Give us a poem which shows how you really feel..

[flaminbats]

The Unknown Citizen

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics(To JS/07/M/378 This Marble Monument Is Erected by the State)

He was found by the Bureau of Statistics to be
One against whom there was no official complaint,
And all the reports on his conduct agree
That, in the modern sense of an old-fashioned word, he was a saint,
For in everything he did he served the Greater Community.
Except for the War till the day he retired
He worked in a factory and never got fired,
But satisfied his employers, Fudge Motors Inc.
Yet he wasn't a scab or odd in his views,
For his Union reports that he paid his dues,
(Our report on his Union shows it was sound)
And our Social Psychology workers found
That he was popular with his mates and liked a drink.
The Press are convinced that he bought a paper every day
And that his reactions to advertisements were normal in every way.
Policies taken out in his name prove that he was fully insured,
And his Health-card shows he was once in hospital but left it cured.
Both Producers Research and High-Grade Living declare
He was fully sensible to the advantages of the Installment Plan
And had everything necessary to the Modern Man,
A phonograph, a radio, a car and a frigidaire.
Our researchers into Public Opinion are content
That he held the proper opinions for the time of year;
When there was peace, he was for peace; when there was war, he went.
He was married and added five children to the population,
Which our Eugenist says was the right number for a parent of his generation.
And our teachers report that he never interfered with their education.
Was he free? Was he happy? The question is absurd:
Had anything been wrong, we should certainly have heard.

-- W. H. Auden

[NewHampster]

1. Terrible

a horse at night

standing hitched alone

in the still street

and whinnying


as if some sad nude astride him

had gripped hot legs on him

and sung

a sweet high hungry

single syllable

--------------------------
Lawrence Ferlinghetti 1955

[Wolfman 11]

2. Short Hairs

The timid
engage
the
profound
through
horror
said
the crippled
old
spider


~Norman Mailer

[TahitiNut]

3. My longtime favorite ...

it's

so damn sweet when Anybody—
yes;no

matter who,some

total(preferably
blond
of course)

or on the other

well
your oldest
pal
for instance(or

;why

even
i
suppose
one
's wife)

—does doesn't unsays says looks smiles

or simply Is
what makes
you feel you
aren't

6 or 6

teen or sixty
000,000
anybodyelses—

but for once

(imag
-ine)

You

— e. e. cummings

[furrylitldevil]

10. e. e. cummings strikes again

It's not that I don't respect the guy, it just always seemed to me that he was weird for the sake of being weird.

[TahitiNut]

14. Sometimes that's the best reason.

:silly:

[zeemike]

4. How do I really feel?

How do I really feel?
Oh don’t get me started
It could be a really ugly spiel
As if I had farted.
Let’s just say I am discontented.
Mostly alarmed, and not well vented
But tomorrow is another day
And they just might try it my way.

[Jackpine Radical]

5. Goddam.

Goddam.
'Tis why I am.
Goddam.

[lucidmadman]

6. REIGN OF A HUMAN RACE- Paul Laraque

you say democracy
and we know that it's tin from Bolivia
copper from Chile
petroleum from Venezuela
sugar from Cuba
raw material and profits

you say democracy
and it's the annexation of Texas
the hold-up of the Panama Canal
the occupation of Haiti
the colonization of Puerto Rico
the bombing of Guatemala

you say democracy
and it's America for the Yankees
it's the rape of nations
it's Sandino's blood
and Peralte's crucifixion

you say democracy
and it's the plunder of our wealth
from Hiroshima to Indochina
you spread the slaughter everywhere
and everywhere ruin

you say democracy
and it's the Ku Klux Klan
a hidden people
inside your own cities
an ogre devouring your children

Ubu from an empire of robots
you've really given us your ravens
from Harlem to Jerusalem
from Wounded Knee to Haiti
from Santo Domingo to Soweto
the people will be waving
the torch of revolution

night is a tunnel opening on to the dawn
Viet Nam stands like a tree in the storm
the frontier which marks the place of your defeat
history's lessons have no recourse
a footbridge stretches forever from Asia to Africa
the reign of the white race has ended on earth
and the rule of a human race in the universe has begun

[Kadie]

7. Listen Christian

Listen Christian


I was hungry,
and you formed a humanities club
and discussed my hunger.
Thank you.

I was imprisoned
and you crept off quietly
to your chapel in the cellar
and prayed for my release.

I was naked
and in your mind
you debated the morality of
my appearance.

I was sick
and you knelt
and thanked God
for your health.

I was homeless
and you preached to me
about the spiritual shelter
of the love of God.

I was lonely
and you left me alone
to pray for me.

Christian,
you seem so holy;
so close to God.
But I am still very hungry,
and lonely,
and cold...


by Bob Rowland


* Please note that I am not trying to offend Christians with this poem, but I think it applies to some who call themselves Christian.

[proud patriot]

8. it's my sigline

:hi:

[Bossy Monkey]

9. Tried that; it's headed straight for the archives

song lyric rather than a poem, but still:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=105&topic_id=1056794&mesg_id=1056794

[lucidmadman]

11. One by Brecht..

A WORKER READS, AND ASKS THESE QUESTIONS

Who built Thebes with its seven gates?
In all the books it says kings.
Did kings drag up those rocks from the quarry?
And Babylon, overthrown time after time,
Who built it again as often? What walls
In dazzling gilded Lima housed the builders?
When evening fell on the completed Wall of China
Where did the stonemasons go? Great Rome
Is thick with triumphal arches. Who erected them?
Who was it the Caesars triumphed over?
Had famous Byzantium nothing but palaces,
Where did people live? Atlantis itself
That legendary night the sea devoured it,
Heard the drowning roaring for their slaves.
The young Alexander took India.
By himself?
Caesar hammered Gaul.
Had he not even a cook beside him?
Phillip of Spain cried as his fleet
Floundered. Did no one else cry?
Frederick the Second won the Seven Years War. Who
Won it with him?

Someone wins on every page.
Who cooked the winner’s banquet?
One great man every ten years.
Who paid the expenses?

So many statements.
So many questions.

[rumguy]

12. Red Wheelbarrow

So much depends upon
a red wheelbarrow

glazed with rainwater
beside the white chickens

WCWilliams

[furrylitldevil]

13. Not a minority

I am not a minority.
I mean, look at me
LOOK at me!

White male, aged 18 to 35
I'm not only
A man, I am
THE man.

Yes, THE man, aka
Cracker
Whitey
Honkey
Honkey Mcgee
Or any other superfluous adjective my ancestors have earned for me
I am not a minority.

But if you think that
Just 'cause I'm white
I don't know what its like
To feel the pain that you've felt
For a lot of your life
Think again.

If you think that
Just 'cause I'm white
I don't know what it's like
To say the words
"I love you.
No one else could love you more.
Te amo, mi dulce vida
Te amo, mi dulce amore."
Just from lookin' at her you wouldn't realize
That her daddy forced apart her 9 year old thighs
Forcibly raped
every-day
for five
terrible years
She was impregnated with hate
Miscarried with fear, so I
Gave her my heart
And she gave me her tears
We were both smokin' weed, 'cause we were
Too young to buy beers.

If you think that
Just 'cause I'm white
I don't know what it's like
To grow up in
Greeley, Colorado?
Shiiiiiit,
I was learning Chicano history before I did European!
That's right, before I was hip to Adam Smith's plan
If you gave me a map
I'd give you Tenochtitlan.
If the Aztecs had lived
Instead of the rest
Maybe our destiny
Wouldn't be so Manifest
MLK who?! I'm talkin about
CESAR
MOTHER
F*CKING
CHAVEZ
He united his people
Gave them back their pride
Gave them the strength that they needed
To look deep down inside
So if you think that
Just 'cause I'm white
I can't look past your skin?
Why don't you try lookin'
Past the skin
I'm in.

[zeemike]

16. Very powerful

Expressing it is half the Battle in dealing with the anger.

[furrylitldevil]

17. Thank you

it's something I've been tooling around with, I want to perform it at a poetry slam eventually, but it needs to be just right before I do.

[zeemike]

18. Go for it

The passion is in the words, so all you have to do is feel comfortable with expressing them to a bunch of people at a time.

[HawkerHurricane]

15. The Last of the Light Brigade

The Last of the Light Brigade

There were thirty million English who talked of England's might,
There were twenty broken troopers who lacked a bed for the night.
They had neither food nor money, they had neither service nor trade;
They were only shiftless soldiers, the last of the Light Brigade.

They felt that life was fleeting; they knew not that art was long,
That though they were dying of famine, they lived in deathless song.
They asked for a little money to keep the wolf from the door;
And the thirty million English sent twenty pounds and four!

They laid their heads together that were scarred and lined and grey;
Keen were the Russian sabres, but want was keener than they;
And an old Troop-Sergeant muttered, "Let us go to the man who writes
The things on Balaclava the kiddies at school recites."

They went without bands or colours, a regiment ten-file strong,
To look for the Master-singer who had crowned them all in his song;
And, waiting his servant's order, by the garden gate they stayed,
A desolate little cluster, the last of the Light Brigade.

They strove to stand to attention, to straighten the toil-bowed back;
They drilled on an empty stomach, the loose-knit files fell slack;
With stooping of weary shoulders, in garments tattered and frayed,
They shambled into his presence, the last of the Light Brigade.

The old Troop-Sergeant was spokesman, and "Beggin' your pardon," he said,
"You wrote o' the Light Brigade, sir. Here's all that isn't dead.
An' it's all come true what you wrote, sir, regardin' the mouth of hell;
For we're all of us nigh to the workhouse, an, we thought we'd call an' tell.

"No, thank you, we don't want food, sir; but couldn't you take an' write
A sort of 'to be continued' and 'see next page' o' the fight?
We think that someone has blundered, an' couldn't you tell 'em how?
You wrote we were heroes once, sir. Please, write we are starving now."

The poor little army departed, limping and lean and forlorn.
And the heart of the Master-singer grew hot with "the scorn of scorn."
And he wrote for them wonderful verses that swept the land like flame,
Till the fatted souls of the English were scourged with the thing called Shame.

O thirty million English that babble of England's might,
Behold there are twenty heroes who lack their food to-night;
Our children's children are lisping to "honour the charge they made-"
And we leave to the streets and the workhouse the charge of the Light Brigade!

-- Rudyard Kipling

[SarahB]

19. Shakespeare's Sonnet XXVIII

How can I then return in happy plight,
That am debarr'd the benefit of rest?
When day's oppression is not eased by night,
But day by night, and night by day, oppress'd?
And each, though enemies to either's reign,
Do in consent shake hands to torture me;
The one by toil, the other to complain
How far I toil, still farther off from thee.
I tell the day, to please them thou art bright
And dost him grace when clouds do blot the heaven:
So flatter I the swart-complexion'd night,
When sparkling stars twire not thou gild'st the even.
But day doth daily draw my sorrows longer
And night doth nightly make grief's strength seem stronger

[KamaAina]

20. Roses are red, violets are blue...

Vacuum cleaners suck,
And Bush* does too!

[Blue-Jay]

21. My own.

(Yes, I'm hack) At any rate:


Big brother, checksigner
and compiler of my
yearly holidays
my urine tester
boiling fester
creativity molester
You cling to me with
a paisley noose
and dangle me from
the building top
with a double windsor knot
like the puppet I've become.



Yeah. I love my day job.

[hyphenate]

22. I wrote this one myself

in or around the summer of 2002.

One Nation, Divisible

My world--a day that shall never die
Has come and pierced its soul
And brought untold pain and untold sadness.
We live again in fear and nervousness
As though nearly four hundred years
Of bloodshed fighting for our principles
Never happened.
This place now reeks of filthy men
Instead of Noble Men
Who use words to keep insecurity alive
And shoved down our throats
Their words not meant to instill
Confidence and wisdom
But the passion of hatred--
Kept alive by always repeating
A message as taught to children
As though it were a life's lesson.
They wish us to remain weak
And reliant on them,
While they continue to berate us
For simply voicing the principles
We once held so dear--
Four hundred years is a long time--
A good time
But now they take advantage of us
Lining their pockets with blood money
Lining their souls with their
Cynicism and intolerance
Forcing us to give up things
Which we were meant to own.
Never give up--never let the bastards win
Never let freedom be given away
But in a heartbeat
It is taken away
Not by terrorists, whose actions
Were fated to come someday
But by those who are supposed
To always be there for us--
Those greedy carnivores who smile
And stab us in the back,
Who say we need protection from
Ourselves and use us to achieve
Their heinous goals.
Look no further than our own
Front door to see the true enemies
Those who use rhetoric and
Accusations to stifle the truth
Those who are devious and self-serving
Enough to swindle the lost people
Out of the very fabric our
Country was founded upon.

Dissent, liberty, for all, our forefathers
Once preached, but how tenuous
That declaration is when madmen
Can challenge and tear asunder
The bequest from those
Who lived every minute to make
Our world a better place.
"What would Thomas do?" I ask
In desperation, as the days
Grow so long with frequent worry
And no heroes to save the day.
"What would Washington or Adams,
Or any one of a dozen, nay
Hundred pioneers of freedom?"
There is no man alive in power who
Can rightfully take up that
Banner. There is no one alive
To carry that torch. There is
No one alive who would be willing to die
To keep us alive, and free from tyranny--
They are the tyrants--
Not the terrorists, whose acts were
Not motivated by greed,
But of different philosophies.
No, our worst enemy is ourselves
Giving up our hard earned freedoms
In the blink of an eye
And giving our true enemy
A foothold to keep us
Dangling in midair, confusion
And uncertainty our only belongings.

©2002, Mary Hartery

[Bonhomme Richard]

23. Here's one

The Set of the Sails

- by Ella Wheeler Wilcox

One ship drives east, and another west
With the self-same winds that blow;
'Tis the set of the sails
And not the gales,
That decides the way to go.


Like the winds of the sea are the ways of fate,
As they voyage along through life;
'Tis the will of the soul
That decides its goal,
And not the calm or the strife.

[Whitacre D_WI]

24. I met the bishop on the road,

And much said he and I.
"Those breasts are flat and fallen now,
Those veins must soon be dry;
Live in a heavenly mansion,
Not in some foul sty."

"Fair and foul are near of kin,
And fair needs foul," I cried.
"My friends are gone, but that's a truth
Nor grave nor bed denied,
Learned in bodily lowliness
And in the heart's pride."

"A woman can be proud and stiff
When on love intent;
But Love has pitched his mansion in
The place of excrement;
For nothing can be sole or whole
That has not been rent."

-- W.B. Yeats