Long Commissions Poems

Eric Mottram on the American literary and cultural scene during 1965-66 while he was the recipient of the American Learned Societies’ award for a year. (begun in the last post and to be continued)

January 2,...

Read More

Moby Dick, a novel by Herman Melville, published in London in October 1851 as The Whale and a month later in New York City as Moby-Dick; or, The Whale. It is dedicated to Nathaniel Hawthorne....

Read More

Have you chosen what you will become,
my son,
or will you become something yet unchosen?

Become?

How will you keep yourself gainfully occupied,
dare I speak of vocation?

Oh yes,
I will be absent.

Absent from…?

From you.
Absent from you.

My wisest son,
thank you...

Read More

as the Crystal Mariachis arpeggiate the morning
why do the mighty remain cruel
while we are manning the oars beneath them
they see a tidy world
where mommy wipes their butts
you got your allegory you got your metaphor
plowing the...

Read More

For my Dad and Mom (Dorothy) on Fathers Day.

 Albin J. Gruhn who passed away at the age of 94 years young. I Love You Dad and I am missing you so much! Robert

When Albin...

Read More

The following is about my beloved father Albin J. Gruhn who passed away at the age of 94 years young. I Love You Dad and I am missing you so much! Robert

When Albin Gruhn got...

Read More

As I sit and watch
Watch you denounce the obligatory violence
Announcing and pronouncing the fabricated freedom
Joyfully commemorating and celebrating your assassinated true leaders
The enemy killed not the leaders but the ideas
You buried not them but the...

Read More

Nationalism,
like other faces of narcissism,
multicultural cynicism speaks in ways devoid of integrity,
authenticity,
global transparency,
empathy,
active power and authority of and for,
from and toward, resiliently positive energy,
compassionate wealth of health,
resonant power,
regenerative EarthPassion,
more like internationalism,
like other faces of polycultural...

Read More

Described as “patriot of patriots” by Mahatma Gandhi
His Words, ‘Give me blood and I shall give you freedom’
Are still ringing in the minds of each and every Indian.
He stood for unqualified Freedom with the use...

Read More

To die an old man, tasks left on slow burn, 
And as fake coins do, get reborn ‘pon earth; 
Work harder still, more mileage points to earn, 
Which, heaven calls goodly deeds well their worth,...

Read More

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...

Read More

The focus in the direction of possibilities and to enter into a bridge of congressional diplomat and to decipher the negative from the positive in all ways of motion and emotional dictation from the view...

Read More

In all things, give thanks.

Surrounded,
overwhelmed by claustrophobic depression,
gratitude.

Gratitude, a sacred noun,
positive attitude, a secular verb phase.

Depression and gratitude,
depressed gratitude,
mystical oxymoron.
Impossibly essential
potential.

Repression and victory.
Hope in and through blind and deaf,
senseless faith in power of positions
over doubling...

Read More

Behind the curtains of this smile, are freshly sewed wounds;
Rich yarns finely whipped by the Armageddon; 
Each touch turned colder, from philosophy of ashes to ashes;
Each an ongoing curse, of every memory of Attila the...

Read More

*************

Having never studied poetry, but composed and wrote it most of my adult life, in the Army, commissions for lovesick, homesick mates. In civvy street, mainly for my wife, the odd commission for enstranged lovers,...

Read More

There is a tide in the affairs of men
Which can lay us low or then
Raise our standards so high
That we can even reach the sky.

But in affairs of the heart
There can be a flood so...

Read More

Perhaps the most inane entities contrived by the human race,
(Leaving folks wondering why they must meet in the first place),
Are the interminable meetings of committee, panel and board,
Convening for hours leaving participants bleary-eyed and bored!

For...

Read More

Most of life plays out somewhere
somehow
sometime
in-between resplendent deification of MotherEarth
and rabid defiance of EarthMother
wisdom

Is a peculiarly Republican challenge,
confusing unchanging 
uniform 
divinely dogmatically inspired
Tradition

As if such Tradition were against
healing
unitarian economic political flow
of Earth-conserving sacred grace
slow-growing
co-invested capital...

Read More

The Job of President
By Franklin Price
10/30/2015

The job of president in the Constitution is defined.
He really has no others except within our minds.
He is the commander and the chief of our military force
Commissions officers therein to...

Read More

That is Admirable A.B. Owl to you the man said.
Buckets of medals must have gone straight to his head.
The rest of us rolled our eyes behind his arrogant back.
We were privates and sergeants, his experience...

Read More

People aren't perfect, for sure this is true.
They don't always do what they say they will do.

By the same token they often aren't guilty,
Of commissions, omissions that some will deem filthy.

Nefarious crimes, using darkness for...

Read More

the one walks out 
of your dreams
and into your life
becoming your wife
my wife one day
was berating me 
for all my myriad faults
all my sins against her
my omissions and commissions
malfeasance and misfeasance 
things I had done
and...

Read More

We'd never know what we meant to someone
Why?
We are not supposed to know
We are supposed to know how we are to someone
and correct ourselves
But the knowing part - hah
Why do you want to know anyway?
So...

Read More

Margin of Error

By Mark D. Stucky
If, statistically, Adam and Eve
hadn’t exceeded Eden’s margin of error,
would lambs now be lounging with lions?
Would toothy T-Rexes have been vegan?
Would we love our neighbors and enemies
as we love our...

Read More

A teacher is a creature
Whose life a miniature
Those who follows the management culture
At last the management becomes a vulture

Teacher have to do the job 
It's as a sales executive bob
To make students to buy the...

Read More