“Hare Out of Place IV” by Robert Deyber
cold
math
reckons
old man time
icy with boredom
existential infirmities
render intellect stagnant wisdom out of fashion
From my book Ephemera
Anachronism
All posts tagged Anachronism
Untitled by Fred Brandenburger
this anachronist
sees but the half
of what’s there
clearly hears
even less
short term memory
stages rebellion
fine motor skills
up and abscond
while muscles and
joints give up
constant complaint
an increasingly
alien culture gives
fame to celebrities
one and all strangers
the popular jargon
a babel
the politics
unrecognizable
cutting edge techno
lands dull
on the brain
nonetheless
here is smiling
and nodding
as if
understanding it all
things and people
behavior and motives
in motions and
tracks unfamiliar
the swimming
and swirling
of current events
much too fast
to be grasped
nonetheless
here is smiling
and nodding
as if
understanding it all
while remembering
one wise-ass boy
who discounted
the elderly
now in his dotage
and coming to terms
with what some
would describe
as comeuppance
“Open Field” by Patricia Awapara
I woke up in a bed
with no scent of my past
a bed in a room
that was nothing but strange
a room in a house
where my mind never lived
a house on a hill
with no trail that I knew
a hill in a world
with no sense of the values
that shape me
no room for the dreams
that compel me
a world full of people
I cannot respect
if you can’t send me back
to the place that I love
take me out to the field
and just shoot me
“No Man’s Land” by Bernard Dumaine
bourbon with bubble baths
meat loaf with manicures
beards with bald heads
shave their chest hair
and football is now but a
game played in fantasy
no men these days would
give up their seat or would
dare open doors for a lady
honor and pride are
no longer sufficient
rewards for one’s effort
it seems I have outlived
the role that my father
with diligence trained me
to play in fulfillment of
ancestral contracts
the blood oaths between
men whose culture
required a masculine dignity
shaped by old centuries
men who loved women
enough to behave at all
times as true gentlemen
it seems I have outlived
my place in this world
disagreement transcends
intellectual honesty
ethical principles fail
to obtain due respect
I am relic among the
advance of rogue values
here twisting and turning
within what’s become
my own living grave
unburied unmourned
From my book Human Waters
“Aftermath”
Painting by Perry House
From glasstire.com
arrange me among my antiques
I belong to their centuries
chairs in which I may repose
in the ghostly embrace of old friends
thinking our shared ancient thoughts
giving memory rational exercise
touching these things touched by
hands of minds sager than mine
patina of their late contemplations
the residue wisdom that dusts
these dead objects these primitive
ordinaries used by men famous
men forthright and brave in their
confident purpose to foment and
father a new scheme of governance
bringing a new world enlightened to life
here I have Washington’s battle sword
Madison’s inkpot and Jefferson’s quill
Franklin’s spectacles Adams’ own teacup
Jay’s gavel and Hamilton’s coins
here I have ideas of words that resound
in my head as they did in the resolute
hearts of revolt the just impetus for great
creation to come from a grave dissolution
here I have words of ideas to surround me
Plato and Paine Aristotle and Montesquieu
Voltaire Rousseau Hume and Cicero
not least the legacy passed on by Locke
arrange me among my antiques
I belong to their centuries
all but ignored as irrelevant snuffed
by the modern political dilettantes
keep me in imperfect reverence
join me to imperfect champions
waste yourself tearing down structures
of imperfect glorious history
“The Anachronism”
Mixed Media Art by Jean Dubuffet
From moma.org
bearded portraits
of intellect
decorate history
lost academic respect
pushed from minds
chased from syllabus
altered and deemed
by the crassness of new
institutional memory
dead white men
worthless of teaching
anachronist values
unwanted unwelcome
in schemas of relative
truths that predominate
postmodern ethics
alas we are bathed
in the acids of irony
etching the signal deceit
of an open mind closed
to its ancestral rigor
“First Anachronism of the Day”
Painting by Adrian Wiszniewski
From apollo-magazine.com
cold
math
reckons
old man time
icy with boredom
existential infirmities
render intellect stagnant wisdom out of fashion
Poesy plus Polemics 