greenmountaineer's thread

The Life Cycle of a Flea

"Certainly the Jew is also a man, but the flea is also an animal."
Nazi slogan


They wheeled him into Spandau's sunshine
as cold as a München Oktoberfest,
the taste of which lingers on his lips
as he swats at imaginary fleas
because Rudolph thinks fleas have wings.

Shoulders wrapped in a mohair shawl
with another shawl on his boneyard knees,
he fidgets with a boneyard finger
imaginary cufflinks der Führer made
from two polished Reichspfennig copper coins

that shined in the eyes of Fräulein last night
when he waltzed with such authority
by the Danube, in music Blue,
in fact, as brown as his Brownshirt was,
and so it remains in his addled brain,

the sulci of which form perfect ridges
for eggs to hatch as he wonders why
the fleas inside won't fly away
and violoncello strings in the park
hang like nooses on Christmas trees.

A slight technical correction -- you want to spell it "Fräulein". In German the plural is spelled the same as the singular, but you are importing the word into English, so I would keep the "s". But it's "lein" at the end. German nouns are always capitalized; you wouldn't need to do that with an imported word, but you did it with "Führer", so you might want to make it consistent.

AlwaysHungry said:

A slight technical correction -- you want to spell it "Fräulein". In German the plural is spelled the same as the singular, but you are importing the word into English, so I would keep the "s". But it's "lein" at the end. German nouns are always capitalized; you wouldn't need to do that with an imported word, but you did it with "Führer", so you might want to make it consistent.

Click to expand...

Thank you, AH. I knew you were familiar with German. I should have asked you to edit it before posting. Because I used the German for Munich, I'll use "Fräulein" as the plural.

Late October on the Forty-Fifth Parallel

It seems as though it was yesterday
the ground was too frozen for maypoles,
but two weeks later peepers hummed,
looking for love in mud by the creek
to later dig deep with one million eggs
for furtherance of life, including feed
for fishes while June bugs percussed
wings to the beat of a bullfrog's drum.

I swear at the time I tasted heat
in the air, maybe musk, something sweet
like basil that all too soon in September
leaves the once pungent leaves a yellow
senseless clump next to a fallow
and spade under a blue blue moon.

Katahdin

The last time the mountain was hot, I say,
was on our honeymoon after dinner
with cheap red wine and Ramen noodles,
but too soon like snow on an autumn day
there were stone cold furrowed brows back home,
and then the regrets in states away
with frozen meals in aluminum trays.

So here we are "on a date," you say.
The mountain is two years older now
and we needn't go to the top,
but maybe we can stop for a while
halfway up the Chimney Pond Trail
on this ardent Indian summer day.

Renewal of Vows

We've lived too long in Leggoland
with pillowcases and Percale sheets
that match the cups for Listerine
atop his and her bathroom sinks.

I'll bring fresh mint for your lips, my Love,
candles to light, champagne in flutes.
I'll French kiss sweetness on your tongue.
I'll build a fire in the fireplace.

I'll be gentle, I'll be kind.
If you feel cold, I'll comfort you.
I'll be your cloth, your velveteen.

Why bother hearing chapter:verse
at church on the altar with a priest
when I can see heaven in your eyes?

The Devil's Triangle

What is there but prayer or my poetry
now that Satan has visited these waters?
He strangles the ship with brown seaweed fingers
after he blew the trade winds to New France
where once I battled St. Laurent ice floes,
trinketing bibelots for Iroquois pelts.

I should have tacked more in the South Atlantic
from west equatorial Africa
to skirt the coast in the land of the parrots,
except Monsieur le Gouverneur sent word
his treasury was lacking for molasses,
and tired of grog, the men wanted whores.

Perhaps we have perished and gone to hell
for having decided to jettison
first the frail intended as one transaction
the Company surely would have forgiven,
but then there was needed all of the rations
apportioned for muscle prior to auction.

Charbonneau, I fear, won't last the night,
but in his madness he says there is time
to find a young widow who for her passage
will pleasure us all the way back to France
where his uncle, a prelate in Cherbourg,
will for a small price grant us small penance.

greenmountaineer said:

Thank you, AH. I knew you were familiar with German. I should have asked you to edit it before posting. Because I used the German for Munich, I'll use "Fräulein" as the plural.

Click to expand...

In that case, you might also want to use Oktober...

greenmountaineer said:

The Life Cycle of a Flea

"Certainly the Jew is also a man, but the flea is also an animal."
Nazi slogan


They wheeled him into Spandau's sunshine
as cold as a München Octoberfest,
the taste of which lingers on his lips
as he swats at imaginary fleas
because Rudolph thinks fleas have wings.

Shoulders wrapped in a mohair shawl
and another shawl on his boneyard knees,
he fidgets with a boneyard finger
imaginary cufflinks der Führer made
from two polished Reichspfennig copper coins

that shined in the eyes of Fräulein last night
when he waltzed with such authority
by the Danube, in music Blue,
in fact, as brown as his Brownshirt was,
and so it remains in his addled brain,

the sulci of which form perfect ridges
for eggs to hatch as he wonders why
the fleas inside won't fly away
and violoncello strings in the park
hang like nooses on Christmas trees.

Click to expand...

Powerful.

I am curious about your inspiration, gm - what sends you into these corners to shine your light onto such interesting and sometimes uncomfortable subjects.

greenmountaineer said:

The Devil's Triangle

What is there but prayer or my poetry
now that Satan has visited these waters?
He strangles the ship with brown seaweed fingers
after he blew the trade winds to New France
where once I battled St. Laurent ice floes,
trinketing bibelots for Iroquois pelts.

I should have tacked more in the South Atlantic
from west equatorial Africa
to skirt the coast in the land of the parrots,
except Monsieur le Gouverneur sent word
his treasury was lacking for molasses,
and tired of grog, the men wanted whores.

Perhaps we have perished and gone to hell
for having decided to jettison
first the frail intended as one transaction
the Company surely would have forgiven,
but then there was needed all of the rations
apportioned for muscle prior to auction.

Charbonneau, I fear, won't last the night,
but in his madness he says there is time
to find a young widow who for her passage
will pleasure us all the way back to France
where his uncle, a prelate in Cherbourg,
will for a small price grant us small penance.

Click to expand...

And this one...

greenmountaineer said:

The Life Cycle of a Flea

"Certainly the Jew is also a man, but the flea is also an animal."
Nazi slogan


They wheeled him into Spandau's sunshine
as cold as a München Oktoberfest,
the taste of which lingers on his lips
as he swats at imaginary fleas
because Rudolph thinks fleas have wings.

Shoulders wrapped in a mohair shawl
and another shawl on his boneyard knees,
he fidgets with a boneyard finger
imaginary cufflinks der Führer made
from two polished Reichspfennig copper coins

that shined in the eyes of Fräulein last night
when he waltzed with such authority
by the Danube, in music Blue,
in fact, as brown as his Brownshirt was,
and so it remains in his addled brain,

the sulci of which form perfect ridges
for eggs to hatch as he wonders why
the fleas inside won't fly away
and violoncello strings in the park
hang like nooses on Christmas trees.

Click to expand...

legerdemer said:

Powerful.

I am curious about your inspiration, gm - what sends you into these corners to shine your light onto such interesting and sometimes uncomfortable subjects.

Click to expand...

Tough question, Mer. I suppose the short answer is I spent a career working in prisons and community corrections, so I've seen the dark side of the human condition. To be fair, I've also seen triumph of the human spirit in those circumstances and have written about it. As to the two previous poems, I like to weave a narrative around known historical references because we all have some knowledge of them as in these regarding WWII and colonial slave trading.

And now on a lighter note.....

Four Joe Joe Penile Poems

I. Joe Joe's at Hooters on Christmas Eve

Joe Joe, who's draining his big longneck Bud,
says he was stunned to find coal in his costume
at Disney World where his Goofy's a hit
and tells the barmaid who serves him another
Christmas is shit despite all the gifts.

"Hey Joe Joe, no Disney World smile today?"
says Larry a kid he thinks he remembers
from Goofy training in November
when they taught him how to say "Gawrsh!"
to all those mind numbing kids from Ohio.

"Cleveland for Chrissakes, the armpit of Erie!"
he says to Miss Fit, looking at his,
who for a big tip says "Betcha ya pump iron"
and though he doesn't, he says that he does

and pays two more bucks to have a St. Pauli
because the label looks like the girl
who works at Epcot's German Pavilion,
the one that gives his schwanzstucker* fits.

https://youtu.be/QuHw5ivCs1A

II. Joe Joe Talks to Himself in the Shower

Try to have Mr. Winkie erect.
That way it's more like Old Faithful,
but don't get too steamy, Joe Joe,
if you know what I mean.

Take aim at the shampoo caddy
and think about that uppity girl
who pissed you off when she wouldn't dance
with you at "Christian Singles" last year

or the one that your newest friend, Bill,
said was making eyes at you
down at Gus' Sports Bar & Grill
who wanted to buy you a beer.

And then there's that guy in the locker room
who struts around with nothing on
and likes to sing "Big Bad John"
if you know what I mean.

III. What's Up, Doc?

"Get ready, get set, fair warning,"
Joe Joe's urologist said to him
as he snapped the latex glove on his hand,
"You got a big one!, Friend!

On a scale from 1 to 10
at 2:00 o'clock in the morning,
his bladder feels like a 12
ounce bottle of Elmer's Glue

since his prostate's clogging the nozzle
as he sits on his ass, too tired to stand,
and squeezes as hard as he can on the can,
thankful it's not number two.

IV. TURP

As Joe Joe was saying "I love you"
to his anesthesiologist,
Darth Vadar tested his lightsaber wand
which in medico-Italian
is called a resectoscopio
because it looks like Pinocchio's nose.

"I wouldn't lie to you, Cara," Joe Joe said
to his love who was talking to Darth
about the strength of Midazolam
which, if Joe Joe's memory's correct,
is what they called the love child of
Ungoliant and Vala Melkor.

"Don't touch" said Darth,
"Oui, oui, Joe Joe said,
having reality well in hand,
when, Eureka! his urethra
got reacquainted with his glans!

"Such an exquisite corps!" Joe Joe said.

Born Again

Intrigued, I start again
when the morning shines,
singing words, slinging them,
parsing one more line,

seeing in the poem
images I treasure,
images I fear:

the first caress, a show of skin,
some -scopy for the body,
sins I never have confessed
forgiven with a kiss,
imagining or being with
my wife, my bliss, my lady.

Azadah Used to Live in the Bronx

Last summer she baked like a Hindu,
but the snow and ice in Paktikā
are as cold as the bullet casings
swept into cracks on the concrete street
from the latest empty celebration,
though not as empty as Delaram was
who jumped head first in the Gomal
after she stripped her burqa off.

Baitullah just sat there, drinking his tea,
and swore "we'll kill them, Brother,
if God wills it," flicking horseshit
and flies from his pantaloons.

Entering-quote-the powder room,
Azadah says she's going to puke
just like Mrs. Rizzo would say it
before she squats and spreads her knees,
telling herself it's just to keep warm,
moving a finger looking for love.

Peggyann’s Unfinished Sonnet

"How do I love Thee? Let me count the ways"

I scribble by your bed. Soon after dawn

you used to change my diaper.
and garden work or golf on Saturday

you counted little piggies.
Wake up there, Sweetie, while I pray a song"

who sang "You Are My Sunshine" as a yawn

became a smile, but here tonight dismayed,



you rummage through the Daily News to find

the comics. Then you tell me
I think that Popeye's dying....."

.......

Skin

It's the largest organ in the body.
It's the scab of it when it's cut deep
or a rash on a baby's fat pink.

It's skins against shirts in the gym
and the sweat on a shot going in
before the shaking of hands for it.

And it's the itch of a her or a him
when in bed alone at night
that certain someone gets under it.

It's also the cock going in
the origin of life, seeding new skin.

For some it's the washing of feet for Him,
baptism poured on original sin,
a time to reap and a time to sow,

a season to turn, turn, turn bedsores up
when it's all you have left on the bone.

Quoting Keats,
Thinking of my Daughter

I will admit it. I am guilty of
“egotistical manufacture of
metaphysical importance
over trivial themes"

because when I see my little girl
in this neonatal wing
at New York Presbyterian
I stand in awe and ask myself why

Margaret sang a lullaby
to her womb in an ambulance,
screaming at a red light on
Park and West 37th Street,

for now I see Elizabeth
incubating under lamps
in a cubic plastic box
with two holes for latex hands

and wonder if there is a soul
that nourishes the empty mind
with wisdom unlike what we know

before the milk begins to flow,
and monkeys start to dance inside
while mothers sing their cradlesongs.

..
very nice gm, the first stanza is mind candy

HarryHill said:

..
very nice gm, the first stanza is mind candy

Click to expand...

Thanks, Harry. Pondering the sweetness of the universe, even if it is artificial, can be mouth watering.

At the 11th Hour on the 11th Day of the 11th Month...

I.

We saw so many holes that autumn,
holes in Rome with frescos of saints,

Paris's less known catacombs,
and those in the Ypres Salient

whose trenches were once filled with blood
where poppies now dance in the wind

as if red flowers ever could
cover up ghosts under white crosses

of stick figure boys who should have been roaring
twenties dancing with their honeys
by the light of the silv'ry moon.

II.

As if a boy's choir sang
in a church on the Graben in Vienna,
voices rose before calloused hands
lifted barbed wire in No Man's Land
to trade cigarettes, tin meat, or trinkets,
but for a teething ring he whittled,
not far from the village of Neuve Chapelle,
for the begat or to begotten.

She was a maid never known for her letters
who wrote him she missed her period,
and he dreams about Mary back in his trench
after a fortnight of shelling
where he prays that when the sun goes down
again after one silent night
no corpsman will find a teething ring
splintered in corporal pockets.

III.

The Lords entrenched in Parliament
and men of cash advance
drank Bordeaux with Gruyère cheese.
The Kaiser swallowed France.

Young Billy Twice*, he'd eat that horse
whose mane was full of lice
the Huns left dead in no man's land,
except there were the mice,

or maybe rats, God knows what
he said behind his mask
he lifts to eat his tin can meat
Huns spiced with mustard gas.

Because his Dad was Billy too,
they call him Billy Twice
when in the trenches Billy sings
to God on silent nights

like some canary in a mine
preventing men from death
but here a sweet song won't forewarn
death's burning lungs and flesh.

He knew the peril gas could be,
although a different kind,
beneath the colliers' hills in Wales,
the mines he left behind

to sow king's seeds of victory
at England's Battle Call.
Your chums are fighting. Why aren't you
to prove your worth to all?

Be sure to eat more corn, more oats,
and rye to save the wheat
and anthracite as big as Sunday
dinner's cut of meat.

"The war to end all wars was just
another goddam lie"
said Billy Twice, when looking up,
he saw the last of life.

*Fictional Character from Ken Follet's Fall of Giants

Valentino

Mother who told me 1000 stories
to rock me to sleep on 1000 nights
said grandmother fainted when he died.
Revived, she held her sheik pillow tight.

I then thought it strange that Mother
reached for a Kleenex, perhaps because
of the onions she diced every night
for Father's meat and potatoes with gravy

served to him with a bottle of beer,
placed just right on the kitchen table
where no open book with one story left

would ever be stained with Shiraz wine,
Medjool dates, and Turkish coffee
after a wild magic carpet ride.

greenmountaineer said:

Valentino

Mother who told me 1000 stories
to rock me to sleep on 1000 nights
said grandmother fainted when he died.
Revived, she held her sheik pillow tight.

I then thought it strange Mother, misty-eyed,
reached for a Kleenex, perhaps because
of the onions she diced every night
for Father's meat and potatoes with gravy

served to him with a bottle of beer,
placed just right on the kitchen table
where no open book with one story left

would ever be stained with Shiraz wine,
Medjool dates, and Turkish coffee
after a wild magic carpet ride.

Click to expand...

Nice capture capture of a time and the conflict of living with what is and l longing for what will never be.

greenmountaineer said:

Valentino

Mother who told me 1000 stories
to rock me to sleep on 1000 nights
said grandmother fainted when he died.
Revived, she held her sheik pillow tight.

I then thought it strange Mother, misty-eyed,
reached for a Kleenex, perhaps because
of the onions she diced every night
for Father's meat and potatoes with gravy

served to him with a bottle of beer,
placed just right on the kitchen table
where no open book with one story left

would ever be stained with Shiraz wine,
Medjool dates, and Turkish coffee
after a wild magic carpet ride.

Click to expand...

Piscator said:

Nice capture capture of a time and the conflict of living with what is and l longing for what will never be.

Click to expand...

Thanks. This was inspired by my lovely wife over dinner with a bottle of wine about her great aunt, childless, back in the Roaring Twenties.

Autochthon Permaculture

After Spirit Moon chill Birth River
spear fish sharp limb mountain sweet tree
black bear eat before go sleep den
by gravel bed Ten Thousand Egg
where smoke fish, tribe not hungry
when deep snow keep warm wìkəwαm.

Elder grind bone children and toothless
mix and bless seed pole bean,
squash, and sweet corn new crop rise
high as totem to Spirit Sun
burn red skin old women harvest
summon children come bring dung,

worm, one hundred leg, plant hole
mark for chickadee sing
when Spirit Sun melt deep snow
by mountain mountain sweet tree
as fast Birth River pour fish Great Sea
until Spirit Moon call fish home spawn.