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Ira Desmond Jan 2017
Avert your eyes
from looking directly
at the monster.

Look only through
that reflective shield,
that glowing rectangle

that parades a
distorted vision of
the objective self,

that which in
dark moments may
suddenly shut off,

revealing one’s face:
inverted, expressionless, petrified—
like when the

mirror of Perseus
at last revealed
Medusa’s horrifying visage.
For me, the naked and the ****
(By lexicographers construed
As synonyms that should express
The same deficiency of dress
Or shelter) stand as wide apart
As love from lies, or truth from art.

Lovers without reproach will gaze
On bodies naked and ablaze;
The Hippocratic eye will see
In nakedness, anatomy;
And naked shines the Goddess when
She mounts her lion among men.

The **** are bold, the **** are sly
To hold each treasonable eye.
While draping by a showman's trick
Their dishabille in rhetoric,
They grin a mock-religious grin
Of scorn at those of naked skin.

The naked, therefore, who compete
Against the **** may know defeat;
Yet when they both together tread
The briary pastures of the dead,
By Gorgons with long whips pursued,
How naked go the sometime ****!
Cné Oct 2017
We bask in light when morning comes, yet tremble in the night.
Halloween must be the cause to give us such a fright.
Ghosts and goblins haunt the streets where moans and chains abound.
Ghouls and vampires lurk in shadows, scared of holy ground.
Werewolves stalk unwary victims. Frankenstein is loose.
Ogres, trolls and spectral zombies hanging by a noose,
Gorgons with their "stoney" eyes and bats with leathery wings...
Mummies wrapped in yellowed cloth with rotting flesh that clings,
Pirates, gangsters, space invaders, just to name a few,
All in search of "Tricks or Treats"(or just a head...or two).
Beware the time when darkness comes. Be sure the door is locked.
But most of all .... to just be safe ... keep lots of candy stocked.
Happy Halloween
Mike sikes Aug 2014
You are a wicked woman.
You have the gorgons stare.

You turn my soul to stone,
with every hateful glare.

Every hybrid moment.
In every waking day.

You always try to prevent.
Reasons
for me to stay.
Third Eye Candy Jun 2013
vague games enable and our liturgies co-mingle in an inkling of the I.
your mind succumbs to the soul. the rabid rain is ironic and the font you spell ' god ' with
is all scrawl and scrumptious. you lump this dream into your dolphin of Delphi
and squeak cute symphonies of deep brood.
you choose your Oblivion.
and that's how Angels kiss. they force the Word through your Animus
and greet your weakness with squinty eyes and Lion's breath.
you're the next best thing since that one thing that had no soul for god to play with.
it never complained. you might look and you might not see
what you're not supposed too. but i know you'll be happy with lemon-drops
and long dark naps.

that's how we do,

like a crispy pillow is a cloud with a lobotomy
and all my barbed wire is wine.
Like i'm the king of unbearable sublime. you anoint the fallen. i spike the punch, judy. you sunshine.

eulogies wet the pavement. darth mauls
the halls of our peril
and the dry
sparrows

you had no love but you had a thing that went thump
when you met her. and some other cocka-mamy thing.
and your narrow view
of the wide ha ha and the mute " **** this "
and why not?

we're all caught in the same frame and the gorgons are massive. you have to elect a hero to laugh at Death with and might get a girl.
you're nothing at all and that infuriates the reality you were dreamt with. you have no kin, but your family hasn't been.... you were unhinged
from the stark grim and the tide pool. why do you think i say things that ain't been language but has always been lingua nova ?
why would i lie ? this is the scepter of the vengeful design and the glee demons of first love sipping from a chalice of lost love
with closed eyes. this is the pier and the ocean. the dime store Picasso hanging the velvet Elvis with the perfect circles
with the little
cube inside...

aching for flamingos.

or not.
Valsa George Oct 2016
‘What a piece of work is a man!’
………           ………
And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of dust’

From Shakespeare, through Hamlet
It rings down to generations
And falls heavily on my ears too
In vain, I attempt to probe into the mystery
Nay, the enigma called man
Both in the silence of my solitude
And in the learned circle of pundits

(Fool…..
Unable to find who you are
Can you venture to say who the other man is?)

Man is a jumble of contradictions,
I know….A hard nut to crack!
So unfathomable, so mysterious
At once a Satan and an angel

To the outer world I am someone
But in the well guarded cellars of my privacy
Aren’t I different?
Hiding my innards to light
As every other man

At times, I feel so proud
Excessively in love with my own image
Like Narcissus, the poor hunter boy
Fated by gods to languish
On the bank of a pond,
Over his own floating image!

However with all my strength within
Do I not feel as helpless as Prometheus bound?
Waiting for a Hercules to come
And save me from my plight
If Prometheus’ ******* was God willed
Mine is self willed…! Is the difference so very crucial?

Sometimes I feel I am Janus
Looking backward and forward
Into my past and my future
Never living in the present
Or am I more a Sisyphus
Eternally rolling a rock over to the hill
From where it keeps falling down

Sometimes I wonder
Amid the splendor, do I not starve?
Like Tantalus of Greece in the pool
Beneath the tree, with the low lying branches of fruits
Constantly eluding his grasp
And the water, ever receding before
He could take a drink!

As a poet how I wish I could
Equate myself with Calliope
Carving my mind on the wax tablet
With stylus, my pen and coloring it with my fancy
Or Orpheus, so skilled in music
That with my sad musings
I can make even Hades weep
And the rocks fall in line

I shudder to be a Medusa
Turning everyone to a stone
With my sinister glance!
Instead, I want to be one of the Graces
And never one among the Gorgons

Pitched in this gallery
Of queer mythological entities
I wonder how I appear to others
And whom I resemble more!
At times I wonder who I am...... ! Man is a bundle of contradictions and we are not sure who we really are. I invite you for a ride through the Greek and Roman mythology!
Marshal Gebbie Mar 2020
Jottings from David Bagerow's "Quickie"

Shame on she, the selfless *****
Who caused your temperature to fire,
caressed your sandy, sweated brow
To rivers of desire,
Tho she fled at poignant time
To leave you in the lurch.
Best you weave your magic touch
And promise her, the church.
Then woo her and caress her
In your happy, carefree way
Then at that moment of exultance,
Laugh and run away.

David Lessar's "To an Unread Poet"

Dave, You are right ,of course, once committed you raise an expectation and once that expectation is released to the world you are obliged to maintain face...but that damnable thing called "Life" intervenes and totally stuffs up the programme. Take the current interlude of coronavirus...the whole world has been taken by the scruff of the neck and jammed, inconveniently and complaining, into seclusion, all systems ground to a halt, production lines vacated, malls and city centres deserted, blown newspaper cascading across the deserted pavement...a testament to mans ultimate frailty when his house of cards collapses, without a whimper.
So you see, as life intervenes...we are excused from maintaining face.
But fear not, like McArthur, we shall return.
Cheers mate M.

Fawn's "Happy Trails"

Were it not the touch profound
That doth caress my feathered ear
Would thou wish a thousandfold
That I should shed a tear?

A glistened tear suspended there
in iridescent light,
While you, my love, with parted lips
Await, the ruby night.

Victoria's "Wherefore Art Thou"

Strides, he does, through corridors of lust bound lessers,
through forests of small penised dwarfs, through canyons of would be's who could be.....just to countenance the promise within your words....Dear Vix!

Terry O'Leary's "Sweet Butterfly"

You enter the portals of entomology where bugs, flies,butterflies and moths are the true rulers of the planet.
A world vastly magnified by compound eyes, of lightening lifetimes and vivid, saturated colour. A world where life and death are synonomous with the culmination of a single ****** union and the reproduction of a batch of precious pearly eggs. Yea Brother thee hath entered the portal...rejoice!
M.

Fun with Terry O'Leary

"Buried in the Sand" by Terry O’Leary

A beggar clump adorns a dump, his pencil box in hand -
With sightless eyes upon the skies he’s lying there unmanned.

He’s fallen down in Shantytown, his knees too weak to stand,
With no relief and bitter grief too dark to understand.

The Bowery blight is hid from sight, it’s covered up and bland,
And Robin Hood and Brother Hood lie buried in the sand.

"A Rebuttal" by Marshalg

So Hood lied low, despite the show ensueing without help,
One would have thought a British sort would spring forth with a yelp!

Would spring ***** to help deflect contusions which occurred
When beggar Clump adorned the dump confusing all deferred.

Whilst sister Ant, attired in scant, ran forth on spindly legs
And brother Frog with shaggy dog said "****" and drank the dregs.

It all became too much, as such, a meelee did ensue,
So all called HALT and as one did BOLT...to the local for a brew!

Phew...that was FUN & hard work!
M.

Singing the Devil's Song*

There is no Makers formula
This life depends on chance,
The way you play your given cards
Depicts your daily dance.

Oh dogma flows in utterance
From pulpits far and wide
From those who claim to understand
Eternity's vast hide.
From those who hold damnation
As a weapon from on high,
From those who claim a judgement
As their finger points to sky.
The good, the bad are absolute,
The right bedevils wrong,
Redeemed shall live eternally
The bad shall singe for long.

Old men stand in pulpits
Across this Sunday's land
To threaten with damnation
If you should cross God's hand.
"Belief" is now their catchword
Abomination's wrong
Is to seek to proffer proof of claim
....to Sing the Devil's Song.

So gather all ye faithfull
Go listen to your man,
Sing the Gospel loud and long
And pay your tithe, as planned.
...But should you find you're dying
From cancer's frozen claw
And the the Godly fail to sweep you
To eternity's gold door?
Remember my clear message
Your life depends on chance,
You live within your own good sphere
....There is no Maker's Dance.

Marshalg
After an overdose of Pulpit hogwash.
10 March 2013

Singing the Song of Angels:
A Response to Marshal Gebbie's "Singing the Devil's Song"
By Luca Anselm
There’s a church in the city with pillars of stone
And windows like sea-glass, still and alone,
A fountain, and cloisters of ivy, away
From the noise of the street, and the hum of the day.
There my father would tell me of Christ, how he died
Surrounded by soldiers and thieves, crucified,
How he wept for the women, and fell in the sands,
And loved those who hammered the nails in his hands.  

Marshal, dear poet, you have heard the priests tell
Of a god who left heaven to walk into hell?
Of a god who wept softly for men he had known?
Of a god who dripped blood in a garden alone?
Of a god who sent men with book and with sword
With eyes bright as fire for love of their Lord,
With limbs dressed in black, on altars of stone
By windows of sea-glass, still and alone?

So they give up their lives for a lie, as we say,
And toiled for centuries, long as each day--
And our money built palaces, lofty and tall
With frescoes and candlesticks, gold on the wall--
They preach with words awful and deadly and free,
Of gorgons and hell-fire, worms and the sea,
Of the last day of judgment, and mankind amassed
By the wailing of angels and bright trumpet blasts…

But Marshal, they preach something sweeter and kind--
Of a mother’s soft love, of a father resigned,
Of a still, soft voice, that comes with a light,
And gives hope to the hopeless, and conquers the night.
Of charity, piety, sweetness and love
Like fiery ***-cakes, but soft as a dove,
Spicy as Christmas, solemn and grand--
(Like throne-rooms or magic or the roar of the strand)
Then you wake, and the house smells of peppermint-pine,
And a child is laid in the crèche, now a shrine.  

And all that I long for, dear Marshal, you see,
Are the gold-blooming gardens that soar by the sea,
The mountains and dragons, the prophets and kings
And Icarus falling with fire-fraught wings,
The grey-shifting sea-lanes, the flutter of sails,
Temples on mountaintops, graves in the vales,
And Dido who bleeds from her breast as she cries
For her Love, and stares helplessly into the skies.
But more than the shadows of worlds that might be
Of fairies or phantoms or rocks by the sea,
Dear Marshal, I long for who made me a man.
And would love and give glory as best as I can.

But these days oh! sad days, the loss and the shame
In which all of my loveliness falls into flame--
Where gardens have withered, and sails have been furled,
And kings plodded off in the dust of the world.
Our cities rise higher, and burn through the night
And rear into heaven with noise and with light,
The palisades echo with horns and sound
And the churches with voices and quarrels resound.
But the statues sit silent, and some say they cry
For the shame of the sins against children. Oh! My God, Why?

And those old men—well—they taught me the loveliest things
Of my gardens of gold, and the sunsets of things,
They told me of kindness, and honor, a way
That winds to the West, where the end of the day
Breaks bright like fresh bread, and crimson like wine,
And the sun sets to purple and green in the brine.

And still I remember their words and their songs
And the churches which taught me so well and so long--
Though I’ve turned my head, to the lands where the sun
Will rise again brighter when starlight is spun,
Somewhere fresher and pale, where the cold and the air
Spreads the dew like a lawn paved of crystal, and there,
In the meadows of silver, with light in my eyes,
I will honor my god in the dome of the skies.

Marshal Gebbie's poem "Singing the Devil's Song" inspired this. It's in anapestic tetrameter, for you metric buffs. If you haven't, you should absolutely check out Marshal's stuff--it's awesome and poetry-inspiring--seriously amazing. Thanks again, Marshal!

Sepia Sown

Sepia sown as best it can
Where you and I, as one, once ran
Across, beyond a savored sea
Where lust became reality.
Where spiraled lust, entwined, entrenched
Left you gasping, pale, en benched...
a figment of a thought, now lost
Forever..at what cost, what cost?
M.

Addenum to "obituary" by V

So no one notices, at all
When golden greys of aged fall?
Except perhaps, for those who stay
To blend with every ordinary day

Plus you and I as time flies by
And too, those starlings flocking high.
That old man loitering in street,
Who eyes the million passing feet.
And she too at corner store,
Toothless face and wrinkled maw,
Exchanging cigarettes for coin
(With surreptitious scratch of groin).
Mailman, fat, long, loop mustache
Complaining long and rather harsh,
That they, gone, without a word,
Should vanish into air...absurd!

Someone in their every day
Feels the absence in the way
Details don't fall into place
And warmth is absent from the face.
M.

The Kraken Arises

From blue tranquillity where turquoise waters wash white golden sand, where brilliant fish school in myriad colour and shape, where magnificent squadrons of sleek tarpon and barracuda dash in perfect formation, grazing schools of silver mackeral through diamond flecked deep green shallows, to plunge vertically down to the depths of the black abyss and security.

Calm tropical waters which shimmer like aqua blue glass in the mid day heat and turn to simmering,red fire at the setting of the enormous, ovate, orange sun.

Sea birds flock above wind blown waves, their sharp cries a symphony of the sea, to suddenly wheel and dive en mass, to dine amidst teeming schools of flashing, shiny minnows.

The idyllic picture of a calm blue infinity of ocean framed, in brilliant sunshine, by white sands and gracefully bowed coconut palms.....and suddenly, at the horizon, a thin black line appears, It approaches with steadily, mounting speed, the coastline surf recedes dramatically seaward leaving exposed coral, mountains of seaweed and frantic flapping, beached fish everywhere. A sudden, oppressive silence becomes a distant roar. The sea birds, as one, take panicked flight... and a massive wall of water rears up and rises like a giant beast, to rush headlong, raging, at the coastline.

What once was blue and serene is now a huge cascade of violent black death and destruction, gigantically it destroys the coast, snapping huge trees like twigs, surging ashore, a tsunami of unimaginable violence it obliterates, housing, streets, bridges, vehicles, shipping, aircraft and people, thousands of panicked, helpless, struggling people, killed in a titanic, black, swirling maelstrom of inexorable violence. The wave is followed by another...and another, extending right along the coastline and beyond. Each wave larger and more violent than the last...surging inland for miles  until defeated by the accident of gravity in rising land.

Those who have survived, on high land, on tall buildings, in treetops....cling to each other and look on in horror and utter helplessness. They can only wait, in fear, for the monster to retreat before venturing down to the devastation below to render help where ever they possibly can.

Twice in the space of the last forty thousand years the Kraken has awaken and risen from the depths of the Tasman Sea to the west of New Zealand. It has risen to gigantic proportions and driven right across the Auckland isthmus to the Pacific Ocean. It has twice flattened gigantic primeval Kauri forests laying them waste, all lying in one direction, each time beneath twenty feet of debris and black mud.

Born in innocence from a natural tectonic adjustment of the earth plates, the Kraken doth arise at any time, in any place to wreak it's dreadful work upon we, who reside in our comfortable, seemingly secure and beautiful coastal idylls.

Marshalg
Dedicated to all the coastal population exposed to the threat of inevitable tectonic induced tsunami.
JAPAN. WEST COAST, USA. WEST COAST, SOUTH AMERICA. ALL PACIFIC ISLANDS. NEW ZEALAND. INDONESIA. AUSTRALIA. SOUTH AFRICA. EAST COAST, CHINA. MALAYSIA.
KOREA. THAILAND. PAPUA NEW GUINEA, VIETNAM. PHILIPPINES. TAIWAN. BURMA.

Part of My Job (A love Poem) by Nat Lipstadt

A little embarrassed by all the attention but great to hear from you Sweetheart...all fine and dandy, here...except for being forbidden to go to the beach and the park..and anywhere else except in cases of dire need..(And on punishment of prison time if caught out!)...but hey, I'm not really complaining...All for he common good, aint that right?
M.

Bridges Burnt....

Bridges burnt in Winter rain
Holds a saddened felt refrain,
Holds a touch of muted horn
Blown in passion unadorned.
Blown away in errant winds
Where no truthlessness rescinds,
Where a lie begat the night
Interceding lost love's plight.

Bridges burnt in Winter rain
Sacraments of loss remain,
Sacraments fragmented drift
Redemption clad in bloodied shift,
Redemption worn as wrong slays right
Till wrongfulness blots out the night,
Till no return this path can be
Until they torch eternity.

M.
SE Reimer's words float before me in his impassioned poem "Bridges"
allowing me to wallow in this, my own dark tangential refrain.
M.

Perchance, in a Bus Shelter

Here I sit amidst the ruin of a white winters' day
Convulsive rain and harsh wind outside, contribute tumult.
And in here, in this small shelter, there is a tension in the air.

We two sit apart, uncommunicative, remote and quite detached.
Not for any reason other than the fact that we are strangers,
We have never met, nor are we ever likely to.
She has an elegance and a stylish angularity whilst I am bald, bearded, unfashionable and somewhat overweight.
She is singularly indifferent to my presence, whilst I am uncomfortable with the circumstance that placed us in this small proximity.
We would, in truth, rather both be elsewhere.

I break the ice in throwing her a small smile and complain about the weather,
Her eyes flick across my face and immediately resume their distant focus on the rain,
She adjusts her seating to face,ever so slightly, askance.
Her choice of course, to assume an air of indifference or superiority...or adopt a measure of defense..or perhaps a combination of a bit all three.  
Regardless... I wipe my backside in exactly the same manner as does she, I  am definitely no less a person for my dumpy demeanor and friendly overture
And I really feel that I don't have to share my space with coldness and impertinence,
Better, I think, to be wet and content with my own company
..So, donning my cap and jacket, I stride out into the deluge to leave the remote and uncommunicative young woman alone and dry with her thoughts.

And then....
Howling rain and shards of wind
Pelt me as I walk
Along the foreshore wild and white
As hovered seagulls squark.
When all at once she's by my side
Walking pace for pace,
Her linen suit a sodden mess
Hair plastered to her face.

"Thought I ought to make it right"
She told me with a smile
I threw my coat upon her back
And walked another mile.
We called into a coffee shop
And sat down by the fire
And sipped a steaming latte
As she told her story dire,

"The cancer's all but killed me
My husband's left the home,
The baby's gone to mother
And I'm facing death alone."
We quietly spoke for ages
I held her hand in mine
Then suddenly she stood to leave
And thanked me for my time.

I sat there in a stupor
Recalling how it played
And felt the guilt impact on me
For judgements I had made.
Those callow, shallow judgements
Made in ignorance, my friend,
Will haunt me as she girds herself
To boldly meet her end.

Marshalg
On a bleak and blustery cold winters day.
Titirangi
5th September 2010

The Old Café by Steve Yocum

It's my go to place,
has been for years,
The Wildwood Café,
an eclectic tiny place
with a mix of old dinette
tables and mismatched chairs.
the cutlery also unmatched
and well used, old photos
and signs adorn the walls
and there is usually a line
of people waiting patiently
on benches outside.

Best of all there is this pleasant
girl, always wearing a welcoming
smile, who seems to know us all.
She knows my order by heart,
Ham and eggs over medium,
a half ration of potatoes, home baked
slice of bread, well toasted, well buttered,
home made salsa on the side, a cup of
"hot" Black English Tea. Tall water no ice.

If I arrive between the busy times, she may
sit down at my table and we talk a while,
It's not a big thing, just chitchat, I'm old
enough to be her grandfather, it's the
dessert before my meal served with genuine
friendliness and unforced civility, not often
encountered in these strange days and times, it's a slice of small town America at it's purest best, she and folks like her help sustain my belief that basic human decency is far from dead.

The food is always good, but it's the comforting embrace of familiarity and
simple warm kindness that assures my frequent return.
It's the little things in life that make living
wonderful, small moments in time felt and
recorded, this is but one of those.
written by Steve Yocum

It's the little things in life that make living
wonderful, small moments in time felt and
recorded, this is but one of those

Marshal Gebbie
  That old world touch suits you Stevo,
When I come visit your beautiful state of Oregon, We shall partake this delightful repast in the company of your fair maid.... and we shall tip her well!
M.

Scoot the Streak
One must believe in something be he misanthrope or gambler
In tomorrows omniscience or the future proof of God
The penance in a drunk's decay sets self destruct's imposer
Wether speaker phone's on disconnect or cellphone's in the bog.

Conveyance of a threat to adherents of St Selfwise
Show atheist's are proof here, in belief of disbelief,
Haunted by the images painting painful retribution
Picture sympathetic **** star's allocated hand relief.

A moments allocation of a syllogist abstraction
Shows perspective of the caliber we now reserve for Saints
A paradox regarded as autistic fascination
In a one act play of living disregarding all restraints.

Deliberately indicative of fraternal heat's expression
Notebook at the ready and deep frowning at the brow,
Question definition's collage of confusion's contribution
Do we sit it out pretending or just catch the late bus now?

Marshalg
13 February 2014
© 2014 Marshal Gebbie
Marshal Gebbie
Written by

victoria  Intriguing work...so I search the comments for help... Ah
0
Feb 2014
Terry O'Leary  Marshal, I kinda like this (I read it several times since yesterday)... but I'm still not sure what it says... maybe I'll down a shot tonight and try again... ;-)) Terry
0

3 replies

Feb 2014
Marshal Gebbie
Marshal Gebbie   A confession Terrance.. I was half cut when I wrote it!
I have no idea what it means.
Feb 2014
Terry O'Leary   :-)) Great... I'll be back in a bit... T
Feb 2014
Terry O'Leary   Well, in the meantime I've had a few shots... now I think I know what it means... hic°°.... hope I remember in the morning... ;-)) Terry
Feb 2014

Pradip Chattopadhyay
Residues
By the night one long dark road
the houses are deep in slumber.

Lucky I'm alive and awake,
can see the stars
in their vast magnitude of silence
gentle and not drunk
have love to count upon
filled with a will to live
feeling I'm almost done.

Having a life is a great reward
and with the residues
gets more valuable.

I won't cry over the lost years
would rather think
have been blessed with enough.

The stars grow blurry dots
as I slip into dreams.

I had a once upon place
and I'm grateful.

With dewy eyes
I hurry to the warmest space
beside her.

You slip into your years well, Pradip.
Your woman must relish your peace, your contentment.
Cheers mate
M.


Tony Grannell
Autumn's Sonneteer
Behold, upon yon ivy bunch, my darling blackbird sings;
I know not why nor shall I try to understand such things.
For born this morning on a song, pray hark, her sweet refrain;
to chance a sigh, oh, dare not I, for this is God's domain.

Out of the night the art of song in tuning in the day;
unknowed afore or evermore such music on display.
'Tis love begad, a lover's song, a diva, I declare,
in soaring o'er both vale and moor, this morning's love affair.

In wonder's charm, this precious bird in song to comfort me.
Alone I stroll, no proffered soul to share my company.
Yet rare this morn, in splendours all, true love like none afore;
let passions roll, in song extol, in verse the morn's rapport.

Be succour in such music found for autumn ails me so,
when summer's run, the harvest done, to rest my scythe and ***.
Of idle lands and nowt ado, to wait without employ.
Yet, hail the sun, my kingdom won, when sings that bird of joy.

Behold her charm and charmed, I am while autumn leaves still fall.
'Tis life anew, a sweeter brew when hear the songstress call.
Though winter’s nigh, with strength and will, we’ll bear our pain and fear;
'tis all to do, good hearts and true, sings autumn's sonneteer.

Written by
Tony Grannell  62/M/Spain

Marshal Gebbie  I stood out at the rock wall and gazed at the splendour of Autumn in Taranaki, as I read, aloud, your sonnet.
...and my heart sang.
M.

Dr Peter Lim
When?
When is the when
of when?  
rampant still is the ravage
which will not relent-

the claustrophobic shut-in
hearts toward gloomy moods they bend
no happy voices of kids heard outdoors
the green fields do not comfort lend-

the downcast look, the sinking feeling
are the joys and delights of yesterday years all spent?
the spectre of pain brings bitterest tears
in the faces of every continent-

oh, when is the when
of when?
such a wash-down
we could never comprehend.

Marshal Gebbie:  But isn't that the way, Dr Pete? Mankind builds his castles in the air, thrusts out his chest and proclaims himself, King of all!
...to be decimated, in an instant, by a microbe of infinitesimal stature. Oh! the fragility of it all.
Life cometh, life goeth....but somewhere, down the track, life shall come again.
M.


Al Drood
The Merman of Orford Ness

So long ago in King Hal’s time, our nets we cast upon the wave;
and drawing in did stand a-feared at what we’d caught in Orford Bay.

Entangled ‘midst our dripping catch, with eyes that stared all hellish green,
enscaléd like some creature deep, a Merman writhed as one obscene.

All webbéd were his hands and feet, his body dripped with ocean bile;
upon his head the ****-wrack grew, green-bearded was this demon vile.

Fast to the shore with awful haste we sped before the wind and tide;
Lord Glanville for to summon forth, the Merman’s fate all to decide.

Upon the quay his Lordship stood with men at arms and shriven priest,
and all did cross themselves in fear before this strange unholy beast.

“Enchain it,” cried Lord Glanville loud, “then to God’s Kirk with all good speed!”
The shriven priest prayed long and hard as to the church we did proceed.

With Holy Water, cross of gold, with candle and with testament,
the priest then exorcised the beast, who knew not what was done nor meant.

To all’s dismay he would not bow before the Host on bended knee;
and so to dungeon was he dragged to dwell upon his blasphemy!

The silent Merman beaten was, and hung in chains in for seven weeks,
and fed was he on fish and shells, yet never did he sleep nor speak.

And so at length his Lordship said, “Across the harbour tie a net,
and we shall see how he shall swim, but by his ankles chainéd, yet!”

The net a-fixed, the village folk came down to see the Merman’s plight;
into the sea they threw him then, with foam and wavelet flashing white.

He vanished ‘neath the waters like some seabird in pursuit of prey,
then surfaced laughing, chain in hand, and to his Lordship he did say;

“You thought to make me such as you, who walk in blindness o’er the land!
You’d punish me for difference!  You thought to treat me like a Man!”

So long ago in King Hal’s time our nets we cast upon the wave;
and drawing in did stand a-feared at what we’d caught in Orford Bay.
Al Drood
Written by
Al Drood  M/North Yorkshire

Marshal Gebbie:  Tones here of the Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner.
An original work in time honoured rhyme and metre.
I devoured every syllable..Bravo!
M.

G Alan Johnson
Kafka's Bug

When I shed the last skin
last year
there was left a hardened shell
protecting a patched up heart
and a petrified husk
of a soul.

You can throw your bombs
if you wish
and they will hurt inside
but I will just eat them
and **** them out
flushed and forgotten.

Sometimes my antennae
come out in a social setting
and people look at me
with an odd expression
or look off into space
a kind of awkward acceptance,
(the ones that know me).

My mandibles will at times
spit out a divine stupidity
a slacker kind of opinion
and no amount of saliva
can dissolve it
so it sits in the heavy air
stinking like a butterfly corpse.

It was an attempt
at transformation
that failed
(I'm too weak with ego),
and I'm glad that I tried
otherwise I would always wonder.

Vincent Price in a cheap suit
and a lost puppy daydream
a world full of flies, wasps and failed caterpillars
patient spiders and polished leeches...
and all I can do is write.
Written by
G Alan Johnson  65/M/USA

Response by Marshal Gebbie

Pelting rain adheres to soil
As spiders sprint and earthworms roil,
World in turmoil stinkbugs, stink
And Satan beetles disgorge ink
But thee, my budding, sodden flea,
Hath entertained quiescent....me.
M.

Nat Lipstadt
Pandemic Poems: Unclaimed bodies, There’s ain’t no anonymity in heaven.

There are more poems inside me, but I intuit it is longer fair to impose on you by sharing more.  The deep seeded infection of my spirit waxes and wanes, and there is no antidote, and unlike the virus itself, there never will be, a future cure, an inexpensive replacement cost for the spirit spent, the time and futures spirited away.

Perhaps you recall I was one mile away from Ground Zero on September 11th.  Rarely do I walk there.

The coronavirus poetry inserts itself unaided, never asking permission, a like minded, but a contra-cousin to the coronavirus.

I live in New York City, the epicenter where now, close to 800 die daily.

Normally, about 25 bodies a week are interred on Hart island, mostly for people whose families can't afford a funeral, or who go unclaimed by relatives.  In recent days, though, burial operations have increased from one day a week to five days a week, with around 24 burials each day.^^

Each dies with no last words, no Kaddish recited, Last Rites, too late, no Ṣalāt al-Janāzah or Om Namo Narayanaya.  Each one, a numbered pine coffin, and each one will have at the very least, a poem of their own, so help me god.

Buried side by side in large trench, room plenty for new arrivals,
I hear the banging, protesting, resisting, this is not the way, I was promised, my ears left pounding!  Hillel, the great scholar in this dream, reminds that “the time is short, and the work is great.”          

He paraphrases, though, “the bodies many, the poems too few.”

There ain’t no anonymity in heaven, but I’ll reconfirm that with you later.

Written by
Nat Lipstadt

Marshal Gebbie
God! It's harrowing to feel the raw spirit in a New York City man's soul.

You speak for the dead, the ailing and the fearful.

You speak for beggar in the street, the broker, quaking in his plenty, imprisoned on the 14th floor.

You speak for the cop, in face mask, on 24th and Vine, doing, as always what he must, with authority.

And you speak for the White Clad Angels who carry the dead to Hart Island and who forgive you, your fear and safer seclusion.

You speak also for we, who watch and sorrow from afar your agony, in our own fear and seclusion.
M.

Nat Lipstadt
raw is the word, oft need to lie down midday to escape the the viral infection of every outlet we use to pass these days. don’t know when i’ll go outside again, because the virus kills and wounds in horrible ways... thank u MG for the kind appreciation natty

Sally A Bayan
Conduits
In distance and in proximity...in despair
and joy...in existing and in dying...in the
bliss of love reciprocated, and in the pain
of love unrequitted...verses dance and call,
awaiting......

poetry has its own pulse, its own heartbeat,
it calls, taps the shoulders any moment,
awake, or adrift, it just can't be ignored...
even in a tangled, or weird circumstance,
it sparks like a bulb or a comet, curving
in a rainbow...riotous some days, teasing, fleeing,
then, turning up at unexpected times and places.

in every bit and breath of life, in every seed,
in every drop of dew, in every ember burning,
there is poetry birthing, growing...

deep within us flows green, purple, red,
glum gray, darkened inspirations...fleeting,
but, when time is ripe, they linger long,
giving us time to capture them all
.............................................
we sense them...we give space
we speak them, or we write them,
:::::::we are conduits:::::::


Sally

©Rosalia Rosario A. Bayan
February 11, 2020

Marshal Gebbie

  A touch, so light,
So sensitively slight
As to be caress,
In dead of night


Don Bouchard
And then
We become old men
And old women, and

We look back wistfully, and
We look forward hopefully, and

We wonder....


Written by
Don Bouchard  60/M/Minnesota

Marshal Gebbie
  Slipped betwixt the then and now
Methinks, with finger on the brow,
Thee needs a shot of earthy ***
And a wanton ****, to rub your tum.
Thee needs a cheery pick me up,
Some hairy mates to help you sup
Elixir from the joy of life
To salve tomorrows' threat of strife.
Cheers mate M.
0
Tommy Randell
From a young man's parlance, tripping from an old man's tongue; Right On, brother, Right On!
Fire breathing gorgons
Consume radical liquids
Fall into poetry repetition
Also sprach Zanabanana
Centered and pressurized
Back-up pushes against
Sphincter.

Antibiotic shortage
Carefully planned
Lower intestinal numbness
Head in the clouds
*** on the ground
I'm right
It hurts.
axr Sep 2016
he roams my mind like a tourist in a pretty town,
he’s been looking at my past and the scars,
he only loves the pretty things,
the flavescent leaves on the ground,
the flowers blooming by the riverside.
the red skies and orange sunsets,
the stentorian voices of the singers by the bar,
the pretty hookers standing near the theater.

he can’t go everywhere,
scared to enter the dark alleys,
horrified after seeing the carcass of my past selves,
covering his ears as the bombs explode near the woods,
running away in fear after seeing gorgons step out of the water.

an afraid young man
running for his life
from my mind
because he was scared that he’ll only love one mind forever
that he won’t get to stomp in the grounds of other minds,
that the dark alleys he saw
will welcome him instead
and the gorgons
will greet him with smiles on their faces.
the hookers by the theater will flash him,
the singers’ voices will echo in his ear.
the skies will beg him to stay,
the leaves will remind him of us,
he will stare longer at the scars.
he’ll feel guilty about my past
but he will leave
because that’s what he does
every single time.
Isaac Sands Feb 2013
I'm drunk again
And am thinking of Midas,
With his Golden Touch
And the Gorgons,
With their stone look,
Because everything I touch
Turns to stone.

She found me,
Hanging from the rafters,
The noose wrapped gently
Round my breathing neck
Mason jars of whiskey
And packs of cheap smokes
Wake me back up.

She whispers,
"Never leave me,"
While I wonder if
I am even alive.
I'm lookin' to the rafters
Where I'm pretty sure
I died.

Can't ******' move
As everything we had
Now goes to ****.
She's cryin' on the floor
Tears mix with blood
'Cause I'm hangin' from those rafters,
Drippin' down from above.
Marshal Gebbie Mar 2013
Gorgons in the grasses by my window
Phantoms in the corridors of mind,
Elves and Angels flit amongst the fairies
But Godhead is the hardest thing to find.

Experiments with rationale confound me
Argument, well meaning, leaves me cold,
I've thrashed it out with he who has seen the Holy See
But futility has left me feeling old.

Millions feel the joy of their religion
Base their lives on regimental right,
Alone I meet the day and feel no need to pray,
And stride with independence to the night.

I read your words of beauty for your Maker
I felt the passion living on the page,
I cried for your belief and in so doing, felt relief
For the singer not the song, for me, engaged.

So there, my beauty, lies our living quandary
For you and I the chemistry's the same.
For you with God in hand inhabit my agnostic land
And simultaneously, we exult in falling rain.

Marshalg
To Christine and Anselm, with happiness in having found new friends.
The Pukehana Paradise
Auckland
12 March 2013
zebra Aug 2019
she kneels in a fire place
******* off a midnight entity
of deformed shadows
and hinged erections

rickety tickety tin
sang clutching muffin
in Neolithic fires
caressing
tinker toy femurs *** deep

a dark heaven chants
**** ghosts and gorgons
while sea witches and dwindling waves
like goat steps
edge twilight princess

Zex depraved lord
and lick my lips
crucify her spread wide
coiling vacant maidens
yielding angel hemic tides
in rituals of *******
skinned on scarlet pavement

as she is dragged
on her knees
where moaning thighs perch
on nailed sticks
like white picket fences
and invisible doors burn
she communes with oracles of lust
that incinerate rafts of solitude
windows slam shut
like shuddering robes of thunder

and a headless god
pours her glistening tears
over his arterial bludgeon

resurrection of eros
in the Golgotha
of swarming incubi

she called to hell
i am prey
Cné Oct 2019
We bask in light when morning comes
yet tremble in the night.
Halloween must be the cause
to give us such a fright.

Ghosts and goblins haunt the streets
where moans and chains abound.
Gouls and vampires lurk in shadows
scared of holy ground.

Werewolves stalk unwary victims.  
Frankenstein is loose.
Ogres, trolls and spectral zombies
hanging by a noose

Gorgons with their "stoney" eyes
and bats with leathery wings
Mummies wrapped in yellowed cloth
with rotting flesh that clings

Pirates, gangsters, space invaders
just to name a few
All in search of "Tricks or Treats"
(or just a head ... or two).

Beware the time when darkness comes.  
Be sure the door is locked.
But most of all, to just be safe
keep lots of candy stocked.
Johnny Noiπ Apr 2018
The name derives from the ancient Greek word gorgós,
which means "dreadful", and appears to come from
the same root as the Sanskrit word "garğ" (Sanskrit: गर्जन, garjana)
which is defined as a guttural sound, similar
to the growling of a beast, thus possibly originating
as an onomatopoeia. While descriptions of Gorgons vary
across Greek literature and occur in the earliest
examples of Greek literature, the term commonly
refers to any of three sisters who had hair made of living,
venomous snakes, as well as a horrifying visage
that turned those who beheld her to stone.
Traditionally, while two of the Gorgons
were immortal, Stheno and Euryale, their sister
Medusa was not as she was slain by the demigod
and hero Perseus. That is to say, there occurred
in the early thirteenth century B.C. an actual
historic rupture, a sort of sociological trauma,
which has been registered in this myth, much
as what Freud terms the latent content of a neurosis
is registered in the manifest content of a dream:
registered yet hidden, registered in the unconscious
yet unknown or misconstrued by the conscious mind.

I made a covenant w/ mine eyes;
why then should I think upon a maid?
Job 31:1
aj Jul 2016
you got those eyes from the gorgons themselves
big and begging
to be seen

the pools of coal abyss are your pupils and they form into
cerberus's frothy, unpure mouths

gnashing and howling until the
bloodletting roars
devour me
5 of 12
dryead Apr 2017
medusa and i are pushing the
limits on stone and snakes.

you are the contents
of your context and

emotions are back,
exasperation backed.
dead stones draped,
messes to clean,
fueled by fire,
sure of rain.
Ken Pepiton Sep 2023
Remake the photocrapsh, you have it,
edit, make the moment be that moment

and we redo the steps, the dance
in the process of time come to pass…

Breathe, be a bit aware, the air,
that essential other than I, is there,

all around us, one gaseous natural
substance us and all the other actual
air breathers,
some in constant meditation,
seeking mediation between spirit and

truth that life tests if I can perceive,
the suffocation of a story, conceived
in side my suit of fingers and toes and
bones and blood and meat and sinyew.
--------


Worth any reader's taken time, to make up
for enticing any one to follow a child
in search of lost time, I'd say none taken, none
left to find
usefull, filling a certain vacuum uses fructus
we yoost to take as needed granted. As cheese
from butter blessed with a meaty rancid taste.

Pre-posed, as supposed, positioned
up, above your head, above our eyes looking
up, into the thinning air beyond the morning fog.

Hear a jet plane, and think that noise unignorable,
then remember not hearing it for days, in the desert.

The ignorability established, test if I missed a sense
shut down class, perhaps I am the audience,
in silent meditation becoming one in time difference,
my peace,
I give,
not as the material reality gives, or is the world,
not all the material reality gives?

Wondering wonderfullness, full double el full,

necessary respiring, reselecting next moment
to breathe, re-in-ex-aspir'tual inter mingling me

and thee, the e, in all out joint efforting t'i
to fructify and die to leave seed soil cannot
suffocate.

Suffer it to be so now, thinking imagined touch,
the breath you take and replace with modified air,
humanized winds waft away the stench of our city,

our only physical existence place time sequence,
relative to mysteries too esoteric, by reputation,

if one never learns to use the good, to make good
a hope, a hook, with mystery, a sur-prize, un earned,

posed to be essential experience, once, for you alone,
the prize of personal recoknowsis acknowledged,

it's your party,
you can cry if you want to, but the art involved's
below you now,

as we took your breath away.
-------------

Fun with functionality, feeling your wish
to feel included, fecundity of same sour dough
higher minds than mine let be in thee
some how sure your part's done,
passed, missed cue, or
not.
The entertained remain, unaware… only knowing

the show must go on, and on,
and people,
on the whole, be having life
in the midst of life supporting

reality, recogentle, wise
teach
as trees teach, learn as nuts do. One
touch, one mind, one time to grow old in…

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

The daily ef'
fort ification va
vacation
cancelation …
looking away
at you, I think, at you,
I aim a wish, a joyish wish
wisht at a once,

upon which all stories dangle,
awaiting your attention, caught.

In the spirit of honesty, snared,
are we honestly acting strangely
similar,
similar tastes acquired, tasting
-----------

Echo rock effect stone groaning
-digital echo effect edit if you care, imagine
Peculiar order
own self first idiom, I am
become first ideal me, being
as good as
my word, and nothing more
esoteric than a reading mind's
recollection of a beauty envisaged

as an instant too brief to measure,
¿
instance,
in contextuality
stopped, and sensed
as a fly-by why, loosed for use
in curious arts, acadamized, apt
to wink at reasons feeding war,
to prove worthiness, what rule
gives order authorship legality,

in the scattered cosmos, who
orders each star to form from
?-
Point potential pose- d
to be
energy, itself mysterious, as to d
source and precognitionation put to work
as the works of God, the creator spirit entity,
put dhe PIE- put'erthere, core cognizance
in me, my child reminds me, for the duration.
Go is an order not a game.
Dare blame the temple servants, dare
cast aspersions at the spirit speaking,

gibberish, you wisht was peculiar, your query
run with your parameters set,
so your query
pulls from the spirit of timeless truth, a quest,
a duty,
a call to you, personally fit for your benefit,

maleficence despised sufficiently
to pass as white noise under signal. Go.

----------

generic me, reacting temper-mentally,
- getting to the crescendo way on
- down the line

to form a personality, a person like me,
emotionally tied to my character, my role

in your life, I see,
the other in the air out there, at the other
end of this wind

breath of life itself, certainly not all mine,
but I did add a touch of exhalent chaos,
in a laugh,
at recognition,
gnosis lies esoteric more within,
adipisci as if adept apt
at marking old regions lost to religion
- parrot headed afternoon paradisiacal
intentional, estate realization, holy place keeper,
mental, fundaments
minimum augments
happy old form gaseous wedom form,

beholder of beauty shown to set the meme,
look into my eyes, think mere words make minds

adversarial, as proverbial order impositioning,

in your brain, the ***** holding your will, if you
will, imagine another mind, with a habit in effect,

set to alarm me, when you see
the back of my head, and I do not turn to see you,

there you are any way, any in the official plethora
of thinkable ways around the obstacle
ambition definitely a needed virtue,
the will to know there is a good way,
the will to not steal, **** or destroy to make it
true
work applying patient perfection
to your tasked self, assigned early on to pursue, this bit
bait, curious bait, as scentual instunk ready, ready
ambitious ends means in minds, imagined done
is good as done,
Jesus said…

Two or more, you and me, endlessly
actual mental agreement, gentle, peacish
way beyond groovin', we be entering coknowing

eaching out, under our stars, we all know
what they are, they are near enough to feel

we each get this one big judgement day win, once…

ready to rock on, sit in witness position, watching
time pass, feeling memories sprout recollected laughs,
take the time, use your own, it never matters

looking back, from your self awareness instant, slo-most,

snap shot scene manurable, yep, gnoshit, that smell,

bucolic, fancy pants word, for real live process smell,
earth in cogitation, using a cast of billions of cloven hoof,
cud chewers fit to a stall and a milk ******* giant calf,

holy cow, each cow contentedly cogitates, how holy
am I to live in constant motherly bliss, and no
bogus science to make me feel lowly, mere meat maker,

for the sausage eaters needed to clean the windows,
so we all can look in on each other and say hello, did

you know this reality was here,
did you appear on purpose, or were you pre
supposed to be, so be ye do be.
Done.
Or don't, being as how here you are.

The end.
Now we wait. The point being made, when we feel it

really realizably so real holy cow, wow, milch for minds,
blowing past reasons for war, what would a holy city do?

----------------
Make a milkshake and use raw eggs.
Don't die.
Here, contemplation, using your knowing to construct
a shelter for a spirit,
a heart shrine, in memorium,
an avatar, that's the word, now, image made in mind,
non projected, kept bound under covering rules, why,

Gorgons are adapting to our air, as we all imagine
monstorous men leading conspiracies, breathing in teams,

fighting like hell to push back the peace cannabis brings
the furrowed fretful brow, high, low or middle, now,
- pushing back opening cannabinoid reception link
- thinking we all tuned in, is not true,
- the sixties I dropped out of,
- some boomers lived in, to this very day.

we all imagine the excess success allows, and the weight,
we all imagine the schedule, and the cameras, and think,

what, me worry? Will you take the esoterica to task, you

imagine life reset
to win the reasoning contentiousness,
with defined ambits being wills used
to lieve be the truth that Jesus said if
he is, believe it or not, leave go you know, if it were not so,

truth itself wills you know… you asked

let thy will be done, mine, I hold in place, conserving
certain truths fed me as a child, pledged in aliegiance.

Some values from when this world was lit by fire,
some of those eternal flames, never let it go out,
lessons used to arrange children on the pyramid,

few were told by their granddaddies
to laugh ten times today, and take
the long way around the mountains, find a stream
and keep its pace, time through space at any speed,

mellow is mental, mind frames are, as well. We think
we see the world one way, but we see it always good,

inherently good, inside the air we breathe and have
our being in, mind and brain barriers imagined,
fallen
long before the reasons for the ritual, right structur-al
to form as a temple made not by hand in mental form

living stones, I presume, am I standing on your toes?
Redone dances long left go be a fantasy from the cave wall.

- tips in times of self rejection, madness of art
devoted sons, once taken to an alter by a broken father,

God, take him, I'll break him, I'll make him like me,
don't let that be thy will, I'll walk with this limp,

but I'll not lie and claim Jacob's well ran dry.

The sack of values a poor man uses to stay alive, sur-
realize reason for being fine with sufficient suffering,

enough, to let me know, it is part of the process of time,
as recorded to be remembered, once
a prophet told you to pay attention, and as it appears,
to me, from here, my entire wedom did,

pay attention, with passionate joy, no lie, not even
to get by,
get past the poison
through the gifted, take life as granted found in a
willingness to whistle while you work, like a little tea ***,

here's my handle,
here's my spout,
tip me over and pour me out… do recall, do, once, redoness

dance on rare either real or otherwise, riverdancing ductility,

until I run out of breath.
And rest.
Riverwise on the seaside, going down.

When you get old life is as complicated as can be…
so- I fforget some things.
So, they had a saying, in the early day of open nicotine and caffeine,

put that in your pipe, and smoke it. Just let be the function. Peace
happens, seemingly by chance, often in Septembers,

made intentionally memorable for a good reason. We smile,
inner chuckle counts for laughing.
"Surely Feynman was not joking"

Let that be a lesson in legalizing enjoyed ennui, put to good use.
Practicing a perfect cast, a certain hue in time...
B H H Burns May 2017
Do gorgons have bad teeth?
I feel inclined to ask
Since there can't be a dentist
Brave enough to do that task...
Alijan Ozkiral Nov 2016
Should you fall asleep thirsty, your soul will wander
to quench your physical desire.
Your soul will sample from filth-
Mud puddles rampant with pus and disease,
filling your stomach with **** stained liquid.
Unfiltered fluid flooding your gut,
poking holes through it's lining.
In the mire is a tadpole fashioned from disgust.
It plops with a squelch into your bloodstream
and swims up to your brain.
There, it releases it's toxins.

The tadpole turns to smog and pollutes you,
it expands like a gas; omnipresent.
After it's poisonous clouds have filled
every space in your mind, it rematerializes.
One tadpole is now one million.
There is no room so they gnaw.
They gnaw through your skull
And they pour out your body.
They smother you.

Should you fall asleep thirsty,
your dreams will wander.
It will find the most hideous pool -
a bath for harpies and Gorgons -
and drink from it.
These ponds will call to your thirst -
like a siren calls to stray sailors -
and show you that you have no place here.
Saw a quote from like 1935 and wrote a poem about based from it.
Dita H Dec 2014
What a way to hold the knife,
and see for yourself
that it is all not the way you think it was.
You are in control.
The Fates have given up,
The Muses are yours to use,
And the Gorgons are all petrified.
Fear not, fear not!
This is not Jason’s tale
or the story of Hercules
It is just one girl
who learned to get up in the morning,
and see the light.
The uniVerse Jun 2015
Jah
They say the pen is mightier than the sword
as is Jah mightier than the Lord
but to ignore the truth you can ill afford
for life is your just reward
so sit back, listen and press record
as i school you like a teacher
a spiritual leader
not a priest but a preacher.

It is you who is blind as i dont need my eyes to see
I use my heart and mind combined to set me free
from mankind's chains of apathy
so let me inject the truth into your vital organs
or else turn to stone like mighty gorgons
do on to others as you wish done
respect your brothers, sisters, daughters and sons
only have love in your heart
for the truth I impart.
One of my first.
Jamie Richardson Mar 2017
1

Around my great table, long dead faces from my past
Chew the empty morsels
From the golden days we thought’d last.
But we’re no longer immortals,
Running through the eternal glade.
And now as I look closer, my friends start to fade.

        2

But sat in different places, they again reappear
Though now with their aspects pale
They don’t seem to be really here.
So I begin another tale,
One I know they’ve all heard before,
It’s met with a Gorgons quiet, when I’d expected a roar!

              3

Now before me, there is Stevens; sweetest of them all,
Rise, and with a great effort,
Try to summon the call.
Yet nothing is heard, apart my thought,
Singing over to itself the one line
‘Please, stay my friends, more wine, more wine, more wine.’

        4

And suddenly I see Evans, a foe more than a friend.
He was still the same small ******,
That he was from his beginning to end.
As I was not actually certain,
Whether or not a ghost can digest,
I thought I’d answer my own question, by stabbing him in the chest.

                5

Evans just carried on talking, in that dry nasal tone,
Always elucidating,
About all that he had ever known.
And I remembered how elating
It was when I heard he had died
Everyone else cried madly, as I just quietly smiled

                6

But even faithful Evans, fades now from my view.
And as a smile on his lips died there
It’s then that I really knew,
That I am forever cast out here,
In the mind’s castle, I wander alone,
The place that’s my prison, and now my only home.

            7

So they look on me now, with pity;
And even that is leaving their weak glare.
They are turning to water before me
And I can only stare.
Oh, how I long for that time of laughter,
And to dip once more in that water.

8

But whatever did happen to those days,
When we were touched by flight.
Where is the life that we lived all ways
From dawn through to the night?
It all went past me in a moment,
Leaving only this sweet torment.
The gorgons were hideous with the gaze of stone
The sister medusa was the only mortal
The grey women with one eye and one tooth
Now one eye less
Told him the way to the hyperborean land
Therein lay the soon to be headless beast
Who could then no longer share her horrible stare
Olivia Kent Jun 2016
He told me that the world was good.
Maybe was carved from ball of wood.
Sadly 'twas invaded by wood worms.
Who spent hours daily nibbling.
However: it isn't really wooden.
Despite the pain 'tis really good, good as gold.
Our world protected, loved so dearly.
Close to ending,
Only nearly.
Protected by the word of various lords,
And mythical souls.
Hercules in full support,
The weight of the world on his shoulders.
Heracles despatching lions, well only one to my knowledge.
Gods and prophets will do their best.
Adam and Eve conceived their sons and Noah's floods and Lot's salt pillar.
Angels soothe minds of the troubled.
While gorgons, witnessed turn to stone, their snakes are hungry their dying for rats.
Samaritans will save the world, not just lonesome travellers.
And Jesus, he turned water into wine, not mine, loaves and fishes to feed them all.
Let us pray.
(C) LIVVI
Jason Myr Jul 2019
Grown and confident
I drowned in a sea of love last night
I flew through a thick den of fright
Conquered my fears
Overcame with might
Steering clear of deep moonlight
Shuddered, stopped halted by the sight
The words, the cheer, the smile
The spite
The anger the rage
That isnt me
Once
The hermit the sage
Now i find the book to burn the page and throw the memories to the fire
Hearing a sad whimper from cupids lyre

The Emotions go with them
The love an lust aswell
Grand notions within them
Locked in an iron cell
now
The boy once again has been shown
And now he turns back into stone.

— The End —