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Pianists call me a composer, composers call me a pianist. The classicists think me a futurist, and the futurists call me a reactionary.
quote by Anton Rubinstein

Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Mirage
A futurist virginity in black rose
was seeking posthumous award
for immoral kisses of thorns.
Unaware of lethal thighs
skipping the lunar landscape
at night.
Were you going to leap over
the mountains curling across the glaciers
of white pain?
I will extend the shadow
of infinite truth,
when we talk about the half-death
of unborn hunger.
poem by Satish Verma

Submitted by Poetry Lover
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On the Conduct of the World Seeking Beauty Against Government
Is that the only way we can become like Indians, like Rhinoceri,
like Quartz Crystals, like organic farmers, like what we imagine
Adam & Eve to’ve been, caressing each other with trembling limbs
before the Snake of Revolutionary Sex wrapped itself round
The Tree of Knowledge? What would Roque Dalton joke about lately
teeth chattering like a machine gun as he dabated mass tactics
with his Companeros? Necessary to kill the Yanquis with big bomb
Yes but don’t do it by yourself, better consult your mother
to get the Correct Line of Thought, if not consult Rimbaud once he got his leg cut off
or Lenin after his second stroke sending a message thru Mrs Krupskaya
to the rude Georgian, & just before his deathly fit when the Cheka aides
outside
his door looked in coldly assuring him his affairs were in good hands no need to move - What sickness at the
pit of his stomach moved up to
his brain?
What thought Khlebnikov on the hungry train exposing his stomach to the
sun?
Or Mayakovsky before the bullet hit his brain, what sharp propaganda for
action
on the Bureaucratic Battlefield in the Ministry of Collective Agriculture in
Ukraine?
What Slogan for Futurist architects or epic hymn for masses of Communist
Party Card holders in Futurity
on the conduct of the world seeking beauty against Government?
poem by Allen Ginsberg

Submitted by Poetry Lover
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0285 A Pretty Kettle of Wish
Meltdown. A new kettle urgently
required for the gas stove. Men
love an excuse to wander around
the Aladdin’s cave of an ironmongers
the older the better.
Shock-horror. Rattly, thin as
they can get away with, and outrageously,
the same price as technology’s
masterpieces of electric jug…
long gone, the solid kettle which sits
so friendly on the hob of open fire…
So it’s off to the Oxfam thriftshop.
a short prayer to the goddess
of the hearth (Hestia, in case
you wonder, poetically) – and lo
and behold, abracadabra, hey presto –
a Designer Kettle in all its glory –
solid, shining, copper-flashed-bottom,
two-note whistle in two-tone brass,
chromium-bright finish, ingenious
spout-opener, handle in clever cool plastic, the whole
a vision, part Futurist image fit for a painting,
part evoking a Mussolini-era steel helmet, and
a theft at the price.
The two-tone whistle packed up the first week
despite prodding and poking its gleaming brass;
the spout-lifter burned the fingers – I had
to grow a long thumbnail to survive;
the gleaming surface scratched when cleaned;
the copper bottom crumbled off;
the short spout made filling a teapot
dangerous on two counts: the steam, and
the aim, endangering the hands.
Was it designed by a woman
or a man? You’ve guessed it. Who’s
the more practical?
The debatable poetic conclusion
of this poet: men go for
form; women go for content.
poem by Michael Shepherd

Submitted by Poetry Lover
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The Philistine And The Bohemian
She was a Philistine spick and span,
He was a bold Bohemian.
She had the mode, and the last at that;
He had a cape and a brigand hat.
She was so riant and chic and trim;
He was so shaggy, unkempt and grim.
On the rue de la Paix she was wont to shine;
The rue de la Gaîté was more his line.
She doted on Barclay and Dell and Caine;
He quoted Mallarmé and Paul Verlaine.
She was a triumph at Tango teas;
At Vorticist's suppers he sought to please.
She thought that Franz Lehar was utterly great;
Of Strauss and Stravinsky he'd piously prate.
She loved elegance, he loved art;
They were as wide as the poles apart:
Yet -- Cupid and Caprice are hand and glove --
They met at a dinner, they fell in love.
Home he went to his garret bare,
Thrilling with rapture, hope, despair.
Swift he gazed in his looking-glass,
Made a grimace and murmured: "Ass!"
Seized his scissors and fiercely sheared,
Severed his buccaneering beard;
Grabbed his hair, and clip! clip! clip!
Off came a bunch with every snip.
Ran to a tailor's in startled state,
Suits a dozen commanded straight;
Coats and overcoats, pants in pairs,
Everything that a dandy wears;
Socks and collars, and shoes and ties,
Everything that a dandy buys.
Chums looked at him with wondering stare,
Fancied they'd seen him before somewhere;
A Brummell, a D'Orsay, a beau so fine,
A shining, immaculate Philistine.
Home she went in a raptured daze,
Looked in a mirror with startled gaze,
Didn't seem to be pleased at all;
Savagely muttered: "Insipid Doll!"
Clutched her hair and a pair of shears,
Cropped and bobbed it behind the ears;
Aimed at a wan and willowy-necked
Sort of a Holman Hunt effect;
Robed in subtile and sage-green tones,
Like the dames of Rossetti and E. Burne-Jones;
Girdled her garments billowing wide,
Moved with an undulating glide;
All her frivolous friends forsook,
Cultivated a soulful look;
Gushed in a voice with a creamy throb
Over some weirdly Futurist daub --
Did all, in short, that a woman can
To be a consummate Bohemian.
A year went past with its hopes and fears,
A year that seemed like a dozen years.
They met once more. . . . Oh, at last! At last!
They rushed together, they stopped aghast.
They looked at each other with blank dismay,
They simply hadn't a word to say.
He thought with a shiver: "Can this be she?"
She thought with a shudder: "This can't be he?"
This simpering dandy, so sleek and spruce;
This languorous lily in garments loose;
They sought to brace from the awful shock:
Taking a seat, they tried to talk.
She spoke of Bergson and Pater's prose,
He prattled of dances and ragtime shows;
She purred of pictures, Matisse, Cezanne,
His tastes to the girls of Kirchner ran;
She raved of Tchaikovsky and Caesar Franck,
He owned that he was a jazz-band crank!
They made no headway. Alas! alas!
He thought her a bore, she thought him an ass.
And so they arose and hurriedly fled;
Perish Illusion, Romance, you're dead.
He loved elegance, she loved art,
Better at once to part, to part.
And what is the moral of all this rot?
Don't try to be what you know you're not.
And if you're made on a muttonish plan,
Don't seek to seem a Bohemian;
And if to the goats your feet incline,
Don't try to pass for a Philistine.
poem by Robert William Service

Submitted by Poetry Lover
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