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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Sep 16, 2015 - 03:20pm PT
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When Autumn Comes Around
She's come to her season now,
The autumn,
Like the dry creek that briefly flows,
And settles down the hillside glen,
With moist cool air along a trodden path,
Awakening remembrances,
Of younger years,
And loved ones so revered,
Secreted, yet deserving,
That their remembrances be told,
See him there least of all myself,
The young man in full bloom,
As he posed beside a deserted mineshaft,
Thinking that he was a man,
But he was still a babe then,
Standing at the cleft of who he would become,
Now looking back and spying him in all his vigor,
I barely know him now,
But remember what he wanted for,
Those things so less important now,
Things that ease like breezes there today,
There and gone,
And what of him?
Now myself the man,
With memories made of wood and stone,
As I negotiate this flesh and bone,
Again comes autumn my old friend,
She helps to carry cherished grief,
And hints at my atonement,
You might have seen him in his day,
Lost to us one October long ago,
Since Tobin sought the mountain spirit quest,
Which took brother and son away,
So enormous was the spirit of the man,
We were near the same height,
I thought he was much taller then,
A welterweight at that,
Unattached in some way to the earth,
As she lie in wait,
Until that day,
When autumn found him,
We shared that quest of boy heart,
As young toe-heads we somehow knew,
His legacy would yet unfold,
A brother's memories now kept,
As to my heart was his learned patient kindness,
I remember him that way,
The way he was towards me,
Her name was Barbara,
Hers the sight and smell of ocean,
It thrills me as it did for her,
October was her birthday,
Her mother's heart so strong and true,
A courageous mind not giving in,
Until life went from my teaching mom,
Her grown to wise professor hood,
Who'd seen the world and then,
She knew there'd be no bargain struck,
Or deals to make in compromise,
But her legacy still perseveres,
Beyond this glade so weathered at my step,
Where leaves of brown now fall,
Like autumn’s memories,
They go tumbling down,
And I find comfort in old photographs,
Of young mother's radiant face,
Calling here briefly year-to-year,
Autumn bears softly with her grace,
But for a month or two,
Her balmy winds a blushing so,
As if time were traversed,
Going sideways in her path,
She follows further in its wake,
To slide with stealth her silky hand,
Aside the simple days we live,
And those memories that we make,
As she saunters down the hill to wash her hem,
In a lonely pond beneath the firs,
Before the winter comes.
-bushman
09/16/2015
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Gnome Ofthe Diabase
climber
Out Of Bed
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Sep 19, 2015 - 06:33am PT
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Seize they control done rested and now procured.
Not creepy old knees bent can't kneel no more
Fallen on that sword once more
Asked if ? A good man? Is?
Are they the same who rested , as those who wrestled
With no need. For sobriety in cruel dysfunctional Orem born?
What is is that the point Gravity is not up or down just is
Too
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Sep 19, 2015 - 10:53am PT
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When Angels and Demons grow Old
"You're getting older now,"
The doctor said to me,
This concept of myself,
And who I used to be,
Like stale pieces of bread,
Withering to mold,
Dissipating to the ether,
To the darkness and the cold,
Putting things in true perspective.
Like an ever present hiss,
Life is suffering and chaos,
Quite the opposite of bliss,
Were I to live a thousand years,
It wouldn't change the fact,
That somewhere near the end,
I would begin my final act,
Like an actor on a stage,
With an audience of myself,
And present in the balcony,
Sits my ego like an elf,
Who judges every nuance,
Every word of every scene,
He always plays the critic,
Over thinking everything,
Social order would impose,
A prison for the mind,
And our willingness to express,
The best about our kind,
Not the intellect or the form,
Though exquisite and complex,
But our capacity for suffering,
And enduring what comes next,
So of agony and misery,
When I think I've had my fill,
And I would not find relief,
From a potion or a pill,
While reflecting on mortality,
There's a victory to be had,
In recording simple words,
Whether poignant or just sad,
Riding pain through every night,
For many months without an end,
One might try to strike a bargain,
Or seek exit as a friend,
But the suffering I can't escape,
Has been revealing to my mind,
It's more than inspiration,
But something rare for me to find,
There’s a quality in listening,
When the hearing starts to go,
There is comfort giving empathy,
When bad eyesight doesn't show,
And new wisdom found in patience,
That I never thought I'd know,
For my angels and my demons,
Are finally growing old.
-bushman
09/19/15
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Sep 23, 2015 - 04:19am PT
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A Whistling in the Dark
Happy wife
Happy life
So many lists a gathering dust
Honey dos
Honey don'ts
Holidays that get put on hold
Work until you're growing old
As I now go under the knife
Happy life
Happy I
Once
I visited my old man
When gramps he worked for Uncle Sam
Disdain he had once for Japan
Now turned to love
So pure
So right
And my heart goes out to him
Tonight
She married me when we were young
Young her and I
So wild and free
But slave to our humanity
We touched tongues and other things
My wife sees all the best in me
What I can't say
She says
For me
With that you can only guess
But I confess her vanity
Really confuses me
And I speak her tongue
Occasionally
So kinders and their kinders
Try to please
As I once tried
They do so much more than me
But I supply
A wealth of stern hypocrisy
Transparent to I
Best not for all the world
To see
So see
Happy pain
There's no rain
There's no rain that we can see
No sudden revelations
Only misdirected incantations
Blathering on so endlessly
From the political box of my tv
It strikes me odd
They cannot see their futile words
So many follow easily
So few think independently
That some of us
Can see
I see
Happy challenge
I once ran up the mountain trail
Or toiled with loads
That made me smell
And followed giants without fail
Up granite spires
O'er precipices shear and bold
It made me strong as I grew old
My hands were gnarled just like the elm
Of trees I wielded at my helm
Like mountain men of days of old
I swam up steam and broke the mold
And stood up to transgressors who
Would tear me down
As some would do
They might have thought I would lie down
They walked away
I stood my ground
But not without giving up
That pound
Of flesh
Up hill I roll
With dogs as I grow old
Each and every one
A friend to me
They've taught me every day what they
Could give of themselves so endlessly
I walk with them as they point out to me
Look at all there is to see
But they like I are mortal
Life is rare even here
As if the illusion of abundance
Outweighs
Our vision
Yellow grass
White hair
Wrinkles here and wrinkles there
Stop and stare the mirrors they are everywhere
And I can't say for certain when
Things got so bad or good back then
I'm only as old as I'll ever be
And only as young as I am
So I relish
It
As I go under the knife
Happy pain
Happy strife
As clear as clear as things can be
At two am so sleeplessly
I write down what it means to me
To breathe the air
And wonderingly what comes to me
As time is near for me to sleep
Wanting not that my words should slip
Beneath the waves so soon
Reflecting in this
Happiness
A whistling goes our breathe
Happy
This
As soon do I
Go under the knife
I mustn't forget to buy
A birthday gift and card
Happy wife
Happy life
-bushman
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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The cops are coming, you can go anywhere you like, but you can't stay here.
I was born an orange redhead
Fading blonde bender to bender
But sometime during the '80s
Like Elvis in Las Vegas
It checked out 'Return to Sender'
Now my hair's done gone and left me
Like the '90s when my kid
Had no use for the old man
And who could blame him when
I was his age that's what I did
Now it grows in those odd places
'Till the 'bug man' comes around
Or my wife appears with tweezers
When I used to squeal in protest now
I give up without a sound
Of those follicles I once had
The last vestiges of my mane
They've departed to deep cover
Abandoning their old post
For a lonely shower drain
-bushman
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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'Clot Dog'
Yawl I wanna hawt dawg
With some mustard n' some cheese
Some bacon n' some mayo
With some greasy French fries please
Oh so sharp and painfully
Mah heart has finally
Dun plain give out on me
Whoa is that a light I see?
So bring some soopa size'a
To the cardiac ward
And some O2 to be fair
The grim reaper will be there
Feed me hawt dawgs on a bun
With nitrates and sodium
Jus' like a loaded gun
Cuz a heart attack's no fun
Bring some squirrel and battered catfish
and some okra fried in lard
With lots of salt and pepper
To keep my arteries hard
Jus' like on my fambly tree
Where we ate what we killed
And we became what we ate
As we got our bellies filled
If I drank a lot o' booze
I would prolly get scirosis
But with frankfurters 'n cheese
It's arteriolar sclerosis
So Yawl I wanna hawt dawg
With some mustard n' a pickle
When it comes to heart disease
I can't be all that fickle
-bushman
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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Opprobrium
or
The Deluge
(written in response to a
challenge to use all of the
five English words ending
in uum in a single poem)
Earth once was an Elysium
Within the space continuum
Which stretches in perpetuum.
It’s now a fouled residuum
Which orbits in the vacuum.
Said Yahweh, during triduum,
“That place is Pandemonium,
I’ll cure that rank contagium!
I’ll quench that foul effluvium!
I’ll send down a diluvium!
“An inundating menstruum
Will solve that human odium
And bring back equilibrium -
And for the next millenium
I’ll have an oceanarium!”
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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i um stunned
cave poetry!
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Oct 10, 2015 - 03:15am PT
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Muppet, say hello to Mr. Merry. You've met before.
Isn't she just the little sweetheart of the rodeo, Wayne?
The picture reminds me of this, one of my favorite poems, somehow--not that Miss Muppet would ever neglect chores.
SARAH CYNTHIA SYLVIA STOUT
by Shel Silverstein
Sarah Cynthia Sylvia Stout
Would not take the garbage out.
She'd wash the dishes and scrub the pans
Cook the yams and spice the hams,
And though her parents would scream and shout,
She simply would not take the garbage out.
And so it piled up to the ceiling:
Coffee grounds, potato peelings,
Brown bananas and rotten peas,
Chunks of sour cottage cheese.
It filled the can, it covered the floor,
It cracked the windows and blocked the door,
With bacon rinds and chicken bones,
Drippy ends of ice cream cones,
Prune pits, peach pits, orange peels,
Gloppy glumps of cold oatmeal,
Pizza crusts and withered greens,
Soggy beans, and tangerines,
Crusts of black-burned buttered toast,
Grisly bits of beefy roast.
The garbage rolled on down the halls,
It raised the roof, it broke the walls,
I mean, greasy napkins, cookie crumbs,
Blobs of gooey bubble gum,
Cellophane from old bologna,
Rubbery, blubbery macaroni,
Peanut butter, caked and dry,
Curdled milk, and crusts of pie,
Rotting melons, dried-up mustard,
Eggshells mixed with lemon custard,
Cold French fries and rancid meat,
Yellow lumps of Cream of Wheat.
At last the garbage reached so high
That finally it touched the sky,
And none of her friends would come to play,
And all of her neighbors moved away;
And finally, Sarah Cynthia Stout
Said, "Okay, I'll take the garbage out!"
But then, of course it was too late,
The garbage reached across the state,
From New York to the Golden Gate;
And there in the garbage she did hate
Poor Sarah met an awful fate
That I cannot right now relate
Because the hour is much too late
But children, remember Sarah Stout,
And always take the garbage out.
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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Oct 10, 2015 - 12:01pm PT
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How about some political limericks?
Here's one for Canada:
Oiligarchs
Big oil in our country depends
On Conservative government friends.
They do business so well
That it’s quite hard to tell
Where one starts and the other one ends.
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Oct 15, 2015 - 05:39pm PT
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A Lyric for Turmeric
There once was an old man named Eric
With a remedy most esoteric
He tried a high dose of Turmeric
Then his wife became very hysteric
It was bordering on the Homeric
As she acted completely barbaric
Then she blew her top like a derrick
With a rage totally atmospheric
It was worse than a Taliban cleric
So he settled on trying generic
With doses much lower numeric
But it left him feeling dysphoric
And he certainly wasn't euphoric
About turmeric shipped way from Zürich
For the cost had become meteoric
But he had to stay clear of rhetoric
From a wife with a temper historic
So he drank some sulphur hydrochloric
And his dregs have become prehistoric
-bushman
10/15/15
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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Oct 15, 2015 - 07:49pm PT
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Great, Bushman!
Anybody remember Lewis Carol's nonsense verse, "Jabberwocky"?
Here's an eastern Arctic bastardization:
Lewis Carrol’s Other Walrus...
(Odobenus neologismus)
(with apologies...)
‘Twas chillig, and the slymey cod
Did smyre and swimble in the wave –
All ditsy were the eider ducks,
And the kinguks outrave.
Beware the Meanuit, my son -
The spears that pierce, the nets that catch,
Beware the Qallunaat, and shun
The roonious umiaq!
He shined his Ivrey tusks with sand –
Long time the noxsome foe he sought.
Then hauled out he on a floe of snee,
And basked awhile in thought.
And while in blubbish thought he lay
A Meanuk, Shootagook by name,
Came poddling through the bulgy seas,
Which curdled as he came!
One two! One two! And through and through
The Ivrey tusks went crunch and crack!
He made it dead, and with its head
He came spaloshing back.
And hast thou slain the Meanuit?!
Come to my flippers, whiskrish boy!
Oh clamjus day! Burgoo! Mornay!
He snortled in his joy.
‘Twas chillig, and the slymey cod
Did smyre and swimble in the wave.
All ditsy were the eider ducks,
And the kinguks outrave.
WM
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Oct 16, 2015 - 04:02am PT
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Rumination on the Tard Bard
"Alas," said Bushman, "my poor friend Yorick.
I knew his verses were sophomoric.
They were acidic, but just mildly boric;
His descriptions, all anthropomorphic."
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Oct 24, 2015 - 10:42pm PT
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Goat Priestess on High
Among dark misty ruins
lie royal tombs in antiquity,
Lost in veils of time
to supplant divine iniquity,
With a cosmic congruence
of celestial intelligence,
They came they saw they conquered
with unprecedented due diligence,
Now all in state they lie
once masterfully predatory,
Having sought to reverse
an evolutionary catastrophe,
Laying pious claim to chaos
they called forth the magnanimous,
But supplanted in its stead
a she goat most ignominious,
Mythic blaring rams horns
heralded the tragic she beast,
Arriving at the parapet
cloven hoofed yet graceful,
All along the hallowed halls
lined the tombs of ancient astronauts,
Who died reticent in grief
for having sacrificed all that was for naught,
In raiment of cotton
she proceeded with an epitaph,
And with visage foul and rotten
she pointed out their cryptograph,
And the prophesies fulfilled by
their reprobate microbiology,
In that bovine physiognomy
laced with callousness and calumny,
While continuing the diatribe
on the alien genomics,
Were working in the background
the hidden electronics,
And the recondite mechanics
of an underground facility,
Unimaginably efficacious
in it's manifest utility,
All creatures great and small
and the entourage of mutants,
Held rapt by all her countenance,
and goatish jurisprudence,
Were preoccupied with fervor
indiscreetly unaware,
Of Goat Priestess and her purview
and her lethal Savoir faire,
Intersected like a matrix
were the multiple connections,
Of creator and creation
and all of their deceptions,
Of the magnitude and mastery
the latitude and scope,
Of an erstwhile superannuated
seraphim of hope,
And by her own designs
leading all to take the fall,
Went the Goat Priestess on high
in an infamous cabal,
Though shrouded was a secret
unbeknown to her through time,
Was a deadly apparatus
in the Capra hircus line,
A peculiar complication
set in motion by the architects,
Encrypted in the blastula
of the caprine she goat sect,
Something heavy in her hand
as she saw it glowing white,
The appendage was erupting
with an eerie glowing light,
With a nauseating drag
the arm was pulled erect,
To a vertical position
by the gyroscope effect,
In opposed rotating spirals
coruscating laser light,
Emanated from the artifice
resplendent in the night,
And seizing at an axe,
the priestess was frenetic
Before she hacked it off
the limb was fully cybernetic,
The craft detached it fused the wound
and exited the proximity,
The priestess gasped in horror
at the remnant of her extremity,
No action ever trivial
no truth too enigmatic,
The company of partisans
injudicious yet pragmatic,
Extracted her to safety
with provisions for her honor,
Not grasping at the transubstantiation
that was upon her,
Of vegetable and mineral
part goat and part of woman,
The angel and the incubus
half animal and human,
The robot god and alien
of birth and Armageddon,
The baptism and requiem
that counts for our acumen,
For lack of comprehension
we dramatize the mystery,
For all the best intentions
we romanticize our history,
We populate the emptiness
with useless superstition,
With the monsters and the demons
that bring meaning to fruition,
The Goat Priestess on high
was caught and never knew her way,
Creation myth and fall from grace
can happen every day,
To beings that have come and gone
there's no homage to pay,
For interstellar wormhole travel
might be for us one day,
Every species was considered
Homo sapiens without exception,
But our latent collective consciousness
part cause for our rejection,
In a tragedy of circumstantial
cosmological committee,
Our intelligence non-exculpatory
on us they had no pity,
Out of chaos comes order
then chaos again,
Uncertainty and folly
on that we can depend,
Evolution like disorder
with its delicate imperfection,
Are like beauty in the making
and of natural selection.
-Tim Sorenson/aka bushman
(Archived WGAW)
04/16/2013)
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Fossil climber
Trad climber
Atlin, B. C.
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Oct 25, 2015 - 12:04pm PT
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On Biological Terminology
Taxonomy, applied to organisms
vegetable, avian or mammalian,
Involves Greek or Latin terms which are
obscure, arcane and sesquipedalian.
I find it possible to remember and even blithely to announce
The mellifluous and euphonious name of a bat called Myotis,
But I become dyslexic, dyspeptic and apoplectic
trying to recall and pronounce
The prickly polysyllabics of the sea urchin,Strongylocentrotus.
And as for biologic processes, why, the terminology borders on apocrypha!
For example, the strobilation of the scyphistoma of the Cestoda and Coelenterata,
Which, by division of the larvae into segments, produces multiple sons and daughta.
There must be easier terms to use –
Or anyhow, there oughta.
wm
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Marlow
Sport climber
OSLO
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The Prisoner of Chillon
By Lord Byron (George Gordon)
My hair is grey, but not with years,
Nor grew it white
In a single night,
As men's have grown from sudden fears:
My limbs are bow'd, though not with toil,
But rusted with a vile repose,
For they have been a dungeon's spoil,
And mine has been the fate of those
To whom the goodly earth and air
Are bann'd, and barr'd—forbidden fare;
But this was for my father's faith
I suffer'd chains and courted death;
That father perish'd at the stake
For tenets he would not forsake;
And for the same his lineal race
In darkness found a dwelling place;
We were seven—who now are one,
Six in youth, and one in age,
Finish'd as they had begun,
Proud of Persecution's rage;
One in fire, and two in field,
Their belief with blood have seal'd,
Dying as their father died,
For the God their foes denied;—
Three were in a dungeon cast,
Of whom this wreck is left the last.
There are seven pillars of Gothic mould,
In Chillon's dungeons deep and old,
There are seven columns, massy and grey,
Dim with a dull imprison'd ray,
A sunbeam which hath lost its way,
And through the crevice and the cleft
Of the thick wall is fallen and left;
Creeping o'er the floor so damp,
Like a marsh's meteor lamp:
And in each pillar there is a ring,
And in each ring there is a chain;
That iron is a cankering thing,
For in these limbs its teeth remain,
With marks that will not wear away,
Till I have done with this new day,
Which now is painful to these eyes,
Which have not seen the sun so rise
For years—I cannot count them o'er,
I lost their long and heavy score
When my last brother droop'd and died,
And I lay living by his side.
They chain'd us each to a column stone,
And we were three—yet, each alone;
We could not move a single pace,
We could not see each other's face,
But with that pale and livid light
That made us strangers in our sight:
And thus together—yet apart,
Fetter'd in hand, but join'd in heart,
'Twas still some solace in the dearth
Of the pure elements of earth,
To hearken to each other's speech,
And each turn comforter to each
With some new hope, or legend old,
Or song heroically bold;
But even these at length grew cold.
Our voices took a dreary tone,
An echo of the dungeon stone,
A grating sound, not full and free,
As they of yore were wont to be:
It might be fancy—but to me
They never sounded like our own.
I was the eldest of the three
And to uphold and cheer the rest
I ought to do—and did my best—
And each did well in his degree.
The youngest, whom my father loved,
Because our mother's brow was given
To him, with eyes as blue as heaven—
For him my soul was sorely moved:
And truly might it be distress'd
To see such bird in such a nest;
For he was beautiful as day—
(When day was beautiful to me
As to young eagles, being free)—
A polar day, which will not see
A sunset till its summer's gone,
Its sleepless summer of long light,
The snow-clad offspring of the sun:
And thus he was as pure and bright,
And in his natural spirit gay,
With tears for nought but others' ills,
And then they flow'd like mountain rills,
Unless he could assuage the woe
Which he abhorr'd to view below.
The other was as pure of mind,
But form'd to combat with his kind;
Strong in his frame, and of a mood
Which 'gainst the world in war had stood,
And perish'd in the foremost rank
With joy:—but not in chains to pine:
His spirit wither'd with their clank,
I saw it silently decline—
And so perchance in sooth did mine:
But yet I forced it on to cheer
Those relics of a home so dear.
He was a hunter of the hills,
Had followed there the deer and wolf;
To him this dungeon was a gulf,
And fetter'd feet the worst of ills.
Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls:
A thousand feet in depth below
Its massy waters meet and flow;
Thus much the fathom-line was sent
From Chillon's snow-white battlement,
Which round about the wave inthralls:
A double dungeon wall and wave
Have made—and like a living grave
Below the surface of the lake
The dark vault lies wherein we lay:
We heard it ripple night and day;
Sounding o'er our heads it knock'd;
And I have felt the winter's spray
Wash through the bars when winds were high
And wanton in the happy sky;
And then the very rock hath rock'd,
And I have felt it shake, unshock'd,
Because I could have smiled to see
The death that would have set me free.
I said my nearer brother pined,
I said his mighty heart declined,
He loathed and put away his food;
It was not that 'twas coarse and rude,
For we were used to hunter's fare,
And for the like had little care:
The milk drawn from the mountain goat
Was changed for water from the moat,
Our bread was such as captives' tears
Have moisten'd many a thousand years,
Since man first pent his fellow men
Like brutes within an iron den;
But what were these to us or him?
These wasted not his heart or limb;
My brother's soul was of that mould
Which in a palace had grown cold,
Had his free breathing been denied
The range of the steep mountain's side;
But why delay the truth?—he died.
I saw, and could not hold his head,
Nor reach his dying hand—nor dead,—
Though hard I strove, but strove in vain,
To rend and gnash my bonds in twain.
He died—and they unlock'd his chain,
And scoop'd for him a shallow grave
Even from the cold earth of our cave.
I begg'd them, as a boon, to lay
His corse in dust whereon the day
Might shine—it was a foolish thought,
But then within my brain it wrought,
That even in death his freeborn breast
In such a dungeon could not rest.
I might have spared my idle prayer—
They coldly laugh'd—and laid him there:
The flat and turfless earth above
The being we so much did love;
His empty chain above it leant,
Such Murder's fitting monument!
But he, the favourite and the flower,
Most cherish'd since his natal hour,
His mother's image in fair face
The infant love of all his race
His martyr'd father's dearest thought,
My latest care, for whom I sought
To hoard my life, that his might be
Less wretched now, and one day free;
He, too, who yet had held untired
A spirit natural or inspired—
He, too, was struck, and day by day
Was wither'd on the stalk away.
Oh, God! it is a fearful thing
To see the human soul take wing
In any shape, in any mood:
I've seen it rushing forth in blood,
I've seen it on the breaking ocean
Strive with a swoln convulsive motion,
I've seen the sick and ghastly bed
Of Sin delirious with its dread:
But these were horrors—this was woe
Unmix'd with such—but sure and slow:
He faded, and so calm and meek,
So softly worn, so sweetly weak,
So tearless, yet so tender—kind,
And grieved for those he left behind;
With all the while a cheek whose bloom
Was as a mockery of the tomb
Whose tints as gently sunk away
As a departing rainbow's ray;
An eye of most transparent light,
That almost made the dungeon bright;
And not a word of murmur—not
A groan o'er his untimely lot,—
A little talk of better days,
A little hope my own to raise,
For I was sunk in silence—lost
In this last loss, of all the most;
And then the sighs he would suppress
Of fainting Nature's feebleness,
More slowly drawn, grew less and less:
I listen'd, but I could not hear;
I call'd, for I was wild with fear;
I knew 'twas hopeless, but my dread
Would not be thus admonishèd;
I call'd, and thought I heard a sound—
I burst my chain with one strong bound,
And rushed to him:—I found him not,
I only stirred in this black spot,
I only lived, I only drew
The accursed breath of dungeon-dew;
The last, the sole, the dearest link
Between me and the eternal brink,
Which bound me to my failing race
Was broken in this fatal place.
One on the earth, and one beneath—
My brothers—both had ceased to breathe:
I took that hand which lay so still,
Alas! my own was full as chill;
I had not strength to stir, or strive,
But felt that I was still alive—
A frantic feeling, when we know
That what we love shall ne'er be so.
I know not why
I could not die,
I had no earthly hope—but faith,
And that forbade a selfish death.
What next befell me then and there
I know not well—I never knew—
First came the loss of light, and air,
And then of darkness too:
I had no thought, no feeling—none—
Among the stones I stood a stone,
And was, scarce conscious what I wist,
As shrubless crags within the mist;
For all was blank, and bleak, and grey;
It was not night—it was not day;
It was not even the dungeon-light,
So hateful to my heavy sight,
But vacancy absorbing space,
And fixedness—without a place;
There were no stars, no earth, no time,
No check, no change, no good, no crime
But silence, and a stirless breath
Which neither was of life nor death;
A sea of stagnant idleness,
Blind, boundless, mute, and motionless!
A light broke in upon my brain,—
It was the carol of a bird;
It ceased, and then it came again,
The sweetest song ear ever heard,
And mine was thankful till my eyes
Ran over with the glad surprise,
And they that moment could not see
I was the mate of misery;
But then by dull degrees came back
My senses to their wonted track;
I saw the dungeon walls and floor
Close slowly round me as before,
I saw the glimmer of the sun
Creeping as it before had done,
But through the crevice where it came
That bird was perch'd, as fond and tame,
And tamer than upon the tree;
A lovely bird, with azure wings,
And song that said a thousand things,
And seemed to say them all for me!
I never saw its like before,
I ne'er shall see its likeness more:
It seem'd like me to want a mate,
But was not half so desolate,
And it was come to love me when
None lived to love me so again,
And cheering from my dungeon's brink,
Had brought me back to feel and think.
I know not if it late were free,
Or broke its cage to perch on mine,
But knowing well captivity,
Sweet bird! I could not wish for thine!
Or if it were, in wingèd guise,
A visitant from Paradise;
For—Heaven forgive that thought! the while
Which made me both to weep and smile—
I sometimes deem'd that it might be
My brother's soul come down to me;
But then at last away it flew,
And then 'twas mortal well I knew,
For he would never thus have flown—
And left me twice so doubly lone,—
Lone as the corse within its shroud,
Lone as a solitary cloud,
A single cloud on a sunny day,
While all the rest of heaven is clear,
A frown upon the atmosphere,
That hath no business to appear
When skies are blue, and earth is gay.
A kind of change came in my fate,
My keepers grew compassionate;
I know not what had made them so,
They were inured to sights of woe,
But so it was:—my broken chain
With links unfasten'd did remain,
And it was liberty to stride
Along my cell from side to side,
And up and down, and then athwart,
And tread it over every part;
And round the pillars one by one,
Returning where my walk begun,
Avoiding only, as I trod,
My brothers' graves without a sod;
For if I thought with heedless tread
My step profaned their lowly bed,
My breath came gaspingly and thick,
And my crush'd heart felt blind and sick.
I made a footing in the wall,
It was not therefrom to escape,
For I had buried one and all,
Who loved me in a human shape;
And the whole earth would henceforth be
A wider prison unto me:
No child, no sire, no kin had I,
No partner in my misery;
I thought of this, and I was glad,
For thought of them had made me mad;
But I was curious to ascend
To my barr'd windows, and to bend
Once more, upon the mountains high,
The quiet of a loving eye.
I saw them—and they were the same,
They were not changed like me in frame;
I saw their thousand years of snow
On high—their wide long lake below,
And the blue Rhone in fullest flow;
I heard the torrents leap and gush
O'er channell'd rock and broken bush;
I saw the white-wall'd distant town,
And whiter sails go skimming down;
And then there was a little isle,
Which in my very face did smile,
The only one in view;
A small green isle, it seem'd no more,
Scarce broader than my dungeon floor,
But in it there were three tall trees,
And o'er it blew the mountain breeze,
And by it there were waters flowing,
And on it there were young flowers growing,
Of gentle breath and hue.
The fish swam by the castle wall,
And they seem'd joyous each and all;
The eagle rode the rising blast,
Methought he never flew so fast
As then to me he seem'd to fly;
And then new tears came in my eye,
And I felt troubled—and would fain
I had not left my recent chain;
And when I did descend again,
The darkness of my dim abode
Fell on me as a heavy load;
It was as is a new-dug grave,
Closing o'er one we sought to save,—
And yet my glance, too much opprest,
Had almost need of such a rest.
It might be months, or years, or days—
I kept no count, I took no note—
I had no hope my eyes to raise,
And clear them of their dreary mote;
At last men came to set me free;
I ask'd not why, and reck'd not where;
It was at length the same to me,
Fetter'd or fetterless to be,
I learn'd to love despair.
And thus when they appear'd at last,
And all my bonds aside were cast,
These heavy walls to me had grown
A hermitage—and all my own!
And half I felt as they were come
To tear me from a second home:
With spiders I had friendship made
And watch'd them in their sullen trade,
Had seen the mice by moonlight play,
And why should I feel less than they?
We were all inmates of one place,
And I, the monarch of each race,
Had power to kill—yet, strange to tell!
In quiet we had learn'd to dwell;
My very chains and I grew friends,
So much a long communion tends
To make us what we are:—even I
Regain'd my freedom with a sigh.
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Nov 24, 2015 - 11:57am PT
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Blessed is the Turkey
Blessed is the turkey who has paid for all our sins,
For we immigrants and pilgrims of un-sacred origins,
Who traveled from so far away to be Americans,
Displacing all the people just the means to the ends,
Like slavery and imprisonment our gratitude depends,
On the name of your religion and the color of your skins,
So gather around the table and imbibe with us my friends,
The constitution favors in the end the one that wins,
Now bring along your wallet and your legislative friends,
And all the rich and famous and some criminal king pins,
'Cause no matter what the hand you're dealt the dealer always wins,
And blessed are the turkeys who have paid for all our sins.
-turkeyman
11/24/2015
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Nov 24, 2015 - 02:27pm PT
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The prisoner of Chillon escaped, the way I heard it.
He's now somewhere on the Cote d'Azure and is know as The Prisoner of Chillout.
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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Just another simple rhyme here and I'm not trying to make light humor or to be insulting, but I believe the life and death situation of so many millions trying to remain sober and survive alcoholism requires some levity to temper all the seriousness. At least the seriousness of my recovery has required large doses of it, but then, that's just me.
The Sound of One Ass Flappin'
There's that time of my life
Thought I had it all down
I kept foolin' myself
While wearin' a frown
I was way down inside
Where I once kept my crown
But this day was done
When the chips were all down
There once was 'this' lad
Who with intricate plan
Would control his whole life
Were it not for the 'man'
Least that's what I thought
Trading chance for some sand
Feeling empty and undone
With delusions so grand
Then the wife and kids left
As my sanity darted
And some the clarity set
Like the Red Seas that parted
I had finally lost hope
To find reason within
And a life without drink
Or a place to begin
And a voice from within
And some well equipped friends
Pointed me to a path
Where a world without ends
So less dire and grim
Than the place I was in
Yet the alter of self
Was to sacrifice from within
That fun luvin guy
Who I thought was my bro
Who would lead by the nose
This child who would go
Was my selfish-est self
That I ever did know
He the life of the party
Cared not for me no
And this intricate self
Compartmentalized
Was never that crazy just
Substance compromised
All my defects and shortcomings
Denied to my sight
Would nerr hold me hostage
When held up to the light
Confused yet by self
And deluded by fun
To cop to my selfishness
Has had me on the run
Though denied by the truth
And the light of the sun
It remains a most ardent
Insidious gun
It would sabotage all
Given half of a chance
But is countered by selflessness
Well in advance
I'd trade alcoholic sickness
For the duel of the self
In leu of sure death
On a liquor store shelf
It's a delicate dance
But a bet that I'll take
With returns high and low
There's so much more at stake
There's the family I love
There's my want and my need
Being true to myself
Remains paramount indeed
So demanding control
And directing the show
In all aspects of life
As if I should know
Beyond all expectation
In reality won't happen
And rings hollow as the sound
Of one ass that's flappin
-bushman
12/06/2015
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Bushman
Social climber
Elk Grove, California
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The Things that came out of the Corpses in the Old Mill
One day I went exploring
The old mill upon the hill
Boarded and abandoned
I could not resist the thrill
My parents both had warned me
But temptation had its way
I pried the boards off of the door
And went inside that day
The smell was what I noticed
When I climbed the rotten stairs
To the fifth floor of the old mill
Then I saw them lying there
Their faces brown and swollen
Their prison blues turned green
The stench was thick and horrid
And the flies the worst I'd seen
Two inmates that were wanted
Had hid out in this lair
Of their obvious demise
Of little did I care
But what I witnessed then
Dare I possibly describe
At the top of that old mill
As I turned on heel to jibe
I had heard a sucking sound
As their heads fell on the floor
And something escaped the corpses
And slid across the floor
With such hideous disgust
I will tell you in detail
Nearly worse than the sight
Was their nauseating smell
Coming at me on those floorboards
From the two dead men's remains
Were two giant grayish slugs
With large and bulging veins
And a cry caught in my throat
As I launched towards the stairs
And a chill was at my neck
On my scalp were standing hairs
And I've never run so fast
As I did upon that day
And I never will escape
And I'll never get away
For although I soon found safety
In the shelter of my home
There will be no sanctuary
In my dreams where they still roam
They were hideous and gray
With their brown and bulging veins
For where they slid across the floor
There were dark and smoldering stains
For a child of tender years
Though he now grown old and gray
Should never see such a horror
And it never goes away
Well the old mill burned down years ago
And no one will ever know
What did happen in that place
And where never again I'll go
-bushman
12/06/2015
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