NCN World Poet Tree Poets from NCN Network 2008-02-22T16:26:00Z User 475 http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/ OrgSpace NewsLog ode to beans, rice and celery soup on a cold, wet day jeans glued to me
soaking wet shoes
socks sopping with rain
oh warm brown rice, rich beans
how you welcome me, how you wait for me
hot shower steams my legs
while you, oh beans, rice and soup
steam my growling appetite

a day of coaxing language
a day of translating algebra
a walk through torrential rains
the puddles, oh rice, oh
the wet lakes of distant provinces
my path a national geographic, oh beans
the trucks that would push me into the niagara falls of despair
those walls of wet, oh soup
yet, yea, as i walk through the storm
the gray outpour, i think of you
you keep me strong
true to my course
oh beans, rice and soup
as long as you feature in my future
i shall walk the toils and atrocities of weather
may this ode entice you to appear this day

judih
feb 2008
]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000075.htm 2008-02-22T16:26:00Z 2008-02-22T16:26:00Z My Garden Waits for Me the sun is out... can you tell?
by Marissa A Spencer


My garden waits for me to come to her
An almost silent humming tickles my feet
Resting this long, cold, winter, she wakes
Underground the waiting is over

The wriggling, creeping, crawling things
Are once again aware, stretching and hungry!
Once again the conflict arises between us
How much for you, how much for me?

Can we arrive at some agreement, dears?
You can eat over there and I will hide
the fruits of my labors over here
Maybe you won't notice at harvest time

I will be gentle to the earth, and to you
Hopefully, you will love the weeds more?
Surely, we shall play hide and seek
And come to an standoff as usual

Me with my soapy sprays held high
And you with your tails and wings
Laughing at me as you scurry away
Come back here you!

YOU!

......................*sigh

© February 13, 2008 ]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000074.htm 2008-02-13T19:26:23Z 2008-02-13T19:26:23Z Penance of Winter there are no blooms on my dogwood this year...
By Marissa A Spencer

The dogwood stands bereft of buds
Sitting in its winter silence; slumbering
The branches twist and turn to the sky
But no harbinger of Spring awaits

No promises, no rememberings
As if no Spring has ever existed
As if Winter has grasped eternity
and choked the flowering graces

The fairies sleep hidden away now
When they arise to touch the bending boughs
Their magic will not bring forth blooms
The dogwood will stand mute and still

No nodding or fluttering white flowers
A fairy wand cannot appease the earth
She will hold back her bounty this time
Cloistered in the penance of winter


© February 7, 2008
]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000073.htm 2008-02-07T17:45:35Z 2008-02-07T17:45:35Z Smell of Air Smell of air Smell of clarity Enters my nostrils Chases my solitude... Smell of air
Smell of clarity
Enters my nostrils
Chases my solitude.
I smile
My lips touch
The waves of the air
To form them
And change them
My lips get lost
In the smell of air
They touch it.
The flavor of the air
Enters my mouth
Plays with my tongue
Caresses it
Touches it.
A state that is neither solid
Nor liquid, nor gaseous
The taste of air
Is the phosphorescent state.
The air tide returns
Up to my eyes
The air dumps
The marine hair of the night
My lips caress the air
Life is in the sea
Life is in the air.


01/08 Monica]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000072.htm 2008-01-26T09:57:37Z 2008-01-26T10:00:26Z time wave zee-row whenever i get a sense of needing affirmation, i listen to Terence McKenna, on cassette or youtube & this is one response:



time wave zee-row

matrix-ual voice
spanning the timewaves
terence on the cosmic surf
vibrate from past to future
into the radiant sense of sublime
words echo centuries long
reaching out
caressing our minds
stretch towards understanding

judih jan/08

youtube offering: psychedelic society
]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000071.htm 2008-01-26T05:10:19Z 2008-01-26T05:10:19Z Listening to the Be-do Project musicians coming together to hear ancient rhythms resound back to the ancient
bedouin and israeli search
where are we headed
desert days stretch to years

stringed instruments with tears in their eyes
looking out through dunes of then
who will recognize the moment of gold?
only the wolf cries tonight

judih
december 2007]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000070.htm 2007-12-28T16:03:55Z 2007-12-28T16:03:55Z ouch, she said ouch welcome class
ouch, she said
bitten by a large creature with no concerns
teacher falls down, plays dead
hoping for no more.

No more war, said Sa'adat, no more bloodshed
ouch, she said
shaken by a falling rocket
house cracks, floors falter
hoping for no more.

inside her mind frazzles
final moment brainstorm electric outtage
ouch, she said
then said no more

judih
november 2007]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000069.htm 2007-12-15T11:05:42Z 2007-12-15T11:05:42Z ugly sometimes There are bombs, there are victims of brainwash, there are mourners, wounded, there are sounds that do not cease ugly sometimes
ugly relentlessly ugly sometimes
mind can't see over the smoke
head bombarded with blasts of rocketfire
eyes see worse than eyes can stand

&over there in a soundproof room
sipping espressos, cocktails, lies
it's so sweet, life's beautiful, fighting over the tip
life's good, endless paychecks doing endless jobs
life's waiting like a ripe olive on an ancient tree
always bearing fruit, a bowlful of promises

but back here it's ugly
ugly with more to come

led zeppelin squeals 60's hope
but it's goddamn ugly


judih
november 9/07

mask of dorian grey taken from: Death Studios
http://www.deathstudios.com/Masks/Masks.cfm?MCID=4]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000068.htm 2007-11-10T04:55:14Z 2007-11-10T04:55:14Z Bats Pint-sized crepuscular creatures Smoking long twisted pipes... Pint-sized crepuscular creatures
Smoking long twisted pipes
Sit nervously
In the buffered seats of their limousines

Swaddled in talcum
And designer three-piece mauve
They duck behind
Opaque impregnable windows:

On a sudden but practiced
Impulse
To hide their unclothedness
From a naked sun-blazed world!


Shimanta Bhattacharyya]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000067.htm 2007-02-20T10:50:23Z 2007-02-20T10:52:40Z Between Bomb Blasts The scourge of terrorism... Resurrects itself. There is no report of casualties.
People are so used to being blown to bits these days:
Prayers shiver down sodden wicks on Divali*.

The silence is a piece of wafer. All huddle around it–
Afraid to eat of it. It isn't strange that deep in the ghettoes
Somebody should prick his ears– above the muezzin's call–
To plumb the soundness of the silence.

The sky is rigged with booby traps. Nobody mentions
Death by lightning. Natural occurrences are rare:
In life as much as in death. So long as the silence lasts
There is no cause for panic.


© Shimanta Bhattacharyya

*The Festival of Lights that is celebrated throughout
India by lighting lamps and bursting crackers.
]]> http://www.newciv.org/nl/newslog.php/_v475/__show_article/_a000475-000066.htm 2007-02-17T10:59:08Z 2007-02-17T23:14:50Z