Tag: poem

An Isolated Incident


It was an isolated incident There is no pattern of any kind here Woven in the fabric of everything.                               – Tortured and murdered for simply But don’t worry at all – I present It was an isolated incident.                               – Caved in with a baseball bat is nothing These things happen; the single event Woven in the fabric of everything.…

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An Isolated Incident


It was an isolated incident There is no pattern of any kind here Woven in the fabric of everything.                               – Tortured and murdered for simply But don’t worry at all – I present It was an isolated incident.                               – Caved in with a baseball bat is nothing These things happen; the single event Woven in the fabric of everything.…

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An Isolated Incident


It was an isolated incident
There is no pattern of any kind here
Woven in the fabric of everything.
–
Tortured and murdered for simply
But don’t worry at all – I present
It was an isolated incident.
–
Caved in with a baseball bat is nothing
These things happen; the single event
Woven in the fabric of everything.
–
Brown, Mcbride, Garner attacked and dying.
Diallo, Dorismund, Zongo. Don’t dissent
It was an isolated incident.
–
Nine black people dead at white hands killing
That almost stopped it’s trigger but didn’t
Woven in the fabric of everything.
–
The legacy of horror is clinging
To that cacophonous endless lament;
“It was an isolated incident.”,
Woven in the fabric of everything.

u cld die 2morrow.


Why not write at least one sentence?
Go on, it can’t hurt can it?
We both know that you’re afraid that it will happen.
Don’t die with so many unfinished stories.
Just try and finish one, one sentence.
Use that cold clawing fear in your stomach to drive you on.
Don’t have another drink
Just yet.

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u cld die 2morrow.


Why not write at least one sentence?
Go on, it can’t hurt can it?
We both know that you’re afraid that it will happen.
Don’t die with so many unfinished stories.
Just try and finish one, one sentence.
Use that cold clawing fear in your stomach to drive you on.
Don’t have another drink
Just yet.

View On WordPress

u cld die 2morrow.


Why not write at least one sentence?

Go on, it can’t hurt can it?

We both know that you’re afraid that it will happen.

Don’t die with so many unfinished stories.

Just try and finish one, one sentence.

Use that cold clawing fear in your stomach to drive you on.

Don’t have another drink

Just yet.

A is for Anhedonia.


A is for Anhedonia.

A is for Anhedonia B is for Boredom C is for Collapse D is for Doldrum E is for Energy F is for Fear G is for Guilt H is for Happiness I is for Indecision J is for Jump K is for Knowledge L is for Loss M is for Morbid N is for Nothing O is for Other P is for Paranoia Q is for Quit R is for Razor S is for Stranger T is for Terrors U is for Undulating V is for Violence X is for X Y is for Youth Z…

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A is for Anhedonia.


A is for Anhedonia.

A is for Anhedonia B is for Boredom C is for Collapse D is for Doldrum E is for Energy F is for Fear G is for Guilt H is for Happiness I is for Indecision J is for Jump K is for Knowledge L is for Loss M is for Morbid N is for Nothing O is for Other P is for Paranoia Q is for Quit R is for Razor S is for Stranger T is for Terrors U is for Undulating V is for Violence X is for X Y is for Youth Z…

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A is for Anhedonia.


A is for Anhedonia
B is for Boredom
C is for Collapse
D is for Doldrum
E is for Energy
F is for Fear
G is for Guilt
H is for Happiness
I is for Indecision
J is for Jump
K is for Knowledge
L is for Loss
M is for Morbid
N is for Nothing
O is for Other
P is for Paranoia
Q is for Quit
R is for Razor
S is for Stranger
T is for Terrors
U is for Undulating
V is for Violence
X is for X
Y is for Youth
Z is for Zero

Dripping in the Ectoplasm of White Privilege


I am normal.

I am kind,

Don’t see colour

Or ever find

The police treat me bad.

They are kind.

No special treatment

I once got fined

For driving drunk

They didn’t mind.

Sent me on my way

So I’m inclined

To love those cops

Who didn’t grind

My bones to paste

Or shoot me in my exposed back

Or kill me for talking back

Or cuff me for speaking out

Or night stuck me for a single shout

That war is for the battlefield

And not for those with badge and shield

Who hate the poor they guard all night

When really if they knew what’s right

They’d turn their eyes from the pitch

They’d join the horde and eat the rich.

A Visit to the Salt Mine


A Visit to the Salt Mine

I wake up every morning with a smile.

Not letting them sleep is okay with me.

Torture kept our country safe, for a while.

These are terrorists, mostly, they are vile

So we can treat them as we wish, you see?

I wake up every morning with a smile.

Stress positions were a reasonable style

Of persuasion, not unlike yoga, see?

Torture kept our country safe, for a while.

There was no need to…

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A Visit to the Salt Mine


A Visit to the Salt Mine

I wake up every morning with a smile.

Not letting them sleep is okay with me.

Torture kept our country safe, for a while.

These are terrorists, mostly, they are vile

So we can treat them as we wish, you see?

I wake up every morning with a smile.

Stress positions were a reasonable style

Of persuasion, not unlike yoga, see?

Torture kept our country safe, for a while.

There was no need to…

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A Visit to the Salt Pit.


I wake up every morning with a smile.

Not letting them sleep is okay with me.

Torture kept our country safe, for a while.

—

These are terrorists, mostly, they are vile

So we can treat them as we wish, you see?

I wake up every morning with a smile.

—

Stress positions were a reasonable style

Of persuasion, not unlike yoga, see?

Torture kept our country safe, for a while.

—

There was no need to offer them a trial

If they were innocent then they’d  be free.

I wake up every morning with a smile

—

Yes, rectal feeding was very worthwhile.

There was no real damage, if you ask me.

I wake up every morning with a smile.

Torture kept our country safe, for a while.

Hand Prints


Palm prints dusted on a dark cavern wall

Tiny stencilled hands forgotten for years.

Large shiny missiles and thuggish bombs fall

Leaders wipe away expedient tears

Until cameras turn their dead lidless eyes

To the next shiny seratonin hit.

Seizures shadowed by paperwork towers

As crowds stumble toward the glowing pit

Of welcoming screams that steams a greeting

To the exhausted the hopeless the…

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Hand Prints


Palm prints dusted on a dark cavern wall

Tiny stencilled hands forgotten for years.

Large shiny missiles and thuggish bombs fall

Leaders wipe away expedient tears

Until cameras turn their dead lidless eyes

To the next shiny seratonin hit.

Seizures shadowed by paperwork towers

As crowds stumble toward the glowing pit

Of welcoming screams that steams a greeting

To the exhausted the hopeless the…

View On WordPress

Hand Prints


Palm prints dusted on a dark cavern wall

Tiny stencilled hands forgotten for years.

Large shiny missiles and thuggish bombs fall

Leaders wipe away expedient tears

Until cameras turn their dead lidless eyes

To the next shiny seratonin hit.

Seizures shadowed by paperwork towers

As crowds stumble toward the glowing pit

Of welcoming screams that steams a greeting

To the exhausted the hopeless the doomed.

Nearby blank faced operatives meeting

For one last time before straightening ties

Join the lines of misery add their cries

Waiting.


Waiting. http://wp.me/s1ew8b-waiting

A train speeds past
Whetting it’s wheels on the track.
Faces sag in unison.
The day has taken a little more
from us
Than we wanted to give.
Yet still someone whistles
Show tunes from Annie.
Tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow.

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Waiting.


Waiting. http://wp.me/s1ew8b-waiting

A train speeds past
Whetting it’s wheels on the track.
Faces sag in unison.
The day has taken a little more
from us
Than we wanted to give.
Yet still someone whistles
Show tunes from Annie.
Tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow.

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Waiting.


A train speeds past
Whetting it’s wheels on the track.
Faces sag in unison.
The day has taken a little more
From us
Than we wanted to give.
Yet still someone whistles
Show tunes from Annie.
Tomorrow tomorrow tomorrow.

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Hibernation.


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float: left;
margin-top: 10px;
text-align: center;
width: 50%;
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max-height: 410px;
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Hibernation.

The Watermeloning – Halloween Special Redux


I posted this before but it’s Halloween so I thought the world was ready to re-experience the horror….

https://vimeo.com/48089957

Oh Dripping maw of meaty red
Do not look in that cave of dread
We Ope’d the Fruit
And so it bled.
Oh Dreaded Fruit of Rotten Red.

https://thesleepcoatleague.wordpress.com/2013/02/01/the-watermeloning/

Sleep with the light…

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The Watermeloning – Halloween Special Redux


I posted this before but it’s Halloween so I thought the world was ready to re-experience the horror….

https://vimeo.com/48089957

Oh Dripping maw of meaty red
Do not look in that cave of dread
We Ope’d the Fruit
And so it bled.
Oh Dreaded Fruit of Rotten Red.

https://thesleepcoatleague.wordpress.com/2013/02/01/the-watermeloning/

Sleep with the light…

View Post

The Watermeloning – Halloween Special Redux


I posted this before but it’s Halloween so I thought the world was ready to re-experience the horror….

Oh Dripping maw of meaty red
Do not look in that cave of dread
We Ope’d the Fruit
And so it bled.
Oh Dreaded Fruit of Rotten Red.

Sleep with the light on tonight…

Mwahahahahahahaha. etc.

Poetry Pot – An Apology, in Advance, to the Memory of Emma Lazarus.


I never like to explain poems but here I am explaining a poem.

I was irritated, this morning, as with most mornings, at what Twitter had vomited out to the world after the announcement of the new Miss USA contest. Now I am not particular fan nor enemy of…

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Poetry Pot – An Apology, in Advance, to the Memory of Emma Lazarus.


I never like to explain poems but here I am explaining a poem.

I was irritated, this morning, as with most mornings, at what Twitter had vomited out to the world after the announcement of the new Miss USA contest. Now I am not particular fan nor enemy of…

View Post

Poetry Pot – An Apology, in Advance, to the Memory of Emma Lazarus.


I never like to explain poems but here I am explaining a poem.

I was irritated, this morning, as with most mornings, at what Twitter had vomited out to the world after the announcement of the new Miss USA contest. Now I am not particular fan nor enemy of the Miss USA competition. It is a particularly American form of demeaning women by making them bark facts and do tricks but everyone enters into it with as much of a freewill as any one can ever enter into anything and it is, even though oppressive in the subtle ways that our patriarchy oppresses all women, not the worst thing that a woman can, in this day and age, experience. I am not a woman so I cannot say this for sure but that is the basis upon which I have feelings regarding the Miss USA competition. From Twitter there came various hateful comments regarding the Indian American winner. They are widely available on the internet. I shall not repeat them here. So in response to a comment made by a friend about how awful this was I appropriated a line from The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus and adapted it for my needs. It is, I believe, the most famous of all the lines and is rendered below:

“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.”

Later, as I pondered my changed version I decided to change the whole poem to reflect my views, at the very present moment on social media. The irony of me transmitting this through social media is not lost on me. What can one say other than that I am a hippocrit. So be it – I find myself guilty as charged.

So here, without further ado, and a lengthy introduction which does not deserve my brutalisation, or your time, I present you with An Apology, in Advance, to the Memory of Emma Lazarus:

Not like the eyeless spawn of silicate shame,
With writhing limbs lumbering from gland to gland;
Here at our broken toothed, fiery gates shall stand
A soiled beacon with a stump, whose flame
Is the searing lie, and it’s name
Moloch’s Minion. From it’s bloodied-hand
Burns world-wide fury; her wild sockets command
The air-thick with rage that prejudices frame.
“Keep, ancient tomes, your  words!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your racist, your sexist,
Your homophobic masses yearning to speak hate,
The wretched moral refuse of your inner world.
Send these, the bankrupt, lunatics to me,
I lift my stump beside the flaming maw!”

Poetry Pot – National Poetry Writing Month.


So National Poetry Writing Month is over and I think I only actually wrote one poem. I did read all of these poems though. I don’t expect anyone to want to listen to all of these at once but here they all are, just in case:

Enjoy.

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Poetry Pot – National Poetry Writing Month.


So National Poetry Writing Month is over and I think I only actually wrote one poem. I did read all of these poems though. I don’t expect anyone to want to listen to all of these at once but here they all are, just in case:

Enjoy.

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Poetry Pot – National Poetry Writing Month.


So National Poetry Writing Month is over and I think I only actually wrote one poem.

I did read all of these poems though.

I don’t expect anyone to want to listen to all of them at once but here they all are, just in case:

Enjoy.

Remember The Victims.


Remember the victims
As they crossed the line.
Do not forget the victims.
-
The happy childish faces
Waving for their parents.
Remember the victims
-
Who walked past exploding
Cars and were spread like paste.
Do not forget the victims
-
As they crossed the line
Exhausted and triumphant.
Remember the victims
-
Who herded their sheep
Unaware of the hovering eye.
Do not forget the victims
-
Who sat in the classroom
Hands thick with paint.
Remember the victims
-
Sluicing on the ground -
Incredulous as they evaporate.
Do not forget the Victims.
Remember The Victims.

Poetry Pot – Sunday Lunch Audio


I hear it’s Poetry Month so, because I have nothing better to do, I’m going to add a scratchy recording every day of a poem that I have written.

Here is the first one.

It is mercifully short.

Text HERE.

Sonnet 3


I want to know how far we have to run

Before we reach that mountain top of Myth.

What jungles, deserts must be overcome?

What trials to come to reach that monolith?

There must be ways to simplify the task

To smooth the path and ease the climb to it.

I feel, within, my lips upon the cask

Of ancient scribes who dwell within the pit.

My knot-tight hand grips tightly to the pen,

I sit awake and stare down at the page.

I crease my brow and summon inner zen

Then scratch across the pulpy sheet with rage.

To balance both on bloodied tightrope here,

The painful task of lonely mountain seer.

Crustal Deformation.


1.

Summer sky thick with clotted clouds

As the drip down sweat curves along the valley

Unfolding into the yielding moment of a swollen harvest.

Sluggish slowing streams slip together in sweet embrace.

Roiling in tumbling turbulence they slice hard rocks

Opening thunderous wounds in thick granite.

2.

With welling waters flowing through thick granite

Bursting forth in tremendous steaming clouds

Overlapping skin of variegated ancient rocks

With piston powered pluvial spears gouge the valley

Singing with cacophonous choral delight. Embrace

Wholly the driven plunge into the wholesome harvest.

3.

Welcome then, with open arms, the shrinkwrapped harvest

Of their back-breaking labour. Render Endless your granite

Pity unto every squat leathered servant that Freedom fails to embrace.

Do not think on the gouging and scraping they endure as clouds

Overhead scudding by twist out their last moisture on your produce in their valley;

In the valley below the clouds where your servants are broken on hard rocks.

4.

Watch and smile in glazed indolence as the foundation of your happiness rocks

Under the slowly increasing inevitable momentum of the seeds of your harvest.

The hammering and the murmuring bubble up like milk through granite

Until you can no longer remember the whispering wind of the valley.

Until you can no longer remember the relief brought by the clouds.

Until you can no longer remember the feeling of that once complacent embrace.

5.

Engage with the torture wrought with the gnawing certainty that you did it. Embrace

The rotten truth that you are a leech, that we are engorged on others. Let the rocks

Of this reality crush you, pound you to dust, smash your bones into clouds.

It’s okay, isn’t it, that every little button pressed is another reckless harvest

Of people never acknowledged as people? It is okay; even carvings on granite

Eventually erode. Your transgression will evaporate. Even the valley

6.

Will wear away. Just the upthrust bones of buildings strewn over the desolate valley.

Yet in dotted patches – here and there; sprouting shoots. Embrace

Now the hope that comes after terrible failure. Cease your easy weakness. Be granite

In the face of what you have done and rebuild, regrow, rebirth even as the rocks

Supple and slow, stretch their muscles, one epoch at a time, awaiting their harvest.

Don’t dismiss the possibility that happiness, not just pain, can come with the clouds.

7.

Roiling in tumbling turbulence they slice hard rocks

Unfolding into the yielding moment of a swollen harvest.

Summer sky; thick with clotted clouds.

The Vagabond.


There is a restaurant over yonder
On top of that lonely old hill.
It is owned by a ragged vagabond
Who the System could not kill.

The moment he could wander
He left his employer's estate
He wandered up the pathway
He wandered out the gate.

The first time the system attacked him,
He was standing by a tree.
The System cut that tree down
And nearly squashed him like a flea.

Then he was minding his own business
Right by a railroad track.
The System saw him sitting there 
And, without warning, launched a sneak attack.

But his reflexes were like lightning
Honed from years of being free.
So he turned that attack back at them
And the System let him be.

But the System it remembered
It knew how to hold a grudge
And when that man opened his restaurant,
The system hired a judge.

The judge he came a'calling
But the vagabond knew the score.
He won that judge with pie and wine
And showed the System the open door.

Now the vagabond is older
He lies awake at night
He sleeps with one eye open
Waiting for the System to strike.

So take a lesson from the vagabond
If you want to be truly free
The System will try to own you,
It will never let you be.

And yet he lived his life
The way that he saw fit.
When the System came a'calling.
He never gave way to it.

Sonnet 2


The key is sitting under the small clock.
It is not the key I am looking for.
The key I need unseals the heavy lock
That keeps shut that ancient massive door
Of the room that I left long, long ago.
I can’t remember what is behind it.
Whether bad, good or neutral I don’t know.
Yes, I am puzzled, yet I must submit
To whatever may pour forth
Into whoever it is I am now.
Without this ability of rebirth
I won’t be able to ride the Great Scow.
The key is sitting under the small clock
But it’s not the key to unseal that lock.