Let eyes meet eyes, be it mirror or pond,
On own image mirage-like crazy go,
For, today’s youth has grown to be nigh fond
Of self, lessons of Narcissus or no.
Let the English lexicon celebrate
Words which the Greek epics gave -- a long list:
Mentor is one, Medea--- Odysseus’ mate,
Panic from their god Pan, and Narcissist.
The last, a tale of extreme self-regard.
Today’s wars wage, for, we think but of us,
And scarce the green garden of others guard,
Why? Narcissus loves only Narcissus,
The world is surfeit with the tales of narc,
The rest as empaths whilst passively hark.
_____________________________
Tongue-in-cheek | 11.08.2026 | adventure, epic, love, odyssey/journey, self, Sonnet
Note: ‘The Narcissus’ in two parts I am trying to expand into a full Crown of Sonnets in seven parts, if I can.
When Napoleon declared the French parliament defunct,
representatives beat him up. A couple hundred miles away,
Beethoven scribbled over his own dedication to Napoleon,
whom he had supposed to be a champion of liberty.
As climbing the greasy pole goes,
this wasn't exactly polished.
He was roughed-up - by politicos!
Can't blame them: no-one likes being abolished
(for sure, not these ego-bloated shysters!)
What else? Oh, in a paroxysm of rage,
an eccentric Kapellmeister
gouged a hole in a music page.
For all his smiling talk of ease and glee
(tomorrow), his eloquent implorings,
this moment always comes.
The pipes get drowned by drums.
The sleek ship of self-regard, so sleazily,
drifts free of its decent moorings.
Let he who is without vanity cast the first insult
Vain to me smacks of superficialities which
in the long run prove fragile and meaningless
You can be proud of your accomplishments
without worries of being vain
Lose your hair, lose your teeth, lose your looks,
lose your vanity
Fashion statements
Youth
Dress-up make-up
Forsooth
A little vanity never hurt anybody
Until it becomes the substance of your life
Uncouth
Raison d'être
It’s not necessarily a negative asset
conceit
conceded
vain
narcissism
self-love
self-admiration
self-regard
self-absorption...
...Is self-love really considered vanity?
visual
diaries
conveying
a sense
of
performative
persona
introverted
&
private
together
in
a
convention
of
representations
imagined
& figurative
self-perceptions
The New World
Why do we write a lovely poem
when they are not reflecting the world
brutal and stark as it is
there will be no Putin, Zelensky or Biden
in his rocking chair
reading a poem jumping up and saying
the poet is right, let us bring peace
We know what providence entails
it is time to clear the deck
and kill millions of people, to give space
for a new beginning
until humanity thinks they are gods
when atheism, self-regard, destroy
the cohesion between the spirituality
of the god of the universe
and humankind
PERSPECTIVES
at every
turn
insistent
tender
encounters
more
prominent
refocussi
of
attention
to
proceed
repurposed
in
an enfilade
brilliant
&
intense
grandiloquence
of
self-regard
with
compelling
familiarity
in
an
unforgettable
literal
fragile
labyrinth
NOTE:THIS IS AN OPEN(organic) FORM VERSE using spaces&breaks without grammatical symbols ,the ' open' relies upon 'the one breath limitation' & so inherently requires the 'reader' (reciter) to input and responds thus making this enigmatic form a two way interplay & interpretatIon unique to the moment& changing according to mood is inherently variable.
Copyright © Brian Strand
The Marketplace of Thought!
Don’t I love who I’m open to - would share soul with (somehow in words -
in poetry, revealing me)? Must I place worth on goods ‘vain’ hawk
to earn a look? Let self-regard be life’s canard! God Loves such cheer?
May I find wealth in other’s health (I pray), by Grace of God’s intent,
not courted rhymes that plague our times, end freedom found in ‘Will of God’
(that lights all life)! Oh, bless the ways God’s muse serves days! Count that enough!
My labor’s mark you think a lark (not worth fool’s ink or up to snuff)?
What you begrudge, I would not judge. I serve my truth! Is it so odd
that’s what I’d share? Your truth is yours if it’s just Coors (in lieu of rent)!
But rent’s still due (my point of view!) I’m happy though to share a beer,
not make you wrong (to me, love’s song!) reciprocate without a squawk.
Life shared’s a chance to change the past, hoist sail up mast, view world like birds!
Long Tooth
October 14th in 2022
Poet's Notes:
Another poem with distant rhyme and note too that each line has an internal rhyme as well! What fun!
CIRLCLE OF LOVE AND SELF-REGARD:
Here's now a real prevised time...
Some people only get you grimed,
Since you don't disclose your plans,
For them to know what's on your mind.
Even if you accept to at least opine,
You sagely do that through a mime.
And they see it as a very wicked blow,
That you opt and unpredictably throw.
Which makes them grow insanely cold.
Hence, they unwisely become your foes,
Who always try to kill your beautiful soul,
As they unnecessarily stand to oppose.
But they don't get to know your goals,
That you've kept in a well covered bowl.
Truly, as you work manificently to grow,
They assume you to be acting saucy,
Though you don't stay by being flossy.
Yet, whenever you decide to speak,
You're being tagged as a rebel on heat.
So it's good you've been able to decide,
To intelligently move in the best line.
With regard to your mind and heart,
By holding yourself deeply with trust,
In the circle of love and self-regard.
When thoughts cease to flow ~
Where does ego go” prompt
by Unseen Seeker
Ego ego, wherefore art thou, ego
are you inert, in our dreams libido
I cannot sleep, twisting to and fro
need to take, a sugar filled placebo
Not sure I believe or even agree, no
Ego ego, an ineffable growing credo
All our unconscious, cannot veto
where wilful thoughts, do indeed go
Does self-regard need a torpedo
humility answer’s’ only if I believe so
By David Kavanagh N/A
Dear Dean of TedTalk
about unconditional self-regard,
As you clearly know from experience,
overcoming disabling
disempowering changes
isn't so much about
stopping the habit
of comparing oneself with others
Yet has everything to do
with not contrasting oneself
prejudicially
against Privileged Others.
Can any fonder love myself endure
Than self-regard bestowed upon a name,
Or for the cause of unrelenting fame
Become a thing unpleasant to inure
Myself, I think it wise, I must demure,
And savor all the taste of dignity
If takes the pleasure from my liberty,
Then I shall suffer long to be obscure.
I struggle for the loss of all that’s me,
When ego flees in search of undue pride
And leaves an aching heart bereft with tears
While my emotions, hopes and dreams, do flee
Perhaps what’s left behind inside of me
Are nothing more than strains of devilish fears.
written December 7, 2021
It would be a shame
to go on and on and then out
longing for grace
of some imagined historically significant life missed,
or simply more entertaining and health wealthy lives
laughingly not chosen,
to instead choose to belong in slow learner loyal grace
of this love life limply lived place
I could have chosen to hurt hurting people
by delightfully deliberately applauding the U.S.
as RedBlooded Earth's manifest supreme land
of patriarchal self-infested opportunity.
But we might instead agree
this is also a matriarchal land of love liberty,
one of a few scattered seed-invested places,
warm inviting wombs
of opportunity for health incubation
with concomitant risks of nationalistic pathology.
It would be my unpatriotic shame
to exit Matriarchal EarthSoul
without fully belonging in graced opportunities
wealth-lived risks
of predestined integrity.
self regard
brings
self respect,
pleasure
pride
simple bliss:
the touchstone
of contentment
laid bare...
...self..care
an enduring
mystique
insistent,partisan
steeped
with
self-thought
intense
innate,yet
heartless:
self-regard
tainted by
self-love
Then came Trump
No one talks about Syria anymore,
Was there a war there?
The bombing of Mosul the long siege
Trump occupies the news
And the whole world from pigmies
In the inner Congo, to the tall Dutch
In Amsterdam, are Psychanalysts?
The press robbed of their pompous
Self-regard like a school yard bully
Scolded, plots shocking stories about
The President of the USA
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