007 Challenge

Happiness is a warm . . .

002

Regulate my behaviour
because it's too hard
to increase your own emotional
strength
to hold the truth
is to be able to handle
embers,
build up tolerance
enabling you to examine the concepts
risk the burn

the age of defining ideas by the most
emotionally resilient is done
pandering to offence
to the femenine value system
to care based morality
where rigor is considered a dirty word
positive descrimination is championed
when inequality is the threshhold of tolerance

When fundamental understandings are
"All culture is equal"
you break down into tribalised groups
your cries of no more bullying
is the cry of the mob

suppression of behaviour
without a fundamental understanding
without acknowledging the difference
between competency and power

aim your spears
aim your guns
start the fires

because we are less
we need to burn down your more
true equality
is ushered in when we are starving
or dead
the greatest leveler
of the human condition......

Lunches from the Starving Classes

More often, they share--
Pile apples on the tray
Of the child who wants them,
Or sliders in the backpack
Of the hungriest with four
Brothers. I admire my students
Because eight times of ten,
They are the best people I know.

Nice tone - you are mindful in your vocation

KINGSTON

By JC © 2004 020602


It’s May in Kingston and the fat
Spring heat
cloaks my new body
oppressive yet new-minted, fulsome . . . .lispy
voice on the phone, smooth
as a pebble round as a stone, soft
as a springsprung bird out of a nest
of pearls
flushes the scales from my eyes, a
rising wind under a Windigo sky
frames her forever in a loose
tapestry of when


-30-

Strong Glass

Finally we could be unafraid.
Sky bald eyed under
Cantilevered structure and glass:
So vast, this found sky.
Found again in morning
Movements of water over water
Over us, mostly water. The Viking
Creation story rises people of wood.
Early masons said stone.
Perhaps a future tribe of children
Grown to story will fashion us
All of strong glass.

WE ARE THE VIKINGS

By Carl © 2005 all rights reserved

riding, riding
pouring out of our longships at dawn, so
hearty and hale with desire
into the village of the Irish
to plunder to
carry off women

when we
arrive
our bellies are thin, when we
leave
our bellies are fat, fat
with wassail and beef, our
loins
empty from the women, we
ride out fat
holding screaming women to our saddles, if
they fall they fall, but if they
climb up behind they will
live with us, become one
with us, riding, riding and
riding again but always
in a circle round the coast, we
know how to fight before armies are mustered, to take
our tribute and leave, to
fill our bellies and empty our loins, to
fill our larders and move on, to

take back the red-haired maidens to
strengthen our tribe, their
issue become the new Vikings, riding
riding and riding

to more plunder, we
live simply at home, farming
fishing and hunting
breeding the red-haired maidens we have
brought home it is
a better land for them it

strengthens them as they learn our ways, as they
bring the red-blonde children
out of their thighs, screaming to the mid-wives who
paint wine on their lips as they labor, the

mid-wives suckle their breasts as they issue, one
on each milk-fat breast, suckle the fat nipples of the
red-haired maidens as they issue

to ease the passage, we

take them back to Ireland to plunder their grandparents, to
plunder their kin, to take more
and go riding, riding, riding with bellies fat, loins empty
of the freckle-faced maidens whom we have loved, we . . .

we are the Vikings

Quite love Gaiman's Norse Mythology. Especially on audiobook.

OK - I've tracked down the ref. Don't rule out Irish Mythology as an adjunct.

. . . and

a very sweet book is Ireland: The Rock Whence I was Hewn, by Donn Byrne - my Mother gave me a copy back in the mists and it never fails to sweeten an evening. The following poem refers

BREAGHEY (A litany of Irish place names)

By Carl (c) 2006, 2017 060216

(for Medbh McGuckian and Donn Byrne R.I.P.)

Breaghey!
The Plain of the Wolves, and I see them
lumpish with their tails furled, bellies
close to the earth
muzzles
kissing the night. kissing the night
of old Ireland.

Anaghgod!
The Marsh of Sally Trees and I see them
lumpish with their branches weeping, roots
close to the earth, pussies
weeping
willows
buds
kissing the morning, kissing
the morning of old Ireland

Booleynaasruhan!
The Milking Place of the Little Streams and I see them
how they roil and furl
lumpish with froth
at the meeting place
splashing on the feet of an old man, an
old man of old Ireland

Bennanilra!
The Remote Place of the Eagle
high country this, such as
high country can be
in old Ireland, as it can be
soaring
its sharp eye remote
sharp as a pin in the eye of a dove

Caherapheepa!
The Fortress of the Fairy Piping and I have heard them
piping in the fourth room
only a dream
of old Ireland

Carrigataha!
The Rock of the Swarming Bees, oh!
to be stung there, to be
stung there in the great hum of it, the
great hum of old Ireland

Clogheracullion!
The Stony Place of the Holly Bushes
many kisses have I taken there, many
kisses
under the holly of old Ireland

Carraghatork!
The Moor of the Hawk
heart is from chest pulled in the
bleak of it, the
bleak of old Ireland

Mallyree!
The Little Hills of Heather, how we
scampered there as wains, scampered there
by the hills of heather, the
hills of old Ireland

Gortacraghig!
The Field of Hanging and my great
great grandfather
hangs there still, hangs there
on the hanging tree of old Ireland, hangs there
for the thieving of ripe plums


Kingston, Ontario, February 16, 2006

Spring feet

Maria yes. The middle movement
Sharps quiet almost beyond
Reach. Almost. But I have slept
Next to her violin before. Sharp
Seagull dives the sea and all
The breathed clouds between.

You're going to make it into the Atlantic Monthly yet

I look for Park pink
under trees
under trees where her Thermos
may have rested, she leaves
raspberry kisses and strawberry
delights
where she's nested, but
it is the cherries, the
cherries which engage me anew, their
spoor
pinkish in the snow

(oh well - I just made it up on the spur . . .

Morning Man

Sleeping late, briefed,
Kissing the smooth clearings,
Nosing the damp forests,
Curling to cave, lifting to castle,
This is the morning ballet
Applauded in the shower.

BRIEFLY 180321


Briefly
in the interrstices
half-glimpsed, a
scampering chipmunk
reveals, her footsteps
already fading, will
there be time will
there be touch

a groundhog
under the duvet, nosing
that damp forest the
darkness of nepenthe ferreting
fossicking and mischiefing
the interstitial spaces nooks

here in the glade where moss
soothes, where
dew honeys the lips
honeys the insatiable

Snow Day

Wet waffle clumps
The size of eyes--
Linebackers--tackle to ground
Yesterday's particulates.
Yesterday's trees remain
And drink. Yesterday's sidewalks
Shine with melt on salt.
Just the air is changed.
Ionized. Humming.

lazy poet segues to bask
in the sweet light
of a previous
beguiled to quiescence
by her grace . . .

until
her fading footprints
bestir him
to give chase

In the Park 180321

lazy poet segues to bask
in the sweet light
of a previous
beguiled to quiescence
by her grace . . .

until
her fading footprints
bestir him
to give chase

. . . slooshing along in the snow he
seems to gain for a moment but
she wraiths . . .
just as she always does when
he is within reach
within touch
within nubbly earlobe kiss
she wraiths

run run, laugh
laugh and laugh tumble down
fallen leaf strewn hill . . .

last summer I caught her
caught her in her long cotton dress, her
big straw hat
turvy in a topple
into each others dream
enfolding

003

Live write because why the fuck not

I'm drunk and trying
to find a way to parse
the moments that shatter mundane realities
Br-
eak coherent thoughts
that......

taste like your tongue
drizzled with honeycomb
free me from myself when the sound
of a zipper
reverbs

Slow motion agony
pauses mid stride a fractional
moment before you reach down
drag my sanity and rationality
coursing sin and blood
and drop it
the smashed remnants are particle
fragments I need to pick through
to reform myself later

and I ache
for wet
for heat and warmth
soft curves to crush the insanity
of pain from this world
at times the only thing that seems
right are your
cries
they echo through the dark
and the rush of my pulse

There is something fatalistic
in the aftermath of torn close
bruised skin
cum stains and sweat
and you have never looked more beautiful
haunting me
with a glazed look
of being somewhere better than here

004

* **

Onyx used to mean something
before it became
the blood of dying stars
chewing grief as wafers
commune with a god
we killed

even in his death the rotting carcass
still has scraps to nourish
the nihilist
scrape away some meaning to smoke later
scatter the ashes
as if they matter anymore

I've harvested some just the same
taken some seeds and tried to graft them
hoping
they will do something more than wither
and die

Onyx used to mean something
before it became
"the blood of dying stars
chewing grief as wafers
commune with a god
we killed"

an exceptional stanza, todski

JCSTREET said:

Onyx used to mean something
before it became
"the blood of dying stars
chewing grief as wafers
commune with a god
we killed"

an exceptional stanza, todski

Click to expand...

Thank you JC

For me at thr moment its all just Melted brain cells

todski28 said:

Thank you JC

For me at thr moment its all just Melted brain cells

Click to expand...

lol - I can't keep up with you

I used to have those but age mellowed them

March

The sign that made me cry
Wasn't the sign riddled by
Bullet holes. It wasn't any
Of the signs of the teens who
Collapsed in street strewn with the silent
Pleas, "this could be me. Please
Don't let this be me." The sign
That broke sobs
From my throat read
"Courtlin Arrington, age 17,
Daughter, friend, nursing student
Killed March 7, 2018
Huffington High School."
It was another block before
I could speak. Then, with thousand
Across the country, I roared.

After

Tub, scrub, salts,
Turban and towel,
File down miles,
Softly dusk.
Strappy dress
Leather trench.
Hello Moon.

Lidded

Papers graded, lesson
Plans tidied, boxed, differentiated,
Sunday evening solved for x.
Goodnight moon.

'Plans' breaks the rhythm - I know it fits logically but . . .

Papers graded, lessons
tidied, boxed, differentiated . . .

Sunday evening, solved for x
Goodnight moon

-- that's a sweet couplet