Best Weltschmerz Poems
It's Not My Job
by
Rick Folker
It's not my job to teach you of
love;
to pull you, pry you from your
place of hate.
It's not my job to lift you
from willful ignorance
when you elect a president
the despot whom
you elevate.
It's not my job to offer you
truth and beauty
in place of your racist, supremacist
warped world-view;
your wicked weltschmerz
you fearfully embrace.
It's not my job to point you
towards the weeping women
whom mourn their lost children,
taken too tragically, too violently
by the guns you make.
No more, no more can I convince you
that this country is in love with death,
No more, no more can you ignore
The glaring cynical game you
continue to play,
The absurd theatre
the thirst for more victims
will not abate.
The truth lies bare
for those of us willing to
educate.
So did you hear me calling?
Of course, I mean you
Indignation you're feeling
Just proves that it's true.
And your Bible says clearly
That you’re born in sin
It’s a paradox truly
Your virtue can’t win.
Did you know that all sinners
Are known by their tribes?
There are fallen believers
Quite sure of God's vibes
And satanic receivers
(Whose thankfulness reeks)
Both so full of themselves that
Their pride only speaks.
There is Democrat Weltschmerz
Republican pride,
Racist Tea Party Christians
With Hitler Youth ride,
Many strongly committed
And ignorant fools,
Largely wasting their lifetimes,
Contempt for God’s rules.
There are tribes of confusion
And tribes of lost souls
Tribes of courageless people,
Their heads stuck in holes
Only one lot worth mention,
Just guess if you can
It’s the group that God loves most
The offspring of man.
Do you think Christ was bothered
By what high priests said,
That He hasn’t a clue if
Inside you are dead?
No explaining His mercy
No sense in His Grace
It seems love of our Father’s
All over the place.
Do you drink wine with Satan
Or bathe in Christ's blood
Were all ancestors living
Right after the flood.
When it comes to the future
Please don’t roll the dice
You can trust in God’s justice
Or else pay the price.
Brian Johnston
October 22,2015
Saša Milivojev
WELTSCHMERZ ("WORLD PAIN") - THE PAIN OF THE WORLD
In this century withal
Rivers of blood still flow
Bombs echo
Children are being killed
Heads are being severed
Millions are starving
Diseases are devouring
And you are singing
The gallows are trembling
In the valley of the fallen
In the salty tears
With our putrescent sores
We fall prey to the crows
Our festering entrails
For the starving wolves
A shattered house
Little boy is weeping
Over the body of his Father
That forever now is sleeping
Schools Temples and bridges bleeding
bloodstained wedding guests are screaming
Little white coffins
Maternal howls
Above Uranus
Hear the painful growls
Delirious poets are prattling
And not a word are you uttering
They blinded you
When they raped your daughter
Strangled ‘er with the wire
They abducted your brothers
Tortured in the cellar
Shattered their fingers
With ferrous clubs
With a saw agape their skulls
Their legs wagons lacerated
Their limbs with machete dissected
Flayed the skin of their backs
Dumpers of corpses
Bulldozers to the grave consigned
Roads run over their bones in cement confined
Bodies filled the bottomless well over the brim
Come closer
Look within
The infinite darkness of the abyss
To hear the silence of the universe
A spark is glistening in an innocent eye
Children are helplessly falling to the dust
Venomous saliva dripping from their mouth
As their rosy intumescent faces bust
In their closing prayer
Reverends to a cross immured
Laughing at the stake they burned
Tender ivory cherubs
Flew away like a flock of birds
Rip my heart out from my chest
As I am unsleeping
May your golden ship catch wind away from shore
To raise your glass of blood once more
As you feast your eyes in silence
Saša Milivojev
Translated by Ljubica Yentl Tinska
visit: www.sasamilivojev.com
The melancholic, cold rain makes me sad.
In the days of loud silence,
rain always called on you.
Your way into my thoughts and tears.
*
Color of lead on the sky; everything is grey.
The blue is in your eyes only.
Come along and listen with me
to the drops dripping down the window.
Like once upon a time down to our curls,
while in love and smiling,
we kissing each other under the clouds.
*
Your head is on my heart.
I am silently touched by your skin.
The gentle warmth of voice.
Your hands on my face heal everything.
*
Heavens Weltschmerz for all sad loves.
Maybe spring will bring something new.
New love and joy.
*
Piano music is somewhere in the distance.
A full circle day is approaching.
Announcement of the golden days in Marrakech.
With flower petals on the bed
and the view of the sunny oasis day.
---#---
In My New Year’s Resolution I Vow
I solemnly declare under oats on the libel to walk
N aked with only a bellow with fellow utopians
M istletoe tattoos on my fingers criss-crossing in
Y onder to shepherd ‘blue sheep’ congregations
N oel novel nobility flying pigs dressed in purple
E merge from a smoke screen of incense sandal
W ood scandals on their quest to capture the moon
Y ou’ll have to bear with my golly batik on grizzly
E nchanted magic spills hailed comet drizzle and rain blows
A biding by enlightened dark chocolate scripture
R ock solid marsh mellows on twelve tables of sand
S unk quick in fluffy cuddles once dogma eats pie
R econfigured lolly popped pious conscription I resolve to
E nshrine on altar egos chapels custard apples
S weet sin of saviour and savages prophets and whiz
O n privets hedging bets on riveting cross bows in
L ucid delusions of light hearted senses’ scent
U surping snakes in the garden’s modest seduction in
T ransit transgression staking boundaries sake
I lluminated I will fly from chandeliers promise to
O bey only mocking jesters fooling the fools
N ever more will Nirvana shout at the Buddha
I n hearse verse and chapter closed by conscious
V irtue vilified by voracious villains vying for
O ms rosaries dumb bells from myriad towers
W hen my Weltschmerz and Zeitgeist tickle my treacle
22nd December 2016
It would be like a Cessna hitting a mountain;
Weltschmerz; rain falling on a tin roof.
So let me work my garden with burnt hands,
Thoughtless as a spade in cold loam.
Let all words fail as the day reduces.
We all love the holes in which we put our heads.
Man, seldom a straightforward animal,
Long lost in the deserts of weariness,
Wants to flee from a life of denial,
Wallows no less still in piles of warm ash,
And feeling hurt, he nurses hidden strife,
Busy harming the self his very own
With some weird philosophy of life
That plunges him in world to him unknown.
World’s in world-wide pain as per German tongue—
Weltschmerz, modern word coined by Jean Richter,
And weltanschauung, one more and also young,
A vast field where the world’s lost in welter.
We see pain, angst in many urchins’ eyes
That beg for crumbs and still cherish a dream,
A look that child's raw innocence espies
Still, aims one day to claim his choicest cream.
Eyes of a house-help show this no less clear
Than householder’s deeply dunk in hardship,
Both dream of making good, both gag a tear,
None of them knows to laugh nor freely weep.
Take daily grind— working in rank odour,
Pitiable public passage, crowded
Journeys, jostles—the rush for earning bread,
The woes of world seen seldom ever ere.
Take a mid-age man, ill at ease, in mime,
And women, hair-dyed, face done up, pushing,
Prancing, pretending having a great time,
What with sad eyes, drunk or doped still showing.
In false bluster, all these men and women,
Unable, woes of their harsh life to change,
Mock at the dangers in a disco den,
And behave in ways bordering on strange,
Running away from reality's face,
Hiding their pain, they try hard to escape—
Escape from this never-ending rat-race,
Yet, cannot stop this reality's rape.
The truth of truth: we all passengers are
On a galloping horse on hire, Desire,
Maverick, even as a movie star,
Rich much as poor, all plunged in a deep mire.
Fortunate few that might face no travails—
The rich Americans— spending today,
Which, for long years their progeny might pay,
Who’d survive this rat race that all us ails?
They that cherish weird dreams and chase mirage,
Not else but very own future mortgage.
________________________________________
Ode |05.10.2011, revised, June 2023| dreams
Poet’s note: Weltschmerz: (welt = world, schmertz = pain), apathetic or vaguely yearning outlook on life, and weltanschauung: (welt = world, anschauung = perception), philosophy of life, conception of the world.
Senescence concomitant
and best buds with malaise
despondency inescapable as
infirmity ages formerly young gals guys
though age just a "number"
father time not shy to apprise
every mortal wakes to the
inescapable truth that never dies
each living species mainly
one known as *****sapiens
allotted longevity not much
greater than highest
double digit which existence flies
at speed of greased lightning,
which passage of years
zip faster -- this strictly my
perception as one nears
cessation finally escaping
nasty, short and brutish
how to remain youthful lies
plugged by health
and fitness tricksters,
"FAKE" staunching
getting older decries
the science of biochemistry,
gerontology, kazoo whist tree, pathology...
though many consumers
spend bajillion dollars to disguise
and/or feebly stave off their demise,
oft times, yours truly (me)
doth not despise
the finality frontier, whereby body electric
ceases to function and this poet cries
against psychological torture of anxiety/
panic attacks linkedin to penuriousness
physiological symptoms
even with prescription medication
i.e. racing heart, chronically
sweaty palms, irritable bowels,
thus there ought not
be cause for surprise,
where salutary marital
bond bereft, when he dies...
finally free and clear
of Lake woebegone angst no lies
yet not courting danse macabre,
but occasionally sighs
pondering courtesy visit
qua grim reaper who allies
him/herself to every storied birth,
whose wish to live
long as Methuselah
an aspiration this
scrivener doth advise
against, no friends family,
nor lovely beau ties
remain, a near reality,
whereby alienation, I cannot excise
thus toy with suicidal ideation,
though ye might chastise
elusive joie de vivre impossible mission
to attain plus world growing
darker shadows along edge
of night with decreasing eye
cite, and gloomy prospect
Medicare maybe axed...
accursed fate eternal sleep
destiny or her her offspring
might hopefully exercise.
Yours truly does readily confess
the following poem crafted more or less
approximately a year ago,
when coronavirus (COVID-19)
wrought havoc creating global mess
when panic against collective temple did press
a feeling of melancholy and world-weariness.
Along luscious green acres banks steep grade
(in close proximity to
Petticoat Junction) naturemade
Perkiomen Valley watershed,
verdant landscape displayed
yours truly, (a garden variety
proto human) arrayed
solely donning birthday suit,
whose fifty plus shades hair gone grayed,
i.e. one infinitesimal measly mortal
whiles away hours, laid
back days of his life as
the world wide web turns
comprising second decade
of twenty first century
civilization, where
coronavirus veritably waylaid
furlough afflicts populations feeling betrayed
entire fabric *****sapiens staid
threadbare existence now best describes
chock full of endemic ennui proliferates,
where vast majority of people afraid
to leave their houses lest COVID-19 played
greater havoc, whereby society already upended
unemployment factor at record high since...
Great depression witnessed
courtesy somber parade,
ninety years ago benchmarked
from May 11, 2021,
an invisible oppressed heaviness weighed
down the madding crowds
aghast how stock market trade
hit rock bottom making paupers,
ill fate clobbered breadwinners
circumstance none could evade
October 29, 1929 haint no charade,
when Black Tuesday hit Wall Street
bitta bing bitta bang bitta played
bitty bitty chitty chitty bang bang
linkedin with irrational exuberance portrayed
American economy supine splayed
versus March 11, 2020 characterized
coronavirus outbreak as pandemic
by the WHO subsequently signaling
Trump cited "fake news" and not dismayed
to expedite drastic measures
none would impede golf nor Mar-a-Lago
leisure him sipping lemonade
acid test tee zing 'bout quaffing electric kool-aid
without getting his doggy dimples in a bunch
he grudgingly complied and obeyed
purveyors (governors) and Anthony Fauci
complete United States government shutdown
approximately mid/late March 2020
which undertaking generated brisk business
grim reaper experienced
(still does) protracted heyday.
Along luscious green acres banks steep grade
(in close proximity to
Petticoat Junction) naturemade
Perkiomen Valley watershed,
verdant landscape displayed
yours truly, (a garden variety
proto human) arrayed
solely donning birthday suit,
whose fifty plus shades hair gone grayed,
i.e. one infinitesimal measly mortal
whiles away hours, laid
back days of his life as
the world wide web turns
comprising second decade
of twenty first century
civilization, where
coronavirus veritably waylaid
furlough afflicts populations feeling betrayed
entire fabric *****sapiens staid
threadbare existence now best describes
chock full of endemic ennui proliferates,
where vast majority of people afraid
to leave their houses lest COVID-19 played
greater havoc, whereby society already upended
unemployment factor at record high since...
Great depression witnessed
courtesy somber parade,
eighty nine years ago benchmarked
from May 11, 2020,
an invisible oppressed heaviness weighed
down the madding crowds
aghast how stock market trade
hit rock bottom making paupers,
ill fate clobbered breadwinners
circumstance none could evade
October 29, 1929 haint no charade,
when Black Tuesday hit Wall Street
bitta bing bitta bang bitta played
bitty bitty chitty chitty bang bang
linkedin with irrational exuberance portrayed
American economy supine splayed
versus March 11, 2020 characterized
coronavirus outbreak as pandemic
by the WHO subsequently signaling
Trump cited "fake news" and not dismayed
to expedite drastic measures
none would impede golf, nor Mar-a-Lago
leisure him sipping lemonade
acid test teetotaler - tee zing 'bout
not quaffing electric kool-aid
without getting his doggy dimples in a bunch
he grudgingly complied and obeyed
purveyors (governors) and Anthony Fauci
complete United States government shutdown
approximately mid/late March 2020
which undertaking generated brisk business
grim reaper experienced
(still does) protracted heyday.
Written: May 18, 2024, For Unseeking Seeker Contest
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Languid breath dwindles, scrounging panacea air
quiddity remorse core conveyed mindful glare
seraphim guilt throe stems from mind sapidity
heart wispy ousts weltschmerz, hatred morbidity.
Gentleness key squeals heart-tangled inner thread
unboxed core lead ecstatic heart hobnobbed tread
Is my heart-mind rancor overlaid by hazy myopia?
milk with ice is a quintessential pillar of utopia.
Shepherding pragmatic apotheosis wide universe
hampered altruistic love ephemeral zeitgeists verse
emotional outbursts during meiosis—placate impact
forging forfend feeling fallacy focusing on facts.
Seeking soothing sense as silk-satin smoothness
fetches forbearance, fosters faith hearty-filled fewness
ripple aposiopesis words transcend catharsis sight
sate sinew, eschew omniscience, heed hubris might.
Living stubbornly with caesura implies life-moored
we are living offhand, leaving us brittle but allured
Issues occur wisely rather than haphazardly sought
willing for heart-mind coo to fulfill what's taught.
With authenticity, grace, sympathy, and tolerance
respect all people, despite views or providence
uphold merciful attitude and passionate mind
brain-heart harmony molded by cosmic pull blind.
Forever, Love!
I will love you, beloved, forever, though fish to your sea,
where my poetry’s bones may be sand on a beach (waves divine
on land’s shore): Clay’s discovered that whispers (would rhyme), “Are you mine?”
still, no poem steals rest in sea’s harbors; rents slip on soul’s quay.
Let me never think LOVE’s just the love I’ve requested (trade this
for a that!) I’m so dumb I dismiss what another soul gives
me with no chance to taste it? We drown in sweet desert! Who lives
expectations and finds that gain lies in the fog of such bliss?
How can Love be things given if folks won’t receive? A child’s born
great receiver, but giving seems hard when a suitor’s at hand,
expectations consume us: past fear makes us feel on remand
from a criminal past. Most corralled sheep don’t like to get shorn.
To keep trusting most friends (though at times their words hurt us) seems small,
why should I disengage then when lovers bring crap to my door!
Have I not done the same; am I quick to cast blame? Is encore
what I long for? Let “Love” be defined as “Who’s taking my call?”
Let me practice receiving, and ways I can give (that show heart),
Most receiving seems easy to all (is perhaps that a rub
that we all should give thought to?) Do gifts say, “I SEE you?” Do pub
friends say drunkenly, “Buy you a beer?” where next round’s a tool’s Art?
LOVE, your feelings all gift me, just seeking them lifts me to heights
few may know (though I never may witness words touch you, effect
brought to life). Might tear stain, joy melt ice, no write views a defect?
May the Weltschmerz (in love) I do battle with lead you toward lights!
Brian Johnston
26th of May in 2020