The Poetry Only Thread

by **4911** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 10:00 am

"if you meet the buddha on the road, kill him." -Ancient Japanese koan

by **Gouda** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 11:33 am

Ave, Caesar No bitterness, our ancestors did it. They were only ignorant and hopeful; they wanted freedom but wealth too. Their children will learn to hope for a Caesar. Or rather—for we are not aquiline Romans but soft mixed colonies— Some kindly Sicilian tyrant who’ll keep Poverty and Carthage odd until the Romans arrive. We are easy to manage, a gregarious people, Full of sentiment, clever at mechanics, and we love our luxuries. --Robinson Jeffers

by **orz** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 12:06 pm

<blockquote>Quote:<hr>"THE LAST WORDS OF HASSAN SABBAH" Oiga amigos! Oiga amigos! Paco! Enrique! Last words of Hassan Sabbah, The Old Man of the Mountain! Listen to my last words, anywhere! Listen all you boards, governments, syndicates, nations of the world, And you, powers behind what filth deals consummated in what lavatories, To take what is not yours, To sell out your sons forever! To sell the ground from unborn feet forever? For Eve-R Listen to my last words, any world! Listen if you value the bodies for which you would sell all souls forever! I bear no sick words junk words love words forgive words from Jesus I have not come to explain or tidy up What am I doing over here with the workers, the gooks, the apes, the dogs, the errand boys, the human animals? Why don't I come over with the board, and drink Coca-Cola and make it? "Now for God's sake, don’t let that Coca-Cola thing out!" Thing is right, Mr. Whoever is responsible for that Who-Done-It! Explain how the blood, and bones, and brains of a hundred million more or less gooks went down the drain in green piss! So you on the boards could use bodies, and minds, and souls that were not yours, are not yours, and never will be yours. You want Hassan Sabbah to explain that? To tidy that up? You have the wrong name and the wrong number! Mr. Luce Getty Lee Rockefeller "Don't let them see us, don't tell them what we are doing!" Are these the words of the all powerful boards and syndicates of the Earth? "Don't let them see us, don't tell them what we are doing! Not the cancer deal with the Venusians, not the green deal! Don't let that out! Disaster, unevaluable disaster! Don't show them that, these things take time and that's my business." As usual, Mr. Luce! Short time to go. Minutes to go! Blue heavy metal people. "Don't let that out! Don't show them the blues!" Are these the words of the all powerful boards and syndicates of the Earth? "And don't whatever you do let them see us." Crab men! Tape worms! Intestinal parasites! Squeezing the air and shitting it out, and eat it again, forever! "Don't let them see us! Don't tell them what we are doing! Don't let us pay!" Are these the words of the all powerful boards, syndicates, cartels of the Earth? The great banking families of the world? French, English, American? Like Burroughs, that proud American name? Proud of what exactly? Would you all like to see exactly what Mr. Burroughs has to be proud of? The Mayan Caper, the Centipede Hype, The Short Time Racket, the Heavy Metal Gimmick? All right, Mr. Burroughs, who bears my name and my words, bear it all the way For all to see, in Times Square, in Piccadilly, Play it all, play it all, play it all back! Pay it all, pay it all, pay it all back! Listen: The word comes before English American German French, and pain and live are arsenic for all How the bones went - use never you have light All of you, all all all, green people crab people blue heavy metal people, compliments of Mr. Burroughs for the Heavy Metal Gimmick ”Don’t let them see us, don’t tell them what we are doing! Premature, premature, reconversion, reconversion blues." Shall I show them the blues? "No! No! No! Premature! Premature! Premature!" Are these the words of the all powerful boards and syndicates of the Earth? I say to all: these words are not premature, these words may be too late. Minutes to go. Minutes to go. Minutes to goo. Minutes to green goo. What I have to say is everywhere now Rub out the word Jew and you rub out the word Hitler The answer comes before the question My words are for all - for all, I repeat for all! No one is excluded! Free to all who pay, free to all who paying pay, for all to see, for all to see! In Piccadilly, in Times Square, Place de la Concorde, In all the streets and plazas of the world! Pay, pay, pay! Play it all, play it all, play it all back! Pay it all, pay it all, pay it all back! See my writing the silent - across all your skies, The silent writing of Brion Gysin - Hassan Sabbah. All out of time! All into space! Forever! Take what is not yours to skies squeezing the eye bodies forever All out of time! All into space! Forever! You cannot take words into space That is all all all, Hassan Sabbah You cannot take woman into space I repeat, you cannot take woman into space That is all all all, Hassan Sabbah See my writing silent - across all your skies, The silent writing of Brion Gysin - Hassan Sabbah. The silent writing of space, the writing of Hassan Sabbah. Look, Look, Look! "Don't let them see us! Don't tell them what we are doing!" Are these the words of the great nations, the all powerful boards and syndicates of the Earth? These are the words of liars, and cowards, and collaborators and traitors Collaborators with insect people, With any people anywhere who offer you a body forever, to shit forever. For this you have sold your sons forever, The ground under unborn feet forever! Traitors to all souls everywhere! You on the board, who want others to pay for you, With your deals to take what is not yours! And leave your human animals to be eaten alive by the crab people, to go down the drain in green shit and piss. The green deal "Don't let them see us! Don't tell them what we are doing!" You on the board, who now say: "Protect us from our our gooks, Protect us from our human animals." Are these the words of the all powerful boards and syndicates of the Earth? And you want the name of Hassan Sabbah on your filth deals To sell out the unborn? "Protect us from our gooks, our dogs, our human animals!" Are these the words of the all powerful boards, the all powerful syndicates, the all powerful governments and nations of the Earth? Liars! Liars! Liars! Cowards! Cowards! Cowards! Who cannot even face your own dogs! Traitors to all souls everywhere! Sold out to shit forever: You miserable collaborators, Now ask the protection of Hassan Sabbah? Are these the words of the all powerful boards? "Protect us from our gooks, our human animals!” No, no, no, I will not protect you, And you will never use the name of Hassan Sabbah - William Burroughs to cover your green shit deals with crab men. With the Elders of Minraud. Listen, listen, listen: I rub out all the words and reports of the board forever I rub out your thing police forever, for Eve-R I rub out the words of Marx Lenin Einstein Freud fraud forever I rub out the formulas of Einstein Oppenheimer forever I rub out their words forever I rub out the Qabalah forever I rub out the Talmud forever I rub out all the formulas and directives of the Elders of Minraud forever I rub out the word forever Listen, all all all, In you I cancel all your words forever You cannot take words with you into space That is all all all, Hassan Sabbah. - William S Burroughs (1914-1997)<hr></blockquote>

by **slimmouse** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 7:25 pm

Nostradamus - ( The world goes to Riyadh) - Don Mclean; Man, Man, your time is sand, Your ways are leaves upon the sea I am the eyes of Nostradamus All your ways are known to me.

by **Seamus OBlimey** » Sun Sep 03, 2006 8:10 pm

Swing Down among the caddis and the reeds Float great renaissance ladies wrapped in satin winding sheets And their rumour spreads like ripples through the weed Lapis eyes the water gently bathes Great artists come to paint them the estate has agents paid To keep the fishes and the waterfowl at bay And by'r Lady who's to blame Now who will fetch the water from the well Who will bind our broken ankles tell her children's tales And take the cattle to the slaughterhouse to sell Whose hand will sketch the lily and the rose Who will pay the old retainers and the tradesmen all they're owed And spread alms among the villagers below Where everybody loved her so It fell upon a holy day a crowd was coming in For the murder of his lady wife to see Lord Barnard swing Some were dressed in velvet pressed and some wore black and scarlet Some had come as he kicked and spun To celebrate and fete our Lords departure The sun came down to see the sportsmen play The nimble man to hang him the parish priest to pray And the stable lad to lead the nag away Who will climb the Oak tree by and by To swing him high above the hayfields in an arc against the sky And let ballads songs and snatches testify That everybody's satisfied But who will drive the gypsies from the door? Who will rape the farmers daughter now set hounds about the poor And kill fair ladies and their lovers by the score? Who will sew the linen for his shroud? And give comfort to his kinsmen when they grieving gather round For we'll miss his steady hand upon the plough So everybody tells us now Down among the caddis and the reeds Float great renaissance ladies wrapped in satin winding sheets And their rumour spreads like ripples through the weed But time will pass the water taking hold What once was fresh and beautiful will blacken and corrode <a href="http://www.blythpower.co.uk/news/index.htm">Joseph Porter</a>

by **biaothanatoi** » Mon Sep 11, 2006 10:01 am

Aeschylus - The Oresteia I call God Zeus, And Zeus, or the greater one, Who wears Zeus like a mask for men to imagine, Has given men this law, The truth has to be meted out of our lives by suffering, Nothing speaks the truth Nothibng tells us how things really are Nothing forces us to know What we do not want to know Except pain. And this is how the Gods declare their love, Truth comes with pain.

by **erosoplier** » Thu Sep 14, 2006 8:25 am

O Children Pass me that lovely little gun My dear, my darling one The cleaners are coming, one by one You don't even want to let them start They are knocking now upon your door They measure the room, they know the score They're mopping up the butcher's floor Of your broken little hearts O children Forgive us now for what we've done It started out as a bit of fun Here, take these before we run away The keys to the gulag O children Lift up your voice, lift up your voice Children Rejoice, rejoice Here comes Frank and poor old Jim They're gathering round with all my friends We're older now, the light is dim And you are only just beginning O children We have the answer to all your fears It's short, it's simple, it's crystal dear It's round about, it's somewhere here Lost amongst our winnings O children Lift up your voice, lift up your voice Children Rejoice, rejoice The cleaners have done their job on you They're hip to it, man, they're in the groove They've hosed you down, you're good as new They're lining up to inspect you O children Poor old Jim's white as a ghost He's found the answer that was lost We're all weeping now, weeping because There ain't nothing we can do to protect you O children Lift up your voice, lift up your voice Children Rejoice, rejoice Hey little train! We are all jumping on The train that goes to the Kingdom We're happy, Ma, we're having fun And the train ain't even left the station Hey, little train! Wait for me! I once was blind but now I see Have you left a seat for me? Is that such a stretch of the imagination? Hey little train! Wait for me! I was held in chains but now I'm free I'm hanging in there, don't you see In this process of elimination Hey little train! We are all jumping on The train that goes to the Kingdom We're happy, Ma, we're having fun It's beyond my wildest expectation Hey little train! We are all jumping on The train that goes to the Kingdom We're happy, Ma, we're having fun And the train ain't even left the station Nic Cave Edited by: <A HREF=http://p216.ezboard.com/brigorousintuition.showUserPublicProfile?gid=erosoplier>erosoplier</A> at: 9/14/06 6:26 am

by **vigilantwarrior** » Thu Sep 14, 2006 9:56 am

It was midnight, midnight at noon Everyone talked in rhyme Everyone saw the big clock ticking Nobody knew, nobody knew the time Elegant debutantes smiled Everyone fought for dimes Newspapers screamed for blood It was the best of times Every place around the world it seemed the same Can't hear the rhythm for the drums Everybody wants to look the other way When something wicked this way comes Sometimes they tie a thief to the tree Sometimes I stare Sometimes it's me Everyone told the truth All that we heard were lies A pope claimed that he'd been wrong in the past This was a big surprise Everyone fell in love A cardinal's wife was jailed The government saved a dying planet When popular icons failed Every place around the world it seemed the same Can't hear the rhythm for the drums Everybody wants to look the other way When something wicked this way comes Sometimes they tie a thief to the tree Sometimes I stare Sometimes it's me Sometimes I stare Sometimes it's me --"Jeremiah Blues", Sting

by **professorpan** » Thu Sep 14, 2006 11:05 am

Sometimes things don't go, after all, from bad to worse. Some years, muscadel faces down frost; green thrives; the crops don't fail. Sometimes a man aims high, and all goes well. A people sometimes will step back from war, elect an honest man, decide they care enough, that they can't leave some stranger poor. Some men become what they were born for. Sometimes our best intentions do not go amiss; sometimes we do as we meant to. The sun will sometimes melt a field of sorrow that seemed hard frozen; may it happen for you. -- Sheenagh Pugh

by **professorpan** » Thu Sep 14, 2006 11:16 am

Long Afternoon at the Edge of Little Sister Pond As for life I'm humbled, I'm without words sufficient to say how it has been hard as flint, and soft as a spring pond both of these and over and over, and long pale afternoons besides, and so many mysteries beautiful as eggs in a nest, still unhatched though warm and watched over by something I have never seen— a tree angel, perhaps, or a ghost of holiness. Every day I walk out into the world to be dazzled, then to be reflective. It suffices, it is all comfort— along with human love, dog love, water love, little-serpent love, sunburst love, or love for that smallest of birds flying among the scarlet flowers. There is hardly time to think about stopping, and lying down at last to the long afterlife, to the tenderness yet to come, when time will brim over the singular pond, and become forever, and we will pretend to melt away into the leaves. As for death, I can't wait to be the hummingbird, can you? --Mary Oliver

by **professorpan** » Thu Sep 14, 2006 11:23 am

Misnomer They speak of the art of war, but the arts draw their light from the soul’s well, and warfare dries up the soul and draws its power from a dark and burning wasteland. When Leonardo set his genius to devising machines of destruction he was not acting in the service of art, he was suspending the life of art over an abyss, as if one were to hold a living child out of an airplane window at thirty thousand feet. --Denise Levertov

by **professorpan** » Thu Sep 14, 2006 11:37 am

Ink runs from the corners of my mouth. There is no happiness like mine. I have been eating poetry. The librarian does not believe what she sees. Her eyes are sad and she walks with her hands in her dress. The poems are gone. The light is dim. The dogs are on the basement stairs and coming up. Their eyeballs roll, their blond legs burn like brush. The poor librarian begins to stamp her feet and weep. She does not understand. When I get on my knees and lick her hand, she screams. I am a new man. I snarl at her and bark. I romp with joy in the bookish dark. --Mark Strand

by **erosoplier** » Tue Nov 21, 2006 11:54 am

One Day

Tell me, is everything unplanned?
It's all so unexpected that I just can't understand
We run so hard and always end up in the same place
Glad that went so smoothly, well that never is the case

One day, the darkest cloud is bright
We'll shake away the shadows of eternal night
It's just the storm before the calm
Like the life held in your palm - it's clay
one day

And you stand there, with ashes blowing past
Dipping into gilt-edged love that will be made at last
And the gold you spend and the hastening end
That you throw into the sea
Coming back a hundredfold, there's no guarantee

One day, the darkest cloud is bright
We'll shake away the shadows of eternal night
It's just the storm before the calm
Like the life held in your palm - it's clay
one day

We'll walk and be like giants, we'll all be honest men
I go back to my blindness so that I may see again
A woman standing on a hill is gazing out to sea
Dreaming of a new age waiting there for me
I call her from a distance and she smiles into the sun
And men and gods begin their dance, for their time has begun
And holy wars extended, and battlefields of pain
Washed away, forgotten, in the perfect rain
Princes, kings and humble things are well-worn and content
Messengers come everywhere, envoys have been sent
Na na na na, na na na na na
A palm tree nodded at me last night he said
'Hey you look so pale.'

The Church

by **erosoplier** » Tue Nov 21, 2006 12:06 pm

Destination

Our instruments have no way of measuring this feeling
Can never cut below the floor, or penetrate the ceiling.
In the space between our houses, some bones have been discovered,
But our procession lurches on, as if we had recovered.

Draconian winter - unforetold.
One solar day, suddenly you're old.
Your little envelope just makes me cold,
Makes destination start to unfold.

Our documents are useless, or forged beyond believing.
Page forty-seven is unsigned, I need it by this evening.
In the space between our cities, a storm is slowly forming.
Something eating up our days, I feel it every morning.

Destination, destination.

It's not a religion, it's just a technique.
It's just a way of making you speak.
Distance and speed have left us too weak,
And destination looks kind of bleak.

Our elements are burned out, our beasts have been mistreated.
I tell you it's the only way we'll get this road completed.
In the space between our bodies, the air has grown small fingers.
Just one caress, you're powerless, like all those clapped-out swingers.

Destination, destination.

The Church (80's, 90's and 00's space rockers)

by **t-an** » Tue Nov 21, 2006 4:15 pm

Make Something Out of Madness

It’s a mark of the beast, the all-seeing eye.

Could you tell me where it goes,
when the walls coming together implode;
and there’s so much blackness
that just taking a step is over the cliff?

Entrainment and the comfort of compliance
group-think tribalism –better to being alone
“put them in the harness when they’re young”
tv evangelize their brains to the soma sound
of drones marching round and round, depressive
stimulant and psychedelic sedative. MKUltra
riding the airwaves
and banking on control.

Is that what we become?
A ghost in the machine? Where hell
is just a pop-up, a metal dream
a primal scream?
And heaven…
just a bowl of sugar pops?

Give us this day, our daily bread
our country on the verge of being dead.
Forgive us our trespass, it will not last,
for we are in the days of future past.

The golden arches and kids
full of herbicides pesticides, hormone
injected infanticide – of the slow
release type – where fat
is just the jello to keep it all inside,
and seasoning factories even
the best of all intentions.

“give the poor cheap burgers sir,
let the stomach soothe the mind”

Face lit face lift give the man botox
feminize the men militarize the women
vanitize the masses and dilute the messages –there-
we have the next step-
roboman and the end of aging

where death is just a figment
of a dis connected imagination.

Til justice reign –
the arrest of the innocent
shall console the guilty and there
rot will consume the body
sins raise maggots and flies
and the world become a cesspool

from a century of lies.

Yet One will come
two would be a luxury…
to tie meaning to thought,
to weave the tapestry…
all the pieces are there…

Integrity, Clarity, and Determination.

Sharpening the claws…
for what purpose? To lead a people into war,
to see their sons returned in body bags? Their
daughters widowed in grief and rage? Speciated
into madness by their own-
reptilian brains?

Wimp the Chimp on Hearing Loss:
or how
Curious George Makes no Friends.
Manhood and Guns equate
or how
Children are Muzzled into Complicity.
or how
the Static of Perverted Metaphor
equates to the Come Clear Mentality of
Empty Shelled Mediocrity.

note* Paradise was never Lost, the Inferno was
just one man’s story of Revenge.

Media power sex and war
adrenalin rush every half hour
death and destruction coincide
with disney’s “it’s a beautiful ride”.
Cognitive rape inside outside,
dissonance deals in every card

and wars are fought…
in electronic fogs.

p.s.
Sub Rosa –
I’ll send you flowers
because I love you.
But don’t ever ask me
to kill for you.
I’m tired of walking on corpses
and of smells too sweet,
to be natural.

Signed,
MI lab drop-out.

in the dog tag fields…
there’s something making red polka dots
on my jacket, there’s a flood starting
a lake forming;
real soon I’m going to need a submarine,
just to keep from drowning.

is it just me? wondering why
you wanted to shoot me?
maybe there’s some kinda wall
like gelatin between you and me?
everytime we almost touch
it rolls over, jiggles, then sets again.

the politician says we should talk more,
but then he’s the one whose son
was jack the ripper; and
Rest In Pieces is the motto
embroidered on his sleeve.

maybe it’ll get warm enough that the walls
will start melting, maybe the puddles won’t
suck our feet too hard to the ground,
and then maybe, just maybe,
we can get around

to talking…

about a better world.

-Political Slogans-
"Compassion In Action"
When do words become
mere metaphors of reality?
Not the thing but the coloring
used to put what doesn't fit
where it doesn't belong? ...as in
the city of lost children
where stolen dreams haunt
graying fields....and the hollow men
tally their losses to their spin doctors
and plead their cases with fire and explosives,

as children gather roses and cry
at the thorns in the barbwire fences.

t-an

The Poetry Only Thread

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Man, Man, your time is sand.

Re: Man, Man, your time is sand.

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from Soul Cages

Sometimes

Long Afternoon at the Edge of Little Sister Pond

Misnomer

Eating Poetry

Inspired by the Images thread

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