When big brother becomes too big
So large it has to put on a larger wig
When the inner cloister is as big as the outer
And detecting dissension becomes too easy to stir
That is when its helm begins to self-sabotage
The appeal of change is no longer a mirage
Its sheer weight disables its ability to pivot
Like Rome’s fall, emerges ignitable toxic glut
The regime self-implodes with the slightest match
Captive of spells by all rhymes and verses
Seized in tangs of thoughts and emotions
I gain joy, love, comfort, strength and wellness
They rob my stress and tensions.
As ink spills down from my deepest blood streams
I release my imagination with thrill
All my hopes, wishes, aspirations and dreams
all freed by the tough handcuffs of my quill.
Poem is a sanctuary of my peace
A cloister where I ponder and meditate
Another calm place to pray on my knees
I feel, slavery of words is my fate.
Devoured by my passion of poetry
I’m like a craving monster, so hungry.
Cast of shadows, courtesy of candle,
Light fading unfolds the same tale at dusk.
Soliloquized retellings of scandal,
Lengthy but worthy, as faults to unhusk.
Memories gone cold, my table setting,
Echoing attenuated laughter.
Plates piled high with the feasts of forgetting,
Still doleful hungers linger thereafter.
The flickering cloister of flames confer,
Enkindling solace in the solitude.
Tacit acceptance, no protest to stir,
Away from the noise, alone without brood.
Resigned, I dine on the remnants of day,
Umbral asylum, narrative decay.
I've lived in it all my life -
the self's grand fiction -
refuge for the child, youths
rebel fortress and a walled
cloister to house
the holy relics gathered
on the pilgrimages
of my mind. I have built it
line by line with words
baked into bricks.
Rooms follow years
down passageways of books,
dusty manuscripts and dreams
hung in stations along
age blackened walls.
In high towers, windows
open to a universe
with a terrifying silence
at its core.
I hear reality's hard fist
knocking at the door,
a presence breathing
its corrosive damp into mortar,
unpicking me
brick by brick. And yet,
a sense of peace in surrendering
what was never really there,
dissolving into what is
echo of silence
Montebelo Mosteiro de Alcobaça
Eight hundred years of monumental complex
With a unique historic atmosphere
confluence of the rivers Alcoa and Baça
a perfect vacuum to meditation
discovery of the unfilled landscape
a space-time pause
indeed, feeling the pause
in the existence of nothingness
dedication to intellect, culture, and art
cosmological stillness
just to go back to that point about the anthropic principle
echo of cloister
echo of silence
Precisely. Precisely.
The vacuum energy’s power
Why do shellfish
Seem so selfish
Is it they dwell
Inside their shell
And don’t admit
But only spit
That old salt brine
After they dine
Day in and out
In their hideout
Yet near the rocks
Creation knocks
On their hard wall
But through it all
They stay inside
To safely hide
From us their foe;
How could they know?
When we dig clams
Their two doors slam
Same with mussel
That we rustle
Can't un-cloister
Hermit oyster
Or peel the husk
From the mollusk
They’re much too vain
In their domain
Or just abhor
The open door
Though we still crave
Them ‘neath the wave
And will not cease
‘Til they release
A cherished dish;
Sorry, shellfish
Wisdom, like the endosperm of a coconut, evolved,
Jordan developed in his self-consciousness day by day;
Though vices around virtues, like the galaxy, revolved,
He, like the Magi, keenly discerned and chose the right way.
Boyishness, as the rind of an orange or plum got peeled,
Fruitfulness in him, like wheat grain formation, peeped its head;
How lovely our once naughty Jordan's true self got revealed!
All those unchurched unaware identities he had shed...!
His son grew up like a pearl in a progressing oyster,
Scholastically and leisurely he's trained without fail;
He gives him freedom too; he's not a monk in a cloister;
Though naughty like his father, he grows up hearty and hale...!
The storm that blows violently can change into a breeze,
Who says a beast running about can never be at ease...?
18 June 2023
Whatever happened to "Jordan" Poetry Contest
Sponsored by: Miranda Hawley
This harsh light, back on you
Piercingly cruel aimed
Is of no sun, though it burns
In heart, as hot yes?
And however thickly
Shaded, walled off are
For protection, there's just no
Hung bough, cloister, right?
Unless counter-eying bright!
Love's, for that loveless!
These, the accepting responses
This, the affirmative nod
To one who feels, fearing greater
Merits not the love of God.
Through that, in its shady cloister
Wild violet's; weak smelt, stemmed.
Heartburst's, not cloud's, sympathetic
Formed from out. Saintly emblemed!
Twelve men in the beginning
reporting unto God
Ten Commandments to proclaim…
devotional synod
Sacred by their nature born
each man immortal bound
Divinity in every word
salvations thorny crown
Choices come and choices go
judgment waits beyond
The weight incumbent, buried deep
embedded in a psalm
Nine will cloister, locked in place
the future theirs to choose
Decisions based on marble text
—Noah’s Ark in view
(Villanova University: June, 2022)
Enter your grave, as though a pilgrim, full of smile,
Within satin muslin decked coffin, sleep peaceful,
May death, the deathless (?), feel ashamed of his sly guile...!
Tomb, the womb of nature, has its grandeur and style,
Ask your guardian-angel! Make your stay blissful!
Enter your grave, as though a pilgrim, full of smile,
Body might decompose into bone - nerve - flesh pile,
Dwell, like a zen cloister; make life calm and graceful;
May death, the deathless (?), feel ashamed of his sly guile...!
You are, like a seed; you might remain for a while,
Each trial you face will make your journey tranquil;
Enter your grave, as though a pilgrim, full of smile,
Tell yourself stories that could make your stay worthwhile,
Bright corners must make you feel heartily thankful;
May death, the deathless (?), feel ashamed of his sly guile...!
Midst thunder, you'll see the son of man's arrival,
Hold on him and remain, for his graces, grateful;
Enter your grave, as though a pilgrim, full of smile,
May death, the deathless (?), feel ashamed of his sly guile...!
15 April 2022
Darkness Reigns
The dark has settled and I am at my height
of delicious evil as I rage through the Earth this night.
A basement of torture in the East, where I relish the lash,
in the market of children lost and hurting, where I laugh loudly,
at the deviant exchange of cold hard cash.
Beautiful bombs are made in a pristine warehouse in the West
and the promise of murder of the masses, perhaps I love this the best.
How I recharge and strengthen in power,
When the axis of evil, in the North and the South crawls and turns on and on every hour.
Every second, every minute, every day
killing and cruelty in every way.
And I walk sometimes slowly and silently with hooded disguise
or join with the normal who walk with closed eyes.
Step by step I’ve been here before, thousands of years
through terror and chains, holocausts and genocide, I know my way,
Give the greedy their chance, the murderous a place to play
The sinister and shameful running to meet me, and meet their clay,
For all will be earth and cloying dark, some time
And I will cloister the cold, welcome the heat and wait, in evil sublime.
3/5/21 Sponsor Funom Makama.
a slick mime had only one dime
bought a slivery pot of slime
world’s no oyster
went to a cloister
sacred graffiti thickens the crime
23rd November 2020
In the apathetic chest of grass
The open intercourse of autumn dew
Opening wings, the bees fly
With the beats of Rabindra Sangeet
Without moon in the neon lights
Fireflies sacrifice themselves happily
In the durable voices of Sarod
Say- Farewell marriage mortification!
Dull, silent torture cloister-
This mental disagreed matrimonial!
But let not be forbidden – the love,
Inamorata's smile, constant staring,
Let not be forbidden - the departure of the lover
And always happy memories of the old days
Yes, let be forbidden – noose of a lovelorn lover,
Loving moonlit tryst and the smiling of pity
-18.11.2020 Chittagong
Repair shop
Worms and dinosaur blood, toil and fuel,
Doors I’ll hold for you.
Pure, old as moonlight, the marbled
Cloister of your pleasance I’ll affirm
They will come for your museums, my love.
They will come for your big, fine Cadillacs…
choke-weed and cottonmouths infesting gardens.
So what? A fish bait fate this birth hook?
Before thought, beyond need, freed
Because of you, because love is thicker.
Tired of tending? Offering? Hoping a bite?
Nectar, somewhere, prevalent as air?
Seen it? Have you?
The world, the worm turning?
Hungry?
Eat.
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