AND THEN YOU LEAVE THE FRONT DOOR OPEN AND THE HOUSE IS FULL OF MOSQUITOES

Of this are life's little joys

made: The washing machine

you think was malfunctioning

working well, and you putting

laundry to dry in the sun, out

on the yard in the afternoon's

great silence, when the birds

and the roads of men

are quiet alike.

30.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse  

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-NINTH DAY OF THE YEAR

& when the end comes,

it will be a blessing

for what is,

and a tragedy,

of the common kind,

for what could've been.

30.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse  

AS THE THUNDERSTORM PASSES

The rain winds down

thunder silent, and

I listen to the silence

that is left, the silence

of absences, of rain

and thunder, and

the voices long lost

that I almost hear.

29.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-EIGHT DAY OF THE YEAR

So many recrets, J. If

I would have been better

that day, perhaps me

and grandfather would

be there, celebrating

your birthday. Perhaps

is a big word, but so

much hangs on them,

those roads not taken

and lives wasted or

misdirected.

29.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

ACROSS THE MILKY WAY

Dust in the interstellar winds.

That's what everything on Earth

has once been, and will be.

Dust in the galactic winds.

26-.28.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-SEVENTH DAY OF THE YEAR

The thunder circles, circles

for a second day; its distant

sound near constant, and

a rare flash in the horizon,

but it never comes atop,

just circling, circling...

28.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

ON THE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-SIXTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Armies of trolls used to shout down support for saving

the environment, and humanity, from the maws

of a self-inflicted global warming, as 'real people'

(if we can call them that) celebrate the drowning

of over 600 people, unashamed to connect themselves

to crowing about drowning of innocent people.

That's where we are in social media.

27.-28.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

NOT BE SILENT AS THE ROSE

Be still as you are beautiful

Be silent as the rose

Frank MacDonagh(1902-61): Be Still As You Are Beautiful

Men love silence, they take

it as agreement from their

flesh-warm marble statues,

whether on a pedestal, in

the matrimonial bed, or

in the kitchen where

knives speak to the fruit

and vegetables what

the tongue is forbidden

from telling to

the pater familias.

27.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse   

IN THE END

Passionate love that

rages out in the open, and

one that burns behind

unsuspected faces

leave ashes that

are as cold.

26.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse          

I WAS TOLD

Long after their marriage was over,

and after they both were dead,

my great-aunt was still amazed that

my grandfather had never beaten

my grandmother, her sister. All his

infidelities forgotten beside that

fact, which my great-aunt still

struggled to comprehend,

herself married to a man who

had killed her beloved dog.

26.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse          

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-FIFTH DAY OF THE YEAR

To be a snake and shed

our skin, leave it behind

and slither away, for

others to pick up and

amaze, as we bathe on

a warm rock in the sun,

or hide in a cool cleft -

that's what we yearn,

we human beings

slowly flayed by life.

26.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

FLUTTERING NO MORE

Lepidopterist Time

picking us, one by one,

from the kaleidoscope

of our existence, to

pin us on the pages

of its collection

to accumulate dust.

25.-26.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse         

ON OUR WAY TO THE FINAL FALL

And now every day will be

shorter than the one before,

until the bleakest winter despair

starts the slow, stumbling march

to a resurrected summer, one

that will receive us older, marooned

farther from those summer days

whose memory makes us waste

these latter summertimes on

our way to the final fall.

25.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse         

ON THE ONE HUNDRETH AND SEVENTY-FOURTH DAY OF THE YEAR

So what to write, when

you have a poem to compose,

and the mind is light on thoughts?

A poem about writing a poem.

You would be surprised

how many poems, under

guises, are just that.

Even my favourite Chinese

authors, writing about staying

up late with tea and wine,

taking a brush and recording

down what the Moon evokes,

writing about writing a poem

to keep up the quota.

25.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

SHOALS IN THE STREAM OF TIME

Time is not the essence

of our existence, time

is what flows around

the essential things in life,

eroding them, carrying

them away, depositing

them as the sediment

in eternity.

24.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-THIRD DAY OF THE YEAR

Midsummer, and already

the short summer

reaches its zenith,

and starts its descent,

dragging us, unwilling,

towards the waiting

autumn nights.

24.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

BURMA / MYANMAR

 Are you aware of what is

happening in Burma?

Scorched-earth policy

devastating village

after village, small

town after small town

as military junta carries

out collective punishment,

air-strikes against civilians

follow one another,

but even the call for

stop sales of aviation fuel

for the military junta

goes to deaf airs.

The world has time

for only one conflict,

and although Burma

has seen conflict

from decade to decade

it's never it's time

to be the conflict

the world cares about.

24.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

GODS

Gods are supple clay

in the hands of men,

who put them on altars

and tell people to kneel.

24.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse        

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-SECOND DAY OF THE YEAR

35 refugees drowned on the Atlantic

off Canaries, but they weren't rich,

so they don't matter. They get

barely a mention, in some news,

and that's that, until the next

fatal shipwreck, which, of

course, already took place.

23.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

ALL THE BEST POEMS GO UNWRITTEN

I was going to write something

deeply meaningful, carve

myself in the fabric of time,

as a spark flickered into

a flame and raged in my mind,

but when I arrived here,

with blank space for me

to fill with Phoenician gifts,

all I had was a mind as blank

as the screen before me.

22.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse       

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTY-FIRST DAY OF THE YEAR

Turmus Ayya burns, and the same people who cry

over Ukraine, the same people who obsess

about billionaires at the bottom of the Atlantic 

over refugees at the bottom of the Mediterranean,

oh they have nothing, nothing to say about

the murder of Omar Jabara by illegal Israeli

colonialists. But a drowning kitten in Ukraine,

after the dam was breached? Now that

was a true tragedy, like billionaires

at the bottom of the Atlantic.

22.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse       

FOURTEEN YEARS

The signs were there, for both

of you, and I noticed a few,

did some perfunctory pleas,

and then forgot. But most

I saw yet didn't notice, not

the way that makes gears

turn in the brain. But I

remembered them,

afterwards, when it

was time for funerals.

21.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse     

IS THERE A WAY OUT OF THIS?

To PRC

What were just honest mistakes

to him crushed all her dreams,

and she had so many of them,

and she had put all of them

in his hands.

21.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse     

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SEVENTIETH DAY OF THE YEAR

On these days it's best

to acknowledge the date,

what was and is not, and

then fill your mind with

whatever is at hand,

to forget what should

never be forgotten,

to ease the day that

shouldn't be, for

even the flower left

in your care is dead

for year and more.

21.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

MOTHER

Fourteen years, and yet,

it could have been a day,

a week, a month, so

short it seems - even as

these years are heavy

on the shoulders

that led you down.

21.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse       

BUT PERHAPS IT'S BROKEN?

Poetry that goes unread,

without a mind connecting

to it to be charged, is just

an empty socket in the wall.

20.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse         

WRITTEN AFTER READING WENDY COPE

To be old and weary, at my age,

is very hard work, but as luck

would have it, I've got a lot of

training, decades of experience

being sour and moody; old

before my age - until age

started to catch up.

20.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse        

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SIXTY-NINTH DAY OF THE YEAR

The morning is all sunshine,

I'm tired, but I've got coffee

coming and a few things to

do - ok, more than a few -

before its time to dive into

sleep and slumber at

the bottom of a coldly

flowing dream.

20.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse       

REPLACEMENTS

Foolish thing, to write poems.

These boughs of laurel never blow.

More foolish, to take the verses of

others, twist them onto different

tongue. Dead words of strangers,

them too you won't revive. A knave's

endeavour then, poetry. But what else

there is to imbibe when the ivory breast

and the wry mouth are lost?

19.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse       

THIS TIME ITS THE BRITISH

At least 4 killed, including a child,

and at least 62 wounded, 14 critically,

by Israel's occupation forces

in Jenin today, and same politicians

who put up boycott and sanctions

against Russia over invasion of Ukraine

are coming up with more bans

of boycotting Israeli occupation.

These people have no shame,

no morals, just black holes

devouring their humanity

from the inside.

19.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse      

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SIXTY-EIGHT DAY OF THE YEAR

We are but entangled thoughts

kicked out in the cosmos

from the womb of non-being,

dazzled, as we fade, by

the mortal universe.

19.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse      

SATYRIASIS

One of my nights when a hoofed

beast awakes among my swirling

thoughts, lusty as hell, and pushes

aside all the comets and the sonnets,

topples all the ancient carved pillars,

and would have you, drowning

 the birdsongs in the soft night

with the sound of our mating.

But you, sweet nymph, have

had your metamorphosis.

19.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse   

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SIXTY-SEVENTH DAY OF THE YEAR

You have lived.

You won't live again.

You will die, and you

will be dead all

the trillions of years

to come. When the last

star cools to cinder

you will be dead, when

the last black hole

explodes, you will be

dead, and in cosmos

where information

is never lost, your

death is eternal.

18.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse     

BE WILD

Those who don't enjoy

their youth, drink the dregs

from the bottom of its once

brimming cup, won't enjoy

their long days of old, for

memories are kindlings

that keep old minds from

flickering, burning steady

before the infinite night.

17.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse      

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SIXTY-SIXTH DAY OF THE YEAR

I'm a bit more alive

with coffee mug in my

hand and grass under

my bare flat feet.

A bit more alive

with hot liquid flaming

the body, except the cold

feet keeping the Earth.

17.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse     

RUPERT BROOKE(1887-1915) 2

Other men died with their intestines

before their eyes, the lucky ones

got blown to bits, but fear extended

seconds from the sound of the shell's

coming. You, you died of a mosquio

bite, and became the symbol

of a soldier's heroic sacrifice.

Never say that the near-blind

destiny wouldn't have a sense

of occasional irony.

17.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse   

DAY LIKE ALL OTHERS

Wake up, the day is old,

it's time to get up

and see the world

bright outside your

enclosing windows.

Wake up, the day is old,

it's time to get up,

and let the world

be bright outside your

enclosing windows.

16.-17.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse     

STILL AS THE MIDSUMMER NIGHT

Night, as close as it will get,

and I sit here drinking coffee

and thinking of the summer

nights like this that were, and the

summer nights that should've been,

the endless stream of memories

and regret, in brooks mingling

across the swarming human

mind, until it grows as still

as the midsummer night.

16.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse      

ON THE ONE HUNDREDTH AND SIXTY-FIFTH DAY OF THE YEAR

Gravel crunching under my boots

I walk the familiar road in the warmth

of the long summer evening, in

its silence unbroken by the sound

of man or beast or machine.

All is silence, except for that sound

of gravel crunching under my feet,

on this familiar road leading

to so many yesterdays.

16.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse    

LET'S SPEAK OF PYLOS AND OUR GUILT ONE DAY MORE

Shall we speak of Pylos one day more,

until we forget, until another boat

takes trapped lives into the depts,

until bodies cover another shore,

until Europe kills again and takes

no blame, and arrests survivors

and declares them guilty, while

promising more wrecks and death?

One more day remembering

that these are the hands that

pushed a hundred children

four kilometers under the waves,

that this is the mind that each day

decides to allow the killing go on,

for Europe is at fault, Europe kills,

and we, we are Europe.

16.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse      

WHEN YOU HAVE LIVED BEYOND YOUR TIME

Life's chill lips on your own,

its cold breast in your embrace,

still it lays and doesn't respond,

no mist appears on the mirror,

yet it subsists until your heart

lies frigid in your chest.

16.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse     

'EUROPEAN VALUES'(TM)

'European Values'(TM) folks -

here's looking at you, von der Leyen

and Michel, Borrell and Metsola -

think they apply only in Ukraine,

not at Pylos nor in Crotone,

not in Western Sahara or Palestine,

not in West Papua or Kashmir,

not when it comes to life-saving

vaccines denied to third of the world.

15.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse    

FORTRESS EUROPA CONGRATULATES ITSELF FOR A JOB WELL DONE

Europe has drowned 22 000 refugees

on the Mediterranean since 2015,

13 000 more civilians than Russia

has killed in its invasion of Ukraine.

According to Europe, only the latter

is wrong and should be punished.

After Crotone and Pylos, Europe yearns

more bodies to fill the depths.

15.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse 

FORTRESS EUROPA REACTS TO THE TRAGEDY AT PYLOS

Europe's answer to its drowning

of over 600 refugees off Pylos

is even less rescue and more

drowning, like 22 000 dead

since 2015 wouldn't be enough

dead in the deep blue graveyard.

15.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse

1974

'Strange' how the "European Values"

of our leaders, thundering in Kyiv

and there spending tens of billions,

don't include ending the 49-year-long

occupation of third of Cyprus,

European Union's member state. 

Instead Ursula and Josep congratulate

Erdogan of his victory, and Cyprus

might as well be called Western Sahara.

15.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse   

IF ONLY THEY WOULD HAVE BEEN UKRAINIANS

You who cry about Ukraine, and wrap

yourself in its flag, won't you cry

for the 600 refugees that drowned

off Pylos, and were left to die by

the 'West', which took photographs

of their plight and then left

the doomed boat capsize.

Refugees from conflicts waged and

funded by the 'West', lands abandoned

by those shouting 'Slava Ukraini!'

from Afghanistan, Palestine, Syria

and so on, kilometers of water above

them now, and not one real tear

from the rulers of the 'West'

among the covering brine.

15.06.2023

#Poem #Poems #Poetry #Verse