("Blue Egg in Red Sea", 2020, original oil)
According to our betters,
The Karens who rule the internet,
We should all be aware enough by now
To know what is expected of us,
And so suitably clothed
In political correctness
Never offend again.
In this way each generation
Will leap and bound
Ever adapting
To the latest trend
All together now
In harmony all
Flotsam on a tide.
(5/16/26)
Surfing the Cyber Sea without a life vest
hunting and pecking each key at best
nothing but a gyre of flotsam and jetsam
Charybdis as far as the eye can see
where once all was clean and pristine
now the dreaded AI rules the roost
with spam from unwanted advertisers
to give it an unneeded boost
culprits remaining nameless
hiding behind anonymity
who knows what they have in mind
but open the door and it's for sure
once they're in they'll rob you blind
Britain is known to have ruled the waves
at the height of its happy heyday
a worldwide web with a maritime domain
but come what may all empires fall
yet will this disinformation superhighway remain?
Let assume the stars
galaxying and the sun
is for instance
shine to earth
and stay for a while and bounce?,
a star for a planet
somehow is a sun
like the sun that is going through?
or for each monster, a friend, a villanelle
like the sun to the earth or north
or like Jupiter or Mercury or Mars?.
Let assume something is the world
and glass
like funny yet fret.
We float amidst the flotsam and jetsam
Seemingly immune to the debris field
Moving past the invisible, the hushed,
Focused only on the we, of us
Our minds deny the truth of what we see
Refuses to face the rising of the waves
Cannot hear the crushing surfs refrain
“I’ve come again…..again…..a g a I n……”
We walk with naked feet on fresh-wet sand
Listen to the sound of stone-roll band
And wonder why it is we can’t abide
The rising of the flotsam-jetsam tides
A running sea
chokes the throat of a cave
then runs away
letting it breathe again.
Starfish light-up
under a luminescent
and radioactive surf,
then are pushed into sandbars
to dry-up and die.
Beach balls are swept ashore,
bleached fingerbones
lift them over the surf,
plastic bottles pile up
with ghost lips
still attached to them.
Soothsayers think we don't know
what's coming,
but we do.
He was a Professor of Difficult Sums,
Always kept a writing pad near,
Just in case of instant revelations,
With pencil parked behind one ear.
He could quadrate equations
With consummate ease
And quantum mechanicals
He found just a diverting tease.
He won the Nobel Prize so often
They let him keep the cup,
And he wore designer braces
To hold designer trousers up.
A benefactor of mankind,
Which used his flowing skill
To perfect better weapons with
Much more efficient ways to kill.
He lived in academic obscurity
Until the people learned his name
When he made the perfect mouse trap
Which brought him worldwide fame?
He was sent back into obscurity
When he just went a bit too far
By inventing a pollution free
Everlasting peoples motor car.
He beach combs now in Tahiti
Fitted with a silicon chip link
To wipe his mind of such thoughts
At the speed of an eyelid’s blink
For business is business
And everyone should know
The worst kind of fool is he
Who disturbs the status quo
Do you strive to be poetic,
while forgetting to be a poet
Your words when forced an epitaph
to what you never said
(Villanova Pennsylvania: August, 2020)
floating aimless
a zig-zag in
a time of discovery...
were these surreal
moments mine
lost in thought
was life a code
poetic thoughts
appear
then fade
seeing the world come and go
in pictures of the floating world
this ode came floating
to unfold
There is a place inside
where the crime and grime hides
All thoughts and fails lie lifeless hand in hand
In the shadow of lies told
darkness unseen
knees cradled
head bent
furtively looking up
in fear that darkness
will feed upon
this dead atom
My make shift soul
Trapped in flotsam skin and jetsam bone
Never felt the warmth
always joined never part
There is a place inside
were the real me resides
Each dawn's debris sort
of wreckage from day before
yields jetsam just junked
and flotsam break-up relics.
On the beach who can tell which?
The flotsam
From the deep of unconscious float up pieces of memories,
like torn pictures of a past, I can’t recall.
I see a child standing on a chair seeing his image in the window.
A man, in the street below looks, up smiles.
A war plane flies right through the house and disappear
Old dreams and forgotten memories have no beginning, no e;
they can’t be expanded and made coherent.
A mighty surge of fear passes through me, an unremembered
memory absorbed into my nascent brain before I was born?
The unborn but is silence it can’t be articulated into words.
I listen to an ancient hum to understand a future that has
no conscience of the coming.
(with a spark of God)
To govern a myriad selection
Of one mind and legion.
Top tier parasitic collection
From every living region.
It's not subjective good or evil,
Moral or immoral, right or wrong --
But, a wanton cellular mass primeval
Versus ego and super-ego strong.
Toxic algae over jellyfish abundant,
Floating in poisons of our making:
CO2, methane, livestock redundant.
Do Vegans dream of plant life taking?
Al Qaeda, ISIS, Boko Haram:
Brain-dead sheep of the clan,
Following blindly without exam,
Trading for virgins on Ramadan.
Black holes wandering
About Yellowstone caldera.
Plague virus pondering
A Thermonuclear plethora.
Anthropogenic extinction sirens:
Suffocating on dead Phytoplankton;
Lost in narcotics and hallucinogens;
Obsessive love via Keats and Byron.
At the precipice of an extraordinary evolution,
We must rid ourselves of ancient superstitions.
To continue our rise, or reverse in devolution?
Agnosticism seems wise -- so say my suppositions.
Flotsam
The debris strewn along the beach
Splintered boat so much out of reach
Slewed and scattered across the sand
Blue and red wood still to hand
Imagination running wild
The wreckage of a boat defiled
Once a vibrant vessel, seaworthy
Now flotsam tossed for all to see
One wonders what had happened here
Which caused this wreck that instilled fear
Did the captain stay alive?
Did any of the crew survive?
Tossed and battered on this coast
Beyond any help from the island's hosts
Her keel and hull torn apart
No mast with sail nor engine to start
The ocean's relentless, remorseless tide
Has wrecked this boat and flung her aside
While benign blue sky looks calmly down
The sombre grey clouds scowl and frown
People walk past oblivious
Ignoring the plainly obvious
Not knowing nor caring why
These timbers were hurled beyond the eye
This sturdy ocean going boat
Which carried men and cargo afloat
Now wreckage laying along the beach
Lost and forgotten - out of reach
Boa Vista 21 April 2015
Landed on the wind-swept shore
a chip---a splinter---maybe more,
small piece of wood in the surf
rubbing against the salt-sand turf.
A sliver from sunken battleship,
now an underwater sonar blip?
Cruise ship chair that came apart,
lost by a deck hand not so smart?
Splintered mast from racing yacht,
port arrival most probably naught?
She picked it up and rubbed it clean,
carried it along the ocean scene,
walked on the dock, gulls did flee,
and threw it into the white-capped sea.
The sea was calm on that fateful day
The crew keen and eager to get on their way
The cargo was loaded, all men were on board
The captain at the helm was standing tall
They raised the anchor with a mighty cry
And bade farewell with a heartfelt sigh
Leaving their loved ones with a fond embrace
Not yet knowing the perils they faced
They raced through the waters with rapid speed
The sails billowing out as the captain took heed
Of the clouds building up looking heavy and mean
Would they make it to safety and land unseen
But the seas became heavier, their faces were ashen
When the captain gave the order with gusto and passion
“Toss the cargo to the sea, we need to make light
Or we’ll not make it through the long, dark night”
They threw the cargo over the side
With speed and haste and nowhere to hide
But still they were sinking with no hope in sight
Of land, or man, or a guiding light
And in the still of the morning when all was calm
While the waves rolled in under the coconut palm
All that was found on the distant shore
Was flotsam and jetsam from a ship no more
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