Jack could fly, had he wings,
and would die, had he not the mind.
The clouds above were his limit,
and no further would he rise.

There were cities in the clouds
made for those who could reach,
and Jack's new springboard
could launch him a hundred feet.
He could arrive just in time
to claim his prize of pride
if he jumped now.

Jack's dreams mocked him,
but with his springboard unassembled,
he told himself "In due time."

Then the day came.

His palms were sweating,
his heart leapt,
he shook with the raw ambition
he was famous for
to join himself to that city.

He ran, and worked up a great speed,
hit the springboard,
flew upward and hit the ceiling
and fell to the carpet.

Finally seeing his springboard
for what it truly was-
worthless,
with broken breaths and watering eyes
and a seemingly indifferent disposition,
he placed the springboard in his closet,
and jumped back into the hole he had crawled out of,
months before.

The Springboard.

I am a springboard
come on,try me out,

Or are you afraid of where i'll land you out there somewhere suspended inside a place where no one else is?


If this is your fear
then be gone from me
for I need you not.

So,
You are the coward I first thought you were.

And so,
Now that I have embarrassed you
Here you are.
And do you need my hands to help you climb aboard or are you able to do this on your own?

Now there, Don't you feel like you have accomplished something even though you ducked out in total fear,

And so,
off you go
Out there inside a place that I made just for you.

And by the way
there's no way out.

jo

So in this Month your Heart begins to press
For Good October promises your Due
Thinking of Delight and Travel Costs less,
And finally meeting her through and through
Her arm must have healed, given Time's duty
No more must such Fortress wall you apart
Her, Blessed Pronoun who cheers you truly
On her own Springboard she performs her Part
As you guide Witness to her own Unique Craft,
That Guideline which does greatly Inspire
Now look! Her Swan whips the Air; And the Draft
Begs humbly deep its legs to retire.
Your Hug was her Reward; Then the Flannel
Covers your Cheers on the Upper Panel.

you sit in the place
where nothing is ever wasted

each memory every act
wove into the fabric

this weaving so colourful
a garment of wonder

all that can hurt you
a springboard for loving

In response to a sardonic essay written in the recent Saturday Nation by Proffessor Ekara Kabaji, wryly  disregarding the position of Kwani in the global literary movement within and without Kenya , I beg to be permitted a leeway  to observe that any literature, orature, music,drama,cyborature,prisnorature,wallorature,streetorature , sculptor  or painting can effortlessly thrive and off course it has been thriving without professors of  literature, but the reverse is not possible as a proffessor of literature cannot be when literature is not there. Facts in support of this position are bare and readily available in the history of world literature, why they may not be seen is perhaps the blurring effects from tor like protuberant irrelevance of professors of literature in a given literary civilization.
A starting point is that literature exists as a people’s subculture, it can be written or not written like the case of orature which survive as an educative and aesthetic value stored in the collective memory of the given people. The people to be pillars of this collectivity of the memory are not differentiated by academic ranking for superlativity of any reason, but they are simply a people of that place, that community, that time, that heritage, that era and that collective experience. Writing it down is an option, but novels and other written matter is not a sine qua non for existence of literature in such situations. This is not a bolekaja of literature as Proffessor Ekara Kabaji would readily put, but it is a stretch towards realism that it is only people’s condition that creates literature. Poverty, slavery, colonialism, ***, marriage, circumcision, migration, or any other conditions experienced as collective experience of the people is stored or even stowed away in the collective memory of the people as their literature. Literature does not come from idealistic imagination of an educated person.
Historical experience of written literature informs us that the good novels, prose, drama and poetry were written before human society had people known as professors of literature. I want you my dear reader and You-Tube audience to reflect on the Cantos of Dante Alighieri in Italy, novels of Geoffrey Chaucer in England, Herman Melville and his Moby **** in Americas, poetry of Omar khwarisim in Persia, Homeric epics of Odyssey in Greece and the Makonde sculptures of Africa and finally link your reflections to Romesh Tulsi who grafted the Indian epic poetry of Ramayana and Mahabharata. At least you must realize that in those days literature was good, full of charm, very aesthetic and superbly entertaining. This leads to a re-justification that, weapon of theory is not useful in literature. University taught theories of literature have helped not in the growth of literature as compared to the role played by folk culture.
Keen observation will lead you dear reader, down to revelations that; professors of literature squarely depend on the thespic work of the people who are not substantially educated to make a living. Let me share with you the story about Dr. Tom Odhiambo who went to University of Witwasterand in South Africa for post graduate studies in literature only to do his Doctoral research on books of David G Maillu. Maillu is a Kenyan writer, he did not finish his second year of secondary school education but he has been successfully writing poetry and prose for the past three decades. His successful romantic work is After 4.30, probably sarcasm against Kenyan office capitalism, while his eclectic, philosophical and scholarly work is the Broken Drum. Maillu has many other works on his name. But the point is that Dr. Odhiambo now teaches at University of Nairobi in the capacity of senior lecturer in Literature. What makes him to put food on the table is the effort of un-educated person in the name of David Maillu. Dr.Odhiambo himself has not written any book we can mention him for, apart from regular literary journalism he is often involved in on the platforms of the Literary discourse in the Kenyan Saturday Nation which are in turn regular Harangues and ripostes among literature teachers at the University of Nairobi, the likes of Dr Siundu, Proffessor wanjala Chris and Evans Mwangi just but to mention by not being oblivious to professors; Indangasi and Shitanda.
No study has yet been done to establish the role of university professors on growth of African literature. One is overdue. Results may be positive role on negative role, myself I contemplate negative role. Especially when I reflect on how the African literati reacted on the publication of Amos Tutuola’s book The Palm Wine Drinkard. The reactions were more disparaging than appreciative. Taban Lo Liyong reacted to this book by calling Amos Tutuola the son of Zinjathropus as well as taking a self styled intellectual responsibility in form of writing a more  schooled version of this book; Taking Wisdom up the Palm Tree. Nigerians of Igbo (Tutuola being a Yoruba) nation cowed from being associated with the book as it had shamefully broken English, broken grammar etc. Wole Soyinka had a blemished stand, but it is only Achebe who came out forthrightly to appreciate the book in its efforts to Africanize English for the purpose of African literature. Courtesy of Igbo wisdom. But in a nutshell, what had happened is that Amos Tutuola had taken a plunge to contribute towards written literature in Africa.
One more contemplated result from the research about professors and African literature can be that apart from their role of criticism, professors write very boring books. A ready point of reference is deliberate and reasonless obscurantism taken Wole Soyinka in all of his books, Soyinka’s books are difficult to understand, sombre, without humour and not capable to entertain an average reader. In fact Wole Soyinka has been writing for himself but not for the people. No common man can quote Soyinka the way Achebe’s Things Fall Apart is quoted. Achebe wrote Things Fall Apart when he had not began his graduate studies. However, he did not escape the obvious mistake of professors to become obscure in the Anthills of the Savanna, the book he wrote when he had become a proffessor. This is on a sharp contrast to entertaining effectiveness, simplicity and thematic diversity of Captain Elechi Amadi, Amadi who studied chemistry but not literature. He does not have a second degree, but his books from the Concubine, The great Ponds, and Sunset in the Biafra and Isibiru are as spellbinding as their counterparts in Russia.
Kenyan scenario has Ngugi wa Thiongio, he displayed eminence in his first two books; Weep not Child and The River Between. These ones he wrote when he was not yet educated, as he was still an undergraduate student at Makerere University. But later on Ngugi became a victim of prosaic socialism, an ideology that warped his literary imagination only to put him in a paradoxical situation as an African communist who works in America as an English teacher at Irvine University. His other outcrops are misuse of Mau Mau as a literary springboard and campaigning for use of Kikuyu dialect of the Gema languages to become literary Lingua Franca in Kenya. Such efforts of Ngugi are only a disservice to Kenyan literature in particular and African literature collectively. Ngugi having been a student of Caribbean literature has failed to borrow from global literary behaviour of Vitian S. Naipaul.  Ngugi’s position also contrasts sharply with Meja Mwangi whose urban folksy literature swollen with diversity in themes has remained spellbinding entertainers.
The world’s literary thirsty has never failed to get palatable quenching from the works of Harriet Bechetor Stowe, Robert Louis Stevenson, Shakespeare, Alice Munro, Octavio Paz, Pablo Neruda, John Steinbeck, Garcia Guarbriel Marguez,Salman Rushdie, Lenrie Peters, Cyprian Ekwenzi, Nikolai Gogol,I mean the list is as long as the road from Kaduna to Cape town. Contribution of these writers to global literature has been and is still critical. Literature could not be without them. Surprisingly, most of them are not trained in literature; they don’t have a diploma or a degree in literature, but some have won literature Nobel Prize and other prizes. Alfred Nobel himself the author of a classical novella, The Nemesis, does not have University education in literature. What else can we say apart from acceding to the truth that literature can blossom without professors, the Vis-à-vis an obvious and stark impossibility.

Sur mes cahiers d’écolier
Sur mon pupitre et les arbres
Sur le sable sur la neige
J’écris ton nom

Sur toutes les pages lues
Sur toutes les pages blanches
Pierre sang papier ou cendre
J’écris ton nom

Sur les images dorées
Sur les armes des guerriers
Sur la couronne des rois
J’écris ton nom

Sur la jungle et le désert
Sur les nids sur les genêts
Sur l’écho de mon enfance
J’écris ton nom

Sur les merveilles des nuits
Sur le pain blanc des journées
Sur les saisons fiancées
J’écris ton nom

Sur tous mes chiffons d’azur
Sur l’étang soleil moisi
Sur le lac lune vivante
J’écris ton nom

Sur les champs sur l’horizon
Sur les ailes des oiseaux
Et sur le moulin des ombres
J’écris ton nom

Sur chaque bouffée d’aurore
Sur la mer sur les bateaux
Sur la montagne démente
J’écris ton nom

Sur la mousse des nuages
Sur les sueurs de l’orage
Sur la pluie épaisse et fade
J’écris ton nom

Sur les formes scintillantes
Sur les cloches des couleurs
Sur la vérité physique
J’écris ton nom

Sur les sentiers éveillés
Sur les routes déployées
Sur les places qui débordent
J’écris ton nom

Sur la lampe qui s’allume
Sur la lampe qui s’éteint
Sur mes maisons réunies
J’écris ton nom

Sur le fruit coupé en deux
Du miroir et de ma chambre
Sur mon lit coquille vide
J’écris ton nom

Sur mon chien gourmand et tendre
Sur ses oreilles dressées
Sur sa patte maladroite
J’écris ton nom

Sur le tremplin de ma porte
Sur les objets familiers
Sur le flot du feu béni
J’écris ton nom

Sur toute chair accordée
Sur le front de mes amis
Sur chaque main qui se tend
J’écris ton nom

Sur la vitre des surprises
Sur les lèvres attentives
Bien au-dessus du silence
J’écris ton nom

Sur mes refuges détruits
Sur mes phares écroulés
Sur les murs de mon ennui
J’écris ton nom

Sur l’absence sans désir
Sur la solitude nue
Sur les marches de la mort
J’écris ton nom

Sur la santé revenue
Sur le risque disparu
Sur l’espoir sans souvenir
J’écris ton nom

Et par le pouvoir d’un mot
Je recommence ma vie
Je suis né pour te connaître
Pour te nommer

Liberté

In English:

On my school notebooks
On my school desk and the trees
On the sand on the snow
I write your name

On all the pages read
On all the blank pages
Stone blood paper or ash
I write your name

On the golden images
On the warriors’ arms
On the kings’ crown
I write your name

On the jungle and the desert
On the nests on the brooms
On the echo of my childhood
I write your name

On the wonders of the nights
On the white bread of the days
On the engaged seasons
I write your name

On all my rags of azure
On the pond mildewed sun
On the lake moon alive
I write your name

On the fields on the horizon
On the birds’ wings
And on shadows’ mill
I write your name

On every puff of dawn
On the sea on the boats
On the insane mountain
I write your name

On the foam of the clouds
On the sweat of the storm
On the thick and dull rain
I write your name

On the scintillating figures
On the colors’ bells
On the physical truth
I write your name

On the awake paths
On the unfurled roads
On the overflowing squares
I write your name

On the lamp that comes alight
On the lamp that dies out
On my combined houses
I write your name

On the fruit cut in halves
Of the mirror and of my room
On my empty shell bed
I write your name

On my gourmand and tender dog
On his pricked up ears
On his clumsy paw
I write your name

On the springboard of my door
On the familiar objects
On the flood of the blessed fire
I write your name

On any granted flesh
On my friends’ forehead
On every hand held out
I write your name

On the window of the surprises
On the attentive lips
Well above the silence
I write your name

On my destroyed shelters
On my crumbled beacons
On the walls of my boredom
I write your name

On the absence without desire
On the bare solitude
On the steps of death
I write your name

On the health returned
On the risk disappeared
On hope without remembrance
I write your name

And by the power of a word
I start my life again
I was born to know you
To name you

Freedom.

As kids
We were taught to cheer for the hero
The picture perfect role model
The one we all strived to be
The one that always found a way to win
No matter what the odds

He always made the decisions
He Should make
And the only mistakes he made
Were ones that could be corrected
So he could keep his perfect image

We cheered for the hero because
When he was faced with tragedy
He didn't drown in sorrow
But instead used it as a springboard
To become something greater

He always saved the day
And everyone who needed
And he never failed to rescue someone
Not even once

So we held him up high
Because that's what we wanted to be

But overtime
We learned that the hero is just a fantasy
He only lives in comics
Because that's where he was meant to be

So we learned to side with the villain
Not because we're evil
But because the villain is more real
More human

When the villain was faced with tragedy
He did what was human
He attempted to swim
In the flood of sorrow
But couldn't swim forever
He drowned

The villain is relatable
He makes the decision
We Would make
He did what he thought was right
Or at least what was necessary
To provide the needs of
Or to avenge
His family

But eventually
He became blinded
To what he did
And he couldn't see
That he was wrong

Because the villain isn't perfect
He's just like us
The villain is human

So we side with the villain
Becuase we feel his pain
We relate with his emotions
We understand his actions

Perfection is something we can't be
So we stopped cheering for the hero
When we realized that's who we can never be
And started to side with the villain
Because he's just like you and me

put everything behind
you. they are
good lessons to springboard
from. Put
everything behind.
everything
in your life are lessons
to springboard into
the now- springboard
into putting
a little more of everything within
your life
Springboard–
this is
your life.

It’s the damndest thing when attentions focused
on one thing beget the focus of another
Like the rooster crowing the sunlight
in the cold, ungrateful weather,
My eyes scan the ups and downs
of those digital stand-ins for those I’ve known
Seeing mistakes, my own and in others,
Seeing perfection, in other’s imperfect successes,
wantonly rubbed in my eyes

As I springboard from the travails of those
with whom I may never vocalize my adoration
I drop out of the air of a life far from mine,
I see mention of a passed on spirit
Who I truly adored,
no digital fakery of half-true fables necessary
to express my love for the ideals implanted in me
by such a tongue so supplicant to the truths in that vast ether
where I used to swim in the light,
never thinking of the dark climes below.  
What choice do I have on an accidental evening like tonight?
I no longer can mask disinterest for other’s soaring narratives
when my true care has been discovered,
been pried away from that dark corner of the airborne pool so ethereal.  

My care, my pride have been torn asunder,
by a mere errant glance on a mere sideways mention
Of a massive, earthly idol, who, if only for a stanza of years
held my full gaze with hopeful smiles and ecstatic promise
for bright futures now gone into grey pastures.  

I lay here an imposter in authentic skin
if only for the sight of words on screens,
with scant meaning in between.

With each blade
Shoved into the flesh of my back
I am more flexible
In my breakage.

My skin feels hot to the touch
As the fire beneath burns closer to the surface
Than ever before.

I push myself.
To stand.
To walk.
To do anything,
Just move, ******

You knock me down.

I do not get back up.

a partial lobotomy of grey matters only to broken mothers of lost soldiers,
pentimento fading a revelation of humanized
modernized sentiment beyond the reaches of fingerless hands;
jagged bangs cut across the face of Burn-Victim Barbie if she were
seven feet tall,
imperfect,
9-dimensional shattered knees.
vote or die downward spiral protecing six-fingered man of mystery:
my name is the youth of America,
you killed my voice,
prepare to suffer in the solitary expression of the empty room.
peanuts for peanuts in a gold star self emporium with
thinking as a feeling sport contested by numerology in all matters moral.
Our very own
Satan as Hamlet,
set in a post-9/11 forgotten Washington,
drowning Ophelia in an ocean of plastic bottles non-recyclable.
meditation of the Om on a springboard of economic dis-stimulus:
up with the people!
in the midnight Vendetta,
too young to learn or sin originally,
masterful drunkenness shrouded in opera scenes from a hat.
fast track to a treble cliff diver
if you ever were my home.

The dragon saw me fly
Spread my wings in valour
Zipping across, beyond
Hoovering within and out

The bold red blood pumped
Showered zest and credence
Saw the springboard of the skies
Dreamt inside the beguiling clouds

Slept peacefully in a paradise
Forgot to guard from the fangs
******* in ripples of venoms
Gullible in the darkened scenes

Kidnapped and handcuffed on pillars
Chained in the unmoving conflicts
The chaotic shadowy cave stares
Dares to throw me in the deep pits

Fear is the only paralysis to fare
The pearls so outdated in efficacy
The bark of a feisty fighter diminishes
Love for humanity is the only key

Midway- Surprise! We saw them
Coming from a mile away.
Japanese aircrafts and ships try and attack,
And they get their butts whooped!
And then we got the idea to island hop!

Hop to Iwo Jima- Slowly.... Slowly.... Don't scare it,
It's like a nest of bees!
And we got it! Two air bases captured
And one step closer to the mainland!
Japan may be fortified, but we
Have tons of muscle!

Hop to Okinawa- this one was a doozy...
The biggest amphibious battle of WWII,
And contained the most casualties! Pretty harsh.
Maybe you they shouldn't have attacked us in the firs place!
We only meant to invade and use the island as a
Springboard towards the mainland, but the
Battle took too long.
Just weeks after the fighting ended, Japan surrendered
And we bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki!
We never got to invade...

An empty drinking glass is pressed against a wall; amplifying the voices on the other side. My ear is pressed to the words, ”outside is a secret key” - I can honestly say, “I hear…" Your words, idealizations, sentiments, selected scrawls of graffiti-type promise and viewpoints echo through the wall. Over and over. Championing outsiders…

Are there WALLS WITHIN WALLS? Can we walk through them? ARE THE WALLS ERASABLE? Will the walls tumble down? Will the walls polarize? WHAT ABOUT CRACKS IN THE WALLS? Can they hear? Can we leap over them?

DO WE build them where everything and anything follows and flows?
DO WE build them where something's nothingness tethers vapors with souls?
DO WE build them so molecular melodies of light and dark can collide unopposed?

Are these word walls of dust?  Can we move them? Can you angle between these walls? Will the walls speak a wealth of quiet surprises, poems, and meditations? Do walls give birth to improvisation?

Now some of these walls, in their moment are with no rules, self-constructed, circling dramatically, and might prove more resistant to erosion.  These are often troubling walls, no voice, no strength of decency, no laughter, which place freedom at stake. That and survival. One can be easily manipulated or yanked by an image of the truth swirling in the brick blackness of the wall. Discomforts relish now. Walls such as these are very deep-rooted and passed on for generations. Yet even those barriers eventually give way once we read the super fine print etched into the wall - a word salad of B.S., idiocy and hypocrisy.

Reach for spray-paint and enlarge your wall… maybe it enhances your world now with colored aerosols of wall portraiture's that capture rebellion and mirth. So many Walls, AND SO MANY QUERIES…

I heard a poem say, “Step out from behind one (wall) and FIND YOUR REAL SELF” – or maybe it whispered “jus walk through that door in the wall.”
Your tightly strung trampoline of words has provided a springboard for me to bounce freely over the many walls we build around ourselves.


by "ooznozz"

0
fine by myself
(0.5
was i ever)
1
starting to talk
(1.5
not knowing how to talk)
2
common interests
(2.5
actually talking)
3
talking more first friends
(3.5
a springboard)
4
leaps and bounds - crickets chirping, fast and annoying
(4.5
finding friends in speed)
5
forgetting
(5.5
never truly forgetting)

6
meeting

7
desiring

8
friendship

9
evolving

10
­losing count

1_
not needing to count

beyond numbers
an entire world

no numbers
reunions

infinity
better with others

I have all my materials, a bathingsuit and
everything my tutor gave me. I love
to dip my leg in the water up to my
knees to check if the fluids are good.

But last week, when I knew I would
have to jump, I sabotaged myself, o why,
did I have to climb the ladder of
that springboard, I could not hand

myself some help, now I could not
feel the water. I had to jump without
the checking, it felt rather nerve-racking.
So I took the leap of no return, only south.

I went in head first, lessons didn't help a lot.
It was never the brightest idea, selftuition.

The couch cushions buckle,
They want our shoulders to touch just enough
To remind me of sweet smiles and our unconventional love.
And for a moment I believe that inanimate padding, beckoning for soft skin to linger just a moment too far gone.
And for our mouths to come just too close, with only inches in-between innocence and ******.
For I know he is my brother,
The one who wipes my tears,
And who supports my head on shoulders of infinite granite.
I love him enough to call him,
But not enough to call him my own.
But the cushions see no difference as the black hole springboard ***** the edges down and we move on the track toward each other.

There will always be days I need you like oxygen,
And without you breathing is pained.
Jealousy will always burn inside like hot stomach acid,
Eating the ribs, threatening my heart.

I wish to quell the jealousy, but never the need.

Once upon a time I met a wise man on this road
Called world who told me to avoid haste and go the toad
He said, "say hello before It's time for goodbye
Laugh out loud for there'll be time to cry
Listen while they talk but oppose with silence
Obeying all constants and paying attention to the variance
Take when you are given but never forget even yours shall be taken
Trust strangers more than friends,by friends you're forsaken
Go as far as the road takes you to know exactly what awaits
And roll with the wind, surf waves obeying every cyclone as it rotates
Life is grilled chicken,chew bones while you still have teeth
And if you're given the chance to kiss the lips, **** even the ***
Scream out loud against all odds if you want to be heard
Keep toiling uphill, don't despair for every situation's hard
Opportunity comes once in a lifetime for fools who ain't welcoming
Otherwise build more enchanting doors and she'll always be coming
The sky is only a lower limit for counting your success
Call it a springboard for the ambitious to set some pace for space
Difficult moments are like caterpillars, ensure they ain't dead
And someday they'll be beautiful butterflies instead
Make peace with your enemies, friends cannot be trusted
Otherwise words like treachery and betrayal couldn't have been invented  
Say what you need to say, when you need to say it
Some simple words humans hold back when released restore a beat
Much as you get warmth from being embraced and cuddled
The same happens when you do embrace those in cold and hurdled
You may believe walking away from the risks is the answer to every question
But it's the ships that sail far from the shore that never escape mention
Do not waste time being troubled and contemplating your death
Worry more about how you're spending the billions of your breath
So go out there and squeeze sap of joy and contentment out the tree of your life
Every genius is just an idiot who ****** every moment like It were a wife

o monotony,
her hideous face allures me
so much that i might leap into the abyss,
a mediocre fall, in truth,
onto a springboard for disaster...
and not for want of false trying.

i watched a movie today that made me cry.
i can't remember the last time i cried in front of anyone.
i looked over at my mom's tear-soaked face and as
she looked back at mine,
she did not see me.
because i don't cry; right?
i'm sure she cried some more just at the sight of me.

i've gone and done it now.
exiled myself from the one thing i want,
the one thing i crave:

the one thing i need,
or else i'll wither, for a little while.
like a tomato plant that's been out
in the muggy alabama summertime;
like i forgot to water her for just a few days;
like the leaves are wilting brown, and gray, and i think:
i can save her.

and i water her day after day;
and i sometimes think i'll drown her
the way i drench her stalk.
and her roots.
and her leaves;
like i want her to live so i can live
and through her love to live instead
of living to love her.
and i have to wait and see if she'll pull through
and save me in return.

and at the end of this day,
of whatever kind it was,
i sang some songs of old,
and smoked until the ash
and dreams
were too soaked into my clothes
for my tear-soaked mother
not to notice.

the sunsets tick like a time bomb to redemption,
the seconds, like so much sweat,
mere atomisms,
symbols of this world's inconceivables,
indecipherable nothings,
whizzing 'round your halo;
rushing to drip down your fading silhouette
before it's shattered by einstein himself.

The waves of the dam
near Ogosta Stadium are raging,
and the opponent of the Glory
is insecure and afraid.

Powerful choruses
the hosts sing
because the moment is coming
for a convincing win.

This is FC Montana.
Club with heart and a century of history,
with ups and downs flooded
always striving for the top and a better change.

With a school springboard for talent,
the only one that is free.
Coaches who believe in children
and in their future glorious successes.
The traditional colors are blue, white and red -
gathering people in a sacred union.

Blue hearts tremble in a fast rhythm,
expecting the match to conquer.
Small and big fans
with songs they strive,
the loyalty for their team to sustain
and give the necessary support.

Every day they long
for the strong emotions,
they share for the future.

The landscape blurs often
as poets go about their business
crafting metaphors of unexpected delight
in forests of jangled words and visuals
unable to contain their excitement
at having conquered that crystallised
moment of love, hate and everything else
in a frozen sliver of time
inescapable from their minds excursion
into unknown unshaped lands.

Not all succeed in this endeavour
most try, few unable
to melt the metal in a crucible of colour
sound, taste or touch, to smell
emphasis and cocktail curiosity
bringing the best to the fore.

The newcomers tremble at the awe
of maestros watching their work
and dissolve in disasters.
There is the odd one that unknowingly
write splendid poetry
and when noticed and heaped with praise
often springboard into showcasing talent.

Reading the works of the masters
is always good. If they think it
is good then it must be good.
So many footsteps to follow and learn.
© Marshall Gass. All rights reserved.

your breath is the,
whisper,
of a higher being,
teaching me of
happiness unknown,

the pounding of my chest,
is the breakbeat,
of joy, in tune with,
ecstasy and unlimited desire,

lying awake, no
need for sleep, energy
renewed, by running
fingers through
your hair...

(lost in the black,
I've no need for them back...)

thirst for water, is satiated
by lips, so soft, your sweat,
sticks, to my soul,
your tears, when happy,
are my oasis, when sad,
reveal, an unknown drive...

I could dive into your
smile, springboard
off your perfection,
splash, in a beauty,
that I certainly don't deserve,

I could bask in your
intelligence, eloquence
and charm, never worried,
of the consequences
of their strength...

I would confine myself,
to rigid structures/rhyme schemes,
if it meant that I could keep you,
in my dreams...

I could love you for,
eternity,
reciprocated, I will,
you're all i want to see, breathe,
drink and feel...

i remember
that one time when you lay in my bed, still,
your head a mess of curls peeking from the sheets.
i smiled, warmed that you had chosen to stay, knowing
that i wouldn't have been able to ask you to on my own.
the movie ended, and
we crawled into bed, the springboard groaning
under the weight of two, the twin-sized duvet straining its
stitches to cover both of our bodies, although in the end
i let you have it, let you twist around in the sheets
like a kitten laying down to nap.

i came up with every excuse not to sleep that night.
loud noises, flight fright, stuffy air, but maybe
i just wanted to lie next to you with my eyes wide open.
my body took in everything: the restlessness, the
quiet moans, the perplexed face that looked very concentrated
on sleeping. sometimes you were so still i would lightly
touch your back, just to make sure you were still breathing.

do you remember?
that night that i looked down at you and cried.
i think you must have known because
when i crawled into your arms for solace, you welcomed me.
your hot skin burned mine,
and your heart beat so fast that i was still, and listened closer
(although thinking back on it now, it could have been
the watch i wear around my neck, mischievously ticking away in my ear.)
in that moment, before i let go out of embarrassment and overheating,
something in my heart clicked-
right then, i knew that i could have loved you.

the next morning, we shook hands, made our goodbyes short,
and laughed about it afterwards.

The mob of eyes watch
from the stands the shivering thing
preparing its plummet.

But the thing’s eyes behold
the clouds swelling
with blackness, a storm
somehow trapped
within the gym, bouncing
the springboard
with merciless air.

It was once a lauded machine,
piercing through the water
like a diamond. But, now I see
some pale creature, its little head
watching waves in the pool
distorted by the storm’s will.

Boos and jeers mingle
with the storm’s howling.
I want the diver to dive,
to defy every force,
to sustain an elegance
before the destructive
everything. But it just stands
there, contemplating.
And now my voice joins
the disgruntled chorus.

Finally, the diver goes
slowly down the ladder.
The wave of boos overpowers
the storm’s wailing.
I look around, and next to me
is a child staring into his phone,
I grab it and launch it
into the air, but the phone
misses the diver and plops
into the water. I watch
the diver descend as the child
scolds me for my faulty throw.

Johnny stood in the dark alone.  High above everything he would now leave behind, he took that last step — the one that would define him forever and reshape in an instant who he would then become ...

Johnny was a diver.  His father had first thrown him into the pool when he was three years old. A loud clap and enormous splash announced his second baptism.  Instantaneously, in the dark wet silence, he sank beneath all that he had previously known, and in the strange umbilical fear that now surrounded him ¬— he knew that this was for him.

Throughout his childhood, Johnny then spent much of his life ‘at the pool.’  First, at the public swim club at the corner of his street in the summers, and then later at the downtown ‘Y.’ Johnny competed on all the youth league teams as both a swimmer and a diver from ages 5-12.  

It was being a diver though that would shape Johnny’s future. When he finally got to middle-school, he was old enough to try out for the school team and made the team on his first try as a diver. From that time on, everything in Johnny’s life revolved around his time at the pool.  He was always the one to try everything ‘first’, no matter how difficult, and the team always looked to him to come through in the end when the score was close. To do that, Johnny not only needed to dive well, but he needed to pick dives that came with a high degree of difficulty.

He was proficient at all three diving events, the one-meter and three-meter springboards, and then his favorite, the ten-meter- high platform. On the high platform, Johnny was more than just proficient. It was when he was towering high above the water, with his fans watching from below, that he truly excelled.  

His specialty dive, and the one that won most competitions, was an inward two and a half from the ten-meter platform in pike position. Pike position, popularly called jack knife, was when your upper body was bent straight-forward and almost touching your legs.  This dive was the clincher that won consistently, often scoring high enough to allow his team to win too.  It was his favorite dive, and also the one that almost ended his life one fated afternoon almost a year before.

    His life Had Almost Ended Thirty Feet Above The Water

That afternoon, and from the back of the platform, Johnny set in motion a routine that he had done thousands of times before. He walked to the platform’s edge, turned around, and set himself with only his toes and the ***** of his feet on the concrete surface. He then bent his knees and threw both of his arms upward trying to launch himself toward the lights in the ceiling high above the pool.  This time though, something was different.

                 And Something Was Terribly Wrong

Johnny’s right foot slipped as he jumped causing his body to become unbalanced.  The strength and propulsion he needed from that leg was now gone, and he should have aborted the dive and just fell to the water below.  He didn’t. Driven by habit, instinct, and force of will, Johnny continued to try and complete the dive. He rotated forward in spite of his flawed take off while hoping he had enough height to be able to clear the platform on the way down.

                                     He Didn’t!

Johnny doesn’t know what happened next. All two hundred and fifty spectators below were awestruck and deadly silent as they sat and watched his failed takeoff from the platform so high above them.  Johnny woke up four days later in Memorial Hospital with his head totally wrapped in gauze and both legs braced in traction from the bottom of his hospital bed. As he stared hard at the ceiling above, he struggled to remember what had happened. He also had no clear idea as to who he was. This blank spot in his memory would continue to dominate his thoughts and bother him even more as the days rolled on.

Johnny had hit the platform hard, first with the back of his head rendering him instantaneously unconscious and then with the small of his back as he rotated forward and slammed into the front of the platform’s edge. This caused him to momentarily hang there, thirty feet above the pool, before rolling off the front of the platform and falling straight down into the thirty-foot deep water below.  His seemingly lifeless body appeared to bounce off the surface before it continued to slowly sink toward the light at the very bottom of the pool.

Luckily, Johnny’s coach and his brother Tom were lightning quick in their reactions, getting to him before he was able to submerge more than five or six feet.  The concussion from the dive, and medically induced coma to reduce the swelling, kept Johnny unconscious for four days.  When he finally did wake up, all he knew was that his head hurt. It hurt with a pain he had never felt before, and the room that he now found himself in looked very strange.

His nurse told him that hitting his head and losing consciousness may have contributed to saving his life. His relaxed body, when hitting the platform and then the water, was much less prone to injury in this state than if tense and contracted.

For six months Johnny stared up at that same ceiling. The memory of what had happened, or specifically lack of memory, haunted his waking and sleeping hours.  No matter what the hospital staff or his family did to try and distract him, he couldn’t help thinking about that dive.

            He Couldn’t Visualize It, But It Was Always There

Over and over, he tried to relive it in his memory, or what little memory he had left. The doctors told him that memory loss was normal with these types of injuries, and he would probably recall what had happened as time went on. His only previous injury had occurred when he scraped his elbow on the front of the one-meter springboard, reaching back while performing a half-gainer in layout position.  He asked his coach why, why had this happened after all the times before?  Did I not do everything the way I had been coached, and the way I was taught, he asked?

His coach said “Yes, you did, but accidents can and do happen, especially on the high platform, and even more so when your back is to the pool and your dive is executed so close to the concrete surface.” Johnny thought about the coach’s choice of the word execute, and how close he had really come.

                       So Close To It All Being Over

After six months in the hospital Johnny was finally sent home. He left on a ‘walker,’ but the doctors assured him that after three more months, the most he would need to get around with would be a cane.  Johnny had other plans.  He would have a two-week rest while he acclimated himself to being home, and then his outpatient therapy would begin. Johnny’s biggest struggle would not be his still ailing body but the lack of any clear memory. It continued to weigh heavier inside of him than any real memory could.

Johnny’s parents had a gala celebration waiting at their house when the ambulance arrived home.  All of Johnny’s family and friends were there, but the one he was most anxious to see was his dog Revo. He had been separated from him for over six months, and the memory of Revo was one of the few things that Johnny could recall.  Revo was a Portuguese Water Dog and got his name from shortening the word revolution. Revolutions were what Johnny was always working on as his dives got progressively more and more difficult. His coach was always including more revolutions to his dives as his talent and proficiency developed.  Revo seemed to know by instinct Johnny’s state of mind and would not leave his side for the next three months.

Johnny looked up on the family room wall and stared at all the medals, trophies, and ribbons that filled the space over the fireplace from end to end.  He didn’t remember winning any of them, although he knew that he did.  How can you know something with conviction and still not remember doing it he wondered?

He thought most about the one medal that was not up on that wall. Missing, was the one from that meet six months ago, the one that almost took his life and the one that would continue to haunt him until he could stop asking himself, why! On that fateful day, in spite of his failed dive, the team had still accumulated enough points to win.

Five days before the end of the third month that Johnny was home, he was again walking on his own.  It had been almost nine months since his accident, and he could once again leave the house and resume an almost normal life.  Except to him, normal had always meant a life centered around diving and his time suspended high above the water.

Johnny walked and he walked, until he could walk as far as the township pool —the one he knew he had been in many times before, and the one that looked back at him now from across the street and seemed to smile.  Was it a smile he saw or laughter that he thought he heard?  He wasn’t sure, but he was sure he didn’t like it, any of it, and somehow, he had to make it stop. Very isolated flashes had started to return to his memory about his last dive, but every time he focused on them, just as quickly as they came, they were then gone.

Part of Johnny’s ongoing (post hospital) therapy involved the pool.  He first started swimming by trying to complete one lap and then increased his distance by one lap a day.  After a month of swimming Johnny thought he was back to normal.  He did everything a normal kid did at the pool, with one exception…

Over a month had passed at the pool and there was still one thing Johnny had not looked at or faced up to. He had still not looked up at the thirty-foot high platform that extended out and over the far (and deep) end of the pool.  He would avert his eyes as he walked by it and always breath out of the side of his mouth that faced away from the platform as he swam his laps.

               There Was One Thing He Still Could Not Do

It was Johnny’s senior year in high school, and his mother and brother had been bringing work home since he had gotten out of the hospital so he wouldn’t fall too far behind.  One day before Johnny went back to school, his brother Tom had brought his lessons home as usual. It wasn’t the amount of work in the stack of books his brother carried that got Johnny’s attention, but the brochure stuck between two of the lesson plans that stopped him cold.

The brochure announced that in two more months that same swim meet would be happening again. It was actually on the same date as last year’s meet, and his name had inadvertently been added to the list of contestants. All that was needed now was his signed confirmation. This was Johnny’s senior year and his last year eligible to compete for the city medal, the one most coveted by all high school boys before they moved on to college or adult competition.

For the longest time, Johnny stared at the brochure until it seemed to burn right into his hands.  He knew in his heart that until he got past this, nothing else in his life would matter. He walked to where Revo was sitting patiently and looked deeply into his best friend’s eyes. He then sat holding him for what seemed like an eternity before he got up and walked back into the kitchen. Johnny then picked up the phone and called his old coach.

Coach Brackett said, “I think it’s too early, but I’ll let you know when you’re ready. I’ve been watching you swim, and no-one ever expected you to come back this soon.”  Johnny said: “This is my last chance, Coach.  In September, I’m off to college. I don’t want what happened last year to follow me there or to have the failure of that day be the last thing that anyone remembers who watched me dive. Mostly though, I have to complete that dive for me.”

                  He Had To Do That Dive For Himself

Johnny’s memory had also started to come back, but his recollection of that dive, and last year’s meet, were still fuzzy inside his head. “It’s your choice alone Johnny, Coach Brackett said, because at eighteen I can’t stop you. But what did your parents say when you discussed it with them?”  “I’ve told no-one else but you coach, and I’d like to keep it that way for now please.”

After hanging up the phone, Johnny walked deliberately to the mailbox.  His future and redemption were now enclosed within the envelope in his hand. His memory might still be spotty, but the determination inside his heart was never more resolute. He wondered why he felt so strongly about doing something that he still had no clear memory of …

Johnny’s strength and body weight were now almost back to where they were before the accident. He was able to sit upright in a chair for long periods, and it was decided that the time had come for him to return to school. His time at the pool swimming laps had worked wonders, and everyone was glad to see him back. They encouraged Johnny with his rehab as he left for the pool each day, but no one expected him to ever compete again.

If the faded memory of that day almost a year ago had plagued Johnny’s psyche, the anticipation of doing it again was now ten times stronger than before the accident. He would go to sleep at night praying for his amnesia to remain and keep the memory of that afternoon at bay for at least two more months.  As the meet got closer and closer, word started to leak out.  Well-intentioned family and friends started calling Johnny’s folks, concerned about his safety and welfare.

The tension at home became almost as bad as the trauma of what had previously happened.  There seemed to be no place for Johnny to escape, least of all inside his own mind.  He started spending more and more time alone. Through all of this, he remained respectful but refused over and over again to back off and withdraw when his parents asked.

Johnny thought about the one-meter, the three-meter, and then it would happen again.  He could see himself walking to the platform ladder, right before his mind would go blank.  Would he slip again on something that for years he had always stepped through, or would he climb the long ladder to the top and only have to turn around, and in his fear and humiliation, climb back down? He thought he knew the answer, but just thinking it was not enough. He had to make at least one more dive.

Johnny’s coach told him that he could do any dive he liked as long as it was facing forward off the platform.  That way he would be almost assured that if it wasn’t a high scoring dive at least it would provide a safe pathway to the water. The coach knew what Johnny might be thinking, and he wanted to take the pressure off by making his only choices perfectly clear.

Johnny listened.  He liked Coach Brackett very much and didn’t want to disappoint him, but he knew a forward entry dive just wouldn’t cut it.  That’s not the way you enter the water from an inward two and a half.  That dive had been his signature dive, and only by making it his dive again would he achieve the peace he so desperately needed. It would then release the freedom inside of him, liberating him from always looking back, and allow him to finally move on.  

He practiced the dive over and over in his mind until he thought his head would explode.  Every time his memory would go blank just as he jumped up and back, after pushing off from the platform, and always before starting his rotation forward. He couldn’t actually practice the dive because someone was always watching. Many nights he thought about sneaking into the pool and getting it all over with but never did.  He wanted this dive to be in front of the same people who were there to watch a year ago. What seemed only twelve months ago to them felt like a lifetime to him now.  He continued to visualize both the dive and the future it foretold.

He wondered to himself; why is the thing that used to seem the easiest now the hardest? He wondered until he could wonder no more.  No answers would come, and the hardest part was still out in front of him.  Would he be able to climb those rungs to an uncertain future— one that called out his name with a snicker in its voice?  He knew the answer was in only one place and in only one performance.  He knew things now that he never wanted to know again. He trained incessantly on the two springboards for the next seven weeks while doing only front entry dives from the ten-meter height.

The day of the meet came, and his parents were livid. Both had been hoping and believing all along that he would finally step down and their wishes would be obeyed.  With a kiss to his mother and a look in his father’s direction, who was now looking away and would not say either goodbye or good luck — Johnny walked out the door.

All was quiet as Johnny entered the pool through the southside door.  His coach was at the judge’s table, and all looked normal.  Johnny changed quickly in the locker room and started his warmup.  He had a series of three dives he would perform today, but he would only practice the first two.

After the one and two-meter springboard competitions, Johnny was tied for first place.  There would be a twenty-minute intermission before the high platform competition would begin, and Johnny used this time to sit in the locker room’s whirlpool and gather his thoughts.  It seemed like a really fast twenty minutes when he heard his name come over the pool’s public address system to report immediately outside.

When he got there, he saw a great commotion and at least fifteen people standing around the judge’s table.  He saw his coach in the middle arguing vehemently with the head judge.  When Johnny approached the table, his coach told him: “They’re not going to let you dive from the high platform. They said it has something to do with insurance and your being hurt just a year ago. In their minds, the springboards were one thing, but the high platform is something entirely different.”

“More arguing won’t do any good” the coach said, “I’ve tried every tactic I know.  You’ve had a good meet Johnny, and everyone knows you tried.” With that, Johnny went back to the locker room. He felt like his entire life had been pulled out from under him. He went into one of the stalls and closed the door behind him, sat down with his arms folded over his head, and cried.

All time seemed to drift away until Johnny heard a door slam and a loud bang as if all the lights had just been turned off. He didn’t know how long he had been in there, but when he opened the door all he heard was the quiet.  When he walked through the door to the pool it was almost totally dark, and everyone was gone.  The only lights in the building were the one’s shining from the very bottom of the pool and the single light attached to the platform railing at the top of the ladder. Johnny looked up at the platform which was shrouded in almost complete darkness.  He now knew, unlike ever before, just exactly what it was that he had to do — and he had to do it now!

                              It Was His Moment!

His entire life flashed in front of him in that instant. All that had ever mattered to him surfaced within him now.  As he climbed the ladder and finally arrived at the top of the platform, he looked down at the small pile of clothes that he had left on the floor.  As he walked slowly toward the dark edge, he thought about them and smiled.

For the first time he realized that it was much more than just his clothes that he had left down there behind him. He had stripped off something that for almost a year had dominated his waking and sleeping thoughts, something that had held back everything in his life up until today, and something that was almost gone …    

As he stepped forward, his future was released from his past. No fear had made it to the first rung of the ladder and what would happen in a few more seconds only he would ever need to know.

    
In the darkness, only wet footprints led to the southside door. All fear had dissolved powerless in the cold dark water behind … and there it was to forever remain!

The tide is coming in.
Off in the distance, I see young swells building, aging, ignorant of whats to come.
Using the ocean floor like a springboard to launch itself into a force to be reckoned with.
All these individual elements, the ocean's collective energy divided among its waves; fractals of something much larger.
In their greatest moment, they come crashing down, seemingly ceasing to exist.
I stand on the shore, a bystander, observing the energy return to the source, ripples being created from the death of waves.
Their relevance lasting as long as the shores remain stained.
And in this moment, I feel better about my own mortality; knowing that my relevance doesn't end when my body dies, that my energy just goes to feed the swell of another wave to come.
And I remain a pillar, unmoved.

She thinks me a
springboard. A
project piece to
project to and then
to leave. I've known
more people that
believe in me
then I've known
me's that believe
in me.

Dark spotted room luminous
stage flare and fire
from the bandstand
reverberating energies
I hold a shipwrecked bottle in my hand
people are screaming
to the transient
and the metaphor
and the silent sky
I hold wicked form in my other hand
KURT     VONNEGUT    PLAYS
(Not a piano)
The room is faster
and chuckling heavy set back row phone call
girl scratches her lottery ticket
It's freezing out
I got a job at a movie theater, new time starts NOW
and we're all trying to make something out of tonight
Sylvia is shaking through the ferocious storm
that Sylvia, the same colors as an
inspired tattoo belonging to a year
everyone's on about
including ** Chi Minh City
and all it's superhighway narrowness n sunshine
What a hell of a year this one has been

(Blackout---Springboard--Parade--Pendulum--Butterfly--???)
­
SO LONG!
SEE YOU LATER!
THERE'S AN EASTERN SONG
I MUST PLAY FOR THE CHILDREN OF VIETNAM!
IN A LANGUAGE THEY DON'T YET UNDERSTAND!

After the show is done
I emerge and the modern rebel
puts on his jacket where written on his back with hard tape reads

“WAR IS OVER”

the hysterics go back to their usual voiceless catatonia
and I wonder at that moment
how we can feel so alone
with so many of us here.

We can manage a dull afternoon
When punished lilies
Imitate the army of rebel waters
Sneaking away on tiptoe
From an empire of lawful soil

Watchful of flood signals
We will wait for a jealous wasp
To peel back the detonators
For springboard demolitions
Fancied on limp petals

While soldiers of nectar’s plight
Talk over plans with bees
We see an enemy of discreet magnitude
Inside us, a showering of infernal degrees
Our hearts soaked in criminal teas

We can manage a dull afternoon
When punished lilies
Imitate the army of rebel waters
Sneaking away on tiptoe
From an empire of lawful soil

Watchful of flood signals
We will wait for a jealous wasp
To peel back the detonators
For springboard demolitions
Fancied on limp petals

While soldiers of nectar’s plight
Talk over plans with bees
We see an enemy of discreet magnitude
Inside us, a showering of infernal degrees
Our hearts soaked in criminal teas

We can manage a dull afternoon
When punished lilies
Imitate the army of rebel waters
Sneaking away on tiptoe
From an empire of lawful soil

Watchful of flood signals
We will wait for a jealous wasp
To peel back the detonators
For springboard demolitions
Fancied on limp petals

While soldiers of nectar’s plight
Talk over plans with bees
We see an enemy of discreet magnitude
Inside us, a showering of infernal degrees
Our hearts soaked in criminal teas

We can manage a dull afternoon
When punished lilies
Imitate the army of rebel waters
Sneaking away on tiptoe
From an empire of lawful soil

Watchful of flood signals
We will wait for a jealous wasp
To peel back the detonators
For springboard demolitions
Fancied on limp petals

While soldiers of nectar’s plight
Talk over plans with bees
We see an enemy of discreet magnitude
Inside us, a showering of infernal degrees
Our hearts soaked in criminal teas