Best Xvii Poems
The Donald supporters were pissed
But Dorian Gray they have kissed!
Measured in fathoms
Their brains’ empty chasms
All hail the chief narcissist
Author's Note: Sunshine Smile's recent post, "Showtime," inspired me to write this. Her poem really speaks to me.
"The Picture of Dorian Gray" is a philosophical novel by Oscar Wilde, first published complete in the July 1890 issue of Lippincott's Monthly Magazine as described in Wikipedia. I urge those who are unfamiliar with the story to check out the plot.
I do understand people's anger. It's unfortunate the rest of us didn't do more to retrain and help the folks between the coasts--like the former coal miners. I really liked Bernie Sanders. Hillary was more a representation of the status quo. I think she lost the election when she called Donald supporters, "deplorables." She didn't get it.
"Make America Great Again," is doublespeak for, "Take advantage of the downtrodden and poor." We all share the same planet and its resources. There will be blowback from what we are doing in this country. No wall or immigration ban will keep us safe from ourselves and what we represent. We have not yet embraced sustainability, and I sincerely doubt the richest cabinet in history will have an intent to help miners. Mine owners are the ones they want to help. Stay tuned world. It is "showtime."
I do not love you as if you were
A flow of pink petals billowing a fire;
I love you as I love certain things secretly
Within the shadows of my heart
I love you as a plant that does not bloom
But holds hidden inside itself: the light of all flowers,
And thanks to your love, living darkly in my body
Is every rich aroma that rises from the earth
I love you without knowing how, when or from where
I love you directly without problems or pride
I love you this way because I have no other way
Only this one, in which there is no you or I
So close that your hand upon my chest is mine
So close that when I yawn, it is your sleepy eyes that close
BACK TO NATURE – JOURNAL XVII
The frogs, the turtles have returned
The river has been cleansed
And I can see some fishermen
Wading out round the bend
Thank heaven those in high places
Have honored their pledge
To clean up our once fair Bawasee
Have brought in a dredge
In these last few I would dredge up my past,
Clean up the errors of years
Be of better vision
Back to nature at last
IF YOU PULL A LONG FACE : Part XVII
IF you pull a long bored face
Oh What's the use no way to be gay
Ev'ry effort gets bogged in rigged rat-race
Some covert service blocks my way
Yet you pull that long out-of-shape face
Bored by the way things turn out every day
No use turning out the lights in bed to efface
Lessons learned during the day you must weigh
If you go on pulling that long elongated face
You risk also pulling your hair out I dare say
Your eyes and ears too without using pliers
End up as Moon pulling tides on Earth all day
Then if you pull a long-pulled face
Forced you say to grunt low bleat and neigh
LIFE's not for sure a pleasure cruise in space
Measure of grains aroma ensures in cup of café
So if you must pull a long out-of-shape face
Depressed by the way the skies turn gray
Look straight ahead not downcast askance
The END's believe it or not but a sly moment away
© T. Wignesan - Paris, January 15, 2019
Unquotable quotes – XVII
The more the spread of the Multi-Verse(s), the less the possibility of purpose in our lives on earth.
In a world chock-full of people where almost everybody wants to be heard, be seen and be remembered, only fools listen to fools and the vain watch the vain and the duped remember the duped..
Only evil-doers think and act as though they can get away with it all for good.
Life humiliates ALL, so what’s the difference if one rises or falls.
Every born being is a ridiculous thing, and most of all the king.
Thinking one can remedy it all – get the better of one’s detractors – before one’s end is the height of gall.
No individual can in all certainty be indispensable to – even – one’s own galaxy – to keep it believable : Is our world of any moment to all the other possible worlds ?
What remains unseen/unseeable is always a mystery to everybody but a few who appear to be inhabited by some alien spirit.
Why do evil-doers always find it always easy to triumph over do-gooders ? The contrary is the case the other way round.
Nothing can change what lies out there – not even with all the goodwill in the world : no man, no god, no will, no sacrifice, no suffering, no prayer, no brilliance, no nothing.
Odd that the most obssesive form of pleasure is still rooted around the portals of birth and excretion.
© T. Wignesan – Paris, 2016
What's true these days? This world we live in has so much lies we can't even
tell the truth anymore. Real eyes, realise, real lies. If only people could see with
the eyes they were born with. Did you know that you don't listen with your
ears? Your ears are simply the reciever of the sound waves I'm creating and it
changes them into impulses which sends them to the brain. So you listen with
your brain. Strange hey. Your brain is the second most powerful thing you
have inside you.
Look around you. You see people that are different to who you are. Different
morals, different tastes, different styles. Acknowledge it because once you try
see the goodness in them that's when you've dropped the ball. Never trust a
soul. Don't trust me. Don't trust the person next to you. The devil was once
an angel. I'm not saying lose hope just be careful. You can't mend a broken
glass because before it was broken it was pure and clean. It had the ability to
hold a certain capacity and now that its broken not only has it lost the ability to
hold something, its capable of cutting you. Bring you down to size. Stab you
with hatred, cut open your gullibility and kill your ego.
Kill the ego that is not visible to the human eye. Cause eyes can only see
what's in front not inside. Two-faced people that look like they have love and
sympathy. Sympathetically loving you for actually believing them.
Sympathetically loving you. They don't love you, they feel sorry because you
don't know what you're about to feel. You are not seeing with your Naked Eye.
Distorted vision. 2 becomes 5 and 5 is soon 10 and before you know it you
don't know who you are. So drunk you don't know who you are. Getting
blackouts, trying to take the black lungs out but you can't... Take something
that wasn't given to you. People say nothing is impossible yet when they try so
hard to do the possible it becomes impossible. Naked Eye. Who do you see? A
poet reciting a poem with a message or a poet asking for permission to enter
your brain and help you see things from another view? You decide.
2014/07/29
Those yelling voices from various tenements
Sounded like the sad treble of girls
In cellars where leviathans
In a spree flourished forced libidos:
The lasses trembling in rude arms!
Sir –
Still in their yellow bloom
Pig-watchers of the wider forest
Clad in the swords of midnight warriors
Performed the vicar’s rituals.
A blue hour lamented the gloom!
In the morning more skulls lie
A trash of real weavers!
(Prof, a sad lad heard the tales told!)
XVII.
It was said in days before.
There they stood.
In pleasant wood.
In unity a sole expression.
Smile.
© veritatem voluntatem 2015?
IF EVER I HAD A COUNTRY : XVII - XVIII
XVII
IF ever I had a country
And if ever I were the Minister of Education
I'd make every child take an Oath of Nature upon leaving school in June
That every kid learn by heart by autumn ten local birds' tune
The Garden Warbler's varied repertoire the toot-toot of the Owl under the moon
To tell which Wood-Pecker drummed which tree out-of-tune
That is, if ever I were the Minister of Education
And even if I never ever had no country
XVIII
If ever I had a country
And if ever I were the Secretary of HEW
I'd make it a certified condition for the leaving of school
Only when every teen acquired the skill of notation as a musical tool
To stock his memory with quarrelsome magpie curses or soothing cuckoo calls cool
And let no carrion crow flutter at school-top eaves calling him a fool
That is, if ever I were the Secretary of HEW
And even if I never ever had no country
© T. Wignesan - Paris, July 6, 2018
K163 and K164 of CANTO XVII of the THIRUK-KURAL with Translation (continued)
K163: aran aakkam veendaathaan enbaan
piranaakkam peenaathu alukkarup paan
Nor wealth nor virtue does that man desire, 'tis plain,
Whom others' wealth delights not, feeling envious pain. (Transl. G.U. Pope)
Of him who instead of rejoicing in the wealth of others, envies it, it will be said,
"He neither desires virtue nor wealth." (Transl. Drew & Lazarus)
He who prefers to live in envy of other people's wealth, rejecting the benefits accrueing in a virtuous envy-free life is one who will be blessed with neither. (Transl. T. Wignesan)
K164: alukkaartrin allavai seyyaar
ilukkaatrin eetham padupaakku arinthu
The wise through envy break not virtue's laws,
Knowing ill-deeds of foul disgrace the cause. (Transl. G.U. Pope)
(The wise) knowing the misery that comes from transgression will not through envy commit unrighteous deeds. ( Transl. Drew & Lazarus)
Sensible people realising the harm envy abets them to commit are likewise conscious of the harm that will engulf them (if they give in to their impulsions). (Transl. T. Wignesan)
© T. Wignesan - Paris, 2017
rubbish heap
seedlings bulge
a plastic bag
Heat building in the cheeks,
As disclosures are expressed,
Written on pieces of paper—
Realizing—they felt it too—
Quaking within at the thought of
Love becoming more than a word
Escaping the lips—
But ceaseless spurts of action
—Joys and pains both,
At the notion of open affection
Anxious minds grasping at once
For the comforts of connection
As the lungs upsurge in and out,
The rise of it all is more than action—
Love becomes habit—
Love becomes function
2.17.20
Rare was the vibe
To which we waltzed
And like plastic pillows
We fondled each others features
Petting each others’ egos
In a wistful manner
No texture of skin
Had ever tasted better
I always intended to love you
Alone.
In secret, in silence, inside, and safe.
I was prepared for the unrequited, for inevitable desire and disappointment,
Spectate, distance, move on,
And be the subject of a one-sided love.
And all the while, you meant each lingering glance to
Linger.
Our eyes knew how to talk before we ever spoke of love or lovers.
I inferred what was hidden there, untold.
I was right to assume, to hope that there was more,
For there was, is, and so it goes.
I love you. Still secret, but now not alone.
I am afraid of what this makes me, but fear knows blood like love knows blood.
And so, knowingly, I let you bleed as you make me
Love.
Don't stand so far away, although I know you must.
My first sleepless night without you.
SONNET XVII
BENEFICENT GOD
You gave Me My Heart’s Desire
Long before I deem it fit to Ask
In Gratitude Lord, I breath Thy Word.
If You find Honey, Eat Just Enough,
Too much of it and You’ll purge.
He that finds a Wife finds a Good Thing,
Obtains favour of The Lord.
Those Looking for Him found Him Not,
But He is fond of them
That know Him Not nor Seek Him
Adam He put to Sleep,
Eve He gave to him; the bone of his bone
Thy Grace and mercy oh Lord
I take not for granted.
@MARCH 2017/©M.H.O.G Unveiled