Deprived by country and elsewhere
For deeds and actions I didn’t do
Suspicious here, not welcomed there
You can imagine my worldview
You’re privileged to move around
Your peaceful countries waged no wars
I’m privileged to go without
The double standard world of yours
You think of nation seeing me
Though it’s not me but your projection
You’re talking to contemptuously
I only mirror your reflection
In Wonderland founded by bandits
Stands a glass house where I live
Break it to shatters, I won’t mend it
Just bear in mind I cannot leave
By circumstances I couldn’t manage
And to be honest, no one could
I am dehumanized and savaged
And you all set and understood
I’m not complaining, but just telling
The facts of living that I find
Funny enough to rhyme, compelling
Your short attention to unwind
I am a laughing man of August
I am a crying man of March
When spring blows off the winter dust
I click some photos to enlarge.
We’re ruled by flimsy Nietzscheans
“It’s all too human”, spoke their mentor
So they dehumanized for us
The services, forced us surrender
To the machineries that count
All that we are, and regulate
All that we could have been, without
The guidance of inhuman state
I doubt that Nietzsche saw that far
Although he prophesized decay
A boudoir philosopher
For jaded bourgeoisie, he played
A wise man’s comedy for those
Nocturnal chaps who lived behind
Closed curtains - I tend to suppose
That’s us, those who forgot to die.
Do you feel like
You are slowly being
Digitized, dehumanized?
Do you feel like
You are losing touch with
Reality, your humanity?
Do you feel like
An alien technology
Is invading your brain,
Turning your life into
A video game?
As a figure in history and legend, she is mythic
but was regarded as parasitic and horrific.
She was demonized and dehumanized;
a woman so fiery,
known for notoriety and impropriety;
a mistress of seduction,
corruption and obstruction,
haughtiness and ungodliness.
Banished for not obeying Adam,
she embodied the fears of man:
a symbol of emasculation,
a primordial she-demon.
There is another side to her story.
Perhaps she deserves to be covered in glory.
She was strong and independent
and while facing resentment
for not being subservient,
she was unrepentant.
For many women, she is transcendent;
a figure so mythical
for feminine strength, she is the pinnacle,
her assertiveness: unequivocal.
Her name means "belonging to the night",
but she may be the brightest light
because - her admirers make no apology -
she represents equality.
I am a child of war, misery, anger and suffering.
I grew up with sadness, uncertainty and anxiety.
I took refuge in solitude to avoid human bestiality and its hypocrisy.
My distress illuminated the darkness of my weaknesses.
I am forged in the burning furnaces of struggle and survival.
In my veins flows the impure blood of slaves, riflemen and resistance fighters.
My gaze carries the weight of the pain of my color and the age-old injustices of my oppressed people throughout the Earth.
My persecuted skin is the cemetery of the scars of battles, trials and sacrifices of my ancestors dehumanized by supremacist slave traders and racialist colonialists.
I am the bitter fruit of a continent nourished by fratricidal conflicts, genocides, civil wars, coups d'état, dictatorial excesses, tribal hatred, treachery, corruption and neocolonial stratagems.
My memories are horrible nightmares, broken fragments of all the horrors my eyes have seen.
My mind is a battlefield where truth, justice, liberty, equality and fraternity are expressed without hindrance.
The imperfect walk of man, cared about in recklessness,
careening for the wall of death, can’t be protected -
no longer in his mama’s womb. Womanized, dehumanized,
faithless…AnD cared about. Those left behind, want to rewind
their watches, but the truth is they couldn’t fix him. All his ills
in his bushy beard, behind it a smile, a hug, a shrug. Darkness
was upon him and in his circle of conspirators…can you believe
the music coming out of them - great big curses, whispers
mixed with praise music…the daring beast brought down
with determined gentleness. They flee from the Spirit’s power.
Still I hope and hope and hope, if this is the end, as it seems,
that somehow, by the skin of his teeth, he made peace with God.
I have been up and down the valley
I have been honored and dishonored
Good and bad times have been my lot
In my search for happiness and fulfillment
I have been to hell and back
False accusations wet my pillow nightly
Isolation was constant companion
I was despised and hated
When I longed for recognition and love
I was brutalized and dehumanized
When I searched for empathy and humanity
I was object of mockery and disdain
When my heart yearned for acceptance and respect
I was invited to high society as guest
But on each occasion turned
Back in disgrace and rejection
I have gone round the circle and back
And standing tall and victorious
For I have conquered all my adversaries
The worse is over
How to rehumanize the dehumanized?
That is the crux of the problem.
A perplexing question.
A philosophical quandary.
Let’s not dehumanize them in the first place an eight-year-old suggested.
What does a child know?
Said one of the ninety-year old -decision makers in the senate.
Electoral mortification
The ego of one man
chaotically divided a nation.
Hypnotically humiliated
and brought its people into dissolute hatred,
plucking each other limits.
Dehumanized the intelligence of great minds.
This team of trumpers!
imperious loud mouths,
puissant leaches stumping on others,
with ominous filthy words.
Despicable regard for biblical equal.
Do not unto others what you would not do unto yourself.
Leave the hate,
it’s like a malignant tumor,
it consumes time to no avail.
Color is just a shade,
Blood in man is indeed unique,
whether it was brown skin Jesus, dark skin Moses you or me.
as it retains a unified bond beyond us.
Someday,
I may need you and you may need me
for something grater than -
this evil influence crawling into our lives.
Your cry and my cry the same, seeking comfort.
©Al Juman -The "said" Poet, 11/25/2019
I feel the choke under the yoke
Of men so dehumanizing
I feel the heel of their rugged boots...
Choking the breath off me
I feel the touch of their tough dark hearts
Smearing at my restless me straining under their strain
I can't breath
I feel it like I were the helpless innocent God made dark coloured paralysed son of man
Dehumanized by the so uncouth not so cultured, heartless sinners of ages.
I can't breath
Its not me without me in this island
Didn't God create all of us in his own image.?
Who issued the ticket in the thicket to a thicksome, gruesome, bad to the eyes a scene that God will never approve of?
The thought of it, such a suffocating milestone.!
I can't breath
Who can breath?
Who will breath?
How do we breath?
How shall we breath?
Who has the answer?
I can't breath!
All differ in relationships that's for sure.
Sometimes, though very hard to endure.
.
Weep over dead animals with hue and cry, we do.
Never once realizing, that our days as family are numbered, too.
.
My question is, are we really family or just putting on false-face?
And if we are, a tragedy,a loss and a total disgrace.
.
A day has twenty-four long hours in it.
Dehumanized,degraded by the eternal,"I am too busy pit?"
.
That grave's mouth is waiting to swallow us all.
What's that you say~ you can't hear its roaring call?
January 7, 2020
To Bear Witness
To bear witness … and awaken the world … he’ll rise:
Helpless to halt routine horrors he’s seeing,
A scared, adolescent boy of slender size,
Nabbed and dehumanized solely for “being”,
Keeps records of the cruelty his captors devise.
Yesterday once stayed his tenacious tenant of time,
Occupying today in recurrent roles of reprise,
Until death voided its lease, evicting crisis from crime.
Exiled to sight and sound, languages always languish:
Lone words, limited mediums too dull and shallow,
Impaired all the expressions of their author’s anguish,
Except to press, “What shall humanity hold hallow?”
Woven together, his words threaded truths for which he fought,
Iterating a haunting testimony of torment.
Emancipated prose, sprung from his mind’s prison distraught,
Sew our human bond on basted seams of past and present:
Empathy must be a measure of our moral fitness
Lest we lose lessons taught by he who lived … to bear witness!
E. V. Wyler
Words of Mass Destruction
Words like bullets do not have eyes, as they fly in our hearts and materialize
Deleterious breaths that we soon despise, words written in stone we idealize
Warring weaponed words that paralyze, wounding wandering words terrorize
Torpedo texts thrown to criticize, paranoid punitive parasites will pulverize
Like the Atom bomb, words are strong only use them wisely where they belong
Some create a lullaby or sweet a song, while others use them to do their wrong
Words of deception create no affection only intervene with the inflating infection
Annihilating in their corrupt convention, wary words that bring rigorous rejection
Of the negative neurotic neglect, wording witches and warlocks of their architect
Dehumanized discord of disconnect, vengeful letters lashing will always resurrect
Words can frighten as well as enlighten, some will delight in words that tighten
Words of corruption bring self-destruction, a raging ruction of a serpent seduction.
Nov.20.2017
Judgmental People And Haters
Sponsored by: Brenda Chiri
Uncommon Man
hard hat
lunch bucket
high steel walker
at home where eagles soar.
mole, in pits and holes
deep, dark cracking stone
labyrinth’s glitter.
salt stained, rocking seas
tread her whims
for silver glint glimmer.
nine to five, three shift
two shift
blue denim Atlas
balances the World.
vilified, patronized
then dehumanized
into work units
commerce engine
used up, spat out
but they abide.
So much stunned at man's alienation
even in the man-made world.
Stunned at the human folly to lust for relations
carrying the signboard "Strictly Prohibited".
Wisdom nullified at the foolish acts
and relationships ruined by the misunderstandings
and egocentric behavior.
Consistent silence not willing to bear any interference of words;
still personal secrets roar in public.
Virginity tarnished by the compelling circumstances.
Mankind dehumanized by the hectic activity
and illusions shatter in face of grim reality.
The very inspiration results in dissuasion
and the Quality crushed under the heavy feet of Affectation.
So much stunned at the talent gone wasted for so many years
as man gets trapped in the wheel of existence killing all soft feelings.
Sub Categories
Looking for the formal definition, structure, and history of this poetry form? Visit the Poetry Dictionary entry below. Then return to explore how PoetrySoup members bring the form to life through their own poems.