Tag Archives: ignorance

The Wider, More Ignorant World

Your words can live forever
cast out in the virtual plane.
They truly are immortal now,
and the internet’s to blame.

No matter your intentions
or the crowd you thought to reach,
your thoughts will be interpreted
and stretched until they reach

the few who you expected,
several more who understand,
a couple dozen converts,
maybe some who’ll take a stand,

and thousands, who although confused
by how you use your terms
will swear your wisdom isn’t fit
for thinking men, but worms.

But that is not the full extent
to which your text will go.
In violent, fiery rhetoric,
some radicals will show

that you are either full of light,
or bullshit, and your words
will serve to fuel the fires of hate,
no matter how absurd.

And nothing you can do or say
will make that flag unfurl,
once you decide to publish for
the wider, more ignorant world.

23 AUG 2017

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The World Remains: rondelet

The world remains,
despite our self-indulgent, hateful ways;
the world remains
through our brief, but continued growing pains,
when most would find a reason not to stay.
Despite our morbid and destructive play,
the world remains.

10 MAY 2017

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Reducto Nostalgia: quatorzain

Some folks who wax nostalgic will believe
that all the future’s answers can be found
back in a yesterday that never was
which lingers, like some land of make believe:

a place where truth and justice are dispensed
like manna from some wise heavenly host,
where doubt somehow is the only unknown,
and right and wrong are both clear and well-defined.

Like paradise, a place they’ve never seen,
just around some past or future bend,
this sentimental halcyon of yore
becomes the drug evangelic shills
use to addict, and thus enslave, the world.

14 APR 2017

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Don’t Worry, Be Happy: canzone

Canto I. Don’t Worry

There is no cause for worry or alarm.
The world will carry on despite your fears;
true love will never languish in the arms
of its emotions’ mirror once there found,
though those who seek destruction may surround
and threaten to destroy the cause of life.
Who cares what fools decide to rally ‘round
this tired and jaded banner of deceit?

There is no cause to fear the coming storm:
at least, that’s what the pundits tend to say;
and who, believing their opinion best,
would dare to contradict such acumen?
Believe, believe, and trust your overlords;
it serves their common interest to thwart
what thoughts of revolution might ensue
should you and I begin to doubt and think.

There is no cause for worry, for no harm
will come to those who meekly bow their heads;
the cannon fodder used to fire loud guns
is manufactured from the irksome weeds.
What good is it to argue, in a rage,
against the great inevitable truth?
What difference does it make that a great lie
has molded us subservient since youth?

Canto II. Just Believe

Who calls this thing for what it is? The truth?
In whose inane philosophy of life
does anything not bite that grows a tooth
or fail to cut whose hand may hold a knife?
Where is it written that all men are just,
that goodness lurks inside the human breast?
We see an enemy because we must,
and separate our good from all the rest.

Who when they are attacked, turns either cheek,
or answers with meek love the fatal stab?
There is no place in this world for the weak;
and doubtful, much space there beyond the slab.
When mirth and goodness fill the world, at last,
when virtuous and kind men rule as kings,
perhaps when that great loaded die is cast
will anyone care much for these fool things.

Who reaches out for what they think divine,
and moves and acts according to the good,
forsaking lustful urging for what’s mine
that makes no sacrifices, even when it should?
What men believe reflects in how they move;
their words mean next to nothing, if their acts
would they and their vain gods, both liars prove.
This is not my conjecture, just the facts.

Canto III. Be Happy

Is ignorance of evil really bliss,
so any knowledge can bring only pain?
What kind of life is made from thoughts like this,
that would eschew all sunshine for a rain
to wash away all purpose and desire
and in its place leave just some bland ennui,
that keeps just above freezing, with no fire,
the heart just barely beating, almost free?

And what is happiness, in such a place,
without an individual life-spark,
a gray and dismal world without a face
with eyes only accustomed to the dark,
whose hope is but a pipe-dream, with no point,
the vain illusion of childhood and youth,
who seek some strengthless victor to annoint
who conquers without battle, strife, or truth?

But still, no cause for worry, friends of mine;
the world is not designed to pass away.
what wills itself to live, will all be fine,
and can survive all trials, come what may.
The crucible you’ve called for has arrived!
Rejoice! They have now standardized the test,
and soon, there’ll be no need for shuck and jive
to separate the chaff from all the rest.

30 JAN 2017

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When It Comes

When it comes,
the night don’t know no difference:
right and wrong
and that thin line in between.

In the dark,
you just watch for the lightning.
All the rest?
Doesn’t matter what you mean.

Simple truths
in the shadows become complicated:
black and white
both appear as shades of gray.

Choosing sides
beyond sight of the border,
where you find
it don’t matter anyway.

When it comes,
the night don’t know no difference:
You and me
and the darkness closing in.

In the end,
it becomes uncomplicated:
birth and death
and the sacred space within.

04 DEC 2015

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The Know of Unclouding: descort

What if I thought
for just a moment
of some mitigating circumstance
that might prove
beyond a shadow of doubt
the single
truth
behind all appearances,
and in that fleeting instant, found
instead of solid rock,
just cloud,
and what if
when I reached within that mass
of disappearing mist and air
I forgot just what
I was
thinking?

14 DEC 2012

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With an Unarmed Foe

You call those claws? Withdraw those nubs,
and come back when your talons grow;
I have no time to make retort
against the feeble likes of you.

You say the world agrees with you?
Well, that just proves the world a fool,
that would admire a steaming mass
of horse manure, long as it’s fresh.

You say you’ve friends to state your cause
in fisticuffs and bloody games;
I’m not surprised. Who was it said
of violence, “dullard’s last resort”?

Call off your hounds, your hawks, your shrews
(they bore me beyond reason’s edge),
unless you mean to (and you don’t)
give me respect you have not learned.

05 AUG 2007

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