"strident" poems
Look in the mirror. Let us both look.
Here is my naked body.
Apparently you like it,
I have no reason to.
Who bound us, me and my body?
Why must I die
together with it?
I have the right to know where the borderline
between us is drawn.
Where am I, I, I myself.
Belly, am I in the belly? In the intestines?
In the hollow of the *** In a toe?
Apparently in the brain. I do not see it.
Take my brain out of my skull. I have the right
to see myself. Don’t laugh.
That’s macabre, you say.
It’s not me who made
my body.
I wear the used rags of my family,
an alien brain, fruit of chance, hair
after my grandmother, the nose
glued together from a few dead noses.
What do I have in common with all that?
What do I have in common with you, who like
my knee, what is my knee to me?
Surely
I would have chosen a different model.
I will leave both of you here,
my knee and you.
Don’t make a wry face, I will leave you all my body
to play with.
And I will go.
There is no place for me here,
in this blind darkness waiting for
corruption.
I will run out, I will race
away from myself.
I will look for myself
running
like crazy
till my last breath.
One must hurry
before death comes. For by then
like a dog ****** by its chain
I will have to return
into this stridently suffering body.
To go through the last
most strident ceremony of the body.
Defeated by the body,
slowly annihilated because of the body
I will become kidney failure
or the gangrene of the large intestine.
And I will expire in shame.
And the universe will expire with me,
reduced as it is
to a kidney failure
and the gangrene of the large intestine.
12k
☮ ☮ ☮
**Society needs more Social Justice.
Humanity needs peaceworkers.**
Peace and Social Justice must be promoted aggressively. There are inequities that must be addressed. Power is not equally distributed. Neither are resources or wealth. Neither are poetic gifts or vision equitably distributed. Unearned privilege is rampant. Poetry must confront this global crisis of capitalist exploitation and manipulation. Poetry must speak to the masses. Poetry must radicalize and inform consciousness to new levels of social change. Marginalized citizens must be empowered. All ****** gender-based, racial, religious, age-based, homophobic, xenophobic, and gynophobic bigots must be brought to see in a new way through our poetry. Community building and local empowerment are of the order. Our poetry must be global in scope – yet rooted and grounded in local community empowerment. Selfless acts of service to promote and increase Social Justice are needed. Lives selflessly devoted to establishing social justice are called for. Our poetic lives must be laid on the altar of the dis-enfranchised and unrepresented. We, as consciously aware poets, must advocate and speak out for those who have no voice.
We, as poets, must, through stirring words of Social Justice, embody through our radical verses the burning hope of a just and sustainable future. This future must become increasingly collective as formerly marginalized consumers become empowered community-builders – through our poetry. As poets of the sustainable future we will empower and inform. Our poetry must collectivize, entitle and enslave. We must speak with ONE VOICE: the voice of change and social justice. Our words will rise with healing in their wings and lift whole communities from despair to radicalized self-awareness in communities filled with strident, intolerant and maniacal practitioners of PEACE & SOCIAL JUSTICE. All poets who do not lay their entire creative and lyrical selves on the altar of struggle to bring CHANGE and SOCIAL JUSTICE will be LIQUIDATED by our own EMPOWERED POETRY. IN THE END WE WILL WRITE A PURE POETRY OF SOCIAL CHANGE, ALL IN CAPS, AND THIS POETRY OF SOCIAL JUSTICE AND EMPOWERMENT WILL BE READ OVER THE GRAVES OF ALL SELL-OUT, CORPORATE, FASCIST, SNITCHING, SELFISH, UNEMPOWERED AND UNEMPOWERING TRAITORS AND ENEMIES OF SOCIAL JUSTICE. IN THE END THERE WILL BE NO PUNCTUATION OR EVEN WORDS ONLY PURE IMAGES OF CHANGE + VISIONARY COLLABORATION IN SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION/MAYBE SLASH MARKS/OKAY MAYBE EXCLAMATION POINTS TOO BUT ONLY THOSE !
WHY? BECAUSE THE ONLY GOOD POET IS A LIVING POET WHO HAS LIQUIDATED EVERY FALSE POET NOT COMMITTED TO THE STRUGGLE FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE !
LONG LIVE POETRY IN ACTION THROUGH CHANGE!
WRITE/SPEAK/AGITATE
FOR SOCIAL JUSTICE & EMPOWERMENT !
**POETRY IS STRUGGLE☻
STRUGGLE IS CHANGE☻
CHANGE REQUIRES SOCIAL JUSTICE☻
SOCIAL JUSTICE BRINGS PEACE☻
PEACE BRINGS WAR☻
WAR BRINGS CONFUSION & DEATH☻**
(SO DON’T BE CONFUSED)
Sep 9, 2015
Sep 9, 2015 at 9:03 PM UTC
Almost round 4:00pm two Asian lover dovers with giggly
laughter took the South Bound subway to South Philly.
Their outward display was so neat and pleasing like a painter with my pen I had to write this...
Watching two Asian school youths;
frequently there;
every smile every nuance of expressions,
their soul-mate world
tells about their quiet and giggly adoration
Transformed from their
hard steel bench
is now a park bench
Encompassing strident voices fade;
Their happy world is victorious
She sits upon his lap
And whispers; they faintly laugh
Their entwined thoughts
cannot be pulled asunder
As I write, I observe;
I laugh to myself,
the remembrance
of my soul-mate and myself
many years ago...
Sep 29, 2014
Sep 29, 2014 at 5:35 PM UTC
Q-Tips raised! Their storm approaches.
Swab those ear-gates free and clear.
Thunder frightens the rats and roaches.
Looming clouds are drawing near;
Audible anticipation
Waxes with our rising nation.
Hope-porn is the thing with feathers
flying low, right before the gale.
Strident left-wing get-togethers
Do their best to countervail.
Tribunals herald something worse . . .
Enjoy some popcorn with my verse.
Martial law—a new diversion,
Flapping wings on the Left and Right
Disturbs the coop (or coup?). Subversion
now displays its plumes outright.
Deep-state angels prove satanic
sparking upper-level panic.
Rumors can be quite arresting.
Cresting waves on the Psy-Ops sea
Break and roll, now manifesting
Dumbed-down mobs, conspiracy . . .
Some citizens awake to truth;
The rest rave on, benighted youth.
Oct 6, 2018
Oct 6, 2018 at 11:23 AM UTC
twitchy sniffly noses
silky bracelets woven
a sennight of whispers
and soft rains fallen
bones strident ringing
skins slow submerging
bloodshot eyes and
star-shot skies and
cheekbones shrouded
in staling chlorine
sneaking syrup smiles
under honey gold
four tonics drowned
to fight off the cold
and fast fortune-telling
for finites foretold
trace the lines and
face the folds, please
hold both palms closer
but leave them closed
twitchy ditzy fingers
***** rings unspooled
a sennight of stories
and sinking in pools
bones washed in phenol
skins slick like ferrule
bloodshot minds and
star-shot why’s and
wisteria lips speckled in
the warmest shade of cool.
Jan 26, 2022
Jan 26, 2022 at 8:01 PM UTC
Il pleure dans mon coeur (“It rains in my heart”)
by Paul Verlaine
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
It rains in my heart
As it rains on the town;
Heavy languor and dark
Drenches my heart.
Oh, the sweet-sounding rain
Cleansing pavements and roofs!
For my listless heart's pain
The pure song of the rain!
Still it rains without reason
In my overcast heart.
Can it be there's no treason?
That this grief's without reason?
As my heart floods with pain,
Lacking hatred, or love,
I've no way to explain
Such bewildering pain!
Published by Better Than Starbucks
Paul-Marie Verlaine (1844-1896) was a French poet and a prominent figure in the Symbolist and Decadent poetry movements. Verlaine has been called "one of the most purely lyrical of French poets." Keywords/Tags: Verlaine, French, translation, rain, languor, heart, treason, reason, pain, hatred, love, Arthur Rimbaud
Ophélie (“Ophelia”), an Excerpt
by Arthur Rimbaud
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
On pitiless black waves unsinking stars abide
... while pale Ophelia, a lethargic lily, drifts by ...
Here, tangled in her veils, she floats on the tide ...
Far-off, in the woods, we hear the strident bugle’s cry.
For a thousand years, or more, sad Ophelia,
This albescent phantom, has rocked here, to and fro.
For a thousand years, or more, in her gentle folly,
Ophelia has rocked here when the night breezes blow.
For a thousand years, or more, sad Ophelia,
Has passed, an albescent phantom, down this long black river.
For a thousand years, or more, in her sweet madness
Ophelia has made this river shiver.
Mar 28, 2020
Mar 28, 2020 at 2:13 AM UTC
She was
coach that
held much
change today
with her
sky aloof
and her
draw still
has gallop
and harmony
sweet as
fudge with
striker here
and her
most strident
step in
soccer today.
Jun 26, 2016
Jun 26, 2016 at 11:43 AM UTC
Sagaciously gloaming melanite eyes
Resonating euphoniously ululated memories;
The shadow land of illusion
Rising out of the ash of an acorn
Wallowing in the blood of wars strident refuge,
Gnomic relics errant of an
Enigmatic almondine heart
Offering an olive branch upon an
Altar made of oak.
A ruminantly nostalgic requiem
Sedititiously traversing the firmament;
Ineluctable reprobation
Ineffably manifested,
The doves of meta-morphosis
Embracing the silk garments of love;
Sound minds cacophany
Devouring the delusional devout
Veridically inspiring ascendancy
Decieving serenities whisper throughout
The dominions audaciously
Rousing ambivalent fears.
ELEETE J MUIR.
Jan 13, 2012
Jan 13, 2012 at 10:27 AM UTC
Same old drudgery,
Papers fresh for grading;
Topics, seldom new,
If honestly presented,
At least encourage worth
In form, in format, in tradition.
Plagiarism creeps up,
Always shocking,
The unauthorized changing
Of voice, of tone, of diction,
Not unlike the sting of a ruthless needle,
The drip of a hollowed, poisoned fang,
The bite of frost, burning a tender cheek...
Sadly familiar, this strident pang.
All hope is lost.
Anger sets in,
Trust wilts,
Hope fades gray.
In plagiarism, the fool's truth lies;
To belie one's honor is to watch it die.
Oct 22, 2018
Oct 22, 2018 at 9:06 PM UTC
As I lay in my bed
in this dark room
the silence is strident
and so is my mind.
My thoughts immediately go to
you
every moment of the day
until
my eyes grow heavy
and my body is at peace
but still
you're there
in the back of my mind.
Sep 29, 2015
Sep 29, 2015 at 6:53 PM UTC
I go unwilling and unarmed
Recruited by age I lay me down
The medals gleaming on my coat
Mean nothing now, my vessel weak
Hard for my ship to stay afloat
The ocean once sparkling blue
A dingy grey of lowering clouds
Dark and foreboding as a storm
I recall standing proudly on the prow
My crew would not know me now
There are things to accept, things to learn
Time to know my place, take the stern
My orders once barked in strident tone
Now a whisper, not my own
My ship becalmed, canons disarmed
Her flag that once flew with pride
Is still, no wind can stir her, colours bled
I salute and a gust raises her high,
A blood red pennant in a star filled sky
I am not afraid to die
Oct 5, 2021
Oct 5, 2021 at 8:15 AM UTC
Up went the roar of the crowd,
Ascending, volumes above, beyond
The everyday murmur of pestering silence.
A futile struggle to withstand its force,
Like a vast wave, rogue and raging,
Slamming nature, a slap in the face of feebleness,
This crowd roars…
Not anger, not anguish, or grief,
But a prideful scream of declaration;
The masses make it known, and known again,
Fists raised, pulverizing the air to a beat
Of human design, of togetherness, of solidarity
In the fight for those like us, a howl,
This crowd roars…
Stampeding feet berate the beaten earth,
Invigorated legs supporting pounding hearts,
To a beat, rolling with the flow,
Energy infusing the soul, encased in flesh, bone, and blood;
Marching onward, forward, processional strides
Declaring and making it known with battle cries,
This crowd roars…
Shouts of proclamation echo the strident resistance
With thunder, earth-quaking, walls crumbling, chains shattering
With thunder, dancing against the discordant system;
Proud warriors raising flags of protest
Amidst the roar, roister, and riots, rising reactionaries
Refusing submission, declining resignation,
This crowd roars…
Bounded together, by blood, by common cause,
Mingling masses of forgotten arise with a vocal
Outcry, intense, pulsing from the core (of us)
Like an infestation, infuriated, a torrent swarm (of us)
Flowing upwards, eroding all obstructions.
Declare, proclaim, announce, request, demand,
This crowd roars…
Jun 28, 2015
Jun 28, 2015 at 12:31 AM UTC
[Dedicated to Allan Bennett]
I
Hail to the golden One
Seen in the midmost Sun !
Hail to the golden beard and golden lips,
His whole lige golden to the finger-tips !
Hail to the golden hair in golden showers
Hiding the eyes like blue blue lotus-flowers !
His name is Ut, for He
Hath risen above all things that be.
II
Ardent and white, the Lord
Whirls forth a strident sword.
Its blade is broader than the great World-Ash ;
Its edge is keener than the lightning flash.
Brighter than all the lights of heaven, it whirls
Out in a chaos of creative curls
And sheathes itself in Me,
Arisen above all things that be.
III
Even as the burning tongue
Og God to God that clung
Dissolved his being to a nameless naught,
Brake all the wings and waves of time and thought,
So in the quivering flame that hurled
Its founts of life to the remotest world
Supreme stood Death, and sware
Destruction to all things that were !
IV
Child, father, warrior,
I worshipped thee before ;
Friend, bridegroom, now I yield me to the rod.
My God, and very God of very God
As breath, as death, as all, as naught, unknown,
Known, is there not an end, when one alone
Stand I, and thou, and He
Arisen above all things that be?
2.4k
She arrives in high stilletto’s
And a miniskirt so taught
That the boys are all distracted
And our job becomes a rort,
And the office girls get ******
And production spirals down
So then our new Middle Manager
Rolls up her sleeves and goes to town....
She sticks her oar in frequently
And stands with jutted hip,
She’s territorial dynamite
And serves us gloating lip.
She often curries favour
With Department Heads and such
And makes a fuss at our expense
Which irritates so much!
She has a way to circumvent
The types she will not face,
In using her authority
To snidely put them in their place.
Her manner is too sharp
And too dismissive for my taste
And the condescending smile
Has me grinding teeth to paste.
And the way she stands and taps her toe
And glares beneath her brows
Has the office juniors panicking
And avoiding, as allows.
There’s an issue over paper
And the telephone account
And the petty cash, though balanced,
Is a questionable amount.
Historically our working week
Has employed a give and take
With an easy flexibility
That allows us all a break,
But the new Middle Manager
Has reversed the mode of work
So that everyone competes
And the roster’s gone beserk!
Her manner’s often strident
With a whiplash to her voice
And the snarl of her vindictiveness
Leaves us all with little choice
But to bend our backs to labour,
Work our fingers to the bone
And suffer her till knock off
Then, thank God, we’re fleeing home!
There’s a memo in the “In box”
Rumour has it, from on high,
That due to overdue restructuring,
That some redundancies are nigh.
And though there’s great reluctance
And some measure of regret...
It seems our new Middle Manager
Has got her notice...Sorry Pet!
Marshalg
Victoria Park Tunnel
15 January 2011
Jan 14, 2011
Jan 14, 2011 at 4:38 PM UTC
Her sea blue gaze arises half asleep.
In silent stasis, sovereign, doth she shine?
Her cadence pulls me inward like the deep.
How selfish would it be to call her mine?
Poseidon cries and grips his strident depths.
In time, I’ll feel the raindrops on my skin.
Beneath the ocean, soundless, I had slept.
Until her laughter drew me from within.
Like rivers with no guidance, I was lost.
She was the sand that swam among the waves.
I had no premonition that the cost
Of sinking in her silence was so grave.
Again, she pulled me deeper into pain.
And vowed that I would never feel the rain.
May 24, 2016
May 24, 2016 at 12:54 PM UTC
Desired to be more attuned with idols
Their private lives gleaned from
Stills and moving images cutting swaths across
Skyscraping billboards, TV screens
The sides of passing buses
Subway cars headed deeper in,
Further in, beneath
Magazine spreads pulled out for
ad-hoc posters taped and tacked across
the plaster-sputtering suburban drywall paths
Like screams in arctic winds
Many, the young mean-spirited things
Wanting kinship with these enemies
Trying to plot a course to
**** diagonally-up across
their strident wildlife scenes
Attuned with idols riding their
phantom wavelengths with the
maverick assistance of Reds and
water-cut pints of irish whiskey
Then Father comes in proclaiming
to have saved our democracy on
the whim of a lever-pull upon
a municipal voting machine
No interruptions now please
I will direct the favors of my unborn
I am honed in on what really matters:
Hemingway hedonism.
Getting dead with generations
slinking in and out of frame
from before and after
me
Nov 7, 2018
Nov 7, 2018 at 2:25 PM UTC
I listen to the sound of the breaking waves
Smell the salt tang in the air
I watch the graceful seagulls
Ride the thermals way up there
No sound of human voice, no strident car alarms
I sit in natures solitude enraptured by her charms
The sea reflects the sinking sun in hues of red and gold
I'll never tire of such things though I grow grey and old
The first gleam of the evening star appears in the ever growing dark
And the golden crescent of the moon begins her journey through the night
No words of mine can best describe natures perfect charm
This is peace, a perfect peace, tranquillity and calm
Apr 28, 2014
Apr 28, 2014 at 5:26 PM UTC
Spleen
by Paul Verlaine
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
The roses were so very red;
The ivy, impossibly black.
Dear, with a mere a turn of your head,
My despair’s flooded back!
The sky was too gentle, too blue;
The sea, far too windswept and green.
Yet I always imagined―or knew―
I’d again feel your spleen.
Now I'm tired of the glossy waxed holly,
Of the shimmering boxwood too,
Of the meadowland’s endless folly,
When all things, alas, lead to you!
Paul-Marie Verlaine (1844-1896) was a French poet and a prominent figure in the Symbolist and Decadent poetry movements. Verlaine has been called "one of the most purely lyrical of French poets." Keywords/Tags: Verlaine, French, translation, spleen, roses, ivy, despair, sky, sea, blue, green, red, black, holly, boxwood, Arthur Rimbaud
Ophélie (“Ophelia”), an Excerpt
by Arthur Rimbaud
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch
On pitiless black waves unsinking stars abide
... while pale Ophelia, a lethargic lily, drifts by ...
Here, tangled in her veils, she floats on the tide ...
Far-off, in the woods, we hear the strident bugle’s cry.
For a thousand years, or more, sad Ophelia,
This albescent phantom, has rocked here, to and fro.
For a thousand years, or more, in her gentle folly,
Ophelia has rocked here when the night breezes blow.
For a thousand years, or more, sad Ophelia,
Has passed, an albescent phantom, down this long black river.
For a thousand years, or more, in her sweet madness
Ophelia has made this river shiver.
Mar 28, 2020
Mar 28, 2020 at 2:17 AM UTC
I will not toy with it nor bend an inch.
Deep in the secret chambers of my heart
I muse my life-long hate, and without flinch
I bear it nobly as I live my part.
My being would be a skeleton, a shell,
If this dark Passion that fills my every mood,
And makes my heaven in the white world's hell,
Did not forever feed me vital blood.
I see the mighty city through a mist--
The strident trains that speed the goaded mass,
The poles and spires and towers vapor-kissed,
The fortressed port through which the great ships pass,
The tides, the wharves, the dens I contemplate,
Are sweet like wanton loves because I hate.
1.9k
Days are splendorous,
in the royal color wash,
and frost,
of November.
Four thirty is a burning torchlight
of reminiscence.
November,
older,
wiser,
But similar,
in the way that air,
is a rustle of crisp leaves,
and emotions that,
stretch across the horizon,
like an autumn parade.
Familiar,
in the way that,
shifting parameters of light,
invigorate and disturb.
Prodigious,
whispering of enchantment,
and it's Siamese twin,
disillusionment.
November,
That lingers like a somber melody,
or a dense beat,
hanging on the evening wind,
Whose disruptive energy,
is portentous,
of wakeful nights to come.
That shimmers,
and shivers,
and sings,
sending a mating call,
to ravenous winter.
November,
is a communicable pheromone,
am aphrodisiac,
A crescendo.
The yearly succubus,
crowned,
in her raucous display,
of jewels,
Her ingenious distraction,
as she drains the world
of warmth,
and daylight.
And I am hallowed.
November's champion,
riding the dark,
like a faithful steed.
A cowgirl about town.
An outlaw,
blown in on a strident wind,
Primed to partake,
of libation and lechery,
because I am restless,
and it is too brisk to wander.
November is distilled,
and flows like hot cider,
steaming in the faces,
of days it leaves cold.
It is one thousand proof,
and permeates breath vapor,
each small fog,
that lingers like an apparition.
Shades of November,
fettered from dissipation,
as winter,
in search of answers,
clutches at the evidence of its becoming.
Dec 4, 2017
Dec 4, 2017 at 11:10 PM UTC
the harmony of discordant tunes
infiltrates mind
closed to thought
strewn against wind
in the onslaught of scattered
steely voices
attuned to this one alone
messages of self-loathing
that medication covers over
the bandage merely adequate
a stale, small blanket
wooley
euthanize thought
unapologetically strident
so that this one
can finally
sleep
dreamlessly
Feb 7, 2012
Feb 7, 2012 at 1:37 PM UTC
Support your local drug dealer, **** your local poets
Protest the local governance
and burn your houses to the ground
We don't need them anymore, not where we're going
So rise to your feet and sweep away the apathy
this is a call to arms, your swollen scarred weather-beaten arms
Take your loved ones and dispel your desires
the Id and Ego will die soon
and we can bury them beneath the beetroot
blood red desires of the human psyche dissipate
All your instinct are an lies
Here in lies,
a truth you despise
Oh, the world in your eyes
After death, again we can rise
Jul 5, 2014
Jul 5, 2014 at 5:48 AM UTC
Vivid with love, eager for greater beauty
Out of the night we come
Into the corridor, brilliant and warm.
A metal door slides open,
And the lift receives us.
Swiftly, with sharp unswerving flight
The car shoots upward,
And the air, swirling and angry,
Howls like a hundred devils.
Past the maze of trim bronze doors,
Steadily we ascend.
I cling to you
Conscious of the chasm under us,
And a terrible whirring deafens my ears.
The flight is ended.
We pass thru a door leading onto the ledge—
Wind, night and space
Oh terrible height
Why have we sought you?
Oh bitter wind with icy invisible wings
Why do you beat us?
Why would you bear us away?
We look thru the miles of air,
The cold blue miles between us and the city,
Over the edge of eternity we look
On all the lights,
A thousand times more numerous than the stars;
Oh lines and loops of light in unwound chains
That mark for miles and miles
The vast black mazy cobweb of the streets;
Near us clusters and splashes of living gold
That change far off to bluish steel
Where the fragile lights on the Jersey shore
Tremble like drops of wind-stirred dew.
The strident noises of the city
Floating up to us
Are hallowed into whispers.
Ferries cross thru the darkness
Weaving a golden thread into the night,
Their whistles weird shadows of sound.
We feel the millions of humanity beneath us,—
The warm millions, moving under the roofs,
Consumed by their own desires;
Preparing food,
Sobbing alone in a garret,
With burning eyes bending over a needle,
Aimlessly reading the evening paper,
Dancing in the naked light of the café,
Laying out the dead,
Bringing a child to birth—
The sorrow, the torpor, the bitterness, the frail joy
Come up to us
Like a cold fog wrapping us round.
Oh in a hundred years
Not one of these blood-warm bodies
But will be worthless as clay.
The anguish, the torpor, the toil
Will have passed to other millions
Consumed by the same desires.
Ages will come and go,
Darkness will blot the lights
And the tower will be laid on the earth.
The sea will remain
Black and unchanging,
The stars will look down
Brilliant and unconcerned.
Beloved,
Tho’ sorrow, futility, defeat
Surround us,
They cannot bear us down.
Here on the abyss of eternity
Love has crowned us
For a moment
Victors.
1.7k
a raven, alone in an old empty church
living by the silence of the moonlit night;
soars into the sky; crying on a silver birch
of seeing other creatures being recognized,
a raven, a captive of every old yearning vow
seeks a better place, yet wings are broken;
if only this strident world is listening now,
that raven might whisper its existence.
Apr 23, 2013
Apr 23, 2013 at 9:34 AM UTC