poetry


• In Memory of Martin Luther King - Hillary Kaye
• I write poems they don’t get published - Nazim Hikmet
• If the Dead had Email - Jim Smith
• Oh soft black night - Shanna baldwin
• death of poets - Bill Fleeman
• From Kid In America - Tony Scibella

In Memory of Martin Luther King

by Hillary Kaye

In memory of what was lost
by ill intent,
by ill in thought,
by ill will so complete and stark,
it kills the good and humble heart. 
 
Tell the children there was someone once
who saw a peace large enough
to house their dreams
and there inside a world conceived.

************
I write poems
they don’t get published
but they will

I’m waiting for a letter with good news
maybe it will arrive the day I die
but it will come for sure

the world’s not run by governments or money
but people rule
a hundred years from now
maybe
but it will be for sure

Nazim Hikmet, 9/2/57

***********
If the Dead had Email

From: Jim Smith <jsmith@freevenice.org>
Subject: If the Dead had email
Date: January 2004
To: Goddess-in-charge <Mother@yahoo.com>

Everyone knows that you can send an email to the deity or to our dearly departed.
The problem comes in getting a response.
But wouldn’t it be great if the dead had email?

So I’m sending you this message, oh Goddess, as your loyal supplicant asking for a modest boon.
I’m not asking for a general resurrection of the dead.
Not even a fiery pillar of fire or a sign in the sky.
And its not just for myself that I make this humble request.
Let’s just start by not canceling their internet accounts when they die.
If it works well, we can expand it to all - yes, Alex the great, typing out a message on a keyboard (or whatever you use over there).
Oh Goddess, let everyone who ever lived hit the send button.
Even Genghis Khan, Cortez and Hitler (no spamming Adolph!)

Just think
We could solve all the murder mysteries. Who killed the Black Dahlia? Let’s ask her.
Who shot you, JFK? Was it LBJ or just Lee Harvey? Please send an email with a cc to me.

Cleopatra could write an “Advice to the Lovelorn” column.
How about a fifth term for FDR? He could do it all by email, and better too! The possibilities are endless!

Got something to say to Jesus? Muhammad? Buddha? Get a reply for only $19.95 a month.
Not only that. Your dear departed mother can give you advice every morning until the day you die. Oops!

Oh well, it’s a great idea but maybe it needs a little tweaking, oh Goddess.

************
Oh soft black night
of unheard prayer
the lady walks
and does not care
she does not know
your path that guides
nor does she hear
what darkness hides
cold and coatless
With windblown hair
The lady walks
her throat is bare
your darkest street
hides her fear
the open doorway
calls her near
Enter in the warm lit room
the poets there
Safe now. from the killers
in the gloom

Safe in our cellar

Shanna baldwin
Venice 1959

************
death of poets
 
in a bombing raid in afghanistan today
u.s. warplanes accidentally killed nine
children, it was reported. in a bombing
raid in afghanistan today u.s. warplanes
accidentally killed nine children, it was
reported. in a bombing raid in
afghanistan today u.s. warplanes
accidentally killed nine children, it was
reported...
 
...the Lady is a lady, man.
mother of all poets. Her
children are precious.
therefore all children are
precious, as all children
may be poets.
five or twenty-five, or
sixty-five! it don't matter,
man.
in Her eyes we're all kids.
ain't that cool?
that's why She don't dig
violence, man.
 
–Bill Fleeman

************
From Kid In America

by Tony Scibella

Black Ace Books 6, Passion Press-Temple of Man 2000

From Part I

isometrics in the chair
already smoked 500 millimeters of cigarette
this morning
2 irish coffees a couple of reds snorted some
coke shot of tequila 3 dexi hearts smoked
some dope valiums 5 deximill spansules
brandy percodans handful whitecross bennies
shot some morph darvon for the head ache
vitimin e washed w/beer group of yellowstate
the desk blotter liquid methin the coffee
dunked hashbrownies ready to go to work now

Posted: Thu - January 1, 2004 at 06:46 PM          


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