Zumwalt Poems Online

Archive for September, 2011

a single word

a single word

words, words, words
static over static
drilling deeply thru the dentine
scraping invasively against skull and skin

your line of supply is inexhaustible
arguments, propositions, explanations
predications, exclamations, excuses
all unecessary barking and bow-wowing
at hidden celestial objects

I am here
don’t chase me away
unless you want me
to be chased away

I am yours
don’t bombard
your own firmly secured posessions with
ammo best saved for those territories still unconquered

give me short compact sentences
phrases and single words
ideas as consumable as quarter pounders

don’t shove a hose down my throat
filling me with mashed escargot and foie gras

words, words, words
I can’t sustain a relationship with them
pelting me from every angle at every moment that
we’re together

take your finger off the trigger
I surrender
make me a prisoner
not a confirmed casualty

words, words, words
they all sound the same
they don’t mean anything
they just demean, meander
and make me end up thinking
that when all is said
I haven’t heard
a single word.

— Zumwalt (1990)

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WordPress Sampler (choiceposts.wordpress.com)

In visiting various WordPress sites, I am enormously impressed by the diversity and general quality of content out there. It is a particular pleasure to read so many original and colorful poems.

After spending some additional time quietly but rapidly exploring (no posts, no likes, etc.) it seemed that it would be nice if there was a “sampler” available of the best posts of the various WordPress sites. I found pages like WordPress’s own Blogs of the Day and various “Best Blog” sites, but I couldn’t find any true sampler blogs. I have decided to launch a WordPress blog dedicated to showcasing the very best post of anyone interested in participating.

The approach is, at least on the surface, pretty simple.

Anyone interested choses exactly one post from their site they wish to have represented on the new CHOICE POSTS  blog. They may chose the post they think is their best, that their readers like the best, that best represents the nature of their blog, etc.

They then email the HTML, Text and any associated images of their representative post to choiceposts@gmail.com plus the link for that post plus four additional links and associated names of four other posts they would like to have referenced. This allows the site administrator to re-assemble this post to match (or at least be similar to) what is on the original site.

It is very important that the Category of the Post is specified such as one of the categories found on the WordPress Tag Page. This will allow readers of CHOICE POSTS to easily browse along their lines of interest and help match readers to blog sites.

In addition, author should submit any additional information they wish to be included about their site and/or themselves which will be included in the post. Author name (real or not real) can also be included. For example, after administration team assembles information provided on email, the resulting post in choiceposts.wordpress.com could look something like:

Poet_Don’t_Knowit is the author of the site “POETRY ON THE RUN”

Poem of the Approaching Autumn (Link1)

I love fall
It whispers in my ear
Like paint drying.

Additional Posts from “POETRY ON THE RUN”
 Poem of Spring (Link2)
 Poem of Winter (Link3)
 Poem of Summer (Link4)
 Poem of Fall (Link5)

[Category: Poems]

(Added 9/26: For very understandable reasons, some participants may wish to just provide link of their “best post” since the look of their site is different than what is at choiceposts.wordpress.com. In this case they just need to provide introductory text about their site and/or themselves and the link of the “best post” and up to four other links to other posts on their WordPress site.)

The CHOICE POSTS admin team will initially post a few of these a week, pretty much trying to post in the order of submissions received until a backlog develops. At that point, some process will be used to select only a portion of the posts submitted — either random selection, selection based on quality, variety and other characteristics or a hybrid approach.

Someone who has had a entry posted on CHOICE POSTS may later feel they wish another post to represent their site. If this happens, and enough time has passed (six months), then they can email a new submission for posting to CHOICE POSTS, indicating whether they want the earlier submission kept or deleted.

All posts and links must be from WordPress sites.  Some constraint is needed and this just makes administratipon easier.  The universe of WordPress itself  is pretty big and way too big for this one project.  In addition, I feel some loyality to WordPress from the short time (3 months) that I have been here.  I like the ease of use, the ability to connect to other users, the sense of community and the flexibility and convenience.

Submitted content should be suited for general audiences with the CHOICE POSTS Admin Team selecting Posts they think acceptable for a “G” or “PG” audience.

Speaking of ratings, please do not rate this post since the “star” ratings are automatically leveraged to identify the best liked poems on the site.

I will leave this post here for a few days before posting the next Zumwalt Poem. Since I will put a similar post out on the CHOICE POSTS  blog, I may delete the version of the post here once enough people have read it.

I want to take a moment to thank all that visit this site, particularly those that take the time to comment, “like” or rate the various Zumwalt poems. It is a pleasure for me to posts these poems, and an even greater pleasure to know that others can read, are reading them and, in many cases, enjoying them.

Best,

zumpoems.com Administrator

forgery sorcery

forgery sorcery

The goal to cajole grains of glimmering gold
from metallically murky, stir-fried mercury through nucleosynthesis control
is now achieved, yet not well received
by those with untold holdings yet unsold.

I started with some crumbs of platinum a month ago
selling my Renault and mortgaging my sixteen acre château
to secure enough on-hand bank-roll dough for the necessary cash-flow
but only a empty-headed fool would continually and conspicuously crow
about changing Romanée Conti Bordeaux into Duckhorn Three Palms Merlot.

So I replaced periodic-table element seventy-eight with element eighty
developing techniques to create the critical intermediate step relatively safely
and though initial results were predictably shaky
eventually I achieved my very own praiseworthy mercury-to-gold bakery.

Yes, it’s now just a simple mechanical execution
taking Mercury 197 plus one neutron
and through proper subatomic distribution
arriving at stable Gold plus one positron
through a process somewhat akin to intrastellar fusion.

Now even though it costs three million dollars an ounce to achieve this feat
the knowledge of this deed
has put second thoughts into the usually well-informed Wall Street
so that worldwide
all precious metal traders,
short-term speculators
and long-term investors are taking the heat
and following world gold prices into retreat.

Meanwhile the government has confiscated my lab
locking me in prison somewhere south of Bagdad
gobbling up my research in one heart-wrenching land-grab
then ultimately failing despite taking their best go-at-it-shower-scene stab
with the well-represented public picking up the final multi-trillion dollar tab.

Now gold sells for ninety dollars an ounce
awaiting an expected but not yet quantifiable dead cat bounce
and soon, the rumor is,
     the President and other heads of states will publicly announce
that all world currency — dollars, coins, crowns and pounds —
are now ultimately, reliably and dependently sound.

But I know better — nothing minted or printed has worth
and metals themselves are just so much galactic debris dug from the earth —
the only time anyone really ever gets fully and satisfactorily reimbursed
is when the solemnly chosen,
     deep-frozen icy-emotion,
     softly spoken, dark-dress-devotion pallbearers
     load the carefully sealed,
     hints-of-some-hereafter-to-be-revealed shiny black-top coffin into the hearst.

— Zumwalt (2011)

Trade

Trade

It’s a fair trade.
Food for fuel.

Convert all our corn.
Add the amylase enzyme gene.
Food for fuel.

It’s a fair trade.
Forests for Food.

Switch soya for corn.
Make Brazil a giant farm.
Forests for Food.

Prices are right for fuel and food.
Step up production:
More fuel, more carbon in the air;
More food, less trees, more carbon in our lungs.

Rising Global Temperatures are ripe to drive up prices.
Droughts increase water’s premium
Aquifers get depleted.
Water becomes even scarcer.
Food prices rise.

Little Johnny wants to make money.
How can he not help to do so?
Invest in food and pollute at the same time.
Easy money.
Pollute on a small scale:
Pocket change.
Pollute on a large scale:
Wealth beyond dreams.

Rising Temperatures,
Erratic Weather,
Population Growth,
Scarce Water Resources,
Civil Unrest
All put stress on
Food supplies.

Now Johnny has to work harder.
He burns the midnight oil.
And makes more money.

Cattle, Sheep and Goats
Make deserts out of grasslands.
Tractors, Freight Trucks and Commuters
Make hazardous waste the speciality in trade.

But it’s a fair trade.
Quality of Life for Quantity of Life.

It’s a reasonable trade.
More humans for less plants and animals.

We will switch the future for the present.
Make our Dreams a Giant Dustbowl.
Swap future prospects for a bite to eat.

Principles are right for the harvesting.
Let’s step up consumption:
More fuel, more carbon in our air;
More food, less trees, more carbon in the lungs.

It’s a good honest trade.
I can write away the guilt.
Put my complaints down on some message board
And feel just a little better
As everyone increasingly feels worse.

— Zumwalt (2011)

The irreplaceble moment

The irreplaceble moment

We passed a law that two things
must not occupy the same space
                           at the same time.

There were some dissenting votes
and much discussion about how to enforce.
Our representatives had to think of the interests of the constituents mainly,
which, in this case, coincided with the interests of the consituent assembly.

We, the people, needed to have a nice place to live.
We evicted the indigenous
making them all indigent
and our leaders sometimes evicted us
as a matter of common sense and expedience.

We, needed a way to move from place to place.
Metal mines swallowed eco-lifelines,
oil sputtered and splattered
coating the coast
from sea to shining sea.

We, needed something to eat.
Food replaced foul-tasting pests
with the help of
magical chemical tricks.
The fumes were awful
confining us to hospitals.
The country became prosperous
as the food became murderous.

My chainsaw spins and thus once again
repels all like things from its space.
It must create to destroy and destroy to create
following the inviolate rules of time and place.

My friends all slash and burn the best they can.
They may displace,
efface and even disgracefully debase nature’s very own birthplace
but it’s all to simply appropriate our formerly shared estate
and establish
through each on-demand phase of
tactically-driven blaze, graze and industrial haze their
own personal haste-makes-waste
state-of-the-art ahead-of-the-pace
deadly-embrace-the-human-race
monetarily-based
technically-graced
profit-making showcase/workplace.

Yes, our life may be just a moment but
the damage we do by being a bit too clever lasts forever.

— Zumwalt (2011)

The last party (Trivial Pursuit)

The last party
(Trivial Pursuit)

She was in the room glowing
a smile on her face
she should have talked to me
or looked at me

Her boyfriend sat across from her
like a cardboard cutout
he should have been alive
or at least awake

another room awaits
autonomous
bordered by sounds
of new wave existence

friends reach out
alcohol people
a swirl of support
a backdrop of goodness

yellow light flickers
orange perfume clusters about
purple music masks the crowded voices

the little dog scurries
moves with short stubby legs
strawberries sit too long
a phantom plays monotonous percipitations

the game continues
to begin anew
the dice is the leader
the cards are finite

time wanders in a trivial pursuit
following the strewn clothes of lovers in transit
drinks stir, soaking the carpets
choices are made to apologize for chance

time beckons in a trivial pursuit
bubbles of memory
pockets of pain
seasons stacked up, circling to land

time chases in a trivial pursuit
paths are lost forever
relationships crumble from the motion
happiness dies countless deaths

time hates itself in its trivial pursuit
it shoulders the consequences of the fear and grief it spreads
it loses its identity
and is crushed by its existence

colors darken into empty shapes
taste and smell congeal
sounds form into thickening twisted knots

a dog scurries
apparitionally
alone in sympathy
it cannot understand

arms of activity
limitless ferment
dancing in madness
fleeing from feelings

this room is silent
solid and isolated
occupied at times
by present and past

Her boyfriend sat across from her
and he once had been me
He should have been happy
He should have stayed

She was in his life glowing
a blessing of emotion
He should have understood her
or at least communicated

the game never finishes
its motion won’t subside
but its pretense fools the wise
and traps all
forever

the morning rises
timidly, relunctantly
its features are grey
from the last party

— Zumwalt (1985)

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