The truth is turning plastic
And politicians spastic
As they dream up fantastic
Ways to be bombastic.
The anti-intellectuals,
Their rhetoric effectual,
Demand a perpetual
And lucrative processional
To a place they know the score
Where they can amass more
Of money and stores
In disregarding the mores
They were elected for
And continue waging war
Like high-priced political ******.

The truth has no chance
In this genocidal dance
Of unfortunate circumstance
Created to enhance
Resultant happenstance
When, by the seat of his pants
When we happened to glance
Away for a particular moment
And were swamped by the foment
Of eight long years of torment;
Freedoms arteries turned to cement
And any chance of sanity
For American humanity
Got buried in some inanity
About hanging chads and counts
Giving a fool a chance to pounce;
To squeeze the last pure ounce
Of dignity out of the Presidency
By merely taking up residency.

Forth upon the Gitche Gumee,
On the shining Big-Sea-Water,
With his fishing-line of cedar,
Of the twisted bark of cedar,
Forth to catch the sturgeon Nahma,
Mishe-Nahma, King of Fishes,
In his birch canoe exulting
All alone went Hiawatha.

  Through the clear, transparent water
He could see the fishes swimming
Far down in the depths below him;
See the yellow perch, the Sahwa,

  Like a sunbeam in the water,
See the Shawgashee, the craw-fish,
Like a spider on the bottom,
On the white and sandy bottom.

  At the stern sat Hiawatha,
With his fishing-line of cedar;
In his plumes the breeze of morning
Played as in the hemlock branches;
On the bows, with tail erected,
Sat the squirrel, Adjidaumo;
In his fur the breeze of morning
Played as in the prairie grasses.

  On the white sand of the bottom
Lay the monster Mishe-Nahma,
Lay the sturgeon, King of Fishes;
Through his gills he breathed the water,
With his fins he fanned and winnowed,
With his tail he swept the sand-floor.

  There he lay in all his armor;
On each side a shield to guard him,
Plates of bone upon his forehead,
Down his sides and back and shoulders
Plates of bone with spines projecting!
Painted was he with his war-paints,
Stripes of yellow, red, and azure,
Spots of brown and spots of sable;
And he lay there on the bottom,
Fanning with his fins of purple,
As above him Hiawatha
In his birch canoe came sailing,
With his fishing-line of cedar.

  “Take my bait!” cried Hiawatha,
Down into the depths beneath him,
“Take my bait, O sturgeon, Nahma!
Come up from below the water,
Let us see which is the stronger!”
And he dropped his line of cedar
Through the clear, transparent water,
Waited vainly for an answer,
Long sat waiting for an answer,
And repeating loud and louder,
“Take my bait, O King of Fishes!”

  Quiet lay the sturgeon, Nahma,
Fanning slowly in the water,
Looking up at Hiawatha,
Listening to his call and clamor,
His unnecessary tumult,
Till he wearied of the shouting;
And he said to the Kenozha,
To the pike, the Maskenozha,
“Take the bait of this rude fellow,
Break the line of Hiawatha!”

  In his fingers Hiawatha
Felt the loose line **** and tighten;
As he drew it in, it tugged so
That the birch canoe stood endwise,
Like a birch log in the water,
With the squirrel, Adjidaumo,
Perched and frisking on the summit.

  Full of scorn was Hiawatha
When he saw the fish rise upward,
Saw the pike, the Maskenozha,
Coming nearer, nearer to him,
And he shouted through the water,
“Esa! esa! shame upon you!
You are but the pike, Kenozha,
You are not the fish I wanted,
You are not the King of Fishes!”

  Reeling downward to the bottom
Sank the pike in great confusion,
And the mighty sturgeon, Nahma,
Said to Ugudwash, the sun-fish,
To the bream, with scales of crimson,
“Take the bait of this great boaster,
Break the line of Hiawatha!”

  Slowly upward, wavering, gleaming,
Rose the Ugudwash, the sun-fish,
Seized the line of Hiawatha,
Swung with all his weight upon it,
Made a whirlpool in the water,
Whirled the birch canoe in circles,
Round and round in gurgling eddies,
Till the circles in the water
Reached the far-off sandy beaches,
Till the water-flags and rushes
Nodded on the distant margins.

  But when Hiawatha saw him
Slowly rising through the water,
Lifting up his disk refulgent,
Loud he shouted in derision,
“Esa! esa! shame upon you!
You are Ugudwash, the sun-fish,
You are not the fish I wanted,
You are not the King of Fishes!”

  Slowly downward, wavering, gleaming,
Sank the Ugudwash, the sun-fish,
And again the sturgeon, Nahma,
Heard the shout of Hiawatha,
Heard his challenge of defiance,
The unnecessary tumult,
Ringing far across the water.

  From the white sand of the bottom
Up he rose with angry gesture,
Quivering in each nerve and fibre,
Clashing all his plates of armor,
Gleaming bright with all his war-paint;
In his wrath he darted upward,
Flashing leaped into the sunshine,
Opened his great jaws, and swallowed
Both canoe and Hiawatha.

  Down into that darksome cavern
Plunged the headlong Hiawatha,
As a log on some black river,
Shoots and plunges down the rapids,
Found himself in utter darkness,
Groped about in helpless wonder,
Till he felt a great heart beating,
Throbbing in that utter darkness.

  And he smote it in his anger,
With his fist, the heart of Nahma,
Felt the mighty King of Fishes
Shudder through each nerve and fibre,
Heard the water gurgle round him
As he leaped and staggered through it,
Sick at heart, and faint and weary.

  Crosswise then did Hiawatha
Drag his birch-canoe for safety,
Lest from out the jaws of Nahma,
In the turmoil and confusion,
Forth he might be hurled and perish.
And the squirrel, Adjidaumo,
Frisked and chattered very gayly,
Toiled and tugged with Hiawatha
Till the labor was completed.

  Then said Hiawatha to him,
“O my little friend, the squirrel,
Bravely have you toiled to help me;
Take the thanks of Hiawatha,
And the name which now he gives you;
For hereafter and forever
Boys shall call you Adjidaumo,
Tail-in-air the boys shall call you!”

  And again the sturgeon, Nahma,
Gasped and quivered in the water,
Then was still, and drifted landward
Till he grated on the pebbles,
Till the listening Hiawatha
Heard him grate upon the margin,
Felt him strand upon the pebbles,
Knew that Nahma, King of Fishes,
Lay there dead upon the margin.

  Then he heard a clang and flapping,
As of many wings assembling,
Heard a screaming and confusion,
As of birds of prey contending,
Saw a gleam of light above him,
Shining through the ribs of Nahma,
Saw the glittering eyes of sea-gulls,
Of Kayoshk, the sea-gulls, peering,
Gazing at him through the opening,
Heard them saying to each other,
“’Tis our brother, Hiawatha!”

  And he shouted from below them,
Cried exulting from the caverns:
“O ye sea-gulls! O my brothers!
I have slain the sturgeon, Nahma;
Make the rifts a little larger,
With your claws the openings widen,
Set me free from this dark prison,
And henceforward and forever
Men shall speak of your achievements,
Calling you Kayoshk, the sea-gulls,
Yes, Kayoshk, the Noble Scratchers!”

  And the wild and clamorous sea-gulls
Toiled with beak and claws together,
Made the rifts and openings wider
In the mighty ribs of Nahma,
And from peril and from prison,
From the body of the sturgeon,
From the peril of the water,
They released my Hiawatha.

  He was standing near his wigwam,
On the margin of the water,
And he called to old Nokomis,
Called and beckoned to Nokomis,
Pointed to the sturgeon, Nahma,
Lying lifeless on the pebbles,
With the sea-gulls feeding on him.

  “I have slain the Mishe-Nahma,
Slain the King of Fishes!” said he;
“Look! the sea-gulls feed upon him,
Yes, my friends Kayoshk, the sea-gulls;
Drive them not away, Nokomis,
They have saved me from great peril
In the body of the sturgeon,
Wait until their meal is ended,
Till their craws are full with feasting,
Till they homeward fly, at sunset,
To their nests among the marshes;
Then bring all your pots and kettles,
And make oil for us in Winter.”

  And she waited till the sun set,
Till the pallid moon, the Night-sun,
Rose above the tranquil water,
Till Kayoshk, the sated sea-gulls,
From their banquet rose with clamor,
And across the fiery sunset
Winged their way to far-off islands,
To their nests among the rushes.

  To his sleep went Hiawatha,
And Nokomis to her labor,
Toiling patient in the moonlight,
Till the sun and moon changed places,
Till the sky was red with sunrise,
And Kayoshk, the hungry sea-gulls,
Came back from the reedy islands,
Clamorous for their morning banquet.

  Three whole days and nights alternate
Old Nokomis and the seagulls
Stripped the oily flesh of Nahma,
Till the waves washed through the rib-bones,
Till the sea-gulls came no longer,
And upon the sands lay nothing
But the skeleton of Nahma.

i find myself reflecting on my girlhood
what should’ve been
i grieve the girl i could’ve been
if these addiction genes didn’t flow so steadily
like an unwavering whirlpool
it wasn’t your fault your mom didn’t care for you
but why couldn’t you care for me
we all have  ways to cope
mine is taking pen to page
yours was needle to arm
i grieve for the girl you should’ve been
for the mom you could’ve been

With black leaves and black clocks,
I fall and drift as the time I forgot
Spirals beneath me,
A whirlpool dragging me
Down, down, down.
It dirties my soul with every turn,
Blackens the lessons that I learn,
Removes my life that means nothing now.
Away I travel.
Exploring the world with a sense of unknown,
Pitter-pattering on the edge of reason.
My doom is inevitable.
It is imminent.
It is lonely.
Alone, alone I press on.
I take back the black of the leaves and the clocks,
And slow the seconds in the time I forgot.
It is now.

when you meet me...
                                     hush my love,
don't tell me that this depth
                               makes you afraid.

That my voice is like a siren 
                           singing on an ocean of words.
                                                          ­                          
A whirlpool
pulling you under
where no light can shine with grace.

Your crashing heart
is yours to cherish tenderly.

In my arms,
                  you will cyclone to the very
                                                               b­ottom of your soul.
My arms
              are here to hold you
                                            while your heartship
                              splinters and cracks
              on its spiraling
downward journey.

Held
in my arms,
you and I will feel it all.

And when it is all over,
when stillness prevails...

from the crumbling shipwreck you
will be born anew.

a mermaid swimming through the ethereal waters of her soul.
Rising up,
                  up,
                         up
                                breaking the surface
                                 to drink her first
                               sweet sip of salty air...

searching for the land
she once remembered
in a time now lost.

when you meet me...
tell me that my arms are as vast as the horizon,
that they are the very water you breathe
holding you through all your waves and ire.

when you meet me...
tell me that my eyes are like the night sky,
that their depth holds the whole universe
within a twinkling facade.

when you meet me...
                                when you meet me...
                                                           ­      when you meet me...

Softly and gently, I swim him along
the frail whirlpool of a lie,
He visits like a lamp in the froth of cold
forward towards but shy

I remember to keep my palm onto the cold night's sheet
and tell him how his would fit in,
how every moment of my cold nights would burn
into the arms of his unconscious sin

I canst remember thy face though,
o love, was the dust of snow much.?

Swaying like a leaf in the wind of my poem
skimming on the foam of an immortal stream,
with his perfect structured fingers touching his evening cup,
he flutters like a laugh from the lips of a weeping dream.

A dream.
A DREAM.
O my.! Was this illusory?

Years of long closed eyelids imagining their perfect fit
The word exists the definition doesn't,
Dejection over fancies is dejecting
Perfection is straight where you find true love.

Tears
shining like precious pearls,
from the corner of your oyster eyes,
trickle in transparent torrents
into the sea of sadness
and drown in the
turbulence of the
wailing whirlpool…

Like jewels, so bright
saline stars stream down
from the sky of your face
to perform
dance of the dire distress
salsa of sad solitude
ballet of broken heart
waltz of weeping emotions
tango of tearful longing…

From the dark veil of clouds
like melting snowflakes,
crystal drops
roll down
your cheeks,
to unfathomable depths
of your heavy heart…

Simple release of sentiments
from overflowing well of eyes
shed silent tears of agony,
streaming down,
trails of shattered dreams
leave traces of hurt and pain…

Lifting your sad face,
with a touch of warmth and love
I wipe your fragile tears.
You smile -
and they reincarnate
as beautiful tears
of happiness…

Copyright 2011 © Bharat B. Trivedi

You are the town and we are the clock.
We are the guardians of the gate in the rock.
The Two.
On your left and on your right
In the day and in the night,
We are watching you.

Wiser not to ask just what has occurred
To them who disobeyed our word;
To those
We were the whirlpool, we were the reef,
We were the formal nightmare, grief
And the unlucky rose.

Climb up the crane, learn the sailor's words
When the ships from the islands laden with birds
Come in.
Tell your stories of fishing and other men's wives:
The expansive moments of constricted lives
In the lighted inn.

But do not imagine we do not know
Nor that what you hide with such care won't show
At a glance.
Nothing is done, nothing is said,
But don't make the mistake of believing us dead:
I shouldn't dance.

We're afraid in that case you'll have a fall.
We've been watching you over the garden wall
For hours.
The sky is darkening like a stain,
Something is going to fall like rain
And it won't be flowers.

When the green field comes off like a lid
Revealing what was much better hid:
Unpleasant.
And look, behind you without a sound
The woods have come up and are standing round
In deadly crescent.

The bolt is sliding in its groove,
Outside the window is the black removers' van.
And now with sudden swift emergence
Come the woman in dark glasses and humpbacked surgeons
And the scissors man.

This might happen any day
So be careful what you say
Or do.
Be clean, be tidy, oil the lock,
Trim the garden, wind the clock,
Remember the Two.

The thing about love is that
     It is strategically tragic,
Built to last, made to make you feel,
Feel good and alive, to feel enough,
     Gracefully and sudden
Like a gentle kiss, the spreading
Of wings of the soul, the fall
     Of listless stars, but
          Just as lasting.

I do not know what else to feel
Upon seeing this ocean, except
To remember you with the same
     Natural feeling, inexplicable,
Like the color blue catches on
     With the bleach of white,
Aiming to accentuate, searching
     For the old burn of red
          In vain.

And beauty is felt more
     Than it is seen. Eyes have
Seen more than they have rested,
And they have seen things best,
     While they are closed.

More than sorrow, pain and suffering,
More than sure looped-goodbyes,
     It is the serendipitous affection
That rules over all, overthrowing
The flowing madness of passing worlds,
Passing all the lovers by, mad enough,
     And mad still, yet the fight
          Is worth loving for.

Love is worth fighting with.
Life is worth it. Love
Is priceless, yet, I love you
A little less
     Than love itself.

Love never grew, it just stays beside,
Just beside, them, us, blown
     By the havoc of life, fate and time,
Drifting amongst the drifters
Surrounding us, dizzied,
     Ever-tested, enduring all.*

© 2015 J.S.P.

She sits.
The ocean crashes on the rocks.
The memories wash over her.
A boy.
No. Not a boy. The boy.
The one who got her into this mess.
The one who stole her heart the moment she laid eyes on him.
Her boy.
No. Not her boy. Her son.
Her son, who knew nothing but love.
Her son, the one that turned her world upside down.
His father.
Her other love.
A sailor.
She should hate the ocean.
But she doesn’t.
The water that laps around her feet
Is not the same water that took her boy away from her.
No. Not her boy. Her son.
Her life.
A simple trip.
Her son.
Begging to go with his father,
On the big boat.
His father.
Agreeing, for it was the boy’s birthday.
A storm.
Out of nowhere.
Raging, tossing the big boat around like it was nothing.
To the ocean, it was nothing.
But to her
It was everything.
The realization.
When she realized that the boat wasn’t coming back.
The tears.
Flooding every inch of her.
Drowning her.
Oh, the irony.
The waves.
Constantly ebbing and flowing.
She longed to join them.
To be reborn
Of sea foam and salt.
But she didn’t.
She sat.
The waves crashing on the rocks.
Anger.
Anger at the ocean.
Anger at her son.
Anger at his father.
And then
Anger at herself.
She went home.
Slept.
Wept.
She sits.
The ocean crashes on the rocks.
A bird screeches.
She is drawn out of her whirlpool of memories.
She picks up a stone.
Whispers.
And throws it into the ocean.
Letting go.
Breathing.
Living.

A Freshened Palate, Perspective, and Purpose

Ingredients:

1 potato, 1 egg, half an onion, 1 clove of garlic
salt and pepper to taste
Light frying oil, 2 slices of bacon,
A fistful of poor self image
I mean, spinach
Balsamic vinegar, applesauce,
A dash of self-hate, and left over unwanted thoughts
Note: for a healthier alternative, forget the self-hate
Also note: Can’t remove unwanted thoughts

Step-by-step instructions:
1. Trim potato of any bad areas
    No matter how badly you’d want to trim
    Yourself
    Wash and scrub away any dirt or sand
2. Grate potato,
    Not knuckles
    Squeeze gratings with an old
    T-shirt or throwaway towel
    You could use the shirt you’re wearing
    But you’d end up wearing your stains
    Which, honestly,
    You do anyway
3. Grate onion, cry
4. Finely chop garlic
    Don’t think about the bad breath
5. Put potato, onion, garlic, and 1 egg (without shell)
    Into the bowl and
    Mix
    But not like mixing drinks with anxiety med
    And bad coping mechanisms.
6. Heat oil until shimmery
    Fry potato mixture to make 2 or 3
    Golden brown, delicious latkes
7. Fry bacon while latkes are in pan
    Fry two slices so the bacon doesn’t
    Have to be
    Alone or
    Isolated
    Set aside on paper towel to soak up the grease
8. Boil water to poach eggs.
    Once boiling,
    Swirl water into a whirlpool
    Exactly like the thoughts scalding
    The insides of my skull
    For example:
    Do you know what it’s like to
    Hate yourself? To not stop the
    Unbelief that you are any
    Good at all?
    Understanding that you’re
    Unemployed
    Unskilled
    Unwanted
Gently crack two eggs into whirlpool
    Understanding that you can’t simply
    “Get over this”
    Like standing under burdens
    And whiskey bourbon hits
    Expectations - faraway dreams
    Only furthering it
    Like you’ll never be able to accomplish them
    You’ll surmount them but run
    Out of oxygen because
    You’re not
    Supposed to be there
    In the first place
(don’t worry, the whirlpool will prevent eggs from
breaking)
    (Don’t you see what
    Everybody else is doing
    And you act like you
    Know what you yourself
    Is doing
    Don’t you see all your
    Truly selfish doings
    Who do you think you are?
    -laughing- you’re bad
    Where do you think
TURN OFF THE HEAT AND COVER
    Set timer for exactly 5 minutes.
    Do not
    Lift the cover until time is
    Up.
    After 5 minutes, scoop eggs out with slotted spoon and set on paper towel to dry.
    Let eggs
    *Rest.
    Be careful,
    The yolks
    Are very fragile at this point.

Assemble the dish
Spread applesauce on potato latkes. Be careful
Not to spread so thin.
Don’t be stingy,
take what You need.
Put bacon on top, stack poached eggs on top of the bacon.
Garnish plate with spinach, sprinkle with balsamic vinegar.
Each thing has its place, even if it seems too complex or complicated.

Flavor Profile;
Latkes are light and
Fluffy and crispy.
Onions, garlic give a basic, yet
Flavorful foundation.
The egg yolks spill a very rich, deep syrupiness that is brought out by the salty, fatty bacon.
The applesauce is special because the sweetness and **** contrasts with the smooth richness of egg, potato and bacon.

And just like life, balances the heavy with the light
          Work with play
       Teaching with learning
                               Spending money with saving money
       Learning things and saying things
       Being there with being here

And sometimes, amidst all of that
You need something to add
a little fresh,
A little color
A little bit of
Different.
That’s where the Spinach comes in
Some
Justified bitterness to
Freshen your
Palate, perspective, and purpose.

With each bite and each taste
You’re reminded that each blend of flavors
Each collision of textures
Are compositions of each ingredients and
each step:
    The onions, the salt, the applesauce
Slicing, chopping, grating
Frying, failing, hating
Boiling, swirling, burning
Accidents, bad luck
Tripping over, getting up
Panicking, breathing, saying “enough”

And having an end product
Like this
Is
Purpose
It is how it’s supposed to be
You are who you’re supposed to be

When you’re finished, wipe your hands
Wash your plate
Realize you have dishes to do
And more courses
More tastes
To produce

*So that you will never go hungry
With this Circadian Appetite

your body, the drain plug,
that climactic days of a day
murky sweet strawberry milk water
ebbs and sways
around, surrounds, and surmounts you

Your body the dumping ground
for pretty poppy seeds
seep, steep
seeded somewhere deep

as

synthetic stinging metaphor rain
pours on your mistreated singing skin
spotted, dotted, synaptic rule
akin to lemon poppy seed muffin tops
your head- a top
spins round
and mimics
never-ending bath drain whirlpool

ambulances and ambivalences soundtrack
this nocturne
night of a morning
mourning already
my poor lost sister
a little less than intact
lost in her head
I'm loosing her

and she's nodding

            and she's nodding

                          and she's nodding

                                    and she's nodding
and she nods
and grumbles,
fumbles for words that aren't there
four words that aren't there
forward isn't there

because what do you say
about matters
when your high
and breathing last breaths overlapping
in humble showers
in heart crumbling nakedness
your faithlessness trapping
murky sweet strawberry milk waters.

Thimble

Darkness rises from beneath,
small, ugly and has no teeth.
Crawls out from the slime,
gets more creepy each time.
Only happens once a year,
one long day makes a career.
Wanders out and wonders why,
one day is one day to shy.
Determined to make a day two,
this isn't Horton hearing a Who.
This is one mean creature,
you student, it teacher.
Only the size of a thimble,
has no name just a symbol.
Dug a hole through the pond,
it's like a miniature James Bond.
Rules the pond like no other,
looking for his missing mother.
Interviewing anything swimming,
dodging every single skimmer.
As the puddle starts to sink,
not an inch or a drop to drink.
A whirlpool circles in center,
into the whole that it enter.
Back down into its hole,
one day a year, it will patrol.

Darkness rises from beneath,
small, ugly and has no teeth.
Crawls out from the slime,
gets more creepy each time.
Only happens once a year,
one long day makes a career.
Wanders out and wonders why,
one day is one day to shy.
Determined to make a day two,
this isn't Horton hearing a Who.
This is one mean creature,
you student, it teacher.
Only the size of a thimble,
has no name just a symbol.
Dug a hole through the pond,
it's like a miniature James Bond.
Rules the pond like no other,
looking for his missing mother.
Interviewing anything swimming,
dodging every single skimmer.
As the puddle starts to sink,
not an inch or a drop to drink.
A whirlpool circles in center,
into the whole that it enter.
Back down into its hole,
one day a year, it will patrol.

I've noticed I've been really stuck in a whirlpool whirlpool whirlpool spin around spin around same thing something different swinggg down the riverside and I'm a stone thrown and I'm a hop skip and a jump and I'm a splish splash bubble dance go for a spin and take a chance always flying by the seat of my pants! dance! dance! dance! I 'got ants in ma pants! ants in ma pants!

I. The Encounter

I awaken to the lull of your voice: seductive whispers that send waves of electricity through my being. And then I see you. The demi-god that you are. And I worship you. Give me strength to endure your charms. And you do charm me, just as I know you will. Lapis eyes dance back at me. But then I'm dreamy; not awake, not asleep. Still in that state between dreams and realities. And to me, you are a god. But reality ~cruel mistress~ charges at me, and I see you for yourself. A mere mortal as I. But still I worship you. You've already begun your seduction. And I am a willing victim.

My first encounter with you is brief, only moments spent in your company. I would've scorned any human brave enough to insist that I would some day love you. I don't want to be aware that you have any power over me. No man has power over me. I have pushed all thoughts of men from the dusty corners of my mind. My life evolving around school and work and her, my lover. You know we are lovers. And I know you are married. Neither of us have scruples.

You offer me a bowl. Soaring above the world helps you cope. I am grounded and decline. But I watch you carefully. Pipe in hand, breathing deeply the smoke of the gods. And I find you amusing. Eyes turning glassy, mirroring my soul. Your face lit by uncontrollable laughter. And I am spiraling from the slightest contact of you.


II. The Seduction

Just a look. It takes only a look from those lapis eyes. And I'm hooked. Captivated by their icy-blue fire. And I'm burning there, burning in those lakes of infinity, those magnetic pools. Electric shocks wave through me, toss my senses, turn me into pure desire. And I desire you. You and the musky scent of your body lit by lust. Driven. Pushed to the insatiable limit. Inflamed.

Spoken and unspoken, your words ****** me. Enticing me, those words encircle me, swirl about me, intoxicate my mind. Notwords. Those words you say with your eyes, your smile, the rhythm of your body. And your whispers. Hot breath against my cheek, my ear, my neck; a trail of kindled passion waiting to explode. And I cannot resist the temptation. Tempted beyond reason, caught in the moment, trapped in the never-ceasing yearning of my body for yours.

Smoldering. You smolder me with kisses. Blaze my body with your tongue, your touch. Smooth skin against mine. A hand filled with impulses, pulsating, beating the rhythm of our hearts, like beats of the tunes you make love to. Wild, savage drums. Wild, savage love. And I long all the more for you. Your touch, your scent, the feel of you in me.

You recreate me. Change me. Make me want you again and again. Seduced.

III. Missing You

Missing you as I do, I cannot remember my life before you. Before your smile touched the depths of my heart. Before I gazed into those familiar eyes and saw my soul staring back at me. Before I felt your lips on mine, sweet, intoxicating, the slightest hint of tequila and lime. Your hands upon my flesh, electric waves. And the movement of your body with mine in cadence to the primal dance. Before you took me into your arms, I existed as only a shell of a woman. A tiny speck among specks in the vast universe. But you reshaped me. Molded me into a goddess. Allowed the woman inside of me to resurface and reclaim her sexuality.

And now you are gone. Out of my life for weeks. Out of my sight, but not my mind. I see you gazing back at me from the mirror each time I look into my own eyes. And then my mind takes flight and I escape with it. At that moment, I can once again feel your arms around me. Your soft, tender touch. The lulling of your husky voice. The musky scent of your skin. I watch from my grounded plane as you lead me to bed, turn down covers, and then motion for me to lie down. You remove my clothing, stripping away all resistance, all inhibitions. Prince sings seductively in the background. And I lose myself in your loving. You descend upon me like a child with an ice cream cone. Lapping at the cream you stir from within me. Your tongue tracing circles upon my skin. A flick of an ***** ******. Kisses trailing my body from lips to thighs and then there. And you linger there. Minutes seem like hours and hours like days. But I cannot imagine time without you. Only after I have traveled into the netherworld you lead me to, do I finally feel you. Hard and long, buried into my flesh. Deep inside me. Inflaming my body with each stroke. You take me, over and over again, to that netherworld of pleasure. And I want to stay. Remain there with you, eternally.

So missing you like I do, I have no appetite for anything but you. Depression falls upon me like a black cloak shielding me from the outside world. And I realize that missing you is missing a piece of me too. Missing my eternal friend. My soul's mate. My heart's constant pounding. Missing you is missing me with you.


IV. Betrayal

You said you'd made your choice: she and I, that's all you'd need. And I wanted to believe you; almost did, in fact, believe that two could be enough. I could've lived with that. She, bound by contract and children; I, bound by lust and desire. I know the game; have played it hundreds of times. And I put my trust in you to keep your word. But you don't belong to me. I have no control over you, no real ability to keep you under control. And so I baited you. Ensnared you in your own trap. Shoved temptation under your nose to test your honor. You have none. You accepted my trap; opened the door to her: a third, an easy, vulnerable prey.

And now you've lost. You will keep the first; she is bound by a higher law. But I am your loss.

Cheap words. You say whatever it takes. Words fall from your tongue as carelessly and easily as a dismissed annoyance. Your heart as cold as the snow surrounding us. You work emotions like a stagnate river: stuck in the routine of building up and tearing down the very dams of trust and passion you blueprint. But I am not like the others in your past. I am a true player. One of the faithful few. But you've destroyed that faith. I know where I stand with you. You've placed me in some category with your other casual notaffairs. But there is nothing casual about me. And if you had taken the time, been true to your word, you would've learned this. I give my all. All of my being, my heart, my soul. Not obsession, just loyalty. I await the rules, and when I have them, I play by the book. But you constantly change the rules, make them up as you go along. And since I cannot claim any part of you, I stumble over your turn of events. And although I try to keep up, I no longer want to match you set for set.


V. Exposed

You breeze through lives like a windstorm: tossing and turning, stumbling along into one life after another. *** appeal, your weapon: a loaded gun, a sword, a double-edged axe. You are crystal in your attempt. Pristine in your approach. Primitive, you take women back to the primal, the cave of the Neanderthal. Back to pure animalistic intoxication. And I almost allowed this. I wanted you. I did want you. You and the beauty that existed on the outside. Muscular facade that shields the turmoil within. And you could've had me.

Those eyes, so like mine, pulling, dragging me further into their blue lake. I would've drowned there for you. Allowed myself to get caught in the whirlpool of your loving. I wanted to more than you could ever know. Whirling there, swirling there. Sinking further and further into the fiery lake of your seduction. And I would not have defended myself. Passive. A kitten de-clawed. I would've sank into your abyss willingly, awaiting your strong arms to enfold me, save me, wrap me into your soul. Die from the shear ecstasy of you.

I confessed. Opened my soul to you. Permitted your entrance. And you took the challenge. Stepped in and put my inner world in order. Sorted through the chaos within me. Within. You were deeper than you knew. In that enigmatic space, you found the seed of my essence buried in a dry desert. And you rained on me, reigned over me, until I blossomed for the first time in years. I unveiled fully for you. A lotus petaled and filled with sweet, sticky nectar awaiting your touch. I removed all masks, all defenses, stripped away all layers. Showed you the sincerest parts of my being. Exposed. Naked. Displayed this being to you without shame or regret; I bore all. You knew me. The new me. The hidden me. The me that rarely allows passage. But I couldn't resist you. You entranced me. ****** me into you. Stole my breath. Exhaled. And scattered me into the wind.


VI. The Fool's Folly

Making restitution. This is what you say you want. And I struggle within, look to the stars, the cards, and my own inner voice. Should I trust you? My horoscope says a fifty percent chance of let-down today. And the cards say, sure trust him, you fool. But inside I scream I want to trust you!

Then I take a reality pill. Swallowing it hard and dry. And I realize this is what I do with you. I swallow you, refusing other nourishment. I swallow you in gulps, like a fine wine. Allow you to descend inside of me, make me raw from the wanting of you. And when the effects of you occur, I immediately become induced, intoxicated, high from the effect. I lose all sense of existence, except for you.

You become the center of that little world you say I've created for myself. You lay there on a bed of black satin, your body shimmering from the candle-lit radiance. And I see you there, there with me and in me, beside me, circling my body with your passion dance. Prince bellows another scream in cadence with my own.

Perfect timing. Too perfect. You give away your method of operation. But only I know of its existence. I have one of my own. And so we come full circle. Knowing you as I do. Knowing your secrets, your methods, your devices of seduction, can I allow your restitution? Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.

Can I risk playing the fool?


VII. Vanished

You've vanished again. Escaped to god-knows-where without me. Again. Without me in your life. Recluse, you've turned me into you. A recluse without explanation. Locked me into the world that exists around you. Trapped me there, helpless, without you to guide me through. And only you have the map, the way to the gate: the escape route you use to flee when life attacks you in the dark. And I want to explore the passage with you. To tell you all that I feel. Feel you with me, in me, beside me. But I'm covered by this web of confusion. A thick heavy blanket of your tormented soul. And mine is there with yours. Our lives intertwined as they are. Twined into enigma. If you would only step from the shadows, motion me forward, I know we could make it out again. The blinded-by-lust leading the blinded-by-lust. And together we could cut our way through this thicketed labyrinth.

Ground smolders and smokes

Luminescent men, humps at the front

**** and poke

The air acrid, the smell of burning stone

On a wall three boys

Gaze, eyes wide, mouths

Marleyesque, dropping

Bewitched as the florescent men

Smooth and calm the steaming earth

Spraying water from a can

To quench its thirst

The seething, black

And exhausted ground

Murmurs in sick response

To its own fragmented curse

A yellow dragon near by

Belches black blood

Oozing from its innards

Through Gothic gargoyle mouth

The lime coloured men shovel

This toxic *****, smear it

Across the gasping earth

That lies, ripped like a jagged

Wound on a dying man

The lime colored men

Mount the yellow dragon

Speed off, leaving

The scorched ground

Burning and hissing,

With sulphurous smoke

A million sizzling angry snakes

The three boys run away in freight

Dropping playthings as they fumble

And tumble in their horrified flight

The black earth cries, bubbles

And consumes their toys

Passes sentence

Makes them L'Enfant Commune

The lost boys

Then there is a quiver

A tedious tremble, a treble;

That played like stretched

Elastic flicked with

Forefinger and thumb

Making the heart numb

Extracting false confessions

A stench of putrid untruth

*** charades of delicate

Ravaged faced youth

A drole de ménage

Slave to the hunger

Of the unknown demand

The French grooming

Of horses, that may charm

The curious but leaves curiosity

Still smouldering in the

Hidden depths of the

Universal mind

Sanumbolists in the

Fullness of a dream of

Ineffable torture consume need

The boys cry out, for the

Earth has stolen a liars tongue

Branded them abominable

With decaying enormities

Detestable, enamelled eyes

Lurk and peer from

Behind gauzed curtains

A corpse of understanding

That inspects the invisible

Images of imbeciles

Parchments dripping in powdered

Crystalline drops smear the pavements

The boys wave their arms

But no-one sees them

There is the rise and fall of cryptic waves

That ebb and flow scorching

A shore of silent sorrows

Lapping feverously at the

Arc of a whirlpool

Whose decreasing concentric

Circles **** the boys down

Into an eternity of hot tears

Leaves them without parents

Gives their brothers and sisters

Into a slavery of barbarous belief

A ferocious language

Banning the boys from all beaches

Provides tyrannical pilgrimages

To black robbed priests

Possessors' of serpents' hearts

The yellow dragon returns

Lemon coloured men spill

From its foaming mouth

The boys hide behind

Dead rose bushes

Ah, but their tenebrous

Trembles creak in the

Blotched and bloodied

Butchers sawdust

A fabulous elegance cradles them

Making the smoking dragon angry

It spews molten bile taken

From the bloated stomachs

Of white beasts

The luminosity of the

Lemon coloured men

Increases to blindness

They wave tattered antediluvian

Bark and scream from

Their dark, deceitful, anchored armchairs

From railed and spiked alters

Spitting bitterest gall

The lemon coloured men

Butcher the fabulous elegance

Leaving the boys naked

Prey to the perfections of

Puerile generosities

That vows to extinguish

Their human desire

Vacant eyes with

Nauseating sight strut

A cruel distortion

Terrifying voices offer

Demonic destruction

The boys weep, but

no-one hears them

A violent paradise

Of popular poses tries,

But fails to caress them

The dragon burns the boys

But no-one smells them

Their terror turns to molten flesh

The lemon coloured men

Spread it over the earth

The beast' heart beats

Joyfully in its bulbous belly

Sacred men smile while

Pitiless priests provide

A comedy

The boys become a hallow

Antique night their left

Legs held up for all

To see

Delirium devours the minds

Of a subjugated people

The deadly hissing of the earth

Like a silken spectre rises

Making scintillating shudders

Through the spiked splinters

Of time

Intelligence is reduced

To the rubble of religious

Intolerance

Lime, yellow, lemon drips

Heated plastic from false eyes

There are cries, sights and sounds

But no-one hears, sees or speaks

No real people are left

Similar boys watch from a wall

Huddle together and weep

Where are you poet?
You poetess?
I search and become everything:

A pen of the sun's fire
Writing on a slab of jade,
I come face to face with all poets,
The roots of their soul dividing
Themselves dissolving into words
Writing the passionate fire sitting
On pillars of clouds,
A thousand moons surrounding them
Each like some serpent god,
They write the darkness like
Guardians of the night,
A stallar vertigo into the words,
They become like flowers
Of the Resurrection and in a lightning
Flash I am on a terrace of gold
Watching over a field of flora
And the storm's of April's pains
Comes to them each as a moon
In the sorrowing takes each word
And swallows them into verses,
They are the testament of wounds.

And still even more,
All are alone in the abyss they all share,
One man stands tall and says,
"Alone with everybody!"
He smiles as each poet places themselves
In a whirlpool of time,
They find a moment invisible
And make it a mirror,
It reflects forevermore the broken
Images of their past, they piece
Themselves upon a verse of shadows,
A verse is born and a piece of them
Stays in the past.

Suddenly there are those who live,
They are reborn from the womb!
They see daylight in the sorrows
And find happiness in clusters,
A perfect memory where the man
Loved the woman, her touch is like
An immortal fire burning into the focus,
His touch is a cascade of rose petals
On her naked body......

The young poets gather,
The defeat the circular days,
Fantastically naive and flamboyant,
Their moments flare like a sun's
Lost kisses on  magnetosphere's outer
Skin,
The procession of new pain
Fills the paper as they write an ancient
Language unbeknownst to them,
Their blood to papyrus, Sanskrit's
Unified language.

I see the poet's in their middle years,
Strong flavors mixed with heavy grief,
The clandar Is splattered in blood
While their dream sails away in paper boats
Sinking in the sea of forgotten hope,
They sculpt words of deep guts
That penetrate my spirit,
Time becomes a race against their pens,
Their fire blue into the jade
And life is lived on a string of theorise,
They become enlivened in the children,
Enormous mouthfuls of hope
Arisen from soils of regret,
And the perfect words ripen
Like a midsummer's harvest,
They spontaneously eat the fruit
Of life's labors and digest words
With seeds for the planting of more.

I turn my face in my search and see
The years turn golden,
These are the poets with life full
In experience and they write like
Youth writes, but written already
With eyes of indecipherable experience,
Their wounds are closed but written
In fresh blood, I could not understand!
They burn and are not consumed,
Their words are eternal in
Endless galleries of Picasso like
Verses, the words penetrate
Leaving me hopeful and confused.
I wonder if I would ever write
The light and the darkened like
They that balance both....

I find all poets in the middle of forever,
I see their walls of frightful memory,
Their home for tomorrow's bloom,
The self knowledge turning in
On itself and becoming wisdom,
They drown themselves in clarity,
Cling to audacious hope,
Remembering the nocturnal nightmare
Of the past, they are endlessly broken,
Always fixing themselves in words.
And I wrote a poem for them in
My mind:
    
        Poets, you little gods,
        The fire of life in your pen,
        You write the existence
        Forevermore on a slab of jade;
        
       I see the souls and angels
       Reading a book of every poem,
       I see God reading to understand
       His strange and wondrous creation
       Called the poet.

Chaos has a method of random
And the mind is a whirlpool
Thoughts gyrating to cacophony
The mind and heart are asynchronous
****** in to the vortex of indecision
Chaos becomes the typical jargon
For a mind that reverberate randomness






© Amitav (Radiance)

There's something tragic about Brisbane; the city speaks of an older more Romantic time, though the people speak of a newer, modern; more disposable age. It seemingly looks at you with a lost lovers eyes.

Though the city still retains some of its antique glamour; take a stroll down any street in the center and around you will be found the remnants of that age.
Victorian Red-bricks dot the city like proud sentinels, keeping watch over the ever expanding invasion of its contemporary neighbours.
What tales would these monolithic madmen tell is if only we had the ears to listen, who's feet did once trample up the now year-stained wooden stairs, who lived and died and loved and uttered curses and birthed within those walls...and what tales would they have to tell if we only listened?

Ah, gentle reader, you see how your mind wanders at the mention of these thoughts?
The City certainly has its landmarks: the Clock tower of Town Hall, over looking the new modern space of "The Deck" in King George Square, the facade of Grand central station still retaining its grandeur and majesty; now turned into theme bars and a nightclub strip. The old houses littering West End and the strip of red bricks running like a sepia toned river up Elizabeth Street. And of course the dotted remnants of Old City Life being ever encroached upon in the center of the City's smoke filled heart.

The most curious of these is the impression wrought in plaster and cement, white over red, of a window in the city center, with a set of stairs leading up to a place that no longer exists; 50 feet in the air.
Whenever I gaze up at that window, that reminder of the past, I cannot help but wondre who would be staring down at us, on this date in the last century.

"Suffer them not" I wish to say, "for these people are of a different age, with different Gods and values than you."

Suffer them not, ignore their slings, suffer them not.

I love Brisbane.

It's mish-mash of centuries, its people, the tales of its unwritten past, it seems as if the city exudes both a sense of joy and one of unutterable melancholy.

I'm on the train, homebound now to my modern house in the ultra-modern Gold Coast. This is quite depressing. The freedom, the movement, the chance, the ebb and flow of the people soaked tide of the city is leaving fast behind me as this electric trap with seats barrels under facades and tunnels, with enormous neon snakes glittering down from the peaks of modern and ancient towers and we find them reflected in the winding river like innumerable fireflies...dying and twisting and being reborn in the soft moonlight.

South Brisbane Station.
An immortal Victorian construct, still surviving to this day. The same architecture, the same route...different paint though. This Industrial Relic is overlooked by the shining modern whirlpool of THE EYE, a gigantic Ferris wheel giving you the chance to see the city by air, to one side; and a multicoloured, four story glowing monument to the hairdresser franchise god Stefan on the other...which I dub "Stefan's Pintle".

It's garish as hell.

Passing through the night the train goes ever on, powered incessantly by the ticket payers seemingly endless dollar supply.

There's a strange transition from City to Coast, the outerlying towns left in the dust and wake of one and unsure whether they belong to the other. Places such as Kuraby, Banoon, Runcorn, Altandi, Logan and Eden's Landing.

Yet the train ponders on into the night, as it's denizens relinquish themselves to its discretion and desires.
Yes; the train ponders on into the night...

We slowly pass through Woodridge, one of those last bastions of civilisation, neither here nor there. A glittering town trying desperately to be a city. They have a McDonalds. Yay. These places always scare me, and confuse me.
What are they like? Their people? I guess I'll never know, i've never stayed in one long enough to realize.

Welcome to Loganlea, this is a strange place...the funniest thing about it is the fact that it IS a hole. Yet the sign into it shows a shining beach with palm trees and boldly proclaims "WELCOME TO LOGANLEA".
As you draw closer you realize it's pock marked with bullet holes and rust stains.

A train whizzes past, and we find ourselves reflected in its windows, our reality traveling one way; our ghosts another.
Into the long, pale night, coloured by the stars of a thousand distant streetlights. Like a million tiny man made suns; created to fend of the darkness and keep our fears at bay. We truely live in the age of endless day.

The melancholy of the city is far behind now, it's streets, its smells, its people all gone. As we are lost in the brightness of the endless day and the night grows ever long, touching those distant, far between places with its natural, velvet splendour, running its hand down the cheek of time. For there will always be a night, even when we create days, and the city will always be melancholy, and the coast will always be a glittering sequin on the dress of a cheap, soulless *****.

I love Brisbane.

You should do this,
You should do that,
Why these diktats I do not understand.
Are we living our life to comply?
Are not we here to supply.
Why we are to be part of some creed,
When in reality we all are from the same seed.
We are stuck in a whirlpool of sanctions,
And I do not know how to come out of this expansion.

Expectations are defining our life more than existence do,
And the biggest question humanity is asking
what should I do?
We are blaming history for our misconceptions,
Naming presumptions as The inceptions.
How we are going to move ahead,
When we are becoming a body with just a head,
Shedding our humanity for a mere piece of bread.

We are the creation and creators of our world,
All of us is an existence a real thing,
Our creativity is our ability to think.
Then why should we be like someone,
When we could be anyone.
I want to holler out at the world with this answer
Yes, we can
Because we are not endowed with a taste
We have a whole Selection.

Miguel is a boy of mystery. His whole life has been a disturbing whirlpool of broken memories. His home's a train wreck, his family has vanished, his life lays in waist... Since the day Miguel was born, its gone unseen by no one of his sinister and baneful behavior. Miguel's own family could not bare the sight of him. By the age of 9 he had been put up for adoption several times. Along with scaring away any hope of accumulating a friend. Even neighbors felt the need to move through pure gut feeling something wasn't right with this young boy...but why?

   Well, the answer lives with a man named Michael. Michael was Miguel's Father. Michael lived a life searching that in which we all seek, riches, the big house, the life of a celebrity. Given the mere fact Michael was simply a fry cook, his dreams looked distant and impossible to achieve. That being said he was ready for a change, no matter the circumstances... One day, Michael was walking home from work when he stumbled across a woman in the doorway to an abandoned building. Not any ordinary woman, a beautiful woman. Her beauty wasn't like anything he had ever seen before. Her cheeks blushed, her voice could sooth a giant, and her eyes glimmered through the moonlight. Covered head to toe in jewels, in Cashmere, in Prada... The woman without hesitation snatches the attention of Michael. Her voice so soothing, so soft spoken, it's hard to feel anywhere else but in your own paradise simply being in her presence. 
   "Michael..." The woman whispers. 
   "Michael...Follow me." She says.
Michael so drawn to her beauty he obeys without the smallest of responses. Walking through the doorway into the abandoned building still manipulated by her beauty she brings him to a room. This room seems to have been abandoned for years. Torn wallpaper, carpet stripped leaving nothing but broken concrete. Although sitting in the center of the room sits a table and two chairs. 
   "Sit." The woman Says with authority. 
The man obeys taking into consideration this new tone of voice. She sits as well, directly in front of him. 
   "I, know you Michael." She says with a smile. 
   "I've been following you for some time." She continues.
Michael sitting in confusion he remains silent. 
   "Speak not if you must, It's only postponing your destiny Michael." She finishes with another smile. 
   "My, my destiny?" The man asks. 
She continues to smile gazing her beautiful eyes into his for a few moments. 
   "Yes my love. Your destiny. I have arranged something for you that you cannot pass up." 
Michael's life has him in such a deep depression he cant fathom on passing up the words of what seems like an angel. 
   "What do you have in mind?" He quickly Replies. 
   "Simple, whatever you want my love." She Replies. 
Michael Sits in silent for a second Not really understanding what is being presented to him. Although at this time he comes to terms he doesn't care, change is change. 
   "I accept anything you have to offer, beautiful." He replies with confidence. 
   "You, will live from this day forward wealthy. I can supply you with a house and enough money to live comfortably for the rest of your days." She offers. 
   "Is it that easy?" He asks  
   "No, you must in return Inflict my religious beliefs into your first born child." She says. 
Michael, not really sure what that means, accepts her deal, for she seems like an angel of the sky. Well, as for Michael he lives his life as planned, Wealthy, happy, Full of adventure. He even finds himself an amazing girl who he falls in love with. They even get married. Now, however, things get more difficult.

   They find out together they are having a baby boy. Yes, the greatest gift to any man or woman they think is about to happen to them. Michael's wife having no difficulties through the pregnancy goes into labor. After 6 hours of labor Miguel is born. He is healthy as can be. Miguel's mother on the other hand has surprisingly gone into shock. Hemorrhaging Viciously in her brain. She is quickly put into emergency surgery. With her life in danger they begin to operate. She, does not live to see another day. After doing an exam on her body trying to solve what caused her to hemorrhage, they find something very odd. During the birth of Miguel she suffered three broken vertebrates, and her ****** had been severed. Not being able to explain the cause, life goes on. Michael is devastated at the loss of his wife. The visions of raising a baby boy together have been wrecked. As devastating as it was Michael was forced to accept it and continue on, raising Miguel on his own. It wasn't much after Miguel's birth that Michael really started to realize something wasn't right.

   Miguel had no emotions. Although medically they could not find a single thing wrong with him, he still remained motionless. His eyes seemed as a portal to oblivion. No smiles, laughs, or anything. Once again as odd as this was Michael was forced to persevere on his mission to raise Miguel on his own. Until Miguel learned to walk. Once this happened Michael started to get overwhelmed. As his Miguel was a walking nightmare. Miguel had killed three of their animals within a months time. Things were looking to get out of hand. No matter how much Michael tried to discipline him, Miguel did not listen. Michael couldn't get a babysitter to watch him for any longer then a few minutes without scaring them off. The babysitters would leave startled, leaving Michael with responses such as "He won't stop staring at me" or "when he is around me the hair on my neck stands up." Miguel had become such an outrage Michael lost custody of him just two days after his third birthday. Miguel had driven His father to the point of insanity. Michael tried to suffocate Miguel and end this misery once and for all, but he could not. Miguel had grown too strong even by age three.  Everyone hated Michael for it and Miguel was taken from him leaving Michael now in prison. Michael at that point realized that woman was not an angel, but the devil in disguise, soon after he committed suicide. What others don't know is Michael knew something they didn't. Something so evil, so sinister, that it would ruin many more lives to come. More and more the people started to realize something wasn't right. He bounced from home to home, leaving every home in complete disarray. He was the talk of the town. He was referred to as the "Devil's Child" or "Miguel From Hell."

   The city was angered by the boys effect in the community and knew something had to be done. The council knew the boy had to be murdered. If only this same council would have seen it as Michael did, when he did. Things would of never gone so far south. However the town started planning in the dark for their attack. They didn't want the boy to catch any wind of this whatsoever. So one night as he was asleep in his foster bed the city made the building evacuate, quietly. All but Miguel had evacuated the building and at this time they said their prayers and begun. Six men volunteered, to enter the building. Holding rope, gasoline, and faith. They grab the boy holding him down on the bed tying him up. The boy begun to rage, but he wasn't quit strong enough to escape the six men. After tying him up and leaving him inside they lit all four corners of the building at the same time. Watching it burn to the ground. Once they thought it was finally over, the body was never found...

-Joseph B Schneider

The bows glided down, and the coast
Blackened with birds took a last look
At his thrashing hair and whale-blue eye;
The trodden town rang its cobbles for luck.

Then good-bye to the fishermanned
Boat with its anchor free and fast
As a bird hooking over the sea,
High and dry by the top of the mast,

Whispered the affectionate sand
And the bulwarks of the dazzled quay.
For my sake sail, and never look back,
Said the looking land.

Sails drank the wind, and white as milk
He sped into the drinking dark;
The sun shipwrecked west on a pearl
And the moon swam out of its hulk.

Funnels and masts went by in a whirl.
Good-bye to the man on the sea-legged deck
To the gold gut that sings on his reel
To the bait that stalked out of the sack,

For we saw him throw to the swift flood
A girl alive with his hooks through her lips;
All the fishes were rayed in blood,
Said the dwindling ships.

Good-bye to chimneys and funnels,
Old wives that spin in the smoke,
He was blind to the eyes of candles
In the praying windows of waves

But heard his bait buck in the wake
And tussle in a shoal of loves.
Now cast down your rod, for the whole
Of the sea is hilly with whales,

She longs among horses and angels,
The rainbow-fish bend in her joys,
Floated the lost cathedral
Chimes of the rocked buoys.

Where the anchor rode like a gull
Miles over the moonstruck boat
A squall of birds bellowed and fell,
A cloud blew the rain from its throat;

He saw the storm smoke out to ****
With fuming bows and ram of ice,
Fire on starlight, rake Jesu's stream;
And nothing shone on the water's face

But the oil and bubble of the moon,
Plunging and piercing in his course
The lured fish under the foam
Witnessed with a kiss.

Whales in the wake like capes and Alps
Quaked the sick sea and snouted deep,
Deep the great bushed bait with raining lips
Slipped the fins of those humpbacked tons

And fled their love in a weaving dip.
Oh, Jericho was falling in their lungs!
She nipped and dived in the nick of love,
Spun on a spout like a long-legged ball

Till every beast blared down in a swerve
Till every turtle crushed from his shell
Till every bone in the rushing grave
Rose and crowed and fell!

Good luck to the hand on the rod,
There is thunder under its thumbs;
Gold gut is a lightning thread,
His fiery reel sings off its flames,

The whirled boat in the burn of his blood
Is crying from nets to knives,
Oh the shearwater birds and their boatsized brood
Oh the bulls of Biscay and their calves

Are making under the green, laid veil
The long-legged beautiful bait their wives.
Break the black news and paint on a sail
Huge weddings in the waves,

Over the wakeward-flashing spray
Over the gardens of the floor
Clash out the mounting dolphin's day,
My mast is a bell-spire,

Strike and smoothe, for my decks are drums,
Sing through the water-spoken prow
The octopus walking into her limbs
The polar eagle with his tread of snow.

From salt-lipped beak to the kick of the stern
Sing how the seal has kissed her dead!
The long, laid minute's bride drifts on
Old in her cruel bed.

Over the graveyard in the water
Mountains and galleries beneath
Nightingale and hyena
Rejoicing for that drifting death

Sing and howl through sand and anemone
Valley and sahara in a shell,
Oh all the wanting flesh his enemy
Thrown to the sea in the shell of a girl

Is old as water and plain as an eel;
Always good-bye to the long-legged bread
Scattered in the paths of his heels
For the salty birds fluttered and fed

And the tall grains foamed in their bills;
Always good-bye to the fires of the face,
For the crab-backed dead on the sea-bed rose
And scuttled over her eyes,

The blind, clawed stare is cold as sleet.
The tempter under the eyelid
Who shows to the selves asleep
Mast-high moon-white women naked

Walking in wishes and lovely for shame
Is dumb and gone with his flame of brides.
Susannah's drowned in the bearded stream
And no-one stirs at Sheba's side

But the hungry kings of the tides;
Sin who had a woman's shape
Sleeps till Silence blows on a cloud
And all the lifted waters walk and leap.

Lucifer that bird's dropping
Out of the sides of the north
Has melted away and is lost
Is always lost in her vaulted breath,

Venus lies star-struck in her wound
And the sensual ruins make
Seasons over the liquid world,
White springs in the dark.

Always good-bye, cried the voices through the shell,
Good-bye always, for the flesh is cast
And the fisherman winds his reel
With no more desire than a ghost.

Always good luck, praised the finned in the feather
Bird after dark and the laughing fish
As the sails drank up the hail of thunder
And the long-tailed lightning lit his catch.

The boat swims into the six-year weather,
A wind throws a shadow and it freezes fast.
See what the gold gut drags from under
Mountains and galleries to the crest!

See what clings to hair and skull
As the boat skims on with drinking wings!
The statues of great rain stand still,
And the flakes fall like hills.

Sing and strike his heavy haul
Toppling up the boatside in a snow of light!
His decks are drenched with miracles.
Oh miracle of fishes! The long dead bite!

Out of the urn a size of a man
Out of the room the weight of his trouble
Out of the house that holds a town
In the continent of a fossil

One by one in dust and shawl,
Dry as echoes and insect-faced,
His fathers cling to the hand of the girl
And the dead hand leads the past,

Leads them as children and as air
On to the blindly tossing tops;
The centuries throw back their hair
And the old men sing from newborn lips:

Time is bearing another son.
**** Time! She turns in her pain!
The oak is felled in the acorn
And the hawk in the egg kills the wren.

He who blew the great fire in
And died on a hiss of flames
Or walked the earth in the evening
Counting the denials of the grains

Clings to her drifting hair, and climbs;
And he who taught their lips to sing
Weeps like the risen sun among
The liquid choirs of his tribes.

The rod bends low, divining land,
And through the sundered water crawls
A garden holding to her hand
With birds and animals

With men and women and waterfalls
Trees cool and dry in the whirlpool of ships
And stunned and still on the green, laid veil
Sand with legends in its ****** laps

And prophets loud on the burned dunes;
Insects and valleys hold her thighs hard,
Times and places grip her breast bone,
She is breaking with seasons and clouds;

Round her trailed wrist fresh water weaves,
with moving fish and rounded stones
Up and down the greater waves
A separate river breathes and runs;

Strike and sing his catch of fields
For the surge is sown with barley,
The cattle graze on the covered foam,
The hills have footed the waves away,

With wild sea fillies and soaking bridles
With salty colts and gales in their limbs
All the horses of his haul of miracles
Gallop through the arched, green farms,

Trot and gallop with gulls upon them
And thunderbolts in their manes.
O Rome and ***** To-morrow and London
The country tide is cobbled with towns

And steeples pierce the cloud on her shoulder
And the streets that the fisherman combed
When his long-legged flesh was a wind on fire
And his **** was a hunting flame

Coil from the thoroughfares of her hair
And terribly lead him home alive
Lead her prodigal home to his terror,
The furious ox-killing house of love.

Down, down, down, under the ground,
Under the floating villages,
Turns the moon-chained and water-wound
Metropolis of fishes,

There is nothing left of the sea but its sound,
Under the earth the loud sea walks,
In deathbeds of orchards the boat dies down
And the bait is drowned among hayricks,

Land, land, land, nothing remains
Of the pacing, famous sea but its speech,
And into its talkative seven tombs
The anchor dives through the floors of a church.

Good-bye, good luck, struck the sun and the moon,
To the fisherman lost on the land.
He stands alone in the door of his home,
With his long-legged heart in his hand.

Today, suddenly, I reached an absurd but unerring conclusion. In a moment of enlightenment, I realized that I'm nobody, absolutely nobody. When the lightning flashed, I saw that what I had thought to be a city was in fact a deserted plain and, in the same sinister light that revealed me to myself, there seemed to be no sky above it. I was robbed of any possibility of having existed before the world. If I was ever reincarnated, I must have done so without myself, without a self to reincarnate.
I am the outskirts of some non-existent town, the long-winded prologue to an unwritten book. I'm nobody, nobody. I don't know how to feel or think or love. I'm a character in a novel as yet unwritten, hovering in the air and undone before I've even existed, amongst the dreams of someone who never quite managed to breathe life into me.
I'm always thinking, always feeling, but my thoughts lack all reason, my emotions all feeling. I'm falling through a trapdoor, through infinite, infinitous space, in a directionless, empty fall. My soul is a black maelstrom, a great madness spinning about a vacuum, the swirling of a vast ocean around a hole in the void, and in the waters, more like whirlwinds than waters, float images of all I ever saw or heard in the world: houses, faces, books, boxes, snatches of music and fragments of voices, all caught up in a sinister, bottomless whirlpool.
And I, I myself, am the centre that exists only because the geometry of the abyss demands it; I am the nothing around which all this spins, I exist so that it can spin, I am a centre that exists only because every circle has one. I, I myself, am the well in which the walls have fallen away to leave only viscous slime. I am the centre of everything surrounded by the great nothing.
And it is as if hell itself were laughing within me but, instead of the human touch of diabolical laughter, there's the mad croak of the dead universe, the circling cadaver of physical space, the end of all worlds drifting blackly in the wind, misshapen, anachronistic, without the God who created it, without God himself who spins in the dark of darks, impossible, unique, everything.
If only I could think! If only I could feel!

Oh cute little thing
I like your contour

you look pretty funny when you're cold
you get these lovely wrinkles
especially in the middle region
nearly dendritic
more like the cracks in the earth

and your satchel breathes on its own
like a brain if it had lungs for itself
but more like an amoebic celestial body squirming around in some primordial goop
I think that's pretty cool

you're a pink and brown mushroom emerging from a forest of black wiry moss

concentrated around you and
all growing in your direction

almost lifting you up and out
and then further away fading

the way the water gets clearer
above a sand bar

and then a great convergence
a crashing of two great waves
against each other

forming a wall of spindly tendrils
before the whirlpool

He was the epitome of a loveless boy, and he knew it. In fact, that was what kept him restlessly awake most nights, especially on this particular evening. He glanced down at the dark mess of hair that was laid across his chest and listened to the soft emission of peaceful breathing slipping from the lips of the girl whose name he did not remember. For a second, he debated on searching the dark corners of his mind in an attempt to remember it, but he soon realized he never even bothered to ask. This disappointed him for one reason - it was another question mark that he had to add to the list of names that he kept pinned to the front of his brain. At the thought of this particular list, he felt sick, as though an ounce of regret had seeped into his stomach and spread like an infection and now threatened to rise like bile. He knew he needed to keep it down, so he leaned over his bed and wrapped his fingers around the neck of the glass bottle he kept hidden in the bed springs. He sat back up and slowly unscrewed the cap, his eyes mesmerized by the amber liquid that swirled around the bottom half like a whirlpool of gold. He brought the top to his lips and tipped it back, filling his mouth with the warmth of forgetfulness and feeling as it burned his throat like fire the entire way down. It instantly washed him clean of every bad memory he had done his best to forget for the past week. Every tear that every girl had shed on their knees in front of him, begging him to love them; every cigarette that he had chain-smoked on the rooftop of his apartment building in an effort to cloud these very memories (unsuccessfully); every streetlamp that he had found solace in as he walked the streets mindlessly at three am, searching for answers that never came to him. He closed his eyes and imagined the whiskey rising inside of him until it leaked into his lungs and filled them, drowning him. He held his breath, pondering how long it would take for him to go lifeless in this position. But the sudden stop in the rise and fall of his chest caused the female lying on it to stir in her sleep, draping her arm around him and pulling him even closer. He felt sick again so he took another sip. He knew that when he looked back on this evening, he wouldn't remember it, which was becoming a classic move on his part. In fact, his life had become nothing more than disconnected nights with nameless and faceless females and fire whiskey that filled all the empty space within him. And he wasn't sure how that had come to be, but he no longer cared enough to even attempt to figure it out.

احب نفسك اولا
(love yourself first)
From the moment I met you,
I was intrigued.
Your eyes were like
A vast blue ocean
That would pull me in
Sometimes welcoming,
Letting me stay afloat
Just long enough to enjoy myself
Other times willing me to drown
And drown, I did
You pulled me completely under
Without stopping to let me breathe
I almost died
Except I didn't die
Just as I gasped one last breath,
You helped me back to shore
Made sure I breathed again
That was when you told me you loved me
And right in that moment I wanted to kiss you
I craved you the way trees crave carbon dioxide
And you said there were times
When you wanted to kiss me
And just for a moment
I let myself imagine
I thought of your strong arms around my body,
Keeping me safe, while wanting every piece of me
Kissing the scars that align my skin
Like a map of my regrets
Wiping any tears I cried away
And that was when
You pulled me back under
you shattered every piece of my already broken heart
"I can't love you, because I'll end up hurt"
Were your exact words
And if I remember correctly,
Those were my words to you
The first time we exchanged
"I love you's"
And as I remembered this,
A riptide occurred
Riptide (n): a strong current caused by tidal flow in confined
areas  and presenting a hazard to swimmers and boaters
you were a hazard to my state of mind
You ruined what was left of my sanity
But it was when you decided to block me out
That I was finally able to realize this fact:
I was so busy trying to stay afloat, alive
In your fatal whirlpool of an ocean
In the ocean of your blue eyes
That I fell too hard for you
Before thinking to fall
For myself

The whirlpool, it spins,
while the mountain, it twists.
As two serpents entwined,
are surrounding this.
Some had once claimed,
that it started as a bear,
others claimed it began at Canopus,
way over, down there.
Multi-headed or spring of rocks,
cavern, mountain or egg,
a great wheel forever-turning,
with a circus and a one leg!
Pushed along by two giants,
grinding up salt with its gear,
thus responsible for the seasons,
floods and movements and the year.
Two horns of the monster,
but not found on its head,
the Earthen plane a giant treasure,
where Drakon made his bed,
with two stars on his brow,
like the two in his eyes,
the porthole of the ship,
a flying horse in disguise.
Scylla, Charybdis,
Jason, Argos, Deucalion,
Ziusdra, Manu, Noah,
-and the two birds who carry on,
and the mountain from below,
which they all rested upon.
Ameleth or Kullervo,
…and brother Utamo’s great wrong,
…and the whirlpool from above that created this song!

And the evil found inside us, the Id and its kin, will nurture the abused child and continue the sin. The great black wheel of madness, as always, will spin, churning out more abusers to fill the Hell that we’re in. When, where or how did the wheel of blackness start? Corrupting the love and joy into the evil in man’s heart and turning family into tragedy and tearing them apart? Next time you feel weak and let the succubus inside, just remember all those in Hell and the reasons they died.

oh right, she's the *** "slave" that gets kissed on the lips after being given oral ***, getting paid £110 AN HOUR... i'm i'm just a free-radical floating about on an income of £120 A WEEK waiting for charity of food and roof? well then... i hope that translates when i speak with a *******'s tongue stolen while having licked all the former ***** out of her **** and said: only i was in there... oh for ****'s sake! take the ****** out, i can feel the mouse tail on the tip of it! so who's the ***** now? the only oil i apply to my brain to ease the pressure after going 30 odd hours sober without sleep is alcohol, i imitate a axe action on my neck feeling my third tonsil turning into a throbbing muscle.

the split apart grapheme in greek!
θ                      and                        φ!
the lost grapheme!
thermometer                                           the
                                                             ­     v'eh or d'eh?
imagine saying     θarmacology
and imagine saying φermometer! imagine!
the english empire... shushed in a second in Dublin,
god knows why Yeats was read by
Clint Eastwood, and to my surprise,
a toothache or a broken nose readjusted is
more painful than what i managed to spot
in the greatest boxing movie: million dollar baby...
some pains are greater, the pains of the past
the past not rekindled are greater than
those of the present, the present can be overcome,
the indestructible element, what with
fire, water, earth, air, electricity, the seventh being
soul - all the others are preserved in continuum,
why can't the soul be kindred of the others,
is it to forever remain a ******* from the *****
bank of Louis XIV, huh?! the soul is equally elemental,
all modern science can tell me a that it's
worth walking in a library rather than a forest,
that all trees will eventually be treated as
toothpicks, matchsticks or pencils,
but i am not bound to exist in the mind
of another person, i am not to be the host eternal,
for all the science, we've become less
individualistic and more prone to parasites
of theory... personally i'd prefer the membrane
of phobias to keep me safe rather than
transcend these little millimetre irrationality
segments to be captured by a frigate of the grand
theorists...

please tell me it's just a horror case of aesthetics,
please! but no, you won't...
i know the overbearing particularity of English
due to missing diacritic,
i know the significance of significant syllable
cutting-up due to diacritical application -
the Greeks had a premature ******* starting
to use them... they shouldn't have...
THE ENTIRE WORLD WAS WAITING
FOR THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE TO BEGIN USING
DIACRITICAL MARKS! why did the Greeks
jump too early into the whirlpool? look at English
culture, they're gagging, rather than laughing,
we were all waiting for them to catch-up to the aesthetic,
they didn't, the Greeks made a falsetto on the 100m sprint,
they should have waited, and waited, until
the English applied diacritical distinction to the print,
in order that they might deal with programming,
encoding, computer language, no wonder
English once so eloquent disintegrated into emoticons
and acronyms! look at it! there's no point feeling
a nostalgia for only one man, there's no point
keeping Shakespeare when there's an entire
century to decipher, Marlowe et al. (i preferred
his Faust to Goethe's - one breath reading session
in Dover) - with nostalgia come the many merry men
of Southampton, not one, you can't do nostalgia
primum uno, you need a species, can we find the
required shrapnel in the Caribbean or in the
Venice of the Indian ocean, namely the Maldives?
you can't do nostalgia like that,
you need at least one other, otherwise future literature
extravagance will be as short-lived as
the Counter-Reformation given Martin Luther,
he isn't god, never was, but imagine the feeling
of disgrace that even poor Charles Dickens couldn't
match up to!

indeed the Greek created the consonant grapheme,
and many other twins separated at birth,
to fuel an orthographic aesthetic -
a bypass necessity of the opposites and lacking
colour - false stance of defeat written on white,
but geometrically written in the *******-out of colour,
therefore mutating, deliberate encoding due to
how to write like an Impressionist or how to write
like a Surrealist...

but as i remember, the riff to Black Sabbath's
black sabbath* written in tabulation:

e ||                                                  (boo tome)
b ||
g ||
d ||
a ||
E ||                                                   (top um)

opening riff sounds like this:

d ||                    3
a ||                                      2
E ||    1    

                 for the trembling effect, quickly
                 interchange with

a ||                                      2             /            3.

I asked a stranger to pour me into the ocean
so shards of me could fall in the peacock blue.
You should put it in writing.
but Amy asks  “But who ya writing for?”
My hair floats above my head
my body hovers
where succubi don’t put up with false pretenses
and neither do I.

And then I was ****** under.
While you were thinking I didn’t have a clue
With no voice in my head, I shot into the sky
to find myself as an emerald.
Where I observe, but don’t change.

Oh, what I would give to be nine and benign
Because as I grow older the flow of concepts grows heavier
And swirls around me rapidly
Creating a whirlpool
I can feel the world pull
In the gravity of ideas
Given weight by words
That brings down birds

We look up only to see Jupiter
And we live on the Earth's back
Weighed down like mules by it's presence
Carrying conflicting considerations
Ideas inflicting incineration

The rain precipitating from the clouds in our minds
Develops a lofty humidity within humanity
And the leaves on the trees point downward
Erecting walls
To trap us in our gravity garrison
Plotting ways to crush each other
Time becomes the most effective method
As we wait to weigh down wanderers
With a point of view
In our gravitational pull
To make them our mule
Carrying our concepts
To strengthen our impact on the maelstrom

As our brain gets bolder
The water gets colder
But this ocean keeps spinning
Keeping the frigid water from freezing
And the gravity of what we think
Is the gravity that makes us sink

From concept cradle to gravity grave
Tranquil transcendence is what we crave

im in a whirlpool of emotions
and i'm not sure whether i should
fight against this current or
if i should just let myself
go.

Love, unruliest hope, when fierce Diana went wild
With savage discourse, the arrow-stroke of her tongue—
While rage-hounds bay in wooded Gargaphie—aimed at Actaeon.
Or old Baucis her god-giving bone fat of mind,
Stewed the broth of covenant for Zeus to repay in kind.
Then Parthenope, siren-stung in her whirlpool of sea vines,
Her maiden-voice is a breath of sand for Naples to muse upon.
The body of Helen still lies in ages-old smoke over our cities,
We live in the timberframe of her bones of burned ships.
Why can’t her death be an end to all skies?

god ****** she misses you

and god ****** i miss you

and im sorry, god, for swearing but i have run out of ideas on how to make this no good shapeshifting warm handed boy notice me remember when he said i love you

this is not a goodbye you don't deserve one this is not a plea for help see previous poems, twitter, my wrists, etc this is not a romanticization of your destructive ways and i no longer hear birds sing when you torch cities and i can't bring myself to see the love in your inferno so what the hell do i have left to say to you

i once wrote that you left love letters on my tongue and that you made drowning fun but i have come to the conclusion that those are both in fact lies and that the only thing you left on my tongue is the bitter taste of your name and beer and that drowning is ******* terrible and so are you

i remind myself everyday that you must have been a good person somewhere along the way and that there must have been some point where you actually did miss the feeling of my skin and that i was the only one you cared for- but i must also remember the day you filled my vacancy and turned on the lights and i still see you in the smiling pictures hung on the walls like your head in the hall whenever i pass by and i remember the day you moved out and on to nicer things and to this day you have succeeded in making the whole thing feel like an eviction, like it was me that wanted you gone and my peeling wallpaper has since revealed that the only thing holding me together was you

funny how every part of this poem ends with you and funny how every thought these days ends with you

and it's funny how when things ended with you you were the only one laughing

this is not a cry or a plea or an appology

this is a eulogy from me to you and i will not waste any more metaphors or adjectives or nights where i should be fast asleep on your whirlpool eyes and twisted smile

you once said, at 3 am, "you know when you're as close to loving someone as physically possible without actually saying it?" and i replied with "yes" and i love you i love you i love you

i hope flowers grow from your rotting heart and i hope you wake up some life and feel just a hint of remorse as you look into her eyes

i'm not a poet and you're not a nice boy and there was a time when i would devote my life to writing about the way you touched my cheek and you would devote your life to exploring the small of my back

that life has ended and i hope she holds you close enough at night

(my own hands will find comfort in the folds you left unnoticed and i will let myself hear the whispers of flattery upon every surface i touch. i will love myself and i will learn to not love you and i will find someone that i can love without pushing myself aside)

I took the first sip of white wine in
trepidation for the aftermath of drunk
people in movies is not very pleasant.
I downed it all, faster than an intruder
who wiretaps an important building
somewhere in America. I had vowed to
not drown in the poison I had just consumed.
But what happened later proved me wrong.
I swam in clouds and I floated in shallow
waters for the slurs that lay on my tongue
were not something I would utter in a
sober state. I cavorted. I danced. I showed
skin. I was the frog that clandestinely dances
in the rain and hides away before the ground
is dry again. I swirled like a whirlpool. My cheeks
were red and I emitted happiness. I made silly
jokes about a plant named Wisteria and lay
in bed, twirling away in my drunken madness.

Woke up to a nightmare
Where gravity disappeared
Scrambling around mid-air
Just to find no one's there
Bright florescent light
Hiding away midnight
It's just not the same
It doesn't feel right

All this pretending
Is bringing me nothing
All this anger
Is making me more empty
Scrambling around in mid-air
Just to find no one's there

Spending everyday
Breaking under pressure
Over digging countless holes
For some kind of treasure
Just to have someone
Fill them back up
Send me out again
And tell me I'm worthless

All this pretending
Is bringing me nothing
All this anger
Is making me more empty
Scrambling around mid-air
Just to find no one's there

And I don’t know where I’ll go
If this light bulb should break
Falling down into a deep darkness
That I’ve tried so hard to escape
The same darkness I have made

There are plenty of fish in the sea
But none like you
As the bottom feeders sank so low
We swam way up high
But we fell into a whirlpool
And I didn't take it right
Don't want any drugs
Don't want any alcohol
Just want you to know
I'm still here after all
Scrambling around mid-air
Just to find no one's there

https://spencercarlson.bandcamp.com/track/mid-air