Tag: Poem

Jump Cuts Like Godard

Jump cuts

Like Godard

On the evening news

Your attention is

The one thing

They can’t afford to lose

 

Stories like Hitchcock

Winding up and down

Twisted stairs

People searching

For secrets and motives

That aren’t really there

 

Sounds like Altman

Bleeding one into another

Cutting in and out

People trying to discern

Truths they whisper

From lies they shout

 

Faith like Scorsese

Still present, but

Beaten and torn

Hoping between

All the death and privation

Something better is born

 

Reality like Lanzmann

Laying bare plagues foul effects

On me and you

Not metaphors

No soft lenses

Just a truth hard to view

Gene G. McLaughlin 2020

Godard

 

The Monkey Sees God in Bananas

The monkey sees God in bananas

The tiger sees the divine in his claws

The crow sees God in the worms of the morning

As he cackles, preens, and craws

Man sees God in the unseen

The preacher sees the divine in his words

The zealot sees it in the crowds that gather before him

As he guides them like an unthinking herd

Let your eyes be your faith and your heart

Let your ears hear the sounds of the divine

Let your own steps guide you to your version of God

As I shall let my feet lead me to mine

Gene G. McLaughlin 2020

Monkey

Everyone Thinks

Everyone thinks
 
The other side stinks
 
And they feel entitled
 
To that which was not earned
 
With Nero’s curse we were riddled
 
Danced to the sound of the fiddle
 
Never once broaching the middle
 
Everyone already decided
 
Whilst we burned
 
Gene G. McLaughlin 2020

Kobe

Bet on work and failure

As a path to growth

Bet it’s a bet

That won’t appeal to most

Own your sins

Grow from them

Acknowledge your failings

As much as wins

Become a better man

In the public eye

Be known as one

The day you die.

Gene G. McLaughlin 2020

Black Friday 2019

The world is on sale

and also on fire

30 percent off all you desire

gifts under the tree

are the world’s pyre

-Gene G. McLaughlin 2019

Ghosts of the Spine

There are ghosts in your spine
Created from that which came before
Thoughts I once called mine
I take full ownership of no more
We are agreements between elements
Negotiations between factions
Maybe influenced by environments
Leading to actions and reactions
Embrace the us in all of us
Make plural the royal we
Are my envy, hate, or lust
Just a war of ghosts within me?
An engine of looping thoughts
A walking talking analogy
Ghosts maneuvering for position
Wishing it to be their eyes that perceive and see
Gene G. McLaughlin 2019

Stay a Little Longer

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

1-800-273-8255

Stay all night, stay a little longer
Dance all night, dance a little longer
Pull off your coat throw it in the corner
Don’t see why you don’t stay a little longer

Even the mountain is not free

Battered and bruised by both water and winds

You have not seen all there is to see

Despite your mind claiming it knows how the story ends

Stay all night, stay a little longer
Dance all night, dance a little longer
Pull off your coat throw it in the corner
Don’t see why you don’t stay a little longer

This is a world of change, nothing else is true

Within it lies suffering and wonder with no measure

Both dispensed and visited upon you

Containing love, loss, pain, and yes even pleasure

Stay all night, stay a little longer
Dance all night, dance a little longer
Pull off your coat throw it in the corner
Don’t see why you don’t stay a little longer

I would request you stay a little while longer

I’ll ask you this each and every day

Each time you feel the black dog’s hunger

We will sip coffee or tea till it fades away

Stay all night, stay a little longer
Dance all night, dance a little longer
Pull off your coat throw it in the corner
Don’t see why you don’t stay a little longer

Maybe we will talk of nothing

For the topic matters little to me

Because a world without your heart beating

Is a far poorer one which you fail to see

Stay all night, stay a little longer
Dance all night, dance a little longer
Pull off your coat throw it in the corner
Don’t see why you don’t stay a little longer

Gene G. McLaughlin

Refrain – Bob Wills/Tommy Duncan from Stay a Little Longer

To the Angry Young Men (Which Once Included Me)

Rage encounters empathy
If you live long enough
Acknowledgment of the other
That’s where it gets rough
Your friends and enemies
Each know the same pains
When harm’s inflicted
Both souls are stained
To be a mammal is to anger
Putting your needs above
But to be a mammal also
Is to love
You did what you did
Then and before
But you can choose to do it
No more
Maybe rage is part
Of a divine plan
But maybe love can grow
In the heart of a man
Live long enough
Perhaps to learn
Fire can warm
Not only burn
Gene G. McLaughlin 2019

Back to School

Dread hangs in the air
Of this free and violent land
Our eyes constantly gaze
To what’s in the stranger’s hand
Sometimes we don’t dwell on
What has happened and what soon will
But then our thoughts are refracted
When the light grows way too still 
Those we love
Those we don’t
Those we’ve met
Those we won’t
We are the audience
We are the participants
Both victims and perpetrators
Despite our reticence
They say freedom has a cost
This we all know is true
I suppose how you judge what it is
Depends on what the word free means to you
They head back to school
As fall approaches in the air
May the strangers inscrutable gaze
Be looking far from there
Gene G. McLaughlin 2019