[LIKE A DIAMOND TRAPPED IN LODE...]

Another written for class. The assignment: write a poem after a beloved master. For this I chose Constantly Risking Absurdity by Lawrence Ferlinghetti.

[LIKE A DIAMOND TRAPPED IN LODE...]
After Lawrence Ferlinghetti’s [CONSTANTLY RISKING ABSURDITY]

Like a diamond trapped in lode
the poem resides
deep within
the mountain of our hearts.

Always mining,
we poets are compelled
to dig them out
lest they erupt:
the grieving
for a mother’s death,
the tasting
of a lover’s breath.

& perpetually we polish them,

until

from raw emotion,
we are left
with nothing
but a gem
we cannot keep,
but feel compelled to give
to the first person
willing & able

to take it

up
&
away.

Jim Crow 2.0

Affirmative action has been part of our social and political landscape for over fifty years now, ever since JFK signed an executive order in 1961 that called for  "affirmative action to ensure that applicants are employed, and that employees are treated during employment, without regard to their race, creed, color, or national origin." Four years later, President Johnson took it even further when he stated:

Nothing is more freighted with meaning for our own destiny than the revolution of the Negro American…In far too many ways American Negroes have been another nation: deprived of freedom, crippled by hatred, the doors of opportunity closed to hope…But freedom is not enough. You do not wipe away the scars of centuries by saying: Now you are free to go where you want, and do as you desire, and choose the leaders you please. You do not take a person who, for years, has been hobbled by chains and liberate him, bring him up to the starting line of a race and then say, ‘you are free to compete with all the others,’ and still justly believe that you have been completely fair…This is the next and the more profound stage of the battle for civil rights. We seek not just freedom but opportunity. We seek not just legal equity but human ability, not just equality as a right and a theory but equality as a fact and equality as a result…To this end equal opportunity is essential, but not enough, not enough.

So here we are, trudging through another presidential election cycle, and as always, Republicans have begun to talk about the inequality of affirmative action. They call it “preferential treatment.” They inspire students to sue colleges over it. They claim that it’s no longer necessary in an America willing to elect a black president. They say that the United States can never be a country based on equality as long as we continue to offer a leg up to a part of our population.They’re right!
Read the rest of the story on The Urban Twist.

lunacy

Lovely Luna is waxing and nearly full. Here's one of my Lunar Cycle poems, this one published in Life in Me Like Grass on Fire. This one was inspired by being surprised by the moon being clearly visible one early afternoon in Reisterstown.

lunacy

I love to see
the moon,
at noon,
high
hanging
in cerulean
sky,
fighting
the bright Sun,
proving
Her own power
does not rely
on His
absence.

I Promised You a Hate Poem

Final Letter to Maria
You think you're so fucking slick
with your adoring looks,
& your sly touches,
all the while pretending
you don't care.

You want to confuse me,
as if you hadn't hurt me enough,
and you hadn't let me fall
a million miles,
once you cut me from your web.

And I hit hard—
you know I hit hard—
shattered to a million pieces,
& now that I'm almost whole,
you want to try and rip me apart,
again?

Well, it's not going to work
because I'm being held together
by a force you could never understand—
more complex than your jealousy,
stronger than the smell of your cunt.

So you can have the money
you think you deserve—
I've met whores who deserve
more than you—& you can have
my advice in times of utter despair—
funny, you never wanted it
when I first offered—
but I won't let you have my heart,
again.

Not so you can crush it
between your palms, 
again,
& smear it on the walls, 
again,
like some gory graffiti
for all to see
...besides, it's no longer mine
to give.

Embers
I sometimes find myself
combing through the ashes
of what we once had
digging, hoping to find something
salvageable amongst all the dead
embers.

I search deep and long, longing
too long, because once I find hope
I uncover burning, breathing coals,
blue-hot to the touch,
remnants of you
burning me, watching me
blister & boil
and catch
until I almost become
one of you,
one with you,
or whatever the fuck happens
when two flames
meet.

I know one day I'll accept that there is nothing but pain within the ashes.

Clean Rinse
I wash my hands,
I wash my hands of you
and everything about you,
the little burdens you try to pass off.

I wash my hands,
I wash my hands of you,
scrub beneath the nails—
if only I could pluck them off
to be sure the residue,
the rest of you,
was rinsed deep clean.

I wash my hands of you,
scrub them to the bone,
and even then I scrub & scrub & scrub
until the bright white light of reflection
blinds me!


Is this all the brightness you could give?

Tarot for Beginners

Tarot for Beginners

“Draw
a card before you go,”
She interrupts.
Not stopping 

my story
I reach out
& blindly pull one
at random; lay
it face down
between us.

“You’re not
going to look?”
She asks, smiling,
staring at the paper
destiny I simply
ignore.

“I’m still talking
here,” I reply,
“and if you can
just keep
your mind on
that, when I’m ready,
I’ll flip it over.
Otherwise, feel free
to flip it for me.”

“Oh no,”
She replies as
Her smile spreads
to her eyes,
as She glares at
her neglected Tarot.
The card itself
expands
like a sponge soaking
in moisture, but I hold
true to my word
& wait until I’m ready.

¡Flip! It’s Death
& we both start
laughing. “Death
doesn’t mean death,”
She begins.

“It means change,”
I finish, “I know.
My mother pulled
Tarot for friends
when I was young.
You learn that
Lesson One.”

“That’s right,”
She replies, finally
looking me in the eyes
—that sea of golden
brown flecked green
exploring what’s inside
me. ¿What does she
see? ¿The Fool
or The Hanged Man? 

¿The Zero

or The Hero?

¿& why couldn’t I
have drawn Lovers?
I suddenly remember
why, which makes me rise,
say my goodbyes, & fly
before She has me
draw another,
like The Tower,
which would make
the world crumble
right before my eyes.

A Woman's Kiss

A Woman's Kiss
There is something that lives
in a woman's kiss,
behind the pleasure
of her lips slipping
against mine,
sof' friction awakening
the beast in the soul.

It is something to know
how a woman tastes—
tongue touch tongue
soul touch soul—
impossible
to better comprehend
anyone,
to reveal yourself,
naked to her palate,
pure.

It was a kiss that made me,
a kiss that destroyed me,
a kiss that consoled me,
a kiss that controlled me,
but only one kiss to save me:
the one from those
luscious lollie lickin' lips
that let the sun rise
once again
on this languid life
and left me lost
to anything less
than our destinies,
intertwined
like the ideal
lustful, lingering, loving
kiss.

Killing Lilith Excerpt: The Cannibals

So, there's been some discussion about the various other internet madness that has occurred since the beginning of the Information Age. Most would agree that the German Cannibals take the cake. They actually make a cameo in Killing Lilith. Here's a snippet of that for your reading pleasure:

A graphic depiction of Armin Meiwes serving  Bernd Jürgen Brandes his own penis

I did as he instructed, opening a separate window for the newsgroup so that we could continue to chat. At the time I don’t know what scared me more, what I read and saw there, or the fact that it was suppose to offer some insight into SlowHand. The thought of either spread a tide of fear over me, powerful and uncontrollable.


Regardless, I scrolled down a macabre list of topics and subtopics. As I did, I wondered what new game I was playing. Was I intentionally seeking out a succession of increasingly outrageous realities? Why? How far would I go? What was I looking for? As I gleaned over the postings, tested my frontiers, I could feel the walls that enclosed my morality and protected it from the absurd. Yet, I could not stop.


As I glanced at the overwhelming number of images—pictures of rotting corpses, serial killers and their victims, mob hits, accident scenes, mass murder and burial sites, charred bodies pouring out from the ovens of Krakow, a manifesto by someone calling himself Billy The Killer, people sprawled like mad sparrows as they tumbled down the towers, the towers themselves—crumbling, gigabytes of Abu Ghraib atrocities, bloated bodies floating like swamp grass in New Orleans in Katrina’s aftermath—I climbed over undeterred. I was past the realm of morality. I had not yet discovered my new domain’s name.


SlowHand: Click on the one titled “the germans”. It’s my favorite.


I scrolled down the list of gruesome titles, Man sleeps with dead wife, yoboy with face blown off!, Killing Strays with Hammer, until I found the right link. It automatically opened up my media player. After a lag, a video began to play. A dark shot of an wok sizzling on a stove. An arm reached into the frame with a bottle, liquor of some sort, and poured it into the wok. It ignited.


LiLith: What’s this? Some kind of cooking show?


SlowHand: Keep watching.


The camera zooms out for a second before zooming back in, closer. The flames died down as the alcohol burned off. I could barely make out what was being flambéed. A sausage? Then it dawned on me.


LiLith: Is that a penis?!


SlowHand: Yes.


The arm reached in, turned off the stove and pulled the pan off the flame.


LiLith: Like what? Dog?


SlowHand: No. His.


The scene cut to a man, seated at a table, not all there. He looked tired, worn. Another man, the man with the arm, pan in hand, came to the table, set the pan down on a trivet, picked up a knife and started slicing. The seated man seemed to perk up.


LiLith: You’re putting me on, right.


He wasn’t. I could remember hearing something, somewhere. A news clip. Maybe a few words in passing. Some Internet chatter. Did you hear about those cannibals in Germany?


SlowHand: The man who is seated is Bernie. He met Arnie, the carver, online in 2001 through an ad Arnie placed looking for people willing to offer and share some of their flesh. Apparently, Bernie was the only taker, or giver as the case may be. Just google “german cannibals” if you want to read all about it.


I opened a third window and did just that, incredulous that this could even be real. I skimmed the article at the top of the list as I tried to keep up with the action on the video. I could only shake my head as I watched Arnie serve Bernie, and then himself. I felt my stomach roll as they both sampled their gruesome meal.


LiLith: Heavy price to pay for a taste of human flesh, don’t you think.


SlowHand: It gets heavier. Arnie convinces Bernie to let him kill him. Keep watching. You get to see the slaughter… if you can handle it. Bernie videotaped the whole thing, It was supposedly suppressed by the german gov, but I guess someone leaked it. These things always get leaked.

I couldn’t. I had seen enough, more really than I could take back then. I wanted to close my player. I didn’t. I couldn’t.