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[barton]

 the Cambridge ladies do not care, above
Cambridge if sometimes in its box of
sky lavender and cornerless, the
moon rattles like a fragment of angry candy

[FlyingVProd]

Art 
By Herman Melville
 
In placid hours well-pleased we dream
Of many a brave unbodied scheme.
But form to lend, pulsed life create,
What unlike things must meet and mate:
A flame to melt--a wind to freeze;
Sad patience--joyous energies;
Humility--yet pride and scorn;
Instinct and study; love and hate;
Audacity--reverence. These must mate,
And fuse with Jacob's mystic heart,
To wrestle with the angel--Art.

----

Salute,

Tony V.

[Cornelius II]

I Am Aged

I am aged, by common definition I suppose:
steely grey hair, fringed 'round a bald pate,
running to curls in back; I wish it were snowy white.

I get along with a cane, take Tylenol regularly,
-- arthritis is a bitch -- helped along internally now
by pacemaker and four cardiac stents.

My hearing is shot, but my eyes are still perfect,
courtesy of the cataract operation of course, but
still seeing keenly, as young as ever, reality in all its wonder.

I have lived through an Age -- of benevolent Government --
from FDR onward: New Deal, Fair Deal, Great Society;
and now see its demise, in the new administration.

So my children will live with it, my grandchildren normalize it,
as times have changed forever, and I will become
a crotchety Ancient, remembering, complaining,
fulfilling my role.

Crp
Dec 21, 2017

[ffleate]

The Meat in the Middle of the 8 Billion Year Thick Sandwich
with a nice glass of Malbec


“The earth” he said “is 4 billion years old”.
We sat at a table for two, with a bottle of wine,
a nice little Malbec
each with a full glass in hand.

Four billion years had passed
(all that evolution and such)
to get to that very moment.
And four billion years more,
inevitably, will follow.

We are the meat (with red wine)
In the middle
of the 8 billion year thick sandwich.

Let’s toast to that

[FlyingVProd]

Passion 
by T.L. Verley 

In a fit of delusion, 
I grasped the illusion. 
I embraced the smell, color, softness, and beauty. 
I hung on not noticing the thorns, 
As the blood ran down my hands, 
And onto the ground, 
Until the roots sucked it up, 
And it was no longer feeding off of some unknown source, 
But instead it was feeding on me. 

---

Here is a page with some of my poetry on it...

http://more.showfax.com/bbs2/viewtopic.php?t=5782

Salute,

Tony V.

[FlyingVProd]

Eldorado

Gaily bedight,
A gallant knight,
In sunshine and in shadow,
Had journeyed long,
Singing a song,
In search of Eldorado.

But he grew old-
This knight so bold-
And o'er his heart a shadow
Fell as he found
No spot of ground
That looked like Eldorado.

And, as his strength
Failed him at length,
He met a pilgrim shadow-
"Shadow," said he,
"Where can it be-
This land of Eldorado?"

"Over the Mountains
Of the Moon,
Down the Valley of the Shadow,
Ride, boldly ride,"
The shade replied-
"If you seek for Eldorado!"

Edgar Allan Poe

--------

Salute,

Tony V.

[barton]

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens.

  -- William Carlos Williams

[barton]

To Elsie

The pure products of America
go crazy—
mountain folk from Kentucky

or the ribbed north end of
Jersey
with its isolate lakes and

valleys, its deaf-mutes, thieves
old names
and promiscuity between

devil-may-care men who have taken
to railroading
out of sheer lust of adventure—

and young slatterns, bathed
in filth
from Monday to Saturday

to be tricked out that night
with gauds
from imaginations which have no

peasant traditions to give them
character
but flutter and flaunt

sheer rags—succumbing without
emotion
save numbed terror

under some hedge of choke-cherry
or viburnum—
which they cannot express—

Unless it be that marriage
perhaps
with a dash of Indian blood

will throw up a girl so desolate
so hemmed round
with disease or murder

that she'll be rescued by an
agent—
reared by the state and

sent out at fifteen to work in
some hard-pressed
house in the suburbs—

some doctor's family, some Elsie—
voluptuous water
expressing with broken

brain the truth about us—
her great
ungainly hips and flopping breasts

addressed to cheap
jewelry
and rich young men with fine eyes

as if the earth under our feet
were
an excrement of some sky

and we degraded prisoners
destined
to hunger until we eat filth

while the imagination strains
after deer
going by fields of goldenrod in

the stifling heat of September
Somehow
it seems to destroy us

It is only in isolate flecks that
something
is given off

No one
to witness
and adjust, no one to drive the car.

-- Wm C Wms

[FlyingVProd]

Fly With Me
by T.L. Verley

Life is wonderful, and great times are ahead,
Precious is the time between our birth and when we are dead,
Some don't get it, some don't understand,
Some live their entire lives with their heads in the sand.

But not you and I,
We choose to fly,
We'll live life to the fullest before we die.

Some are hopeless, living life in despair,
Some have no faith in themselves, in others, or faith that God cares,
Some see only bad, and they see life as getting worse,
Instead of as a blessing, they see life as a curse.

But not you and I,
We choose to fly,
We'll live life to the fullest before we die.

Anything is possible, dreams can become real,
Though sometimes in life we are wounded, the wounds heal,
Hand and hand together we shall walk up the hill,
And see the beauty all around us and feel the love that we feel.

Because you and I,
We choose to fly,
We'll live life to the fullest before we die.

------------

Salute,

Tony V.

[josh]

Today, we mourn the passing of Mary Oliver.

[FlyingVProd]

I wrote this a long time ago, I hope you like it...
 
Tree of Life
by T.L. Verley
 
If pears became the international source of power,
the partridge would have no home.
If all the air could be bottled,
people and animals would suffocate.
And if he who controlled the air gave it back,
he still might starve to death.
 
Tis extreme I know.
 
Capitalism is my partner and friend,
compared to tyranny its evil twin,
but both hold hands against us,
every now and then.
People divide in every which way,
and when they combine I don't always condone,
as someone is always left out;
in this humans seem prone.
Deprivation as motivation,
to conform, enslave, and the such,
gets easier and easier it seems,
the more one gets out of touch.
And monsters arise in the confusion,
and ideologies that don't mean shit,
and the glory becomes an illusion,
and the victory aint worth spit.
 
Why fight or be alone in the Garden of Eden,
when there are so many to share it with?
But it aint up to one man or government,
as society must learn the trick.

--------

Salute,

Tony V.

[barton]

Lines Written in Early Spring

-- William Wordsworth, 1770 - 1850

 I heard a thousand blended notes,
While in a grove I sat reclined,
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

To her fair works did nature link
The human soul that through me ran;
And much it grieved my heart to think
What man has made of man.

Through primrose tufts, in that sweet bower,
The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;                         
And ‘tis my faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.

The birds around me hopped and played:
Their thoughts I cannot measure,
But the least motion which they made,
It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

The budding twigs spread out their fan,
To catch the breezy air;
And I must think, do all I can,
That there was pleasure there.                             

If this belief from heaven be sent,
If such be Nature’s holy plan,
Have I not reason to lament
What man has made of man?

[oilcan]

Ferlinghetti turns 100 this Sunday.  And has a new book.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/lawrence-ferlinghetti-is-about-to-turn-100-and-he-hasnt-mellowed-at-all/2019/03/14/bdafafc0-45c4-11e9-aaf8-4512a6fe3439_story.html?utm_term=.0b1d4502a277

[FlyingVProd]

A Dream Deferred

What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore--
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over--
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?

Langston Hughes

-----------

That poem was used as the intro for the play "A Raisin in the Sun." When I was in college and in acting school I really got into the plays written by Black people, and poetry by Black people, I could relate to the suffering and poverty and I could relate to their desire to rise. Some of the best poetry, and plays, and music, are by Black people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Raisin_in_the_Sun

I could relate to people who want to overthrow oppression and experience true freedom.

The modern slaves are the workers in communist China, people need to flood China with the Black poetry so they can see how much the modern Chinese are like the Blacks during slavery.

Salute,

Tony V.