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Olive Spectrum - An employee at the BNB Bank.  Olive Spectrum is best friends with Jewel StoneWall.  She is the love interest for Akurra Wings.

Akurra Wings - The leader of the Black Crime Syndicate.  Akurra owns a scrap yard.  Akurra is thd love interest for Olive Spectrum.

Jewel StoneWall - The owner of the Golden Scissors hair salon.  Jewel StoneWall is best friends with Olive Spectrum.

The Black Crime Syndicate - A black criminal organization led by Akurra Wings.  The symbol for the Black Crime Syndicate is a winged snake coiling around a Cherry Blossom tree.

Amber Forest - The second in command of the Black Crime Syndicate.

Edward Davis - The owner of Club Envy *******.

Jade Moss - The leader of The Jade Dragons.  Jade Moss is a black woman.

Green Haven - The name of the city where the story takes place.

The Jade Dragons - A criminal organization led by Jade Moss.  The Jade Dragons are allies with The Black Crime Syndicate.

BNB Bank - The bank where Olive Spectrum is employed.

The Golden Scissors - A hair salon owned by Jewel StoneWall.

Club Envy - A ******* owned by Edward Davis.

The Long Arm Bandits -  A criminal organization who members are corrupt police officers.  The long arm bandits are rivals to The Black Crime Syndicate.

Written by Keith Edward Baucum
Michael R Burch Feb 2020
When Pigs Fly
by Michael R. Burch

On the Trail of Tears,
my Cherokee brothers,
why hang your heads?
Why shame your mothers?
Laugh wildly instead!
We will soon be dead.

When we lie in our graves,
let the white-eyes take
the woodlands we loved
for the *** and the rake.
It is better to die
than to live out a lie
in so narrow a sty.

In October 1838 the Cherokees began to walk the "Trail of Tears." Most of them made the thousand mile journey west to Oklahoma on foot. An estimated 4,000 people, or a quarter of the tribe, died en route. The soldiers "escorting" the Cherokees at bayonet point refused permission for the dead to be buried, threatening to shoot anyone who disobeyed. So the living were forced to carry the corpses of the dead until camp was made for the night. Years after the Cherokees had been rounded up and driven down the Trail of Tears, John G. Burnett reflected on what he and his fellow soldiers had done, saying, "Schoolchildren of today do not know that we are living on lands that were taken from a helpless race at the bayonet point, to satisfy the white man's greed... ****** is ****** and somebody must answer, somebody must explain the streams of blood that flowed in the Indian country... Somebody must explain the four thousand silent graves that mark the trail of the Cherokees to their exile." Keywords/Tags: Cherokee, Native American, Trail of Tears, Ethnic Cleansing, Genocide, ******, Evil, Death, March, Death March, Infanticide, Matricide, Racism, Racist, Discrimination, Violence, Fascism, White Supremacists, Horror, Terror, Terrorism, Greed, Gluttony, Avarice, Lust, ****, mrbpig, mrbpigs



Cherokee Prayer
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

As I walk life's trails
imperiled by the raging wind and rain,
grant, O Great Spirit,
that yet I may always
walk like a man.

This prayer makes me think of Native Americans walking the Trail of Tears with far more courage and dignity than their “civilized” abusers.



Native American Prayer
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Help us learn the lessons you have left us
in every leaf and rock.



Native American Travelers' Blessing
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Let us walk together here
among earth's creatures great and small,
remembering, our footsteps light,
that one wise God created all.



Sioux Vision Quest
by Crazy Horse, Oglala Lakota Sioux, circa 1840-1877
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

A man must pursue his Vision
as the eagle explores
the sky's deepest blues.



Cherokee Travelers' Blessing I
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I will extract the thorns from your feet.
For yet a little while, we will walk life's sunlit paths together.
I will love you like my own brother, my own blood.
When you are disconsolate, I will wipe the tears from your eyes.
And when you are too sad to live, I will put your aching heart to rest.

Published by Better Than Starbucks and Cherokee Native Americans



Cherokee Travelers' Blessing II
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Happily may you walk
in the paths of the Rainbow.
                  Oh,
and may it always be beautiful before you,
beautiful behind you,
beautiful below you,
beautiful above you,
and beautiful all around you
where in Perfection beauty is finished.

Published by Better Than Starbucks



Cherokee Travelers' Blessing III
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

May Heaven’s warming winds blow gently there,
where you reside,
and may the Great Spirit bless all those you love,
this side of the farthest tide.
And wherever you go,
whether the journey is fast or slow,
may your moccasins leave many cunning footprints in the snow.
And when you look over your shoulder, may you always find the Rainbow.

Published by Better Than Starbucks



What is life?
The flash of a firefly.
The breath of the winter buffalo.
The shadow scooting across the grass that vanishes with sunset.
―Blackfoot saying, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch



Warrior's Confession
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Oh my love, how fair you are—
far brighter than the fairest star!



Cherokee Proverb
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Before you judge
a man for his sins
be sure to trudge
many moons in his moccasins.



Cherokee Prayer
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

As I walk life's trails
imperiled by the raging wind and rain,
grant, O Great Spirit,
that yet I may always
walk like a man.

When I think of this prayer, I think of Native Americans walking the Trail of Tears.



The Receiving of the Flower
excerpt from a Mayan love poem
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Let us sing overflowing with joy
as we observe the Receiving of the Flower.
The lovely maidens beam;
their hearts leap in their *******.

Why?

Because they will soon yield their virginity to the men they love!



The Deflowering
excerpt from a Mayan love poem
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Remove your clothes;
let down your hair;
become as naked as the day you were born—

virgins!



Prelude to *******
excerpt from a Mayan love poem
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Lay out your most beautiful clothes,
maidens!
The day of happiness has arrived!

Grab your combs, detangle your hair,
adorn your earlobes with gaudy pendants.
Dress in white as becomes maidens ...

Then go, give your lovers the happiness of your laughter!
And all the village will rejoice with you,
for the day of happiness has arrived!



The Flower-Strewn Pool
excerpt from a Mayan love poem
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

You have arrived at last in the woods
where no one can see what you do
at the flower-strewn pool ...
Remove your clothes,
unbraid your hair,
become as you were
when you first arrived here
naked and shameless,
virgins, maidens!



Native American Proverbs

The soul would see no Rainbows if not for the eyes’ tears.
—loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

A woman’s highest calling is to help her man unite with the Source.
A man’s highest calling is to help his woman walk the earth unharmed.
—loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

When you were born, you cried and the world rejoiced.
Live your life so that when you die, the world cries and you rejoice.
—White Elk, loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

What is life?
The flash of a firefly.
The breath of a winter buffalo.
The shadow scooting across the grass that vanishes with sunset.
—Blackfoot saying, translation by Michael R. Burch

Speak less thunder, wield more lightning. — Apache proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

The more we wonder, the more we understand. — Arapaho proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Adults talk, children whine. — Blackfoot proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Don’t be afraid to cry: it will lessen your sorrow. — Hopi proverb

One foot in the boat, one foot in the canoe, and you end up in the river. — Tuscarora proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Our enemy's weakness increases our strength. — Cherokee proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

We will be remembered tomorrow by the tracks we leave today. — Dakota proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

No sound's as eloquent as a rattlesnake's tail. — Navajo saying, translation by Michael R. Burch

The heart is our first teacher. — Cheyenne proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Dreams beget success. — Maricopa proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

Knowledge interprets the past, wisdom foresees the future. — Lumbee proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch

The troublemaker's way is thorny. — Umpqua proverb, translation by Michael R. Burch



Earthbound
an original poem by Michael R. Burch

Tashunka Witko, better known as Crazy Horse, had a vision of a red-tailed hawk at Sylvan Lake, South Dakota. In his vision he saw himself riding a spirit horse, flying through a storm, as the hawk flew above him, shrieking. When he awoke, a red-tailed hawk was perched near his horse.

Earthbound,
and yet I now fly
through the clouds that are aimlessly drifting ...
so high
that no sound
echoing by
below where the mountains are lifting
the sky
can be heard.

Like a bird,
but not meek,
like a hawk from a distance regarding its prey,
I will shriek,
not a word,
but a screech,
and my terrible clamor will turn them to clay—
the sheep,
the earthbound.



Years after the Cherokees had been rounded up and driven down the Trail of Tears, John G. Burnett reflected on what he and his fellow soldiers had done, saying, "Schoolchildren of today do not know that we are living on lands that were taken from a helpless race at the bayonet point, to satisfy the white man's greed ... ****** is ****** and somebody must answer, somebody must explain the streams of blood that flowed in the Indian country ... Somebody must explain the four thousand silent graves that mark the trail of the Cherokees to their exile."

In the same year, 1830, that Stonewall Jackson consigned Native Americans to the ash-heap of history, Georgia Governor George Gilmer said, "Treaties are expedients by which ignorant, intractable, and savage people are induced ... to yield up what civilized people have the right to possess." By "civilized" he apparently meant people willing to brutally dispossess and **** women and children in order to derive economic benefits for themselves.

These nights bring dreams of Cherokee shamans
whose names are bright verbs and impacted dark nouns,
whose memories are indictments of my pallid flesh . . .
and I hear, as from a great distance,
the cries tortured from their guileless lips, proclaiming
the nature of my mutation.
―Michael R. Burch, from "Mongrel Dreams" (my family is part Cherokee, English and Scottish)

After Jackson was re-elected with an overwhelming majority in 1832, he strenuously pursued his policy of removing Native Americans, even refusing to accept a Supreme Court ruling which invalidated Georgia's planned annexation of Cherokee land. But in the double-dealing logic of the white supremacists, they had to make the illegal resettlement of the Indians appear to be "legal," so a small group of Cherokees were persuaded to sign the "Treaty of New Echota," which swapped Cherokee land for land in the Oklahoma territory. The Cherokee ringleaders of this infamous plot were later assassinated as traitors. (****** was similarly obsessed with the "legalities" of the **** Holocaust; isn't it strange how mass murderers of women and children can seek to justify their crimes?)

Native Americans understood the "circle of life" better than their white oppressors ...

When we sit in the Circle of the People,
we must be responsible because all Creation is related
and the suffering of one is the suffering of all
and the joy of one is the joy of all
and whatever we do affects everything in the universe.
—"Lakota Instructions for Living" by White Buffalo Calf Woman, translated by Michael R. Burch



Veiled
by Michael R. Burch

She has belief
without comprehension
and in her crutchwork shack
she is
much like us . . .

tamping the bread
into edible forms,
regarding her children
at play
with something akin to relief . . .

ignoring the towers ablaze
in the distance
because they are not revelations
but things of glass,
easily shattered . . .

and if you were to ask her,
she might say:
sometimes God visits his wrath
upon an impious nation
for its leaders’ sins,

and we might agree:
seeing her mutilations.

Published by Poetry Super Highway and Modern War Poems.



Ali’s Song
by Michael R. Burch

They say that gold don’t tarnish. It ain’t so.
They say it has a wild, unearthly glow.
A man can be more beautiful, more wild.
I flung their medal to the river, child.
I flung their medal to the river, child.

They hung their coin around my neck; they made
my name a bridle, “called a ***** a *****.”
They say their gold is pure. I say defiled.
I flung their slave’s name to the river, child.
I flung their slave’s name to the river, child.

Ain’t got no quarrel with no Viet Cong
that never called me ******, did me wrong.
A man can’t be lukewarm, ’cause God hates mild.
I flung their notice to the river, child.
I flung their notice to the river, child.

They said, “Now here’s your bullet and your gun,
and there’s your cell: we’re waiting, you choose one.”
At first I groaned aloud, but then I smiled.
I gave their “future” to the river, child.
I gave their “future” to the river, child.

My face reflected up, dark bronze like gold,
a coin God stamped in His own image―BOLD.
My blood boiled like that river―strange and wild.
I died to hate in that dark river, child,
Come, be reborn in this bright river, child.

Originally published by Black Medina

Note: Cassius Clay, who converted to Islam and changed his “slave name” to Muhammad Ali, said that he threw his Olympic boxing gold medal into the Ohio River. Confirming his account, the medal was recovered by Robert Bradbury and his wife Pattie in 2014 during the Annual Ohio River Sweep, and the Ali family paid them $200,000 to regain possession of the medal. When drafted during the Vietnamese War, Ali refused to serve, reputedly saying: “I ain't got no quarrel with those Viet Cong; no Vietnamese ever called me a ******.” The notice mentioned in my poem is Ali's draft notice, which metaphorically gets tossed into the river along with his slave name. I was told through the grapevine that this poem appeared in Farsi in an Iranian publication called Bashgah. ―Michael R. Burch



evol-u-shun
by Michael R. Burch

does GOD adore the Tyger
while it’s ripping ur lamb apart?

does GOD applaud the Plague
while it’s eating u à la carte?

does GOD admire ur intelligence
while u pray that IT has a heart?

does GOD endorse the Bible
you blue-lighted at k-mart?



Enheduanna, the daughter of the famous King Sargon the Great of Akkad, is the first ancient writer whose name remains known today. She appears to be the first named poet in human history and the first known author of prayers and hymns. Enheduanna, who lived circa 2285-2250 BCE, is also one of the first women we know by name.

Lament to the Spirit of War
by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

You hack down everything you see, War God!

Rising on fearsome wings
you rush to destroy the land,
descending like a raging storm,
howling like a hurricane,
screaming like a tempest,
thundering, raging, ranting, drumming,
whiplashing whirlwinds!

Men falter at your approaching footsteps.

Tortured dirges scream
on your lyre of despair.

Like a fiery Salamander you poison the land:
growling over the earth like thunder,
vegetation collapsing before you,
blood gushing down a mountainside.

Spirit of hatred, greed and vengeance!

******* of heaven and earth!

Your ferocious fire consumes our land.

Whipping your stallion
with furious commands,
you decide our fate.

You triumph over all human rites and prayers.

Who can explain your tirade,
why you go on so?



Temple Hymn 15
to the Gishbanda Temple of Ningishzida
by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

Most ancient and terrible shrine,
set deep in the mountain,
dark like a mother's womb...

Dark shrine,
like a mother's wounded breast,
blood-red and terrifying...

Though approaching through a safe-seeming field,
our hair stands on end as we near you!

Gishbanda,
like a neck-stock,
like a fine-eyed fish net,
like a foot-shackled prisoner's manacles...
your ramparts are massive,
like a trap!

But once we’re inside,
as the sun rises,
you yield widespread abundance!

Your prince
is the pure-handed priest of Inanna, heaven's Holy One,
Lord Ningishzida!

Oh, see how his thick, lustrous hair
cascades down his back!

Oh Gishbanda,
he has built this beautiful temple to house your radiance!
He has placed his throne upon your dais!



The Exaltation of Inanna: Opening Lines and Excerpts
by Enheduanna, the daughter of Sargon I of Akkad and the high priestess of the Goddess Inanna
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Lady of all divine powers!
Lady of the resplendent light!
Righteous Lady adorned in heavenly radiance!

Beloved Lady of An and Uraš!
Hierodule of An, sun-adorned and bejeweled!
Heaven’s Mistress with the holy diadem,
Who loves the beautiful headdress befitting the office of her own high priestess!

Powerful Mistress, seizer of the seven divine powers!
My Heavenly Lady, guardian of the seven divine powers!
You have seized the seven divine powers!
You hold the divine powers in your hand!
You have gathered together the seven divine powers!
You have clasped the divine powers to your breast!

You have flooded the valleys with venom, like a viper;
all vegetation vanishes when you thunder like Iškur!
You have caused the mountains to flood the valleys!
When you roar like that, nothing on earth can withstand you!

Like a flood descending on floodplains, O Powerful One, you will teach foreigners to fear Inanna!

You have given wings to the storm, O Beloved of Enlil!
The storms do your bidding, blasting the unbelievers!

Foreign cities cower at the chaos You cause!
Entire countries cower in dread of Your deadly South Wind!
Men cower before you in their anguished implications,
raising their pitiful outcries,
weeping and wailing, beseeching Your benevolence with many wild lamentations!

But in the van of battle, everything falls before You, O Mighty Queen!

My Queen,
You are all-conquering, all-devouring!
You continue Your attacks like relentless storms!
You howl louder than the howling storms!
You thunder louder than Iškur!
You moan louder than the mournful winds!
Your feet never tire from trampling Your enemies!
You produce much wailing on the lyres of lamentations!

My Queen,
all the Anunna, the mightiest Gods,
fled before Your approach like fluttering bats!
They could not stand in Your awesome Presence
nor behold Your awesome Visage!

Who can soothe Your infuriated heart?
Your baleful heart is beyond being soothed!

Uncontrollable Wild Cow, elder daughter of Sin,
O Majestic Queen, greater than An,
who has ever paid You enough homage?

O Life-Giving Goddess, possessor of all powers,
Inanna the Exalted!

Merciful, Live-Giving Mother!
Inanna, the Radiant of Heart!
I have exalted You in accordance with Your power!
I have bowed before You in my holy garb,
I the En, I Enheduanna!

Carrying my masab-basket, I once entered and uttered my joyous chants ...

But now I no longer dwell in Your sanctuary.
The sun rose and scorched me.
Night fell and the South Wind overwhelmed me.
My laughter was stilled and my honey-sweet voice grew strident.
My joy became dust.

O Sin, King of Heaven, how bitter my fate!

To An, I declared: An will deliver me!
I declared it to An: He will deliver me!

But now the kingship of heaven has been seized by Inanna,
at Whose feet the floodplains lie.

Inanna the Exalted,
who has made me tremble together with all Ur!

Stay Her anger, or let Her heart be soothed by my supplications!
I, Enheduanna will offer my supplications to Inanna,
my tears flowing like sweet intoxicants!
Yes, I will proffer my tears and my prayers to the Holy Inanna,
I will greet Her in peace ...

O My Queen, I have exalted You,
Who alone are worthy to be exalted!
O My Queen, Beloved of An,
I have laid out Your daises,
set fire to the coals,
conducted the rites,
prepared Your nuptial chamber.
Now may Your heart embrace me!

These are my innovations,
O Mighty Queen, that I made for You!
What I composed for You by the dark of night,
The cantor will chant by day.

Now Inanna’s heart has been restored,
and the day became favorable to Her.
Clothed in beauty, radiant with joy,
she carried herself like the elegant moonlight.

Now to the Noble Hierodule,
to the Wrecker of foreign lands
presented by An with the seven divine powers,
and to my Queen garbed in the radiance of heaven ...

O Inanna, praise!



The Exaltation of Inanna: Opening Lines, an Excerpt
Nin-me-šara by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

Lady of all divine powers,
Lady of the all-resplendent light,
Righteous Lady clothed in heavenly radiance,
Beloved Lady of An and Uraš,
Mistress of heaven with the holy diadem,
Who loves the beautiful headdress befitting the office of her high priestess,
Powerful Mistress who has seized all seven divine powers,
My lady, you are the guardian of the seven divine powers!
You have seized the divine powers,
You hold the divine powers in your hand,
You have gathered up the divine powers,
You have clasped the divine powers to your breast!
Like a dragon you have spewed venom on foreign lands that know you not!
When you roar like Iškur at the earth, nothing can withstand you!
Like a flood descending on alien lands, O Powerful One of heaven and earth, you will teach them to fear Inanna!



Temple Hymn 7: an Excerpt
to the Kesh Temple of Ninhursag
by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

O, high-situated Kesh,
form-shifting summit,
inspiring fear like a venomous viper!

O, Lady of the Mountains,
Ninhursag’s house was constructed on a terrifying site!

O, Kesh, like holy Aratta: your womb dark and deep,
your walls high-towering and imposing!

O, great lion of the wildlands stalking the high plains!...



Temple Hymn 17: an Excerpt
to the Badtibira Temple of Dumuzi
by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

O, house of jeweled lapis illuminating the radiant bed
in the peace-inducing palace of our Lady of the Steppe!



Temple Hymn 22: an Excerpt
to the Sirara Temple of Nanshe
by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

O, house, you wild cow!
Made to conjure signs of the Divine!
You arise, beautiful to behold,
bedecked for your Mistress!



Temple Hymn 26: an Excerpt
to the Zabalam Temple of Inanna
by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

O house illuminated by beams of bright light,
dressed in shimmering stone jewels,
awakening the world to awe!



Temple Hymn 42: an Excerpt
to the Eresh Temple of Nisaba
by Enheduanna
loose translation by Michael R. Burch

O, house of brilliant stars
bright with lapis stones,
you illuminate all lands!

...

The person who put this tablet together
is Enheduanna.
My king: something never created before,
did she not give birth to it?



Update of "A Litany in Time of Plague"
by Michael R. Burch

THE PLAGUE has come again
To darken lives of men
and women, girls and boys;
Death proves their bodies toys
Too frail to even cry.
I am sick, I must die.
Lord, have mercy on us!

Tycoons, what use is wealth?
You cannot buy good health!
Physicians cannot heal
Themselves, to Death must kneel.
Nuns’ prayers mount to the sky.
I am sick, I must die.
Lord, have mercy on us!

Beauty’s brightest flower?
Devoured in an hour.
Kings, Queens and Presidents
Are fearful residents
Of manors boarded high.
I am sick, I must die.
Lord, have mercy on us!

We have no means to save
Our children from the grave.
Though cure-alls line our shelves,
We cannot save ourselves.
"Come, come!" the sad bells cry.
I am sick, I must die.
Lord, have mercy on us!

NOTE: This poem is meant to capture the understandable fear and dismay the Plague caused in the Middle Ages, and which the coronavirus has caused in the 21st century. We are better equipped to deal with this modern plague, thanks to advances in science, medicine and sanitation. We do not have to succumb to fear, but it would be wise to have a healthy respect for the nasty bug and heed the advice of medical experts.--MRB



Regret
by Michael R. Burch

Regret,
a bitter
ache to bear . . .

once starlight
languished
in your hair . . .

a shining there
as brief
as rare.

Regret . . .
a pain
I chose to bear . . .

unleash
the torrent
of your hair . . .

and show me
once again―
how rare.

Published by The HyperTexts and The Chained Muse



The Stake
by Michael R. Burch

Love, the heart bets,
if not without regrets,
will still prove, in the end,
worth the light we expend
mining the dark
for an exquisite heart.

Originally published by The Lyric



If
by Michael R. Burch

If I regret
fire in the sunset
exploding on the horizon,
then let me regret loving you.

If I forget
even for a moment
that you are the only one,
then let me forget that the sky is blue.

If I should yearn
in a season of discontentment
for the vagabond light of a companionless moon,
let dawn remind me that you are my sun.

If I should burn―one moment less brightly,
one instant less true―
then with wild scorching kisses,
inflame me, inflame me, inflame me anew.

Originally published by The HyperTexts



The Effects of Memory
by Michael R. Burch

A black ringlet
curls to lie
at the nape of her neck,
glistening with sweat
in the evaporate moonlight ...
This is what I remember

now that I cannot forget.

And tonight,
if I have forgotten her name,
I remember:
rigid wire and white lace
half-impressed in her flesh ...

our soft cries, like regret,

... the enameled white clips
of her bra strap
still inscribe dimpled marks
that my kisses erase ...

now that I have forgotten her face.



Villanelle: Because Her Heart Is Tender
by Michael R. Burch

for Beth

She scrawled soft words in soap: "Never Forget,"
Dove-white on her car's window, and the wren,
because her heart is tender, might regret
it called the sun to wake her. As I slept,
she heard lost names recounted, one by one.

She wrote in sidewalk chalk: "Never Forget,"
and kept her heart's own counsel. No rain swept
away those words, no tear leaves them undone.

Because her heart is tender with regret,
bruised by razed towers' glass and steel and stone
that shatter on and on and on and on,
she stitches in wet linen: "NEVER FORGET,"
and listens to her heart's emphatic song.

The wren might tilt its head and sing along
because its heart once understood regret
when fledglings fell beyond, beyond, beyond ...
its reach, and still the boot-heeled world strode on.

She writes in adamant: "NEVER FORGET"
because her heart is tender with regret.



To the boy Elis
by Georg Trakl
translation by Michael R. Burch

Elis, when the blackbird cries from the black forest,
it announces your downfall.
Your lips sip the rock-spring's blue coolness.

Your brow sweats blood
recalling ancient myths
and dark interpretations of birds' flight.

Yet you enter the night with soft footfalls;
the ripe purple grapes hang suspended
as you wave your arms more beautifully in the blueness.

A thornbush crackles;
where now are your moonlike eyes?
How long, oh Elis, have you been dead?

A monk dips waxed fingers
into your body's hyacinth;
Our silence is a black abyss

from which sometimes a docile animal emerges
slowly lowering its heavy lids.
A black dew drips from your temples:

the lost gold of vanished stars.

TRANSLATOR'S NOTE: I believe that in the second stanza the blood on Elis's forehead may be a reference to the apprehensive ****** sweat of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. If my interpretation is correct, Elis hears the blackbird's cries, anticipates the danger represented by a harbinger of death, but elects to continue rather than turn back. From what I have been able to gather, the color blue had a special significance for Georg Trakl: it symbolized longing and perhaps a longing for death. The colors blue, purple and black may represent a progression toward death in the poem.



Turkish Poetry Translations

Attilâ İlhan (1925-2005) was a Turkish poet, translator, novelist, screenwriter, editor, journalist, essayist, reviewer, socialist and intellectual.

Ben Sana Mecburum: “You are indispensable”
by Attila Ilhan
translation by Nurgül Yayman and Michael R. Burch

You are indispensable; how can you not know
that you’re like nails riveting my brain?
I see your eyes as ever-expanding dimensions.
You are indispensable; how can you not know
that I burn within, at the thought of you?

Trees prepare themselves for autumn;
can this city be our lost Istanbul?
Now clouds disintegrate in the darkness
as the street lights flicker
and the streets reek with rain.
You are indispensable, and yet you are absent ...

Love sometimes seems akin to terror:
a man tires suddenly at nightfall,
of living enslaved to the razor at his neck.
Sometimes he wrings his hands,
expunging other lives from his existence.
Sometimes whichever door he knocks
echoes back only heartache.

A screechy phonograph is playing in Fatih ...
a song about some Friday long ago.
I stop to listen from a vacant corner,
longing to bring you an untouched sky,
but time disintegrates in my hands.
Whatever I do, wherever I go,
you are indispensable, and yet you are absent ...

Are you the blue child of June?
Ah, no one knows you―no one knows!
Your deserted eyes are like distant freighters ...

Perhaps you are boarding in Yesilköy?
Are you drenched there, shivering with the rain
that leaves you blind, beset, broken,
with wind-disheveled hair?

Whenever I think of life
seated at the wolves’ table,
shameless, yet without soiling our hands ...
Yes, whenever I think of life,
I begin with your name, defying the silence,
and your secret tides surge within me
making this voyage inevitable.
You are indispensable; how can you not know?



Fragments
by Attila Ilhan
loose English translations/interpretations by Michael R. Burch

The night is a cloudy-feathered owl,
its quills like fine-spun glass.

It gazes out the window,
perched on my right shoulder,
its wings outspread and huge.

If the encroaching darkness seems devastating at first glance,
the sovereign of everything,
its reach infinite ...

Still somewhere within a kernel of light glows secretly
creating an enlightened forest of dialectics.

In September’s waning days one thinks wanly of the arrival of fall
like a ship appearing on the horizon with untrimmed, tattered sails;
for some unfathomable reason fall is the time to consider one’s own demise―
the body smothered by yellowed leaves like a corpse rotting in a ghoulish photograph ...

Bitter words
crack like whips
snapping across prison yards ...

Then there are words like pomegranate trees in bloom,
words like the sun igniting the sea beyond mountainous horizons,
flashing like mysterious knives ...

Such words are the burning roses of an infinite imagination;
they are born and they die with the flutterings of butterflies;
we carry those words in our hearts like pregnant shotguns until the day we expire,
martyred for the words we were prepared to die for ...

What I wrote and what you understood? Curious and curiouser!



Mehmet Akif Ersoy: Modern English Translations of Turkish Poems

Mehmet Âkif Ersoy (1873-1936) was a Turkish poet, author, writer, academic, member of parliament, and the composer of the Turkish National Anthem.



Snapshot
by Mehmet Akif Ersoy
loose English translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Earth’s least trace of life cannot be erased;
even when you lie underground, it encompasses you.
So, those of you who anticipate the shadows,
how long will the darkness remember you?



Zulmü Alkislayamam
"I Can’t Applaud Tyranny"
by Mehmet Akif Ersoy
loose English translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I can't condone cruelty; I will never applaud the oppressor;
Yet I can't renounce the past for the sake of deluded newcomers.
When someone curses my ancestors, I want to strangle them,
Even if you don’t.
But while I harbor my elders,
I refuse to praise their injustices.
Above all, I will never glorify evil, by calling injustice “justice.”
From the day of my birth, I've loved freedom;
The golden tulip never deceived me.
If I am nonviolent, does that make me a docile sheep?
The blade may slice, but my neck resists!
When I see someone else's wound, I suffer a great hardship;
To end it, I'll be whipped, I'll be beaten.
I can't say, “Never mind, just forget it!” I'll mind,
I'll crush, I'll be crushed, I'll uphold justice.
I'm the foe of the oppressor, the friend of the oppressed.
What the hell do you mean, with your backwardness?



Çanakkale Sehitlerine
"For the Çanakkale Martyrs"
by Mehmet Akif Ersoy
loose English translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Was there ever anything like the Bosphorus war?―
The earth’s mightiest armies pressing Marmara,
Forcing entry between her mountain passes
To a triangle of land besieged by countless vessels.
Oh, what dishonorable assemblages!
Who are these Europeans, come as rapists?
Who, these braying hyenas, released from their reeking cages?
Why do the Old World, the New World, and all the nations of men
now storm her beaches? Is it Armageddon? Truly, the whole world rages!
Seven nations marching in unison!
Australia goose-stepping with Canada!
Different faces, languages, skin tones!
Everything so different, but the mindless bludgeons!
Some warriors Hindu, some African, some nameless, unknown!
This disgraceful invasion, baser than the Black Death!
Ah, the 20th century, so noble in its own estimation,
But all its favored ones nothing but a parade of worthless wretches!
For months now Turkish soldiers have been vomited up
Like stomachs’ retched contents regarded with shame.
If the masks had not been torn away, the faces would still be admired,
But the ***** called civilization is far from blameless.
Now the ****** demand the destruction of the doomed
And thus bring destruction down on their own heads.
Lightning severs horizons!
Earthquakes regurgitate the bodies of the dead!
Bombs’ thunderbolts explode brains,
rupture the ******* of brave soldiers.
Underground tunnels writhe like hell
Full of the bodies of burn victims.
The sky rains down death, the earth swallows the living.
A terrible blizzard heaves men violently into the air.
Heads, eyes, torsos, legs, arms, chins, fingers, hands, feet ...
Body parts rain down everywhere.
Coward hands encased in armor callously scatter
Floods of thunderbolts, torrents of fire.
Men’s chests gape open,
Beneath the high, circling vulture-like packs of the air.
Cannonballs fly as frequently as bullets
Yet the heroic army laughs at the hail.
Who needs steel fortresses? Who fears the enemy?
How can the shield of faith not prevail?
What power can make religious men bow down to their oppressors
When their stronghold is established by God?
The mountains and the rocks are the bodies of martyrs! ...
For the sake of a crescent, oh God, many suns set, undone!
Dear soldier, who fell for the sake of this land,
How great you are, your blood saves the Muslims!
Only the lions of Bedr rival your glory!
Who then can dig the grave wide enough to hold you. and your story?
If we try to consign you to history, you will not fit!
No book can contain the eras you shook!
Only eternities can encompass you! ...
Oh martyr, son of the martyr, do not ask me about the grave:
The prophet awaits you now, his arms flung wide open, to save!



Sessiz Gemi (“Silent Ship”)

by Yahya Kemal Beyatli
loose translation by Nurgül Yayman and Michael R. Burch

for the refugees

The time to weigh anchor has come;
a ship departing harbor slips quietly out into the unknown,
cruising noiselessly, its occupants already ghosts.
No flourished handkerchiefs acknowledge their departure;
the landlocked mourners stand nurturing their grief,
scanning the bleak horizon, their eyes blurring ...
Poor souls! Desperate hearts! But this is hardly the last ship departing!
There is always more pain to unload in this sorrowful life!
The hesitations of lovers and their belovèds are futile,
for they cannot know where the vanished are bound.
Many hopes must be quenched by the distant waves,
since years must pass, and no one returns from this journey.



Full Moon
by Yahya Kemal Beyatli
loose translation by Nurgül Yayman and Michael R. Burch

You are so lovely
the full moon just might
delight
in your rising,
as curious
and bright,
to vanquish night.

But what can a mortal man do,
dear,
but hope?
I’ll ponder your mysteries
and (hmmmm) try to
cope.

We both know
you have every right to say no.



The Music of the Snow
by Yahya Kemal Beyatli
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

This melody of a night lasting longer than a thousand years!
This music of the snow supposed to last for thousand years!

Sorrowful as the prayers of a secluded monastery,
It rises from a choir of a hundred voices!

As the *****’s harmonies resound profoundly,
I share the sufferings of Slavic grief.

My mind drifts far from this city, this era,
To the old records of Tanburi Cemil Bey.

Now I’m suddenly overjoyed as once again I hear,
With the ears of my heart, the purest sounds of Istanbul!

Thoughts of the snow and darkness depart me;
I keep them at bay all night with my dreams!

Translator’s notes: “Slavic grief” because Beyatli wrote this poem while in Warsaw, serving as Turkey’s ambassador to Poland, in 1927. Tanburi Cemil Bey was a Turkish composer.



Thinking of you
by Nazim Hikmet
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Thinking of you is beautiful, hopeful―
like listening to the most beautiful songs
sung by the earth's most beautiful voices.
But hope is insufficient for me now;
I don't want to listen to songs.
I want to sing love into birth.



I love you
by Nazim Hikmet
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

I love you―
like dipping bread into salt and eating;
like waking at night with a raging fever
and thirstily lapping up water, my mouth to the silver tap;
like unwrapping the unwieldy box the postman delivers,
unable to guess what's inside,
feeling fluttery, happy, doubtful.
I love you―
like flying over the sea the first time
as something stirs within me
while the sky softly darkens over Istanbul.
I love you―
as men thank God gratefully for life.



Sparrow
by Nazim Hikmet
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Little sparrow,
perched on the clothesline,
do you regard me with pity?
Even so, I will watch you
soar away through the white spring leaves.



The Divan of the Lover

the oldest extant Turkish poem
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

All the universe as one great sign is shown:
God revealed in his creative acts unknown.
Who sees or understands them, jinn or men?
Such works lie far beyond mere mortals’ ken.
Nor can man’s mind or reason reach that strand,
Nor mortal tongue name Him who rules that land.
Since He chose nothingness with life to vest,
who dares to trouble God with worms’ behests?
For eighteen thousand worlds, lain end to end,
Do not with Him one atom's worth transcend!



Fragment
by Prince Jem
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

Behold! The torrent, dashing against the rocks, flails wildly.
The entire vast realm of Space and Being oppresses my soul idly.
Through bitterness of grief and woe the sky has rent its morning robe.
Look! See how in its eastern palace, the sun is a ****** globe!
The clouds of heaven rain bright tears on the distant mountain peaks.
Oh, hear how the deeply wounded thunder slowly, mournfully speaks!



An Ecstasy of Fumbling
by Michael R. Burch

The poets believe
everything resolves to metaphor—
a distillation,
a vapor
beyond filtration,
though perhaps not quite as volatile as before.

The poets conceive
of death in the trenches
as the price of art,
not war,
fumbling with their masque-like
dissertations
to describe the Hollywood-like gore

as something beyond belief,
abstracting concrete bunkers to Achaemenid bas-relief.



Excerpts from “Travels with Einstein”
by Michael R. Burch

for Trump

I went to Berlin to learn wisdom
from Adolph. The wild spittle flew
as he screamed at me, with great conviction:
“Please despise me! I look like a Jew!”

So I flew off to ’Nam to learn wisdom
from tall Yankees who cursed “yellow” foes.
“If we lose this small square,” they informed me,
earth’s nations will fall, dominoes!”

I then sat at Christ’s feet to learn wisdom,
but his Book, from its genesis to close,
said: “Men can enslave their own brothers!”
(I soon noticed he lacked any clothes.)

So I traveled to bright Tel Aviv
where great scholars with lofty IQs
informed me that (since I’m an Arab)
I’m unfit to lick dirt from their shoes.

At last, done with learning, I stumbled
to a well where the waters seemed sweet:
the mirage of American “justice.”
There I wept a real sea, in defeat.

Originally published by Café Dissensus



The Leveler
by Michael R. Burch

The nature of Nature
is bitter survival
from Winter’s bleak fury
till Spring’s brief revival.

The weak implore Fate;
bold men ravish, dishevel her . . .
till both are cut down
by mere ticks of the Leveler.

I believe I wrote this poem around age 20, in 1978 or thereabouts. It has since been published in The Lyric, Tucumcari Literary Review, Romantics Quarterly and The Aurorean.



The Hippopotami
by Michael R. Burch

There’s no seeing eye to eye
with the awesomely huge Hippopotami:
on the bank, you’re much taller;
going under, you’re smaller
and assuredly destined to die!



Ballade of the Bicameral Camel
by Michael R. Burch

There once was a camel who loved to ****.
Please get your lewd minds out of their slump!
He loved to give RIDES on his large, lordly lump!



The Echoless Green
by Michael R. Burch

for and after William Blake

At dawn, laughter rang
on the echoing green
as children at play
greeted the day.

At noon, smiles were seen
on the echoing green
as, children no more,
many fine vows they swore.

By twilight, their cries
had subsided to sighs.

Now night reigns supreme
on the echoless green.



Unlikely Mike
by Michael R. Burch

I married someone else’s fantasy;
she admired me despite my mutilations.

I loved her for her heart’s sake, and for mine.
I hid my face and changed its connotations.

And in the dark I danced—slight, Chaplinesque—
a metaphor myself. How could they know,

the undiscerning ones, that in the glow
of spotlights, sometimes love becomes burlesque?

Disfigured to my soul, I could not lose
or choose or name myself; I came to be

another of life’s odd dichotomies,
like Dickey’s Sheep Boy, Pan, or David Cruse:

as pale, as enigmatic. White, or black?
My color was a song, a changing track.



Spring Was Delayed
by Michael R. Burch

Winter came early:
the driving snows,
the delicate frosts
that crystallize

all we forget
or refuse to know,
all we regret
that makes us wise.

Spring was delayed:
the nubile rose,
the tentative sun,
the wind’s soft sighs,

all we omit
or refuse to show,
whatever we shield
behind guarded eyes.

Originally published by Borderless Journal



The Shijing or **** Jing (“Book of Songs” or “Book of Odes”) is the oldest Chinese poetry collection, with the poems included believed to date from around 1200 BC to 600 BC. According to tradition the poems were selected and edited by Confucius himself. Since most ancient poetry did not rhyme, these may be the world’s oldest extant rhyming poems.

Shijing Ode #4: “JIU MU”
ancient Chinese rhyming poem circa (1200 BC - 600 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

In the South, beneath trees with drooping branches
thick with vines that make them shady,
we find our lovely princely lady:
May she repose in happiness!

In the South, beneath trees with drooping branches
whose clinging vines make hot days shady,
we wish love’s embrace for our lovely lady:
May she repose in happiness!

In the South, beneath trees with drooping branches
whose vines, entwining, make them shady,
we wish true love for our lovely lady:
May she repose in happiness!

Shijing Ode #6: “TAO YAO”
ancient Chinese rhyming poem circa (1200 BC - 600 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The peach tree is elegant and tender;
its flowers are fragrant, and bright.
A young lady now enters her future home
and will manage it well, day and night.

The peach tree is elegant and tender;
its fruits are abundant, and sweet.
A young lady now enters her future home
and will make it welcome to everyone she greets.

The peach tree is elegant and tender;
it shelters with bough, leaf and flower.
A young lady now enters her future home
and will make it her family’s bower.

Shijing Ode #9: “HAN GUANG”
ancient Chinese rhyming poem circa (1200 BC - 600 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

In the South tall trees without branches
offer men no shelter.
By the Han the girls loiter,
but it’s vain to entice them.
For the breadth of the Han
cannot be swum
and the length of the Jiang
requires more than a raft.

When cords of firewood are needed,
I would cut down tall thorns to bring them more.
Those girls on their way to their future homes?
I would feed their horses.
But the breadth of the Han
cannot be swum
and the length of the Jiang
requires more than a raft.

When cords of firewood are needed,
I would cut down tall trees to bring them more.
Those girls on their way to their future homes?
I would feed their colts.
But the breadth of the Han
cannot be swum
and the length of the Jiang
requires more than a raft.

Shijing Ode #10: “RU FEN”
ancient Chinese rhyming poem circa (1200 BC - 600 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

By raised banks of the Ru,
I cut down branches in the brake.
Not seeing my lord
caused me heartache.

By raised banks of the Ru,
I cut down branches by the tide.
When I saw my lord at last,
he did not cast me aside.

The bream flashes its red tail;
the royal court’s a blazing fire.
Though it blazes afar,
still his loved ones are near ...

It was apparently believed that the bream’s tail turned red when it was in danger. Here the term “lord” does not necessarily mean the man in question was a royal himself. Chinese women of that era often called their husbands “lord.” Take, for instance, Ezra Pound’s famous loose translation “The River Merchant’s Wife.” Speaking of Pound, I borrowed the word “brake” from his translation of this poem, although I worked primarily from more accurate translations. In the final line, it may be that the wife or lover is suggesting that no matter what happens, the man in question will have a place to go, or perhaps she is urging him to return regardless. The original poem had “mother and father” rather than “family” or “loved ones,” but in those days young married couples often lived with the husband’s parents. So a suggestion to return to his parents could be a suggestion to return to his wife as well.

Shijing Ode #12: “QUE CHAO”
ancient Chinese rhyming poem circa (1200 BC - 600 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

The nest is the magpie's
but the dove occupies it.
A young lady’s soon heading to her future home;
a hundred carriages will attend her.

The nest is the magpie's
but the dove takes it over.
A young lady’s soon heading to her future home;
a hundred carriages will escort her.

The nest is the magpie's
but the dove possesses it.
A young lady’s soon heading to her future home;
a hundred carriages complete her procession.

Shijing Ode #26: “BO ZHOU” from “The Odes of Bei”
ancient Chinese rhyming poem circa (1200 BC - 600 BC)
loose translation/interpretation by Michael R. Burch

This cypress-wood boat floats about,
meandering with the current.
Meanwhile, I am distraught and sleepless,
as if inflicted with a painful wound.
Not because I have no wine,
and can’t wander aimlessly about!

But my mind is not a mirror
able to echo all impressions.
Yes, I have brothers,
but they are undependable.
I meet their anger with silence.

My mind is not a stone
to be easily cast aside.
My mind is not a mat
to be conveniently rolled up.
My conduct so far has been exemplary,
with nothing to criticize.

Yet my anxious heart hesitates
because I’m hated by the herd,
inflicted with many distresses,
heaped with insults, not a few.
Silently I consider my case,
until, startled, as if from sleep, I clutch my breast.

Consider the sun and the moon:
how did the latter exceed the former?
Now sorrow clings to my heart
like an unwashed dress.
Silently I consider my options,
but lack the wings to fly away.



The Drawer of Mermaids
by Michael R. Burch

This poem is dedicated to Alina Karimova, who was born with severely deformed legs and five fingers missing. Alina loves to draw mermaids and believes her fingers will eventually grow out.

Although I am only four years old,
they say that I have an old soul.
I must have been born long, long ago,
here, where the eerie mountains glow
at night, in the Urals.

A madman named Geiger has cursed these slopes;
now, shut in at night, the emphatic ticking
fills us with dread.
(Still, my momma hopes
that I will soon walk with my new legs.)

It’s not so much legs as the fingers I miss,
drawing the mermaids under the ledges.
(Observing, Papa will kiss me
in all his distracted joy;
but why does he cry?)

And there is a boy
who whispers my name.
Then I am not lame;
for I leap, and I follow.
(G’amma brings a wiseman who says

our infirmities are ours, not God’s,
that someday a beautiful Child
will return from the stars,
and then my new fingers will grow
if only I trust Him; and so

I am preparing to meet Him, to go,
should He care to receive me.)

Keywords/Tags: mermaid, mermaids, child, children, childhood, Urals, Ural Mountains, soul, soulmate, radiation



On the Horns of a Dilemma (I)
by Michael R. Burch

Love has become preposterous
for the over-endowed rhinoceros:
when he meets the right miss
how the hell can he kiss
when his horn is so ***** it lofts her thus?

I need an artist or cartoonist to create an image of a male rhino lifting his prospective mate into the air during an abortive kiss. Any takers?



On the Horns of a Dilemma (II)
by Michael R. Burch

Love has become preposterous
for the over-endowed rhinoceros:
when he meets the right miss
how the hell can he kiss
when his horn deforms her esophagus?



On the Horns of a Dilemma (III)
by Michael R. Burch

A wino rhino said, “I know!
I have a horn I cannot blow!
And so,
ergo,
I’ll watch the lovely spigot flow!



The Horns of a Dilemma Solved, if not Solvent
by Michael R. Burch

A wine-addled rhino debated
the prospect of living unmated
due to the scorn
gals showed for his horn,
then lost it to poachers, sedated.



The Arrival of the Sea Lions
by Michael R. Burch

The sound
of hounds
resounds in the sound.



Hounds Impounded
by Michael R. Burch

The sound
of hounds
resounds
in the pound.



Prince Kiwi the Great
by Michael R. Burch

Kiwi’s
a ***-wee
but incredibly bright:
he sleeps half the day,
pretending it’s night!

Prince Kiwi
commands us
with his regal air:
“Come, humans, and serve me,
or I’ll yank your hair!”

Kiwi
cries “Kree! Kree!”
when he wants to be fed ...
suns, preens, flutters, showers,
then it’s off to bed.

Kiwi’s
a ***-wee
but incredibly bright:
he sleeps half the day,
pretending it’s night!

Kiwi is our family’s green-cheeked parakeet. Parakeets need to sleep around 12 hours per day, hence the pun on “bright” and “half the day.”



Ah! Sunflower
by Michael R. Burch

after William Blake

O little yellow flower
like a star ...
how beautiful,
how wonderful
we are!

Published as the collection "When Pigs Fly"
Toe-skewered socks shuffled in years-tattered shoes
Patched-up tweed elbows rested gently; arms folded in poised disapproval
He was my teacher
A man steeped in the essence of the written word
Every bump and groove of his face were the syllables of a life long-lived
Stressed and unstressed beats of the tension between us denoted his impatience
For he and I saw the word a different way
He detracted the sweetness of my plum-purple prose
and I loathed the strictness and banality of his expert structure, his measured cadence
but we could agree on one thing
We loved the word
We loved every echo of it in the long night
After fires fade and blue birds sleep
How dreams tumble out of the mouths of snoring dissidents
See those murmurs become the dialectic, the dreams, of poets and gods galore!
We agreed on this
The desperate cry of freedom
Yet we could not agree on his score of my work
Which I had so passionately written till early morning
Rings of the moon beneath my eyes as I argue
And his stonewall-gaze leaves my arguments blunt
For you are young, he says, you do not know the way of the pen, still
With sword I could ply approval from his lips
Rend his flesh asunder
Feed the dogs and the birds
Leave marks on his children like slave brands,
The power of the sword could make him do as I asked!
Exactly as I asked…
But with pen I could get nary a nod
I abandoned my search for his smile that day
Yet not the pen
In fact, I pressed firm, not with the nib, but with my mind
Day by day
Hour by hour
Past midnight into dreamland, by the light of the cosmos I composed worlds into waking
Tirelessly, my fingers plodded upon the keyboard
I watched the letters tick by
On and on
Full speed ahead
As if I were running
Outrunning…
Him
That stonewall-gaze
Peering down at my soul from an emerald tower
Each keystroke was a step away
A step beyond, years beyond
I sought my pleasure where it could be found
The approval of my peers
My professors
My colleagues
My fans
Scores of adoration, as if by the metric-ton
Still running
As if a scarlet letter of FAILURE were etched in my soul
And just like that,
My running came to a stop
As news of his death reached the shore of my self-imposed exile
Exile from shame
Exile from disappointment
I saw myself more lowly than ever
As, for after all those years of running, those stonewall-eyes had gone to sleep
And had not cared for my embarrassment
My resentment
My bitterness
Indeed
It were as if I were fighting a ghost I created
And look where it got me
To the top of the world
Chased into an emerald tower
Alone
Fearing myself a fraud at the ease of my keystrokes
How could such talent belong to a failure?
Well the man who proved I was a failure was dead
And I realized
So, too, should my defensive pride live no longer
So, too, should I free myself of the fear that manifests the agonizing toll of the pursuit of perfection
So, too, should I realize…
Just because he did not approve
Doesn’t mean I shouldn’t approve of myself
Exit stage left
Where dreams await
And I learn to enjoy what the dissidents dreamed
A life in which our dreams live free
No longer sheltered in the embrace of our childhood nightmares
No longer living in fear…
It's funny, I've often reflected on this particular comment one of my English teachers gave me once.

What's weird is, at the time, I considered his comment a compliment, "Second-rate author," I never considered myself to possess authorship, much less being second-rate, so I accepted it as subtle praised and moved on.
Yet years later, when I began to take much pleasure in, and put focus on, my writing, I began to resent this comment of his.

Obviously, I'm a much better writer than when I was 16/17, but for whatever reason, this comment of his bugged me as I was getting my degree in creative writing.

It's also startling that I got some very cruel criticism from some professors of mine while getting my degree, yet none of them needled my brain as much as that which I heard as a teenager. The irony is startling, LOL.

Anyway, I myself am now a teacher. When I began heading toward this profession, I knew there was going to be some sort of transformative lesson I would learn. Something important. I kind of lead my life this way.
Yet this poem is every proof of what it was that I set out to learn and this is only the beginning.

I love when a poem comes together like this one.
I had the first 5 lines pop into my head ad-lib and I had such an itch to jot them down that I ignored some important things to wait on my slow computer to open up Word so I could record them.
An hour later and I have this poem, which I consider a beauty.
It's certainly pleasing to me.
I haven't written a long poem like this in almost a year.
I've been on a steady diet of writing Twitter poems, haha.

Last night, I was looking at my pinned tweet, which was the last poem I posted here, and I thought to myself, "I need a new one, it's been almost a year."
Lo and behold! The Lord provides, haha.
It was a great day for this, too, because this was a great teaching day.
Rewarding, valuable, transformative, a source for reflection and catharsis, all culminating in this poem here.

I feel quite satisfied :)
I hope this poem was great for you, too.

ENJOY!
DEW
Edmundo Jul 2021
A stonewall face
Beaten by sun
Drunken by sorrow
Punished by rain
Melted the stones
Now forever shrunken
As Olive Spectrum lay on the floor at Club Envy with her lungs burning and filling up with blood from being shot by an unknown person.  She thought her life would never end like this.  Olive's tears started to flow as she thought of the years she spent slithering with snakes.  Her job at the BNB Bank made it easy to launder money for the Black Crime Syndicate.  It was six years ago in the month of June that her life took a downward spiral.  Upset at the thought of being late for work Olive floored the gas pedal.  As she passed by the slow moving drivers weaving in and out of traffic.  Olive hoped she didn't get a ticket.  I just had to stay up late watching the marathon of Funny Man.  Now I got to race the clock and pray I don't get stopped by the police.  Thought Olive as she sped past the other drivers.  As Olive Spectrum pulled into the BNB parking lot she checked the time.  "It's 7:55am.  I made it within five minutes" said Olive.  Getting out of her car Olive walked through the bank's glass doors.  As the time passed the employees of BNB got the bank ready for the public.  One of the three people that arrived at the time of opening was a new face.  Mmmmm yummy thought Olive as she walked up to the tall light skin man.  "Hello sir how can I help you?" asked Olive as she eyed the man up and down.  "My name is Akurra Wings.  I would like to open a checking and a savings account" answered the tall light skin man.  "Mr. Wings please follow me to my office" said Olive.  As Olive and Akurra sat in Olive's office filling out papers Olive made it up in her mind that she would get to know Akurra on a personal level.  After a day's work Olive got behind the wheel of her BMW and started her drive home.  On her way home Olive called her best friend Jewel StoneWall.  "Hello Jewel how are you?" asked Olive with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand holding her cellphone.  "I'm doing great Olive.  What's up?" answered Jewel StoneWall as she did one of her client's hair at her salon the Golden Scissors.  "Are we still on for Saturday?" asked Olive.  With a confused look on her face Jewel ask "Is the day Friday already?"  "Yeah girl what day did you think it was?" responded Olive.  "To tell you the truth Olive I thought the day was Thursday" said Jewel.  "No Jewel it's Friday.  I'm glad I have a friend who owns a hair salon" said Olive.  "You better be thankful.  I'll talk with you later Olive" said Jewel.  "Ok bye Jewel" said Olive.  Olive Spectrum was a plain looking black woman in her 30's who lived a very plain life.  She always looked forward to Saturday.  A day she would spend at the Golden Scissor getting her hair done and talking with Jewel StoneWall her childhood friend.
Written by Keith Edward Baucum
This is a gangster love story.
GREEN Chapter One

As Kenya lie on the floor at Club Envy with her lungs burning and filling up with blood from being shot by an unknown person she thought her life would never end like this.  Kenya tears started to flow as she thought of the years she spent silthering with snakes.  Her job at the BNB Bank made it easy to launder money for the Black Crime Syndicate.  It was six years ago in the month of June that her life took a downward spiral.
Upset at the thought of being late for work Kenya floored the gas pedal.  As she passed by the slow moving drivers weaving in and out of traffic Kenya hoped she didn't get a ticket.  I just had to stay up late watching the marathon of Funny Man.  Now I got to race the clock and pray I don't get stopped by the police thought Kenya as she sped past the other drivers.  As Kenya pulled into the BNB Bank parking lot she checked the time.
"It's 7:55a.m.  I made it within five minutes."
Kenya got out of her car and walked through the bank's glass doors.
As time passed the employees of BNB got the bank ready for the public.  One of the three people that arrived at the time of opening was a new face.  Mmmmmm yummy thought Kenya as she walked up to the tall light skinned man.
"Hello sir how may I help you?" asked Kenya as she eyed the man up and down.
"My name is Malik Maxwell Williams.  I would like to open a checking and savings account" answered the tall light skinned man.
"Mr. Williams please follow me to my office."
As Kenya and Malik sat in Kenya's office filling out papers Kenya made it up in her mind that she would get to know Malik on a personal level.  After a days work Kenya got behind the wheel of her red BMW and started her drive home.  On her way home.  On her way home Kenya called her best friend Jewel Stonewall.
"Hello Jewel how are you?" asked Kenya with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand holding her cellphone.
"I'm doing great Kenya.  What's up?" answered Jewel Stonewall as she did one of her client's hair at her salon the Golden Scissors.
"Are we still on for Saturday?"
With a confused look on her face Jewel asked
"Is the day Friday already?"
"Yeah girl what day did you think it was?"
"To tell you the truth Kenya I thought the day was Thursday."
"No Jewel it's Friday.  I'm glad I have a friend who owns a hair salon."
"You better be thankful.  I'll talk with you later Kenya."
"Ok by Jewel."
Kenya Ayanna Night was a plain looking black woman in her 30's who lived a very plain life.  She always looked forward to Saturday.  A day she would spend at the Golden Scissors getting her hair done and talking with Jewel Stonewall her childhood friend.


Written by: Keith Edward Baucum
Mariah Jan 2015
They'll use Martin Luther King day to sell anything from mattresses to cars.
Even he has been ripped up and replanted,
capitalized, like Christmas or Easter,
by the people who give us images of a white Jesus,
but you bet they don't pay everyone equal.
We have boulevards, schools, and libraries named after King,
but streets over, we have Confederate soldiers carved into a mountain,
we call 'em heroes, that's what I was taught,
the ones who fought, the ones who ate lead,
But, they aren't talking about who really put a bullet in Dr. King's head.
What the **** is wrong with us?
America will go see Selma in millions,
this weekend, go back home to their all white neighborhoods,
thinking about how it was bad then, but now, it's all good.
Who are we really trying to fool?
Stand up for the pledge in school
Put your hand over your heart and forget
all this country denies you
telling you that there isn't a heart of a human beating inside you
because you're gay, you're black, you're not like that,
She was a flirt, she wore a short skirt,
Every day you try to heal the hurt
Justice for all? Like are you kidding me?
There ain't such a thing here as liberty
Do you know where you stand
was Native American land?
Ripped from their bleeding hands
And don't even get me started on Iraq and Iran.
You know that mountaintop?
The one I was talking about,
Did they tell you it was a KKK meeting spot?
Bet not.
I wonder, is the clay here red from all the blood?
We hide our history,
sing promises of liberty,
say that racism ended with slavery,
and it's Stonewall Jackson, he's a hero, they say
but never speak of Stonewall Riots any day
and I'm afraid for our children and what they will learn,
in classrooms, will they be silenced?
Come here kids, let me tell you a story,
of Ferguson, New York, Hong Kong,
about how people will look back and see they were wrong,
But some never did, some died with hatred,
some died because of it,
Let me tell you about homeless LGBT youth
Let me tell you about all these issues
Let me tell you the truth
And there are different ways of seeing it,
but only one way to say it,
you and I both know,
You just have to listen for it.
(The mountain I'm talking about is Stone Mountain, Georgia, btw.)
Snapshot memories of are past
having so much fun with the hope that it would last
To my best friend Nan,
a beacon of light to a hurting world in need of love

To the truest friend I ever had
those memories by the stonewall
Started playing together as friends
She had blue eyes & long blonde hair

I had brown eyes and brown hair
roller skating on the sidewalk with the attached rollers with a key
Went down by the brook to catch poly wags
we both went to the same school

Having sleep overs was a blast
a secret passage to get to her father's soda shop
Taking ice cream and delicious candy
everything nice and dandy with Nancy

Yours was are youth to be captured with a precious smile
Cape cod trips when Nan would drive
going to a trip to Provincetown
watching the folks dive for money

Big ships coming to dock
the men would get the money in their mouths
The island we used to go
in a row boat along the beach

Looking for young boys and we found them
went to dances at the Bristol Boys Club
Doing the latest dance craze the Huck Buck
Boys wearing pegged pants and girls wore skirts

To cherish those lasting memories of a time ago
getting married
Nan had three children
Ann had six

To raise and cherish the family united in love
Today we are in are eighties
both with medical issues
Yet remained best friend's after all these years
John F McCullagh May 2013
The moon shone full that fatal night
When Stonewall and his men
were returning from a scout
around their former friends.
The brightness of the risen moon
Put them in silhouette.
The pickets rose and fired;
an action they would soon regret.
Stonewall Jackson was unhorsed,
a Minnie ball in his arm.
The surgeons had to amputate.
One week later he was gone.
It marred a famous victory,
A masterpiece of Lee’s,
when Jackson crossed over the river
to rest in the shade of the trees.
A poem about the battle of Chancellorsville 05/02/1863
Josh C DeWees Mar 2014
I'm standing at a crossroad
I've stood somewhere similar before
But never one of this magnitude
Like staring death in the eye.

I've always been the kind of man to die alone
I love them but they'd leave me
So I'm touched by nothing anymore
A stonewall of a man.

I'm broken and tired
It's hard to have faith in someone
When you've been loyal to no one but yourself
A rogue knight in a chess game.

I'm standing again in a meeting of choices
Option like poison that all take me a different way
But inevitably to the same place
Or close enough.

I'm taking my time this time
Time that I don't have to think
Love one way
Happiness another
And finally Freedom
Each as caustic as the last

Love.
A poison but a **** good
The ******* of my options

Happiness.
Butterflies and rainbows
or really violence and ***** for me
a lovely ******

Freedom.
My own life of my choices
No tether or chain
A free floating **** in the air.

They all sound as good as the last.
But I'm stuck here.
I
Am
Lost
And
I
Will
Have
To
Lose
Myself
More

I'm standing at a crossroad
I'm lost and broken

I'm standing at a crossroad
a man with nothing to lose

I'm standing at a crossroad.
I pick that one.

I'm leaving a crossroad
alone and broken

I'm lost but hopeful
To the future I walk
Just writing
As Olive Spectrum lay on the floor at Club Envy with her lungs burning and filling up with blood from being shot by an unknown person.  She thought her life would never end like this.  Olive's tears started to flow as she thought of the years she spent slithering with snakes.  Her job at the BNB Bank made it easy to launder money for the Black Crime Syndicate.  It was six years ago in the month of June that her life took a downward spiral.  Upset at the thought of being late for work Olive floored the gas pedal.  As she passed by the slow moving drivers weaving in and out of traffic.  Olive hoped she she didn't get a ticket.  I just had to stay up late watching the marathon of Funny Man.  Now I got to race the clock and pray I don't get stopped by the police.  Thought Olive as she sped past the other drivers.  As Olive Spectrum pulled into the BNB parking lot she checked the time.  "It's 7:55am.   I made it within five minutes" said Olive.  Getting out of her car Olive walked through the bank's glass doors.  As time passed the employees of BNB got the bank ready for the public.  One of the three people that arrived at the time of opening was a new face.   Mmmmm yummy thought Olive as she walked up to the tall light skin man.  "Hello sir how may I help you?" asked Olive as she eyed the man up and down.  "My name is Akurra Wings.  I would like to open a checking and a savings account" answered the tall light skin man.  "Mr. Wings please follow me to my office" said Olive.  As Olive and Akurra sat in Olive's office filling out papers Olive made it up in her mind that she would get to know Akurra on a personal level.  After a day's work Olive got behind the wheel of her BMW and started her drive her home.  On her way home Olive called her best friend Jewel StoneWall.  "Hello Jewel how are you?" asked Olive with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand holding her cellphone.  "I'm doing great Olive.  What's up?" answered Jewel StoneWall as she did one of her client's hair at her salon the Golden Scissors.  "Are we still on for Saturday?" asked Olive.  With a confused look on her face Jewel asks "Is the day Friday already?"  "Yeah girl what day did you think it was?" responded Olive.  "To tell you the truth Olive I thought the day was Thrusday" said Jewel.  "No Jewel it's. Friday.  I'm glad I have a friend who owns a hair salon" said Olive.  "You better be thankful.  I'll talk with you later Olive" said Jewel.  "Ok bye Jewel" said Olive.  Olive Spectrum was a plain looking black woman in her 30's who lived a very plain life.  She always looked forward to Saturday.  A day she would spend at the Golden Scissors getting her hair done and talking with Jewel StoneWall her childhood friend.

Written by Keith Edward Baucum.
A gangster love story.
miranda schooler Dec 2013
i want a good heart .
i want it to be made of good stuff .
i want the stain glass window builder to be my drinking buddy .
i want to drink only the punch of a million gender queer school kids taking free martial arts lessons to survive recess .
i stopped calling myself a pacifist when I heard gandhi told women they should not physically fight off their rapists .
i believe there is such a thing as a non violent fist .
i believe the earth is a woman muzzled , beaten , tied to the cold slinging tracks .
i believe the muzzled have every right to rip off the bible belt and take it to the patriarchy’s *** .
i know these words are going to get me in trouble .
it is never polite to throw back the tear gas .
just like its never polite to bring enough life rafts .
they crowd the balconies where the wealthy shine their jewels .
but sometimes love ..
sometimes real love
is ******* rude .
is interrupting a wedding mid vow just as the congregation is about to cry .
to stand up in your pew to say 
“ is everyone here clear on how diamonds are mined ?” 
hallelujah to every drag queen at stonewall who made weapons out of her stiletto shoes .
hallelujah to the blues keeping the neighborhood awake .
to the activist standing in the snow outside of the circus 
holding a ten foot photograph 
of a baby elephant in chains ,
when it’s probably some little kid’s birthday .
hallelujah to making everyone uncomfortable .
to the terrible manners of truth .
to refusing to clean the blood off the plate .
bend this spine into a bow 
i can pull across the cello of my speech .
love readies its heart’s teeth ,
chews through the etiquette leash .
takes down the cellphone tower after millions of people die in wars in the congo fighting for the minerals that make our cellphones . 
love blows up the dam .
chains itself to the redwood tree ,
to the capital building when a trailer of mexican immigrants are found dead on the south texas roadside .
love insists well intentioned white people officially stop calling themselves color blind .
insists hope lace it’s ******* boots 
always calls out the misogynist , racist , homophobic joke . 
refuses to be a welcome mat where hate wipes its feet .
love asks questions at the most inappropriate times .
overturns the defense of marriage act then walks a pride parade . asking when the plight of poor single mothers will ignite our hearts into action like that .
love is not polite .
deadlocks our rush hour traffic with a hundred stubborn screaming bikes .
hallelujah to every suffrage movement , hunger strike .
hallelujah to insisting they get your pronouns right .
hallelujah to tact never winning our spines .
to taking our power all the way back to that first glacier that had to learn how to swim .
to not turning our heads from a single ugly truth .
to knowing we live in a time when beauty recruits its models outside the doors of eating disorder clients .
that is not a metaphor .
this is not a line to a poem .
an indian farmer walks into a crowd of people and stab himself in his chest to protest 
the poisoning of his land .
a buddhist monk burns himself alive on the streets of saigon .
a united states' soldier hangs himself wearing his enemy’s dog tags around his holy neck .
may my heart be as heavy 
as a tuba in the front row of the mardi gras parade five months after katrina .
may it weigh the weight of the world 
so it might anchor the sun 
so it might hold me to my own light until i am willing to sweat as much as i cry .
until i am willing to press into the clay of our precious lives .
a window .
might our grace riot the walls down .
may the drought howl us awake
may we rush into the streets 
to do the work of opening each other’s eyes .
may our good hearts forever be 
too loud to let the neighbors sleep .
Mike Bergeron Oct 2012
Thump
Thump
Thump
Thump
Thump
Thump
Break
Thump
Thump
Whump
Break
Broken...
Broken.
Goodnight, I love you.
wind scatters the fallen leaves

mother roams helpless
child in her arms

fleas merrily peel the stray
and her two pups

girl offers her flower
for a dime

as the clock strikes three
the devout race for a glimpse

the deity’s stone carved face
beams with divine grace.
I am a humming bird with a broken wing forming a geometric fall.
I am a conjoined twin with a foot in heaven and one in hell.
I am a geyser spewing out echoes from a stonewall well.
I am an open road stretched for miles paved with a murderous smile.
I am a man with a firm handshake who stands still on top of an earthquake.
I am a visionary man who slipped on fate and fell in love.
I am a preliminary hearing fallen on deaf ears.
I am the contribution to your retribution.
I am a person of depersonalization.
I am a one man army minus one man.
I am the desired taste of orange juice and toothpaste.
I am concentrated concentration.
I am the formation of your imagination.
I am the comma for your introductory clause.
I am the cause for your sudden pause.
I am the spatula that stirs up your anxiety.
I am the reaper who never leaves a clue.
I am the lace that always chokes the shoe.
I am the light that finds its way thru helping the little shrew.
I am the suburban white boy who sings the blues.
I am consistent inconsistency.
I am your assigned tour guide for your expiration exploration.
No.
The lips lock
And won't budge.

Cries of men
From the grimy depths of the trash
Rise with loud flames burning tall.
Tears ball up in the eyes of the multicolored soldiers
And their gray oppressors alike who
Spit and ****.
Tears, blood, and mascara wash the New York streets
Clean.

A fresh painted face for the queen

Let's sit in Christopher's patch of grass,
So these matchstick moments that burn briefly
Can rest among us.
We'll carry them back into battle tonight
On our backs
As Diana's drum beats a smooth rhythm.

Never before has the color of stone been so radiant
As when the soldiers file out of their stone homes
To behold that colorfully calloused street.

In Grecian fashion,
The openly wild fighters pull capotes
Over their decorated uniforms
And charge.

Through the noise and through the pain,
Soft embers from the fiery battle
Float above the city.
Winds lift these delicate remains toward Heaven
Where defeated warriors like Cannon and Ulrichs
Feel the familiar consistency of these blacked bits between their fingers.
They smile and celebrate.

Finally, the bodies of men begin to wan
And topple.
Of those still standing,
Only some hold their heads high.

The victory fell upon our colorful
And tested soldiers.

Their enemies were left grimaced and gasping
On their knees begging for mercy
At the hands of those brave and beaten
Multicolored defenders.  

Afraid to be burned again, the powers of gray returned
To where their world made sense
In books and sermons.

The heroes moved on
To the next street.

No,
No more.
As Kenya lay on the floor at Club Envy with her lungs burning and filling up with blood from being shot by an unknown person she thought her life would never end like this.  Kenya's tears started to flow as she thought of the years she spent slithering with snakes.  Her job at the BNB Bank made it easy to launder money for the Black Crime Syndicate.  It was six years ago in the month of June that her life took a downward spiral.
Upset at the thought of being late for work Kenya floored the gas pedal.  As she passed by the slow moving drivers weaving in and out of traffic Kenya hoped she didn't get a ticket.  I just had to stay up late watching the marathon of Funny Man.  Now I got to race the clock and pray I don't get stopped the police thought Kenya as she sped past the other drivers.  As Kenya pulled into the BNB Bank's parking lot she checked the time.
"It's 7:55am.  I made it within five minutes" said Kenya.
Kenya got out of her car and walked through the bank's glass doors.  As time passed the employees of BNB got the bank ready for the public.  One of the three people that arrived at the time of opening was a new face.  Mmmmmm yummy thought Kenya as she walked up to the tall light skinned man.
"Hello sir how may I help you?" asked Kenya as she eyed the man up and down.
"My name is Malik Maxwell.  I would like to open a checking and a savings account" answered the tall light skinned man.
"Mr. Maxwell please follow me to my office" said Kenya.
As Kenya and Malik sat in Kenya's office filling out papers Kenya made it up in here mind that she would get to know Malik on a personal level.
After a day's work Kenya got behind the wheel of her BMW and started he drive home.  On her way home Kenya called her best friend Jewel Stonewall.
"Hello Jewel how are you?" asked Kenya with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand holding her cellphone.
"I'm doing great Kenya.  What's up?" answered Jewel as she did one of her client's hair at her salon the Golden Scissors.
"Are we still on for Saturday?" asked Kenya.
With a confused look on her face Jewel asked
"Is the day Friday already?"
"Yeah girl what day did you think it was?" responded Kenya.
"To tell you the truth Kenya I thought the day was Thursday" said Jewel.
"No Jewel it's Friday.  I'm glad I have a friend who owns a hair salon" said Kenya.
"You better be thankful.  I'll talk with you later Kenya" said Jewel.
"Ok bye Jewel" said Kenya.
Kenya Ayanna Night was a plain looking black woman in her 30's who lived a very plain life.  She always looked forward to Saturday.  A day she would spend at the Golden Scissors getting her hair done and talking with Jewel Stonewall her childhood friend.

written by Keith Edward Baucum
Olive Spectrum was a plain looking black woman in her 30's who lived a very plain life.  She always looked forward to Saturday.  A day she would spend at the Golden Scissors getting her hair done and talking with Jewel StoneWall her childhood friend.  When Saturday rolled around Olive hopped out of bed and got ready for her hair appointment.  On her way to the Golden Scissors Olive thought about how Jewel have been trying to get her to get Dreadlocks.  "Jewel said I should try something different.  I guess I'll be getting Dreadlocks" said Olive.  As Olive parked her red BMW in the parking lot of the Golden Scissors she noticed she was Jewel's first client.  Now only if it would stay like this thought Olive.  Opening the doors to the hair salon Olive saw Jewel sitting in her chair as if she was a client waiting to get her hair done.  "Jewel get off your lazy **** and get started on my hair" said Olive as she entered the Golden Scissors.  "Olive hush your mouth before I make you turn around and leave" said Jewel as she rose to her feet.  Rolling her eyes and waving her hands in the air Olive pranced over to Jewel and tugged on her hair.  "I've decided to let you dread my hair.  You're right It's time for a change" said Olive as she raked her fingers through Jewel's hair.  Placing her hands on her hips Jewel said "It's about time.  Place your **** in my chair so I can get started."  "Oh yeah I got a fish on the line" Olive told Jewel as she sat down.  Dragging the comb through Olive's hair Jewel says "Mmmm do tell Olive and don't leave nothing out."  "I won't and by the way dye the tip of my dreadlocks red.  This new face came in the bank today.  A tall good looking brother by the name of Akurra Wings.  He opened a checking and a saving account" said Olive.  As Jewel twisted Olive's hair she asked the question "Did you ask him out?"  "Not yet.  The next time he come in I'll ask" answered Olive.  "What does he look like?  C'mon Olive I need details" said Jewel.  "He's tall around six feet, light skin, and has a brush cut" said Olive.  "Mmmmm he sounds yummy.  Will you get in trouble if you date him?" asked Jewel.  "I don't think so and it's nobody business who I date" answered Olive.  With a concern look on her face Jewel says "I just want to make sure you don't get in trouble."  "Jewel we don't hang out that much any more.  We need to get together and do something" said Olive.  "With me working all the time Olive I don't have that much free time.  Because of who you are I'll make time" said Jewel.  When Jewel StoneWall finally got finished with Olive's hair it was 1:00pm.  "Take a look in the mirror Olive and tell me what you think" said Jewel as she took a step back.  Rising to her feet Olive looked in the mirror.  "Wow Jewel if I knew I looked this good with Dreadlocks I would have gotten them a long time ago" said Olive as she stared at herself in the mirror.  "What else are you doing today?" asked Jewel.  "I'm going shopping.  I need a new outfit" answered Olive as she paid Jewel for doing her hair.  "We'll get together Olive.  Just let me move things around on my schedule" said Jewel.  "Yeah sure Jewel" said Olive.  Getting back in her car Olive drove to the clothing store New Fashions.
Written by Keith Edward Baucum
This is GREEN Chapter Two.  A gangster love story.
Make my life a hollow reed
That will bend now in stormy breeze
For in numbers I find my strength
Beneath the willow tree

Make my life like the rock
Piled high upon , top to top
A stonewall that runs for miles
Around my lands it stands

Make my life short and sweet
Give me peace not dire defeat
Give me love and woman's sigh
Amidst the clovered fields

Make my life a Godly song
One that knows right from wrong
With wisdon as old as stars
I'll dance inside the fire

Make my life to unfold
I am tired , my shoes have holes
My dreams are seeds cast to the wind
And just the husk remains

Make my life now come to end
It's my time to propend
I'll walk among the ghost's remains
And willingly I quote

Hollow reeds will bend not break
Holow reeds will not forsake
Of hollow reeds my death bed make
And lie amongst the stars
Kate Morgan Jun 2013
I met her in the parking lot of a liquor store one Friday night with my naked body hidden beneath a dressing gown.
I’d put it on whilst I finished the gin from my 20th birthday within my boyfriends closet as he drank his **** down in beer and asked why I was in the closet.

Impotent, it was a quick exit as I thanked the drink for making me able to ride my bike back minus the safety of a sanitary towel, without my **** left to think of his grunts and groans and his hands which branded my thighs as he fed me lies that it was just in the moment; his finger prints left signatures citing his latest triumph of lasting one hundred point thirteen seconds.

The magnetism between the Alchemist and me was instant.
She held out her palm and asked for mine as the lines in my hands rewrote themselves in twisted, hopeful anticipation; reaching out, what I felt from the tips of my fingers was magic as I traced her navel to the logo of DKNY on the front of her black, cotton *******.

I taught her how to blow out smoke rings like the clowns at a circus who sit within purple tents and repeat sums of the class of 1969, the date they got their ***** kicked in, indigo, violet, for being performers.
I taught tobacco. She taught me ***.
There was ****** deviation towards devilry as I delved into the darkness between her legs as her ****** enchantment captured my hand and leaned me back;
Black blindfold, sight slaughtered.
Burning desire rolled over my bare ******* and left a trail of rouge; yet her warmth was not tender nor loving, but raw, earthly.
A sensual split as she clawed my back and licked the drips of blood that seeped into the bed, which was our place.

I felt myself become an astrologer as I left my body and rose in starry bliss; I became an adventurer as I breathed out ships, which sailed us to Stonewall as I stuck ******* up, not her sadly, but the blue meanies, the pigs which ate out of the trough of **** Tim Loughton fed us from our backyard.

I said we are making love. She said we are making a revolution.
Our energies combined, our spirits sang as it is in all and all is in us.
Time was alive as my fingers curled, my teeth bit into my open lips,
My back arched and my arms reached out in holy restoration.
Her incantation was irresistible.

Cosmic forces worked effortlessly as we evaded time and entered a transcendent state. Magical longing; primal consciousness;
Fate brought us together, past the ******* stage of our ****** evolution
As what we felt replaced what Freud saw.
A ****** of witchcraft.
An ****** of obsession.
The day I stepped out of the closet and away from my boyfriend I drank the elixir of life from your lips and knew our love would never die.
Alexa Sep 2012
Ushers clad in white rush the masses to their seats.
Talk dulls to whispers as the queue outside depletes.
A black suit waves his wand at centre stage.
“It looks just like they said it would on this week’s news’ front page,”
             they say.

The tuxedo raised its hands, to quell the audience,
His stonewall face daunting, demanding perfect silence.
As the ushers move in tandem, down the aisles to the stage,
The curtain breaks, the glasses shake, as the lights begin to fade.

Hooded figures appear, wheeling metal tables
Bearing cobalt cadavers, held fast with jumper cables.
They are brought to centre stage, to three white-clad physicians.
Tools are passed into the hands of each the meat-magicians.
“Thank you. You’ve arrived very much on time,” says tuxedo,
       and he snaps a shot of bourbon.

Curtains billow ‘round the stage like clouds of clotted blood.
The lights dim and the show begins, the audience waiting, rabid.
And through the obscurity,
Through the gloom of the room,
They see the white-coat men lift their arms in unison,
As the tuxedo points his wand about like a handgun.
He waves his stick at the white-coat men
And they lower their hands to the bodies in front of them.
They hold tools with blades short and long,
    and dig into their subjects.
They pick through pith and pulp,
     casting flecks of flesh into the audience.
Their white coats blush deeper and deeper
   the farther they dig with their knives and their peepers.
The tuxedo thrashes his wand astir, directing the dissection with little discretion.
The audience gasps and murmurs a disturbed digression
   but watch with wide eyes in disgusting obsession.
“Someone’s got to teach these ******* a lesson,” says a white-coated man, digging deeper depressions.
All the while the corpses lay, until the tuxedo man bends in plie.
And the cadavers awaken and scream upon seeing their entrails laid out for display.
“What a horribly carnal ballet!”
             they say.

The audience clamours, simply enamoured,
Erupting with tears, and applause, and laughter.
They clap at the bodies exploding in seizure
While the white-coats rip and cut to their leisure,
The subjects watch in horror as they are filleted,
Their own pelts and rinds are stars on Broadway.

Suddenly the tuxedo man stops,
Signaling the white-coats to stop in mid-chop.
The mangled bodies see on the floor themselves in pieces like the dried needles of pines.
And they curl and writhe on the metal tables, hugging tightly to their own spines.
“Thank you. But it seems we’ve run out of time,” the tuxedo man says with a bow,
As he wipes the sweat and blood from his brow.
And the ushers rush the audience out,
While the hooded men return to collect the waste
While the audience leaves feeling nothing close to disgraced.
“I’ve never once seen a better display,”
             they say.
Epic Sep 2018
As Kenya lay on the floor at Club Envy with her lungs burning and filling up with blood from being shot by an unknown person she thought her life would never end like this.  Kenya's tears started to flow as she thought of the years she spent slithering with snakes.  Her job at the BNB Bank made it easy to launder money for the Black Crime Syndicate.  It was six years ago in the month of June that her life took a downward spiral.  
Upset at the thought of being late for work Kenya floored the gas pedal.  As she passed by the slow moving drivers weaving in and out of traffic Kenya hoped she didn't get a ticket.  I just had to stay up late watching the marathon of FunnyMan.  Now I got to race the clock and pray I don't stopped by the police thought Kenya as she past by the other drivers. As Kenya pulled into the BNB Bank's parking lot she checked the time.
"It's 7:55am.  I made it within five minutes" said Kenya.
Kenya got out of her car and walked through the bank's glass doors.  As time passed the employees of BNB got the bank ready for the public.  One of the three people that arrived at the time of opening was a new face.  Mmmmmm yummy thought Kenya as she walked up to the tall light skinned man.
"Hello sir how may I help you?" asked Kenya as she eyed the man up and down.
"My name is Malik Maxwell.  I would like to open a checking and a savings account" answered the tall light skinned man.
"Mr. Maxwell please follow me to my office" said Kenya.

As Kenya and Malik sat in Kenya's office filling out papers Kenya made it up in her mind that she would get to know Malik on a personal level.
After a day's work Kenya got behind the wheel of her BMW and started her drive home.  On her way home Kenya called her best friend Jewel Stonewall.
"Hello Jewel how are you?" asked Kenya with one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand holding her
cellphone.
"I'm doing great Kenya.  What's up?" asked Jewel as she did one of her client's hair at her salon the Golden Scissors.
"Are we still on for Saturday?" asked Kenya.
"Is the day Friday already" said Jewel.
"Yeah girl what day did you think it was?" responded Kenya.
"To tell you the truth Kenya I thought the day was Thursday" said Jewel.
"No Jewel it's Friday.  I'm glad I have a friend who owns a hair salon" said Kenya.
"You better be thankful.  I'll talk with you later Kenya" said Jewel.
"Ok bye Jewel" said Kenya.
Kenya Ayanna Night was a plain looking black woman in her 30's who lived a very plain life.  She always looked forward to Saturday.  A day she would spend at the Golden Scissors getting her hair done and talking with Jewel Stonewall her childhood friend.

Written by Epic
Olive Spectrum was a plain looking black woman in her 30's who lived a very plain life.  She always looked forward to Saturday.  A day she would spend at the Golden Scissors getting her hair done and talking with Jewel StoneWall her childhood friend.  When Saturday rolled around Olive hopped out of bed and got ready for her hair appointment.  On her way to the Golden Scissors Olive thought about how Jewel have been trying to get her to get Dreadlocks.  "Jewel said I should try something different.  I guess I'll be getting Dreadlocks" said Olive.  As Olive parked her red BMW in the parking lot of the Golden Scissors she noticed she was Jewel's first client.  Now only if it would stay like this thought Olive.  Opening the doors to the hair salon Olive saw Jewel sitting in her chair as if she was a client waiting to get her hair done.  "Jewel get off your lazy **** and get started on my hair" said Olive as she entered the Golden Scissors.  "Olive hush your mouth before I make you turn around and leave" said Jewel as she rose to her feet.  Rolling her eyes and waving her hands in the air.  Olive pranced over to Jewel and tugged on her hair.  "I've decided to let you dread my hair.  You're right it's time for a change" said Olive as she raked her fingers through Jewel's hair.  Placing her hands on her hips Jewel says "It's about time.  Place your **** in my chair so I can get started.  "Oh yeah I got a fish on the line" Olive told Jewel as she sat down.  Dragging the comb through Olive's hair Jewel says "Mmmm do tell Olive and don't leave nothing out."  "I won't and by the way dye the tip of my dreads red.  This new face came into the bank today.  A tall good looking brother by the name of Akurra Wings.  He opened a checking and a saving account" said Olive.  "As Jewel twisted Olive's hair she asked the question "Did you ask him out?"  "Not yet.  The next time he come in I'll ask" answered Olive.  "What does he look like?  C'mon Olive I need details" said Jewel.  "He's tall around six feet, light skin, and he has a brush cut" said Olive.  "Mmmmm he sounds yummy.  Will you get in trouble if you date him?" asked Jewel.  "I don't think so and it's no body business who I date" answered Olive.  With a concern look on her face Jewel says "I just want to make sure you don't get in trouble."  "Jewel we don't hang out that much anymore.  We need to get together and do something" said Olive.  "With me working all the time Olive I don't have that much free time.  Because of who you are I'll make time" said Jewel.  When Jewel StoneWall finally got finished with Olive's hair it was 1:00pm.  "Take a look in the mirror Olive and tell me what you think" said Jewel as she took a step back.  Rising to her feet Olive looked in the mirror.  "Wow Jewel if I knew I looked this good with Dreadlocks I would have gotten them a long time ago" said Olive as she stared at herself in the mirror.  "What else are you doing today?" asked Olive.
"I'm going shopping.  I need a new outfit" answered Olive as she paid Jewel for doing her hair.  "We'll get together Olive.  Just let me move things around on my schedule " said Jewel.  "Yeah sure Jewel" said Olive.  Getting back in her car Olive drove to the clothing store New Fashions.

Written by Keith Edward Baucum.
Gangster love story.
Bows N' Arrows Mar 2016
Postpartum epiphanies
I'm shuddering against a stonewall
taking into myself the smoke,
snowy hills and the quiet of the
pine trees
I feel awake as the noise in my
head starts to dissipate
I go under water between thoughts
and comeback up for air once a
conscious realization dawns as
sentences
blooming in my third eye
The solitude in these mountains is
medicine for me like lighting sage
it mends the holes I possess in
my aorta
This large Earth is turning soft
I can't trace it in the swift grey clouds
or the suns hide and seek game
I'm tongue-tied on the ecliptic orbits
I trip over the luminaries movement
The trees whisper faint
stories but i am
ear-less to their memories
I wish I could close my eyes and
fall asleep to their song-tales
like a child at bedtime
I'm faceless to this circumstance
I feel like shattered glass
The future seems at once
both short-sighted and vast
I'm getting through on faith
believing my time is precious
and too rare to spend it in a cage
Its 8:30 in the AM
The Corn Moon
is being routed by a
Manassas cloud bank

NPR be barking
Irma this, Irma that
my tremblin Rav4
stuck in the rush
is idling behind
a pair of gray hairs
spewing
leaded premium
out the back
of a big old black Buick
sportin Florida tags

inching north up I95
I’m relieved to be
a thousand miles
ahead of the
monstrous *****
denuding Barbuda
deflowering the
****** Islands
and threatening to topple
the last vestiges of
Castro’s Dynasty
by disrupting upscale
bourgeois markets
for cafe Cubanos,
cool Cohibas and
bold Bolivars

she’s a CAT 5
counterclockwise
spinning catastrophe
churning through
the Florida straits
bending steel framed
Golden Arches
shaking the tiki shacks
gobbling lives
defiling tropical dreams

the best
meteorological minds
on the Weather Channel
plug the Euro model
to plot a choreography
of Irma’s cyclonic sashay

they predict she’ll
strut her stuff
up a runway  
that perfectly
dissects the  
Sunshine State
ransacking
the topography
venting carnage
like battalions of
badly behaved frat boys,
schools of guys gone wild
sophomores, wreaking havoc
during a Daytona Beach
spring break
droolin over *******
popping woodies at
wet tee shirt contests
urinating on doorstoops
puking into Igloo Coolers
and breaking their necks
from ill advised
second floor leaps
into the shallow end
of Motel 6 pools

but I’m rolling north
into the secure
arms of a benign
Mid Atlantic Summer
like other refugees,
my trunk is
filled with baggage
of fear and worry
wondering
if there’re be anything
left to return to
once Irma
has spent herself
with one last
furious ****
against the
Chattanooga Bluffs of
Lookout Mountain

Morning Edition
Is yodeling a common
seasonal refrain
the gubmint is
just about outta cash
congress needs to
increase the debt limit

My oh my,
has the worm turned
during the Obama years
the GOP put us through a
Teabag inspired nightmare
gubmint shutdowns
and sequestration
shaved 15 points
off every war profiteers vig
it gave a well earned
long overdue
take the rest of the week off
unpaid vacation
to non essential
gubmint workers
while a cadre of
wheelchair bound
Greatest Generation
military vets get
locked out of the
WWII Memorial on the
National Mall

this time around
its different
we have an Orange Hair
in the office and there's
some hyper sensitivity
to raise the debt ceiling
given that Harvey
has yet to fully
drain from the
Houston bayous

the colossal cleanup
from that thrice in a
Millennial lifetime storm
has garnered bipartisan support
to  clean up the wreckage
left behind by a
badly behaved
one star BnB lodger
who took a week
long leak into the
delicate bayous of
Southeast Texas

yet we are infused
with optimism that our
Caucasian president
and his GOP grovelers
now mustered
to the Oval Office
will slow tango
with the flummoxed
no answer Dems
to get the job done

pigs do fly in DC
Ryan and McConnell
double date with
Pelosi and Schumer
get to heavy pettin
from front row seats
beholding droll  
Celebrity Apprentice
reruns

The Donald, Nancy and Chuck
slip the room for a little
menage au trois side action
transforming Mitch and Paul
into vacillating voyeurs
who start jerking their dongs
while POTUS, and his
new found friends
get busy workin
the art of a deal

rush hour peaks
static traffic grows
in concert with
a swelling  
frenetic angst
driving drivers
to madness
terrified
they won't
get paid if
the debt ceiling
don't rise
they honk horns
rev engines
thumb iPhones
and sing out
primal screams

unmindful drivers
piloting Little Hondas
bump cheap Beamers
start a game of
bumper cars
dartin in and out
of temporary gaps
uncovered by the
spastic fits and starts
of temporary
decongested
ebbs and flows

A $12 EZ Pass
gambit is offered
the fast lane
on ramp
has few takers
just another
pick your pocket
gubmint scheme
two express lanes
lie vacant
while three lanes of
non premium roadway
boast bumper to bumper
inertness
wasted fuel
declining productivity
skyrockets
the  wisdom of
the invisible hand doesn't
seem to be working

DOJ bureaucrats
In Camrys and Focuses
dial the office
to let somebody
know they’ll
be tardy

gubmint contractors in
silver Mercedes begin
jubilantly honking horns
NPR has just announced that
Pelosi and Schumer
joined the Orange team
the rise in the debt ceiling
will nullify their 15%
sequestration pay cut

NPR reports the
National Cathedral will
deconsecrate two hallowed
stained glass windows of
rebel generals R E Lee
and Stonewall Jackson
it's a terrible shame that
the Episcopal Church
will turn its back on the
rich Dixie WASPS
who commissioned these
installations to commemorate
the church's complicity
in sanctifying the
institution of slavery,
WWJD?

as I ponder
this Anglican
conundrum another
object arrests my
streaming consciousness
upsetting an attention span
shorter and less deep
than the patch of oil  
disappearing under the front
of the RAV as I thunder by
at 5 MPH

to the left I eye a
funny looking building
standing at attention
next to a Bob Evans

I’m convinced
Its gotta be CIA
a 15 story
gubmint minaret
a listening post
wired to intercept
mobile digital
confabulations
from crawling traffic
inching along
beneath its feet

this thinking node
pulsing with
intelligence
reeking with
counterintelligence
the tautological
contradiction
guarantees the
stasis of our
confused
national consciousness

strategically positioned to
tune into the
intractable Zeitgeist
culling meta code
planting data points
In Big Data
data farms
running algos
to discern bits
of intelligence
endeavoring to reveal
future shock trends
knows nothing
reveals less

the buildings cover
is its acute
conspicuousness
gray steel frame
silver tinted glass
multiple wireless antennas
black rimmed windows
boldly proclaim
any data entering
this cheerless edifice
must abandon all hope
of ever being framed
in a non duplicitous
non self serving sentence

the gray obelisk a
national security citidel
refracts the
fear and loathing
the sprawling
global anxiety
our civilization's
discontent
playing out
in the captive
soft parade
ambling along
the freeway jam
imobilized
at its stoop

Moning Edition jingle
follows urgent report of
FEMA scamblin assets
arbitraging Harvey and Irma
triaging two
tropical storm tragedies
and a third girl
just named Maria
pushed off the Canaries
and is on its way to a
Puerto Rico
homecoming

while
gubmint  bureaucrats
anxiously push on
to their soulless offices
the rush hour jam
has peaked
my WAZE
is having a
nervous breakdown

next lane over
a guy in a gold PT Cruiser
is banging on his steering wheel
don’t think this unessential worker
will win September's
civil servant of the month award

Ex Military
K Street defectors
slamming big civie
Hummers
getting six mpg
lobby for a larger
apportionment
of mercenary dollars
for Blackwater's
global war on terror

Prius Hybrids
silently roll on
politely driven by
EPA Hangers On
hoping to save
a bit of the planet
from an Agency Director
intent on the agency's
deconstruction
the third 500 year hurricane
of the season
is of no consequence

obsolete
GMC Jimmy’s
are manned by
Steve Mnunchin
wannabes
the frugal
treasury dept
ledger keepers
pour good money after bad
to keep the national debt
and there clanking
jalopies working

driving Malibus
DOL stalwarts
stickin with the Union
give biz to GMC

nice lookin chicks
young coed interns
with big daddy doners
fix their faces and
come to work
whenever they want

my *** is killing me
I squirm in my seat
to relieve my aching sacroiliac
and begin to wonder if my name
will appear on some
computer printout today?
can’t afford an IRS audit
maybe my house will
be claimed by some
eminent domaine landgrab?
Perhaps NSA
may come calling,
why did I sign that
Save The Whales
Facebook Petition?

The EZ Pass lane
is movin real easy
mocking the gridlock
that goes all the way
to Baltimore
a bifurcated Amerika
is an exhaust spewing
standing condemnation
to small “R”
republicanism  

glint from windshields
is blinding
my **** is hurtin and
gettin back to Jersey
gunna take a while
GPS recalcs arrival time

an intrepid Lyft driver
feints and dodges
into the traffic gaps
drivin the shoulder
urging his way to the
Ronnie Reagan International
I'm sure
gettin heat from
a backseat fare
that shoulda pinged
an hour earlier

Irma creeps
toward the Florida Keys
faster then the
glacial jam
befuddling congress

I think I just spotted
Teabag Patriot
Grover Norquist
manning a rampart
bestriding a highway overpass
he’s got a clipboard in hand
checking the boxes
counting cars
taking names
who’s late?
who’s unessential?

man
whatta jam we're in

Music Selection:
Jeff Beck: Freeway Jam

Orlando
9/21/17
jbm
written as im stuck in jam headin back to jersey
Malik Maxwell: The leader of the Black Crime Syndicate.  Malik owns a scrapyard.  He is the love interest for Kenya.

The Black Crime Syndicate: A black criminal organization led by Malik.  They are allies with the Jade Dragons.

Kenya Ayanna Night: An employee at the BNB Bank.  Kenya is best friends with Jewel.

Jade: The leader of the Jade Dragons.

The Jade Dragons: A criminal organization.  The Jade Dragons are allies with the Black Crime Syndicate.

Jewel Stonewall: She is best friends with Kenya.  Jewel is the owner of The Golden Scissors hair salon.

The Golden Scissors: A hair salon owned by Jewel Stonewall.

BNB Bank: The bank where Kenya is employed at.

Edward: The owner of Club Envy.

Club Envy: A ******* owned by Edward.

Amber: The second in command of the Black Crime Syndicate.

Mecca: A high ranking member of the Black Crime Syndicate.

Phil: A high ranking member of the Black Crime Syndicate.  Phil is a dog *******.

Cherish City: The name of the city where the story takes place.

written by Keith Edward Baucum
Julian Aug 2020
Articulate Throwback (Amazing Rap that Doesn't Get Enough Respect)
Fielding an eclipsed Jack the Ripper Sun
Yielding dismissal garish, begotten The Matrix smokin’ gun
Wielding a firebrand skittish
Skills levied an intolerable tax by quisling quoted British
Stunting on heyday levity marksman of primes
Flogged for flagrant dragons sinking nickels and dimes aimed beatific sublime
Flowing like centripetal orbit  galvanized by riddled spirits dashed in secondary impetus of reason over rhyme
Littoral swank partial to Taylor Series of dedications Speak Now peaks livid with fumiducts of crippled sheep blandished for reach
Apologies invited always welcome for a kitsch debased by universal theaters yet united for Payable on Death singing the deceit of receipts impeached
Islanders flooding suicides punning that a sunken treasure is barbs smuggling
Otiose on ribald corsairs blinkered by the rhombos of speculation thunder itself about lightning starts wondering
Where a City by the Bay shining on a Hill of travesties of decay tanks for domesticated Negros that flashbangs got to slay
To the wistful shaken house music garnishing the prey of prayer on heavy pulls of quotable 415 hay-day
The wrinkled stray dog never  far from *****
Slapsticks against the tribunes awaiting for meteoric functions of a recessive allele of a dominant comet
Ludacris flickers dancing in dormant revelry because On Top, Just Let Go..I am honest and On It
To the milk of harvested stars glaring at tankers and garish broken FaceMash scars teetotalers scatter with Thursday crashing into glass shards
Black fame is a white epiphany of infamy designated by name
Of the craven coltish spinsters who market the crackling whiplash of sanity apportioned to the regaled insufflation of blame
Streaky on a jejune Diggity hapless hop of Kumbayas etched by Trailer Park’s scalding flop
Glorifying a Gangester heir to titanic humbled beginnings chockablock divested to Kennedy’s dead Candy Shop
Impressive rags of riches of counterfeit tags blundering with lazy LASER Tag of sharks too bellicose to earn a pitfall pittance of swag
Trippin’ by tripwires too flippant to be flippin’ on known graves sidesplitters of treecheese yaggots grimaced on madcaps of bottlecaps swimming in ether of money too happy for House of Pain rags of gag orders intrepid because some blood is Bad
****** drapes of tapestries too woven on Ducking Badger duck tape
Pretending not even a slightest twinge of celebrity faked is a tantamount affliction to Kobe’s escape
Time to rig the 7/11 notoriety of a caper drawl in Cape Town Blue Sky Action can barely offer scrape
Let them eat cake and heads roll like Nicholas Cage clairvoyant in mystique quaking like a Quaker parody rank-and-file rancid graveyard creep
Cuz the best in the Business evokes singes of Dre grazed persistence a Space Rover rather than a broken-down drive-by Vegas Cheap Holyfield Jeep
Forgeries in trigonometric time gone haywire because ******* of fools is delicious neutered ballistic wrong with elemental statistic
Armed to the Teeth because twinges of righteousness is strongly established because it elevates truces well-predicted
Reckon the self-aware hive jetsetting with Jive warbles of departure yet to arrive
“Talk” of those fewer in knowledge yet living an invented diatribe
Lil Dicky mumbling his churlish codling vendetta
Too petty on the game like a turgid Mariah Carey Christmas Sweater evaporating on benzo bleats because exaggeration is a measuring stick more prone to delusion than the vapid version of Eddie  Vedder
Ripping through seamstresses of time a delope from impoverished cesspool grime
Certainly not swinging with sockdolagers like Musk as UPS owns insider angles about BitCoin riches scoffing at #11 Sublime
I owe respect to an upstart prescience scowling hatched never against fragile egg-shell minds
He’s the predecessor to the Walter White of cesspool inveterate rivets in hulking pretense of a measured stick lying like Tony  Hawk on the grind drawling on videogame addicts lost to numbers like Wall Street bet on fractions divisible like Scarface on cardinal crime
Blip on the WHIP cackles of clever pasquinade owned by sizzurp of Red Wings demolished like Draper balking at the West Coast ****** of East Coast royalty etiolating on Life After Death because of a teased script of March 26th shining bright like nine-inch nails longer than an exaggerated Dicky loving pollution more than Sina Loa loves bricks
Mad respect to juggernaut Michigan flow, but when you henpeck a rooster fewer regaled Ravens start to sing like Tomorrow’s sung by Sheryl Crow
So attack the kenspeckel hiding like sobriety itching to revel
Even the greats are grating despite prestige owned like Steppenwolf inventing Heavy Metal
Yet the raspy dengonin certainly a curtain call for the moribund smooth competition genius but not square to my elevated level
Time to brush aside, politics is a Velvet Morning rather than an Everest scaffold of glaciers divide
Flourishing Eden of a Seattle worthy of treason on rollercoasters yet to ride
The contumely of charlatans berating brassage is a Lie Boring in Federal Way united against prejudices scowling because Qwersy Mencia is too fraught to enjoy the jeers of a tattered Pride
Past-Tense Quinn in his Chauvin Blue Suit is Queer on The Bends
For a better radio the shatter of the quaff is Damon on the mendlatch for the rights of heroism among men
Applesauce is scary when the cooks are too chary for emoluments of cherry-picked vanity inoculated because hackneyed hacksaws aren’t that scary
To a Rush Hour acclaim that owes a Martian a fair-share of the inviolable degrees above freezing that guarantees the Hang Seng
The cretaceous dinosaur livid in the Fields of Dreams lives to the honor of the author rather a subsidiary prosperity rooting for the same exact team
Credit belongs not to slot-machine jibes of Navy throngs because the sealed pedigree of a Potemkin stonewall ravaged an Atlanta March that Richard Sherman found himself wrong
Ripostes of wavered glory serenade Field’s Medal accolades jaunty with brimstone repartee for persecution of Sing-Sang jailed avuncular Dana Carvey
Crumpled in missives etched decisively by Popcorn paparazzi Lee Harvey Oswald Part Three dinging Reagan’s Drugs because belittled Batman and Robin Harvey Dent is on a defalcation spree
Limited by the gambit of orbit I flex space measured only by perception hourglasses mistake for Dewey Decimal ministry
Because mountebanks of the tramontane canard unscrewed by Donkey’s without the triumph of vindicated colts spew the unwarranted without the warrant of upright parlance
Deflecting the useless caricature of Jezebels they barely even know dancing with fisticuffs choleric with jaundiced illuminati chants of an age bracing for the venom of viper’s of gratuitous pretense in violence because the whittled conscience scourges footloose profligacy in dementia that owns probability rather than certainty but doesn’t stand a chance
A billowing toxic fume of a Trojan Horse of galloped complicity of headless horsemen too scared to even pinprick the average Brett Hume huffs like mad wolverines dancing with Buccaneers for the fidelity of bridled brides with a tailored or sloppy groom
Cowering behind plashy starlets dashed for authenticity too soon
The Red Robin Hood ****** of silhouettes of Caste system indecency is reduced to reductivism in peddled paranoia of Randall Graves confronting his deepest specious tomb
To rogue slipshod miracles of denuded ice for Christopher Reeves Wally World White in Simple Jack owleries of confiscated light they caper encaged Caspergers ergotamine flavored favor uptight
Glaring prince dashing Rusty with ***** for Hummers glazed with donut torus hummus swift with reverend repartee
Sunken sleepless abyss ghosts haunt for quaffs evanescent in backbone bliss incurring parted sight for nebbich sprees
Calculated by persnickety prattle brazen with bravado promontory sparked on the flames of an overhyped hysteria ablaze
Raisins aren’t the determinant of a blinkered starstruck page gilded to amaze
Formidable reform conserved against blasphemies of ****
Withstands the immutable geotaxis of inevitable backfires in limited scourges of scorn
Time to sacrifice the badge earn the primacy of trimleggers making a dash rushing for hourglass sand prominent in fiat flash
In a second a trampoline against a specious marvel is a sour remorse of a crusade turning into protection not found in autumn ash
With autarky righteous rain boogies against bogeys of golfers livid with sensational inane
Lunacy predicated on sensational maudlin labors of Genesis 3:16 birth pain
Incurred upon the toil of the lugubrious heights of teachers that defy tribes and stripes
Soldiering for God without even the slightest nefarious mercenary spite
Because Ledgers cannot be mistaken for legends because petty battles Abandoned Pools named were avoided for Nobel Prizes of moonshot fame never King Kong because 24k magic called the Hang Seng  game enter stage right
The thematic liberation of the freewheeler isn’t a combustion of truckers Ruckers allergic to chattered shame
But the time honored Sevendust defies blisters because a brave heroism leaps into legacy vaunted by cheery repute in winning hegemony against rigged fraud in frigid feral tames
I march to an inaugural chance without a chance of quick inauguration because Junetao is a duck-duck-go childish flicker against Amsterdam Vallon besides the church with a touching spectacle of solidarity beyond temporal Anacondas of deserved blame
An ally to the kitsch the prosperity of Nas is afforded to optimism never so fulgurant because of a bewitched Tik Tok twitch
As the true flock regards the true shepherd the guardian of wonder and the captain avoiding Yellow Submarines because Stayin’ Alive is a prophecy not a febrile contagion of germs pitching tents for flukes insistent on incident rather than honorable to Canada Dry on Strike for better than a bubble gum mumble rap of Lil Pump’s pruned humps for a ******* ghost rider rather than a profaned itch
But the camel survives because the needle doesn’t thrive in a world where God is always Stayin’ Alive to strike a pose for the voguest Jive
“The Seduction” lives and the corruption limps with glib bribery fibs because 2 Timothy 1:7 in autarky is a generous rhyme that  gives and gives
In endless crusade to beat like David the ***** of a poker miracle that stars in a showcase of a life of splendor eternal rather than a cursory kamikaze reckless fib
Its time for  abundance of life to be lived fully to truly find riches in the best possible life winsome in discretion to quake and yet remain immune to a Walgreens of Stonewall myth
Cast not the first stone against the immaculate Giant because everybody is shaking to Bond and Saint Joseph’s guarded wordsmith
Louis Brown Dec 2010
I'm going AWOL at first light
Sherman threatens my hometown
I hate to leave Robert E. Lee
But my heart's not backing down
There's a railroad to Atlanta
I'll fight side by side with Paw  
General Johnson's too outnumbered
But we'll stand at Kennesaw


I don't like to leave Virginia
But Atlanta needs me there
With my family in danger
It's a duty I must bear
I'll meet Mayde at Big Shanty
We can have some time at last
I'll get up at the crack of dawn
And kick old Sherman's ***

Now I know we're way outnumbered
They have more than two to one
And Sherman hates all rebels
He's Abe Lincoln's favorite skunk
If we could get old Stonewall
To come down for just a spell
We could kick old Abe's invaders
From Kennessaw to hell


Mayde, I'm real scared of dying
If our rebel line should fall
But I'll stand to fight **** yankees
Make 'em think they hit a wall
We own no slaves but Sherman thinks
It's rebel killin' time
So I'll shoot holes in Yankee coats
Before there's one in mine
Copyright Louis Brown
William Lodge Jul 2016
There’s one small window in the stone wall
I look out slowly on a twilight world
With people I never knew
Telling me they know me
By way of the voices in my head
I feel different, and hungry
Hungry for things I forgot
And still, I don’t know how they say they know
The last four digits of a number
I never decided to remember
Tell me what I hunger for and why why why
Are they in the way?

Stone walls are familiar to the air I breathe and
Somehow, to my sense of taste. Forbidden, it is but I never
Wanted to go through the window
Into a twilight world
Hoping against hope
That the star shines for me and this pain in my body
Isn’t personal, but neutral

Why can’t I remember the numbers?
The lock stays as it is
Am I forever inside
Stone
walls
Mary McCray Apr 2015
(NaPoWriMo Challenge: April 20, 2015)

The tendency to give high accuracy ratings to descriptions of your personality that supposedly are tailored specifically for you, but are in fact vague and general enough to apply to a wide range of people. For example, horoscopes.

P.T. Barmum’s boxcar of fortune tellers, religions and personality tests
predict I may be inadvertently pressuring someone.
I may be inadvertently over-extended. I need to be proactive
and not be proactive in taking on more than I can handle.
However, the sun is in my Professional house
which may affect my relationships. I blame this on my Gemini.

People suspect he’s holding out on them.
(That would be me.)
His problem will continue if he continues to stonewall.
(That’s right.)
If he throws someone a bone, that will buy him sometime.
(Interesting.)

Nothing is any good in the long run.
Something is always changing.
You never give yourself credit for being specific enough.
Based on my horoscopes today from SF Gate and Huffington Post (Women's section)
Carly Salzberg Sep 2010
Fluid like the Guinness that flows from the oil rust taps, rapid and white battered. It laps quickly between every bridges thigh, whining as waves do in captivity. The air is thick and dewy in the Galway harbor. Each breath tastes saltier than the next. The rush, the rapid race signals the open sea. Spring could not come sooner than is demanded. Still six old rust stained fishing boats bob along the mossy stonewall. Untouched. The flow churns quicker; the longer the eye stands in gaze. A ***** yellow sign signals caution –a stolen ringbouy, a stolen life. And there amid the unrest I like to rest and reflect beside fettered waters whose tempest surface hides my face.

I am not alone,
the troubled waters
call my name.
If a cupboard falls;
to the floor and breaks,
and all your precious
memories awake;
Then tells you how;
it's gone too late,
would you just accept;
all that and fade?
Sven Stears Sep 2013
There's a broken banjo in my birthright,
It was tied to were I wonder
Hidden between John Henry's Hammer,
and the hobbling post on Humble Hill.

I've walked this far on the blame in my grit,
pushed to by tailwind sunsets,
So kick me a mea culpa kneejerk
hardball, and sandstone my stonewall.

Forget storms in the cradle,
I found dustbowls in my waiting room,
Chasing rabbits in a wordwind,
plinking at the vermin as
they rolled into town with the rest of us,

*****, but soaring, Carrion pigeon in the clouds
not getting caught up in admiring the reflections
in all the silver linings,
Just... Flying.

narcissus couldn't manage
the glory of wax work wings.
But Icarus knew real beauty.
He felt it.
When he hit the ground

The heat of floating zeroes
blasting his broken bones
into the obsidian of desert floors...
See, angels can be as jealous as God.

Anywhere can be as lonley as the long plains
of Kansas,
Empty canvas trampled by dog and pony shows
as cowboys rode mules muddy miles
through ****** brambles
to drive herds of bulldogs and lions
from the hunting grounds of dragons
to the safety of home
from High, High, Horses.
Under the shadows of eagles.

But the devil never waits at the crossroads, people.
He lays in lies.
And six shooters,
Under Dog Collars,
with the blood and scars
of everyday life,
and the beaten bodies of
seraphim, fallen to **** the well,
with their phoenix ash.

Sheep and shepherds are never friends,
Ones happiness is the other's hunger.
Dont get me wrong, wolves get hungry too,
But at least their honest about the arrangement.
Daniello Apr 2012
The fingernails of my brain brim
Horizons of grime. Can’t seem to keep them paws
            Out of the dirt.

And the dirt lives on the ground, so its head is always
            Down.
And it claws like a dog spraying a groove under a fence
After he’s picked up in the scent what it would be like
To roll in the other grass, which is the same grass, but it’s
            Across the pickets.

It’s the uncovering, and it’s dead awfully hard.

For instance…

Thinking I must scratch sound to hear sound.
Not knowing, like this, of course there’d be only
That scratch-scr-scratch-scr-scratch-scr-scratch
Around me like hellrats…

For instance, hurling my eyes at vision, only
That they should slam against something like stonewall.
            (And the crash, unscratched, unheard.)

Imagine how gravity would throw your skeleton
(Nest of forest twigs-become-tooth-pick birdcage)
            Ten, twenty      thirty stories
Meeting earth’s immovable bone—
That cold you’d feel crack your headrock—
            That concrete is my vision.

Yes, finish off the senses, finish off the lines.
If you put your life here, in this poem’s lonely glass,
            It will take its shape.
For isn’t that the oldest metaphor?      Life—water?

Yes, water with yourself these lines.

My brain needs to rinse me         clean from its hands.
About the feeling you get when you crash against your senses like waves against cove rocks, and you're unable to let yourself be transported by them. Unable to be in the moment because you're too busy thinking about them, too busy being stupefied by them, being paralyzed by them. And if not paralyzed, then looking like a desperate dog trying to dig, always trying to reach the root. Meanwhile life's passing you by.
imadeitallup May 2014
violent
beating
our hearts
bleeding
together

go ahead
and run
for your
life
you know
I'll find
you again
but I can't
promise
I'll be
the same
person when
that happens

torture
stonewall
captive hearts
breaking
apart

so we
meet again
but now
we're standing
on opposite
fences
and I got
the feeling
I'm staring
down a barrel
you've got me
in your sights
but do you
have the guts
to pull
the trigger?

vacancy
strangers
familiar hearts
begin to forget
what it felt
like to not be
empty
Not quite sure if this is a song or poem yet. I just wrote this earlier this morning. :)
Mahima Gupta Jan 2014
12:39 a.m
At first I was trying
To make it rhyme
With no reason
Pushing them together
Those words
Those meanings
Drifting apart
One by one
I made everything
Sound spurious
Pretentious
Fabricated.

12:41 a.m
Two minutes later
I realized
There's no complication
It's me
Who's the stonewall
Preventing those
Words
From making sense
Creating a rumpus
An unnecessary altercation
Casting cement for my own bridges.
It was illegitimate.

2:41 a.m
Two hours later
I understood the power of words
I proposed an adamantine will
Purported to it  
Maybe
But things were now clear
I wasn't lying to myself
I sounded reasonably correct
In my mind
Unconsciously pondering
Consciously oblivious.

1st January,2017
Now, it has been years
It was me who acted like a can of worms  
All these years
Now it goes with the flow
It's difficult to tread the boards
Now my words
Are prepotent
Adequate
I stopped rhyming
Now the arrow hit the spot.
OnlyEggy Aug 2011
With my back pressed firmly against the wall
I heard a whisper amidst the winds
It sounded enticing, but something was wrong
The words were jumbled and the tone was bumbled
as they ran through the grass, the notes stumbled
and tumbled,
from trees as they fell with the rustling leaves
the bustling breeze
the hustling freeze, stuck on off toned keys
singing, bleeding, screaming
until I was begging please, please
For voice of the ****** from it's own hoise
and became nothing but noise
that struggled to find poise against my stonewall soul

— The End —