The Best of Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum : 04.14.12
“The worlds I paint leave a lot to engage the imagination by hinting at what lies beyond the four edges of the painting.” Thomas Kinkade
The Act of Creation (above) by featured artist, David Arthur-Simons.
Guess who's back? And don't you act surprised, Mad Swirlers. After all, how could anybody, especially the maddest of swirlers, say no to David Arthur-Simons mad skill? Not us! This is David's third time to be featured in the Mad Gallery. And can you blame us? Behind the surreal imagination of these jaw-dropping paintings there is an even more surreal process. This New York based artist spends one day of the year on each painting... which means he has 365 paintings in process, that he only works on once a year, leaving whatever he'd accomplished to wait 364 days to be touched again. You'd think the madness would stop there, but just look at a few of his paintings, and you will find yourself exploring realms of your own mind you didn't even know existed. Prepare yourself for some intense pieces of work, and perhaps just a teeeeeny bit of envy, as you take a peak inside the swirlingly profoundly mad mind of this month's featured talent. - mio
•••••••••••
This last week in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum... we saw: from the womb of a watery grave, a whimsical wake; from a darkened door, death dodged, but not dread; from run and think, an urge to drink; from stumbles and stammers, a sterilized temple; from dark uncertainty, a colorful dream; from cloyed contemplation, an unclear complexity, chip-chip-chipping away; from insipid altruism, an angstful invisible man.
BROOKLYN’S INVISIBLE MAN
Like a rat in a maze, an unwilling subject in a sinister experiment,
exposed and disposable,
I wander through
the bleak, barren
streets of
Brooklyn.
What’s my sin? Old and obsolete, someone pressed the delete key
and transmogrified me into an invisible man,
a grotesque, ghostly pariah,
broke, unemployed,
and forgotten.
No one can see me now. How did this happen? Even Kafka was kinder,
his Metamorphosis of Gregor Samsa not as Machiavellian,
not as heinous or brutally evil as invisibility,
darkened by the pitch-black, piteous
streets of Brooklyn, the
labyrinthine wasteland
I travel through.
What will I do? I can’t find the exit. I’m Brooklyn’s invisible man.
But my brothers and sisters meander across the U.S.A.;
every lost day they inhale and exhale the
murderous miasma that’s spreading
to every town and city.
Beware! Invisibility will swallow your faces too, leaving no traces of
human life. Look closely. Yes, the epidemic’s coming your way
with fringe benefits-despair, hopelessness, and desperation.
Look closely at our beautiful nation and its people.
I’m the disheveled old man you can’t see. I’ve got a long gray beard
and wild hair. If you could see me, you’d shout: “Hello, Einstein!”
I wear torn jeans and tattered sneakers and a
George Carlin T-shirt. It says:
Too Much Stuff!
I carry an old Barnes & Noble green bag. It contains all my possessions-
4 books by Dostoevsky, Hesse, Vonnegut, and the divine author
of the Bible.
Enough!
I’ve got enough except for food, water, and shelter. Homeless and invisible,
exposed and disposable, broke, unemployed, and forgotten,
I wander through the bleak,
barren streets of
Brooklyn.
What’s my sin? Does anyone out there know? Goodbye. Why?
An alien presses the delete key
and that’s the
end of
me.
- Mel Waldman
(2 poems added 04.14.12)
editor's note: There are more of these folk wandering every city. See them or see through them, avoid mirrors. (Another good one from the Dr. on his page, check it out!) - mh
We All Want to Be Cemented into our Favorite Memories and Dreams...
But reality is a fucking monster..., and dreams are easily slayed..., I'm tired of written and assigned fears and worries..., lightning and flashing crashes, are crushed by flushing patterns..., It doesn't seem to matter..., and the pitter-patter, doesn't sound like tiny feet on a sound plane..., I want to flow back in time, not to grow or feel, not to hear or see (no obligations)..., just to cease to be..., involved..., in contemplation..., and fake sophistication..., fake projection surprised..., a firefly trapped in a clapping competition..., recently surrounded by death..., every breath, makes me wonder..., "Where is my place in that line...?" a situation where a number is not assigned...,you cannot know..., time after time, I wonder while standing in that silent line..., a lake and a stream, filled with all of the bad dreams is the shoreline we all will eventually visit..., time and existence are complex pick-axes..., and you can't feel them necessarily, but they are always, silently, chipping away...
- Eric J. Brinovec
(added 04.13.12)
editor's note: If that's what we want, let's find a better glue. Perhaps run-on poetry will do - talk 'til destiny tires and turns away. - mh
Inconsistency
My words are quiet and have no meaning. My emotions are retained inside trying to find a way out. There are no answers for the inconsistency I'm surrounded by. No honest explanations for the dark uncertainty. I dislike the unbalance my destiny has shaped for me. I miss the comfort of my early years. I'm running towards my future, taking baby steps in my present and constantly reminiscing on my past. While you daydream I build walls between us. I wish for a better tomorrow, I pray for a colorful dream in a far away land where my reality has a different story line.
- Michelle Camacho
(added 04.12.12)
editor's note: Not to mention the inconsistencies in the answers that surround us, too. Dream reality with no regrets, keep moving forward. - mh
GODLESS TEMPLE
the holy man with the holy thread,
stands proud at the temple door,
honey licked, saffron rubbed,
milk on a black stone poured,
jingle of the coins last night scored,
stumbles a woman to meet her god,
stammers a woman to make a prayer,
a widow she is. Impure!
seeks to cross the door.
her voice is the hum of blasphemy,
her faith a fake act.
entry to the temple denied!
he then turns to move in,
and hit head before the idol,
hoping the fine sculpted clay
will look after his prayers,
not knowing that,
the True Hearing God,
has long abandoned this temple!
- Aftab Yusuf Shaikh
(added 04.11.12)
editor's note: You can change dogma, but the characters remain the same. Ohm - men! - mh
Beast in the Bathtub
Sometimes
It’s better to run
Than walk.
Sometimes
It’s better to think
Than talk.
Sometimes
It’s better to agree
Than baulk.
And today
It’s better to drink
Than caulk.
- Hal J. Daniel III
(added 04.10.12)
editor's note: Would rather drink than do almost anything, but this talk incites me to walk, not baulk, away from caulk! Hell, yeah! - mh
Dark/Light
You walked a golden path and I
was in front beating the bushes for
hidden dangers, eyes darting left
and right, a force field of high alert
with the tingle of anticipation
stiffening my spine.
Behind, your face radiated the
beatific smile of the innocent ignorant,
the birthright of The Golden, of the ones
who know nothing of terror, spite or shame,
but see only through eyes of sunlight.
At the end, we were both too blind —
I by suspicion,
you by trust —
to see the tip of a cloven hoof
at the bottom of the door.
- Charlotte Hamrick
(added 04.09.12)
editor's note: Only let him in if he can speak the secret password. But, don't tell him that there isn't one. - mh
Found on the Ship’s Wall
My dear, let’s just let death’s gravity
magnetize us toward the ocean floor
in the peace of painless sleep.
Let it bury us under overlapping glass waves—
soon our tortured days will be done.
But I wonder if our corpses will be recovered.
Stones covered in daisies will we ever lay under?
or ever have our names engraved on our graves. . .
And as we slide deep into the sunless water,
remember when you sucked honeysuckles
off Mrs. Fink’s green gate in the pale-lit alley
all those summer evenings with bike and kid brother—
headed home to your Mother’s dinner table.
Head home to your Mother now, just let go.
- Catherine Zickgraf
(added 04.08.12)
editor's note: A watery epitaph, ghost memories for the dead. Let the living carve stone. - mh
•••••••••••
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 here...
Engagin',
Johnny O
Editor-in-chief
MH Clay
Poetry Editor
The Act of Creation (above) by featured artist, David Arthur-Simons.
Guess who's back? And don't you act surprised, Mad Swirlers. After all, how could anybody, especially the maddest of swirlers, say no to David Arthur-Simons mad skill? Not us! This is David's third time to be featured in the Mad Gallery. And can you blame us? Behind the surreal imagination of these jaw-dropping paintings there is an even more surreal process. This New York based artist spends one day of the year on each painting... which means he has 365 paintings in process, that he only works on once a year, leaving whatever he'd accomplished to wait 364 days to be touched again. You'd think the madness would stop there, but just look at a few of his paintings, and you will find yourself exploring realms of your own mind you didn't even know existed. Prepare yourself for some intense pieces of work, and perhaps just a teeeeeny bit of envy, as you take a peak inside the swirlingly profoundly mad mind of this month's featured talent. - mio
•••••••••••
This last week in Mad Swirl's Poetry Forum... we saw: from the womb of a watery grave, a whimsical wake; from a darkened door, death dodged, but not dread; from run and think, an urge to drink; from stumbles and stammers, a sterilized temple; from dark uncertainty, a colorful dream; from cloyed contemplation, an unclear complexity, chip-chip-chipping away; from insipid altruism, an angstful invisible man.
BROOKLYN’S INVISIBLE MAN
Like a rat in a maze, an unwilling subject in a sinister experiment,
exposed and disposable,
I wander through
the bleak, barren
streets of
Brooklyn.
What’s my sin? Old and obsolete, someone pressed the delete key
and transmogrified me into an invisible man,
a grotesque, ghostly pariah,
broke, unemployed,
and forgotten.
No one can see me now. How did this happen? Even Kafka was kinder,
his Metamorphosis of Gregor Samsa not as Machiavellian,
not as heinous or brutally evil as invisibility,
darkened by the pitch-black, piteous
streets of Brooklyn, the
labyrinthine wasteland
I travel through.
What will I do? I can’t find the exit. I’m Brooklyn’s invisible man.
But my brothers and sisters meander across the U.S.A.;
every lost day they inhale and exhale the
murderous miasma that’s spreading
to every town and city.
Beware! Invisibility will swallow your faces too, leaving no traces of
human life. Look closely. Yes, the epidemic’s coming your way
with fringe benefits-despair, hopelessness, and desperation.
Look closely at our beautiful nation and its people.
I’m the disheveled old man you can’t see. I’ve got a long gray beard
and wild hair. If you could see me, you’d shout: “Hello, Einstein!”
I wear torn jeans and tattered sneakers and a
George Carlin T-shirt. It says:
Too Much Stuff!
I carry an old Barnes & Noble green bag. It contains all my possessions-
4 books by Dostoevsky, Hesse, Vonnegut, and the divine author
of the Bible.
Enough!
I’ve got enough except for food, water, and shelter. Homeless and invisible,
exposed and disposable, broke, unemployed, and forgotten,
I wander through the bleak,
barren streets of
Brooklyn.
What’s my sin? Does anyone out there know? Goodbye. Why?
An alien presses the delete key
and that’s the
end of
me.
- Mel Waldman
(2 poems added 04.14.12)
editor's note: There are more of these folk wandering every city. See them or see through them, avoid mirrors. (Another good one from the Dr. on his page, check it out!) - mh
We All Want to Be Cemented into our Favorite Memories and Dreams...
But reality is a fucking monster..., and dreams are easily slayed..., I'm tired of written and assigned fears and worries..., lightning and flashing crashes, are crushed by flushing patterns..., It doesn't seem to matter..., and the pitter-patter, doesn't sound like tiny feet on a sound plane..., I want to flow back in time, not to grow or feel, not to hear or see (no obligations)..., just to cease to be..., involved..., in contemplation..., and fake sophistication..., fake projection surprised..., a firefly trapped in a clapping competition..., recently surrounded by death..., every breath, makes me wonder..., "Where is my place in that line...?" a situation where a number is not assigned...,you cannot know..., time after time, I wonder while standing in that silent line..., a lake and a stream, filled with all of the bad dreams is the shoreline we all will eventually visit..., time and existence are complex pick-axes..., and you can't feel them necessarily, but they are always, silently, chipping away...
- Eric J. Brinovec
(added 04.13.12)
editor's note: If that's what we want, let's find a better glue. Perhaps run-on poetry will do - talk 'til destiny tires and turns away. - mh
Inconsistency
My words are quiet and have no meaning. My emotions are retained inside trying to find a way out. There are no answers for the inconsistency I'm surrounded by. No honest explanations for the dark uncertainty. I dislike the unbalance my destiny has shaped for me. I miss the comfort of my early years. I'm running towards my future, taking baby steps in my present and constantly reminiscing on my past. While you daydream I build walls between us. I wish for a better tomorrow, I pray for a colorful dream in a far away land where my reality has a different story line.
- Michelle Camacho
(added 04.12.12)
editor's note: Not to mention the inconsistencies in the answers that surround us, too. Dream reality with no regrets, keep moving forward. - mh
GODLESS TEMPLE
the holy man with the holy thread,
stands proud at the temple door,
honey licked, saffron rubbed,
milk on a black stone poured,
jingle of the coins last night scored,
stumbles a woman to meet her god,
stammers a woman to make a prayer,
a widow she is. Impure!
seeks to cross the door.
her voice is the hum of blasphemy,
her faith a fake act.
entry to the temple denied!
he then turns to move in,
and hit head before the idol,
hoping the fine sculpted clay
will look after his prayers,
not knowing that,
the True Hearing God,
has long abandoned this temple!
- Aftab Yusuf Shaikh
(added 04.11.12)
editor's note: You can change dogma, but the characters remain the same. Ohm - men! - mh
Beast in the Bathtub
Sometimes
It’s better to run
Than walk.
Sometimes
It’s better to think
Than talk.
Sometimes
It’s better to agree
Than baulk.
And today
It’s better to drink
Than caulk.
- Hal J. Daniel III
(added 04.10.12)
editor's note: Would rather drink than do almost anything, but this talk incites me to walk, not baulk, away from caulk! Hell, yeah! - mh
Dark/Light
You walked a golden path and I
was in front beating the bushes for
hidden dangers, eyes darting left
and right, a force field of high alert
with the tingle of anticipation
stiffening my spine.
Behind, your face radiated the
beatific smile of the innocent ignorant,
the birthright of The Golden, of the ones
who know nothing of terror, spite or shame,
but see only through eyes of sunlight.
At the end, we were both too blind —
I by suspicion,
you by trust —
to see the tip of a cloven hoof
at the bottom of the door.
- Charlotte Hamrick
(added 04.09.12)
editor's note: Only let him in if he can speak the secret password. But, don't tell him that there isn't one. - mh
Found on the Ship’s Wall
My dear, let’s just let death’s gravity
magnetize us toward the ocean floor
in the peace of painless sleep.
Let it bury us under overlapping glass waves—
soon our tortured days will be done.
But I wonder if our corpses will be recovered.
Stones covered in daisies will we ever lay under?
or ever have our names engraved on our graves. . .
And as we slide deep into the sunless water,
remember when you sucked honeysuckles
off Mrs. Fink’s green gate in the pale-lit alley
all those summer evenings with bike and kid brother—
headed home to your Mother’s dinner table.
Head home to your Mother now, just let go.
- Catherine Zickgraf
(added 04.08.12)
editor's note: A watery epitaph, ghost memories for the dead. Let the living carve stone. - mh
•••••••••••
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 here...
Engagin',
Johnny O
Editor-in-chief
MH Clay
Poetry Editor
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