If you annoy a Sicilian woman
She will fling herself at you shrieking,
Her hair and eyes wild with rage; she’ll plunge a dagger
Into your heart three times before you fall

And then she’ll spit on your corpse and curse your memory

If you annoy a French woman
She will fling at you a stiletto heel
Or a saucepan (with sauce veloute’, oui!)
Either one will take you down, mon ami

And then she’ll dial a friend for company

If you annoy a Russian woman
She will make a discreet telephone call
And when in spring the ice of the Neva thaws
Your frozen body will at last pop up

And then she’ll write a poem in your memory

If you annoy an English woman
She will smile sweetly, and poison your tea
And as you collapse, gasping desperately for breath
She will smile again, and ask if anything’s wrong

And then she’ll ring for Jeeves to tidy up

Finally:

A Canadian woman  (I’m telling no tales) -
You mess with her, and you’re bait for the whales!

                               -fin- (so to speak)

no number of opinions will alleviate this apathy, promised, paradoxically: a pandora's box of pathology, which is why attempting dialectics is a farce, a cheap magic trick for a talk-show host in being "understanding", to attempt in mediating, and then scoffing it off, like some under baked crumpet / scone, and yes, it makes sense, pivoting on the possession of a conscience... it's not that some people appear to now possess it, but that they are comical in possessing, and comedy is always nuanced, an ambiguity surrounds their conscience... the binary opposite of comedy? the birth of the tragedy, a succumbing to madness, a suicide... every person possesses a conscience, as the universal law of unit, but comedy hides a person with a grieving conscience, making the person so callus as to make them donkeys, laughing stocks, spaghetti entangled liars... it's only a conscience triggered into a tragedy that reeks with redemptive qualities ascribed to a person, cf. the already mentioned carl sergeant and 'arvey 'ard on weinstein... in the spirit of the film split: rejoice! for those who have suffered are redeemed! rejoice! said the beast. the comedy is near impossible to avoid in post-script idiocy beaming the letters FAIL; the tragedy of conscience, at least we know some evil doers in death are redeemed with the only puritanical act to redeem conscience: the bride of honour.*

can an intelligent person make a slapstick
joke?
  or is it that,
   a dumb person cannot make an original
joke?

besides the point,
  a question is a question -
  and as most questions go -
it's not whether there's a correct
or wrong answer,
rather, whether there actually is
an answer to accomplish
that stated question.

i've noticed a resurgence of dialectical
inquiry, but i have decided to
avoid perfecting the art,
   other than in person,
on a park bench, rather than on
a page in pixel white...

  oh sure, i have a life beyond this
outlet,
and i rarely write a platonic dialogue
to reinforce my experiences,
i once enforced a question
upon a child in a supermarket:
do you think animals are unable
to see 3-dimensional objects
     in / on a 2-dimensional canvas?
he didn't answer, because his guardian
thought i was weird in my
presumption...
which was, however you imagine it:
casual, cordial, orientated
within the adequate use of time and space
for the question to be asked.

personally i find myself if a binary
realm of,
   which isn't exactly a left right divide -
as a "schizophrenic" i am marching
down the middle, and asking myself:
   there's only the middle to mind,
and the mind is the only thing worth
juggling, sure, but juggling
a thesis hemisphere and an antithesis
hemisphere becomes lost in
the schizophrenic-quadratic -
      right down the middle.

which is why i find modern attempts
at dialectics so odd...
i prescribed myself dialectical escapism,
simply because there are too
many opinions i'm simply not interested in.

people seem to have stored these opinions
for so long, they are choking at not
having talked about them...
  it's apparent in comedy...
among comics...
                    they simply say:
if we can't bypass the comedy and sit down
with a cold beer, we can't actually
take the opinion seriously,
  if we can't, at first, make a joke of it...
that's hard...
              that's near impossible to stage...
you can realise the complexity of
enabling a seriousness with a comic precursor
antics to "soften" the blow of
approach...
that is why i await the awaited for
dialectical artist, who must be much
older than i, frankly the age of socrates,
i can only fathom dialectical escapism,
    in that i can fathom an opinion,
but i can't fathom being endearing to it,
keeping it, nurturing it,
       maturing it,
                     making the animate
water into inanimate ice...
                       which leaves steam
   a categorical conundrum of categorisation...

in terms of the human mind,
i can only find comparison with Alcatraz...
i am forever attempting escape,
i know i will be aided by the snitch,
judas, death...
     but i have to be lodged into
a vocab that may aid me,
  or hinder me.

                   the human experience is
an Alcatraz because of the a priori principle -
what came before me: set the rules,
the winding corridors where
i'm not the Minotaur,
but the scared victim,
   or just the dumb-enough brick of
the labyrinth's wall.
or? the a posteriori principle -
           i impose my own graffiti on
the walls, and be the Minotaur of the long
wait of life, with death:
my morphine angel.
                              
         but i see no desire to engage in
dialectical endeavours,
            hence my choice in attempting
a purification of poetry,
against technique of schooling,
  in making poetry less and less
musically orientated, and returned to
its primordial genesis: of narrative.

  hence my dialectical escapism,
i really have not stable opinion,
or opinion i'd like to adhere to, to subsequently
hug a pillar of a Parthenon.
                
- believe me when i say that the english
language has no inclination of
orthography, since it uses no diacritical
distinctions...
  and yes... russian diacritics is ugly as
your waning babushka of "secrets"...
  - the beauty of existentialism?
            avoidance of the thesaurus,
mismatching words, ambiguity -
the phraseology of: for lack of a better word...
     fiddly parts, you know,
            **** it, you can't exactly
interrupt a waterfall, so why bother
   attempting to boil some water in a saucepan?

  the world once believed in the enterprise
of dialectics, but since the emergence
of a third party mediator,
       what sort of "dialogue's" worth of
the dialectical endeavour is there left?
once upon a time, in ancient,
the mediator of a dialogue was a park
bench, after that a stage for actors...
who asked these third party ponces,
  more to the point: who invited these
plebs into our private debate so they can
mere awe and sigh their saturday nights off?!
who the **** let these plebs in?!

       i'm a pleb, i can call them plebs,
do i ******* look like i work at 10 downing st.?!
plebs only understand pleb talk,
  rude, incoherent, mildly orientated
in journalism, and ever wishing for some
marquis de sade hard-ons.

i encourage dialectical escapism, frankly,
because,
          i 've found that i have a bare
minimum, laurel leaf worth of covering my
genitals aspiration to keep opinions...
    opinions have become spare change,
you loose them almost all the time,
they're the pennies from heaven,
some other lucky ****** might find them,
and then the resourcefulness of that poor
****** is imminent: spend it,
what's there to debate?

                    the only truth of opinion is
that one man keeps them,
and by keeping them, idealises them,
thus becoming an idealist,
  or that another man discards them
as easily as a ***** peacock,
and by doing the ***** peacock strut,
discarding them,
          becomes a chameleon,
a "non-conformist" (**** me that's
stretching the idealist antonym);
  
   if there's a truth: it's a bunch of lies -
and if there's a lie: it's the only truth -
because the rule of pluralism (borrowed from
heidegger states):

          one truth = many lies
           one lie = only one truth

(there is no pluralism of a truth,
       but there is a pluralism of a lie -
the genesis of a lie is?
             a continuum beginning
with the original temptation -
truth is "plural" but it is not
a continuum of precipitation,
but even if it is dismembered
it is a whole, already apparent,
           or rather: to be made apparent,
it does not require a preceding step
to provide a pro-ceding step...
   lies are obstructive,
truth never obstructs; truth rapes,
while lies groom)...

   unum verum = falsum multis
   falsum unum = solum verum unum selem.

On my kitchen shelf
happy little saucepan birds
nest inside each other

Hot and absent
With blurs rushing inwards and out
Flying up stairs that curl and bend
And a constant shout of noise
My head spins, my eye sends a glance
Purposefully at many signs
I can't chance too many wrong turns
My brain turns to wine, the smell makes it ache
I follow toothpaste coloured overalls
In a number of steps to counters and beds
Heavy and tense, both fall on me.
I clutch a card that I've read over again
Over again
Again I am lost
Every wing looks the same
I know that time costs the same as fresh air
Window panes here only open enough
To let in a fly
And a breeze not a cough
Rattles my heart when I near you.
You appear small and soft
Not much of you there
In that armchair propped up by pillows
Where we kneel by your side, holding your hand
And that equivalent draft billows in green
Life from out there prods and it lifts
With us talking to you,
Quiet and spent and wistful
The alphabet brings nothing new
We walk out pondering, my arm through yours
It is just us two

It creeps up on me.
The sneaking suspicion
that I'm stuck
in it.
My hair is falling
in my face.
Only a year ago...

I built everything —
it was so clear.

Even though —
it was chaos.

People were worried.
But it was simple.

It was as simple
as simmering sausage
in a saucepan,
sweating in a brick kitchen,
listening to Sade,
and thinking of rooftops.

Things are more grounded now.
People are less worried.
The kitchen is smaller,
and shared.
I turn down Sade
when someone enters.
I'm still sweating,
but it's because something
is wrong with the heating system.

I long to take
an anonymous walk
between buildings.
There are only
neighborhoods
and shopping centers here.
And I keep running
into people who know me.

It's either too cold or too hot —
It's never summer every day.

Everything that was hanging on
my walls
is on the floor.
Precious paintings and prints
dusting with potential.

I reveal myself
less to strangers.
I don't take public transportation.
It's disconcerting how
comfortable having a vehicle is.
I feel urged to uproot,
swinging in someone
else's hands,
but feel like..
I'm interrupting.
Can't I just arrive for awhile?

My safety net is too big
and my home is too small.
But if I abandon it,
I'll wonder if I'm bound
to be restless.

S H E


She softly came into my life without her crown

To whisper, to shed light and to turn me upside down

As soft music, she spoke through her pictures

And once I saw them, I adored her features

Something is daily pulling me to her marvellous cave

To appreciate her fountain of beauty  to which I crave

She gave me something I won't lose

Even if I drank too much *****

She gave me something to keep in heart

So that we won't ever part

Something I look at and see her in mind

Then slowly move to heart to bind

Now that I am totally stunned and sedated

It is too hard for me to be eliminated.



Sam Burton ©



Today is Sunday, Oct. 5, the 278th day of 2014 with 87 to follow.

The moon is new. Morning stars are Jupiter, Mars and Uranus. Evening stars are Mercury, Neptune, Saturn and Venus.



In 1876, the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Texas, now Texas A&M;, opened. It was the first public higher education institution in Texas.

In 1883, the Orient Express train made its first run.

In 1895, the U.S. Open men's golf tournament was first contested. It was won by Horace Rawlins.



A thought for the day:



You can become a winner only if you are willing to walk over the edge. -- Damon Runyon





QUOTES for the day:



It is the desire of the good people of the whole country that sectionalism as a factor in our politics should disappear...

------------------------

He serves his party best who serves his country best.



Rutherford B. Hayes



You're dealing with the demon of external validation. You can't beat external validation. You want to know why? Because it feels sooo good.





Barbara Hall, Northern Exposure, Gran Prix, 1994



“So much of what we call management consists in making it difficult for people to work.”

Peter Drucker



"A champion is afraid of losing. Everyone else is afraid of winning."



Billie Jean King



POETRY





AEDH Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven



W.B. Yeats


Had I the heavens' embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

About this poem


"Aedh wishes for the Cloths of Heaven" was originally published in Yeats' collection "The Wind Among the Reeds" (John Lane, 1899).

About W.B. Yeats


A poet and playwright, Yeats was born in Dublin in 1865. He received the Nobel Prize in literature in 1923. Yeats died in France in January of 1939.

*
The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience.


This poem is in the public domain.
Distributed by King Features Syndicate







Vocabulary

"Bona fide" is used to mean good faith, sincerity. It is the evidence of one's good faith or genuineness -- often plural in construction; evidence of one's qualifications or achievements.

Health and Beauty



Pumpkin Seeds



Have you ever toasted pumpkin seeds at Halloween? Don't wait until the holiday to eat them. Pumpkin seeds are a great source of iron, zinc, calcium, and magnesium, and area also high in omega-3. One handful a day makes a big difference.





CHINESE FOOD

In Canada, Thanksgiving is just over one week away. As an alternative to turkey, how about serving Cantonese Roast duck for Thanksgiving dinner?



Cantonese Roast Duck



By Rhonda Parkinson



Author Deh-Ta Hsiung writes: This is the duck with a shining reddish-brown skin seen hanging in the windows of a good Cantonese restaurant.

Serves 10 - 12 as a starter, or 4 to 6 as a main course. (Note: total preparation time does not include the time needed to dry the duck before cooking).

Ingredients

    One 4 1/2 lb (2 kg) oven-ready duckling
    2 teaspoons salt
    4 tablespoons maltose or honey
    1 tablespoon rice vinegar
    1/2 teaspoon red food coloring (optional0
    about 1/2 pint (280 ml) warm water
    For the Stuffing:
    1 tablespoon oil
    1 tablespoon finely chopped spring onion
    1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh ginger root
    1 tablespoon caster sugar
    2 tablespoons Chinese rice wine (or dry sherry)
    1 tablespoon yellow bean sauce
    1 tablespoon hoisin sauce
    2 teaspoons five-spice powder

    Prep Time: 30 minutes
    Cook Time: 60 minutes

    Total Time: 90 minutes

Preparation

Clean the duck well. Remove the wing tips and the lumps of fat from inside the vent. Blanch in a *** of boiling water for a few minutes, remove and dry well, then rub the duck with salt and tie the neck tightly with string.

Make the stuffing by heating the oil in a saucepan, add all the ingredients, bring to the boil and blend well. Pour the mixture into the cavity of the duck and sew it up securely.

Dissolve the maltose or honey with vinegar and red food coloring (if using) in warm water, brush it all over the duck - give it several coatings, then hang the duck up (head down) with an S-shaped hook to dry in an airy and cool place for at least 4 - 5 hours.

To cook: preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. (200 degrees C./Gas 6). Hang the duck head down on the top rack, and place a tray of boiling water at the bottom of the oven. Reduce the heat to 350 degrees F. (180 degrees C., Gas 4) after 25 minutes or so, and cook for a further 30 minutes, basting with the remaining coating mixture once or twice.

To serve: let the duck cool down a little, then remove the string and pour out the liquid stuffing to be used as gravy. Chop the duck into bite-sized pieces, then serve hot or cold with the gravy poured over it.

Courtesy of Deh-Ta Hsiung.

JOKES



Skeleton in the closet



A very large, old, building was being torn down in Chicago to make room for a new skyscraper. Due to its proximity to other buildings it could not be imploded and had to be dismantled floor by floor.

While working on the 49th floor, two construction workers found a skeleton in a small closet behind the elevator shaft. They decided that they should call the police.

When the police arrived they directed them to the closet and showed them the skeleton fully clothed and standing upright. They said, "This could be Jimmy Hoffa or somebody really important."

Two days went by and the construction workers couldn't stand it any more; they had to know who they had found. They called the police and said, "We are the two guys who found the skeleton in the closet and we want to know if it was Jimmy Hoffa or somebody important."

The police said, "It's not Jimmy Hoffa, but it was somebody kind of important."

"Well, who was it?"

"The 1956 Blonde National Hide-and-Seek Champion."



Quick Quotes



"It was different when we were kids. In second grade, a teacher came in and gave us all a lecture about not smoking, and then they sent us over to arts and crafts to make ash- trays for Mother's Day." --Paul Clay

---

"We should have a way of telling people they have bad breath. 'Well, I'm bored...let's go brush our teeth.' Or, 'I've got to make a phone call, hold this gum in your mouth.'" --Brad Stine

---

"Doesn't it bother you when people litter? The most creative rationale for throwing an apple core out the window is 'It will plant seeds for other threes to grow.' And, of course, our highways are lined with apple trees--right next to all the cigarette bushes." --Nick Arnette



Republican or Democrat?



A woman in a hot air balloon realized she was lost. She lowered her altitude and spotted a man in a boat below. She shouted to him, "Excuse me, can you help me? I promised a friend I would meet him an hour ago, but I don't know where I am." The man consulted his portable GPS and replied, "You're in a hot air balloon, approximately 30 feet above a ground elevation of 2346 feet above sea level. You are at 31 degrees, 14.97 minutes north latitude and 100 degrees, 49.09 minutes west longitude.

She rolled her eyes and said, "You must be a (political party)." "I am,"replied the man. "How did you know?" "Well," answered the balloonist, everything you told me is technically correct, but I have no idea what to do with your information, and I'm still lost. Frankly, you've not been much help to me."

The man smiled and responded, "You must be a (political party)." "I am,"replied the balloonist. "How did you know?" "Well," said the man, "you don't know where you are or where you're going. You've risen to where you are, due to a large quantity of hot air. You made a promise that you have no idea how to keep, and you expect me to solve your problem. You're in exactly the same position you were in before we met but, somehow, now it's my fault."



Birthday Gift

A husband went to buy a birthday gift for his wife. Some friends had been invited over that night to celebrate her fortieth, and he wanted to get something special. At the store he spotted some cute little music boxes. One blue one was playing "Happy Birthday."

Thinking they were all the same, he chose a red one and had it gift-wrapped. Later, at dinner, he gave it to his wife and asked her to open it...

When she lifted the lid, out came the tune to "The Old Gray Mare, She Ain't What She Used to Be!"



Blonde Convention



80,000 blondes meet in the Kansas City Chiefs Stadium for a "Blondes Are Not Stupid" Convention. The leader says, "We are all here today to prove to the world that blondes are not stupid. Can I have a volunteer?" A blonde gingerly works her way through the crowd and steps up to the stage. The leader asks her, "What is 15 plus 15?" After 15 or 20 seconds she says, "Eighteen!"

Obviously everyone is a little disappointed. Then 80,000 blondes start cheering, "Give her another chance! Give her another chance!" The leader says, "Well since we've gone to the trouble of getting 80,000 of you in one place and we have the world-wide press and global broadcast media here, gee, uh, I guess we can give her another chance." So he asks, "What is 5 plus 5?"

After nearly 30 seconds she eventually says, "Ninety?"

The leader is quite perplexed, looks down and just lets out a dejected sigh -- everyone is disheartened, the blonde starts crying and the 80,000 girls begin to yell and wave their hands shouting, "GIVE HER ANOTHER CHANCE! GIVE HER ANOTHER CHANCE!"

The leader, unsure whether or not he is doing more harm than damage, eventually says, "Ok! Ok! Just one more chance -- What is 2 plus 2?"

The girl closes her eyes, and after a whole minute eventually says, "Four?"

Throughout the stadium pandemonium breaks out as all 80,000 girls jump to their feet, wave their arms, stomp their feet and scream...

"GIVE HER ANOTHER CHANCE! GIVE HER ANOTHER CHANCE!"





Have a super nice Sunday!

yes, i know he said he was a vegetarian, delicate counter-priesthood prince - a manner of vegetarianism that expressed an abhorrence of the practice of Eucharist, i too think the Eucharist as a metaphor is a bit porridge: i.e. yucky.  but as Wagner said to him: up north, either you eat meat or you lose the plot (loose - ß - again, not scharfes S - but die scharfes'zart - sharp-tender - already prerequisite of what sharpening omega meant for the w); mind you: salt & pepper to taste according to your own palette - if you're not a sugar ****** you won't over-salt the sauce... and you certainly will not overcook the pasta, halfway between dreadlocks and poodle hair: desirably experience bound al dente, and here comes Socrates with his knowledge of al dente: me no muffin! true that... like all these excess sugar breakfast cereals - ******* the outside, soft inside... or like the idea of ants having an exoskeleton... that's pure culinary theory - al dente exoskeleton; did i already mention salt and pepper to taste? yeah, the beef stock cube is salty, but not salty enough, given the already unsalted meat and vegetables: i cook, i take care of a toddler - Nietzsche keeps bragging: cooked by a cyclops.

who would have thought that a personal
revision of mama Italia's classic
could end up being so tasty;
Nietzsche is the foremost diner in my humble
abode: i just like the way he says:
who let woman into the kitchen?!
that's right, i deviated from the standard recipe
of mama Italia's cooking for papa don
Giovanni - honestly? in lonely times at
university when everyone was into ******
ad drunk debaucheries, and ****** fancy dress
parties? Aria Giovanni saved the day...
just look at the classic beauty, plump as a plumb
in between two cream bergs - such
exfoliation... where's that daddy long-legs
on the catwalk... come on! shove a malteser up
her *** like a suppository escutcheon - i'm sure
the salad leaves will keep her starving even more,
or walk her in Gucci with a drip-pole -
intravenous therapy while on the job -
but can you believe what only a quarter of a teaspoon
does to the Bolognese sauce recipe?
wonders... you don't add the carrot, or the celery,
among the vegetables you add button mushrooms,
and the three colours of peppers -
onions and garlic (a lot of it) as standard -
oregano, rosemary and thyme too,
some Italian five-spice - but the fennel seeds!
the fennel seeds! after i learned to cook i see
ready meals are diabetics in disguise,
and restaurant foods as defunct -
what? we're all expressing our capacity to
make choice, apologies if you made the sort of
choices you now hate... hardly a reason to
complain about my exercise in freedom,
i don't blame you, i'd have chosen differently
if i were you too... but there we go...
i'm cooking Bolognese from scratch because i like
to tickle my sense of smell and the buds of
the palette garden, i look at the sauce and
write fiction: the plot thickens...
                                                     and that's the great
3 minute microwave sequence on the other
side of the spectrum... because we're all so *busy -
busy bees and that's merely the generation Y
dads getting hormonal treatment from tending to
babies - choices choices choices -
                                                          oddly­ enough
the mediocre work that goes on in those glass
shards - by comparison, the default argument is
pretty obvious: i too would have not invested
in caring for art, or as i once said:
you can't get good art and raise a family -
you can create good art that will support the family,
you'd end up being a great technician,
an artistic engineer - the standard model of bridges /
already in your head - is refining yourself
via plagiarism - you end up plagiarising yourself -
but come one! a quarter of a teaspoon of fennel seeds?
well, i'm not talking cumin seeds...
or maybe it was the turmeric powder that
coloured the onions yellow while frying?
2 tablespoons of garlic - for sure, enough garlic
and we're already talking Dracula -
~5 strips of bacon too -
                                          no, not necessarily involving
carrots and celery - why be boring?
this is me in my furore days in an organic
chemistry class at university - back to the esters
and perfumes, but this is raw, it's analytical
chemistry, it's nothing synthetic -
birds and the bees and some hippy buckles over
a giant butternut squash - which is why i find
people who ably memorise and recite poetry
are the same people who probably write polemics,
and do the peacock verbal dance for a woman
in a restaurant - rather than give her raw grub
of your own calibre - 1 cube of beef stock
dissolved in water - simmering for about 40 minutes,
tomatoes chopped - obviously tomato puree -
500 grams of mince beef -
                                                ever think that poetry
could reinvent journalism and also the way of
writing recipes? FENNEL SEEDS! that's what goes
in first, you roast them in chilli infused olive oil -
let them sizzle for a bit - and yes,
you pour some oil into salted water where
you'll be boiling the spaghetti - the oil means the
spaghetti won't stick together, plus pouring
oil into a saucepan of boiling water is the other
famous pastime of chemists... the former?
watch paint dry. i'm pretty ****** sure i missed something,
like mama Italia missed something to keep
the recipe a secret - well... there's Parmesan cheese
to garnish and fresh basil -
                                                and if i were raising a family,
i wouldn't be listening to the dead skeleton's album
dead magick... oh sure, the reward would be:
i'd have a little crowd at my funeral, some gibberish
about how many people knew me so well... but really
didn't... the whole street profession...
                i never got the idea of solitude and how it
might be sad from the Beatles' Eleanor Rigby song -
don't know never became an impressionable counter -
oh yeah, Darwinism helped! it helped a lot
in creating a world view, a world view that said:
don't touch this ****... leave them to it:
these people are more influenced by opinion columns
of newspapers than philosophy books -
in England, where, i dare say, the daily telegraph
is actually respectable, as is the guardian -
and the central of the two opposites? tickling
tabloid, i call the times posh tabloid, because it is
a posh tabloid: i like the way fame
desired for sales becomes toilet paper
the next day... or the newspaper on the street
that gets the footprint on the plastic surgery escapades...
love it! mm, yes darling! lovin' it!

Yield infinite possibilities

Ingredients
A pinch of “I don’t give a crap”
A dash of “respect”
A cup of “alone time”
2 sprigs of a “peace of mind”
A heaping tablespoon of “some good lovin’”
2 gallons of “go **** yourself”

Directions:
1. Pour half of “go **** yourself” into a saucepan and mix it with “I don’t give a crap.”
2. Place the sprigs of “a peace of mind” and stir constantly with “some good lovin’” and half of the “alone time.”
3. To finish it off, add “respect” and then place the saucepan over medium heat for 5 to 10 minutes, or until it is very hot but not boiling.
4. Remove it from the heat. Add the remainder of “go **** yourself” and the other half of “alone time” if needed. No need to pour it into mugs. Keep back pocket and use all the time

Nutritional Information:
Amount per serving

Happiness and self worth: infinite
*******: absolutely none
Years gained in life: too many to count
Knowing that you don’t give a **** because you’re happy: PRICELESS

If there's one thing I fear will always be a mystery to me, it is with the ease that some people fall asleep.

Like, seriously just lie down and that's it. That's it?

That's it.


It's 4am and when I lie down my mind is still racing a million miles an hour, even when I'm so tired I can't even walk straight. And I check every limb for a sense of weighted-down, for that sleepy-fuzzy feeling in my knees and calves, tense abdomen, fixed shoulders, arms crossed like a saint, or flung up, whatever feels right, trying to find the holy grail of comfort that may or may not exist depending on what night and how long until I have to get up. 5 hours. 4 hours. 2 hours and 46 minutes.


It's the sound of an entire town sleeping, the privilege of hearing the secret noises that houses make when nobody else is lucid, praying your mind will wander, willing yourself to wander into it, setting traps, trying to find solace when you're left out of sleep, when everyone else sleeps, and it's tantamount to the feeling of being picked last for a soccer game in elementary school.


I used to imagine making soup. I would imagine my feet on the ground, planted firmly, gravity on me vertically instead of horizontally. The gritty tile, barefoot. Savor every step to the drawer, rummage for the can opener. On your tip-toes to reach the can of mushroom soup on the second-highest shelf, turn the can around to see the label and make sure it's the right one. Get a pan out. Scratch a flake of dried food off the metal side. Open the can, pull the little slice of paper off the jagged rim, pour in the water and mash the solid with a fork. Turn on the stove. I would be asleep by now. Or I would have wandered into a variant scenario. The saucepan was full of water and dead flies. I had to drive to Giant Tiger for more dish soap. I was a kid again, when I was wearing a swimsuit and anxious they wouldn't let me in. I needed a watergun. It was summer. It was finally a dream. Free of reality.


But it isn't. I feel my head heavy, the grinding feeling on the inside of my forehead. I ease myself with facts that hold little solace. Insomniacs have higher IQs. Insomniacs function better. Insomniacs succeed. You know what? Insomniacs have higher rates of breast cancer. Insomniacs have frighteningly higher rates of depression, anxiety, memory problems, automobile accidents, functional issues, all because they soup trick didn't work one time cause I tried it with tomato, all because I woke up too late this morning, it's 4:30 and I have 2 hours and 30 minutes to sleep and is it even worth it?


When your head falls back into the pillow and you feel the muscle unfurl, the slight pain that loosens into nothing, warm legs, heavy knees, weighed at your ankles, arms crossed like a saint, flung up, fetal with your knees grinding into each other, your hips off-kilter, and your mind still races a million miles a minute, dances around every trap you set, your stomach clenches in panic at nothing, you hear the secret noises that houses make when nobody else is lucid, you see the orange haze of the sky from the streetlights of the city next over, you've seen so much half-light the color is saturated into the skin under your eyes, bleary blue, sharp blue, blue raspberry kool-aid powder, half-everything and you know you've lost the fight, it's over, it's morning.



Can you dream during the day?
Can you stop your head from lolling on the desk?
Can you finish the assignment when you're ankle-deep in IQ?
Can you simply get into bed and go to sleep?


That has to be the worst advice I've every gotten from multiple people.


"Just go to sleep."

I can't describe the dark, moreso how it fades away to blue or hazy orange depending on whether we're rural or urban. I've not slept in a hundred places. I've not slept while a thousand different birds chirped and it blended into some sort of organized chaos and I can still hear the most persistent of them to this day. I've not slept in light-polluted cities where the falling snow was tinted orange and the closest thing to a star was the airplane that I mistaked for Venus. I've not slept in my boyfriend's bed where I woke him up to half-stroke my hair at 2am when he'd been asleep since 12. I've not slept in camp rooms where I  lay there in the darkness, scared to wake them up, surprised when the prettiest girl snored the loudest. I've not slept on couches, after ***, before scaling 30 foot poles in some version of a trust exercise, above and all else in my own bed, and you can just lie there and go to sleep?


You can just lie there and miss all that?

We stayed in a house
A big cottage looking house
It was so lovely

I shared a room with
a girl in my class, we had
a room on ground floor

I loved the country
lanes it felt wonderful to
walk in to nature

At night the stars shined
brightly , o there was many
sparkling sweetly

Then I saw saucepan
A saucepan in shape of stars
Was god cooking din!

I realised today
I notice nature when young
But had forgotten

I can only see a
little memory it seems
very far away

But it's there somewhere
Floating by me like a cloud
on a sky blue day

But it hardly stops
And when it does it plays like
an old time movie

Until it runs out
Leaving just a blank screen where
a snubbed *** **** burns

I cannot stretch this
memory no more , but I'm
glad the saucepan stayed

i can clearly hear how english mutates...
a book review by a channel... better than food...
the book he's reviewing is goETHE's captain faust:
and the non-avengers...
but no...

i don't hear: stick an umlaut anywhere you please...
i, "for some reason"... do not hear
a: Θ... a göethe... or a goëthe (ladin alphabet -
the germans know about this)...
there is this... goe-ether association...
it's sometimes a riddle of goë, göe...
or quiet simply...
the remains of the ancient latin grapheme (œ)?

educated people make this distinction -
and they'll catch "you" out on it...
since... they represent the Hyacinth Bucket brigade...
gynocentrism doing a snail-trail:
one step forward... two steps back...
it's beside what the linguist "says":
a bucket is a bucket a ***** is a *****...
otherwise? glorifying such a harsh reality
of a surname like: bucket... but not beckett?
no... "samuel"? well then...
it's not a bucket if it's somehow
translated via chernobyll as: bouquet...
is it?! is it?
because even in french: they self-cannibalise...
i.e. they "eat" some letters...
they write one language: but speak another...
what isn't bucket what is nonetheless
bouquet? well... isn't it: bouque-?
it's not even that... boo-k for the ones that
still hear... and can write grafitti schlang...
in some variation of a german...

becuase educated people can get away
with treating GOETHE...
as?  '/ˈɡɜːrtə, ˈɡeɪtə'...
or in simple-me-and-you being bilingual...
fiddling around we arrive at:
Göerte... which is "said"...
but this "lunatic asylum" exception has
to be written: with a clarity of a *******
Greek THETA... a fin! the end!
which always makes lying easier...
when you can: say (a)... but... but...
imply (b)... like some "metaphor"...
some forever useful tool of nuance...
some "spectacle"...
it's easier to lie when... you say (a)
but are "implying" (b)...
then you can blame it on...
not allow the literacy of the masses:
quite as much... you require... exceptions
to the rule... to **** out the lesser educated
"people"...

don't get me started...
born? Ostrowiec Świętokrzyski...
perhaps i should have never left...
3 years in Edinburgh...
over a month in St. Petersburg...
somewhere in Paris, Stochholm, Venice...
Athens... Belgrade from a distance...
Amsterdam... two weeks in Kenya...
and a nonchalant attitude surrounding
London... a strong distaste for Warsaw...
a myth of Cracow...

and no, i haven't been everywhere...
but... after a while... does it really matter
where you go, if you're bringing
expectations with you?
expectations and postcards?
clichés? clichés expectations and postcards?
and... a whole lot of strangers
you haven't met?
tourism and: feeding the ghost town
mentality... perhaps a ghost town would be
something to behold... instead of this...
atypical metropolitan casualness of avoiding
each other... busier busier: and no more
busy than once pronounced dead...
but wait for it: you're at least given a "scene"...

but no... i know one language that
makes pedantic orthographical observations...
but i also know a language that...
write one way... speaks another...
whichever way, best, to suit it...

and you "know" it would only be Fa-Ber'g -
no... borrow the j- from je suis...
if that last E was not an acute É...
but an grave È (grave... or? gráve...
grrrr'av... not a hey hey grave...
GRA-Vity)...

hence? my point exactly..
if the diacritical markers are respected
in fwench... with an acute É and a grave È...
why do "we" need... I(i) and J(j)?
why not... I(ı) and J(ȷ)?

besides... ever imagine writing an autobiography
like a Knausgård... defender of the runes
for a sentence in volume 1...
major google-maps ****** *** volume 2...
i write that with a "glee"...
i mean... you can be immediately be put off
writing an autobiography...
just to avoid the mediocre descriptive elements
of using something more complicated
than a hammer...
for an otherwise... less than a hammer's worth
of banality: evaluation of modern banality /
procrastination...
no one we have been given these complicated
tools... and to the best of our abilities we
best procrastinate, using them...
i hardly think a hammer would be used
to... pretend to play the drums...
but yes: Knausgård... the defender of runes...
irony... but the mr. google-earth guy to turn to...

yes... and before i discovered a past...
there were the runes... and there was
forever this latin morph of the barbarians
"thieving"... but there was also the glagolitic script...
apparently! and before that there was the greek!
and... somehow... i did arrive at having
to master some vague understanding of
mother cyrillic!

- but prior to... did you know what
slavs love cabbage? all the pakistani point this
out: slav love cabbage!
today? i watched the film Layer Cake
and made some cabbage soup...
Layer Cake being? the pre-to-a-bond-film
taster for the actor Daniel Craig...
it was hardly a Guy ******* Ritchie film...
woz itz? but... a decent actor advert...
with "hindsight"...
if i watched the film then...
or as i whatched the now...
and all the known actors jumped the train...
well... cabbage soup... base?
a decent polish / jewish chicken broth...
most of the chicken goes into a ***...
except the *******: you make a *******
roulade with that...
and proper potato bakes...
potato bakes like Heston Blumethal
boils a soft egg...
tatties in cold water... until they start boiling...
then you hunch over them...
boil them for a decent fiver...
turn off the heat...
again... hunch over them...
like an inquistive condor waitig for
the water to stop bubbling...
asking the question: are we all ready...
for the oven? yes, my toy soldiers,
are we, ready?

apparently they taste like christmas
tatties in waistcoats!
my my... what a lovely affair!
cabbage soup? you really need a complete
lack of imagination and a work-around
using root veg...
the european way...
but what is preferred is ensuring
you make a cabbage soup like...
a slav treats a cabbage like a frenchman treats
an onion: you suffocate it...
an hour minimum...
until the crass ******* boils out...
and you're left with...
a sweetness... and softness...
bay leaf all-spice (english spice) included...
some kiełbasa (etymology?
root... kieł- derived from the plural?
kły... canines... suffix -basa?
baza - base... canine-base...
something that requires an understanding
that elevates the dog, "debases" the man...
no quran reader will understand this:
for lack of a better word: shaming food...

where would pakistani cuisine be...
without the pantheon of hindu spices?!
i'll eat like a dog and in so doing:
live a tier above a king...
i still find it highly unimaginative...
to call one fruit "forbidden"
and one meat: "impure"...
whatever Gabriel spoke to Muhammad...
never really explained crab meat...
crab meat crab meat...
the Maldive muslims eat crab meat...
what's crab meat again:
when it concentrates a comparison
with ol' porky porky? scavenger of the seas...
what's with the muslim beef on pork?
and god was critical...
of his perfected animal worthy of
consumption... looks pretty silly from
Beijing... so Beijing is ensuring that Muslims
"look silly"... well... "live"... silly...
so god was so... this that and the other...
then he lent his "all knowing wisdom" and said...
no... this one animal... which you can...
butcher and make use of...
all that's missing is the oink and the hoofs!
or whatever it was: i can't eat the oink,
the grunt remain's the bacon's owner...
and perhaps the "hoofs"...
but such a pristine animal...
tapeworms come... much larger in size...
from aquatic flesh... so...
tic-toc... tic-toc... pull a sly porky on me or...
Gabriel my ***...

the Pwophet sez!
much easier these days: to, "get away" with "it"...
camel jockeys turned oil barons...
yachts... whizzed-up-*******-white-****-****...
and never... the odd-ball from
that long extended lineage of the family
living with a cuddles *****, soft toys...
east of Beirut...
that pencil girth's woe explosion in the sky...
"built" by people...
who employ slave Bangladeshis for
a sunday's worth of sabbath cricket in the desert...
i thought that deserts were only good
for waiting for qurans and dinosaur blood
and myopia and... the odd dehydration
hallucinations?!

i'll eat some sushi to sober up before
i accompany my mother: circa 60 getting
a hip replacement surgery done on her...
i'll sober up: but first things first:
spew...

mind you... below you will find some
ancients inscriptions...
i had to wonder: if the precursor text
of the anglo-sphere people...
the germans and "celts" of the british isles...
the welsh... the scandinavians...
was bound to runes...
before the latin men came...
what did "we", the slavs, use?

before the greeks allowed us entry into
the realm of mediating the otherwise:
quasi-fathomable?
cyrillic is what came: AFTER...
but there was a prior...
i'm no longer interested in the prior...
no more than i am interested in greek...
i once slurred russian cyrillic
for not having any diacritical markers...
i knew they had them...
but that they were... crude...
for lack of a better word...

how does that theory sound?
the: ex Africae omnis est Africanus...
sorry... what?!
giving my scrutiny of phonetic encoding...
am i closer to speak...
or thinking, and if not thinking,
then, reading?!
by the looks of it...
i devolved from encoding in
chinese... perhaps not so much:
sanskrit... but i most certainly suffered
moving across Siberia: obviously: not "i"...

mind you: i've looked at "it" and thought...
me, reproduce? add a stranger to the equation
of my family? i'm just happy to end
the libeage... thank god i don't have
some inheritence complex abounding...
no expectation, no "legacy" akin
to a surname like Rhodes (circa NY)...
i was born with one ****** surname,
which changed... i'll die with another ******
surname: that never made it to a status
of Eshlert... nonetheless! i'll leave...
like a ******* Einstein of an acronym:
E = MC... good for me! bravo ty! bravo ja!

beside the egyptian hieroglyphs...
i'm yet to read something...
from... Congo... perhaps i'm just too ignorant...
or the -igger shade was just too much
that it... grabbed my attention and
i forgot that the victim olympics didn't
happen every 4 years...
but every... whimsical time-span of...
a quarter of the length of a fortnite...

whatever: all out of africa implies...
i'm writing in a devolved chinese...
frozen bits across the siberian fickle desert...
next stopover? Novosibirsk!
no need for pyramids in Novosibirsk...
no "awe" to be found...
when you're toe-dead numb from
frost bite.... is there?!

my letters are a sieve... they allow meaning
through like hands praying to cusp water!
it's, the, reality...
you have ****-wit socialists on one side...
and then... this hyper-inflated
darwinism is all historism on the other...
middle ground, people!
"democracy"! i stand stand both the marxism...
or the darwinism... but arguments failed...
or? we can have the extreme of both ends
of the argument! enough of reading
Pasternak will teach you...
hey... shhh shhh... the collective can
congregate any minute now...
they don't need that many intelligent people
to rally them...
what your, "your" side needs, though?
if enough brass people: stupid enough
to entertain, to lulluby...
em... that's now much to "go on"... is it?
the intelligent with pour gasoline
on a fire...
the entertainers will simply pour
cold milk into a saucepan that contains
milk you're warming to...
melt some butter some honey and an egg yolk
to self-remedy: devoid of big pharma influences...
a witches' brew for a cold and soar throat...

side note: do i "worry" about not having children?
if i lived on the Faroe islands,
Greeland, Iceland, Norway -
i most probably would probably mind...
small town mentality: enlarged...
then again: my family, "my" and "family"
is not exactly accomodating...
why am i not spending time with my grandparents?
at least one side... the "patriarchal" side
drops off: accomodating the madonna anyways...
a sister (my mother) and a brother (my uncle)
are waging a war...
this... "eastender" soap opera is...
i don't have the finances to grativate away
from it...
enter children? and they'd be more ******
up than i already am with my libido
and no outlet... i've stopped seeing prostitutes:
no because i felt "bad":
that one time we only pretended to be
leeching / kissing oysters just because
i forgot to trim my ***** hair:
like some western feminist argument
about the exploitation of romanian women "matters"...
when... the labourer drones of men
of building sites... coming in to work...
hangover... might perhaps... stop...
fuelling the english lush economy...
i didn't want to have children because:
family-wise? things, "things" are messy...
and there's no magic carpet to get me out
of here... not when the last surviving remnant
of a past... i.e. my grandmother,
talks to my dementia riddled grandfather
with the words...
and he stresses them: you no good...
skurwysyn!
elaborate? sure! z-kurwy-syn...
from-a-*****-son..
my grandfather's mother...
well... let's put it in facts...
my grandfather is an illegitimate (
oh **** me, i spelled that right, drunk)
son... his mamma then married...
the father of this illegitimate child...
was a polyglot... spoke 7 languages...
emigrated to the U.S. of A...
remarried, fostered some shards of glass...
and sent his last postcard...
from Niagara Falls... before jumping
into the kamikazee sun...
oh my family is perfect...
then this mother of his...
had two children with a man...
who would beat my grandfather...
which is why he became a "pioneer"
coal-miner aged 15 or 14 or 16...
then this one kid ended up being
fostered... then this "watermelon" of a kid
(nickname) came out...
from a love affair... and when the "*****" died...
his quasi-foster father lived with him...
and in this custard: he...
the father semi-god-know's what...
abused the old man for putting up with
him as a love-child: in wedlock...
and... well thank god there was
no epitaph to begin an end with...

me and children? i am gracious,
i am kind... i don't want them to inherit this
history... which is worse than
a history of germany... at least those *******
had the nazis... which is worthwhile
in terms of exploiting them via video games
as those: evilz badz guyz!

i always think: the sooner i'm dead -
the more chances i have
to either dream... or breathe...
currently i quasi the former and accept
the reality of the latter...
but me and children? my, own, brood?
em... for some capitalistic driven darwinism
pressure ploy of narrative?
taxes and retirement plans for
the western: placebo: aged?
grand'm'ah and gwand'p'ah not fit under
the same roof... set them on the butcher's
path toward the "shop" of wrinkle
and: pristine effortless economic
endeavor... the pig's the lot...
economic meat and... about as barren as a dinner
plate scooped up for examination
once a pauper sat before it to supper...
ingenious! if only, if only we were all born
into a Charlie ******* Dickens' lot of life!
then, only then, we could, we could
perhaps, perhaps: write about it!

i have seen how people have lived their lives...
how... they had wish to write about it...
which always involved a lot of other people -
movie scripts written by directors
and not... actual manuscripts of scripters...
they would write... but then:
started to gag from **** at the mere of thought
of being: brutal, honest, honing...

people either write an honest autobiography,
they ghost it: have someone write a biography,
they write an autobiography that's
designated as: tabloid...
but most importantly... they forget...
a "Moscow"...
when i was in Moscow... i felt like i was
in London for the very first time...
a last time...

i did mention that i didn't envy the russian
diacritical approach...
the odd: miss and "there"...
but no... i didn't envy them...
to me there was no russian orthography...
there is an orthography: which you mind
above any metaphysical discussion...
when, and only when... aesthetics comes
into play...
i.e. rz = ż and ó = u and ch (cerp i ha) = h (samo ha)
this is how orthography is born...
sorry... i'm too "busy" dealing with
orthographic ******* to even mind
your "metaphysics" or a death of (it): interim...

as i stood at the feet of the tower of babel...
i started to su doku the pieces that
pleased my eyes... and the pieces...
left in leftover arabic squiggles of
the remnants of the 20th century...
and the new emergence of environmental
beijing free-of-syndromes to spawn
the 21st... or...
the child of a one-child-state-policy
without a Beijing... only a gradual evaluation
of... concerns for...
not giving birth to yet another ****-wit
of the world's counter to: another
****** of a gullible persuasion...
given that law is blind...
he must have been born: deaf!

- you didn't see me coming;
i didn't even see you leave... -

since the greek letters i tend to most "forget"
are:
- gamma lower-case (γ) because
of the upper-case upsilon (Υ)
- lower-case zeta (ζ) becaue
of the lower-case "11" (ξ)
- eta, lower-case (η) is no real grief
with lower-case EPSILON (ε)
until... you enter the cyrillic
"debate" of е and э...
- lower-case NU (ν) and lower-case
UPSILON (υ)
- Ξ (Θ, Φ) i.e.: XI, PSI, CHI, PHI...
return: that first 'un' is an ale'ks...
alex... but it's not an X in the way that
CHI expresses itself in CHurCH...
lay-teΞ...
- then again... greek orthography begins
in SIGMA... those... quasi-germans...
those remnants of the northern / teutonic
crusade... those Pruσσianς...
or... Prußianς...
the greek F and the greek "F"...
key into a keyhole: Φ...
key turning in a keyhole: Θ...
the iota of four uses... Θ, Φ, Ξ... Ψ...

but that's only the greek... i will not touch
on the glagolitic... until, barely skimming
the draft months earlier...
until i come with my own diacritical markers
and show you: how i was wrong...
yes... the russians do use these markers...
but they, mostly... do not "accent" them...

because i'm no Ezra Pound i didn't have
to imagine going as far back
as the Taoist ideogram...
because i remained bound to the anchor
of europe and...
i really didn't find anything of worth
in africa encoding: silence into their
verbiage with anything:
beside the odd spell of hieroglyphs...
so? i am not an Idaho man...
or whatever mid-western miss-western
******* the genius came from...

i don't have an ideogram:
i have a synonym... the sound is exactly
the same... but Charon 'ave their eyes!
mind you...
ądam and ęwa are off limits...
as is: ł... then again: given that i write in english...
em... "yes, and no"...

but here's my rubric... a rubric implies:
i will not narrate this crap:

don't get me started on the russian variations
of Y... i once said... because the greeks had
names for their letters... and the romans didn't...
well... in western slavic: Y "why, I" has a name:
e'GREK... iGrek... e and i are interchanged
between the western slavs and the islanders...
but the russians?
let me Shakespeare that for you:
pre-scriptum - don't ask me...
how oh how a german umlaut infiltrated
the alphabet: i blame catherine the great...
you have...

е (ye)
ё (yo)
й (-y-) - which acts like a "ȷUDAS"
ы (ý) - alt. to? ıGREK
ю (yu)
я (ya)

all that's missing is a: иы variation?!
let me check my pentagram of vowels...
e, o... u, a... oh right... IO-T'AH-T'AH-T'AH...
sinking the ******* POTEMPKIN!

it's for the best: i'm entrenched in two languages...
which makes me "schizophrenic" /
bilingual... ergo? i have to write in at least:
four... pepper in some latin etc.....
and modern slang? i need that...
and some german... and perhaps a dash
of Gaelic... and some scandi-navigational
pseudo-romancing the rosetta stone...

the rest is quiet "simple"...
a french-atypical acute... because there's no gr'ah-v'eh!
grave ole...
and a dot... like the dot used for no real purpose
in english...

i.e. ь involves the acute...
while the ъ involes the "horde" symbol...
either the dot above the Z in ż or the caron
above the R: ř...
alternative interpretations invoke
even more: 'hide and seek" mechanisms
of the russian Y...
  объект: interJEct with an obJEct...
thus? there just seem to be gradations
of hiding a why (y) with its added vowel...
and its mutant й... crescent mongol moon...
and all the rest of "it"...
since when you "borrow": yew borrow...
you get something along the lines
of: e.g.:

ć.        ць: c.f. surnames ending with -CKI
ń.       нь
ó.      "u" or? Loonin...
ś.        cь
ź.        зь
dz.     ž (dzik - boar - the wild adjective is a tautology)    
ż.      ř       rz   (зъ) or? ж...
ł.       woad... łagodny (he - gentle)
                        łagodna (she - gentle)
š.      sz.      ш             (sh)
č.      cz.      ч               (ch... you're not foreign
to graphemes... mr. Æ ms. Œ...
you simply haven't seen it applied
to consonants... only vowels!)
щ     šč     (szczypta - pinch -
a germanic, saxon "ch" is a cz...
or a caron above the C...
ch' ch'.... akin to the caron above the S...
sh' sh'... so far away from "god": YHWH...
yet so close, so, close!)
ha ha... a "dangling bit"...
and i thought the russians weren't
good at hiding "things"... from ш to щ
you have hidden: a caron a "c"...
a ****'s CHeap... in a dangling "left-over"...
of an otherwise caron S... heap of SH SH ****...

in terms of the cerp and ha and samo ha?
the greek χ (chi) comes into play...
but not like a cheeze...
more like a vowel-catcher breath...
eerie as ****... a HA HA with...
cHA cHA! i.e. like the surds you allow
hindu words access to: gnostic -
'nostic... or... knife... i.e. 'nife...

it's no surprise for me, now...
out of all the black caribbean kids,
the indian and pakistani,
the africans... i was one of the first
to: come out swinging from under
the iron curtain:
distrust levels? high... near almighty...
not enough "japanese" in me
to squander a late debt from
Hiroshima or some other etc.

in some remote original draft...

as ever, i drink, and am a nobody, but then i find myself inclined to look upon the god of gods: whatever remains of worth for the phonetic encoding... whether latin, greek, rune, cyrillic, or ⰒⰑⰃⰀⰐ ⰒⰉⰔⰏ (another googlewhack)... the glagolitic phonetic encoding... sure, first they'll ban the runes in sweden, before realißing that... there's another alphabet... the glagolith...
                  Ⱉ = Ω, given Ѡ = ω...
         this alphabet has been suppressed, long enough!
to be honest? i've never seen a more beautiful letter,
anywhere, other than in the glatolith...
     Ⰿ = M = ᛗ...
                      maybe that's why i like my given names
so much...
                            ⰏⰀⰕⰅⰖⰞ
                 i too! i too have a past!
             i don't need to peer into pseudo-arab ***
the quran religiosity of hieroglyphs
of the northern africans, camel jockeys!
                             there's, oh there's so much
more at stake than the runes...
                what of the Kiev Rus vikings?
this, this is their language:
                ⰕⰑ          "ⰏⰑⰆⰅ"          (może = maybe)    
(to = this)
                                                   (ⰜⰀ = trzeba, trza /
                                                            tsa)­
            ⰕⰔⰑ (tsa)           ⰃⰀ (ga)     ⰂⰀⰓⰉ (vari)
               (gadać = converse... gavari)

    Ⰴ (d)                ⰆⰫⰕ (żyt = fathoming life)

                             ⰆⰫⰕ (worthwile noting:
this is out lot of, a, life)...

      ⰛⰫⰛⰍⰀ (szyszka = cone, of the ᚦᛁᚱ /
                                     ⰡⰑⰄⰟⰀ - fir /
                              jodła tree)

see, i can't solve crossword puzzles...
      i don't know where i would begin,
fathoming this sort of "plaything" thesaurus...
i can play a solitaire mahjong,
i can solve you a su doku puzzle
without wanting to compensate myself
by competing...
                  
   but i do know...
                    what conjured the atom,
the letter?
  what conjured the atom, the letter,
and subsequently, the alphabet?
        noun...
                  the cipher conceptualißation
of making a name, smaller,
so small, in fact...
that letter emerged, and names were
no longer indicative...
of a meaning...
  so much so, that units were
formed, fathomed...
and when merely giving names
to these units, akin to the greeks,
alpha...
        which had to become a-lpha...
and beta had to become b-eta...
          well... only thanks to the latin men...
they became songs...
sing-alongs...
   very much thanks for the H vowel
catcher of the hebrew god...
ah... said the castrato...
  b'eeh sang the castrato...
           em...
  obviously the devil managed to keep
some of the letters...
z'ed...
                 it's still bewildering...
how the latin men "reinterpreted"
the northern runes...
   as the greek men "reinterpreted"
the north eastern glagolitic script...
and to think! to think!
    Ⱃ = R = ρ = rho...
         but what happened, "elsewhere"?
ᚱ = R... but... but... where's the trill?
R, as a letter, looks like it's about
to hide a leg... and start rolling...
ripping apart all other onomatopeias
associated with the rattle of a rattlesnake,
or the sound it could make,
to associate itself with the sound
of water boiling... where did that "go"?
with the french hark "innovation",
and the english tongue...
being bitten and left numb by
a tarantula?!
                      
  point being... i never imagined myself
much of an archeologist...
i always found:
  if you state your "necessary" freedom
to speak?
you're a tongue inside one cranium,
at a particular time, in a universal space...
but, like kierkegaard,
you care more about a freedom to think?
i'm "here", i'm "there", i'm "i'm"
like heidegger might state...
                  using this very modern
language that's english...
          but then sliding back into...
an obscure region of history...
      in two places at once...
        at a universal moment in time,
in a particular space...
                   talking exhausts me,
whenever i start speaking for more than
ten minutes,
there is a cotton mouth infestation,
my tongue turns into a serpent about
to shed a layer of its skin,
and, if i'm lucky,
i will not swollow the tongue...

                    and why wouldn't the runes
be more protected, but currently under
siege -
             both the latin text and the greek
text (respectively),
had the ambition of performing an
x-ray on the runes and the glagolitic texts,
treating them as pseudo-hieroglyphics...

but they found similarities,
   which made this foreign phonetic
encoding systems relateable...

ᚠ = F
                ᚢ = U         (copernican "up-side-down")
ᚨ = A (strange sort of arithmetic, / \
                                              )
               ­ ᚱ = R (d'uh)
   ᚺ = H...
           ᛁ = I
               ᛋ = s
                ᛏ = t (what's with the "bending knee",
so much for the supposed: "arrow"),
               ᛒ = B...
           ᛖ = Σ = E...
                   ᛗ = M...
                   ᛚ = L...
                  ᛟ = o - crude version of circle...

so? the latin men had an easier way to
fathom the runes, and ingest them
into the x-ray vision of post-latin...
   the greeks with the glagolitic script?
much harder...

         Ⱂ = Π = P = ρ (rho)
                 Ⰰ = A = ᛉ = Z...
             Ⱇ = φ = ᚦ = θ...
                             Ѡ = ω...
                Ⱑ = A...
                          Ⱔ = ε....
                                            Ⱚ = θ...

but i agree... you couldn't get "our"
peoples to where we are now,
with these pseudo-hieroglyphics...
   after all: Ⰿ (M) is a beautiful letter...
in glagolitic terms...
          but... it's too complicated for us,
at this moment in time...
it might have had all the necessary
practicality in its necessary time...
that it was allocated to...
but... given people these days
are looking at X-|ɔ\
                              / \ /_ / ?
                            how ******* hard must
it have been, when,
the phonetic encoding,
was as hard as it, to now, us,
it seems?!
                   so... whatever is happening
in sweden, right now?
       i'm not bemaoning it,
   i have a tattoo... it reads: Sienkiewicz...
the swedish deluge of 1626–29... a.d.,
          **** it, ban the runes...
i've "just" discovered the gagolitic phonetic
encoding, the sort of **** that
st. cyril and methodius had to work with,
and it wasn't as easy as translating /
incorporating the runes...

                     oh sure, i'm waiting...
                 first they ban the runes...
   then they'll have to learn something akin
to the glagolitic script...
             returning back to their x-ray
latin lettering...
                       i still can't believe that
james joyce got away with writing finnegans
wake... without ever employing a single
diacritical marker...
spewing out... what became the modern
english grafitti spreschen...
   e.g.: lolz...
                              und: L8ER...
it's like: the worst of the worst of what
already is the worst in the form
of the h'american demands for acronyms.          

after watching an old couple walk
past me into the supermarket:
    or unlike the men climbing
           the matterhorn:
   which from postcards seems so
much more majestic in its formidable
shape than the goliath everest
    (from postcards) -
                 5 miles, a dark forest,
  and i can show you where english
druids chant: satanus in excelsior!
   and i thought i spoke bad english:
it's: in excelsis satanus...
       i would have approached them,
but then i was alone,
      and there was one idiot shouting
and about a crowd of twenty disciples:
you could hear the murmur
   adhering to the chant from a distance
of about 300 metres...
                    i only had beer on me,
no goat blood, no woad pigment...
                crash a party when they
were having a party in complete
darkness?
                     it's a good thing there was
a song change on my headphones
               and for a minute i picked it up...
wait a minute: i thought i owned
these woods, walking at night?
               ragnarök blood of Hvalba:
unfortunately the norse founded
kiev,
           so if they founded kiev,
                they must have past where
i made mark as: the land immune to
                                       the black death...
if i were an academic with a stipend,
   i'd write another boorish book on the matter
to attract moths...
          but the old couple, hand in hand,
shrinking but not exactly disappearing...
     in me the inherent conceptualisation
of a twin, like a limb missing,
  but with all my limbs intact...
              yet still a twin gleaming in my mind,
as the story i was told in my childhood
no echoes like a behemoth ghouling:
    they said to me:
   did you know that in this world there exists
a person that looks exactly like you?
         what? so i started looking,
      not leonardo, not brad,
                    can't compete -
            if i really am the stronger twin
                 who sent my twin to the plough
and the hearth... am i not to suddenly
    lick ash?
                  but the old couple:
   what a rarity to see, dwarfs,
                                  of former majestic
forms... elsewhere the single mother with
a baby in a buggy at 10 minutes to 11 during
the week, bewildered by reading
frozen foods labels...
           oh... about the supermarket...
grr... mein gott!
                    Surabhis! Surabhis everywhere!
the joy of walking into a supermarket
last, aisles as spacious as any king's
    lonely castle...
        but in the hours 12 in the afternoon
till about 5 in the afternoon?
        traffic jams!
                   zombified shoppers, women,
of course, children to boot...
                           how many times i might
have bumped into them...
      gaze lost, hazy eyed...
                 sometimes i had to walk down one
aisle, emerge from another, just to pass
  a woman standing fiddling with her
hair...
           the new meeting place, apparently,
but that's beside the point,
   the more i listen to radio,
  the more i learned that i'm far from
a music snob...
            take for example:
       free deejays's song
                            el amor es un party...
what? cuba not pretty any more?
              but there's a worthwhile observation
in there:
        only rich men have the chance
        to play a woman's game of "the chase"...
        only rich men get to "chase" women...
        the poor schmucks?
                          ****! have to live with them.  
****... i need to find that
    one exchange in ingmar bergman's
film wild strawberries:
            when the old man wakes from
a dream-memory in which he is
the ****** of a **** scene...
        where a woman is teasing a man
to the point, until he transcendes
                   a teasing woman,
                       and finds a Jezebel...
so upon waking...
                the "children" are picking
flowers in the rain...
                          and there's talk of
abortion...
       at this point it's gone beyond
castration...
                      the conversation invokes
the death-mask of man,
    or man as tomb, and woman as
the robber -
                         apparently once impregnated
man cannot ask for his ***** back,
and in some twisted way:
           and as much as i'd like to "cheat"
having found the screenplay online,
   i have the misfortune of owning the ****
movie...
        and how i like returning
to silent cinema, black & white, foreign,
with subtitles...
                     at this point,
because didn't place the subtitles: on top
of the screen, but at the bottom...
   well, **** me: am i looking for
Cindarella, because focusing back
on those faces means i seem them without
lips and merely eyes and noses,
   and perhaps a chance to spot
   a wriggling, morphed into an insect
st. peter's, if not van gogh's ear!
              or the lost "art" of handwriting...
Cinderella? my focus is so low from
      the action, that i might as well be
  watching, either a ballet, or a *******
riverdance!
             dr. isak borg (a)
marianne borg (b)
        dr. evald borg (d)

such a weird and heart-numbing thinking
went into writing this...
i have a history, a past:
regardless of having children and with
their existence: some sort of guarantee
for a future...
that i have a past, a history,
and it exists... outside of its current
written format,
that i can escape with or without having
children: that i would have probably
later ***** mentally...
having ingested all this third party
quasi-history propaganda
for the only history that's being
salvaged: the insect prone libido
of a status quo... well then...
let my "failure" be the patent for all future
success.

It is his pride and joy
His one and only pleasure
His favourite toy
His hidden treasure.
It is the Duck’s saucepan cupboard
Where he keeps his stash
Like Old Mother Hubbard
Except it’s a duck’s trash.
Little bit of this and a bit of that
Where his secrets are hid
From anything to next door’s cat
And perhaps the odd saucepan lid.
It is where he hides when he’s in trouble
When he has gone off the rails.
Not being one to burst his bubble
And I am not the one to tell tales!
They knew he was  in there
Always with a smile on his fat face
And whilst the Duck is sat on a chair
They sat outside his door just in case.
Ramming the odd sandwich into his beak
Made weeks ago hence difficult to digest
The sandwich positively antique
And would fail a hygiene test
But he does not care he feels okay
He is in his cupboard and that is beyond measure
Because at the end of the day
It is his pride, pleasure and treasure.

Out he shot like a screaming hyena, the Pig’s wig to the side
His trotters were performing a jig, he wasn’t quite sure.
Usually he leaves the house so full of respect and pride
And was particular about anything he touched or indeed wore.

“The Duck’s gone” he yelled to nobody that was about
“My friend has up and left me” sobbing out for all he was worth
“Does nobody care, can anyone hear me if I shout”.
“Talk to me, it doesn’t cost the Earth”

By now the Pig had got his bloomers in a twist
Started searching all the cupboards he could find.
Seeking out the little places he had inadvertently missed.
Looking in all the secret hideouts a Duck would hide.

The Pig sat in a corner and waited for the duck to come back.
He waited a couple of days and he was wondering whether he was dead.
He something outside, he thought it was a quack.
In slid a skinny leg and a webbed foot as brown as wholemeal bread.

In slid a suitcase with stickers “I was here” on from a seaside resort.
In came an enormous stuffed donkey toy with “Made in Spain” on it.
The little devil has been abroad without me, he thought
He has got the nerve I have to admit.

He was getting crosser and crosser by the minute
He was a nice shade of violet and blue.
The blood in his veins putting pressure on his three piece suit
In fact he was getting himself wound up and in a stew.

“Where exactly do you think you have been” enquired the blue blob
“Oh I have been to Majorca for the week, told you when I booked”.
By now he’d heard enough and his head had started to throb.
The Duck had squeezed in his saucepan cupboard and never looked.

The Pig was still chattering on firing the same old question
The Duck was stuffing himself silly with Spanish sweets
Devouring one after the other in no order or hesitation
Never before had he had such nice treats.

The pig finally tapped on the door of the cupboard and spoke
The Duck could not answer owing to too much food being in his beak.
The Pig was under the impression he was copying a bloke
When the Duck let out a gigantic squeak.

A line of ants were frog marching a leaf around his leg
He froze like a solid lump of ice on a hot day.
His legs were shaking like they were scrambled egg
And his mind had gone into panic and was far away.

The Pig the protective one, at once became a superhero role
The door between them came down with a crash
To the annoyance of the Duck who had his head in a pudding bowl
Promptly hid the bowl and sweets in a flash.

“How dare you interrupt me” shouted he with a frown.
His legs were twitching from the ants which were bothering him
The Duck got up off the floor and proceeded to jump up and down,
The Pig thought his actions were foolish and pretty grim.

One week later the Duck reluctantly emerged from the cupboard
And began to prepare something for friend to eat.
He ransacked the shelves like old Mother Hubbard
Rescuing some tins of something or other which were now obsolete.

Which was fine by the Pig, he ate anything he could get his trotters on
He was just pleased to be reunited with his dear old friend.
He dined until whatever the meal was called was gone
He did not enjoy the slop and once more had to pretend.

i'm not a master,
i'm no man.
snot drips from the nostril,
the sizzle grips the saucepan.
static head in the negative degree,
below freezing weather, i do believe.
stone cold stare at the fire ablaze,
blood boil, bubble bath and turmoil,
death to the royals.
potbellies to the gifted,
flight or fight feelings for the lesser.
lack of passion, slow moving action.
caught in the eye of abstraction,
I lost my bond with reality.
sneeze out the cake batter,
dimmed lights-
I'm in in my corner.
the last in line,
a faster pace raced in my mind.
blurred vision,
motionless mission.
still, the snot drips as
time slips through my
failed finger tips.

People think poets don't crap
like
they're all,
some o' that.
but
it's not true.
I assure you, we are the same
feel the same pain
bleed similar blood
and some,
yes some,
are very very good,
they still crap though,
they're only human.

It is his pride and joy
His one and only pleasure
His favourite toy
His hidden treasure.
It is the Duck’s saucepan cupboard
Where he keeps his stash
Like Old Mother Hubbard
Except it’s a duck’s trash.
Little bit of this and a bit of that
Where his secrets are hid
From anything to next door’s cat
And perhaps the odd saucepan lid.
It is where he hides when he’s in trouble
When he has gone off the rails.
Not being one to burst his bubble
And I am not the one to tell tales!
The Pig knows he is in there
Always with a smile on his fat face
And whilst the Duck is sat on a chair
He sits outside his door just in case.
Ramming the odd sandwich into his beak
Made weeks ago hence difficult to digest
The sandwich positively antique
And would fail a hygiene test
But he does not care he feels okay
He is in his cupboard and that is beyond measure
Because at the end of the day
It is his pride, pleasure and treasure.

The law says: every action must be accompanied by a reaction.
So when I slipped out of bra and ******* and spread myself open on the kitchen floor,
I expected that he would at least put down the crossword puzzle. No response, though.
I rose up and emptied the saucepan over him.

I went on a course: 'Poetry-writing for beginners'.
I made my similes illuminate the dark, like phosphorus flares.
My metaphors danced the can-can, naked, around the market square.
The teacher said: "Yes, very clever dear. But your imagery clothes a void,
Where the poet's deepest thoughts and feelings should be".
That was when I unstoppered the nitric acid bottle. She will probably keep the sight in one eye.

I joined my local writers' discussion group. At the last meeting, this was the consensus:
Music was subordinating sense; my attempt at profundity was just a lazy mysticism.
They suggested flushing out the drivel from the windmills of my mind.
I added bleach to their cappuccinos. They were left speechless.

I looked in Yellow Pages, and found a personal poetry trainer.
He said, "From now on, you let other people see your poetry only when I say you may.
I shall hold you back until every cadence convinces;
Until I hear the extraordinary, the important and the authentic sing from the bedside table."

Eventually, we were both satisfied.

Hard boiled eggs.

Fill the saucepan
up with water;
boil and boil
till everything is dry;
then run
the cold tap
so that
the inferno
cools down.
Peel
gently,
add
salt and pepper
and
devour.

A
gastronomical
delight
for
anyone
in
a garret.

Out he shot like a screaming hyena, the Pig’s wig to the side
His trotters were performing a jig, he wasn’t quite sure.
Usually he leaves the house so full of respect and pride
And was particular about anything he touched or indeed wore.

“The Duck’s gone” he yelled to nobody that was about
“My friend has up and left me” sobbing out for all he was worth
“Does nobody care, can anyone hear me if I shout”.
“Talk to me, it doesn’t cost the Earth”

By now the Pig had got his bloomers in a twist
Started searching all the cupboards he could find.
Seeking out the little places he had inadvertently missed.
Looking in all the secret hideouts a Duck would hide.

The Pig sat in a corner and waited for the duck to come back.
He waited a couple of days and he was wondering whether he was dead.
He something outside, he thought it was a quack.
In slid a skinny leg and a webbed foot as brown as wholemeal bread.

In slid a suitcase with stickers “I was here” on from a seaside resort.
In came an enormous stuffed donkey toy with “Made in Spain” on it.
The little devil has been abroad without me, he thought
He has got the nerve I have to admit.

He was getting crosser and crosser by the minute
He was a nice shade of violet and blue.
The blood in his veins putting pressure on his three piece suit
In fact he was getting himself wound up and in a stew.

“Where exactly do you think you have been” enquired the blue blob
“Oh I have been to Majorca for the week, told you when I booked”.
By now he’d heard enough and his head had started to throb.
The Duck had squeezed in his saucepan cupboard and never looked.

The Pig was still chattering on firing the same old question
The Duck was stuffing himself silly with Spanish sweets
Devouring one after the other in no order or hesitation
Never before had he had such nice treats.

ThePig finally tapped on the door of the cupboard and spoke
The Duck could not answer owing to too much food being in his beak.
The Pig was under the impression he was copying a bloke
When the Duck let out a gigantic squeak.

A line of ants were frog marching a leaf around his leg
He froze like a solid lump of ice o a hot day.
His legs were shaking like they were scrambled egg
And his mind had gone into panic and was far away.

The Pig the protective one, at once became a superhero role
The door between them came down with a crash
To the annoyance of the Duck who had his head in a pudding bowl
Promptly hid the bowl and sweets in a flash.

“How dare you interrupt me” shouted he with a frown.
His legs were twitching from the ants which were bothering him
The Duck got up off the floor and proceeded to jump up and down,
The Pig thought his actions were foolish and pretty grim.

One week later the Duck reluctantly emerged from the cupboard
And began to prepare something for friend to eat.
He ransacked the shelves like old Mother Hubbard
Rescuing some tins of something or other which were now obsolete.

Which was fine by the Pig, he ate anything he could get his trotters on
He was just pleased to be reunited with his dear old friend.
He dined until what=ever the meal was called was gone
He did not enjoy the slop and once more had to pretend.

Stagecoach trundled, rutting, wheels
Soily grasp, grabbing at the earthy recipe
Cart....horsing around the outdoorsiness
Ferris wheel spun, gathering passengers
To overlook the show ground, smattered
Four legged races, saddled with encumbents
Bobbing in display formation.  Far above
I caught sight of circular ribbons emblazoned
Lapels holding onto prize winners, suffering
The pin ***** jabbing at willing winners
Left foot first, hopscotch to the flap of tarpaulin
Billowing their precious overgrown greatness
Of perfect vegetalia, proud, excessive....of the
Dinner plate variety.  Don't touch their polished
Surface, they deliberately await photographic
Validation; future growers, challenging champion
Chompers, terrorising super-veggie heros
I wonder what becomes of former ground growers
Do they take a back stage bow? Uprooted with
Those of a lesser kind, jostling for saucepan space

Gone unto Heaven

Unto the Heavens she hath gone
Leaving me with an only bun
My mother has passed away
So got no more time to work on clay
With her death, time recalled all hert past
While I sailed alone in a boat with one mast
I remembered all what she didwithout a fee
And how much she eagerly wished to see me
Her words are still alive in my mind
A lady like her is so hard to find
So mother rest in peace
We all miss you even my niece

Sam Burton


Today is Friday, Oct. 3, the 275th day of 2014 with 90 to follow.

The moon is waning. Morning stars are Jupiter, Mars and Uranus. Evening stars are Mercury, Neptune, Saturn and Venus.f



In 1950, the Peanuts comic strip by Charles M. Schulz was published for the first time.

In 1959, The Twilight Zone, with host Rod Serling, premiered on U.S. television.

In 1967, Thurgood Marshall was sworn in as the first African-American justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.



A thought for the day:



The upward course of a nation's history is due in the long run to the soundness of heart of its average men and women. -- Queen Elizabeth II





Quotes for the day:



A black cat crossing your path signifies that the animal is going somewhere.

------------------------

A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five.

------------------------

A hospital bed is a parked taxi with the meter running.



J. Marx





Every instance of heartbreak can teach us powerful lessons about creating the kind of love we really want.

Martha Beck





"With the exception of women, there is nothing on earth so agreeable or necessary to the comfort of man as the dog."



Edward Jesse



"Efforts and courage are not enough without purpose and direction."



John F. Kennedy



"All you need is the plan, the road map, and the courage to press on to your destination."



Earl Nightingale





Poetry


PLAYBACK



Lauren Camp



Let there be footfall and car door. Let me
be finished with fire. Let
the man get on a plane for his morning
departure, erasing each reverie. Soon
there will be only daylight,
maybe a blue envelope, torn. Maybe bracelets
of color from the petunias. I will need
to know how to recover
the familiar, how to open the door
in the evening. How to again lock it.
Almost everything about me goes unspoken,
but commas and colons. I live with this
heart rate, multiple times, its direction,
its tempo: my 4/4 with acceleration, sometimes
tuned to an alternate signature. Think of Brubeck's
"Take Five." Those blocky chords were the result
of an accident-dead on arrival, they said,
after he smashed to the surf. Think how
he switched it around, made his hands
do what he wanted to hear, and forgive me
for the analogy. May I never
rush a surge for a better experience.
Every Sunday all over the country,
apologies gather. When I'm not in this
small cottage, unreacting, I cascade sound
and a few sentences from a cramped
room to whoever will listen. I know some
people think it is sinful to love such temptations,
but I stay with my face soft against
microphone, announcing my moral
directions. Sometimes, I'm convinced my blood
needs all those crossings. I'm not after
absolution. The man I love taught me to want
without lyrics. Remember I haven't
gone anywhere. I'm in a thirsty way
sort of possessive. I shouldn't show you this
side of myself. Try to remember I'm also praised
for my kindness. We each need to learn
to turn off some dreams so we can play
hours without creases.


About this poem


"Sometimes my poems are clearly focused on a single topic, but more and more they seem to need to be about many things because that's how I experience the w orld-so much going on all the time. Given the chance, I'll always try to make c onnections-in this case between jazz, love, humanity and potential error."
-Lauren Camp

About Lauren Camp


Lauren Camp is the author of "The Dailiness" (Edwin E. Smith Publishing, 2 013). She hosts "Audio Saucepan," a global music/poetry program on Santa Fe Public R adio, and lives in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

*
The Academy of American Poets is a nonprofit, mission-driven organization, whose aim is to make poetry available to a wider audience.


(c) 2014 Lauren Camp.
Distributed by King Features Syndicate




Health and Beauty Tip



No matter what kind of ****** cleanser you use, check what kind of water you have access to. Hard water can be just as detrimental to skin as plain soap, and can dry it out.



JOKES



Toddler Property Laws



1. If I like it, it's mine.

2. If it's in my hand, it's mine.

3. If I can take it from you, it's mine.

4. If I had it a little while ago, it's mine.

5. If it's mine, it must never appear to be yours in any way.

6. If I'm doing or building something, all the pieces are mine.

7. If it looks just like mine, it's mine.

8. If I think it's mine, it's mine.

9. If I... Oops! I'm sorry, I goofed! Instead of typing in the Toddler Property Laws, I've been typing in Bill Gates' primary business plan.





Phone Call



A young boy answers the phone.

A man says, "Hello is your dad around?"

The boy whispers, "Yes."

The man then asks if he can talk to him.

"He's busy at the moment," the boy whispers.

"Then is your mom there?"

"Yes" the boy whispers.

"Can I talk to her?"

"No, she's busy," the boy whispers.

"Is there anyone else there?"

"Yes" whispered the boy.

"Who?" the man asked.

"A policeman," came the whispered reply.

"Well, can I talk to him?"

"He's busy too," the boy whispered.

"Is there anyone else there then?"

"Yes" whispered the boy.

"Who then?" the man asked.

"A fireman," the boy whispered.

"Can I talk to him?"

"No," the boy whispered, "he's busy."

Annoyed, the man asked what they were all doing.

"Looking for me." the boy whispered.





Hard Working?



A business owner decides to take a tour around his business and see how things are going. He goes down to the shipping docks and sees a young man leaning against the wall doing nothing.

The owner walks up to the young man and says, "Son, how much do you make a day?"

The guy replies, "150 dollars."

The owner pulls out his wallet, gives him $150, and tells him to get out and never come back.

A few minutes later the shipping clerk says to the boss, "Have you seen that UPS driver? I left him standing around here?"



Presidential Quotes



"If Lincoln were alive today he'd roll over in his grave." --Gerald Ford (president, 1974-77)

---

"A friend of mine was asked to a costume ball a while ago. He slapped some egg on his face and went as a liberal economist." --Ronald Reagan

---

"I want to make sure everybody who has a job wants a job." --George Bush





Football and Confession



Years ago, the chaplain of the football team at Notre Dame was a beloved old Irish priest.

At confession one day, a football player told the priest that he had acted in an unsportsmanlike manner at a recent football game. "I lost my temper and said some bad words to one of my opponents." "Ahhh, that's a terrible thing for a Notre Dame lad to be doin'," the priest said. He took a piece of chalk and drew a mark across the sleeve of his coat.

"That's not all, Father. I got mad and punched one of my opponents."

"Saints preserve us!" the priest said, making another chalk mark.

"There's more. As I got out of a pileup, I kicked two of the other team's players in the . . . in a sensitive area."

"Oh, goodness me!" the priest wailed, making two more chalk marks on his sleeve. "Who in the world were we playin' when you did these awful things?"

"Southern Methodist."

"Ah, well," said the priest, wiping his sleeve, "boys will be boys."




Have a super nice Friday and a very dazzling weekend!

Don’t eat chicken noodle soup from a saucepan leaned back in a recliner
because your neighbor could hit his wife in the back of the head
with a cue ball and the cops might siren down your street
causing you to flinch and spill hot broth on your
chest;  I have a bone to pick with the coward.

Full sta(r)ring
I sit as the window
was a pleading enormous nobody
he declared my head
practically lost.

2.
flustered you’ll doubt that
he glanced
sleep can’t.

3.
Crooked conversation listeners
clenched authority grimy
beside the sight attempt

4.
that chanced amusement
obliged its stiff attempt
by askance explanation
he and the slipped tongue
therefore sitting
on the heels of friday

5.
overhead the engine slipped suddenly when
she whispers explanation
grand

6.
growling hurried difficulty
shouldn’t reason but
the creature bitterly
declared in smaller steps
"you’ll doubt when i"

7.
I blinked and riddle
the shifting moral of executed
fright the cunning
underpromised
dependent muddle
congressional huddle

8.
not the sadistic wet world
glaring or the the the
defended
answers soaped the the the
dyed course
hello doesn’t the the the
let my coming

9.
adding highest denial
we tear the despair
rolling secret sea so far
winter guard softly introduced
my remembered underneath

10.
his daughter
a canary warily dared
to pretend to drink in
bound education of judging

11.
the height dating
and pushy she interrupting
like the party
for wonderful
      couple of sharks

12.
elbow listening did dishes
she declared panicky
we will go by asking
uh um
curled hair blank slate
forming saucepan all sobbing

I know that look,
don't let my arms unhook from around your neck,
you'll make me cry or laugh trying.
eyes wide or closed you let me see.
the would you filled with oxygen, when I thought only in keratin,
those feathers that prickled now tickle and the waves wash me warm.
you watched films with me, wished and washed away the wanders of the world, stories of curses and castles that move with the ebb and the flow, and I know you said till the north wind blows but I thought you didn't want to go.
you used and abused the power you had over my imagination for hour after hour after hour inill our love ran sour.
but its just four letters that create a sound that escape the lips on unruly men.
So I became caught up looking for my Heathcliff because its me, Cathy at your window and my god its ******* freezing.

so he kissed my lips with his nicotine lies, crept from my lungs just to start on my thighs, built me up, let me down, handed me promises and then let me drown.
but as nights out changed from pastise so saucepan eyes saying goodbye made me realise that I had bigger fish to fry.

but I've been learning and growing learning when to say no and soon enough I can show how to make my own feelings known.
but sometimes tripping's harder when there's someone to catch you, and the hitting's always harder with someone you attach too.
but just wait, wait, wait, see this guys got flaws too and at some point in the future it'll resonate on you.
it burns a hole in my heart that the sun doesn't see and the blame for that pain, yeah well that falls on me.
but creating something you love that is due to the lack of it. in some beautiful way always just brings you right back to it.
but don't let that word slip too quick from your lips because even if not reciprocated when taken back stings, stop softening your words, trying to stretch unborn wings because in that situation there no one who wins.

with people whispering, gossiping , eyes twinkling starts to sing of never ending social mistakes or lies humour and heart breaks, vocal **** spreading takes me to a place where every one fakes there smiles, laughter and good days.
coz sitting pretty's pretty ******* when your stuck in this sitting of self pity and loathing. and when it comes to freedom and adventure, most people here don't dare to dip a toe in. and days go by full of lies of self sacrifice and not looking twice at the sky that could be reached if you had just tried to fly.

I’d hidden away the mirrors
Packed them up and sent them off,
Taken the shine off the saucepan lids,
Sandpapered the coffee ***,
Everything that reflected I’d
Sand-blast, like the sliding doors,
Even got rid of the polisher
For shining the wooden floors.

It was very like narcolepsy when
She saw her face on a plate,
She’d go in a trance and sit for hours
In a crazy, dreamlike state,
I’d take away the reflection and
She’d sit and weep for hours,
‘You’ve taken away my beauty,’ she
Would say, and take cold showers.

It seemed like a terrible sickness that
She loved her looks so much,
She’d say, ‘If you won’t let me see myself,
I’ll just make do with touch,’
She’d run her fingers over her face
Explore each crease and mound,
And sigh to her satisfaction as
She felt her lips turn down.

I couldn’t get rid of the garden pool
That flowed on in from the brook,
Babbling over the standing stones
From the woods at Nether Hook,
I’d catch her kneeling beside the pool
And staring into its depths,
Smiling at each reflection that
Would ripple with every breath.

‘Beware of the evil Water Sprite,’
I told her more than once,
‘He takes advantage of lovely girls
For he hates to be outdone.
He’ll lure you into a shady pool
With guile, and his tender lies
And hold you down ‘til you surely drown,
You’ll avoid him, if you’re wise.’

She told me then of a vision that
She’d seen, that of a prince,
He’d smiled at her from the water but
She hadn’t seen him since.
‘That’s not a prince but the Water Sprite
And he’s trying to lure you down,
To put your face to the water, but
I’ve told you once, you’ll drown.’

The water was babbling gently on
A sunny day in Spring,
In shades of the weeping myrtles and
The sound of cuckooing,
Miranda was knelt beside the pool
And I saw her head go down,
When claws reached out of the water
Pulled her in, without a sound.

I raced across and I seized her hair
And I pulled her from the pool,
But claws had raked at her pretty face,
She said, ‘I feel a fool!
I should have listened to you, I know
But I thought that just one kiss…’
But he had turned to a monster and
Had bitten her rose red lips.

I put the mirrors all back in place
And I bought new shiny pans,
Polished the floor, you can see your face
But she hides behind her hands,
She never looks in a mirror now
Though her scars are healed and white,
But goes each day to poison the pool
To **** off the Water Sprite.

David Lewis Paget

It was the morning after the night before
Three bullet holes were embedded in the dress.
Strangely there was no blood on the floor
You don’t need to be an expert to guess the rest.

Because the event did not happen, it was all a dream
A dream produced solely inside the pig’s head.
Things were not how they planned to be or seem
The future Mrs Pig is not real and definitely not dead.

Mr Duck slithered into the room with a pipe hanging from his beak
A stuck on pair of mutton chops and a green check cape.
Mr Pig hid behind a newspaper laughing unable to speak
Hatching a cunning plan from which to escape.

“So my dear Watson, er sorry Pig, what were you dreaming last night.”
Mr Duck was puffing awkwardly on his pipe.
I suggest I heard a scream just on when it became light
And you were muttering on about a blood type.

“Murderer” shouted Mr Pig, and then slapped his hand across his lips.
Regretting his choice of word he quickly said “moody aren’t we”
Mr Duck tried to squint at him and stood with his wing on his hips
Squinting was ******* - he could hardly focus let alone see.

He now was confused, slung off the cape which was getting hotter
That was because it burst into flames from ash from the pipe
Which promptly landed on Mr Pig’s sore trotter?
Mr Pig was oblivious to this and thought he smelt tripe.

However the newspaper he was holding went up in smoke
Mr Pig heard the crash of a saucepan and its lid.
Thinking what now has Mr Duck broke
Not realising Mr Duck had fled and hid.

Now can you guess the rest?

Her parents
row at night
Fay heard them

from her bed
her brothers
young and small

innocent
in their sleep
she held tight

in her hand
her wooden
rosary

her small thumb
rubbed over
the plaster

crucified
two voices
in conflict

high and low
a duet
that threatened

harsh violence
Fay's body
huddled up

beneath wool
coverings
if only

Benedict
could be there
him there now

at the foot
of her bed
her 12 year

old white knight
and she his
12 year old

young princess
of their twin
childlike game

but he's not
he sleeps in
his own bed

in a flat
on the next
balcony

beneath hers
if only
he would come

sword in hand
standing there
at the foot

of her bed
protecting
with his mum's

small saucepan
a helmet
on his head.

He said, "Tell her it was your fault,"
As if a four-year-old drawing Spiderman in art class was the worst offense--
Messier than the milk he spilled that morning and louder than he'd scream that night
As his mom looms over him, saucepan in tow.
"Tell her it was your fault," he insisted as his mom got out of the car to collect her son,
Her property, her punching bag, and bring him home to God only knows what kind of house
Full of whips and chains or--perhaps worse than that--sheer normalcy and the emptiness of a wealthy family's home
Since a life lived being pushed around is one that feels bare like a vacant motel room
Where one day he'll sit, thrown out of his house by his wife and kids
Who will be stronger than his mom was, braver than she'll ever be.
He just wanted me to say it was my fault so I did, but it wasn't enough to break the spell
And now I know that nothing ever will be
Because five hours of statements with the police and interviews with child services
Won't effect change in this boy's life
Because if his saying, "Mom hits me" can't,
Then nothing will.

I think anyone would
sitting in a saucepan
with a shocked look of surprise
on its blue cold face.
Feet dangling over the side
turning a nice shade of pink.
Feeling hot, hot, hot
Feeling hot, hot, hot
Nok likely.
The lobster dashed bravely
out of the pan.
Again with a shocked look
of surprise on its face.

I made a bowl of soup for myself tonight.
Red bean, kale, and quinoa.
I toasted two slices of bread,
buttered them,
let them cool.
I planned on dunking them
in the soup
to sop up leftover broth.

While the canned food heated
in the red saucepan
on the first burner
to the right,
I did simple tasks.
Recycled bottles from days before,
put away the dishes in the drying rack,
fed the cat.

I paced back and forth,
in my purple socks,
from my bedroom
to the kitchen,
listening to an old record
that sounds like nostalgia.

I did simple tasks.
Small, achievable things.
Self care comes
in many forms.

It was a dark Byron night when
You and i looked at the stars,
Explained to the Indigo child,
From America,
His name was Tyler
That there a
Saucepan beside a
Southern Cross
...
And then we
Went
On a journey of discovery...

Thirteen years later we
Are still here.

With the same dreams,
Right beside the same fears.


Do You Have A vision?

If so, proclaim it to me now.

Dear Husband,
I Miss You.