| Pummeling
Posted: 8/24/2006 5:53:26 AM | PUMMELING
Why, it's love! It's love
--calling to us
like a banana-boat in the night.
(But where is the glint
of native iron from the shore?)
The boat is low in the water.
The long oars dip, and dip again.
The wind is fresh, but with the taint
of something heavy on its breath,
and the downstream ocean
licks at the river,
wooing it home: "Come hooooome."
On the bank, palms sway.
The boat creaks. The crew shifts,
ready to earn their danger pay,
then
a stammer of moonlit spearheads
arcs across the water. "Jettison the cargo!
"Speed! More speed,"
the captain cries,
and hunchbacked bananas
shoulder apart the water.
The prow lifts, and the crew,
dirty and eager for home, clash oars
and go pummelling away in the night.
J. Newman Sudden Proclamations copyright 1992 | |
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| Pummeling
Posted: 8/24/2006 6:16:22 AM | Not too shabby! Welcome  | |
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| Pummeling
Posted: 8/24/2006 9:02:42 AM | "Not too shabby" was precisely the effect I was aiming for! Thank you. And here, in appreciation, is a great favourite of mine:
Danse Russe
If I when my wife is sleeping
and the baby and Kathleen
are sleeping
and the sun is a flame-white disc
in silken mists
above shining trees,--
If I in my north room
dance naked, grotesquely
before my mirror
waving my shirt around my head
and singing softly to myself:
“I am lonely, lonely,
I was born to be lonely...”
Who shall say I am not
the happy genius of my household?
Wm Carlos Williams
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| Pummeling
Posted: 8/24/2006 5:19:44 PM | | My favorite WCW poem....by the way Alyosha like your stuff and simply must ask would you happen to have an older brother named Ivan? | |
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| Karamazov!
Posted: 8/25/2006 7:55:12 AM | | Delighted to encounter someone who is acquainted with the K's - which meant so much to me when I first read it, but found it too long winded the second time to get beyond the prologue | |
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| Karamazov!
Posted: 8/25/2006 8:58:14 AM | | it's the best novel ever written in my opinion. Long-winded...yes but at least it's not Proust or Pynchon | |
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| Karamazov!
Posted: 8/25/2006 11:15:58 AM | | Well, you're in none too shabby company as I read somewhere that Einstein considered it the greatest novel ever written or his favourite. | |
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| Karamazov!
Posted: 8/26/2006 8:19:00 AM | For those that do not know, this book they speak, and referred to as the greatest novel writen, is "Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky", sometimes called a spiritual drama.
Brothers Ivan and Alyosha
Really enjoy your poems Alyosha
Welcome to the Poetry Forum
Quote from Dostoevsky
So long as man remains free he strives for nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find some one to worship.
- The Brothers Karamazov | |
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| Karamazov!
Posted: 8/27/2006 7:34:34 AM |
So long as man remains free he strives for nothing so incessantly and so painfully as to find some one to worship.
But we should no more wish to worship others,
Fyodor, than we should wish to be worshipped,
for neither worshipped nor worshipper
can ever truly see each other. | |
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| A One-night Stand
Posted: 9/16/2006 7:48:43 AM | A One-night Stand
What is a one-night stand?
It is like squeezing a pimple
when what you want is to have
all over beautiful skin.
What is an affair?
It is a cruise on a luxury liner
With all thought of the mainland
Gone.
J. Newman © 2006 | |
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| WE ALL FALL DOWN
Posted: 9/18/2006 9:45:26 AM | WE ALL FALL DOWN
Somewhere in each of us
the way is set from which
our straightest paths
diverge a quarter-inch
till we are country miles
from where we started out,
babbling eagerly
in some indecipherable tongue.
J. Newman Sudden Proclamations copyright 1992 | |
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| DEATH IS A KIND OF LOVE
Posted: 9/19/2006 8:06:05 AM | Death is a kind of love
suspended, an afternoon withdrawn
before it began. Hope
leans out over the irresistible pool
a little further, a little
further.
Nothing we know
will sufficiently grieve
that fall into the self.
J. Newman Sudden Proclamations © 1992 | |
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| It’s not that the dead are dead
Posted: 9/20/2006 7:04:29 AM | It’s not that the dead are dead
but that they’re gone:
finished! Done
before you’re done with them.
Sister, I want another word or two,
a last chance to say I love you.
Please...
J. Newman © 20Sep06 | |
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| Karamazov!
Posted: 9/20/2006 8:36:24 AM | For those that do not know, this book they speak, and referred to as the greatest novel writen, is "Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky", sometimes called a spiritual drama.
Brothers Ivan and Alyosha
Yes. I owned a copy and have read it thru. Unfortunately, loaned it to a friend and well, you know what happens to books loaned to others.
Really enjoy your poems Alyosha
Welcome to the Poetry Forum
Totally agree. You can read more of Alyosha in the first line/last line poetry thread. | |
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| You can speak for hours with friends
Posted: 9/21/2006 3:38:45 AM | You can speak for hours with friends
–good friends. You can speak with them
about everything, your fears,
their joys, or you can speak
for ten minutes with your lover
about nothing at all
and come away refreshed
by the intimacy of it.
J. Newman © 18Sep06
Thank you, Charlie Girl | |
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| The long day darkens
Posted: 9/22/2006 4:53:47 AM | The long day darkens. Soon, the night
will pulp over all of us
a plump berry of unlight.
J. Newman Sudden Proclamations © 1992 | |
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| More odd couples
Posted: 9/23/2006 12:55:12 PM | ESS AND EM
Rack and Pinion used to be into
S. & M., chains, leather, whips
and long, punishing silences,
but now they're bored
with all that stuff. They're not looking
into each other's eyes,
exactly, but they're looking,
looking: a threesome, a foursome, snuff
movies... Oh, what? They roam
the bars and beaches, looking.
Aware and yet unaware
of the eyes that are sizing them up.
The summer has many a surprise
in store for all of us.
J. Newman Sudden Proclamations © 1992 | |
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| Like Fish out of Water
Posted: 9/24/2006 3:53:25 AM | Like Fish out of Water
Like fish out of water,
like birds aching for the sky,
like lovers who have lost
the ones we loved, we gather
in this virtual place
and wonder
Are you there? Are you there?
Like orphans searching
for a name, an address,
a home that never was,
we ask some other questions
but not the one we hardly dare:
Are you there?
Are you there?
Were you ever there?
J. Newman © 2006 | |
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om
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Joined: 5/28/2006
Msg: 19 | |
| Like Fish out of Water
Posted: 9/24/2006 7:19:04 AM | | hey, older dude, You have Plenty of Fine food here! Enjoyed digesting them! | |
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| You can speak for hours with friends
Posted: 9/24/2006 7:50:19 AM | You can speak for hours with friends
–good friends. You can speak with them
about everything, your fears,
their joys, or you can speak
for ten minutes with your lover
about nothing at all
and come away refreshed
by the intimacy of it.
That is lovely Alyosha and so true. | |
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| I Will Follow You
Posted: 9/24/2006 7:50:48 AM | Hey, young whipper-snapper, you're welcome at my table anytime, but bring your own teeth, eh.
I will follow you
to where the hidden springs
of your nature
rise with the chuckle
of an urgent underground stream.
I will marvel
at your expressed form
and delight along with you
at what is yet to be revealed.
J. Newman © 2006 | |
|
om
|
Joined: 5/28/2006
Msg: 22 | |
| I Will Follow You
Posted: 9/24/2006 11:32:31 AM | Life can be hairy at times
But if I follow my nose
I'll find something
To chew on
Even if I can't
Sink my teeth into it.
:/ | |
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| I Will Follow You
Posted: 9/24/2006 11:39:25 AM | | ...watch out that it's not your moustache! | |
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| Death is the lonely boy
Posted: 9/25/2006 1:04:03 AM | Death is the lonely boy
in the pantry,
pining.
In his hand
a scrap of paper,
a name,
blurred,
barely legible
J. Newman © 25Sep06 | |
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| Stuff Happens
Posted: 9/25/2006 9:20:37 AM | The smile on Rumsfeld’s face
is confident, well fed,
and every tooth represents
one or two hundred thousand dead.
“You go to war,” he said,
“with the army you have”
and of course with the Secretary of Defense
and the President you have
and the objectives you have
–whatever they are.
Stuff happens...
J. Newman © 25Sep06 | |
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