Poetry
• The Vatican Rag - Marvin
Klotz
• Tell Me Again - Mary Getlein
• Greedy Night - Lynette
• Hope Is Hip - S.A. Griffin
• Praise for a lost Woman - hillary
kaye
• Applause - Paula Ross
• After the rain - Jim Smith
The Vatican Rag
Headline: “Vatican toughens rules on
sainthood”
By Marvin
Klotz
Some headlines grab you by the
throat,
Some by more primal
parts.
But this one knocked me for a
loop--
(Brash theocratic
arts).
The last pope’s
liberality
Created quite a
stir.
He canonized five hundred
saints--
(The most to date--by
far!).
But worse than that, he bent the
rules--
Cut short review time
spent.
Beatified a host of
folks
(Most, just in time for
Lent).
Mother Teresa, all in
all,
Was J. C.’s humble
student;
But Pius Twelfth’s grim
Concordat
(Dismissed as merely
prudent!)
Creates some questions for this
church.
The Fathers must take
pause,
And delve more deeply, search the
lives
Of new
intercessors.
Sainthood is rare, and should be
so.
So let’s slow down a
bit.
Or risk a heaven
SRO,
With no place left to
sit.
And that might sour older
saints,
Turn situations
odd--
I wouldn’t want disgruntled
help
Petitioning my
god!
••••••
Tell
Me Again
By Mary
Getlein
Things that are no
more-
can’t get them
back-
all the trees that are cut
down
all the people that were cut
down-
what would you do with them if they were
here
piled up trees and piled up
people-
we can’t worship the
dead
we can only take notice and appreciate
them
for what they gave
us
Just like the
trees-
just take notice of how beautiful they
are
how beautiful the sun going
down-
it’s beautiful when someone
dies
just as it’s beautiful when someone
is born
The tide goes in and out, in and
out,
follows the path of the
moon
the planets are
round
rocketing through space, always moving,
always changing
A tear falls then another
one-
every day someone is crying, someone is
laughing
Trees are cut up for
firewood!
Who is more important? The woman or
the tree?
The spirit within the tree or the
spirit within the woman?
A woman give birth and
then takes the child away
Everyone is mad at
her
the tree is gone, the woman is gone, the
child is gone
Where did they
go?
Somewhere they are
welcome…
not on this
planet
Women are born with an x on their
back!
Women are murdered every day by husbands,
lovers,
brothers, sons, fathers, friends,
strangers, no one, everyone
Women are murdered
by people who do not even know them
Women are
murdered for being pretty or not pretty
enough
Women’s spirits are murdered for
being pretty or not pretty enough
Women are
murdered for being raped or having sex
freely
Women are murdered for having cosmetic
surgery
Women are murdered for having
“fat” surgery-
for being too fat-
gotta have surgery to deal with it
Women are
murdered by the media-
Media murders women day
after day after day
Media murders women for
being bad mothers
Media murders women who kill
their children and themselves
A man can kill
but not a woman
Somehow it’s worse when a
woman does it
A woman kills for the same reason
as a man!
frustration, anger, mayhem, drugs,
alcohol, a lousy childhood
too much rap
music
too much
media
no community, no nurturing, no loving, no
one there for her
she murders her children so
no one else will hurt them
she murders herself
so no one else will hurt her
yes, there is a
limit to hurt- death
death is the final end to
hurt
being homeless used to
mean
“freedom is just another word for
nothing left to lose”
living in a place
can be like a jail sentence
you have to live
there because you can’t afford to move
out
Landlord is just a
title!
it doesn’t mean
“king”, even though they might think
so
“king” of all he
owns-
his tenants live in fear of what
he’s going to do next
I live in
America
I live in
America
I live in
America
I turn on a tap and hot water comes
out
I don’t have to gather fire wood in
the Dafur, to make
a fire and boil
water.
I don’t have to be afraid of being
raped, when I go
out to get fire wood to make a
fire.
I still am afraid of the dark, here in
America
How many women end up in
someone’s fire pit,
with the guy saying:
she did it to herself,
all I did was burn the
body?
How many times must a woman be called
“BITCH”!
to her face before she
gets it!
This country is not ready for
her?
This shit just keeps going on and on and
on
The princess women don’t get treated
like this?
only the poor? The rich women get
killed too,
by their husband, boyfriends, etc.
etc.
tell me again why you won’t vote for
a woman
tell me again about a woman who acts
like a man
tell me again about a woman
unleashing her anger
tell me again how hormonal
women are
tell me again that a woman just
can’t do a
man’s
job-
What was that job
again?
dropping bombs on
children?
shipping jobs to other
countries?
cutting off benefits to poor,
elderly, children, mentally ill,
homeless
services?
sending back $800 this time, to
people who file for taxes,
in an effort to
“boost the economy”?
Look
around
see all the homeless living in the
street?
they are not invisible- they are here,
in front of you-
how do you think they got this
way?
is this a joke to
you?
This is the direct result of some man
being in office.
with trickle – down
cruelty!
It’s another government trick to
fool us!
doing one thing while telling us
it’s another-
killing is killing,
bro-
That’s how this country really makes
money-
even if it means killing its own
citizens-
at a war, or at home, on the
street.
tell me again why you won’t vote
for a
woman.
••••••
Greedy
Night
By
Lynette
One
more,
Grotesque screaming
faces
pressed against a rain-streaked car
window,
Teenage vultures descend upon another
Pop-culture carcass...
What do you want from
me?!
A thousand hands clawing at clothes and
flesh,
A simple
song,
My suit of regulation black
leather,
My disheveled
hair,
My
money,
My
body,
...everything!
On
stage
staring at the manic
tapestry
of writhing and flailing pubescent
bodies,
Bright lights blind the tired
performer,
Seduced by commercial
demand
I am your shallow, sexual
robot...
Every city a ravenous, undulating
crowd,
Caressing a plastic
idol,
Searching for a
secret,
In my
pocket
precious, furious
jewels,
Folded scraps of
paper,
This is
me...
Will you listen to my
words?
Can you feel my
private
••••••
Hope
Is Hip
By S.A.
Griffin
first of ‘08 and
already
history has
been
and
is
being
made
no need to spell it out
here
but this ranks right up there
with
first
flight
penicillin
moveable
type or
“Mr. Watson, come
here.
I need
you.”
first time since the 60’s
were assassinated
that there’s been
anything like genuine hope
sparkling in the
drinking water
humans, wear your vulnerable
skin
to the hungry
dance
where
dreamers
jump to such a
song
sounding on the bones
of
this
nations’s
weary
jukebox
a place where somebody with an open
heart
knows the future on a first name
basis
and all last laughs
are
on the
house
••••••
Praise
for a lost Woman
By hillary
kaye
A life
covered
in the blood of
betrayal
A cremation of
dreams
A fire
pit
of loss
A
woman’s
life
the
life of the
soul
emmeshed
in
sorrow and joy
She gives birth and
nurtures
and still is
slandered
by a world enthralled
with
its own
destruction
And yet she loves the very
things
that hate
her
and is buried by
the
same blood as her
sons
••••••
Applause
(5
from The Haiku Series)
By Paula
Ross
Chet
Baker
Bare bones of a
boy
Raspy whispers tear a
heart
Naked
horn/stinging
Sarah
Vaughan
Sounds of liquid
gold
Flowing from her heaven
place
As we
chant...DIVA
Miles
Davis
Gravel voiced
guru
Painting rainbow trumpet
strokes
Cosmic
Chameleon
Betty
Carter
Listen in the
night...
Far away/Beyond
Birdland
Shaman woman
scats
Dizzy
Gillespie
Oh, ancient
father
There are secrets in those
cheeks
Tilted toward the
sky
(Paula Ross, Venice artist and poet
died Dec. 19 - see last month’s Beachhead for details. A memorial for her
is being
planned.)
•••••
After
the rain
By Jim
Smith
After the
rain
the gulls were flying
low
over the
boardwalk.
I turned to
see
if Philomene was
near.
For days the
air
had been thick and
sweet
like a fragrant
jewel.
I thought of
you.
Is this how the
dead
communicate with the
living?
Philomene, our rain
maker.
Poems floating in the air.
Posted: Sat - March 1, 2008 at 03:55 PM
