graaf static
   of "levitating" hair?
(when televisions were still 3D and played
you remnants of the big bang
       in televised black and white khrrr sound,
all dicta fidgety, like looking through the eyes
of a bluebottle fly)... or
    the original prince of persia?
     those two dimensional ferns rotating round and
round when approached in the original tomb raider?
oh forget the cone-****-madonna...
shaid the ish cream van man to shaun shoonery...
cheap ****: said the dead with charlie
at the head of their horde of entertainment's flops.
i retired from the gaming world though,
left it when PS1 expired...
and morphed into PS2...
           i'm half sad and half saying: i can understand
candy crush, because i can understand
the origin: TETRIS.
like i can understand why i can't do crosswords,
my father just said: even i can't do them,
the clues are all a bit of a wanking to comprehend...
it's as if they only based them on the thesaurus...
   we're good on sudoku though, that can be solved
without problems...
        i miss those games though,
i finished final fantasy 7 with a walkthrough
though... tenchu was also fun to complete,
crash bandicoot? anyone remember him?
           now for not faking it...
                                     i'm glad that's over,
i'd hate the gaming experience as i hate interactive
t.v. thesedays... all this pause and rewind?
  thanks to it i sometimes press the STOP
button when listening to the radio and wonder
why it just keeps running... oh right: this isn't
a c.d. transmission... funny though, the gaming experience
translated into t.v. really has made advertising
ultra competative or utterly useless....
   you just end up pausing before a break, and then
scrolling past the advertisers' airtime...
next thing i'll be buying is when they make
an advert for shoepaste.
Mateuš Conrad Apr 2019
ask me: i'm a sucker for pop music and medieval hymns, whether folk or of a gratitude toward a community akin to Taizé... while society suffocates me with jester's pounces to satiate a coming bride.. i'm more inclined to satiated myself with monkish escapades... i am aware of the "existential" absolute negotiation: to preserve the upright specimen... i'm pretty sure the chinese, the african and the indian sub-continent have it covered, i'm happy to be part of the dodo project... clearly i don't want to be part of it... i should have been allowed to be a monk, with each day passing i'm hardly thinking of the petty conquests of a bedroom with a... come on... even i thought this brief relationship could resemble a brothel's "one hour spare"... Tamara... spanish girl, worked in a barber shop... lived with three homosexual hunks... i tried having a hard-on, even when she told me to have a bath with her and talk... i couldn't get it up, i was put off when she wanted a kleenex moment, ***, incubated, under the bedsheets... in a brothel you **** under dimmed lights but not in a womb of cotton! you shower first, sometimes even washing each other, there's this whole unwritten ritual! she puts on a ****** while she ***** you off... come on... aaesthetic, cordiality... prostitutes have been the most respectful women i've ever ******, it's like joining an army of marching ******... in a pink floyd revision of marching hammers... imagine... the neo-communist flag: ***** replaces the hammer... the sickle? scissors, i guess, borrowing from scissor sisters? ***** & scissors? great! we have ourselves the new soviet, ahem, soviet union... and a flag to boot! oh Tamara Tamara... sure, no hard-on... drunk one-night stand cameo... i tried and tried, but i kept suffocating under the bed-sheets cocoon ***... she broke with me after 3 days because the hard-on wasn't coming... god, i too wish i could be the perfect ***** with a heart, kidneys, liver stomach and brain to match: ON / OFF... isn't a male ******* akin to a slobbering oyster of a woman's *****? **** impressions... kama sutra speaks about elephant phallus and a rabbit's ****** (depth)... i can't just switch it on, & off... it's not a ******* ****-pumping-piston worthy of ******* web-cam incel ******* worth of video, is it?! never mind... i was having coffee in the morning between her inquiring gay-minders (she suddenly left of Ibiza to find love)... i was saved by a presence of a robin... and you know what a fictional Napoleon would have said: a robin is worth twice the sparrow's worth... timid foot, tender foot... shy organge loiter... who... for some strange reason, migrastes to eastern europe for winter, then migrates to england during the summer... i guess: continental europe provides the sort of winters that are summers, while england provides the sort of summers that are winters... the mythology of Poland... storks and bisons... on a whiff... teenage gamer... but the storyline still grips me: soul reaver:
   protagonist: Raziel...
the brothers:
              Melchiah, Zephon, Rahab and Dumah...
games what worked as book-alt.,
                  i'm almost itching to add diacritical
marks to those names to "x-ray" into syllables
and hyphens...
    mind you, what has remained of the old
anglo-ßaß?
        names in chemistry... already, mentioned,
somewhere...
  sure... gaming is fun these days,
given the in-game cash-in handicap...
from Kazakh, Ukraine, China of the rich...
etc.,
                    these internet-based non-NPC games...
they're great for non NPC non-a.i. characters,
i.e. the old games had... not so much NPC...
but s.i.: synthetic intelligence...
   it wasn't artificial as it wasn't analytical
intelligence, it was a fixed intelligence
of the "opponent" / i.e. narrative...
             modern gaming can only be spectated...
on the evolutionary "debate"
when you: only purchased a PS1 and didn't
buy any console after...
as if "waiting" for the internet to catch up
to the grid... where you could play games live...
imagine a game...
     like the old narrative games...
but where the "opponent", i.e. the narrative
learns from your first encounter...
   long gone would be the encounters
with NPC in the old school standard of
synthetic intelligence, synthetic implying:
repetition, nothing being new...
   if the NPS characters could be given
analytical intelligence parameters...
     you could reinvent the old model of games...
away from the internet FREE...
  but, really: you're playing with a handicap
against people who have made in-game
purchases... hell... once a game cost 20 quid...
and it might last you three weeks' solid
of weekend gameplay in the early morning
on a saturday... in bed...
           i'm not really a gamer...
well if i'm the *******, the throne of thrones
i'm a gamer: just like some people
are thinkers on the ******* reading books...
but the old "solipsist" gamer is long gone...
the one who played to construct
a complex cognitive narrative...
i'll repeat the mention...
i once told a "friend" about playing sims...
he was so engaged in the game,
built this, built that...
i told him i freaked out when i moved
my sim to play a game on the computer...
hence finding the illuminating
wormhole of the Droste Effect...
  i stopped playing...
  final fantasy VII?
   only with a walkthrough...
homework and ****...
           going to the mall on saturday
with the misfits...
running up tier carparks and then aiming
with saliva on people walking in...
    talking to hare krishna converts...
about Dave Lombardo's insane drumming...
ilford: early 21st century...

cut off... a second poem:

.poland played israel in a soccer match today, the hymns began, first came the israeli hymn... boos and whistling, at first... but then i heard casimir III hush the crowd.... lucky for me not being in warsaw... the crowd silenced their illogical anti-semitism, the choir sang, libera me domine... i cannot fathom the russian purges, or the germanic dislike of these people.... casimir III's hush... i look at the cat sitting on my bed, glum, yet proud... how soon the whistling and engaging with mob sounds was hushed when the israeli anthem was sung... i'm happy for these people, even if i am one of them, but at such a distance: i don't feel i am part of them... so much for the glorification of western objectivity standards in argument... but i am a ******, on the british isles... what sort of objectivity am i i to expect? the objective counter-subjectivity of born in Poland, but bred in England?! is that it?! walking abortion... i am proud that the crazed mob was hushed when the israeli anthem continued... after all... SS-obersturmbannführer rudolf höss did cite casimir III allowing jews to settle in these eastern european lands... nes c'est pas? né(s) ç'é(st) pā(s)?! how else to write something akin to this, without finding oneself gritting one's teeth, grinding them into a toothpaste sensation of fluoride sandpits?!

fan-boy literature: stendhal, dante,  
         dumas             (vs)
   young-adult novels,
              which, i will never read...

            just enough whiskey
to count the rounds
of the crucuible
of the current escapade...

i'm ageing,
but i still like bands
like i might be a teenager...
          
came the: grand sorrow
taste, for all that's worth,
in encompassing a tomorrow.
Micaela Tennis Oct 2013
you
No, I'm not here to tell you that you're weak.
I'm not going to turn your weaknesses against you.
Just to say you need a God to make you strong.

God transforms you.
I can't tell you that the
alcohol
drugs
***
and cursing
are bad
and that
maybe
you should consider
a God who can
change it.

I'm not going to lure you in by your own demons
Just to make you believe

But let me ask you this,
Do you honestly believe that God can't use you?

Noah was a drunk
Abrahm was "too old"
Jacob was a liar
Leah was ugly
Joseph was abused
Moses stuttered
Gideon was afraid
Rahab was a *******
Jeremiah and Timothy were "too young"
David had an affair and murdered
Isaiah preached the gospel naked
Elijah was suicidal
Naomi was a widow
Job lost everything
Peter denied Christ
All of Jesus' disciples fell asleep during prayer
Martha worried
The samaritan woman divorced
Paul was  "too religious"
Timothy had an ulcer
And Lazarus?
Oh, he was dead!

But Christ used each and every one of the characters of the Bible to bring Glory to His name!
Wade Redfearn Jun 2010
A little known secret of actors:
you can force yourself to cry by
simply thinking about how badly
you want to.

Here's how it's done.

Start with fertilizer. Remember how
you felt that first year you
did so excellently at school, all-year
struggling and so devoted, woke up
Christmas to your mother's purchase,
eager for sugar plums and hedonist
things, ripped merrily into math workbooks.
The seed comes next, budding in the
open tunnels of self-worth - when
he told you that the thing you were
best used for could be done by anyone, really,
the oldest profession, and how you
liberated your oils on canvas long exiled
to make a scene of Rahab and Joshua,
and cried yourself away on alien bedding.

Water it all in whatever leaves the garden hose.

When they whistled without a name.
When your first time hosting supper was a catastrophe.
When you failed to keep certain things alive.
When the housecat burrowed in your warm
motor, and you just wanted to leave so badly.

Funerals of people you never knew, and
bugspray in your eyes.

One neglected message stays: anyone can cry.
courtney jean Aug 2016
i live my life alone, everything around me is so beautiful
yet i hate all of it. nobody gets what they deserve.

laguna beach a place so lovely yet unenjoyable for me,
endless thoughts of a neglected childhood. haunt me.
there is no closure with a lacking family but acceptance with a wiser child.

im turned on and off, seeking a person to fill the void that gradually gets bigger with every disgusting thought

nobody can fill a void quite as big as mine
not my father, a figure who was never there. and doesnt have to be.
who loves his children with doubt theyre his children.
he walks to the bar then goes to his house.
halfway house.
he loves alcohol because it fills his void to the brim.

not my mother, who failed to raise me. who gave me up.
actions speak louder than words, she gave me neither.
back and fourth rahab pulled her in like a rip tide
she stuggles till she gives in.
7 years of my life spent together only to give up again.
she dances around reading the bible
then punches me in the face
i can see her brain tangled in confusion
she loves drugs because it fits her void like the perfect puzzle piece.

not my grandpa who raised me, filling my void a quarter full.
a man of few words
cancer drains the quarter filled
rest in peace, the greatest man i ever knew.

not my grandma who raised me, so compassionate and humble.
she flys as far as she can go
struggling and alone she spends every penny she receives
she cant help it.
she fills my void less and less with every minute she grows older
unable to hold a conversation, she cant remember.
i love her so much.

not my little brother, whos unable to talk to me.
shielded by a thick layer of our moms alcohol induced breath,
he doesnt understand and doesnt have a chance
manipulated
hes dragged out by the rip tide by my moms side.
3 years pass by, not a word spoken, not a picture seen.
i feel his void brewing only to awake
when he is a wiser child

not my bestfriend, who grew up on the sidelines
who does whatever she can to help and comfort me
who shares her house and bed with me.

nothing is ever enough and i hate myself.

my one night stands overfill my void
but i wake up with it stretched out and empty
only to feel sadness roll over my entire body like a soft expected wave of freezing ocean water
i get tense and sick from my recent meal.

i collapse onto my bed, im a wiser child but an empty one
laguna beach am i living "the life"?
i can see the sun set behind the ocean from my bed
a beautiful view but i hate it.

76 degrees and sunny
the weather feels like ****
Renoka McCracken May 2012
Great God of Mine,
How is it that the planets faithfully revolve around Your solar star
How is that the acorn mystically re-fashions itself into the majestic tree
How is it that the monarch finds the flyways and air currents to its winter home

Great God of Mine,
Why is it that babies are being born to immature children who can’t rear them
Why is it that a father takes out his anger on his wife and offspring
Why is it that man is incapable of living peacefully with his neighbor

Great God of Mine,
How is it that Rahab was chosen to facilitate an enemy’s victory over her Jericho
How is that the Samaritan woman at the well claimed Jesus’s living water
How is it that Simon of Cyrene forcefully bore the cross to Golgotha behind Jesus

Great God of Mine,
Why is it that mothers can end the lives of their little ones
Why is it that drug-users and perverts are destroying safe homes
Why is it that political leaders make selfish decisions that harm their constituents

Great God of Mine,
How is it that you created man for relationship knowing his inability to sustain it
How is it that you eternally love mankind in the face of his constant rejection
How is it that you sacrificed your innocent Son to save a sinful people

Great God of Mine,
Why is it that the twelve apostles included a traitor
Why is it that the “rock of the church” denied your Son three times
Why is it that an apostle who walked with Jesus could doubt his authenticity

Great God of Mine,
How is it that You knew me before time began
How is it that You saved me with my not deserving it
How is it that You love me; You LOVE…ME!
Paul A Moon Jun 2016
I. Double edged swords

Every evening, spring keeps its marriage
to winter. Twilight is crazily quilt
in orange as purple with scattering grays, sage

stars calmly coalescing and being built
into constellations… The twilight air
imposed winter’s silence. People slit

these pavements as capricious walkers. There
is a squirrel within and out of trees, or cat
eating a rat in a squeaking swallow. Are

the homeless equal to BlackWater’s scrounging what
state alms exists? No…Night’s misery
is never silent, so unseen more---that

is civilization…****** of industry
are its captains. Blood subsidies, ****
ravage and revile Eve and Mary:

our Mothers in regret over humanity. Keep
Palestine’s Olive Tree in heart…
Eastern Star, and Western Constellations, weep

for the nameless and defenseless ramparts
of refugees: Moses again… Here in Queens,
Manhattan’s gaudy skyline rapports

a look of 11th Avenue’s Rahab’s face. Scenes
of red and blue, white broken teeth buildings
from too many *******, and pained spleens

of her here and there, everywhere, “It’s a living…”
Ugliness has a pretty face, it progresses…
Winter’s chill will soon be here, not forgiving

those who are homeless from God, homeless
from being brethren’s keepers. We are quick
winter. Death is us, and we are death, endless

because of our need for a monied physique .
Poems are for poets, sing. As you were silenced,
your song was written in winters oblique

in their endings, its prayers against the NKVD
KGB and un-repenting CIA, a spoken
covenant to the people, and the words rhymed  

against the powerful from Stalin to Reagan…
We’re blessed for the verbal and intellectual
knife of verse. We must sing against state’s sin.

As you did scrawling on soap bars habitual,
writing, with burnt matches, ritual.

II. Your Legend

Called ***** and nun, there’s a price
for being a poet: never sequestered
in black and white terms, clerk or captain
king or peasant, Christian or pagan:

our stamps earned in civilization.
By seeing things in gray, a poet intuits
monsters we knew as children are
real as warheads once aimed at one another.

Our hands, their lingering fingers and palms,
can either be nailed on a martyr’s arms,
or holding a scythe or Wesson. Your wishes
were fists wounding your heart---your anguishes.

Why did subtle music bloom from your lips?
Why hadn’t your tongue expressed bitterness
from the Muses of lonely Siberia
or **** bombs---destroying statues of Maria

in Saint Petersburg?  Why did your voice remain?
There are only questions about you, for
your  pain and joy seemed the same: you cried.
It surely seemed both should have died.

Drinking ***** was surcease from bureaucrats,
to your son’s exile to Siberia, these cruel cascades
of the state. Watch the platoons, and
see their eyes in long ceremonial parades

for the state’s saints: dying from heart attacks before
your mourned demise. Did one shed a tear?
Only posterity knows. As the present can infer,
veterans are always “was” and “were”, never now here…

In here, where the written word was a noose,
and sentences were genocide, thus a paragraph,
a stanza, or even an essay was inconceivable
horror people receiving an order’s end.

In here, where order promulgates,
where time is counted by snowflakes
where space is counted by snowflakes,
why is never asked, it’s just struck with, “Do.”

But, it was when despair was thick withered
winter branches, without hint of leaves or spring,
love needed anguish to show its strength
love needed this psaltery against death.


III. The seen and unseen

Thinking of you Anna, ah this world.
Then, as the world lives and does
as just bearing witness,
the guts to live and bear pain
is in the poet’s voice,
in the saint
the seemingly graceless soldier
******, Matthew, Saul, Romero.
Song found, song lost
Song of Songs,
the poet names the names
of all to give monsters and empires
a voice
to be seen and unseen,
with a cold lunar heart,
and to let prayer
come as souls decapitated from this Palestine,
this Armenia, this Navajo nation,
with a left-handed signature, tear written.
Rahab
A harlot, a monster
She tears at my flesh
She weeps at my glory.
I am ensnared in her gaze,
enslaved to her power.

Blazing in the sun, shimmering in the moon
Inexplicable, flawless
Her smooth arches have seduced me.

Let me go, I pray
Let me go
And she released me.
But she chased me
She never found me
I am free
I am lost.
Ikimi Festus Jun 2023
In the realm of riddles, I shall weave a tale,
Of women who dared to risk, their spirits unveiled.
They belittled themselves, chained by their own doubt,
But within them, a fire burned, yearning to break out.

A call to action for those who undervalue their worth,
Who think beauty alone can grant desires on Earth.
Fashion's trends may sway, but cannot define,
The essence of a soul, radiant and divine.

Humble yet afraid to take a leap of faith,
They stood at life's crossroads, contemplating their fate.
For life, a game of truth and dare, they knew,
To seek the truth, risk must be embraced anew.

Abigail, the joy of her father, held the key,
When Nabal insulted David, her spirit flew free.
She acted quickly, in desperate times she knew,
Extreme measures were needed, her resolve true.

With gifts offered in secret, she soothed anger's fire,
Submissive and respectful, she fulfilled her desire.
Bowing before David, forgiveness she did seek,
Her courage shone bright, humble yet bold and meek.

Joanna, a name mentioned briefly in holy verse,
Willing to follow her Savior, her faith a rehearse.
Supporting Jesus and the apostles from her own means,
Connections to Herod's palace, where danger convenes.

Her husband Chuza, the right hand of the king,
Yet Joanna chose the path where faith takes wing.
Risking it all for her Lord, she stood strong,
Her dedication rewarded, she witnessed the empty tomb's song.

Rahab, known as a harlot, yet her past did fade,
When she risked her life, her loyalty displayed.
Spying for Joshua's men, hidden on her rooftop,
Lying to the king's men, her family's safety her hope.

Deborah, wise and courageous, a beacon of light,
An influential woman, standing firm in the fight.
As a prophet and priestess, God's voice she would hear,
Leading worship and preaching, casting aside fear.

With Barak and troops, she ventured to the fray,
The glory destined for a woman, prophecies would say.
But not Deborah herself, it was Jael who would stand,
Driving a tent peg through Sisera's head, bold and grand.

Esther, the Queen of Courage, in the palace she dwelled,
Never forgetting her roots, where she once excelled.
A loyal Jew, she held fast to her faith,
Trusting in God's wisdom, she prepared a banquet's wraith.

No blind rush, no heed to doubts and fear,
She approached King Xerxes, her voice crystal clear.
Risking her very life, she yielded to God's might,
Trusting His plan, walking in His guiding light.

Ruth, when her husband died, faced a choice,
To return to her kin or embrace a new voice.
Against doubt's agony, she held steadfast,
Choosing to stay with Naomi, her conviction unasked.

Her influence grew, as others took note,
Admired for her loyalty, a foreigner of note.
Favor gained from Boaz, protection sought under wings,
Her decision stood out, like vibrant colorful rings.

A woman who stood apart, shining so bright,
Impressing the town and elders with her inner light.
May God make her like Rachel and Leah, they blessed,
A pillar in Ephrathah, her name forever impressed.

To the women who ponder their worth and might,
Who belittle themselves, yet yearn to take flight,
I ask you now, in the face of life's glare,
Will you embrace risk's dare and dare to dare?
Babatunde Raimi Jul 2020
Dear God
The Genesis of our problems
Lays in the Exodus of our morals
If we can come together like the Corinthians
With psalms and hymns like David
In the end, we will celebrate like Esther
And also jubilate like Job

After the fall of the First Adam
It had been Chronicled in "The Book"
That our Lamentations will be grave
Just like that of Brother Job
Oh Lord! Please send us "An Isaiah", a Moses
Lead us and cleanse our land Mark, Mathew, Luke and John, please pray for us

We are mystified by these plagues
With the semblance of Revelation chapter 18
Teach us to Number our days oh Lord!
In longevity and peace as promised in Deuteronomy
Judge us not for our sins
Spare us like you did Rahab in the book of Joshua
For we are to you what Ruth was to Naomi

Soon, the King will hear our cries
Swallow up our challenges as the fish to Jonah
Streghten our faith to trust like Daniel
As we contest for the faith of our fathers
We shall bow our kneels like James
That we may all win like the Isrealites...
Oh Father God, deliver us from flesh
May we be always spiritually fresh
Oh Lord Jesus, save us who are like Rahab
Grant us purity and a decent job
Oh Holy Spirit, rescue us from prostitution
Be our guardian against fornication
This we ask in our Almighty God. Amen.

-12/21/2015
(Dumarao)
*Gideons Prayer Poems Against Life’s Problems
My Poem No. 461

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