In Foresight

From the apparently lovely film, Moonrise Kingdom. I haven’t actually watched it yet.

My feet know neither pain nor pall,

they refuse death yet embrace birth,

They murmur softly, swift as ghosts

towards my grave on this green earth.

.

My heart it knows none but itself,

my tongue it tastes only success,

my eyes they see the mirror here

and yet no further with finesse.

.

But for my shortness of vision

I turn no blind eye to the past

eras when older eyes would send

pupils into a world so vast.

.

I hear their cries for racing time

the grains of sand beneath their feet

reminders of the ticking clock

a legacy they must complete.

.

Yet time abundance still have I,

so let me tend to nascent fields

whose crops are many, in their prime

and offer ever-pleasant yields.

Burgerz

Because everyone craves social commentary like they crave a good burger.

O glorious melted American cheese‚

of sharp cheddar taste that never fails to please

the taste palette of ignorant fools—

feed him a burger‚ see how he drools!

.

Scrumptious tomatoes drizzled with red‚

like blood over the faces of the dead

soldiers perished in the quest for war

who don’t have a clue what they’re fighting for!

.

Lettuce commence into the land of green‚

where icebergs float under seas‚ unforeseen

by the people who claim to be “eating organic”

when the state of their tummy is worse than Titanic.

.

On either side‚ a bun of bread round‚

speckles of white sesame abound‚

little bits of litter lying on the hot

street — something someone forgot!

.

But the heart of the situation lies in the middle‚

eponymous burger to this patriot’s riddle‚

sizzled to juicy‚ peppered perfection‚

so full of meat‚ so little direction.

Dusk of Civilization

had a vaguely unsettling amount of fun writing this one. It’s not meant to be taken too seriously… or is it?

Casinos catechize like temples for fools‚

fools that indulge in the grandest of golds

and burn upon pitiful pyres of pyrite

as the forever-flaming urban night unfolds.

 

The angels above hear the cries of the doomed

(you mere mortal men who make money like love)

and tower with power o’er glittering town

with the sore scathing stares of those from above.

 

Silence! Young babe, look out at the night

and behold Babylon, the priestesses are out—

their hair in long tangles, their clanking gold bangles,

how intoxicated they are as they stumble about.

Her

Silence melting in her mouth. Her teeth

chattering in slow motion, soundless horror of the

daily grind. Her tongue caressing a façade of saccharine joy

from the too-often bouts of laughter

that fizz out upon examination.

 

Her eyes, darting around the world in

eighty seconds, two pupils

of the eternal didactism that clutches her heart—

her heart, palpitating purple pulp,

gushing out the lifeblood of anguish

turned mockery turned romance.

 

Her hands, how they search for feeling

like two bloated tarantulas in the equinoctial abyss,

hop from here to there and abruptly they are falling,

hairy legs flailing, through a rather deep hole

in the center of her head.

Contented Contentions

poet =/= always speaker 

I am content, as content

as a contented man may be;

there’s too much of the world

for me to possibly see,

so as for the dreams

and the hapless seams

of life where they may tear

I have no such fear—

to live life in its entirety.

 

Don’t tell me what to do

or what pursuits to pursue;

I simply want to live and die

and to die having had the few

pleasures life will offer me,

the few sights my eyes will see,

knowing that they will shed

no tears for being dead.

 

I am content, as content

as an apathetic man may be;

Though pathetic I seem to those

pitiful fools who stare at me

with a confusion born of disparate

wants and needs, so desperate

to remedy the problem they think

is their mortality— but to drink

from the cup of life, to succeed,

one must its fallow terms accede!

Mei Nü

Mei Nü is the Chinese word for “beautiful woman” or “goddess”.

Her hair was always perfect

for she could outrun the wind,

she’d say her house was filled with gifts

that Mother Earth would send.

 

Bullets couldn’t catch her,

but insults sometimes would.

Beauty wouldn’t condemn her,

but society itself could.

 

And midnight thoughts sometimes do

see the light of day,

and though an act unspeakable,

it was better than the things they say—

 

And still do, over her grave,

over closed eyes and haunted face,

“Beautiful thing, she’ll forever be

to mankind a disgrace.”

Summer Dust

Summer‚ oh summer‚ why must you depart with such haste?

Summer dust hangs faint

in the air

beneath the roof

of this ramshackle car.

we breathe it in

ambivalently

because it belonged to faeries

before it belonged to

our cracked lips.

The tires roll around

circumventing lullabies

and bringing us straight to

the warm cotton darkness.

But even in my subaqueous dreams

the summer dust is there,

a thousand golden flecks

suspended.

Each little part reflects the sun

that billows in the water

like mythos.

When I wake up I can see

the ever-changing world

outside the window

flashing by through diaphanous

sheets of summer dust.

Two Poems

She counts the moons as they pass

by overhead‚ illuminate the grass

on vast-reaching fields where the gold

spins monochrome the world and maid;

bread crumbs line the trail of tears

stretched to the horizon‚ a hundred years

of endless dreaming fill her heart—

wrench blood‚ tissue‚ flesh apart—

for however enticing these dreams may be‚

she’ll always be chained to the solitary tree

that stands upright with fatigue and age;

traveller‚ she can’t be helped‚ simply turn the page!

 

Through the blue and through the black‚

a moon whose halo does not lack

the pure ivory of a rising dawn

without the music— all‚ all gone!

And then‚ ephemeral comes the sound

that reverberates around and round

the shadowed shoreline laced with sand

beneath her feet‚ delicate and

like little knives cutting through the timeless

solitude that wraps around her‚ a dress—

naked before the long forgotten melody

of the wind chimes through the air‚ the waves‚ the sea

Toussaint’s Overture

Toussaint L’ouverture‚ the leader of the Haitian Revolution of the 1790s‚ was betrayed by a “friend” and deported to a French jail. He died during this imprisonment‚ alone and in a foreign country.

Gone now were those passion-filled days,

When calm discourse fell victimized

To gunpowder shouts and rebellious craze

While battles raged for ideas unrealized…

 

Gone now were those young boys’ faces

Names and bodies forever to juggle

In his mind as they moved to greener places

Bless their brave souls– away from the struggle!

 

Now was the time of iron-clad bars,

Risen in front of him like a looming gate

That conceals a land of velvet-kissed stars

And pleasures, pleasures of the human state!

 

And he thought to himself, in the darkness of night,

Cursed is the world that lets the glorious fade,

The ones who before sang with war-seasoned might,

And now are on the edges of graves displayed.

Cogito Ergo Scribo

Sometimes I wonder what my life would be like without poetry. Then I realize… it wouldn’t exactly be life‚ would it?

i. Blank ceilings beckon to minds that

too often succumb to the saccharine pleasures

of life, only to find a bittersweet aftertaste

in want of something more.

There is something in the human mind

that longs for life to be defined.

 

ii. Cogito, ergo sum.

I think, therefore I am

A quiet, night-kissed fur face stealing away to a hidden place

with bright eyes that sing of distant memories still

outrunning the ever frosty winter chill.

A bon vivant with a taste in voices that embody

the spirit of millions yet has roots deeper

than those of the Shepherd’s Tree.

A creaking bark tossed by the resurgent storm of

a society always demanding more of the weak

and anachronistically bleak.

A chess piece, carved from brilliant ivory, caressed

by men who hold green paper and sands

of time and entire futures in their hands.

A lover to Gnosis but a slave to Pathos

and a beating human heart from which

Art’s arteries bleeds curiosity.

A startling flicker of light that in the

asphyxiating abyss came

before the ashes devoured the flame.

A speech scrawled in haste before

the ink ran out and never

even delivered.

 

iii. Poet (n)

I think, therefore I write

Cogito ergo scribo