TRUTH: PARTIAL AND IMPARTIAL 


Lies are our staple food.
We feel convulsions
When we occasionally turn to truth 
Those who encounter it 
End up in hospitals, 
Or on the pistoled pier,
If the dose of truth was higher.

Literature is the realm 
Of the partial truth 
Even history has no history 
Of telling the impartial
Unqualified truth does not let us sleep
Try the balm of poetry  
Where the wounds are too deep. 

Literature introduces us 
To the best parts of  humanity, 
And history to the worst 
Yet we love history 
Though it always acts like a wamp
Tempts us with its perilous glory 
Which bears the death's stamp.

Our silence can make stones speak, 
And  also shut whirling  tempests
Of verbal extravagance. 
History is the warbling noise 
Of the river of life 
In its glorious as well as meanest flow 
Poetry interprets and modifies the show.

..........




HOPE AND FAITH 



Hope sustains life 
And it is hope 
Which makes meat of a man,
Killing  him bit by bit 
Rather than despatching him off  once for all.

Hope is a path  kept open
While all the doors 
Are closed
Leading to despair
All around the earth and the firmament.

Hope tempts us into living
And keep on suffering 
The tantrums of fate
Believing 
All will be well one day.
 
Men who fail in their endeavours 
Turn to Hope 
To keep the masters 
In good humour thinking 
The mortals believe in their mercy.

Faith, rather than hope, is 
A positive asset for man 
Which does not leave things 
To the will of gods 
Rather put the responsibility on human action.

..............




THE ARTIST

(At a fancy eating joint in the Hotel La Matriciana opposite Operation House,  Rome)


Whatever you have, 
Body or mind
You have to exchange it
For food.

It is normal, 
And has nothing to shock
If the exchange 
Is willing and under no stress.

This exchange 
Loses its exalted status
When we oversell ourselves 
Because we have to survive.

Even if it is the centre of civilization 
The Republic Square of Rome
The Creators of Beauty 
Have to beg to run their home.

An artist, a singer, a poet 
Perform for the joy of creation
But they have a body too
And a mind to be kept in motion.

When poets or singers sing 
In the streets 
It is divine 
And sends us in a trance 

But when next moment, 
He advances towards you 
With a begging bowl,
All divinity takes wing.

It was half for joy of his calling 
And half for his stomach 
Yet what a performer!
I appreciate the singer !

But I pity the system 
Which has everything for the artless 
And nothing for the artist 
Whose work is so sublime.

...............
.





MAKING IT EASY


Easy chairs have been in vogue
Though these days
Ease has filtered out 
And now chairs keep you near standing
As they  resemble the  tables only .

The more ease we find
The greater is the torture
Inflicted on the wooden stuff
Just see how uneasily 
They are fixed to give peace to our flesh.

Some species of men  are found
Looking so easy in life
I can't help remembering those
Whose bones are fitted beneath
To give them an elevated state of  peace .

You cannot be easy unless you give  Comparable torture to some one
And all ease which 
Twists the bones of  another person 
Is indivine and unjust.

...............







THE SECOND FALL



Gods believe in subtle communication
They talk in silences
And gestures 
Words and speech are crude arts
In their parlance
Which ignorant people use
Or verbal aids for mentally retarded.

Birds, animals, even insects know
The subtle language of love 
Which gods understand 
And feel happy to bless them
Man is the only creature
Who has lost this subtle approach
Because of his selfish know-mongering. 

 
Essential knowledge to remain alive 
Is imparted to every object
That is why doves and lambs
Have not been forced 
Out of existence 
They know the basic art of survival
And nature's world is still aglow with life.

Only men, in their selfishness, gathered 
More knowledge than was required
To be alive with dignity
The result is before our eyes
See the fast fall of mankind alone
From essential graces 
The greatest loss being their innocence and joy .

Gods wonder what to do with 
Men with torn psyches who have 
Converted themselves into debris 
Impatient to overreach themselves.
How to bless this ignorant tribe ?
Who don't know when they abort a tree, they are cutting a descendant from the branch of life.

...........





............


ROME

Here, in my hotel room, there is absolute calm 
I am in a state of complete self possession.
Only some memories dance their way 
Into my mind.

Is man lonely any time? I think never. Life is reduced to memories and emotions and wherever we are, they follow us 

But I find time with myself. This place where I stay has started communicating with me.
Here are the three poems I have composed 
just now. 

A feeling of thankfulness to gods has overpowered me. And from this mental state, spring up these poems inwhich you will find me conversing not only with God but with  fellow human beings too.

FROM SILENCE TO DOCTORATE IN NOISE


The things He created 
Were in an Accord of Silence 
Spreading fom end to end.

It was the beginning of creation
And gods knew 
Things possess communicative powers

Birds, animals, insects 
Each one and then our waters 
And mounts  conversed in silence.

And there was no problem 
In understanding each other 
So plain was the language of silence.

Things took a 'loud' turn when men 
Appeared on the scene
Who took silence for half approval 

They decided to kill the trees
They were silent,
And men considered it half approval 

They wanted to imprison rivers into bottles
But rivers were in a trance 
Men considered half yes when they said no No 

Men prayed for more and more 
Gods remained silent.
Men took it as their half-approval

When they found nature grumbling 
And gods frowning 
Men decided to break the Accord of Silence 

From silent communication 
they came to words
And from words to blows 

From blows, to muscles, and then, 
Over to machine guns
Silence has now  received doctorate in noise.


..........

LIVING WITH GOD 


Someone told me keep remembering God 
Go on telling him 
You are doing these good things
And you have done this bad 

Soon I came to know
 God does not like to be kept busy 
All the time 
No fun engaging him in minor issues.

I realised this thing in a very 
Costly way.
Whatever I said, 
God often found fault with my words 

Finally every time I had to say sorry 
God never reverted to me
When I was busy 
Only I did it out of fear or to please him.

Now I let God do his work 
He knows I am here 
And I remember him.
And when in need,  he is here for me.

We do not talk now much 
I also do not tell people 
How much I love him
Or He loves me 

He is there in his grand presence 
And I am here in mine
Mini presence trying to partake 
Some sparkles of his splendour.


........

JOURNEY OF JOY 

 

Is joy a personal domain?
Entirely individual property?
Something like food 
Which we own and eat
When we need?

No it is a protean im mass
Falling and rising each moment 
Does not stay in the same shape 
Nor in the same mind 
Can't trust it.

Every other person around you 
Related or unrelated
Can make his  participation
In the creation of 
This dynamic content 

I sometimes feel though we call it
My joy my pleasure, my happiness 
It is all an illusion.
It is supplied to you  
By people you operate with.

Any one can cause dents in your joy 
Turn it into grief 
And make you weep.
You are at the receiving end only 
When your joy turns grief 

How helpless I am! 
It is a matter of the heart !
Where is my heart?
Is it inside the vaults of my chest 
Oh..I see it like a ball running out 

And from there it returns carrying 
So much soil and waste matter 
Bruised too at  times 
And sometimes when kicked, 
Crying.

Joy which looks so much my own 
Rides  on my passions 
Knocks at several doors 
In search of a return feeling 
But often returns crestfallen.

Can I erect walls around it
So that it does jump out
Nor expect anything 
Nor feel lost
But just stay inside, content with itself?

Gods were unhappy to see me distraught 
They suggested another way.
If you love others, 
Without expecting returns
Nobody can divest you of your joy.

mockery of democracy

why mockery of democracy?
because demo
                         crazy can be easily
                                                           mocked.


this world or being optimistic

i read what
i’m interested in
                               yes, yes,
but it makes it
harder to live
                           yes, yes,
in this world.


which world?

a very
reliable
source
who said
that those
who are
honest & good
who have
character & discrimination
win the respect
of all
           the world
must not
have seen
the latest
political
results.





William’s masterpiece

beyond honest
                          & good
                                         character
                                                            & discrimination
                                                                                          there must
                                                                                                              live
                                                                                             what is
                                                                         impossible
                                                      to fathom
                                    a phantom
                     lurking
in the shadows
                     somewhere in the coulisse
                                                                    Shakespeare himself
                                               hysterical
                                               (laughing)


builders of this world or what his world builds       

if i could
laugh
           with you
i’d celebrate
all my mirth
                      & frivolity 
reach beyond
the myth of
                      integrity & other worldly
                                                                 lies
& lie with you
until at last
                      we make it true.








bonus:

tomorrow’s optimism or the new builders

we need 
a new word
with a new
definition
for the new
world.

A funeral wreath for Gaza, apartheid for us

I am transparent

I am thing

I am war

I am insomniac

I am dream

I am war

I am atomised

I am radioactive

I am war

I am child

I am mother

I am father

I am poet

I am war

I am Africa

I am war

I am writing to reach you

I am war

I am not calm

In war, no one is calm

My poems

mean absolutely nothing

to the ghosts that

now inhabit Gaza.

What honey and milk taste like during war

You, war, talk to me of

 the alternate universe

you live in, talk to me or

don’t talk to me of

your dead. In war, the

child is alone. The poet

stands alone. I think of all

the summers I was

loved. I am waiting for the

dead to meet me

For my second mother

to greet me, for her to

embrace me, call me,

welcome me home.

You, Gaza, are Steve

Biko. You will always

be remembered. Monuments

will be built in your honour.

I will remember your name for

centuries. I picked up

the human bone in the dirt.

It, too, was a gift.

Prayer For The Future or Wildflowers Growing Out Of The Eyes Of The Sun

He’s going to have

 children with

another woman

 because I can’t

have them anymore

Wildflowers bloom

in my stomach

 lining, my aorta,

my cranial devices,

my medulla oblongata,

my womb

There’s a starry-starry night

in my ovaries

Oh, they have never seen nor

felt the light of day

No children have I

No man by my side

Only an army

Angels in front

Angels behind

And the infinite potential of

The mind

I teach millions of children

about the nature of the medicinal

properties of plants

How to heal and knit and sew

 propaganda to the instruments of change

Dear Gaza,

the world will never

forget your dead

Dead children

Dead women

Dead men

I will always love that river

The ebb and flow of that river

To the sea

Watch me chase

the cloud like a horse

Call upon the birds

to feast on shrapnel

To protect the children’s eyes

To protect their liberty.

4th of March, 2024

I did it for Yasser

No extremist was I

There was a cause I was fighting for

An issue at stake

One fine autumn day

my mother was Russia

and I was Biden

I called her entourage

 and said I wanted a meeting

but they giggled behind my

 back and so my mother and

 I went our separate ways

I ate Jerusalem in tiny bite sized

 pieces but my mother told me in

 no uncertain terms that I had to share

So I divided what I had left into

two between the east and the west,

 calmly composed myself and went

 in search of Oriental studies.

2nd of March, 2024

I Can’t Reply

 one hand is my sky

That spreads peace of shadow

 All the seasons l feel it

My every morning blooms 

With the blessing of it

My day mixes with it

I dream lying in its lap

As if l were an innocent infant

I do everything in the heaven

Its touch welcomes my steps.

Your another hand is the crown of glory

That spreads the pages of beauty

All the time beauty kisses my heart

And makes me a ship of love

That sails through the sweetness.

The ship is nothing but fresh love of eternity

The fountain of the crown refreshes my breath ;

Gentle breeze writes love letter In my virgin eyes

l read and feel that with time

But I can’t reply. 

#################

Tomorrow’s Couple

Everyday my rainbow draw you

The colours adorn love river

My breath touches your bright lips

The roses bloom in my heart to read you.

Every spring l hear a new sound

I feel new fragrance in secret

l compose a song of soul

I plant a tree of love and tenderness.

I and you are always tomorrow’s couple 

Not for the present time

Tomorrow is always pleasant 

As we can’t touch it. 

For wide is the gate, and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it. 

• The Holy Bible

Matthew 7:13

There was an eastern town, and an old man watched the rain from the window, his Bible on a small table beside. He sometimes wore a brimmed hat in the outdoors but only went out to get food from the grocery store. He had a little Christmas Tree, a Charlie Brown Christmas tree, small enough to go on a little table. Each year it came out. I liked this tree.

He had very few visitors but sometimes a soul would show up, someone from the old days. These people, most of them, grew up poor. It was nice that their children wanted more, wanted to succeed. There is no harm in that. But some of their children’s generation went crazy w/it, and took it all too seriously, breaking relationships, family bonds, trust, even any measure of happiness, over monetary gain. The world of others didn’t laugh outwardly at him but didn’t respect him, for his worldly accomplishments were not great or even pronounced. The affluent wanted to keep their money and get more and the poor wanted to be wealthy. The man wanted me to shave his face because he couldn’t do this any longer as he was getting shaky at ninety three years of age.

So he sat in an old chair, I think one of the very chairs I used to sit in as a child when he fed me lunch. I carefully shaved his face. Outside it rained. I could hear it against the glass and knew it was making its way into the earth here, mixing with the soil, disappearing somewhere there, but in some places went through gravity to fall down industrial grates built into the roads. He had chosen to never grow a beard. That choice in a man has always been strange to me. Though an orphan or mystery at birth in actuality, my people must have had beards, and there must be some spiritual or genetic memory of such, somewhere, somehow. But to each his own. Some people are like that, and most all people have their ideas about what is the right way to dress, to look, to speak, et cetera, and what is not. Each secretly and not no secretly thinks they are right. When I was a child he made me soup, and there were many cans of soup in the cupboard.

One day his wife said, ‘Where is the child’s drink,’ to which he replied, ‘Soup is liquid he doesn’t need a drink.’ This was a mistake. The woman scolded him and was vexed. That’s a word they used, ‘vexed.’ She said, ‘Get him a drink, and this child is never to be served a meal without a drink again.’ Time passes. He used to tell me stories of a ranch where someone is stealing in the night. But the ranch owner stayed up and watched and caught the person. It was determined the thief needed some livestock so the ranch owner gave it to him, gave him some livestock. Cormac McCarthy the old man was not. When I finished shaving the man he said thanks. He said once in those late life days, ‘It is lucky you are here.’ That was nice. I didn’t mind. His wife had long left the world and he was not long for the earth as is said.

Now, I suppose someone else lives there. Some soul or souls. That’s the way it goes. The man had fashioned his own necklace to help his soul. It was a piece of yard and on it were medallions of various Catholic Saints. And he had received the last rites two or three times, even in the days when he was healthy if elderly. One’s soul is their own responsibility in a way. I wonder if that saint necklace still exists somewhere. I wonder whatever happened to it. I wonder what happens to things, and to souls and old chairs and even cans of soup.

A Child of God:

Writer has a few questions.

William Blake insisted that at age four he’d seen God watching him, his head pressed against Blake’s window. 

Scholars and layfolk cite this as the beginning of Blake’s prophetic afflictions.

God-believing scholars and layfolk.

But the eyes of the Lord are in every place, no?

After all, a thing unseen is neither good nor bad. 

As Heisenberg and Schrödinger proved, it’s only thinking that makes it so.

And who worth their weight in salt doesn’t watch after their children?

Brooks Lindberg lives in the Pacific Northwest. His poems and antipoems appear frequently in The Beatnik Cowboy, Horror Sleaze Trash, and elsewhere.