Social Illiterates
Why are the people angry?
'Comments made to them,
Were upsetting when expressed.'
But...
Were they true?
And from who?
'All of it was true.
And everyone listening knew it too.
Those who stayed after the booing died down.
And paid attention with a listening done.'
Then...
What is the problem?
'The speaker who spoke,
Came dressed to impress.
And no one expected,
Their delusions to become affected...
By such an effectiveness as to them addressed.'
So what did the speaker say?
'He kept calling them social illiterates.
And many of them began to leave,
Saying...
No one is going to tell them,
They are 'dumb' and do not know how to read.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Related quotes
One Little Comment
One little comment can really change your life;
It can make you feel good or cut you like a knife.
As a result, you may now want to try something new,
Or with an aspect of life, you may now be through.
You mull the comment over and take it to heart;
The speaker of the comment, unaware they’ve played a part.
The chances are that, of the comment, the speaker has forgotten,
But you are now left feeling really encouraged or really rotten.
Some comments are just throw-a-ways,
But they can easily make or break your day.
Some comments stick forever in your mind,
Whether they’re really hurtful or really kind.
Many years later, a comment you may still be able to quote;
It could be one which made you sink or one which made you float.
You will probably still be able to recall it word for word,
And even imitate the tone in which the comment was first heard.
As the result of a comment, you may feel better or worse,
And the speaker of the comment, you’ll either love or curse.
A comment can make you give up or give you the will to succeed;
Off one little comment, our further thoughts will often feed.
They can change the way that you see yourself,
And even have a good or bad effect on your health.
A bad comment can leave us feeling rather unsure,
Whereas a good comment, can leave us wanting more.
Just one comment, which may last only a few fleeting seconds,
May result in a whole new life, which suddenly now beckons.
You may leave your old life far behind,
Or a whole new life, you may now find.
So just take a moment and think before you speak;
Of the joy you may bring or the havoc you may wreak.
poem by Angela Wybrow
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Paper Men To Air Hopes And Fears
The first speaker said
Fear fire. Fear furnaces
Incinerators, the city dump
The faint scratch of a match.
The second speaker said
Fear water. Fear drenching rain
Drizzle, oceans, puddles, a damp
Day and the flush toilet.
The third speaker said
Fear wind. And it needn't be
A hurricane. Drafts, open
Windows, electric fans.
The fourth speaker said
Fear knives. Fear any sharp
Thing, machine, shears
Scissors, lawnmowers.
The fifth speaker said
Hope. Hope for the best
A smooth folder in a steel file.
poem by Robert Francis
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Listening
Listening.
And being there for someone loved...
To do just that!
With a mind willing,
To be receptive and clear...
Of opinions sitting,
On the tip of one's tongue.
With a giving of attention,
And staying mum.
Listening to someone.
Listening is not easily done.
For those who have experienced...
A life in which peace of mind has come.
When a listening ear,
Had not been volunteered by no one.
And some who know this...
Do their best to sit with patience.
Listening with no other reason...
But to be there as is wished.
For someone who has selected you,
Just for this.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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An Opportunity to Leave You Alone
Why didn't I tell you before?
I did.
But I was not dressed the part.
I was not the vision you expected.
And your listening ended quickly.
I've been telling you.
But the familiarity of my voice...
Had not sweetened with deception.
And you became impressed,
By those who were at their best,
Expressing a falseness.
I addressed...
To your vacant eyes!
Now you find yourself completely duped.
And I don't understand that.
Since you were the one,
Who chose that life to live.
Did you not tell me,
To 'keep the faith? '
And maintain my realities?
I have.
Thanks for the advice.
And an opportunity to leave you alone.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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As We Spoke
As I was listening, your lips they were glistening
I remember that day that we spoke
I smiled and I agreed, your words I did heed
As I took them seriously, and never as a joke,
All your words I did hear, about your life and career
I was anxious and excited from every word you said
So I waited for your words, as though listening to songbirds
As you spoke, I listened to your feelings instead.
I began to converse, sometimes in text or in verse
What was going through my thoughts and my brain
You just nodded your head, from the stories that I read
As though I was alone and I talked from pain,
With me you were bored, so my stories you ignored
I felt so sad that I almost began weeping
You just didn't care, if I was here or over there
But then when I looked at you, you now were sleeping.
Randy L. McClave
poem by Randy McClave
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Then as the years went on and my listening became more deliberate, I would climb up on an arm of our big sofa to get my ear closer to the wireless speaker.
quote by Seamus Heaney
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Black Bruises II
I can ponder upon the blackness,
the garrulous of silence
placated by benign solitude
I can endure the ostracizing
listening to lulling lullabies,
listening to trembling metals,
listening to enraptured echoes,
listening to a soundless shattering,
listening to nothingness,
listening to guffawing crows,
listening to diffident clocks,
listening to the waning time;
but am I the only one listening
to these black bruised whispers?
poem by Norman Santos
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Untitled 14
sometimes i find comfort in my silence
i am listening and
then i pretend i am listening and then
i continue pretending until then that the talker
sees that i am already showing that i am no longer listening
that i am no longer interested in whatever is said
that words sometimes have no use to ease the pain that we have
that we have inherited from the leaves of our family tree
from all of them down to the last and true source of our sorrow
when Adam gave the apple because he says Eve asked him to do it
because Eve was ordered by the Snake because they were all innocent
and dumb.
sometimes i look at a space
where there are no more trees, no sky, no sun
sometimes nothingness becomes the real thing: everything.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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So Much Can Be Accomplished
Substance with content,
To affect with effectiveness...
Is the foundation of meaning.
With a purpose to communicate comprehension.
That's all an open dialogue should be.
And if a listening is done with a priority,
So much can be accomplished...
With an exchange of appreciated awareness!
However...
A stubbornness may have content,
But the affect of it loses its effectiveness,
When a kept patience...
Can no longer be expected to remain justified.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Living Under Such Duress
You had been the one to chose,
To ignore the wounds and sores...
Upon others done.
Hunger and homelessness,
Were those things not addressed.
Since you were then not affected.
In fact,
You had expressed...
A disdained for those suppressed.
And living under such duress.
That you are now stressed,
By similar distresses.
Why are your needs more of a priority?
When it has been your selfishness,
And way of life kept...
That has created today's disasterous effects!
And I,
Still affected...
By your decades of unwarranted disrespect,
Am accused of not expressing...
To you an empathy you feel I should direct?
Your delusions have created this mess!
Not mine!
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Pay Attention! Part 2 (listen with your eyes)
Pay Attention Part 2 (listen with your eyes)
Pay attention!
Truly watch the one you’re with and you’ll see what most miss
Let them do the speaking, and watch closely while listening
Don’t think what your reply shall be, as most people are want to do
nor interrupt or comment while they speak.
Instead, listen superficially and observe hypercritically.
As much of communication involves facial contortions
and body gyrations, as does the actual uttering of words and sound
Follow the subject matter with sufficient attention, enough
To satisfy your speakers desire to speak, then endeavour to
Observe the amazing physicality involved
In this most multi-faceted, supremely descriptive,
intricate act of tacit communication
Watch, and hear with your eyes!
Observe the unceasing gymnastics of your speaker’s dancing eyebrows
Note the many times that only one brow arches high
When expressing derision, disdain, or contempt
Note the ‘window-shade-flying-up’ effect
When your speaker expresses surprised amazement
As much optically, as orally, in their discourse
Listen to their expressions!
Watch the subtle interplay of eyelids as they slowly lower
To narrow the openings, so as to express deep suspicions
Or intense examination in their subject, and more yet,
To flutter like bird’s wings, in excited exasperation
Listen lightly and observe heavily!
Tis almost a sure occasion that in your daily discourses
You but allow to pass unnoticed this rich melange of mute communication
This most primal means of information transport
That is passed in passed in utter silence
Yet loudly, says so much
Please pay attention!
Or you will surely, unknowingly miss
Much of this very outspoken, richly textured
Delightfully expressed communication, audible, not to one’s ear
But only through one’s eyes, and then only to those privileged few
Who know to see, when one speaks
If my overblown orations and ruminations arouse a bit of interest, please let me know and I’ll continue
With a Part III
poem by David Whalen
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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What Re-action From Me Do You Expect?
Observing...
With a giving to someone,
Undivided attention.
To listen as they reflect retrospectively,
A doing done to achieve their success.
This 'should' be an event to experience their happiness.
And not an opportunity for them to solicit empathy...
To pour from their hearts,
Highlighted aspects of their regrets.
As a forgiveness is mentioned for them to accept,
During a process of it being expressed.
But many find and discover,
Happiness is not one's ability to acquire possessions.
Or listening to someone confess this.
Since it is boring enough to watch them try,
To cry fake tears.
'You don't know how I wish,
Things between us had been different.'
~For what reason?
To experience the reality of feeling something real?
Or to relive your comments,
That I am not addressing my potential to impress.
Which thoughtless direction would you like to reminisce?
And what re-action from me do you expect? ~
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Mr Speaker Gets The Word
Wriggles from his captors arms
Mr speaker gets the word and
Running now from the alarms
Speaks his mind free as a bird
Free now to roam around
Stand up straight when he quotes
Spread the word that he has found
Books of verse and scribbled notes
Mister speaker gets the word
(to tell the secrets he has heard)
Speaks so fast his words are slurred
(mister speaker gets the word)
Stands up straight outside my door
I bring you now the words Ive learned
To whom it may concern senor
Tell my friends I have returned
Mister speaker gets the word
(to tell the secrets he has heard)
Speaks so fast his words are slurred
(mister speaker gets the word)
Excitement rages through his brain
Stirred and stirred throughout the years
Not enough time to explain
Eyes of many sighs of fear
Making space from colney hatch lane
Just some poetry my friend
Scuttles past my window frame
Vanishes right round the bend
Mister speaker gets the word
(to tell the secrets he has heard)
Speaks so fast his words are slurred
(mister speaker gets the word)
song performed by by Madness
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Mr Speaker
Wriggles from his captors arms
Mr speaker gets the word and
Running now from the alarms
Speaks his mind free as a bird
Free now to roam around
Stand up straight when he quotes
Spread the word that he has found
Books of verse and scribbled notes
Mister speaker gets the word
(to tell the secrets he has heard)
Speaks so fast his words are slurred
(mister speaker gets the word)
Stands up straight outside my door
I bring you now the words Ive learned
To whom it may concern senor
Tell my friends I have returned
Mister speaker gets the word
(to tell the secrets he has heard)
Speaks so fast his words are slurred
(mister speaker gets the word)
Excitement rages through his brain
Stirred and stirred throughout the years
Not enough time to explain
Eyes of many sighs of fear
Making space from colney hatch lane
Just some poetry my friend
Scuttles past my window frame
Vanishes right round the bend
Mister speaker gets the word
(to tell the secrets he has heard)
Speaks so fast his words are slurred
(mister speaker gets the word)
song performed by by Madness
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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As If Made to Compliment
Embedded within those self centered mindsets...
Are preconceived judgements.
And indoctrinated at birth...
Are our obsessions with possessions.
Valued more than deeds...
Done by anyone at a greater worth.
Embedded within,
Them...
Those with turned up noses.
Are visuals that impress.
Before indepth attention is addressed.
And this is expressed...
To avoid any references directed to insecurities.
Surfaced by others...
As if made to compliment.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Sugar Plummed By Fairyisms
Hmmm...
Do I care that my comments may be offensive,
To those who may be of slow apprehension?
I've been called crude and rude and heartless,
By some.
Brilliant by others.
And stupid and dumb...
By those who qualify themselves,
As loved ones.
But...
Do I 'care' that my comments may be offensive?
That depends if I am in a forgiving mood to forget.
Since the recalling of my 'anguish' goes totally misunderstood,
By those whose lives have been fantasized...
And 'sugar plummed' by fairyisms.
I grew up in a tenement project.
A place we called the 'brickyard'.
But officially named Bellevue Square.
An experiment of sorts,
For those poor and Black!
Living in Hartford, Connecticut.
But I do the best I can,
To provide an accurate assessment of my outlook.
From my experiences and point of view.
Even though it is difficult to sweeten,
Those lingering memories.
Hmmm...
Do I care that my comments may be offensive?
Oh yes.
Especially when I become victimized,
Listening to them repeated...
And,
Coming from the mouths of those who believe I stay angry.
And I'm only angry on Tuesdays between 2: 30pm and five.
And on most Thursdays anytime before noon.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Railroads And Riverboats
The railroads, and the riverboats, that bred the mighty man
That we read about, and we dream about
The men who built this land
And the farmers and the lumbermen and the men who worked the mills
And the poor hard working miners
Who died inside the hills
While the rivers that flow
Are the blood of our land
And the trucks they keep rumbling
On the great concrete band
And the railroads keep pushing
To be all they once were
And nature is calling
No one's listening to her
And the immigrants, by the boat load, in a dozen different tones
Sang of freedom, in the new land
Climbed the ladder rung by rung
Some to Boston, some to Pittsburg, Philidelphia and St. Paul
And the old ways, led to new days
They were welcome one and all.
While the rivers that flow
Are the blood of our land
And the trucks they keep rumbling
On the great concrete band
And the railroads keep pushing
To be all they once were
And nature is calling
No one's listening to her
With the railroads, and the riverboats, and the bread lines far behind
And the days we sang together
Long gone but still in mind
And the men who, came before us, men who brought us to today
And the story, still unravels, from the dreams of yesterday
While the rivers that flow
Are the blood of our land
And the trucks they keep rumbling
On the great concrete band
And the railroads keep pushing
To be all they once were
And nature is calling
No one's listening to her
And nature is calling,
No one's listening to her
song performed by by Jim Croce
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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My Eyes Are Fixed Only Upon The Dealer
I've made comments.
And sometimes read more,
Of your work.
I may or may not give what I read a rate.
I appreciate the giving done.
Because I know what that takes.
But to suggest that I must read,
Your submissions with a rating I don't feel.
Doesn't do the craft any justice at all.
Going through the motions,
To appeal an ego seeking to be massaged.
With a zap to zing a zest,
That produces an invitation to squeal with zeal.
Ugh!
I never was one to seek that kind of praise.
Since my connection began with pure love.
You know?
I'm one of those who do it for the art types!
I've made comments.
And sometimes read more,
Of your work.
I may or may not give what I read a rate.
I appreciate the giving done.
Because I know what that takes.
But I'm not going to foresake what I do for you.
Nothing like that appears in the deck of cards...
God has dealt to me.
And until I leave...
My eyes are fixed only upon The Dealer.
That's it!
This is His game.
Not mine.
poem by Lawrence S. Pertillar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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Oh How That German Could Love!
[1st verse:]
Once I got stuck on a sweet little German
And oh what a German was she
The best that was walking, well what's the use talking
Was just made to order for me
So lovely, and witty, more yet she was pretty
You don't know until you have tried
She had such a figure, it couldn't be bigger
And there was some more yet beside
[chorus:]
Oh how that German could love
With a feeling that came from the heart
She called me her honey, her angel, her money
She pushed ev'ry word out so smart
She spoke like a speaker, and oh what a speech
Like no other speaker could speak
Ach my what a German when she kissed her Herman
It stayed on my cheek for a week
[2nd verse:]
This girl could squeeze, and it never would hurt
For that lady knew just how to squeeze
Her loving was killing, more yet she was willing
You never would have to say please
I just couldn't stop her, for dinner and supper
Some kisses and hugs was the food
When she wasn't nice it was more better twice
When she's bad she was better than good
[2nd chorus]
Oh how that German could love
With a sweetness that's sweeter than sweet
Just say what you please, you would hug and you'd squeeze
Just the shoes that she wore on her feet
Her smile was like money that somebody owed you
That somebody wanted to give
When you felt like dying and she started sighing
Ach my it was worthwhile to live
[3rd verse:]
Sometimes we'd love for a week at a time
And it only would seem like a day
How well I remember, one night in December
I felt like the middle of May
I'll bet all I'm worth that when she came on earth
All the angels went out on parade
No other one turned up, I think that they burned up
The pattern from which she was made
[3rd chorus:]
Oh how that German could love
With a love like you see in a play
When she said, "My dear," it would ring in my ear
For a year, and a week and a day
Her no was like yes, and her yes was like no
It was something like yes, it was, well
When we got together ach donner und vetter
'Twas love with a capital "L
song performed by by Irving Berlin
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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The Listening Week
This is the listening week of the year
Listening-in.
A-cock and alert is the national ear
Listening-in.
All over the land in the country towns,
From the back of the Leeuwin to Darling Downs,
Layers of 'quids' or the odd half-crowns,
They are listening-in.
On the far-flung farms they are round each set,
Listening-in.
The work and the worry they all forget,
Listening-in.
Wherever an aerial soars in space
To the Cup, or the Oaks or the Steeplechase,
To the roar of the ring and the lure of the race
They are listening-in.
In the far outback there are sun-tanned men,
Listening-in.
Where the woolshed stands by the drafting pen
Listening-in.
Old Dad's come in from the Ninety Mile;
He scored on the Cup and he wears a smile,
And he 'reckons this game is well worth while'
So he's listening in.
To the edge of the desert the sound-waves go;
And, listening-in,
Ned of the Overland, Saltbush Joe
Listening-in
Recall the giants of years long past,
And the loneliness of these spaces vast;
But they reckon that life's worth living at last
With this listening-in.
poem by Clarence Michael James Stanislaus Dennis
Submitted by Poetry Lover
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