"santayana" poems
Everybody knows today's figures.
Lincoln Park. Kanye West. Beyonce.
Musicians. Artists. They are all praised in today’s society.
But nobody knows the names of people who actually matter.
Willis Carrier. Invented the air conditioner.
Nobody knows his name.
Robert E. Kahn. Made the internet.
Nobody knows his name.
The problem with today’s society
Is that the minds of young people are being poisoned.
By the schools who leave things out of textbooks.
By the people on the street, screaming their views.
The riots, the protests, the hell of today.
Poisoning the minds of young people.
Reed Hastings. Marc Randolph. Nobody knows them
Yet millions of people use Netflix.
SalvinoD'Armate. Nobody knows his name.
Yet over 4 BILLION people wear eyeglasses.
Young people today hate history.
They think, “Why do we need to learn about dead people?”
George Santayana once said:
“Those who cannot remember the past, are condemned to repeat it.”
We learn these things, not to be bored in history class.
Not to just **** time in the day.
But to inspire. To help young people to become creative, more innovative.
Imagine a world, where Alexander Bell never made the telephone.
Imagine a world, where the internet, just wasn’t a thing.
Imagine a world, where nobody invented new things.
William Higginbotham. I Guarantee that nobody in this room knows his name.
He created the very first video game, Tennis for Two, in 1958.
Without him, we would not have the games we have today.
Assassin’s Creed. Grand Theft Auto. Call of Duty.
People play these games, and use the other things I’ve listed every single day,
And they use them without any thought, or appreciation for where they came from.
Or how far we have progressed as humans.
So I ask you this. Who invented the desk you are sitting on?
Who invented the jacket you’re wearing?
Who invented that pen in your pocket?
You don’t know, do you?
Aug 30, 2018
Aug 30, 2018 at 1:52 PM UTC
Send my soul back to Europe for this night of excitement.
I wasn't thinking in plain terms, I had already read this in Santayana but I was only noticing that you were soft and pale,
My neighbors treat me so much better than you seem to (try noticing that they're people too sometime),
You complain and put up your false barricades to lower at moments notice,
Momentous when I'm out of sight and still carrying the remnants of scent and dreams of morning candles.
Turns out you aren't very unique and you major in manipulation, honing your skill and your art isn't to be displayed in public.
Will you say I broke my own back, or admit you were taking my head and changing your voice, ignoring what was right in your eyes?
I was already agitated.
Our last supper was in the front seat of your toothpaste green Ford, no mint on the floor,
To rub your collarbone and then wish I could take it back because you ended up in my bed...
But you made it clear that we were just friends, absolutely.
You said to stop, didn't you?
You told me it was wrong?
You didn't, I asked.
It was a game of consent and I lost.
Aug 17, 2016
Aug 17, 2016 at 1:49 AM UTC
The whole of human history
is but a memory
I can't speak for you
But if I've learned anything
It's that nothing is more fickle,
more malleable, more suggestible,
than the fragile tendrils
of human thought
History is an old man
With weak knees and arthritic fingers
Drunk off the non-existent
fumes of long forgotten glories
His cracked and bony cane crashes,
crushes, and disperses,
seemingly indiscriminately
He who grappled with Stalin and Caesar
With kings and commoners
With everybody who cried 'Wait! Wait!
More time! More time!'
(And everybody who didn't)
And this request they were granted
by the old man
For time he has plenty
Understanding he does not
Dec 12, 2010
Dec 12, 2010 at 7:15 PM UTC
Santayana said,
"Those who cannot
remember the past
are condemned
to repeat it"
but did not mention
that today
is tomorrow's past
Mar 19, 2014
Mar 19, 2014 at 12:53 PM UTC