Long Historian Poems

I wanted to write
 The best slavery poem   ever written—
Perhaps win a Pulitzer or Faulkner. 

I had every intention of conforming 
To the standards 
Of modern verse and composition, 
Lyrics fluidly written, 
Perfect...

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When I was born in 1949, Harry Truman was the President of The United States.  Of course I do not personally remember him.  Mr. Truman was followed by Mr. Dwight Eisenhower, but I...

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Beware The Ides of March 2023
 
Ides simply referred to first new moon, 
which usually fell between 
the thirteenth and fifteenth day
of a given month.

The following events all occurred
fifteenth of March 
across span of millenniums.

One:...

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“On the Sonnet”
by John Keats

If by dull rhymes our English must be chained,
And, like Andromeda, the Sonnet sweet
Fettered, in spite of painéd loveliness;
Let us find out, if we must be constrained,
Sandals more interwoven and complete
To...

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Sometimes faith lives on the edge of a knife
as Sviastoslav the Rus sacker came to know 
The Khazar Khanate knew how to cut a slight
his gilded skull stole the show,
The Vatican went from a marsh...

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Ides simply referred to first new moon, 
which usually fell between 
the thirteenth and fifteenth day
of a given month.

Smithsonian Magazine history buff
Tom A. Frail
posted March 4, 2010 issue
url = https://www.smithsonianmag.com/
history/top-ten-reasons-to-beware-
the-ides-of-march-8664107/
top ten reasons to 
beware the...

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I'm musing with Jill Lepore,
historian (Harvard feminist, but definitely within brackets of general interest),
through eight hundred pages of These Truths
telling an other U.S. herstory.

She starkly says,
"Slavery is political"
while I had been thinking more of addictive...

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Childhood Memories!

Playing soccer as a forward and a goalie in early childhood through first grade
meeting a pilot and a stewardess in kindergarten and even wanted to be a pilot for a while because I thought...

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As a historian I was focused, on the long record of writing,
Considered an expert in the field, I found it most exciting.

For countless delights have arisen, out of the written word;
And we only knew crude...

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I was a famous, learned historian, living a good life in prevalent today;
As vast, grey clouds must move on, once wild storms are swept away.

I spent many golden days and plum evenings, perusing historical books,
Like...

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Yahya Kemal Beyatli translations

Yahya Kemal Beyatli (1884-1958) was a Turkish poet, editor, columnist and historian, as well as a politician and diplomat. Born born Ahmet Âgâh, he wrote under the pen names Agâh Kemal, Esrar,...

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Still binge reading Bertrand Russell...
9/8/2020

I plunge further into 
erudite epistemological philosophication
courtesy said renown British polymath,
philosopher, logician, mathematician,
historian, writer, social critic,
political activist, and Nobel laureate.

Whew! His treatise
A History of Western Philosophy Quite profound 
grist for intellectual mill
yours...

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A New View, Translation of Carlos Bousono’s poem : La nueva mirada

(My own view of Carlos Bousono stems from a full academic year – from the beginning of September 1970 to the end of May-June...

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Dear Thom the Train
Attorney Page,

Defender of all Creatures
here below
in these DisUniting States
of throwback uncivil disunion,

What is your root foundation
for a constitutional argument
that all living residents
of these remaining United Democratic States
have a right
to restoring healthy justice,
to...

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Philippines, my country of birth,
one of the countries in Southeast Asia.
It is an archipelago or group of islands,
with more than seven thousand islands.

Luzon, the largest island in the northern
part of the country, is where I...

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This revolutionary fella followed by 
Adams family patriarch,giving rise 
twin heir (plain lee gifted "Renaissance 
Man") Jeff force'n without hemming 

and hawing, subsequently conceding 
nexus (nor horse drawn Lexus) of Colonial 
power to Madison, thence...

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Brave Conquerors Of Weakened Tribes

They could never in any great haste
their false glory dare to forsake.
Why abandon that gleam in their eyes
for truth in those sad tomorrows?

Dwell not in that bitter splendor
A victor with a...

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I was out walking on a trek
through forested Adirondack hills,
looking for a good place to camp,
to drop my pack and just chill.

It was a weekend excursion,
and I’d already done eight miles,
seeking out the kind of...

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An absolutely truthful account... (strangely, including the contest’s mandatory ’*’)

Twas something like nineteen seventy seven
I saw a guy on a bridge gazing at heaven...
I was sat fishing, set up for the night
The night that that...

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1.


In an ahistorical fog:

all the Ways home,

all the signposts,

treacherously hidden 

by greedy men and women:

all eyes off the ball:

mere contemptible bourgeois folly.


2.


The rain is unending,

the wind howls,

the flooded river races,

its banks rapidly disappearing

in this darkness...

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Allow the mind
Afford its need to conjure
Profound:
If exaltation and majesty
Require a bit of provocation and amnesty today
Humor:
As remedy and coagulation
From the bleeding of
Pain, stress and anger
Affection:
To reach out from solitary
Disconnectedness and remind
Ourselves that human beings...

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Sent to his on tree in truth and fabled firewood topped                        ...

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I was thrown  into a conflicted family
my boat tossing and turning until
my sails ripped rendering me immobile
and unprepared for life
and fearful of the instability of existence
 Iike a plant adapting to toxic ground 
I...

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Mahammad Fuzuli (1494-1556)

Mahammad Fuzuli, the poet-philosopher, is one of the founders of the divan genre in the history of Azerbaijani and Turkish literature. He wrote his works in three languages (Turkish, Arabic, Persian) in the...

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Perhaps being something of a contrarian and historian
I like to spend Sunday mornings playing American Top Forty reruns on the oldies station
because I enjoy the songs and stories related to me by Kemal Amin Kasem

Also...

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