Poet's Corner

[midcan5]

'All That's Left'

"All that's Left
in the world
—whether in Cuba, Venezuela, Bolivia
as well as in China, Japan, the United States,
Europe, the Middle East, Africa—
all of them cannot,
despite their resistance,
despite their refusal,
stop this march of death
because they,
as well as all that's Right
in the world,
despite their refusal,
despite their resistance,
already are counted among those
in this last parade.
Communists and progressives,
nazis, fascists and reactionaries,
zionists and anarchists of every stripe—
none are excluded, none can evade the march.

This one's not coming
with hammer and sickles or swastikas
or flags of any land.

This one's the march
all wars surrender to.

But when?! comes the unanimous cry.
When will it really happen?
If death is peace,
when can I truly die?

You will never know, and yet you do,
because you may already have,
and this life is your way
of paying homage to the power
that loves you enough
to have taken your life away
and left you with the taste
of immortality on your lips.

Nothing mystical: no Christ,
Allah, Jahweh or Buddha in the wings.
Even lying on your back you're marching.

This is not a cynical or pessimist
or nihilist poem. Join death
to your life and you will live
as if there were no drum to march to.

There is no march at all.

You're done. All will be well for all."

Jack Hirschman

 

[Bootneck]

O Lord I have not been to careful
In the things that I have said and done
I’ve boasted too much on my nights on the spree
And the games of pontoon that I’ve won

But I have always done my duty
Wherever I have been
Ashore with the gallant commandoes
Or out with the fleet at sea

But when Gabriel blows his last trumpet
And the reaper his harvest doth gleen
O Lord if I’ve been a sinner
Well at least I was a Marine

Once a Marine, Always a Marine

Per Mare Per Terram

 

[paperview]

One of my favorites, by Adrienne Rich.
I may share some of my own here ...at some point.
------------------------------

Good-bye to you whom I shall see tomorrow,
Next year and when I'm fifty; still goodbye.
This is the leave we never really take.
If I were dead or gone to live in China
The event might draw your stature in my mind.
I should be forced to look upon you whole
The way we look upon things we lose.
We see each other daily and in segments;
Parting might make us meet anew, entire.

You asked me once, and I could give no answer,
How far dare we throw off the daily ruse,
official treacheries of face and name,
Have out our true identity? I could hazard
An answer now, if you are asking still.
We are a small and lonely race
Showing no sign of mastering solitude
Out on this stony planet we farm.
The most that we can do for one another
Is let our blunders and our blind mischances
Argue a certain brusque abrupt compassion.
We might as well be truthful. I should say
They're luckiest who know they're not unique;

But only art or common interchange
Can teach that kindest truth. And even art
Can only hint at what disturbed a Melville
Or calmed a Mahler's frenzy; you and I
Still look from separate windows every morning
Upon the same white daylight.

And when we come into each others rooms
Once in a while, encumbered and self-conscious,
We hover awkwardly about the threshold
And usually regret the visit later.
Perhaps the harshest fact is, only lovers --
And once in a while two with the grace of lovers --
Unlearn that clumsiness of rare intrusion
And let each other freely come and go.
Most of us shut too quickly into cupboards
The margin-scribbled books, the dried geranium,
The penny horoscope, letters never mailed.
The door may open, but the room is altered;
Not the same room we look from night and day.

It takes a late and slow blooming wisdom
To learn that those we marked infallible
Are tragic-comic stumblers like ourselves.
The knowledge breeds reserve. We walk on tiptoe,
Demanding more than we know how to render.
Two edged discovery hunts us finally down;
The human act will make us real again,
And then perhaps we come to know each other.

Let us return to imperfection's school.
No longer wandering after Plato's ghost,
Seeking the garden where all fruit is flawless,
We must at last renounce that ultimate blue
And take a walk in other kinds of weather.
The sourest apple makes its wry announcement
That imperfection has a certain tang.
Maybe we shouldn't turn our pockets out
To the last crumb or lingering bit of fluff,
But all we can confess of what we are
Has in it the defeat of isolation --
If not our own, then someone's, anyway.

So I come back to saying this good-by,
A sort of ceremony of my own,
This stepping backward for another glance.
Perhaps you'll say we need no ceremony,
Because we know each other, crack and flaw,
Like two irregular stones that fit together.
Yet, still good-by, because we live by inches
And only sometimes see the full dimension.
Your stature's one I want to memorize --
Your whole level of being, to impose
On any other comers, man or woman.
I'd ask them that they carry what they are
With your particular bearing, as you wear
The flaws that make you both yourself and human.

 

[midcan5]

'We Didn't Start The Fire'

"Harry Truman, Doris Day, Red China, Johnnie Ray
South Pacific, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio

Joe McCarthy, Richard Nixon, Studebaker, television
North Korea, South Korea, Marilyn Monroe

Rosenbergs, H-Bomb, Sugar Ray, Panmunjom
Brando, "The King and I", and "The Catcher in the Rye"

Eisenhower, vaccine, England's got a new queen
Marciano, Liberace, Santayana goodbye

Chorus: We didn't start the fire
It was always burning
Since the world's been turning
We didn't start the fire
No we didn't light it
But we tried to fight it

Josef Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser and Prokofiev
Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc

Roy Cohn, Juan Peron, Toscanini, dacron
Dien Bien Phu and "Rock Around the Clock"

Einstein, James Dean, Brooklyn's got a winning team
Davy Crockett, "Peter Pan", Elvis Presley, Disneyland

Bardot, Budapest, Alabama, Khrushchev
Princess Grace, "Peyton Place", trouble in the Suez

Chorus

Little Rock, Pasternak, Mickey Mantle, Kerouac
Sputnik, Chou En-Lai, "Bridge on the River Kwai"

Lebanon, Charles de Gaulle, California baseball
Starkweather, homicide, children of thalidomide

Buddy Holly, "Ben-Hur", space monkey, Mafia
hula hoops, Castro, Edsel is a no go

U2, Syngman Rhee, payola and Kennedy
Chubby Checker, "Psycho", Belgians in the Congo

Chorus

Hemingway, Eichmann, "Stranger in a Strange Land"
Dylan, Berlin, Bay of Pigs Invasion

"Lawrence of Arabia", British Beatlemania
Ole Miss, John Glenn, Liston beats Patterson

Pope Paul, Malcolm X, British politician sex
JFK, blown away, what else do I have to say

Chorus

Birth control, Ho Chi Minh, Richard Nixon, back again
Moonshot, Woodstock, Watergate, punk rock
Begin, Reagan, Palestine, terror on the airline
Ayatollolah's in Iran, Russians in Afghanistan

"Wheel of Fortune" , Sally Ride, heavy metal, suicide
Foreign debts, homeless vets, AIDS, Crack, Bernie Goetz
Hypodermics on the shore, China's under martial law
Rock and Roller Cola Wars, I can't take it anymore

Chorus

We didn't start the fire
But when we are gone
Will it still burn on, and on, and on, and on..."

Billy Joel


[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E8lrRvuwczk]YouTube - We Didn't Start the Fire[/ame]

 

[The Illusion]

Malady
By Jamie

The rhythm of life surrounds me. The steady pulse from the Mother echoes through the womb of the Earth. She bears witness to the deformities of the Circle, broken. She adjusts herself in an attempt to regain the balance once maintained by mankind.

I view the world around me through the eyes of ignorance in her purist form...releasing herself through me...a radiance that beats through my very existence. Beating. pulsating. Neverending. She comfots me withher beautiful scenery...but WHY???? Comfort is for the imperfect souls- the weak - the vulnerable! How dare I think I should need comfort! Raised with a stiff upper lip and skin of leather I was! To accept comfort, is to sheath the only pride remaining in me. I do not deserve comfort.

Society is relentless - never ceasing to assault my person...backing me up into recluse. I am but a composer of my own sorrow - a tragedian - my very own author and I have now completed my nightmare. Society cannot punish me, I simply will not allow it. Miserable I make my every day - creating for myself and intense reality...that I do not want.

Escape! I need to escape! Melting from the mind outward...the dreams..the thoughts...the conscious - all bleeding from the sockets of my eyes and flowing thus from my vision - clouding my view of reality. Day after day, misery is my companion, a self created asylum inside my mind...thirteen long years of malignant torture...

It had me. It fooled me. It blinded me. No mercy - my own mind - my own predator - my very own shadow. All my fears and anger-guilt...shame...everything was deranged and malicious...deadly mad and breathing in nothing less than heinous thoughts. Chaos drifts pasts and cloaks itself around me. Darkness consumes the fathoms of my heart...tearing myself apart from the inside out. The dwelling place of a little blue-eyed girl...destroyed and then burned...chased away by the heathen woman residing in this flesh. The little girl murdered and left to rot in the heat of the present evil...and her soul left scarred on that ether of time, replaying it's lonliness over and over like a broken record...

Death of innocence is never easy, nor it is ever forgotten. Guilt plays in the mind..boiling over time..and then suicide. Suicide of the mind. Death to the soul. It becomes me...and i...become it. I welcome death. I caress it. I contain it. It fights for its freedom but I've become too strong. It relaxes and lays at my feet...obediently: Death.

Within the Bardo I can see many selves - crystal clear vision. My heart pure as the most flawless diamond...my mind overflowing with the mother's sweet wisdom. Memories of the before-self...a genuine sycophant. I've been now inoculated with her seed bearing the inscription of my path and an insatiable thirst for knowledge prevents me from remaining listless...to think that at one point I was that temerarious...a prig - plucked out of the weeds...ah god - the noxious weed garden of mundane, torment infested by the many irreparable maladies...collections of misery..now lost forever...in time...

 

[Bootneck]

I'm sitting here thinking of my best friend Rob. Today would have been his birthday. So, dear Rob, I lift my glass and wish you happy birthday...wherever you are. I'll never forget you brother.

Wherever we must go
Whatever we must do
My brother’s in arms I promise
I’ll always stand beside you
I’ll face the dangers you face
Keep you safe from harm
I’ll guard you as you rest your heads
When all about seems calm
When the enemy is closing in
I’ll help keep them at arms length
Then we’ll send those bastards packing
Together with our strength

Should one of our brothers fall
I will share his pain like you
For the honour we’ll hold for our brothers
Helps each one of us through
We’re all in this together
Brother’s in arms far from home
And knowing we all stand together
Not one of us is ever alone

My Brother’s I salute you
For you are all my friends
I’m proud to stand beside you all
United ‘til the end

Michaela Turner


To Rob and all my fallen brothers from 3 Commando Brigade
Cheers and bless you all.

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IG82urgLZXU&NR=1]YouTube - Royal Marine's Commando R I P[/ame]​

 

[The Illusion]

Thats nice, boot. Very very nice... almost made me cry...

Jamie

 

[Bootneck]

Thats nice, boot. Very very nice... almost made me cry...

Jamie

Thank you Jamie. My tears run freely for those of my brothers I'll see no more.

 

[PixieStix]

I'm sitting here thinking of my best friend Rob. Today would have been his birthday. So, dear Rob, I lift my glass and wish you happy birthday...wherever you are. I'll never forget you brother.

Wherever we must go
Whatever we must do
My brother’s in arms I promise
I’ll always stand beside you
I’ll face the dangers you face
Keep you safe from harm
I’ll guard you as you rest your heads
When all about seems calm
When the enemy is closing in
I’ll help keep them at arms length
Then we’ll send those bastards packing
Together with our strength

Should one of our brothers fall
I will share his pain like you
For the honour we’ll hold for our brothers
Helps each one of us through
We’re all in this together
Brother’s in arms far from home
And knowing we all stand together
Not one of us is ever alone

My Brother’s I salute you
For you are all my friends
I’m proud to stand beside you all
United ‘til the end

Michaela Turner


To Rob and all my fallen brothers from 3 Commando Brigade
Cheers and bless you all.

YouTube - Royal Marine's Commando R I P​

That is beautiful Bootneck It made me cry

~Rest in Peace Warrior Brothers! You mission is complete. Your Brothers will carry on~ A Friend

 

[midcan5]

'Still I Remain'

"Who is this man, that can pull a trigger,
and end a life without so much as
the quickening of his heartbeat?
What do his hands grasp now I wonder?
Cold metal, a Commando dagger,
whilst the memory of his soft touch,
still aches on the surface of my skin.

I may not know who he is, but my heart does.
It shouts his name with every beat,
and grieves every second that we’re parted.
It knows every inch of his skin,
and can see the edges of his soul.
Each beat a metronome counting,
the moments until he’s safe in my arms.

I didn’t know that fear like this was possible.
But it has become my everyday companion.
I’m waiting for him alone in the darkness,
like a princess locked in a tower,
whilst I spin my fear into hope and,
my love and prayers into a suit of armour,
to keep him safe. Still I remain."

"Lucy"

February 2009
War poetry 2009

 

[midcan5]

'A Love Song'

"What have I to say to you
When we shall meet?
Yet—
I lie here thinking of you.

The stain of love
Is upon the world.
Yellow, yellow, yellow,
It eats into the leaves,
Smears with saffron
The horned branches that lean
Heavily
Against a smooth purple sky.

There is no light—
Only a honey-thick stain
That drips from leaf to leaf
And limb to limb
Spoiling the colours
Of the whole world.

I am alone.
The weight of love
Has buoyed me up
Till my head
Knocks against the sky.

See me!
My hair is dripping with nectar—
Starlings carry it
On their black wings.
See, at last
My arms and my hands
Are lying idle.

How can I tell
If I shall ever love you again
As I do now?"

William Carlos Williams

 

[The Illusion]

Those are quite good, Mid. I enjoy reading your work.

Jamie

 

[Sky Dancer]

Speaking: The Hero


I did not want to go.
They inducted me.
I did not want to die.
They called me yellow.

I tried to run away.
They courtmartialed me.

I did not shoot.
They said I had no guts.

I cried in pain.
They carried me to safety.

In safety I died.
They blew taps over me.

They crossed out my name
And buried me under a cross.

They made a speech in my home town.
I was unable to call them liars.

They said I gave my life.
I had struggled to keep it.

They said I set an example
I had tried to run.

They said they were proud of me.
I had been ashamed of them.

They said my mother should be proud.
My mother cried.

I wanted to live.
They called me a coward.

I died a coward.
They called me a hero.

by Felix Pollak

 

[Sky Dancer]

The End and the Beginning

by Wislawa Szmborska


After every war
someone has to clean up.
Things won't
straighten themselves up, after all.
Someone has to push the rubble
to the sides of the road,
so the corpse-laden wagons can pass.

Someone has to get mired
in scum and ashes,
sofa-springs,
splintered glass,
and bloody rags.

Someone must drag in a girder
to prop up a wall.
Someone must glaze a window,
rehang a door.

Photogenic it's not,
and takes years.
All the cameras have left
for another war.

Again we'll need bridges
and new railway stations.

Sleeves will go ragged
from rolling them up.
Someone, broom in hand,
still recalls how it was.
Someone listens
and nods with unsevered head.
Yet others milling about
already find it dull.

From behind the bush
sometimes someone still unearths
rust-eaten arguments
and carries them to the garbage pile.

Those who knew
what was going on here
must give way to
those who know little.
And less than little.
And finally as little as nothing.

In the grass which has overgrown
causes and effects,
someone must be stretched out,
blade of grass in his mouth,
gazing at the clouds.

Wislawa Szmborska was a Polish poet. She was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1996. She died in 2002, at the age of 101.

 

[BasicGreatGuy]

What Gift is Fitting for Thee?

What gift is fitting for thee, if not my heart?
Shall mere thoughts of inaction be the light
that illuminates the depths of my heart, of which
I ask of thee to walk in?

What gift is fitting for thee, if not my friendship?
Shall I make a kindred fire that reflects the
whimsical dances of your face, if friendship is
not the spark that has created the fire upon which
we find comfort?

What gift is fitting for thee, if not compassion?
Shall the footsteps of ego and cynicism bring my
heart closer to yours, if compassion is nothing more
than the vain echoes of derision? How will I be able to
walk with you, if I cannot see the person of you in the
mirror of compassion?

What gift is fitting for thee, if not understanding?
Shall I call to thee from my hidden room, and require
thee to understand that which I deny myself?
Shall I covet the past in its dimmed memories,
while seeking to find the light in the woman of you?

What gift is fitting for thee, if not love?

copyright 2008 BGG

 

[Sky Dancer]

The Peace of Wild Things

When despair grows in me
and I wake in the middle of the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children's lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting for their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Wendell Berry

 

[dilloduck]

I got a lot of compliments on a shirt I bought

I hate when people notice what I wear

It was white with green and black stripes

I took it back


dillo duck

 

[Phoenix]

I got a lot of compliments on a shirt I bought

I hate when people notice what I wear

It was white with green and black stripes

I took it back


dillo duck

Deep, ducky. Really deep.

 

[dilloduck]

I got a lot of compliments on a shirt I bought

I hate when people notice what I wear

It was white with green and black stripes

I took it back


dillo duck

Deep, ducky. Really deep.

thanks--some of my latest stuff--neo-duckish

 

[Phoenix]

thanks--some of my latest stuff--neo-duckish

Way better than anything I've got.