Ends February 14, 2010. Usual rules apply: Less than 26 lines, voting held on the 15th. One vote per discussant/participant.
LANGUAGE FUTURES
The squeaky wheel was once the Greeks
As they rolled siege engines toward Troy
Helen was on a trading route
Later the world capital was Rome then Paris
Now it's New York
Named after the Duke of York
Brother of Charles II
Glittering green fields of Haarlem
The Dutch of New Amsterdam
Gave way to the commercial potential of Wall St.
Now it's been struck by planes
With men speaking Arabic
Futures in Arabic up 50%
Korean growing rapidly
We haven't had a war w/France
Since the 1760s
(French study down, departments closing...)
People along the border learn Spanish
Talk to your invader
Maybe it'll make some cents
15 comments:
Pieces of Eight
America was founded
On pieces of eight,
Mined by mestizos,
Coined by the crown
Out of silver.
Jefferson had no
Francs, pounds, or kroners
To buy Louisiana.
Pieces of eight made
America Greater.
Two bits, four bits,
Six bits, a dollar.
Pieces of eight
Make you stand up
And holler.
The scientist kneels,
and receives
the body and blood of Christ.
The man of reason,
meets the man of faith,
in one mind,
in one heart.
America began
With genocide and disease
Brought slaves and immigrants
And gave them a squeeze
Oligarchs were pimps
And presidents were whores
They maintained their power
With perpetual wars
Ended up being hated
By three quarters of the earth
And after Soviet collapse
Terrorism gave deadly birth
Caught with their pants down
By a murderous Alan Funt
And now they're pumped with propaganda
By lying Fox News cunts.
LIGHT FILTERS DOWN OBSCURELY FROM HEAVEN
Not only to Odysseus but the Cyclops as well
Whose punctured eye is raised dimly toward Justice
The light has come from the stars since Odysseus' time
To announce a meaning into the world
"quixoteehsqianna"
catholic adventures
be it brendan
or rambunctious columbous
horizon bound fools
with pretty good boats
windtossed
windtossed
windtossed
well this ain't china
but it' ain't bad
over a hundred years later
the prods started washing up on the shore
shoring up by drinking manhattens
and exploring entertainment possibilities the jews are funny let them do the standup
and what about that negro music now ain't that grand
we probably underestimate the influence of klezmer on jazz
at the center everyone is swinging to the left and to the right
going round and round
someone told a lie and everyone believed it
someone said
progress is a given
well so then is the opposite
someone always gets sucked down the drain
do the haitian shuffle
john hanson
"quixoteehsqianna"
catholic adventures
be it brendan
or rambunctious columbous
horizon bound fools
with pretty good boats
windtossed
windtossed
windtossed
well this ain't china
but it' ain't bad
over a hundred years later
the prods started washing up on the shore
shoring up by drinking manhattens
and exploring entertainment possibilities the jews are funny let them do the standup
and what about that negro music now ain't that grand
we probably underestimate the influence of klezmer on jazz
at the center everyone is swinging to the left and to the right
going round and round
someone told a lie and everyone believed it
someone said
progress is a given
well so then is the opposite
someone always gets sucked down the drain
do the haitian shuffle
john hanson
An old man with a mad mean mustache,
Long and grey beneath a classic
Cowboy hat, hops across the beat-
Down dance floor, a gaggle of young girls
Dressed like should-be-whores
Laugh from the bar...the music shifts.
Oh it's a trip! To see these hicks
All dance in a line - the Cowboy Cha-cha
The electric slide, then that old man
Comes by their side, raises a gentle
Hand and says "may I kindly have this dance."
One girl giggles, her friends insist
That she be ironic and say 'why yes,'
That old man gently takes her hand
And softly leads her round the dance floor's edge
A perfect, simple, subtle cowboy two-step
At first she laughs at the smell of his
Tobacco-stained and hard-worn lips,
But as the rhythm stutters and skips
Her sarcastic laugh dies to a sincere grin
And when the song ends, and she suddenly dips,
She looks up into his worn-out smile
And finds she's been a cowgirl all the while.
He leads her to her friends, tips his hat, 'ma'am.'
She turns to her silly scornful friends and says
We should sincerely come back here again.
i didn't mean to enter the poem 2wice i hope i don't get friggin dqD
i think i'm going to have to come up with something better than craigz pome to win
brett might win if subtlety has anything to do with it
the word
mississippi
is my next poem
jh
Especially liked DO THE HAITIAN SHUFFLE, as I had forgotten all about that bunch!
i think if we have to go back in time to win this thing we should be able to write poems with as many lines as we want i mean if th eonly way to win is to get zapped through the space-time travel tube then it would seem munificent on the part of the blog owner to let any sort of extensive runofthemouth blather extend on and on and on and on and on and on but no matter if it turns up we lose a year of consciousness we have the rest of eternity to catch up for if you go back in time you have to ride a laser right past albert einstein's sunglassses and do the watusi while you're at it
no
this is retrograde
this is timewarp
this is language poets at a rodeo
this is humanism doing a striptease
to drunk irish catholics as if there are any different kind
i mean we might as well be doing standup on deathrow
{:-(]>
Standup on death row! That's a killer! Har har.
I like the idea very much.
This would be better than making them make license plates.
It could be like American Idol only now the best deathrow inmate would get commuted to life as long as they kept the laughs coming.
The ultimate gong show...
JH has the best line in the contest-- standup on deathrow.
But I think Brett's is the best poem.
My vote's for Brett. Great story!
Brett Swanson -- WINNER!
Post a Comment