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any reuse of the material must have the written permission of the copyright
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BEGINNING
I like to believe
the big bang
began with
a tremendous
climax of
orgasmic stone
melting into lava
hotter & hotter
higher & higher
poured into
ecstatic pores
of possibility
And all was a
tremendous
Good God!
Claire J. Baker
Cheap Therapy
I found out years ago
I could write my blues
into a poem
and then a song too
and later laugh about it all
after I cried myself to sleep
while dying of brain rot
in corporate america.
It's all just cheap therapy
if ya know how to do it.
©Peter Bray, 9/24/07
All rights reserved
What you
gonna do?
What you
gonna do when you realize the minorities are ruling the majority? Will you
jump out windows, climb out doors, close your souls to what you know, that
your ruling days are through? That your nightmares came true and now you
have to bow to the ones who cowered cause you towered on their pride, will
you hide? How will you feel Mr. Man when you must kneel and kiss the hands
of those you threw out your house, out your doors, who swept the filth on
your floors? What the fuck will you do when you have to ask, not demand to
pass while they laugh in your face as tears stream down your ass. You ass,
you asked for this, you dissed em and pissed em off cause you played for
decades as they ranted and raged to take their place you took a look at
their races, and spewed disgrace, instead of seeing beyond your blind spot,
you forgot to be a child of God. Now what you gonna do?
Leah
9/ 18/07
Stuffing our bloated, dead faces,
With trash-food, full of chemicals,
And genetic mutation time-bombs.
Raping our fragile bodies with,
Prozac and steroids and Lipitor,
As if doctors can cure foolish assumptions.
Smoking and boozing like,
Slow motion suicide bombers,
Worshiping the 'right' of self-destruction.
Slashing and burning our forests for what?
Asphalt and concrete temples called malls,
And garbage dumps full of plastic forks and fetuses.
Behaving as if bank accounts are gods,
Too stupid to recognize that dollar bills,
Can't even pour a glass of water.
Wasting our precious, unreplacable time,
Slopping around in fear and arrogance,
Pretending guns and armies cure ignorance.
Screeching around in fat cars,
Spewing filth into Mother's air,
Like terrorists - yes, YOU and ME,
Mindless, mindless, mindless idiots.
Yoshe Revelle
DID IT ANYWAY
It wasn’t your decision to make alone.
But you did it anyway.
Then you board a plane
and go back to the land of
“It’s your problem now
and I won’t answer my phone
because I don’t want to hear you
criticizing me.”
You thought you made your decision
with good intentions
and a desire to mend a relationship
from which you never quite received
respect and trust.
Instead, you decided to Go It Alone—
refusing to consult me and other
family members—
making a decision that affects the
rest of someone else’s life—
and you return to the land of
“I want to be 23 years old
even though I’m more than twice that
age.”
Thanks ever so much for doing it your
way
after telling me that I was to be the
final arbiter
of any decision made about my mother’s
health.
I’ll remember that while I’m on my
knees
trying to clean up the mess you left
for me.
Terry McCarty
Girl Oh Girl
I loved you like a friend,
I needed you like a sister,
I wanted you like a lover,
I walked with you like a father,
I worked with you like a partner,
There in the haunches of old Victory Hall,
I let you in because I thought you had something to offer,
And I gave to you like a brother-spirit and vulnerable
soul-,
You took my head and squeezed it,
My stomach and pumped it,
My hand and wrung it,
My name and cursed it,
My noise and silenced it,
My backbone and torpedoed it,
You took over dusk till dawn,
Spider to fly and nasty email after forlorn stare,
Bled-out the truth,
The words you did not want to hear,
And killed me,
Never did I know such paranoia and guilt,
Such shameful shame,
Such ruthless soul-stepping,
Your beautiful brunette head could inspire,
I, a man of countless words,
Found myself dumbfounded and numb,
By the extent of your ugliness,
Your nastiness,
Your narcissistic truth-bending,
I could not express the fear and guilt I felt after you
called the police on me for a beautifully succinct and tender phone message I
left telling the truth,
The snake had ensnared my beautiful dark-haired head,
And laughed at my gorgeous disaster of a God,
The devil had won,
The old suicidal tendencies took hold like vice grip around
throat,
Death thou hast a name,
It is spelled C-H-R-I-S-T-I-N-E,
Christine,
Without the Christ.
Radomir Vojtech Luza
^^^^^^^
Your Attitude Is Getting In The Way
Yeah, you, who doubled as my friend
Told me not to come back
The eyes and ears had much too much of me
The improvisation you so weep
Has handcuffed you to the wall
Singing refrains of ego and blue
Standing still before the ultimate fall
You looked me in the eye and shook my hand
Then told me not to show-up
Like the Romans did Jesus
Like the West Wind does dirt
Like my legs which could not convert
Like the sun does earth
Like Cain did Able
This God,
Forsaken unforsaken,
Stolen lullabye of greed,
Confused underbelly of insolent rhyme,
So incredibly incomplete
In this Utopian dream
This carnival of lies
Sent me packing to my nearest neighborhood guru
Except he had seen you
So was much too ready for me.
Radomir Vojtech Luza,
CEO/Radman Productions
I am not one color, one world, one size, one tribe. I am all
people, all cultures, all time. I am answers to all questions I
am what came before they laid claim to what was never given.
What is this world but a name? Can it take away the poverty or
pain? Who gave suffering a title? What rights have they left
for cries in the night? Too much food gone to waste laid in
rotten fields paid to hands that cram euros’, dollars, gold into
power towers that no one knows but the bottom feeders, the ass
kissers, the pleasure seekers, the handsome trash that bow to
cash.
I am not interested in what doesn’t matter. I’m here to hold to
light the dark side of the night. I am what’s right and strong
and clean upon this land, not what tears apart the hope I gave
to save the spirit, not strip away the bright of day. I gave
knowledge to all that walk, all that talk, all that reason. Live
a lifetime in one day, keep enough to refresh yourself , stay
ahead of the rest, ahead of the pack, remain grateful remain
faithful. Life is a test if you cheat you fail and you only
cheat yourself, no one else can master the answers meant for
you, fail and you remain the same, you don’t advance, you miss
your chance to grow. I am the light that shines upon the worst
of times, on the bastard minds spinning tainted actions in your
path, paid for by monster whores copulating on corporate boards,
spawned on marble floors of national proprieties. Don’t cry to
me you ancient trolls you think I don’t know there is no hate
without guidance? I’m the one who knows you exist in tailored
suits and polished manners deciding what comes after you try to
destroy it all, fools trying to take what you didn’t make, you
taste like fetal waste what you touch is ghouls dust while you
smile decay, advocating trust, you twist truth to fit the
occasion. Beware my children, they must fall, they can only
stand tall for as long as it takes them to crawl.
I AM THE WAY, I AM THE LIGHT, I AM WHAT’S GOOD, WHAT’S RIGHT. I
AM THE BEGINNING AND I WILL, MY FRIEND, BE THE END. THERE IS
NONE BEFORE ME, NONE AFTER. THERE NEVER WAS NOR WILL BE ANY
OTHER THAN ME. I AM JAH, I AM BUDDAH, I AM THE MESSIAH, I
CREATED THE DAWN, RIGHT AND WRONG, NO ONE ON EARTH CAN BE
WITHOUT ME, RUN TO ME AND LEAD THE FIGHT. RUN WITH ME FIND
FREEDOM BE ONE WITH ME. TOGETHER WE WILL LIVE FOREVER, TOGETHER
WE WILL TAKE THE BABIES FORWARD TO GLORY, RUN TO ME AND END THE
DEVIL’S STORY. MAN HAS NO CONTROL, CREATION WAS NOTHING BEFORE
ME, WITHOUT ME THERE WILL BE NO MORE, THERE IS BUT ONE, NOT
MANY, NOT FEW FOREVER TRUE, FOREVER THEN, FOREVER AFTER. WHEN
ALL IS DONE I AM THE ONE WHO REMAINS, I AM THE MASTER. AFTER
DEVILS DOOM HAS LAID ITS CLAIM, I SHALL RISE; I SHALL BEGIN
AGAIN, WITH OR WITHOUT YOU.
8/12/07
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Important Phone
Call
They were sitting,
the three of them,
in the booth across from ours
at 8:45 p.m.,
the child, the wife, and the man.
He held a cell phone to his ear,
talked for many minutes
while they awaited their orders.
He missed what his child said;
he missed what his wife replied;
he talked and listened to the cell phone.
What could have been so important
that had to be discussed
at 8:45 at night,
to make him miss moments
in the life of his child
and ignore the woman beside him?
What could have been that important?
Ursula T.
Gibson, copyright 8-24-2007
3 poems by Don Kingfisher Campbell
I GOT THE AMERICAN RIGHT
I got the American right
to wake up to an alarm clock
tuned to a talk radio station
(too many bad things going on)
I got the American right
to take a hot shower
and dry off with an imported towel
(too many damn imports these days)
I got the American right
to drive my SUV to work
and use premium gasoline
(too many emissions regulations anyway)
I got the American right
to put a cell phone to my ear
and talk my head off while I drive
(I told you there's too many nitpicky laws)
I got the American right
to stop off and eat a double cheeseburger
and order some large fries too
(a person's got to live while you can)
I got the American right
to go to my HMO when I feel bad
and buy drugs from Canada on the internet
(good ol' American ingenuity, I say)
I got the American right
to have my son enrolled in a private school
and avoid having him serve in the military
(leave that to the immigrant children)
I got the American right
to ignore my daughter's a lesbian
and publicly declare homosexuals are going to hell
(I usher in church every Sunday)
I got the American right
to own a home in the suburbs
and pay a variable rate mortgage
(more talk radio to listen to on my commute)
I got the American right
to run up my credit card debt
and relieve my burden by filing for bankruptcy
(only in America can you start over and not go to jail)
I got the American right
to be buried any way I want
and have my relatives go on with their lives
(that's the work ethic that made America great)
THE LEAGUE OF LA-BORING POETS
It could be a wild west saloon
With round wooden tables
All wooden chairs (such grain)
Even the walls are wood-paneled
One painted white simply
To contrast the window panes
It's a busy Friday night outside
But only ten wordslingers are in
Inside this dry wanna-be tavern
Wherein one poet promises
There will be music and food
Tomorrow night
I'd been there a few months earlier
So I recognize the regulars
Who almost make up the whole
Sparse audience of twenty eyes
Sitting at four of eight possible tables
Each with some book or paper
One by one we are called up
To spout words for thought
Most in the assembly are busy
Preparing their own works or
Reading silently from a published tome
A few yawns do surface as a reader reads
I found myself asking myself
Why are there so few bodies now
In this perfectly enclosed space
When months ago there had been
More and many more before that
Where have these writers gone
Is this part of the normal
Fluctuation of things I've been told
At other venues on equally deserted nights
No one dares mention aloud what
I'm sure we're collectively thinking
Is poetry becoming even more unpopular
Or are people so wrapped up
In their own lives they aren't ready yet
To share intimate confessions
Or social diatribes, which is
What I hear tonight from
The few souls who bother to show
Maybe there is hope for more poets
Possibly some of them will be published
A few minds might be motivated to try
To venture out again for acceptance
Applause from those of their own kind
Possessed by the need to express just why
MANS
Let me get this straight
these hu mans are
divided into two mans
man and womb man
and they have the nerves
to differentiate each other
even further by something
small as color, tint, hue (man!)
Let me understand
these hew mans believe
they can create
machine exhaust
without repercussion
to whew man lungs and plan it
Then these hee umans
put chemicals in their food
and bodies and act surprised
when their internal
illnesses multiply
like plants die
Strangest of all
they have created
the greatest good
imaginable: poetry
and soak their brains
instead with
trivial news
game shows
video consoles
slam bang movies
and occasionally
listen to poetic words
only in times of
untimely death
Alright I think I've
got these hugh mans
figured out they specialize
in underachieving
so as to resemble
their gods who seem to
have the same traits
No wonder they've merely
existed for a million years
been "civilized" a few thousand
they should be gone
in a century or two
unless they learn to make
a hospitable existence
with their plan knit
Don Kingfisher Campbell
Rage
we go on, wagging forefingers on skies,
resenting seasons that fall on us in clumps of
such rhythmic regularity we just can’t rage
against or else against the grind
we feel a heartless hand its fingers
like iron claws so tight in grip we find
our waggling a senseless attempt
at being freed.
If but one beat one spark:
one breath that does not fall in hands
that move from point to point to point,
interminable points, infinitesimal bits,
that had so imprisoned us raging—
if one breath were to stop, still we won’t
find out we’ve moved away or out
of the seasons we resented, the beats
we raged against.
Alegria Aurora Imperial
© 2007 Vancouver, Canada
aurora_cst@yahoo.com
System X
System X is for the young, the brave,
the naked and the technically
and/or mentally challenged.
Old codgers like me should stick
with what we know, shovels and axes
and chainsaws, pie tins, bacon stains
around the lips and lengths of rope
from behind the truckseat for
tying things down, lumber, ladders,
and other matters of the working day.
System 9.2 reloaded on a re-initialized, purely clean
hard drive is like a handful of deck screws held tightly
in the lips, corrosion-resistant ones.
If this hard drive gives me any more crap I'm gonna
Makita drive/deckscrew it to the mouse and the keyboard
too and see how they all like taking a last carefree
ride to the dump.
I'm up and running again.
Publishing poetry and e-mailing too on a Mac G3, it
ain't stunning, but it works as regular as the sun and
moon. Only the tides crash and wave and burn this far
inland and then soak into the sand.
©Peter Bray, 4/5/07 All rights reserved
Flat Line
During a nuclear burn in a rain forest,
reinitializing my hard drive,
my13-year old monitor flat-lined out
in front of me. It was like an old friend giving me
one last electronic wave goodbye.
I could still hear the software loading or unloading
behind his one yellow-green eye on a terminal field of
black...No longer able to sweep from side to side, he
peeked out from under his heavy eyelids of black, just a
thin shell of his former self, but he was radiant to the
end.
Electrons should always go out smiling, knowing that
somewhere else in the cosmic sphere of all things,
they'll still be the current thing.
©Peter Bray, 4/5/07 All rights reserved
Young, Dumb, And Numb
They wrap their
childhood pain
Is in the squeeze
of every trigger
Every unspoken word of
praise
Is in the jerk of every
weapon's recoil
Eat that, you rag-head
motherfucker!
Fuck you, anyone who
ever hurt us!
For giving us an outlet
for our rage!
For giving us pretty
uniforms
And powerful weapons to
play with!
Thank you, Condoleeza
Rice
To vent our frustrations
on the world!
We don't know anything
about politics
We don't know anything
about the enemy
We don't know anything
about life
But now, we know how to
shoot
Now, we know how to do
what we're told
And we know how to feel
good about it
And now, we feel
powerful
And these boys, who feel
like men
Continue to drive around
Iraq
Getting their asses
blown off
And these children, who
feel like men
Continue to kick in
doors
Increasing the hatred
towards them
Continue to strut their
stuff
Sucking up the memories
of those they kill
While their leaders
argue over what to do
While their leaders talk
about how great they are
While their leaders,
shamelessly, entice them
While their leaders
continue to send them
into hell
And when they come
home...
Who will explain what
happened to them?
Who will help them deal
with their new pain?
Who will forgive them
when they attack the
rest of us?
Who will save them from
the madness they carry?
They wrap their
childhood pain
Fifteen Crosses on a Hill—
Littleton, 1999
How tragic! Fifteen crosses in a row!
Those chilling symbols of such needless terror
entrenched our nation in Death's heinous blow
as mourning souls were shocked with crushing horror.
Those fifteen eerie crosses eulogized
those precious lives snuffed out in schoolroom panic—
that vile, atrocious act of raging hate
when two mere boys freaked out and terrorized
their helpless classmates—oh were they barbaric!
Their cult beliefs were brutal and satanic,
so fifteen crosses bore their curse of Fate.
What hostile forces prey on teenaged minds
that make them snap and violate their friends?
What evil power captivates and binds
weak minds to follow diabolic trends?
Obsessed with Self-Destruction's blinding outrage,
they felt betrayed by a society
that could not sanction their outlandish themes.
And so they schemed to stage a vicious rampage
to prove their militant virility
and leave their mark of notoriety:
a gruesome trail of broken, shattered dreams.
Those fifteen crosses touched our troubled nation
and reached across broad generation gaps,
bemoaning soft Security's weak station
in rough Reality's destructive traps.
That senseless massacre awoke concern
for mental, moral and religious guidance
of youthful minds exposed to vile peer pressure.
Those ghostly icons, bold yet taciturn,
bore elegies besmirched with fierce defiance
from troubled youths who needed peer acceptance,
but who instead were plagued with social failure.
What sucked them into fangs of Counterculture's
obsession with defiance and destruction?
What drove them to pick prey like bloodless vultures
and laugh as if it were a social function?
Were they performing a cult ritual
to emulate Nintendo's mania?
And when their game was done, would life come back?
Did thoughts of their own lethal arsenal
inflate their egos with euphoria?
Who could believe the mass hysteria
those two frail boys begot with their attack?
Yes, fifteen crosses told this brutal tale
that left indelible tattoos of Death,
and yet contention marked this man-made grail,
since two were for those boys and their last breath.
So two came down when a parent disagreed.
But crosses form strong bonds and sooth emotion,
and two bore thugs when Christ was crucified,
so when the rest came down, they sparked dissension.
This golden land of hedonistic greed,
with our contentious and litigious creed,
can't set examples when we're mortified.
As devastating grief and tortured pain
continue bleeding through those coffin lids,
Contention's rancor falls like acid rain—
no wonder that we have such mixed-up kids!
Each self-styled expert over analyzes
to selfishly protect their own mores.
Does blatant Hedonism have to reign?
When Tragedy's malicious force arises
and blinds us with Dissension's rancid haze,
must we infuse Confusion's deep malaise?
Oh please! Let not those lives be lost in vain.
Cliff Price
June 11, 1999
Revised, July 5, 1999:
May 28, 2001
Sophistry and Apathy—
A Sonnet on Imposters
Our Constitution guarantees our voice
in our great government in peace and war.
Our sacred voting system gives us choice
to guard the liberty we all adore.
But voters really have little say
in choosing all the candidates and bills
and know the ballots on election day
are full of empty promises and frills.
With noxious rhetoric from stubborn mules,
with partisan and childish sophistry,
our politicians act like utter fools—
what an embarrassment to our country.
Corruption, petulance from slick impostors—
no wonder apathy afflicts poor voters.
Cliff Price
November 27, 1995
Revised, Dec. 10, 1997
ODE TO RUSH
Corrosive Corpulence;
Aural anality:
Perniciously pustulant postulant
punctiliously
promoting
and
pushing
exponentially excrementitious effluent.
did anyone file
Environmental Impact Reports
on you?
Jim Lyle
BUSHWHACKED
Bushes can be so deceiving
A tangle of half truths and lies
Caught in desperation on the branches
While shifty eyes swerve and smiles smirk.
Bushes can be so confusing
To those who are righteous
All life is precious and sacred.
How can anyone who knows this
Execute even criminals, take their lives?
Bushes can be so deluding
A war fought on assumptions and untruths
Changes from one operation to another
Like a pendulum swinging dangerously
Out of control.
Bushes can be on fire
With death and destruction
No peaceful negotiations or talks
With others who think us evil,
The axis of preemptive chaos.
Fiery bushes ignite others,
Brush fires turn into flaming forests
Which no one knows how to extinguish.
We must leave the burning brambles
To their own civil war shambles.
Other countries have their own bushes
Which are beaten around their own way --
Bring all our soldiers home
From terrain running rampant with oil.
Let them fight among themselves,
Let all our young men be safe
Let the world know we made a mistake,
'Winning' answer to the uninvited.
Floriana Hall - February 27, 2007
Dear Mr.
President,
You have
authorized the military to torture detainees
to preserve the rights of each and every
American.
When you get to me, let the guy go.
Give him a bunch of flowers to take to his
mom.
Ask him to call you if he thinks of anything.
Give him an apology for any inconvenience.
Just, let him go. You’re not protecting my
rights.
If you’ve got charges, then charge him.
I don’t need you to pull out any finger nails
on my account.
He’s not going to tell you the truth anyway.
Gary Lehmann
Twice nominated for the Pushcart
Prize, Gary Lehmann’s poetry and prose is published in literary and popular
journals all over the world, over 100 publications per year. His most
recent book is Public Lives and Private
Secrets [Foothills Publishing, 2005]. Look for his forthcoming
book entitled American Sponsored Torture
[FootHills Publishing] in May 2007.
Visit his website at
www.garylehmann.blogspot.com
Scar Tissue
I remember how the scar tissue twisted around the whiskers of his neck, where
the surgeons pulled his flesh and stitched him back together.
Where the shrapnel took out pieces of his jaw, teeth, his right optic nerve,
right wrist and right and left hands, leaving him a left wrist only.
He would later relearn to write and draw primarily with his left prosthetic
hook, the one he could rotate best because he still had a wrist on that arm.
He taught me how to use my first hand tools, how to make simple home repairs, my
small hands at 5 and 6 and 8 being more articulate than his aluminum hooks. He
would place X’s on a line on the upstairs plywood flooring for my new bedroom,
my small hands easily taking the nails out of the nail can, starting the nails
on the X’s and then he would follow behind me, power hammering the nails to
completion. What a team of determination, insight, resources, and a will to live
and get back to normal, if normal could ever be redefined.
I can still recall the smells of trains and the crunch of snow in Utah when Mom
and I traveled there to visit him during his earliest reconstructive surgery,
shortly after the close of WWII. And then later at Palo Alto Veterans Hospital.
How he told me to say, “Hubba-Hubba at your legs, Mommy,” me becoming a
messenger for a wounded vet, still alive, being reconstructed, and eager to
become whole again.
He went on to become Prosthetic Chief of the VA Regional Office at 49 Fourth
Street in San Francisco, serving the prosthetic needs of US veterans throughout
Northern California.
His friends were all vets too, leg and arm amputees, paraplegics, quadriplegics,
Col. Frank H. with his shattered WWII elbow, Bill E. with his mortar wound at
the base of his neck, now a quadriplegic from the Korean War. Bill M., a leg
amputee from WWII, who caught it in a bomber over Germany.
Towards the end of his career, before he retired in 1975, Dad told me that he
had served vets from the Spanish American War at the Veterans Home in
Yountville, California, as well as WWI and II vets, Korean War vets, and was
having his share of Viet Nam vets as well.
And now we’re engaged in another f’ing bloody war, this one preemptively created
because a moron in office wanted to be a war president, because war presidents
were popular presidents. What an idiot! Add to it a collective band of further
idiots whose global quest for oil domination of world reserves led to a
preemptive attack on Iraq, a country with oil that might satisfy the glutinous
petroleum needs of our own leaderless country. Our country so frozen in its own
vested corporate interests so as not to begin effective research on our own
alternative fuel possibilities. Add corporate war profiteers in need of a
country to annihilate so as to immerse themselves with rebuilding in the
corporate troughs of greed. No thank you. No thank you. No thank you.
I’ve lived with the war disabled and have seen the downside of war. It ain’t
pretty, it’s heartbreaking though it’s inspiring, and sometimes it’s not even
survivable, not even for the greedy and/or the stupid, of which we have many in
positions of dysfunctional leadership in the US government. God help us all.
When do we begin to get smart in the United States of America? I doubt that it
will happen with this current administration in Washington, DC. Where else do we
turn?
©Peter Bray, 3/5/07
Head Bones
Geometry, strength and
nature of materials, and visual perceptions – from
these I’ve built a lifetime and have survived to the
present,
64 years later and still counting.
But how the mind and body work,
I don’t have a clue.
Gene pools, lust and envy,
hard work, nutrition, rest and recreation,
psychology and psychiatry, medical clinics, humor,
sorrow, hunger, and environmental factors – the head
bone’s connected to the rest of us bones.
Interconnections with organs and enzymes, all
complying to or moving with some outside/inside
stimulus or rhythms.
I have only scratched the surface,
it bled more than once and I bandaged it from the
bandage collection in my truck.
First Aid endures to the present.
It’s only a start, there’s
so much more to learn, and when I do, watch out.
The world’s gonna spin so much better
and the seasons will all smile at each other and
elope. Jihad will be just another word in a dumpster
unused and unnecessary.
©Peter Bray 2/21/07 All Rights Reserved
DEPRESSION……CUT ME
DEPRESSION CUTS THROUGH MY MOOD
DRAG’S ME TO MY TOOL’S
PEOPLE SHOUT AND CRITICIZE
THEY DON’T UNDERSTAND, THOSE FOOLS
THEY
SINK IN MY FLESH, THE KNIFE AND THE PIN
IT’S
THE ONLY WAY I GET PLEASURE WITHIN
AT EVERY OPPORTUNITY, TO MY SACRED
PLACE I ELOPE
IT IS MY SANCTUARY MY ONLY PLACE OF HOPE
MY PARENTS SHAKE THEIR HEADS AND SHOUT
THEY RAVE AND CRY, STOP THEY DEMAND
PLEASE DON’T JUDGE OR CONDEMN ME
THE ONLY PLEASURE IN MY LIFE COMES FROM MY HAND
I AM TOLD SELF MUTILATION IS A SIN
BUT TO CUT AND BURN IS MY RELIEF
WOULD PEOPLE PREFER I WAS AN UNDERAGE PARENT?
OR A DRUG ADDICT THIEF?
THIS IS MY PRESSURE RELEASE
WITH LIFE’S PROBLEMS MY WAY OF DEALING
HOW CAN YOU JUDGE ME? YOU JUST DON’T KNOW
IF THESE DESIRES KILL ME, IT’S MY LIFE I’M STEALING
I HIDE MY LIMBS, KEEP EVIDENCE LOCKED AWAY
I WONDER AT THE TORTURE THAT BROUGHT
ME HERE
I DON’T THINK ANYONE CAN UNDERSTAND
UNLESS THEY’VE BEEN THROUGH THIS I
FEAR
THEY TRY TO MAKE ME BETTER
TREAT ME LIKE I’M ILL
I’M NOT JUST SEEKING ATTENTION
I DON’T WANT RELIANCE ON A PILL!!
I DON’T WANT STUPID INTERFERENCE
I ENJOY THIS ON MY OWN
IT’S MY LIFE, I DON’T WANT ATTENTION
JUST LEAVE ME ALONE
Sean SESSIONS 04/10/2003 (Scotland)
©
COPYRIGHT S SESSIONS 04/10/2003 ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
Honesty in Politics—
A Sonnet on Faking It
Sincerity and honesty must reign
to keep our nation's heritage intact
and let our government be free of stain
from sinister Corruption's lethal pact.
But crafty politicians bend the rules
to weasel fame and win their lofty posts.
Their honesty dissolves in bloody pools;
sincerity is feigned with flagrant boasts.
And when these criminals are caught in crime,
they spread humility thick with sweet talk
to slickly cover all their filth and slime,
then beg for a reprieve, and off they walk.
When our public servants have to fake it,
doesn't all their trash just make you vomit?
Cliff Price
January 21, 2007
Arrested!
If only I could arrest you
Handcuff you
Interrogate you
Sitting at the end of a long steely table
Your furtive green eyes that refused to meet mine
Would have to give me their dragon stare
Seething
Ha! I found you out
Of course I would first remind you
That everything you said can and would definitely
be used against you
And when you asked for your attorney I’d smile and
say
You have to serve as your own
And that one call?
Well…you already made it
So let’s get down to it
The terrible truth
The deception, the les, the saying one thing and
meaning another
The saying one thing and doing another and oh yes
admit it you had a hidden agenda one you partner new
nothing about…all in all the fraud you so carefully
concealed and the supreme deceit
You mastered
And I know you’d sit there
You wouldn’t say a thing
You’d look down
Then you’d look to one side
Then the other
Stonewalling
I never got used to it
The hours would pass
The only sound the clock
And slowly you’d crack
And I’d go out of the room
Back in with a different face
Carrying coffee and donuts
All smiles and friends
How much of a break could I give you?
Would you remember what it was like and wasn’t it
all so confusing?
But we’d never agree
No resolution – how familiar
You still wouldn’t come clean
So out I’d go and in I’d go
Good cop – bad cop
Just like you did to me
Till the dawn’s early light but this time you
couldn’t leave me
Lockdown
Till you really cracked
There would be no place to run and no place to hide
Just me and you
I finally had your attention
And I’d shout “the truth…the truth is all I want”
Admit it, you were “in so deep” you tricked yourself
And you’d finally give in and it would all come out
All the complexities and intrigue
And finally that one last question I would “dragnet”
out of you
Were you really crazy?
Martha Y. Wright
Nameless Ones
With tattered, flea-infested fur
they slink through the underbrush. During a drought
you may put a bowl of cool water under a tree, and
during a thunderstorm, when your beloved Natasha is
curled securely on the couch, you may think of them
in the sodden forest.
This summer there
are more of them than ever before in shades of black
and mottled brown, subsisting on vermin and birds.
On White Oak Drive, one was run over yesterday; its
carcass provided a feast for the crows.
The township
health department has warned not to feed them, to
keep healthy pets indoors, but Natasha enjoys her
morning bask in the sun, her stroll atop the fence
which can't completely protect rich cats from poor.
Arlene L. Mandell
Santa Rosa, CA
Another Bus Ride in 1965 (To Ron Clarke)
I too took the busride in 1965
to the Oakland Induction Center.
It left the Selective Service office in Martinez at some
ungodly hour, like 4:30 am to avoid the protesters I was
told. By that time the lies about how we were doing in Viet
Nam were anyone's guess, same as Iraq today.
I was as bare-ball naked as any one in Oakland, passed my
physical and was told to go sit in that little room and wait
at the end of the hall.
Was told I could go to OCS and work at being an officer.
I still had my graduate year at Berkeley to finish.
I finished the year and went to work at the Berkeley Lab.
Necessary national security I was told. Later went to
MBAssociates in San Ramon and joined the war machine,
illustrating then designing and building rockets and
launchers to go to Viet Nam: 13, 20, 25, 30, and 40mm
rockets and launchers carrying flare, chaff and
electromagnetic radar-jamming materials. I saw the kinds of
weapons and it wasn't hard to imagine the kinds of
industrial fuckups that took my Dad's hands off in Germany
when dullards pursuing profit war dollars instead of
humanistic values, turn shit into shinola in a profit-driven
hurry. All my weapons fired upon testing.
When I nailed the last explosive box into the
explosive-handling truck leaving the area, I had
illustrated, designed and test fired all the stuff in those
boxes headed for Viet Nam. Those things hopefully saved the
lives of downed pilots in the jungles and helped evacuate
them to on-carrier sea safety, away from McNamara's,
Johnson's and Nixon's war of bullshit and rich man's causes.
Iraq is no different today. If the US had gotten off its
oil-glutted ass decades ago, we'd be independent of oilmen's
needs for war to secure petrol-resources in pre-emptively
targeted foreign countries. Politicians and fat-assed
bureaucrats draft others to ride the f'ing buses and go
through the charades of war. Some lose their lives, limbs,
and families. Others of us just write about it and remember
all the Need to Know Only reasons we were ever employed
during that time.--Pete Bray, Benicia, CA 12/23/06
Darfur
Desert sand hushes
everything machine
gunbursts human
shaped
screams muffled
with
hard hands over
faces
wild eyes become
glazed
red puddles in
disappearing
ink signed on
documents
meekly chastising
monster crime
desert sand hushes
machine mothers
everything
--write demand action
James Downs
12-18-06
IN McKinley GROVE
(northern Kings Canyon)
Lying beside
the grove's shaded pathway
a giant sequoia
over a thousand years old --
hundreds of initials carved
into the debarked trunk
by visitors who won't live
to one hundred twenty.
(c) Claire J. Baker
December 8, 2006
Plundered Roses
Sadness envelops Renoir's blowsy flowers, lush peach and pale lemon,
sketched with thick brush strokes against a golden background. Their
drooping heads are heavy, fragile; their ripe scent saturates the warm
air as he clutches his brush, working as fast as arthritic fingers will
allow.
Imprisoned in a gilded frame the
painting hangs for twenty years in the salon of wealthy industrialist
Otto Krebs amongst his profusion of exquisite French art. Like millions
of Jews, Poles, and Gypsies, this painting, along with its extraordinary
companions, is crammed into box cars, shipped on steel rails. Then utter
silence for half a century till a curtain lifts, revealing hundreds of
masterpieces in superb condition.
Today we examine a fallen petal
resting on a table, the whorls of peach, pale lemon, the flow of
Renoir's master strokes reproduced in the Hermitage's Hidden
Treasures Revealed, a book that assigns no blame, offers no
redemption.
Arlene L. Mandell
Begging Eyes, Empty
Stomachs—
Fate's Accursed Poverty
Sad, bewildered eyes of starving
children
beg with heavy hearts, so weak, so broken.
Deeply sunken eyes in ghostly faces,
blandly starring in lethargic trances,
search with helpless innocence and
agony—
they are locked in Fate's accursed
Poverty.
Eyes that never peer from cozy playpens;
eyes that never see sweet treats from
kitchens;
eyes that never gleam when playing with a
toy;
eyes condemned to life bereft of childish
joy.
Oh what tragedy to never know love,
never see an angel nor a sacred dove.
They asked not for birth in such a troubled
world
where cold Poverty's rejection is unfurled
in this ill begotten world of shameful greed
that ignores these children wrought from
Grief and Need.
Why must Poverty consume their frail
souls,
ostracize their hopes and smash their
feeble goals?
Curse this fickle world that trashes the
poor,
blesses the rich, and lets Starvation's gore
seethe inside a helpless, empty body
trapped in ghetto life that's so grim and
shoddy.
Empty stomachs in defenseless waifs
scream
while Society pursues its fancy dream.
Cliff Price
July 4,
1997;
Revised:
July 1, 1998;
Nov. 8,
2006
I wrote this poem in response to your previous email where
Comcast censored your
web site.
Jim
THERE IS A POEM HERE SOMEWHERE
Our nation kills children, mothers, fathers, whole families,
and complete clans disappear to quench the dry mouths
of our own War Monsters.
Slimy slithering censors are more profane and dirty, than the
"S-H-I-T!" they cut.
Censors can find evil where none exists.
After all, they set the standards, that create their job… and,
they contradict themselves at will or opportunity.
They paint crosses in the night like Gothom City's light, calling Batman!
They beam holy invitations to chases organized to catch the sin de jure...
They hate wanton serving wenches, topless entertainment, and
vast reservoirs of bubbling vintage sin...where none exists.
They are blind to the boulder in their eye, but stumble over our gravel.
They pray for obvious signs, and proclaim sin in everything new.
But those of us who have fallen into Poetry… like it.
Truth is… it’s the monkey on our souls back!
We are witch doctors writing prescriptions in exchange for free love,
We are Pimps getting laid in meter,
We Pantoum, and Haiku, and, Villanelle, and flaunt our Caesura
We shoot up in strange places, main line in Coffee dives,
compose on napkins, write on the host's walls, and, sometimes…
we get so up tight we even do Sonnets!
We admit and commit otomotopaia in the presence of children!
And yes, there is a fee for free verse!
If it sells there is a tax.
Shoot up, drink down, inhale, shout it out, do it all...
Poets have secret knowledge and weapons!
Freedom is addictive, and love is never dirty.
Those Critics and Censors got here the same way we did…
No matter how hard or how easy the road, life’s first poem is jump started
with a sharp smack on the wet bare butt!
For most of us, our first poem was an angry cry of protest.
When death comes, protest is still the proper response!
So far Poetry records, sorts, catalogs, and explains
far better than does History!
(C) Jim Lyle 7 Oct
06
AN AGNOSTIC RECOGNITION
Their thundering addiction for
your name drowns your song;
"a still small voice" never seems an option.
Denouncing science and blossoming creation,
they do not hear "rocks cry out";
they forbid divinity in progress and process.
Burning crosses foul night, blacken stars,
and blind the heavens to which you pointed.
They proclaim your royalty, but forget your humble clothes.
They turn "the least of these" away,
never dreaming you among the forlorn seekers.
They praise fish and loaves but deny food to the hungry.
They condemn contraception and then murder to protest abortion;
yet they ignore children who starve smelling the banquet,
and freezing just beyond warm insulated doors.
They dream your descent from heaven
wrapped in power and radiance,
but never consider... such power might already be here…
unannounced.
I never, ever, see you in their posture, or from their pulpits.
I do not know you by their works.
I do catch quick freeze-frames of presence in crowds...
remnant graffiti wrappings from gifts of grace;
warm auras of comfort and sympathy;
radiation from exchanged love;
and, within children,
the spreading infection of forgetting and pardon.
Then, do I dare dream renewal.
But, I do not soil myself, nor ever misunderstand you...
by following!
In my mind, I enjoy walks side by side, together... You and I...
and Buddha, and Lao Tsu,
and Socrates, and Zarathustra,
and Maimonides the Rambam
and all the unnamed others...
the whole lonely gang...
all the ones who really wanted to understand;
and could see,
and could learn,
and could love,
and could teach,
and dared to do so.
(C) Jim Lyle, Christmas 1999
VOODOO WOMAN
She was
From the last world
When language was a thought
Humming me into
The present
As close to me as Pluto
She
Washwoman
To my
Heartbeats
She was my nanny in the womb
Plating my hair with sunsets
Rhythm celebrating her music
Slowly
My hand with tentacle stethoscopes
sewed into its tips
I feel you in watts
touch me
woman
A forbidden taste
Touch brushed into wet tongues
Woman
Sandalwood arms wrapping around
The hearts of the universe
Brown skin dripping
Woman
Touching the sweat from my heart
Sucking the salt from my pores
She Lives life
She lives
Like
Somersaults in vacuums
Gravity split into heavy breathing
Breath floating mountains
Climb woman
Inside my vibrations
Yell Oya whispers
Till I hear her insides moving silent
Across my nerve endings
tithing me with your scent
Move
woman
Move globally
woman
Move
Underground from the top of me
Peeking behind eyelids
Around comers
See me in tomorrows
Woman
Like
No one has
Make me scream
Yoruba Chess kings
sing me Angel wings
suckle the world from your breast
she
is praying backwards into the light
Her spine leaking strength
Painting her hips over distance passed
from corners
Alley ways
Peel away this world
Woman
Peel away who
I was
Woman
Make me
Whole again
Woman
Voodoo woman
Don't let go
Don’t ask me why I scream
woman
Come to me
Come now
Cause I need to live again
(C)2006 Tshaka Campbell
War Rant
Alaina says she wants more passion
Andrea quit reading the morning news
Yvette sees “The Devil Wears Prada” –
Twice – her savior is in fashion.
I check my e-mails, avoid over long queues,
And await my daily dose of inspiration
Wondering each day if I’ve paid enough dues.
Adam watches the blogosphere
For flash mobs, trends and hot spots
And we all fret about the biosphere
While white girls don’t do much hip hop
But for me, I can’t help it –
Rhythm and words are my companions, true and loyal
So forgive me now if I don’t exactly know how to do it –
Just say it’s a rant, peace and love style:
I want to save the world, do it now, don’t get caught
By indecision, paralysis, missteps or overwrought.
But the world and I have conflicting views
On how to end this madness. Stop the bombing, end the wars,
I cry - but no one listen to my news.
My nighttimes glisten with the sweat of murder,
Mayhem and slaughter.
I could just go over there, I think,
Land smack down on the pavement.
I’d put on my white gloves; make a stink
Shout “What a horror!” while dancing on the griddle
Of hot sand, tar: “There is no left, no right, no middle
C’mon stop the killing! End the riddle.”
But I’d be dead before you could say red
And then I think:
“If not now, when?”
Wasn’t it I, who called myself a warrior?
Every day new news arrives stinking,
Reeking with tragedies undreamed –
Tidal waves, heat waves, bodies downstream.
A wave of bombings on an unsuspecting train
We seek for terror but what about D.C.? “We can’t explain.”
I voted right, I mean left - is my persistent refrain
I took myself off the list of dinner parties where people
complain
Of gas prices and fish prices and politics not spoken
Cuz I’m getting sick of being powerless, feeling broken.
So c’mon people do one thing today for peace
Save a tree, save a child, sign a paper, beg for release
Of fighters and lovers, for peaceniks and hippies
This battle of west meets east is not what we ordered.
Joan Gelfand
(C)2006
Put Me On An Ice
Floe (For Ron Toryfter)
When I’m old and ready to go,
just put me on an ice floe.
Save the long faces and the I-V lines,
the anti-fibrillators and the resuscitators, urinal bags and a thousand meds –
it’s OK to use the Arctic Foodchain Exit Plan and just put me on an ice floe.
I can be an Eskimo's cultural icon
or a polar bear’s icy snow cone.
Ashes to ashes and dust to dust
and over-cooled squares to icey cubes, ya know?
Just put a Colonel Sanders chicken wing in my mouth and head me south (Original
recipe, or course).
I’ll pretend our ’fridge was on the fritz, or that our 100-year appliance
warrantee policy was really the shits.
And as my temperature begins to drop,
my anxieties about failing health in old age will surely stop.
Jesus, it’s cold out here!
I’ll just fade to blue (then black with arctic frost).
Think about the fantastic savings in cost!
HMOs eat your heart(s) out.
Wow! Check out the Arctic Lights!
Is that Santa Claus and his reindeer all in tights?
Adios...on...the...rocks, amigos y amigas.
©Peter Bray, 9/22/06 All rights reserved
Chocolate Chicken
Back in Corporateville
she was one of my managerial peers.
She had a less-than-direct way
of dealing with the truth,
whether it was workload or personnel matters.
It was like me missing one of my chickens and I’d ask her if she’d seen any of
my missing chickens.
Holding something behind her back,
squawking, and losing its feathers she’d say, “Why, Noooo, I haven’t seen any of
your missing chickens.”
Later that night she’d serve her favorite Chocolate Chicken to her guests and
they’d all throw their well-chewed bones back over my back fence.
©Peter Bray, 8/28/06 All rights reserved
How Many More Dying Faces...?
How many more dying faces must we see
Before we see
That they are the dying faces of you and me?
How many more tears must we watch fall
Before we all
See that they are continually falling for us all?
How much more pain must we witness
Before our witless
Minds realize that we are all on the hit-list?
How much more blood must be spilled
Before we're chilled
By the thought of the lives that the blood once filled?
How much more cruelty must we be a party to
Before we decide to
Put our lives on the line for the humanity we belong to?
How much more shame must we live with
Before we get with
A program that we can proudly and peacefully live with?
How many more dying faces must we see
Before we see...?
Year of the Princess
She was born in the year of the princess
Her arrival heralded by golden sunrise
and clouds tinted with majestic purple hues
As she grew woodland creatures would scamper from their
boroughs
to happily line her path
Chirping song birds twittered and flew round her head
Flowers bud and bloom turning their blossoms to the sound
of her laughter
In her kingdom all was sweetness and light
until one day someone dared to tell her no
Vexed she stomped her dainty foot
Self absorbed and vain she couldn’t see past her own
desires
It was her birthright that all must obey and bend to her
will
Anger flared wrath rained down
Flowers wilted birds and animals scurried back to their
homes
Skies darkened and clouds turned blue black with rage
None would find peace until this wrong had been righted
Order must be returned to the land
for after all she was born in the year of the princess
©2006 Martha Meltzer
m.meltzer@comcast.net