Haiku
by E “Blue Screw” Dai
At winter solstice,
a squirrel’s shadow passes
across the shutters.
Haiku
by E “Blue Screw” Dai
A new year appears,
with Dakotsu Iida,
on this dreamless night.
E. “Blue Screw” Dai is a poet of surreal tendencies. The above two haiku draw on haiku of Dakotsu Iida (1885-1962), a Japanese Modernist poet and proset.
~~~
Haiku
by “Clear Dew” Ibuse
House sparrows singing,
ding-dong, ding-dong, Christmas bells
are ringing, swinging.
“Clear Dew” Ibuse is a haiku poet.
~~~
Haiku
by “Wired Clues” Abe
Shining, sparkling deer,
holiday decorations,
brighten the night sky.
Haiku
by “Wired Clues” Abe
A window pane cracks,
as the temperatures descends
to below freezing.
“Wired Clues” Abe is a haiku writer of temporary contemporary scenes.
~~~
Newsreel:
Although inflation in Japan reached a three-decade high,
at 3.8%, it’s one most wish they could supply.
~~~
Yogi Bearings
by Badri Suwecele
I.
He wasn’t feeling very good when he was in his bed,
but still he got into the lotus pose; he rose his head.
Up from supine, he raised his spine, to strive for the sublime,
although he knew it would not be that easy, o, this time.
On the white-sheeted mattress, he could barely feel a bounce,
as he connected to the all-embracing, cosmic trounce.
He felt surrounded, hounded by the boundless universe,
but tried to reach accord with its eternal, sternal curse.
He wondered just how much he could endure its endless pain,
and still call its rich beauty and its bounty, o, a gain.
II.
Although he was surrounded by gray walls around him there,
he got into the lotus pose to think upon the fair.
He closed his outer eyes to open up his inner eye,
so though he could not see reality he felt its lie.
He stretched his spine from the supine, and lifted up his rack.
He felt like as a throbbing bridge from west to east and back.
He wondered how much traffic he could take upon his roads.
Could he withstand fate’s hardest hands? Could he uphold such loads?
Although he felt at peace, and wasn’t feeling any pains,
he felt the constant rolling down against his highway lanes.
Badri Suwecele is a poet of poses.
~~~
Newsreel:
The sausage multi-millionaire, one Pavel Antov, “fell”
down to his death—that Putin critic—from his high hotel.
~~~
“Carol of the Bells:” the Christmas Wars, a Century Ago
by Waldi Berceuse
The “Carol of the Bells,” a well-known Christmas melody,
a song based on th’ Ukrainian folk chant that’s called “Shchedryk.”
O, little swallows soar through air, and wing in the New Year;
one hears them singing in the…evening, bountiful…and clear.
The rhythm hemiola, like bells ringing, clattering,
a chant based on an ostinato four-note patterning.
Associated with the Feast of the Epiphany,
so left, by Russia’s Communists, to die by slow degree;
a fitting dirge for the Ukrainian Leontovych,
killed by a Russian agent back in 1921.
Waldi Berceuse is a poet of Slavic music. Ukrainian Modernist composer and musicologist Mykola Leontovych (1877-1921) was murdered by the Russian Communists, before he and his family could escape from his country. He would never learn what became of his arrangement.
~~~
Newsreel:
The Russians have unleashed a large barrage of missiles on
the major cities of Ukraine, a necronomicon.
~~~
A Painting by Piero della Francesca
by Buceli da Werse
Piero della Francesca’s Resurrection
of Christ is a truly extraordinary
vision. In it the risen Christ stands erect, one
foot still in his sarcophagus, the other on
its edge. He is wide awake above four Roman
soldiers asleep, one with a spear, unaware of
Him holding, in His right hand, the red cross banner
on a field of white. Behind Him are trees and hills,
as well as a castle’s contours. Christ’s own manner,
angular and confident, excites as it thrills.
In pale robe and halo, He accepts election,
the discoverer of the new era He wills.
Concerto Cracks
by Buceli da Werse
He slowly treads the icy path, for fear of falling down,
but then he turns abruptly…slipping…crashing on the ground,
and rises quickly, hastening across that stretch of ice,
lest it crack up…and he be dumped…with brutal, brumal sigh.
He slowly moves across the floors, thick wool socks on his feet.
Inside, the sights aren’t bleak, for though it’s cold, there is some heat.
He looks outside through window panes, tree leaves go flying past;
and then one cracks…the window breaks…a curve across the glass.
He slowly steps in bundled wrap, he feels the chill north winds,
and hears th’ unfurling, whirling, swirling, th’ howling, wi-ld din,
that courses through his home despite the locked and bolted doors;
it sneaks through cracks, yet leaves no tracks upon the wooden floors.
Buceli da Werse is a poet of Italian painting. Piero della Francesca (c. 1415 – 1492) was an Early Renaissance mathematician, geometer and painter. Antonio Vivaldi (1648-1731) was a Baroque Italian composer and violinist, who consolidated the concerto form into a consistent idiom.
~~~
In Straightened Circumstances
by W. “Blue Cedar” Ise
“Man has created some lovely dwellings, some soul-stirring
literature…But he has not…created a…grove of pines…[or]…the dank
smell of the deep forest…”
—Harvey Broome
He was in straightened circumstances in the forest green.
He didn’t know which way to go, the t-r-a-i-l sign unseen.
And so he paused beside a clump of gray-bark climbing trunks,
and grabbed a blanched branch in his hands, in one of those hard funks.
His cap was white and blue and red, his shirt was red and black.
He tried to catch his breath, o, yes, and so he bent his back.
He did not loosen his black belt, although his heart beat on.
O he was panting like a panther in a pantheon.
One saw his shiny ring while he held on to that tree trunk.
He did not want to fall down, and he had to move with spunk.
W. “Blue Cedar” Ise is a poet of forests. Harvey Broome (1902-1968) was a Modernist American environmentalist and founding member of the Wilderness Society.
~~~
Sitting on a Curb at 25°
by Bruc “Diesel” Awe
He had no sign, his head bowed down; one wondered if he’d freeze;
a man was sitting on a curb at 25°.
In this Year of the Slap, one wondered how hard he’d been slapped.
His clothing didn’t seem enough, as he sat there unrapt?
One wondered of his circumstances. How did he get there,
near the commuters in their vehicles in that cold air?
Had one remembered, when he was as young as that young man,
when he was out along the roads and didn’t have a plan,
what it was like to have no clue? One had to face life’s blight,
with more than just some hope someone would teach one how to fight.
Bruc “Diesel” Awe is a poet of transportation.
~~~
An Upper Respiratory Tract
by Dr. Weslie Ubeca
He nursed his upper resp’ratory common cold dis-ease,
with ginger and turmeric tea, as well as rest and sleep.
It didn’t fe-el harmless—the infected viral spread—
yet he’d recover from its fierce attack upon his head.
His runny, stuffy nose gave way to a bung-rough sore throat.
In his goatee, he felt like as a gruff and low-grade goat.
He did his best, yes, to suppress his vexed, catarrhous cough,
while using tissues to undo congestion dropping off.
He still continued intermittent dieting as well;
so as the hot, drouth hell wore off, his hearty health could swell.
Dr. Weslie Ubeca, a poet of medicine, is not, nor ever has been, a medical physician.
~~~
The Trooper
by Bilee Wad Curse
He did his best to keep his legs together, taut and tall,
as he withstood th’ unfurling, swirling, whirling, hurling squawl.
It was his duty, so he tried to be quite dutiful,
although his straightened circumstances were not beautiful.
O, all around the World was gray, cement and iron wrought,
beseiged by enemies, abounding, techno-corpo-rot.
But he stood up. The tasks at hand required he do so;
and though at times he felt upset, he did not let it show.
And so, he went on fearlessly, not giving in to pain,
as good and pleased as he could be, content, unbent, restrained.
He Felt Like Hell
by Bilee Wad Curse
He turned around, but what he found, was not to be desired.
He felt like he was trapped again, his circumstances dire.
He wished that he was home and free, not in some low-life jail,
where he would not be beaten, where there wasn’t any bail.
But he had done the crime, and now he’d have to pay for it.
Society was not about to let him go and git.
He tried to make the best of his time in his prison cell.
Although, at times, he could not help it, o, he felt like hell.
Would heaven ever be removed from his worn, forlorn gaze,
and would he always be plagued by unhappiness and haze?
Bilee Wad Curse is a poet of crime.
~~~
Newsreel:
More than 300,000 left the state in just one year,
thus California led the nation in flight engineers.
~~~
The Twitter Flies
by Esca Webuilder
“The Twitter flies are old news.”
—Caud Sewer Bile
The FBI paid Twitter to process all their requests,
more than three-million dollars, so to work at their behest.
At Twitter, many former FBI employees worked,
and made a secret channel to onboard new Feds accrued.
The Twitter leadership got rid inconvenient truths,
because they didn’t want them on the platform, no, forsooth.
And Twitter’s many propaganda people were at pains
to aid the Pentagon’s covert online psyops campaigns.
Executives from Twitter had been pressured to locate
misinformation from the Russians, even if half-baked.
And Twitter interfered in 2020 censoring,
to ban all Hunter Biden laptop story mentioning.
But, also, as with Twitter, this crazed governmentia
has been in contact with each corp’rate social media.
And Twitter didn’t ban this OneState’s deep fake images,
it still deleted unliked individuals, o, yes.
The Twitter flies flew all around their giant Trojan Horse;
and this has been known for some time; it is par for the course.
The Twitter BS then so thick, could anybody think
that most of what they thought they wrought did anything but stink?
~~~
Newsreel:
He would resign as CEO, as soon as he could smuck,
someone to take his foolish Twitter job, said Elon Musk.
~~~
Below a Condo
by SubCIA Weedler
This wild Whirled World seemed a topsy-turvy place.
He found himself within gray walls, with concrete round his space.
It seemed all so mechanical, and also metal too;
the stairs above, him there below, a condo moment’s view.
Not much was shiny, maybe just a latex sheath and ring.
When he looked all around him, gray paint covered everything.
It seemed to be a meeting, secret spies, or something else.
The coded message, he’d have to decipher it himself.
He felt like as he’d fallen in to some outrageous trap,
that he must manage to get through: a slap, a zap, a wrap.
SubCIA Weedler is a poet of espionage.
~~~
Pep Talk
by Rudi E. Welec, “Abs”
He tried to do his best. He knew he needed to improve.
He’d have to get up off his duff, and he would have to move.
And though he knew he’d never be as good as he should be;
it didn’t stop him working to do better endlessly.
He knew it was important not to give up; he must strive.
He had to keep on doing more to truly satisfy.
And though he be forced ever to withstand Fate’s angry Khan,
who’d slap him hard and shove him down, he’d still keep pushing on…
until the end…He’d buck up with his coffee cup and cream,
and call the troubles he received a lovely, gorgeous dream.
That Exercising Mensch
by Rudi E. Welec, “Abs”
He sat upon that narrow bench, that exercising mensch,
with slowly-moving, up-and-down, dense muscles, taut and tense.
It was late morning exercises by the barbell rack.
He took his time; he didn’t want to break, or crack his back.
His trunks were red, as was his head, this man with auburn hair,
who longed to lose extraneous weight, yes, to be more fair.
He clenched his fists, on tightened wrists—no Titan, just a dude—
who wanted to feel good within, to sm-i-le, not to brood.
If he could do enough of these crude, simple, workout drills,
o, he could be content, appreciating life’s small thrills.
Rudi E. Welec, “Abs” is a poet of exercise.
~~~
A Couch Potato
by Cu Ebide Aswerl
He was a couch potato. He loved being on a couch.
And watching black-and-white noir movies added to his pouch.
O, he could lie, head on a pillow, for long hours on end,
like as a happy camper on a lovely river bend.
To sink into those plush and poofy cushions was sheer joy.
He’d close his eyes and dream about that overwhelming poise.
It would rejuvenate his body; he would fe-el good,
he’d then be willing to do m-a-n-y things he could or should.
But he could not remain forever in that peaceful pose,
and he would have to get up off his back and smell a rose.
Cu Ebide Aswerl is a poet of leisure.
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