A Single Day

A single day in Kobane Ayn al-Arab

Rojava Syria

290 dead

100 children

79 females

22 entire families

at the hands of the Islamic State

In the photo a sad tired

looking woman in her mid-20s

with a baffled looking baby in her arms

stands before a brick wall

brown land horizon 

in fading light

Both killed

28.06.2015

THE PASSAGE OF TIME

Odd how

so many memories

have gone to

ashes and dust,

so that the mention

of those events,

by someone else,

brings nothing but

motes briefly glimmering

in the light of

our consciousness.

25.06.2015-21.03.2022

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

LIKE NOTCHES ON A GUN GRIP

In each Apple product

there should be

carved the number

of workers

who

killed themselves

in the factories

which produced

the parts and

put it together.

The price

of the brand,

the price of being 'cool',

of riding the Zeitgest wave

on corpses,

the lost dreams

of real people.

24.06.2015-21.02.2022

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

Possessed by the Past

Awake after a night spent reading -

that tremendous feeling of just

going through page after page,

hour after hour,

just like in the past, in the years

before everything started to fall into pieces.

Old books, long ago bought, never finished,

the last one signed by me on 19th of February 2001.

Still eight years, four months and two days

until the end of the world.

Now this night of cold rain

as the days tumble towards Midsummer's Night,

not a... resurrection, but a renimation,

my lich's fingers holding the book

in the little light of your lamp

you bought with me before the last Xmas.

And the shadows, all those years gone

in to them, all the decades,

all that time wasted, all that was lost,

held back, for this night, by

devouring the books.

19.06.2015

Democracy

The problem with democracy

is the assumption that people are

both good and that they -

both those who vote and

those who are voted for -

make decisions based on reason.

The fact that a mug of beer

was considered enough to buy a vote

in early 19th century England

should have already

revelead the fault in that idea.

Greed is the basis of democracy;

greed for power and status for the politician,

greed for things that they desire for the voters.

There is nothing wrong in that, as such;

reason can drive your greed,

make the politician bend -

just make sure that the politician

pays more than a mug of beer for your vote.

10.05.-16.06.2015

Buddha, in a previous life,

allowed a hungry tigress to kill him

and with her cubs to eat his body.

The path to enlightenment

leading between the fangs

and through the belly of a tiger.

The lesson: All flesh, life

in itself is meaningless;

throw them aside

when compassion can guide

us to a path to escape

the cycle of suffering.

22.03.-16.06.2015

Make a wish

No fallen stars
no coins thrown in hope

at the bottom of this pool

just bottle caps

shimmering through the water

12.06.2015

His classic song

Disgusted by Jacques Brel

singing about Madeleine

pathetic awful parody of a song

like a worm twisting its way

inside

like the light the horrible

pale cold light of this long afternoon

in the video

his teeth seem to move on their own

those enormous teeth

of Jacques Brel(1929-1978)

whole face ready to come apart

in black and white

and the sickening unseen audience

applauding applauding

there's Boris Karloff in Frankenstein(1931)

in this hunched man

missing one huge teeth on one side

Simian

smile

sweat

whole face

in sweat

Madeleine

something in my throat

like a big white worm

making its way up

as I listen

on this shivering June day

to the 1962 past

as horrific as this

and in the end
the awful circus melody

for the tormented ape-man

in him

and me

12.06.2015

Happy the ones
who never
lose their early illusions

about life and society

Unhappy those

who have lost theirs

and are ruled

by those who have not

12.06.2015

The faded colours

of faded lives

in old photos

the missed dead

in the warmth

light of gone days

and today

the cold light

of what is

less real

12.06.2015

Archimedes' death

Sharper than the wit of a genius

the blade of a nameless soldier.

08.-12.06.2015

Until the end

The end is always the same.

The only question is when.

How far you will get?

The only difference

until your own end.

12.06.2015

We have no right to turn away

from suffering.

No matter what form it takes

we have a duty

to look, go forward

and help, if we can.

It's the duty
that comes with
being a human.

09.06.2015

Every war is fought against civilians.

There are no exceptions.

Some wars are necessary,  justified

until humanity learns

and grows up.

But after a just war of liberation

the dead civilians

are still as dead

as after an unjust war of conquest.

They must not be forgotten.

07.06.2015

Love is the poison which is most deadly

for no Mithridates can become resistant to it

through small amounts of love.

07.06.2015

Greed is the sin, greed is the traitor

No one has a right to be rich,

become rich

or stay rich.

Greed is the sin

that makes stones

out of hearts.

Greed is the traitor

that stabs the conscience

in the back.

Greed is the disease

that devours humanity

in a human being.

To be ruled by a

pack of hungry beasts

driven by greed

is not a state

humanity should accept;

their greed,

our harm,

the planet's bane.

Viva la revolucion!

07.06.2015

 

 Nocturne

Night silenced the winds,

made dark,

calm statues out of trees

yet allowed the birds sing

of love and territory

throughout it's reign,

forever merciful,

the summer night.

07.06.2015

Tony Blair's New Job

So Tony Blair wants to ban Holocaust denial and antisemitism,

in exchange of a big pay day.

Let's look beyond Tony of the bloody hands and endless greed,

and say something of denial and racism:

Denial of suffering, historic and current, is all around us,

ill-informed and deliberate revisionism both; should we ban it all?

If not, why only particular case or cases,

and leave other bastions of ignorance and hate unbroken?

Should only those whose voice is loudest, whose mouth is

closest to the ear of the politicians and the media

and those who control both, have their grievances relieved?

Isn't the denial of suffering that goes unchallenged the worst?

Antisemitism is racism. It's not something else,

it's not more or less worse, or more complicated.

It's racism. If you don't want to fight racism in all its forms,

in equal measure, you can't fight antisemitism.

And it's not a tool to be used, not a shield to rise

to 'defend' Israel, like Tony Blair and his alike think.

They think it's in the arsenal of politics,

but so did think the Czars and the Nazis in their day.

06.06.2015

The only kind of charity
we should allow to the rich

is a free noose given to them,

a chair for them to stand on

and a free kick.

06.06.2015

Welcome to The Economist

I had to laugh out loud

when opening The Economist's web page

a pop-up window came up

claiming "Welcome to independent thinking..."

I had thought for decades

The Economist was dry

magazine without a sense of humour,

and then they come up with a joke like that!

Independent thinking!

I still smile while writing this;

where no thought swims free

the absurdity is at least acknowledged.

02.06.2015

'Basic' Finns

Be very afraid of the weak,

in terror shun the needy,

in haste turn away the refugee.

Vote us, we shall

protect you from those

who need protection.

Vote us, we shall

kneel before the powerful

and the wealthy;

we shall take from you

and we shall take

from the weak and the needy

and give to those

who have plenty

so that they could have more.

Vote us, we shall

screw you

and make the country suffer.

And so you did,

and we servants of the rich

thank you for it.

01.06.2015

 A Song For Summer

1

First of June,

first of Summer,

a cold, rainy day,

wind bending the trees.

Wind that goes to the bones,

wind that breaks the branches.

All the warmth

of the late May gone,

the Summer is here,

June is here,

all cold and wet,

overcast.

2

From the surface

of a muddy pool

my reflection,

dark, looks

back at me

without a smile.

In him I see

the autumn.

01.06.2015

Diddly

Palladius the bishop

to Ireland sailed,

in Wicklow came ashore.

He had papal orders

to bring forth Christianity

and thus the bishop did,

but the green isle forgot

all about him

and came up with

Saint Patrick instead.

And in glory stands

the myth, and

in dust lays the memory

of Palladius of Gaul.

01.06.2015