Waiting for the Devistation

In this the face of devastation
three years since it last appeared
this night will fall on trepidation
and the calm will be the breath
held by those whose homes and lives
are in its path.

Trace the path of devastation,
the head above the scroll proclaims
just get out, get out now, stay out
and don’t venture near harm’s way;
but if you do, take a photo and send
it our way.

The lessons learned are in effect as
the trains and buses run, as the great
dome stands empty, the occupancy none,
it’s bearing down, 1, 2, 3, or worse
so move to higher ground, away to a hill
not a rooftop.

In this face of devastation man against
the world, the metal, concrete and motors
pump against the swelling, rising tide
that pushes against the insufficient levees
that no one properly mended and still
need to be rebuilt.

Perturbation

Each dream, alive is kept
to face each day, left unspent
among the faces, false façade
amongst the backlash, of a
vein parade, a grand charade,
a off-key serenade.
A dream, perturbation
a moment, blemished
as each hope is vanquished
heads on the block, final
syllables, the black ink spills
from the pin-pricked heart
and fills the white-space with
cold conceits to the empty
words of the representative
democracy and the fascist
one percent that buy its every
move, give us hope back
soon, give us hope back, soon.

A Poem to the Congress and President

Would you care for a spot of cash?
No real help for those who are strapped,
just a stipend to get you out,
and hope you shop about,
spend you cash here and there,
and spread government cheer.

Would you care for bit to spend
or will you save it till needed again?
We want you to go to the mall,
or put a down-payment on a new hummer
we want you to go spend it all
not save it so you can slumber.

Would you like this check to cash
six hundred per gent and per lass
and a bit more payout for
each kid you’ve popped out
a little incentive to buyout recession
rather than pay for healthcare for children.

Would you take it and say thank you please
while the debt keeps us down on our knees?
We owe it to China and Arab Emirates
not to collapse our precious stock markets.
So take these dollars, they’re worth half what
they aught too, spend it quick, don’t think it through.

Would you take it please, we borrowed
at moderate interest. Oh did we say this was
a tax rebate? We lied it’s a payout from the
loans we made, it’s how we fund everything these days.
So take it and spend, because you can’t see
the end of the interest our grandkids will pay.

An Affect [a personal poem]

An Affect

I often feel as if I damage everyone I touch;
as if contact with me in some way diminishes
the essence of those unfortunate enough to
enter into my mangled sphere of tangled dreams
and broken hopes, my failed attempts and
grandiose disappointments which mark my days.

I often look upon those who have ventured close
and wonder for their safety; their hearts and minds
are in mortal peril as they are engulfed by the
angst and anguish, strife and decadence that permeates
my every pour, that surrounds my every jester,
which makes me ever more a threat to those, too close.

I sit alone when surrounded by others as the anxieties
swirl about my days and abound beyond control,
vexing the very center of my gravity, an enigma which
bound to my heart, troubles my thoughts and drains
my blood to the page, where it spells out the thousand
shocks and heartaches my flesh is heir to, my consumption.

I empty my thoughts into a bottle with a black label which
spills out amber liquid in which I swim at night until
I lose sensation in all my extremities and find the peace
of cold, black nothing and let the chilling calm become
me as I lie back upon a bed that I have unmade beside
one who looks upon me, ever, with a glimmer of hope
that I will amass a sum,
greater than my parts.

Marc Daneker 2007

Two New Poems, Communicate and Rant

Communicate

I don’t know what to say when I sit

down to put the words on the white

space and my thoughts are shards of

glass in a vortex, shredding reason,

piercing logic. The aftermath is my

voice screaming, the words are the

delusional ravings of a madman.

All who hear turn away and wonder

why would he go on like this if he

wants to say something about the

state of US then he should put his

words into something non-combative,

fair and measured, foregoing the

foul language, never lowering to

insults or personal attacks, even on

people he wants to attack personally.

If he’s going to call himself a writer

then he should show and not tell, he

should say something that says some-

thing not rant and rave about what

it is that he’s pissed off about, because

we don’t care if he’s pissed off, every-

one gets pissed off, anyone can rant

anyone can scream, anyone can swear

as if they were born to it

if they set their minds that way.

I know what I wanted to say, when I

look at the white space with the murky

passages of my dark heart bled out

upon it. I know that the point was

between the verbs and the nouns with

the modifiers, constructing my similes

and metaphors, held together by

my marks of punctuation which I don’t

think I will ever master. I know that

somewhere in my words I’ve placed

every idea I wanted to state, but I know

that this rant will only mark my

disillusion, my opinion, for all it’s

selfish trappings only serves to

better express my confusion, until

the vortex subsides, and I abide but

here’s my rant, I really did try.

Rant

Everything changed after

nine, one, one ‘O one

add six now ‘O seven,

the number of heads on

the beast, at the end of that

book, which seems to leave

so much to interpretation,

that it seems like it could

mean just about anything

at all, if you read it in just

the right way.

Who are these people

that can’t talk a strait

talk not matter how much

they talk about how only

the strait should marry

because it would hurt

an institution to allow

otherwise, but I don’t

live in an institution,

not yet, Orwell said I

might some day but I

told Big Brother to Fuck

Off in no uncertain terms.

Stick that in your pipe

and smoke it, Dick, when

you send more youth to

die in the desert for crude,

it’s rude you know to shoot

at folk when you’re supposed

to shoot at the farm-raised

caged bird with the clipped

wings that never had a chance;

Dennis the Menace, with

the sling-shot in his pants

pocket, you make me feel

like poor ‘ol mister Wilson,

I need my nerve tonic. Election

day can’t come soon enough.

After all the constitution’s just

a piece of paper, dubba-ya said

so, though it’s really parchment,

asshole, take a history lesson

before you pretend to run a

country. Go clear some bush

for the cameras, I’d love to clear

Bush for the cameras because

I really can’t take anymore of

that eyesore. The drafters of the

constitution were flawed, they

weren’t stupid, there’s a difference.

How can anyone read so much

about history and know so little

about it? Read some more “My

Pet Goat,” you know, it was upside

down, the camera’s don’t miss

a thing. What were you thinking

for seven minutes – counting

millions? – while the thousands

looked death in the eye like you

never did when you didn’t even

show up for roll call, much less

an unpopular war, for a country

you wouldn’t fight for, but send

others to die for. You fucking

hypocrite. I hope you believe in

hell, because there’s a room

reserved for your end of days.

We were told years ago that

oil was cheap and plentiful, and

we would not go cold within my

lifetime, but I’m still alive and

the wells are dry but the demand

is high and only the rich survive.

Why shouldn’t the poor die?

Born to suicide. Just climb

on our backs, we’ll give you

a ride. You lied when you

said you didn’t divide,

the fissures so wide you could

get lost inside. When a city died

and Brownie got a pat on the back

for his lack of ability to do anything.

You chide, but the right don’t shake

the lefts hand anymore and all

the negotiations are out the door,

as the fissure grows wider and the

ideology divides us into those

who think, and those who think

what they are told. It’s cold, and

the routine is old, the modern

baroque, grotesque, extravagance

bringing back the fat, the pork

that clogs the arteries of our system

and causes the final heart attack.

Our dollars worth less than half

of the Monarchy we once spat

upon and fought off, His Excellency

might cry, that the men who died

for the freedom you decide is not

needed if an iron fist will chide

the dissention from a policy of

hate, of hate, of hate. It’s not why

they hate us, it’s why you hate them

and why you don’t care about us.
They laugh at the divider, the powerful

decider, the chider, the liar, the

ignorant squire, who can’t see

his ass because his head

is stuck

inside it.

Idealism in poetry

The Confusion

If enthusiasm could be half as prevalent as apathy,

then imagine a world where the chilling indifference

was warmed by the fires of hope and we could all

look forward with a promise to end this confusion.

If intolerance was no longer tolerated in a society

based on equality, imagine a world where each soul

born into it had the same hope and promise as each

that came before and could elevate us above this confusion.

If extremism could be tempered with moderation

so that each side would merge into a sphere of understanding

with a brilliant, blazing core of ideas that would

become the solutions which could end this confusion.

If we had the power to understand that which we believe

and to believe that which we understand the division

between yours and mine could become a connection

to what is ours and with patience and grace

we could end this confusion.