Surrealistic Sutures For The Acetylene Virgin
'I think that poetry should stay
awake all night drinking in dark cellars.' - Thomas Merton
Look to the body for metaphor -
Look to blood, use this word
in relation to dreams or flowers
while silver runs in veins which
are usually streets or vines.
Breasts, male and female,
are stars, have to do with
a handful or feet to span them.
Abdomen, then, is a great
Milky Way gathering,
holding, expelling comets,
caroling colons' humming.
Spleens are bones
to pick teeth with, teeth
which are, of course,
sea horses or gravestones
bearing images of the Flagrant
Heart to tame this spot
of gypsum and flint, to charm
where Violin's cut throat sings
itself awake, one black breast
out of its fold slapping metal seas
against dropping metal shores in
Sidelight's shadow across this
hand writing now, slap of waves
mute in this stillness of knees.
So lend a darkness to gardens,
ancient pattern of a breast,
cloth lightly lifting, black on black.
From Her chest reveal a slenderer throat
that nods when she swallows
and names her peace.
The delicate will not pass away just yet.
Great Seamstress of Space
sew, please,
with fingers of dew.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Related quotes
Of Ancient Mastodon, Sleepy Bee & Young Men Who Leap Too Soon From Bridges - Nightingale Confesses Into Straighter Teeth
'...descend, and of the curveship lend a myth to God.' - Hart Crane
Pueri aeterna, septem cadens
Etiam plures ad
The boys eternal, seven falling
Too many more to come
Jamey Rodemayer
Tyler Clementi
Raymond Chase
Asher Brown
Billy Lucas
Seth Walsh
Justin Aaberg
Sub olivae, pacem
Ut vos omnes adoremus orientatio
Under the olive trees, peace
May you all adore this orientation
******
"I imagine one of the reasons people cling to their
hates so stubbornly is because they sense, once
hate is gone, they will be forced to deal with pain."
- James Baldwin
'Ignacio goes up the tiers
with all his death on his shoulders.
He sought for the dawn
but the dawn was no more.
He seeks for his confident profile
and the dream bewilders him
He sought for his beautiful body
and encountered his opened blood
Do not ask me to see it! '
- Federico Garcia Lorca*
1
Even the pigeons on my stoop are silent now.
One mourning dove coos tenderly for these who
have taken their own lives publicly on our behalf,
for those many gone before them, broken hearts
enraged, no more to engage the unpersuaded
world which, one of them, one of the public ones,
in spite of murmuring wharves, in spite of amorous
dark alleys bitter in the pitch of the last hateful
American Century, Hart Crane, wrote before his leap
from the ship beside the phallic curve where Cuba
meets the lisping sea, took his tongue away which
sang of chill dawns breaking upon bridges whose
spans still freely splinter light returning hungover
from the night wharves, grottoes, and denim World
Wars, industrial embraces crushing every man and
now another one abandons his fingers and fiddling
to scattering light, takes flight from ledges to
edge close to an embrace no longer forbidden -
'And so it was I entered the broken world
to trace the visionary company of love...'
I am at the 'Way of Peace Bistro, ' where the server
Alberto whose cousins are the famous Wolf Boys in
Jalisco, Mexico, hirsute himself, gives me free double
espressos so I may hear his confession, who only just
yesterday came out to me in my confessional booth
here at the perpetually wobbly table in the far corner
at the cracked window rocking with Hart's un-confessed
bones wrapped in soothing silt which he now dreams
to be his silken pall.
Life is indeed strange above the veiled bottom.
I do receive confessions here where I weekly haunt
for studying, writing, chasing down dreams, waves,
receding horizons.
Why, I wonder, is each window where I sit cracked?
I am the itinerant priest who sits at meager feasts.
Suffering congregants, forlorn over their starfish
and soup, ask about dreams, confess to anguish, ask
what should be done. I consult espresso foam, open
the nearest book at hand willy nilly to see what advice
or wisdom might be gained from That which, we hope,
indiscriminately sustains us all here straining after
some realing thing to keep us going when Hart and
those too recent others obey some impulse to place
at last the final period, reifiying the punctuate
though unrepentant ending of this too too long run-on
sentence of hate. One hopes this period holds fast,
that Logos/meaning is somehow, plates of starfish
with fork and knife beside, true or truing at least.
One serves where needed. And when.
So come unto me you 'sad young men.
All the news is bad again so kiss your dreams goodbye.'**
Here at my confessional I can only plead mercy upon the boys
who have jumped from bridges, hung themselves, cut, sliced their
compulsive hands, exploded hearts, leaping dears eyes ablaze in
thrall of antlers, trembling flanks strong to fly decrying the
violent hunt which always ends in a death bequeathing these
chopped bits to me and to others like me who remain at table,
plates before, to stare at what is to be later scattered, sown,
these pieces in and for Love-without-name still a stain upon
confused local deities and their wild-eyed supplicants.
But there is no stain upon the promiscuous sea.
The compliant sky is not confused.
Neither is all that is between confused,
allowing birth and blessing, passing of
all kinds in all manner of motive and motion.
But in the human world, distressing, there
will be more boys, more men growing up as
from the very beginning where earliest enmity
mythically grew strong before shoes, before
hearts were capable of breaking, before turgid
theological floods spilled blood of brother
by brother turning witness stones toward silence,
echoing lamenting Federico,
'Do not ask me to see it! '
I don't want to see it!
I will not see it!
But I, but perhaps we, who remain to plant these
petaled parts of these unwitting scapegoats whose
eyes are milk now forever, we must bar sentimentality,
must move toward genuine knowing which comes from
the long hard stare beyond Milky Ways at the way
things still inexorably are. 'Nothing gets better -
or changes for the better - until it is what it is.'
But the falling ones, half-way to eternity while
here and eschewed, know what the 'is' is of the matter,
that it is the others, too many of them, who don't
or won't know, who willingly refuse to see 'what is'
in order to reach beyond the collective NOT SEE
solutions' of hetero-normative culture/religion.
Perhaps even in the deepest fault of the ocean that
very visionary company - in league with stuporous
pigeons, a mourning dove, me here who remains-not
-yet-remains, tearful over my espresso looking for
signs, finding only an endlessly fracturing rainbow,
remembering, too, the murmuring secrets of wharves
and co-mingled breath - that very visionary company
traces all the sunken ones, the jumping ones, those
with other means for departure by their own hands
empty now of demands for love.
Here I sit, arthritic living hands still
demanding, remembering full of past and
present griefs the Violin with a cut throat
in a youthful suicide once writ years ago,
hidden, hiding out, refusing to shout my
rage to Almighty 'Nothing-But':
Do not hear nothing but the cabin walls,
do not hear nothing but late summer roses
petal by petal leaping from the still too
white trellises, leaping pinkly, redly,
memory to breezes, overwhelmed by trellises
shagged with cut sleeves.***
But not me. Not yet.
I don't want to see it!
I will not see it.
On the mute page, the Violin refusing to sing
- in love with Garcia Lorca,
the goring horn of the Bull,
the destined cornada -
each and all appalling, commanding 'Write'
in long nights working where the mentally ill
wandered with me, keys ironically in my hand,
the yellowing hallways with even more ironic
EXIT signs brightly RED above the locked doors,
silent companions somnolent but for the jangling
joke of the keys.
Do not ask me to see it!
I don't want to see it!
I will not see it.
Still, I have now these better days in the Village,
broke or near to it, with eggs and beans, cheap but
edible things. An epicurean after all, I do luxuriously
head to the Polish butcher shop nearby to gather meat
but not any of the young butchers want to be gathered
- too Catholic - for Poland is 'passing strange' with
bad teeth, fingers stained with nicotine. Or is it rust
from once Curtains of Iron,
or the Blood of the Acetylene Virgin? ****
I get my meat, cook my greens and things, have good-enough feasts for garlic and the right spice make grander the demanded abstemiousness of current coin. I purloin my pleasure during eats in my dirty yet happy apron with recordings of poetry, lectures or a good aria or two to salt my food with tears, a blubbering fool beside his one low watt lamp, darkness too too comfortable like a pooch or cat at feet. What is that bleating in the darker corner? I shall wait for daylight to see what it can be. And if I can I shall free it from it's trap and in doing so perhaps free me from all this, all this witnessing as life demands I must, of young ones setting themselves free because they are forced to do so by collective psychopathology now rendered even more effective and efficient via technology, via internet, emphasis upon the 'net', where the ills set free from Pandora's Modem have only begun to be revealed.
But I shall use that 'net' and my still goodly paper and goodly pen to dim whatever ill tides there are and to come, as they surely will in spite of low wattage. I'll jangle keys on the night watches reading my mystic books, making my prayers with roamers of wards and wharves glancing up, considering bridges, edges, silty bottoms. The tides are here even now. But right now I wish to sing a lullaby in protest to those hurting departed, even to those coming ills, that I may sing innocence dumbly back to those who may come ashore again more gently having forgotten enforcing depths insisting them toward resistant yet resolved embraces...
...So breech then, waves. Feet first. Heads in the brine. I shall keep time on your wrinkled toes sticking up from the sand, play peek-a-boo. Then while you sleep I shall harvest gently, place them firmly in that old woman's shoe...'there was an old woman who lived in a shoe, had so many children she didn't know what to do'.
She may yet have learned what to by now.
I haven't. But for my one strange harvest here below...
2
Somniculosus Apis, Sleepy Bee
Ascendit infra me, He rises beneath me
Deus absconditus placet, The hidden God is pleased
He is busy even as I write this preparing a repast for many paying guests who will watch him cook sacred chilies of his Mother's garden born, who will hear him sing their praises...Krishna was over yesterday, nervous and excited about it all. Working out regularly at the gym he is now very toned, muscular in a good way, not too pumped in exaggerated lumps, and he is even more radiantly beautiful/handsome than when we first met beside the cardamom and the ghee in the intoxicating basement of the Indian spice and food shop not easily hidden, such aromas are not to be tucked down like the shop is beside and below the avenue.
Which flower should I adorn my table with? I ask, approaching shyly beside the spice bins. I buzz inside, a bee for the nectar.
If you serve, said he, If you serve with cardamom and ghee then flowers three are best, the jasmine, the oleander, the anthurium. But if choosing only one, he looks at me, something insistent, responding, in his eyes, I would choose for you the anthurium.
And so we began our time together, the cooking lessons, the first demur approaches, the blushing papayas, then the fires, the chilies harvested, curtains drawn. One day perhaps I to shall fall but in this way:
I shall fling back the curtains
Open the window
Throw cut sleeves for years
gathered, hidden, to the street.
Shouting out names of lovers,
I shall then leap openly into life
land softly upon the Autumn
ginkgo leaves and, golden,
kiss every parked car
on the street leaving
lips like leaves and all
the cut sleeves in love
with all the world and if
not all the world then
all the cars and a fiddle
dee dee for the fall of me
Yesterday I coached him on slowing down as he speaks (his accent is thickly, richly Tamil) , how to enunciate each syllable. He had several stories to choose from which he may relate to the guests, all of which he related to me, a sweet one of him as a little boy waking up at dawn, asking his dear mama for an omelet to eat:
'Sleepy Bee, ' she called to him. 'Go, my Sleepy Bee, to the garden and be sure to smell the jasmine there, touch softly the spices in trembling rows, fetch then some chilies of many colors and I will prepare for you a dish as you wish. When the teacher makes you sleepy by noon reach then your fingers to your face, smell the spices there, remember the touch of smooth skinned chilies whispering of lingering liaisons to come, and you will brighten my Sleepy Bee.'
A chili omelet she would make, a side of yogurt to soothe the burn, and milk from the cow drawn before dawn's first udder swelled against the press of distant hills where even the Temple soundly sleeps so very full and pleased with itself. Mother, each morning as he stumbles, rubbing his eyes, into the garden, tells him,
You may shout if you wish to wake
the Temple for the cow cannot speak -
Wake up! Awake! Make haste!
Lord Indra comes! Prepare the wicks,
the incense sticks for His Holy Fire!
Hasten! Hurry! Quicken!
There beside Lord Indra's captured fire in the little grate her Bee awakens watching her slow movements, the slicing of chilies, the removal of seeds, the washing again of plump hands, the cracking of eggs, beating them with the whisk, spreading ghee upon the hot flat stone, the enchantment of liquid whites and yokes becoming firm, becoming food. She turns them in round rhythms as she rhythmically prays.
After eggs and chilies are eaten comes the rose oil poured upon his raven hair smoothly brushed back to reveal his shining face, his smile. She prepares him for school with kisses, his uniform freshly cleaned, ironed, smelling, too, of rose-flavored soap. Then off to school with a lunch, a string of chilies of all colors sewn together, sewn when he was still in a waking dream.
'The chilies may burn, ' he tells me, speaking slowly, enunciating each syllable, practicing through smiles, returning to my gaze. 'But not like the touch of my mother's hand. She is far away but I can feel her burning hands on me now.' He smiles. I stammer. How can one enunciate such wonder?
Visionary company, Krishna, his mother, and me.
I have been encouraging Krishna (which is a funny thing to say, Krishna being a bold, blue God) to find a language coach to help him with his accent, to tone it down while keeping the wonderful music/lilt of it and he's going to do that...he complains of tilting his head as he talks 'as all Indians do' but I insist he merely speak and let his head and hands speak, too, in their own way. If he does more public events he will need to be understood clearly when he speaks while preparing his magnificent dishes from his country, his rich feasts of stories of the chilies from his mother's garden entwined by morning glories, the morning cock already at quarrel with the world just beyond the tin reaching in to take some spices too enticing to refuse...
I always feel as if he is, or will soon be, bored with me and my humble 'ministrations' but he sweeps into my little 'box-doir' - you recall how tiny my expensive studio on the 5th floor is! - like a Raj, a young prince beaming, brimming full of stories to tell me, usually some food, spicy hot, he has prepared for me, offered with a grin. Then he strips instantly down, lays upon the down pallet in easy, unabashed nakedness - it catches my breath, I do want to see! - checks his Blackberry for the latest cricket scores while I hurriedly 'hide' my Ganesha, the prominent statue of the god I have in front of my useless fireplace; this hiding I half understand...but still, naked, he has a fresh and beautifully made tattoo of Ganesha on his shoulder, he wears a Ganesha necklace, a Ganesha bracelet, and a Ganesha waist scapular, the image of which is just below his navel. So why, I ask only myself and Ganesha, never Krishna, why must I hide my large wooden Ganesha statue? But I do hide Him in deference to Krishna's wishes and meanwhile have intercourse with the god-in-miniature, scraping a necklace trunk with an ear, a tongue, receive a scapular kiss of the image upon my forehead as I trace those wonderful hairlines of the male body on my way to other deities.
Ah! give me all the beans in the world in all my poverty! Am I not, too, a Raj of floors and scented pillows, this beaming god beneath me thrusting utterly to reveal his secrets, his desires, his pleasures to me who am not a god?
Life, dear Valdosta, over all, is good, yes? I wish it no ill. But, agreeing with the cock, I will quarrel, even fight, with life when young men still leap too soon from bridges because I have learned (and relearn it hard lesson by hard lesson at a time) visionary company insists its tracings in many forms, man to man being but one holy expression, those sons, burning mother's hands upon them demanding, insisting to life that each her sons is a rajah, a Sleepy Bee.
So please the intemperate humanity, in the face of patient deities the burning ones are leaping still and I am ill with grief, with prayer, their dead bodies gone, their now emptier hands.
And he leaves me.
I return to my poems.
The room is filled with Krishna, aromas of rose oil in his hair, pungent spices in his sweat and upon his hands and skin, and sex.
I retrieve Lord Ganesha out from his little sanctuary of hiding (it seems I am always retrieving deities) and we both laugh richly. I remember to sprinkle some cologne upon Him, to pour out some milk into His votive bowl, to rub His belly, to light another candle (the other extinguished, panting, while we were busy bees exchanging knees and sighs, diffusing male spices into bracing air, fingers upon oily chilies thickening in always morning hunger) .
I light more incense and thank the Lord Ganesha in all his forms, appearing both large and small, His adornment of Secrets, though one cannot easily hide an Elephant, man-love and more in such a small infinite universe whose toes I seek to tickle then gather for a shoe as tides shrink and swell, grow and diminish depending upon the worshipers, those who will do so in spite of those who would kill delicate or manly infidels whose worship, forever babies breath, is all the more meaningful.
Be damned the trellises. The petals shall reach, shall extend outward.
The violin's throat cut.
'Do not ask me to see it! '
Then, Ganesha restored to His rightful place; good-natured about being hidden, it is back to the kitchen, the slicing of the onion, the crushing of the garlic, the pouring of the wine, the selecting of the greens and washing them of the clinging sand and grit they kindly bring, then to the pot to cook them in, the meat to go with, and begins the fire, O Indra, more aromas extend into, entwine with what Krishna has left to me and the god and I am grateful, full of heart, for each time he is here is a miracle. A grace. Mother India with hot hands gifts me one of Her Raj's who graces me with his presence evoking praise bestowed from oft bitter lips and tongue made the more bilious by aging, aching joints, laxer muscles, and yet the encroaching decrepitude is bent and stretched, the better for the wear from Krishna's 'half nelsons' and yogic overreaches. More the better for me.
Yet I remain bitter, too, from the senseless loss of young men who could not endure, no fault of their own, for sure, who leap from bridges, forced to by killing edges broken open within and by hateful, fearful others forgetting, if ever had, those restorative burning constancies of a Mother's hands upon them
I have placed your picture, dear Valdosta, upon my altar beside Lorca's portrait, and Hart Crane's young face, the image of a sweet Christ holding a lamb en perpetua, and the yellowed newspaper clipping from Spain of the Matador's death, along with photos of the young men in the past two weeks who have joined Hart becoming ghostly visionary company. They now remain forever chaste not having lived long enough to be wasted, emptied of love from loving deeply out into love for more love, endlessly bleeding out like our Lorca, a corrida of laurel encircling his head no longer remembering but remembering only one sound, guns exploding outward, extending, bullets, petals, one by one beyond the wall where he stood stunned, 'how young and handsome are assassins' faces', he flew backward in the wall graced with his brave shadow then his blood until he fell. I believe he fell hard for life demands it as does death which will continue its duende.
Love, as Hart and all hearts love, is still a vision not yet fully, solidly formed in spite of stones and walls forgetting noble shadows, but there are foolish Krishnas, restoring Krishna-moments, patient hidden gods though human hearts and bodies remove themselves from the potter's wheel too early, too broken, too tired, too alone to try to shape love from Love from the tiny shard, the remnant bone of the ancient mastodon, the last one, dreaming within each heart of that Love which all Nature yearns for.
I pray for my inherited brood of brothers, and remember to be gay for all the gray afternoons in this sad but forgiving confessional, while not forgetting mine and the cock's quarrel with life, in the booth by the cracked window near the corner of 7th and Second.
I am yours, bleating, sometimes crowing, but almost always bestowing praise. I am loved, Valdosta, and I love you.
N. Nightingale
******************
*Opening quote is from Lorca's elegy, 'Lament for Ignacio Sánchez Mejías'
** The Ballad of the Sad Young Men
Music written by: Tommy WolfLyrics written by: Fran Landesman
(best version sung that I know of is by an aged Mabel Mercer in concert, hard to find it now)
Sing a song of sad young men
Glasses full of rye
All the news is bad again so
Kiss your dreams goodbye
All the sad young men
Sitting in the bars
Knowing neon nights
Missing all the stars
All the sad young men
Drifting through the town
Drinking up the night
Trying not to drown
All the sad young men
Singing in the cold
Trying to forget
That they're growing old
All the sad young men
Choking on their youth
Trying to be brave
Running from the truth
Autumn turns the leaves to gold
Slowly dies the heart
Sad young men are growing old
That's the cruelest part
All the sad young men
Seek a certain smile
Someone they can hold
For a little while
Tired little bird,
She does the best she can
Trying to be gay for her
sad young man
While the grimy moon
Blossoms up above
All the sad young men
Play at making love
Misbegotten moon
Shine for sad young men
Let your gentle light
Guide them home again
All the sad young men
***In China homosexuality was referred to as 'the cut sleeve'.
Read an excellent account of this in
Passions of the Cut Sleeve, The Male Homosexual Tradition in China.
http: //www.ucpress.edu/book.php? isbn=9780520078697
****Surrealistic Sutures For The Acetylene Virgin by Warren Falcon
'I think that poetry should stay awake all night drinking in dark cellars.' - Thomas Merton
Look to the body for metaphor
Look to blood, use this word
in relation to dreams or flowers
while silver runs in veins which
are usually streets or vines.
Breasts, male and female,
are stars, have to do with
a handful or feet to span them.
Abdomen, then, is a great
Milky Way gathering,
holding, expelling comets,
caroling colons' humming.
Spleens are bones to
pick teeth with, teeth
which are, of course,
sea horses or gravestones
bearing images of the Flagrant
Heart to tame this spot of
gypsum and flint, to charm
where Violin's cut throat
sings itself awake, one
black breast out of its fold
slapping metal seas against
dropping metal shores in
Sidelight's shadow across
this hand writing now,
slap of waves mute in
this stillness of knees.
So lend a darkness to gardens,
ancient pattern of a breast,
cloth lightly lifting, black on black.
From Her chest reveal a slenderer throat
that nods when she swallows
and names her peace.
The delicate will not pass away just yet.
Great Seamstress of Space
sew, please,
with fingers of dew.
poem by Warren Falcon
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
With Teeth
But she will not let you go
But this time Im not coming back
She will not let you go
But this time Im not coming back
Keeps holding on
She will not let you go
Keeps holding on and on
She will not let you go
No, no, no, no, no!
With teeth
With teeth
With teeth
With teeth
I cannot go through this again /x8
No, no, no, no, no!
With teeth
With teeth
With teeth
With teeth
Youve finally found the place where you belong
It comes on strong
She makes you hard
The rules have changed, the line begins to blur
To what you were
Wave goodbye
With teeth
With teeth
With teeth
With teeth
And it runs deeper than you dare to dream it could be
The black seal
She makes you better than anything youve tried
Its in her kiss
She comes along
She gets inside
song performed by by Nine Inch Nails
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
January in New York
Black ship of night
sailing through the world
& the moon an orange slice
tangy to the teeth
of lovers who lie
under it,
sucking it.
Somewhere there are palm trees;
somewhere the sea
bluely gathers itself up
& lets itself fall again
into green;
somewhere the spangles
of light on the ocean
dazzle the eyes;
but here in the midnight city,
the black ship of night
has docked
for a long, dark stay,
& even the citrus moon
with its pockets of juice
cannot sweeten the dark.
Then the snow begins,
whirling over the Pole,
gathering force over Canada,
sprinkling the Great Lakes with sugar
which drowns in their deep black cups;
it is drawn to the spires of New York
& the flurries come
scampering at first,
lighthearted, crystalline, white,
but finally
sucked into the city
as into a black hole
in space.
The sky is suddenly pink-
pink as flesh: breasts,
babies' bottoms. Night is
day; day is whiter than the desert;
the city stops like a heart;
pigeons dip & veer
& come to rest
under the snow-hatted
watertanks.
poem by Erica Jong
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Across
I turn the page of the day,
writing what I'm told
by the motion of your eyelashes.
I enter you,
the truthfulness of the dark.
I want proofs of darkness, want
to drink the black wine:
take my eyes and crush them.
A drop of night
on your breast's tip:
mysteries of the carnation.
Closing my eyes
I open them inside your eyes.
Always awake
on its garnet bed:
your wet tongue.
There are fountains
in the garden of your veins.
With a mask of blood
I cross your thoughts blankly:
amnesia guides me
to the other side of life.
poem by Octavio Paz
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Scars Of Lovers....
a sharp sword
sharpens itself against
another sword
metal to metal
to the sound of the gritting teeth
one wants to imagine
an ecstasy of
a wound
blood dropping from
a slit on the
hand
there is none here
for this is but an affair
of a sword to another sword
thinking that
there is no war but love
in the air
sweet sounds of birds
sex moans and
calls for a mating
of the season
there is this hate that hides
inside the chest
where there is no option but
to sleep with
the one that never tickles you
not a bit
where love is feigned and
subdued
by need by survival by
pretenses
that man understands it
one can see the scars
not the stars......
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Lie Awake
Let’s lie awake together
I’m not sleepy yet
Let’s play a few games
And give each other pet names.
Let’s lie awake together
It’s just us in this empty park
Hand me that sandwich
I’m getting hungry.
Let’s lie awake together
The grass is getting a little itchy
Hand me your jacket
I’ll keep you warm instead.
Let’s lie awake together
No, I saw that plane first
Oh wait it’s not a plane
Was that a shooting star?
Let’s lie awake together
Think of as many rhymes
Poetry is beautiful
But so are you.
Let’s lie awake together
What’s that light I see?
Oh no it’s the police
We need to run!
I know what I want to do
Let’s lie awake together
I’m sure tomorrow will be great
Seeing the sun rise next to you.
poem by Janine Alyssa Navarro
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Being A Black Male....in 2012
..... Why as a black male I feel so underrated even from my own brothers.. Maybe it's because we call each other nigga because we are to ashamed and ignorant to comprehend that they were Once enslaved by the very word NIGGA.. My brother, far down your ancestry Your great great dear aunty watches over the ashamed.. and disgraced.. the very freedom she earned through all of her pain I promise you If she could she would lynch you by your own chain But she won't.. Hurt like stepping on a thumb tack Failed education because marijuana became your new colon Blacks dropping out of school to chase a street dream We all suffer trying to get whips and chains But I can bet your great aunty suffered from the same thing Don't be clouded by the smoke from the black Remember brother you black and the education you need that In slavery they were afraid to educate a black man Afraid of what vast secrets can be released I stand before you today Asking are we ignorant and enslaved as we were a 100 years ago Are we bound.. Chained from light like a caged dog on a Sunday night Why, why did we give up or dreams, Dreams of becoming strong educated and free Education was always the key Or maybe society advanced so far and made it seem like we were locked out But in reality we have become too weak to pick up the key But why Why are we so weak? You tell me, what time, what season and who allowed us colored people to follow knee deep in our own sorrows where we allowed our dreams to be strangled by the root of evil, Which made BLACK choose to play Russian roulette with their lives Instead of educating each other, and themselves...
Ron Poetry
poem by Ron Poetry
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Aura
The air was dark
The moon was dark
The night was dark
The cloud was dark
The heat was dark
The stars were black
The birds were black
The eyes were black
The shadows were black
The planes were black
A sound of night
The hearts of night
A chase at night
A fall at night
No help at night
The night is night
Where is my sight
I have no sight
Your light was sight
No light no sight
No one in sight
The dark in sight
Don't call my name
What's my name
They call my name
That's not my name
Who said its my name
I have no name
You took my same
It was our same
She was our same
She's now your same
Its all the same
I'm not the same
Judas and my hand
You took my hand
'I do' my hand
You kissed my hand
You broke my hand
You fell my hand
A tear in sand
A heart in sand
A body in sand
Alone in sand
A dust in sand
At home in sand.
poem by Jenim Dibie
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
An Open Boat
O, what is that whimpering there in the darkness?
'Let him lie in my arms. He is breathing, I know.
Look. I'll wrap all my hair round his neck' - 'The sea's rising,
The boat must be lightened. He's dead. He must go.'
See - quick - by that flash, where the bitter foam tosses,
The cloud of white faces, in the black open boat,
And the wild pleading woman that clasps her dead lover
And wraps her loose hair round his breast and his throat.
'Come, lady, he's dead.' - 'No, I feel his heart beating,
He's living, I know. But he's numbed with the cold.
See, I'm wrapping my hair all around him to warm him.' -
- 'No. We can't keep the dead, dear. Come, loosen your hold.
'Come. Loosen your fingers.' - ' O God, let me keep him!' -
O, hide it, black night! Let the winds have their way!
And there are no voices or ghosts from that darkness,
To fret the bare seas at the breaking of day.
poem by Alfred Noyes
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
This Is A Poem I Wrote At Night, Before The Dawn
This is a poem I wrote before I died and was reborn:
- After the years of the apples ripening and the eagles
soaring,
After the festival here the small flowers gleamed like the
first stars,
And the horses cantered and romped away like the
experience of skill; mastered and serene
Power, grasped and governed by reins, lightly held by
knowing hands.
The horses had cantered away, far enough away
So that I saw the horses' heads farther and farther away
And saw that they had reached the black horizon on the
dusk of day
And were or seemed black thunderheads, massy and
ominous waves in the doomed sky:
And it was then, for the first time, then that I said as I
must always say
All through living death of night:
It is always darkness before delight!
The long night is always the beginning of the vivid blossom of day.
poem by Delmore Schwartz
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Latter day South Africa
The face of the old black woman
is plastered with mud,
a red cloth is wrapped around her head
and her feet treads burdensome
where she walks bare foot
on rocky roads
and every now and then
steps into a thorn
and almost fall over
while she removes it clumsily.
The child that she carries piggy-back
isn’t black,
nor white,
or yellow,
or eastern coloured,
he’s something of everyone
and is belted to her back
with a ragged cloth
and it’s difficult
since he’s restless
and the child is thirsty
and the hunger
burns from his stomach
to his throat.
In the distance
she hears people
gathering around a bon fire
drinking beer and dancing,
but she’s locked out
and the road is long
and she hobbles on
while the twilight is falling.
poem by Gert Strydom
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Black Flowing Hair, A Memory Of You
I see you leaning by a wall next door
Against an afternoon sun
And though it is your back that faces me
I know
From the beating of my heart
That it is you, Black-flowing-hair
I can smell you
In mint
And you shall be inside me
As I breathe
So I can live for another time
You are
My tallest tree
On top of the Sleeping-dragon-mountain
And I look up to you
Like my full moon one cold night
Untouched by my fingers
Black-flowing-hair
The world may not have found love in my eyes
As I have none to boost
Since I have given it to you
All of it
I shall find it
But shall not take it back
From you
Your shadow is my god
And it is only that I can touch
Without you knowing
The shadow
Of your
Back
My self-made god
Is enough life
I do not ask much
I cannot
You do not know me
There is no need
I only give myself
I do not have to take any
In return
Now I declare
I have found my place
In you
I have found myself
In you
I have found you
I am Mute-white-dove -sitting
On the breast of Black-flowing-hair
Touching the clouds
Holding the rainbow
Saving all the raindrops of my life.
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
You have a taker.
They say you are dark,
And yet would care
Their lashes and lock
Ever to be black.
They like to their heart
The Koel and the Tusker,
Dark though they are,
And would rather admire
The dark horse in race
And the black bull in fight.
To me you look no dark.
The solitary diamond
That radiates on your nose
Is far shining –
Like a lonely star –
From your new-moon face.
Whenever you grin
There forms a crescent
Across your cheek,
Flashing like a lightening
From the rain-cloud sky.
Your teeth are far milky.
Draped in lime-white voile,
With jasmine weaving your tress
And silver anklet
Circling your limbs,
You are a snow-clad peak.
No more are you dark.
I like you to my heart
Only because you are dark
And not though you’re dark.
Be assured you have a taker.
08.01.97
poem by Rm. Shanmugam Chettiar
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
New Year's Eve
There are only two things now,
The great black night scooped out
And this fireglow.
This fireglow, the core,
And we the two ripe pips
That are held in store.
Listen, the darkness rings
As it circulates round our fire.
Take off your things.
Your shoulders, your bruised throat!
You breasts, your nakedness!
This fiery coat!
As the darkness flickers and dips,
As the firelight falls and leaps
From your feet to your lips!
poem by David Herbert Lawrence
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
100 I Dream
They brang us up with horns and hollywooden songs
Dead snakes and poisoned wisdoms between our teeth
The evil thats been done still is carrying on
And on this night therell be no peace
The old leaders bones still beat on our homes
They built our life before us, we had no choice
The evil thats been done still is carrying on
And when theyre gone well be the voice
Blue bird on a rock, slow wind blowing soft
Across the bare face of the sleeping lake
Rise up and be free, voice whispered to me
And in this way you will awake
Go climb up on a hill, stand perfectly still
And silently soak up the day
Dont rush and dont you roam, dont feel so alone
And in this way you will awake
And in this way you will awake
And this way you will awake
Pick up the pieces you see before you
Dont let your weaknesses destroy you
You know wherever you go the world will follow
So let your reasons be true to you
Stay close to your friends up until the end
And when they know that you feel the same way
Rise up and be free and die happily
And in this way you will awake
And in this way you will awake
And this way you will awake
song performed by by Cat Stevens
Submitted by Lucian Velea
Vote! | Copy!
The Guardian and BloodRose
BloodRose,
Rose of my love,
My love for Dark moon,
Dark as my heart,
Black as my soul,
And gave me my rose.
The rose of blood,
With petals soft and black,
Never as a rose so beautiful,
Grown not in light,
But under a dark moon lit sky.
Guardian,
Yes a guardian of BloodRose,
With teeth long and sharp,
Claws hard as diamonds,
Scales as dark as night.
My dear sweet guardian,
Guardian black as my heart,
Fire in your eyes,
Shadows in your soul,
A dragon of the dark moon.
A single rose,
With petals so fare,
As dark as my heart,
I now hold in my hand,
The rose of blood.
You are my darkness,
Fear of this love,
This love for you,
Love for darkness,
The cold shadows in my heart
That makes me yearn for you.
Now as you lay dying,
I hold a single rose,
The rose you gave me,
And as I hold it tight,
The thorns slice my hand,
Covered with blood,
My blood.
I have one fear,
The fear of death,
Symbol of my lost love,
Rose as dark as me,
Laying in a pool of blood,
Blood from me.
As I lay dying,
I remember my name,
BloodRose,
I am the rose of blood,
And I died of my own creation.
A creation of perfect beauty,
Petals dark black,
Thorns like small daggers,
Grown from my love,
My love for a dragon,
A dragon as dark as my heart.
Even in my death,
I think of you,
And the rose you gave me,
The rose that killed me,
The Rose of Blood.
poem by Nicolette Gonzalez
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
Max
Who is that big black dog I see?
Who is that big black dog indeed.
With a deep black shiny coat and sharp teeth that could bite to a gore
Who is that big black dog?
Come big black dog
Come to me
Those brown eyes that see
They see things at night that would frighten me.
But, oh, my big black dog
How I thank GOD that you have nails and a ferocious look to protect me
Come and walk with me for you see things I cannot see
I will never be afraid with you near me.
So, please, never go away my big black dog…
Just you and me, my MAX and me.
poem by Bonnie Lisa Sanchez
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
An Alliance
This is the weird of a world-old folk,
That not till the last link breaks,
Not till the night is blackest,
The blood of Hengist wakes.
When the sun is black in heaven,
The moon as blood above,
And the earth is full of hatred,
This people tells its love.
In change, eclipse, and peril,
Under the whole world's scorn,
By blood and death and darkness
The Saxon peace is sworn;
That all our fruit be gathered,
And all our race take hands,
And the sea be a Saxon river
That runs through Saxon lands.
Lo! not in vain we bore him;
Behold it! not in vain,
Four centuries' dooms of torture
Choked in the throat of Spain,
Ere priest or tyrant triumph -
We know how well - we know -
Bone of that bone can whiten,
Blood of that blood can flow.
Deep grows the hate of kindred,
Its roots take hold on hell;
No peace or praise can heal it,
But a stranger heals it well.
Seas shall be red as sunsets,
And kings' bones float as foam,
And heaven be dark with vultures,
The night our son comes home.
poem by G.K. Chesterton from The Wild Knight and Other Poems (1900)
Submitted by Veronica Serbanoiu
Vote! | Copy!
Ancestral
The star dissolved in evening—the one star
The silently
and night O soon now, soon
And still the light now
and still now the large
Relinquishing
and through the pools of blue
Still, still the swallows
and a wind now
and the tree
Gathering darkness:
I was small. I lay
Beside my mother on the grass, and sleep
Came—
slow hooves and dripping with the dark
The velvet muzzles, the white feet that move
In a dream water
and O soon now soon
Sleep and the night.
And I was not afraid.
Her hand lay over mine. Her fingers knew
Darkness,—and sleep—the silent lands, the far
Far off of morning where I should awake.
poem by Archibald MacLeish
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!
The Darkness Ate The Day
I left the light behind and the darkness ate the day,
I stay in the shadows of the night with little regret to say,
The dark is warm like a subtle flame, even the light was never the same
I should be ashamed to say this aloud, but it's easier to say how I am proud
Proud to let the light stay away, proud that the darkness ate the day
For there is little light to fight back, a world that's nothing but black
Black sun, black moon, black night, black day, all the world's that's black will stay,
Stay the way of the night, always straining to destroy the
Light
poem by No Reason To Care
Submitted by Poetry Lover
Vote! | Copy!