Poetry – Prog Gold

Prettige SinterSquid!

Published on December 5, 2007

Today is Sinterklaas in the Netherlands and I wanted to do a nicely festive post, something a liittle seasonal yet with none of that racist Zwarte Piet nonsense. No, we’ll celebrate the proper way, with squid.

So here for your delectation and delight is a molluscan reworking of Dickens*.from reclusive poet The Digital Cuttlefish. This blog’s nothing iif not multicultural.

A Squidmas Carol

It was late December, down in the bathysphere,
And the holiday spirit was anywhere but here.
Half a mile down it’s as black as ink
No room to move, but there’s time to think
How I miss, how I miss that topside squidmas cheer!

You can’t “Fa-la-la” with a rad-u-la, my darling
You can’t “Fa-la-la” with a rad-u-la, my dear.
And that star so bright—
It made you flip your lid?
It’s the photophoric action of the firefly squid
It’s the way we know that squidmastime is here!

Every night down here is a silent, silent night
And I’m glad the doors and windows are closed real tight
There’s a noise on the roof, but I know the truth is
It’s the long, long arms of the architeuthis
No sled, no reindeer, no reason for delight…

[…]

You can keep your sled and your eight tiny reindeer
It’s squidmastime in my tiny bathysphere
You can envy me in your world above
‘Cos I’m spending squidmas in the place I love
Merry Squidmas, and a wonderful New Year!

Read whole poem…

*Well, at least the title is Dickensian.

Happy National Poetry Day

Published on October 4, 2007

I’ve posted this before, but I can’t think of a poem more apropos to the political moment.

The Responsibility

by Peter Appleton

I am the man who gives the word,

If it should come, to use the Bomb.

I am the man who spreads the word

From him to them if it should come.

I am the man who gets the word

From him who spreads the word from him.

I am the man who drops the Bomb

If ordered by the one who’s heard

From him who merely spreads the word

The first one gives if it should come.

I am the man who loads the Bomb

That he must drop should orders come

From him who gets the word passed on

By one who waits to hear from him.

I am the man who makes the Bomb

That he must load for him to drop

If told by one who gets the word

From one who passes it from him.

I am the man who fills the till,

Who pays the tax, who foots the bill

That guarantees the Bomb he makes

For him to load for him to drop

If orders come from one who gets

The word passed on to him by one

Who waits to hear it from the man

Who gives the word to use the Bomb.

I am the man behind it all

I am the one responsible.

Elegy for A Blog

Published on September 19, 2007

So, farewell then, Norbizness.

Happy Furry Puppy Story Time, your blog’s called.

But there’s no puppies
No fur
And no happy stories.

What’s up with that?

Such cognitive dissonance. No wonder you quit.

Not EJ Thribb, Aged 17 3/4

The Only Real Freedom Is Inside Your Head *

Published on April 4, 2007

Boot, meet other foot.

Those of us old enough to recall disco and roll-on, cherry-flavoured lip gloss with a fond smile will also remember, if we were paying attention, the justified outrage of the western intelligentsia when the writings of imprisoned Russian dissidents Solzhenitzyn and Irina Ratushinskaya were published in the West. Their works were hailed on all sides as the triumph of human spirit over torturous repression.

But while I don’t doubt the sincere horror at what was revealed as having been going on behind the Iron Curtain that the commentators of the day displayed I also don’t doubt that many felt a secret relief that it was happening somewhere else, to someone else, safely away from sight.

If you’d told the Dacron-suited, muletted and sideburned disapprovalists of 30-odd years ago that one day there’d be US government-run gulags and torture chambers right in their faces, in their own backyards, they’d’ve been so disgusted and they’ve had you run out of town for even suggesting it. “That’s evil Commie stuff, we’re the Good Guys!”

But where’s their outrage now, when here we are with the first publication of a book of poetry written by Guantanamo Bay detainees?

[Courtesy Rippen Kitten]

From The Wasteland: The Death Poem by Jumah al-Dossari

“Take my blood.
Take my death shroud and
The remnants of my body.
Take photographs of my corpse at the grave, lonely.
Send them to the world,
To the judges and
To the people of conscience,
Send them to the principled men and the fair-minded.
And let them bear the guilty burden, before the world,
Of this innocent soul.
Let them bear the burden, before their children and before history,
Of this wasted, sinless soul,
Of this soul which has suffered at the hands of the “protectors of peace.“

A-Dossari wrote this poem in Guantanamo Bay where he was tortured by US agents and military.

Blacked Out Face

Published on February 24, 2007

I came across this poem, by Walter Otton, at Zippysite when idly googling, as one does. So I saved it for a day when a little poetry seemed appropriate. Which is most days, but particularly on a dull rainy Saturday.

Blacked Out Face:

Because I don’t want you to see my features
I’ve blacked out my face
I don’t want you to know my name
Or my school, my family or my dwelling place

My alcoholic dad ain’t around so much and

My mum likes a drink too
They have never taken me on holiday
Anyway, I couldn’t even spell ‘the Algarve’ or ‘Corfu’

Last August my flat burned down
Luckily no-one was hurt
I lost all my clothes and possessions
Every trainer, all my socks, each shirt

I moved into my sisters and stayed on the sofa
I slept on the cushions for thirty six weeks
I had a duvet and a sleeping bag
But I never had any fresh sheets

Older brother number one got a fifteen year old pregnant
Older brother number two is a little mad
He tried jumping out of a top floor window
Doctors sedated him in a cell covered in soft pad

Read More