Long Charlatans Poems

"Ground Level Entry"

“She fits the bill”,
they say it 
insouciantly

visions of being 
carried in the beak 
of a bilious pelican 

where it builds
its rudimentary nest, 
it uses sticks and debris

no stones, yet,
from irreverence
thrown at it

no higher...

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Predator Antiqua Multis Versus Respiciens Tempus


I Watched Midnight Sun Fall Into Dark Shades Of Oblivion

Part I

I watched midnight sun fall into dark shades of oblivion
with its dying light screaming in agonizing moans
upon bloody battlefields of...

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I never told anyone how my ears reverberate in a silent room.
The whirring drone ever present, a conquistador of my private spaces.
This is my cohabitation with an industrial generator.
But I’ve graduated from the torment. 
My...

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There's a defender among us, a friend who never surrenders or concedes
No thief is he, who offers encouragement to people with his kind deeds

A rapscallion, devoted to negativity, brings gloom to Poetry Soup Forest,
a site...

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I’ve seen the never-ending ads touting ‘new’ solutions for losing weight - without a grueling workout plan - for years...
But after trying several - at a sizable expense...I still look like a hippo when surrounded...

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Tonight I will not write
of stars, nor moon,
seeds of wisdom--
just mind flattering
bloom--

Nor will I write of love--
neither here nor above;
though our dearest 
sentimentality, the heart, 
too often foolishly enacts 
its own fatality;

and if I decide...

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whether you like it or not, your priest, your pastor, your minister,
your clergyman 
of whom you hold the utmost regard,
whose very advice
you secretly tell yourself has been inspired by
the lord your god &
maybe even “jesus”...

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Tears are not just drops
That fall from the eyes 
Tears are messages
Were written with an encrypted language 
And need deciphering

Tears are not just drops
That fall from the eyes 
Tears are words
Were written with all languages
And...

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I, who now sit alone by this barren shore
Looking vainly out to sea as if 
I thought I could espy distant Crete,
Have become a source of ridicule 
Among these lesser men,
Who strut and title themselves...

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Much of my life has been in the environs of church activities,
some of which found me in the presence of 'faith healing evangelists'.
I do not mean to be, but I tend to be a natural...

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“The Wolf’s Pockets”




Virginia knows 
what’s written 
in the mass of a rock
the heaviness of words
not soluble
anchored to life
that does not float

A Wolf swallows Woolf whole
Hungry for something -
 
“other than”  ;

Submerged, 
what is not...

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imagined by others,
s/he is approached as the
perfect candidate,
s/he is that last 
perfect
puzzle
piece,
which will make the whole
monstrosity,
complete &
not a shred of talent matters,
not a shred of ambition is
needed,
not a shred of ideals, not a
shred of intelligence,...

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the circumstance of his birth
had somehow become joined 
to the circumstance of his life
raised on cowboys and Indians 
when no bigger than a twig
alone on a little mattress
talking to limp cloth animals
explains much of this
chromosome...

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Dr. George Gey from Johns Hopkins Hospital
Was looking for cells that would be reproducible
Of their own accord for the benefit of medicine
And lo and behold one day found the perfect specimen
And how he acquired it...

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We have the left; we have the right.
In the political arena they both fight.

Always claiming to be on our side,
With ferocious rhetoric, opponents they deride.

Vote for us, to be saved from a vicious clan’s
Reckless and...

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By invitation from a trusted friend, 
a medium intervention took place and I went.
The building set in the thick forest by a shimmering lake,
some broken sheds looking sad and strange to take.
Weeded and worn the...

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i get it now....
jackasses and elephants 
are one and the same
getting off on control
getting rich off our prolonged misery
our collective pain is their continued power
our division is their weapon of choice
to maintain that power-

Do pray...

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Born a lover, man of valor and strength
Admiration of women, eyes in length

Head of the valiant
Power acquired from assailant
Might relinquished at hand
Born to conquer by hand
From the sword lives the strong
Bold and louder than a...

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Rites and Wrongs  

This write suggests the search of many slants
Pursuing words of truth you hold most clear.
Stand sober toward the charlatans whose rants
Exact belief in those susceptible to fear.

Reflections on the tomes of...

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How often have you heard this expression: “ Well, sorry to say, this is my nature.” Just
what is the nature of Man? Why are we such a predictable lot? Why is War our bed partner?
These...

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There is a corruption we all should abhor,
It starts on the left, and corrupts to the core,
Cancer of the soul, if left to go on,
It takes bit by bit, ’till the whole soul is gone.

Makes...

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not happy with the idea
that when the heart stops
& the brain shuts down,
the personality ends &
nothing follows,
s/he wants
options---
in fact, s/he is simply one
in a series of zillions of
humans that have lived &
died, all wanting more,
all...

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there is a sentiment amongst the most public of believers &
even those nonbelievers who still hold some sick
compassion for them…
these
“privately religious,”
who do not parade around with the charlatans 
who gather on sundays or get down...

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As I lay in the dark, accompanied by only my thoughts
and memories.
   I can feel the grip of the night, clutching with its embrace
of ill intent.
   Plunging me into the depths...

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I Will Repay

My house is called a house of prayer
But you have made it into a den of thieves
And there’s not a single heart that care
Just charlatans with tricks up their sleeves

Prosperity is what you...

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