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Westley Barnes Dec 2013
Bright windy November
with the slap of cold sun sending frowns
and the absent rain not beating down
choleric substitutes of alcohol withdrawal
and spatial omissions of home fires stoking
empty remembrances of faded potential and
misplaced amorous regret
Haunted by the lingering smell of the souls of
last night's GUINNESS intake staying swell in
the nostrils which is in reality the gulf breeze blowing
gullshit down the river Liffey giver of life.

...And here I am Dublin pillaged and funded
en route to the hour-rate slog
shiny white commerce bleaching out of
windowsills distracting from rooftop
Chiaroscuro  serenading a sky
which old ****** forgotten Sons and Daughters
will die under.

Boots tapping mock-goosestep to the ground
past a girl who speaks on her IPHONE to someone
who presumably not only wants to be seen speaking
to someone on their IPHONE but who also cares enough
to listen as the girl announces to all-and-sundry
human dodging on Bachelors Walk this fateful morn
that "I realised what my problem is Now! People
think i'm saying N when I'm really saying M!"

.....quite an existential crisis you got there, EH DOC?

("This girl's SITUATION belongs in a scenario in the TV show GIRLS which young
Woman Europe-wide have embraced as their spiritual saviour in an era of Consumer
impulse control. By placing the mundane generalities and perceived social failings
interpreted by young American female comediennes as instead representing a means of
self-forgiveness and attempted new-wave soft-core feminist self-celebration young American
actresses are inspiring a new generation of young woman to speak openly in a more in-depth level about everything that usually happens to themselves or some girl they know"-From "The Post-New Male Gaze: Interpreting Critiques of Stereotypically Feminized Pop Culture in Westley Barnes's "Notes on a Rant: The "Took Me Up To Dublin Where It's Famous" Notebook
:2013
)

This is the new white noise.

White Irish Male Critiques perceived socially-announced problems of White Irish Female over White Technology on a white morning in a grey city.

A grey city which subliminally stinks of shame and left-over guilt and of spending too much money on tecno-toys and new-improved nullifying debauchery and even rent during a significantly rough stretch of fiscal years. After a lot of years of white nonsense, really.

But this is where I took myself, and this is what happens once you take yourself here and this is where its famous for it.
Dublin,
Once Monto-based FUNDERLAND for the rich and royal turned over-waxie infested tenement slum district and second city of an industrialised economy waiting for the rest of the world to pay its way.
Dublin,
capital of green and squeaky saviours of the third-world who made some money and forgot about everyone else they used to know back home. Mr Poverty, Mr Humbleness, Mr Sense of Catholic Shame.
Until the rents got too high and they had to move home again.
Dublin,
no matters what it achieves, always putting itself down.

But I can adapt.
I've lived in Rathmines and Portobello before living in either was a
really hip decision to make.
I can find somewhere else before its gets gentrified
(after I find some job that's not worth complaining about
or I eventually leap into becoming to middle-class
to complain about it.)
enough that its a headache living there, too many men wearing the same winter
jackets. Too many packed restaurants and your local actually preparing the tables
in the run-up to the Rugby game on Saturday.
The less of all that, the better for me.

I used to day dream about all of the above, honestly, but I
somehow managed to regain my innocence by living through it.

As for the girl who discovered self-realisation on her (through her?) IPHONE?
She'll be alright. If that's how she starts wading through the floodwaters of relating
herself to the world, misunderstood syllables, name-fails and all, this time in twenty
years, she'll be laughing. Don't worry yourselves, she'll adapt with the times.
Sure, Dublin's famous for it.
Jared Eli Dec 2013
They say when water drops hit your head
They help to inspire thoughts
I suppose that's why
When I took a shower
I found myself thinking about her
About how she makes me feel
I stood there, letting
The steaming drops
That had once been the tears of clouds
Bring me back to such great heights
To every cliché that falls under the category
Of that one, single deadly word
The balloon inflates
I fly away
And I'm trying to convey the feeling
By making senseless analogies
About the barter system

"Imagine a time before we got rid of
The barter system
Imagine the biggest herd
Of livestock
Every single cow in the world
All compiled together
Imagine all those potential burgers
And the sheer size of
That herd
And that is about a fraction
Of what I feel"

The Brother's Grimm had a statement
About how much infinity is
They spoke of an enormous mountain
Made entirely of glass
And that every hundred years
A hummingbird would
Sharpen its beak
Against the mountain
And when the mountain had finally
Been whittled away to nothing
The first second in infinity
Had passed

If I could make an analogy
Equivocal to that
To describe how she makes me feel
I would
The closest I got was the cows

I can't aim when I kiss her
And I can't stop smiling
For very long
And I can't help giggling
When she raises her eyebrows
In that adorable way of hers

I used to be satisfied
With not feeling terrible
My scale of happiness
Stopped at ten
And ten was labeled
"Not terrible"
But now, I realize
That there is a whole universe
Of happiness
Beyond ten

It's like being shown
How to fly
You never believe it until it's happening
And your arms are outspread
And behind them, sprouted from your shoulders
Are your wings, pumping away
Pushing the air back toward Earth
Pummeling gravity in a defiance
That only flying can

And it doesn't matter about the end
If it ends well, if it ends terribly
It doesn't matter
Because I have been shown
The other side of
"Not terrible"
I have something, if nothing else
To believe
A big scary word
A big cliché
A belief worthy of Westley
Is worthy of me
Because she. . .
She is worth being treated
Like Buttercup

The one phrase that broke my heart
Could very well break it again
But if it does, I can always mend it
"I can live without love"
It gets me every time
But I can stitch every cut
Can overlook every scar
That shows up on my heart
Suture self, and I can

She has lifted me up to such great heights
And I'll inadvertently do what Billy Joel says
And tell her about it
Because the least I can do
For the woman who has opened my eyes
Has enlarged my heart
Has befuddled my mind
Has ******* my tongue
Is let her know
Just how spectacular she makes me feel

The steam continues
Long after the drops are gone
And lingering with the steam
Is a giant smile
The like of which
Only she can bring
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gKAPXfYSHxw
RavensMirror Apr 2014
when I lived with Kyle, we had a shot glass on our bathroom counter we kept there. A small house spider made its home inside of it. Every night before I went to bed I would tell it; Good night Westley, Good work. Sleep well. I'll most likely **** you in the morning.
Westley Barnes Dec 2018
Your soul, which loves my own,
Is woven with it into an old Tibetan rug.

Strand by strand, these enamored colours,
Stars, that courted each other across heaven's length.

Our feet are resting on this treasure
Stitches numbering in the thousands.

Sweet desert son on your musk plant throne,
How long has your mouth kissed my own
and cheek to cheek has time in colour woven us?

-Else Lasker-Schüler (Translation : Westley Barnes, 2018)
This is my translation of the poem "Ein alter Tippettepich" by the German poet Else Lasker-Schüler (1869-1945). Lasker-Schüler's work became synonymous in her own lifetime with the German Expressionist movement, and her work was featured in the editorials of many of her contemporaries, including Karl Kraus (1874-1936)  in his journal Der Fackel. As a Jewish author and illustrator famed for her bohemian lifestyle during the Weimar Republic, Lasker-Schüler fled to Jerusalem in 1934.

The poem, originally published in 1910, is in the public domain.
Westley Barnes Sep 2015
Ever since I’ve been a child
I thought the old dead painters
painted the sky.

Coffee cream on Nursery wall blue
stretched out like souls on a
recently ***** dinnerplate.
No planes cutting between them
up there because I’m still watching
from the middle of the green where I lived.

An older version of myself
-in an attempt to dazzle-
while describing an evening sky
might have written “chiaroscuro”
…but for now I’ll stick with “skidding”
as an allusion to the colours I’m seeing
that mark the surface of the clouds
“Like paintings in a museum.”

The way they’re “so far up but floating even farther away.”

Serious and untouchable and content
the keepers of dreams
adrift in the biggest sea of all
which is the sky.

-Westley Barnes.
atticus wilson Jul 2019
We all wish we had the love
That Jim and Pam shared
That Westley and Buttercup shared
But as well all know
“This is true love, you think it happens every day?”
Qualyxian Quest Aug 2020
You mock my pain.  Never do it again.

Life is pain, Highness.
Anyone who says otherwise is selling something.
Qualyxian Quest Aug 2020
There's a shortage of perfect ******* in this world. 'Twould be a pity to damage yours.
Qualyxian Quest Jul 2020
We are men of action
Lies do not become us

The Princess has been taken
Who then can we trust?

The wind is in the willows
Find her still we must

Buttercup is beauty
The wind begins to gust
Qualyxian Quest Sep 2020
Westley:  You're that smart, are you?

Vizzini: Put it this way. You've heard of Socrates, Plato, Aristotle?

Westley: nods yes.

Vizzini: morons.
Qualyxian Quest Sep 2020
Buttercup: The Fire Swamp! Westley, we'll never survive!

Westley: Nonsense. You're only saying that because no one ever has.

😄
Qualyxian Quest Sep 2021
Probably no more to come in dreams
So I sit by Mother Mary
Guadalupe green
Candles in the night

Poem to Taipei
Tomorrow Toyota Camry
Yesterday slips
Basketball tonight

Quiet doctor's office
Refill my medicine
No Dread Pirate Westley
The name is worth the fight

Yangmingshan, Taiwan
Ravenstory stamps
Maggie's Farm in Charlotte
Cranberry juice with Sprite

                Avatar alight.
Qualyxian Quest Dec 2021
Westley is a man of action
Unbecome by lies
1987
I laugh until I cries

I am a disabled man
Broken in my brain
Inner silences
Fear. Hear. Pain.

Gratitude stands guard
Threats indeed abound
Guns and ignorance
Confusion all around

I walk my dailiness
Ain't lookin' for a fight
Looking for vocation
Looking for the light

          Still I write.
Qualyxian Quest Dec 2022
I don't get too far past the First Noble Truth
Though I know there are three more
Westley, the Man in Black
Is there an alien shore?

Death will be release
Say goodbye forever
Sting and the Police
The Rabbi of Krakow's hidden treasure

Never read Ted Hughes
But poetry comes from pain
Will they pity me?
Will she flee to Spain?

Not feeling well
I Walk the Line for Scott
The Italian love of beauty
Help me not fear to be not

                    Not.
Qualyxian Quest Jan 2023
Westley is a Man of Action
He is the Man in Black
But so was George W. Bush
And he destroyed Iraq

Emily was a recluse
Didn't leave her room
Lovely white dress
Amherst glowing moon

Mr. Markson visited bookstores
In New York City the Strand
I married and had children
But I'm a Solitary Man

Sometimes words are deeds
Plant them and then wait
O you future folk!
Something radiates

          Taipei temple. Dragon Gate.
Qualyxian Quest May 2020
If Petrarch would have had Laura
For his wife

Think ye he'd have written
Sonnets all his life?

If we had married
And not broken up

Would I be Westley
And she Buttercup?

Yet he has blue eyes
And she is blond

But we're both brown
Time travels on.
Qualyxian Quest May 2021
I was given madness
Madness was given me
Westley went to seek his fortune
In the Land beyond the Sea
Happiness?
Not meant for me
But I love the Princess Bride
Ever After happily
Qualyxian Quest Jul 2020
It's a horror story world
But moments of hope remain

Chaos and confusion
But also gentle twilight rain

Westley is quite right
Highness, life is pain

I yearn to leave my home
And ride the Midnight Train
Qualyxian Quest Feb 2020
Yes, Sakyamuni
Life is suffering

Yes, Westley
Life is pain

Yes, Qoheleth
My life too in vain

But, ah! this night
this night, this night

the lovely sound
of gentle rain!
Qualyxian Quest Feb 2020
Buddha wandering
Silent forest

Rodin pondering
Mind is porous

Bangkok, Thailand
Monsoon rain

I've been to France
But not yet Spain

Westley's right:
Life is pain.
Qualyxian Quest Nov 2020
I worry about what I can't control
I worry, it is true

I worry about them often
I worry when I'm blue

I stay inside and sleep
Outside the falling rain

Inside a troubled mind
Inside a troubled brain

Westley was quite right
Highness, life is pain

So what then keeps me going?
To see them once again.
Qualyxian Quest Sep 2020
11:37
One for Johnny Cash

Folsom Prison Blues
Boy Named Sue to make them laugh

You and Westley
Both the Man in Black

You are gone from us now
But your music will come back!
Qualyxian Quest Aug 2020
The name is the thing. No one would surrender to the Dread Pirate Westley.

                          😀
Qualyxian Quest Apr 2020
country out of whack
        but Westley comes back
                         and me?

   today I'm the man in black
Qualyxian Quest Dec 2020
I grew up in this country
But it's really not for me

Westley left to make his fortune
In the land across the sea

Home is where the heart is
My heart is with my three

Far from home I have to roam
But I stay silently.

— The End —