::: A Taste of Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum : 01.02.10 :::
"Year's end is neither an end nor a beginning but a going on with all the wisdom that experience can instill in us." Hal Borland
Happy New Year! It's 2010. A new year, a new decade, a symbol of a time to let go of yesterday, embrace today and dream about tomorrow. We here at Mad Swirl have lots of plans in the works for this coming year. What exactly? Well you'll just have to stick with us and see! One thing we plan on continuing is giving you a sample of the poetic morsels that come swirlin' thru our mad hands. So without further ado...
In case you missed it, here's just a taste of the poetry we featured this week in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum...
•••••••••••
LORD OF THE ROACHES
Do not fuck with me, please
Roach
I will destroy you
I am your fucking god
And I eye you out of boredom
While sitting upon my porcelain throne
Within this terrible and forbidden chamber
Green mists of sickness
Surround me, coating the aura of the forgotten
I am the god of the roaches
And, as all gods are
I am an indifferent god
Fuck with me
And you will pay
Don't fuck with me
And you still might pay
It depends on what mood I'm in
Or if you're in my way
Because I am the Lord Of The Roaches
As a young entity
Moving joyfully but eccentrically
About the old planet Earth
I was ruled by overlords that existed before my time
Blind idiot gods and goddesses who willed whimsically
As I entered adolescence, I utilized
The underestimated powers I'd had all along
And sought to blaze my own path
Through the material world and beyond
The unblinking eyes of blind, nameless stars
They had willed that this was a phase
But I was too powerful even for them
And so this was no phase
This was to be
Alas, my power, strong and mad
Far exceeded my abilities to be quick
And I am imprisoned
Within this tomb
Filled with relics from a civilization
That it would be better for one not to know
Vengefully, I have written many scriptures
And they are read by the outer world's few and mad
Mad as I am
Shitting into the Stygian abyss
Laughing, though sorrowful
A bastard abomination in a malicious microcosm
Sadly never to be worshipped again
Enshrined by only worthless roaches
Small, mindless, disreputable, and annoying armies
Arisen from the excess of my ancient filth
For I Am The Fucking Lord Of The Roaches
And when I am free
You can pray all you like.
- Kyle Segars
(3 poems added 01.02.10)
•••••••••••
'dear,'
teach me to play guitar
and kiss me with a paragraph in your mouth
blow it into my stomach,
minimum of five sentences
(and remind me not to leave the oven on,
and when you leave it on i wont say anything, i'll just turn it off)
show me more chords
teach me about windowblinds
turn me into a guitar, or
something else useful
a hammer or a pacemaker
turn me into a song, a birds nest
a bed for you to sleep in, i'll hold your head in my hands
make me into a little something-something
something without an expiration date
- Kelley Davidson
(added 01.01.10)
•••••••••••
Three Arrows
Feather floating over a beautiful war
as the Blue of the West Coast Ocean
meets the East Side Breakers
breathing over the time scored borders.
We’re beginning to deserve this;
flailing as the membrane
between action and conscience shreds.
Glasgow flats and Brooklyn brownstones
Apartments everywhere let us share
a vague universality,
minimizes our inimitable natures:
Homo reductus.
young turks sit at keyboards,
release their viruses into systems
shouting Whoville songs
quashed chaotic smear into empirical thought.
A teardrop breaks on pavement
and we’re left at the end of hurt
in a car where neither of us can speak
only accuse-- trifling, paper lives shredded,
Until, fighting for survival, we disarm
before we regress too far.
Burnt and drowned from within
Potential buried behind the bush
‘til the morass entombs us,
exhausted, into brittle romance.
Chewing bitter root,
waiting for our enemies to emerge
whispering new realities--
where we weren’t a week before
--proving again our adaptability
Trenchcoats over wet London
passive faces in corner lamps:
tropes we understand.
The turnabout in the desert and jungle
and small Midwestern cities in repetitious
MIDI beats by bedroom geniuses
no improvements only consensus
For competing overmind agendas:
has creativity has become shorthand for expression,
craftwork has become artwork,
and artwork is anything you throw on a wall?
"The best all lack conviction...."
Clothing must be couture and food must be gourmet
and we must be self-consciously isolated,
endlessly choking on the dust of personal
anthropology. Road-trippers, we pull over
celebrating the raw glory of nature
on a civilized macadam strip:
father and mother to both.
- Brendan McEntee
(added 12.31.09)
•••••••••••
The Silver Hill
Stone citadel atop the silver hill
bristling with bare locust trees
where the eyrie rejoices in solitude
overlooking the lake.
The majestic deer glides down from the ridge
to sip at the stream in the valley.
I ascended in trance
the splintered trees like archways,
the blue wind deep like shadow paint
over your lidded eyes in holy ecstasy.
The world of my body pulses with love
as you anoint the veils of earth with menses.
I remember the people who are not here
with tenderness,
their presence is felt like soft ferns.
I accept the privilege to be living,
I kneel in honor unfolding before you.
- John Swain
(added 12.30.09)
•••••••••••
day sky
I - The child, he's got his own
private tourist,
smelling of pineapple and despair.
Each set of hands
takes a holiday
across the other blue body,
while each set of lips
like Lady Day
fill the red night.
II - That wind sparkle in his eye
has done gone;
there's no need to tell me
we're sound coming back,
earthen.
It's all over now,
you've changed.
- Adam Henry Carrière
(added 12.29.09)
•••••••••••
My Palace in the Shade
I’ve spoken to my hands before,
whenever I’ve had visions
of Hitler with a hose up his rectum
in hell. My smile reaches new limits.
Why—peeping through Hoffman’s camera—am I
more alive alone than when I am with another man?
I know people have nightmares about blood,
if not about blood, roots. It’s an excuse
to keep dying, and ask for the time. My palace
in the shade is full of books packed with questions. Is
the law, cops rubbing their eyes, and its curvature
an American sentence?
Is it true doves are demanding
they be allowed to go to war in heaven?
I’ve become a saint. My grace
has a catheter in its nadir.
- Sergio A. Ortiz
(3 poems added 12.28.09)
•••••••••••
The Mail
The mailwoman started leaving my mail
at the end of the driveway
after she peered through my front window
and saw me naked
with a garden hose
watering my rug
to the Sounds of the 80s.
Mail service grew sporadic
after I placed a "Beware of Goldfish" sign
on my front door
and she caught me de-boning some raw Atlantic salmon
with my teeth
adorned in yellow tights
a superman cape
and a 14 inch boning knife.
Mail delivery stopped altogether
when she discovered me naked
and passed out face down
in a blow up swimming pool
in my living room
with whipped cream swirls
on both cheeks of my ass
and a signed Menudo poster
strewn over the couch arm.
I now have to go down to the post office
to collect my mail.
Apparently,
some people scare easily.
- Ryan Quinn Flanagan
(1 poem added 12.27.09)
•••••••••••
The whole Mad Swirl of everything to come keeps on keepin' on... now... now... NOW! Every second, every minute, every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, every decade, every every EVERY there is! Wanna join in the poetic conversations going on in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum? Then stop by whenever the mood strikes! We'll be swirling it here 24/7!
Looking Forward,
Johnny O
Editor-in-chief
MH Clay
Poetry Editor
"Writing a poem is discovering." Robert Frost
Happy New Year! It's 2010. A new year, a new decade, a symbol of a time to let go of yesterday, embrace today and dream about tomorrow. We here at Mad Swirl have lots of plans in the works for this coming year. What exactly? Well you'll just have to stick with us and see! One thing we plan on continuing is giving you a sample of the poetic morsels that come swirlin' thru our mad hands. So without further ado...
In case you missed it, here's just a taste of the poetry we featured this week in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum...
•••••••••••
LORD OF THE ROACHES
Do not fuck with me, please
Roach
I will destroy you
I am your fucking god
And I eye you out of boredom
While sitting upon my porcelain throne
Within this terrible and forbidden chamber
Green mists of sickness
Surround me, coating the aura of the forgotten
I am the god of the roaches
And, as all gods are
I am an indifferent god
Fuck with me
And you will pay
Don't fuck with me
And you still might pay
It depends on what mood I'm in
Or if you're in my way
Because I am the Lord Of The Roaches
As a young entity
Moving joyfully but eccentrically
About the old planet Earth
I was ruled by overlords that existed before my time
Blind idiot gods and goddesses who willed whimsically
As I entered adolescence, I utilized
The underestimated powers I'd had all along
And sought to blaze my own path
Through the material world and beyond
The unblinking eyes of blind, nameless stars
They had willed that this was a phase
But I was too powerful even for them
And so this was no phase
This was to be
Alas, my power, strong and mad
Far exceeded my abilities to be quick
And I am imprisoned
Within this tomb
Filled with relics from a civilization
That it would be better for one not to know
Vengefully, I have written many scriptures
And they are read by the outer world's few and mad
Mad as I am
Shitting into the Stygian abyss
Laughing, though sorrowful
A bastard abomination in a malicious microcosm
Sadly never to be worshipped again
Enshrined by only worthless roaches
Small, mindless, disreputable, and annoying armies
Arisen from the excess of my ancient filth
For I Am The Fucking Lord Of The Roaches
And when I am free
You can pray all you like.
- Kyle Segars
(3 poems added 01.02.10)
•••••••••••
'dear,'
teach me to play guitar
and kiss me with a paragraph in your mouth
blow it into my stomach,
minimum of five sentences
(and remind me not to leave the oven on,
and when you leave it on i wont say anything, i'll just turn it off)
show me more chords
teach me about windowblinds
turn me into a guitar, or
something else useful
a hammer or a pacemaker
turn me into a song, a birds nest
a bed for you to sleep in, i'll hold your head in my hands
make me into a little something-something
something without an expiration date
- Kelley Davidson
(added 01.01.10)
•••••••••••
Three Arrows
Feather floating over a beautiful war
as the Blue of the West Coast Ocean
meets the East Side Breakers
breathing over the time scored borders.
We’re beginning to deserve this;
flailing as the membrane
between action and conscience shreds.
Glasgow flats and Brooklyn brownstones
Apartments everywhere let us share
a vague universality,
minimizes our inimitable natures:
Homo reductus.
young turks sit at keyboards,
release their viruses into systems
shouting Whoville songs
quashed chaotic smear into empirical thought.
A teardrop breaks on pavement
and we’re left at the end of hurt
in a car where neither of us can speak
only accuse-- trifling, paper lives shredded,
Until, fighting for survival, we disarm
before we regress too far.
Burnt and drowned from within
Potential buried behind the bush
‘til the morass entombs us,
exhausted, into brittle romance.
Chewing bitter root,
waiting for our enemies to emerge
whispering new realities--
where we weren’t a week before
--proving again our adaptability
Trenchcoats over wet London
passive faces in corner lamps:
tropes we understand.
The turnabout in the desert and jungle
and small Midwestern cities in repetitious
MIDI beats by bedroom geniuses
no improvements only consensus
For competing overmind agendas:
has creativity has become shorthand for expression,
craftwork has become artwork,
and artwork is anything you throw on a wall?
"The best all lack conviction...."
Clothing must be couture and food must be gourmet
and we must be self-consciously isolated,
endlessly choking on the dust of personal
anthropology. Road-trippers, we pull over
celebrating the raw glory of nature
on a civilized macadam strip:
father and mother to both.
- Brendan McEntee
(added 12.31.09)
•••••••••••
The Silver Hill
Stone citadel atop the silver hill
bristling with bare locust trees
where the eyrie rejoices in solitude
overlooking the lake.
The majestic deer glides down from the ridge
to sip at the stream in the valley.
I ascended in trance
the splintered trees like archways,
the blue wind deep like shadow paint
over your lidded eyes in holy ecstasy.
The world of my body pulses with love
as you anoint the veils of earth with menses.
I remember the people who are not here
with tenderness,
their presence is felt like soft ferns.
I accept the privilege to be living,
I kneel in honor unfolding before you.
- John Swain
(added 12.30.09)
•••••••••••
day sky
I - The child, he's got his own
private tourist,
smelling of pineapple and despair.
Each set of hands
takes a holiday
across the other blue body,
while each set of lips
like Lady Day
fill the red night.
II - That wind sparkle in his eye
has done gone;
there's no need to tell me
we're sound coming back,
earthen.
It's all over now,
you've changed.
- Adam Henry Carrière
(added 12.29.09)
•••••••••••
My Palace in the Shade
I’ve spoken to my hands before,
whenever I’ve had visions
of Hitler with a hose up his rectum
in hell. My smile reaches new limits.
Why—peeping through Hoffman’s camera—am I
more alive alone than when I am with another man?
I know people have nightmares about blood,
if not about blood, roots. It’s an excuse
to keep dying, and ask for the time. My palace
in the shade is full of books packed with questions. Is
the law, cops rubbing their eyes, and its curvature
an American sentence?
Is it true doves are demanding
they be allowed to go to war in heaven?
I’ve become a saint. My grace
has a catheter in its nadir.
- Sergio A. Ortiz
(3 poems added 12.28.09)
•••••••••••
The Mail
The mailwoman started leaving my mail
at the end of the driveway
after she peered through my front window
and saw me naked
with a garden hose
watering my rug
to the Sounds of the 80s.
Mail service grew sporadic
after I placed a "Beware of Goldfish" sign
on my front door
and she caught me de-boning some raw Atlantic salmon
with my teeth
adorned in yellow tights
a superman cape
and a 14 inch boning knife.
Mail delivery stopped altogether
when she discovered me naked
and passed out face down
in a blow up swimming pool
in my living room
with whipped cream swirls
on both cheeks of my ass
and a signed Menudo poster
strewn over the couch arm.
I now have to go down to the post office
to collect my mail.
Apparently,
some people scare easily.
- Ryan Quinn Flanagan
(1 poem added 12.27.09)
•••••••••••
The whole Mad Swirl of everything to come keeps on keepin' on... now... now... NOW! Every second, every minute, every hour, every day, every week, every month, every year, every decade, every every EVERY there is! Wanna join in the poetic conversations going on in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum? Then stop by whenever the mood strikes! We'll be swirling it here 24/7!
Looking Forward,
Johnny O
Editor-in-chief
MH Clay
Poetry Editor
"Writing a poem is discovering." Robert Frost
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