Till We Die

.
Till We Die
.
So “science” is placed upon a throne that gives
It more of title than of power, while 
In vassalage to commerce and its drives,
With human wit and industry subsumed 
By all the cash that builds up capital.
.
This puts us on the roads of noise and rush—
The paths that lead us more and more away
From quiet observation—being one
With all existence—and our reverence
For life and all of Nature's balances.
.
Our sense of right and wrong, a sense innate
That judges what is fair and feels the pain
Of other beings—this is dulled, obscured
By distance from the acts that we defend
Or those about which we are ignorant.  
.
Afraid of depth, afraid of painful sight,
We close our eyes and ears and so our hearts, 
With minds and senses jaded, scoffing at
The ones who bring attention to the wrongs
Or struggle hard to change what isn’t right.
.
This mass retreat to dwell in shallowness—
Is this from age—and  all the buffets borne
Through years of struggle to subsist, survive—
To do what’s right in even little ways—
To find that even these were scorned and blocked?
.
Or is it from the long-accustomed ease
Of “going with the flow”, “not making waves”—
That most of us have followed through our lives –
As evils grew—with our acquiescence—
With basic ethics leashed and pegged in place?
.
I do not know—but see this in myself 
And others of my age and even those
With many years remaining in their lives.
It is as if we all have given up
On even seeing past our small cocoons.
.
So hopes of changes for the better lie, 
Along with youth, within our garbage cans,
And even younger folk are blinded by
A loss of sight as more of us are turned
To serfs that sell our labor for a wage. 
.
And yet, we still have senses left to use—
To know and try to understand the world,
However poorly, yet with diligence, 
With patience, inner sight, humility,
And courage still to question and rebel.
.
And doing this may often cause us pain,
With scorn from others when we speak of things
They do not wish to hear. And yet there is
The truth, perceived, that undercuts the lie, 
That each can softly whisper, till we die.
.
2024 July 3rd, Thu.
Berkeley, California
.

Sanity

 
Sanity

Amidst the horrors all around, we see
The things of beauty, hear the sounds of joy,
Observe the workings of compassion, care—
And so find solace still—and sanity.

To only note the horror, being blind
To all that still remains of living grace,
Is clearly partial. So it also is
To turn away from cruel miseries,
As if these things were mere imaginings.

How easy it can be to close the eyes,
The ears, and heart and mind, to misery;
How hard it is to turn to it, to try
To ease that pain—or point to it at least,
So others firstly see and then decry
Yet more of endless pain and suffering,
And act together then to end this curse.

******

There is a time for action and a time
For needed rest, reflection and repose.

One needs to close one’s eyes and savor peace—

Whatever little fortune might dispense—
And so to gather strength to live, to think,
To speak and act in ways that benefit
The beings who are helpless and besieged—
No matter what their kind or heritage.

******

When madness dire has seized the populace,
Then thoughts and words and acts are deemed insane
That try to turn from madness back to sanity.
And those who still persist are vilified
And labeled this and that and even worse,
And so, in time or rapidly, they lose
Their friends, their jobs and often even more.

******

We each are subject to what others think
And how they speak and act as they react
To what we say and do. And this is good,
As this constrains us when we are amiss.

But when we take account of frailties
That might be ours and still in peace conclude
That we should speak and act to try at least
Prevent injustice, death and suffering,
Then that is what we need to do, or else
Forfeit what still remains of sanity.

2024, January 28, Mon.
Berkeley, California

Packaging

Packaging 

  

 
So you're the one who's just been hired
To do the jobs of those who're fired.
Their number? It was two or three.
From work and income, they are free!
But you are now our newest slave
And you'll survive, if you are brave—
But not in speech or action, no!
But rather, in your letting go
Of all the stuff you'd nursed before—
Your scruples, fuss, and all you know
That you had learned in school and college
And also, maybe, in your village.

For here, where cars and humans jostle,
You’ve got to learn, kid, how to hustle.
We've found out—that all we'd learned
We might as well have tossed and burned.
For that was all about the stuff
About which folks have had enough.
Who cares for how or why or when
Or even what? It’s now, not then!
What use is there in understanding?
The profit comes instead from branding!
For in this world of marketing
What matters is the packaging.

So fie with focus on content!
On selling, you should be intent.
Do not be Santa's slaving elf.
Go sell the goods—and sell yourself!
And if you'd like to cut your losses,
Then always bow down low to bosses.
In offices, do not be bold.
Do not question. Do as told!
Be sure to cover up your ass
And smartly then salute the brass.
If you're savvy and survive,
Perhaps you'll be a boss—and thrive.

As it's in sales, so it's in all.
Do not drop, my friend, the ball.
And if you do, then hide it well—
Or you'll be in for bloody hell!
In this place, you've got to run—
And those who do, can have their fun.
Do not sweat the small details.
The one who does this always fails.
Well, that is all for now. Good luck!
Remember—do not care a f**k!
No matter what the tint of the collar,
It's all, at the end, about the d****r.

2018 January 26th, Fri.
Brooklyn, New York

Fragments

   
Fragments

We age and then, in time, we die.
And yet, although we might despair,
We hold to truth, refute the lie,
And try to mend what needs repair.

We're humbled by the blows of time,
And all our hopes are dashed in turn.
And yet, we breathe, and persevere.
While life remains, our candles burn.

Who knows the truth, except the gods?
And surely they are blinded too.
We hold our fragments to the light,
For that is all we each can do.

2017 April 24th, Mon.
Brooklyn, New York
 

Fools—II (with pictures from Brooklyn and Manhattan, 2016 June)

Note:  Some photographs, taken in June in Brooklyn  and Manhattan, are included at the bottom of this post. Those pictures are not directly related to the topic of the poem. The initial post of July 8th had also included photographs from the first few days of our trip to China in July.  I have now removed all but one of those pictures, so as not to overload the reader/viewer.  I will try and post them later. -- Arjun, 2016-07-23
----------------------------------------------------

Fools—II 

We’re living now in pressured times—
Been doing that for quite a while.
And so, we see our fellows frown
More often than we see them smile.

Where empires each extract their loot,
We hear the cracking of the whip.
We also note the racing, there,
Of mind and hand, of tongue and lip…

For “Time is money.” we are taught,
As clocks and coinage rule the lands.
The ones who rush get praise, while those
Who care and fuss get reprimands.

But here and there, among the serfs,
We find the ones who “play the game”.
They live on others’ labor and
They cheat and steal—and feel no shame.

And some among these folk may “rise”
To “oversee” the ones who toil—
To see that those “below” are squeezed,
As fish are pressed for precious oil.

And there are those who might be slow,
Who question, think and answer, “No.”
And these, we note, will never “rise”.
They’ll suffer till their times to go.

For rackets, scams are “systems” now,
With doubters scorned as “slack” or ‘slow”.
The savvy, to the systems, bow,
And paddle deftly with the flow.

So virtue now is turned to vice.
By those "above", we’re viewed as tools
Or else as problems.  Swindlers thrive,
While honest folk are seen as fools.

2016 July 7th Thu - 8th Fri 
Beijing, China
(1st stanza: July 5th Tue - 6th Wed
35,000 feet above the Arctic Ocean)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

To view the pictures in a somewhat larger and clearer format, please single-click on any one image. Allow some time for the pictures to load. Then, to see each picture in turn, use either the right and left arrow keys on your keyboard or click on the thumbnails at the bottom of the screen.  Captions will not be visible.  To return to this post and read the captions, click on the white X near the top right of the dark background.  Thanks.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  

Sunset over Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, looking west along Bath Ave from 19th Ave.   2016 June 5th, Sun, 8:24 pm.   © Arjun Janah

  

Sunoco gasoline station, at the corner of 19th Ave & Cropsey Ave, Bensonhurst, Brooklyn.   2016 June 5th Sun, 8:34 pm.  © Arjun Janah

Laundry cycle-rickshaw, at a crossing in midtown Manhattan,
2016 June 6th, Mon, 7:09 pm. © Arjun Janah

Skyscraper, with clouds and reflections, midtown Manhattan.
2016 June 6th Mon, 7:10 pm.  © Arjun Janah

Man using cellphone while striding past displays in upscale
Manhattan store windows, 2016 June 6th Mon, 7:12 pm.
© Arjun Janah

Skyscraper, reflecting buildings, midtown Manhattan,
2016 June 6th, Mon, 7:16 pm. © Arjun Janah

Two skyscrapers, one reflecting clouds, midtown Manhattan,
2016 June 6th, Mon, 7:16 pm. © Arjun Janah

Rearviews of Manhattanites, walking along 6th Avenue,
2016 June 6th Mon, 7:17 pm. © Arjun Janah

Garbage can and chained lids, 19th Ave, Bensonhurst, Brooklyn.
2016 June 14th Tue, 6:44 pm. © Arjun Janah

Our Italian-American neighbor Tony's tow truck, with a metaphor
and a pun, 19th Ave, Bensonhurst, Brooklyn,
2016 June 14th Tue, 6:46 pm.  © Arjun Janah
 
(Single-click on the image to read the inscription. Click on the white X
near the top right of the black background to return to this post.)

Rear view of  a woman walking a dog past a shiny blue car, 19th Ave,
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, 2016 June 14th Tue, 6:48 pm. © Arjun Janah

Our neighbor from Szechuan, China. 19th Ave, Bensonhurst,
Brooklyn, 2016 June 14th Tue, 6:49 pm. © Arjun Janah

By chance, this man and his family were also once my wife's family's neighbors in Canarsie, a faraway section of Brooklyn. Their daughter was a physics student at Canarsie High School, where I taught for thirteen years, from 1989 to 2002, mostly while traveling an hour and a half each way by bus and foot.  Of course, I was younger then.

The daughter is now a mother, with two boys. Her elder son is a student at Brooklyn Technical High School, in downtown Brooklyn, near Manhattan.  I once also taught there, as a sabbatical replacement, for a term in 1988. 

The daughter told me that her sons loved the scent of the spicy fish I used to cook in the evenings. So I gave them samples of that cooking.  Her mother, also from (another part of) China, gave me hot peppers and other vegetables from their backyard garden.
   

David A. Boody Intermediate School (IS 228), Brooklyn,
2016 June 22, Wed., 3:15 pm. © Arjun Janah
 
I was one of a group of teachers who graded the NY State Physics Regents
exams here: June 22-24, 4 pm to 9 pm & June 25 Sat, 8 am - 12 noon.

   

Shadows, of tree branches and of a human with a book-bag,
cast on the pavement outside IS 228, Brooklyn.
Early afternoon, a day after the summer solstice,
2016 June 22 Wed, 3:16 pm.   © Arjun Janah
 
(The human's unfinished cup of coffee is on
the pavement, in the shadows of the leaves.)

 

Sunset over Brooklyn, taken through the wire-grill of a window
at David A. Boody Intermediate School (IS 228), Brooklyn,
2016 June 22 Wed, 8:28 pm.  © Arjun Janah

Sunset over Brooklyn, with the Verrazzano Bridge to Staten Island at the horizon, 2016 June 23 Thu, 8:21 pm.
© Arjun Janah
 
(I placed my phone's camera-lens in a square in a window-grill in IS 228.)

  

At El Charrito Jr., a Mexican family restaurant near IS 228,
Brooklyn, 2016 June 24 Fri., 9:38 pm. © Arjun Janah
 
I used to stop here after work at nights for a soft taco.

El Charrito Jr., 2016 June 25 Sat., 12:11 pm.   © Arjun Janah
 
(The restaurant was not yet open for Saturday.)

Fort Hamilton Parkway subway station, Brooklyn, 2016 June 28 Tue, 10 pm.   © Arjun Janah
 
(Except in central NY City, the "subway" trains mostly run on elevated lines.)
I was going home after work at a federal election poll station, 5 am - 9:30 pm.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Crossing over the Pole, on a Cathay Pacific flight from
New York to Hong Kong, en route to Beijing, China,
2016 July 5th, 6:14 pm EDT.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
   
Note: a related short poem, with the same title, is: Fools 

( http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2013/05/fools.html ) 
   

Fools—II (with pictures from Brooklyn and Manhattan, 2016 June)

Note:  Some photographs, taken in June in Brooklyn  and Manhattan, are included at the bottom of this post. Those pictures are not directly related to the topic of the poem. The initial post of July 8th had also included photographs from the first few days of our trip to China in July.  I have now removed all but one of those pictures, so as not to overload the reader/viewer.  I will try and post them later. -- Arjun, 2016-07-23
----------------------------------------------------

Fools—II 

We’re living now in pressured times—
Been doing that for quite a while.
And so, we see our fellows frown
More often than we see them smile.

Where empires each extract their loot,
We hear the cracking of the whip.
We also note the racing, there,
Of mind and hand, of tongue and lip…

For “Time is money.” we are taught,
As clocks and coinage rule the lands.
The ones who rush get praise, while those
Who care and fuss get reprimands.

But here and there, among the serfs,
We find the ones who “play the game”.
They live on others’ labor and
They cheat and steal—and feel no shame.

And some among these folk may “rise”
To “oversee” the ones who toil—
To see that those “below” are squeezed,
As fish are pressed for precious oil.

And there are those who might be slow,
Who question, think and answer, “No.”
And these, we note, will never “rise”.
They’ll suffer till their times to go.

For rackets, scams are “systems” now,
With doubters scorned as “slack” or ‘slow”.
The savvy, to the systems, bow,
And paddle deftly with the flow.

So virtue now is turned to vice.
By those "above", we’re viewed as tools
Or else as problems.  Swindlers thrive,
While honest folk are seen as fools.

2016 July 7th Thu - 8th Fri 
Beijing, China
(1st stanza: July 5th Tue - 6th Wed
35,000 feet above the Arctic Ocean)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

To view the pictures in a somewhat larger and clearer format, please single-click on any one image. Allow some time for the pictures to load. Then, to see each picture in turn, use either the right and left arrow keys on your keyboard or click on the thumbnails at the bottom of the screen.  Captions will not be visible.  To return to this post and read the captions, click on the white X near the top right of the dark background.  Thanks.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
  

Sunset over Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, looking west along Bath Ave
from 19th Ave, 2016 June 5th, Sun, 8:24 pm.  © Arjun Janah

  

Sunoco gasoline station, at the corner of 19th Ave & Cropsey Ave,
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, 2016 June 5th Sun, 8:34 pm.  © Arjun Janah

Laundry cycle-rickshaw, at a crossing in midtown Manhattan,
2016 June 6th, Mon, 7:09 pm.  © Arjun Janah

Skyscraper, with clouds and reflections, midtown Manhattan,
2016 June 6th Mon, 7:10 pm.  © Arjun Janah

Man using cellphone while striding past displays in upscale
Manhattan store windows, 2016 June 6th Mon, 7:12 pm.
© Arjun Janah

Skyscraper, reflecting buildings, midtown Manhattan,
2016 June 6th, Mon, 7:16 pm. © Arjun Janah

Two skyscrapers, one reflecting clouds, midtown Manhattan,
2016 June 6th, Mon, 7:16 pm. © Arjun Janah

Rearviews of Manhattanites, walking along 6th Avenue,
2016 June 6th Mon, 7:17 pm. © Arjun Janah

Garbage can and chained lids, 19th Ave, Bensonhurst, Brooklyn.
2016 June 14th Tue, 6:44 pm. © Arjun Janah

Our Italian-American neighbor Tony's tow truck, with a metaphor
and a pun.  19th Ave, Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, 2016 June 14th Tue, 6:46 pm.  © Arjun Janah
 
(Single-click on the image to read the inscription.  Click on the white X
near the top right of the black background to return to this post.)

Rear view of  a woman walking a dog past a shiny blue car, 19th Ave,
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, 2016 June 14th Tue, 6:48 pm. © Arjun Janah

Our neighbor from Szechuan, China. 19th Ave, Bensonhurst,
Brooklyn, 2016 June 14th Tue, 6:49 pm. © Arjun Janah

By chance, this man and his family were also once my wife's family's neighbors in Canarsie, a faraway section of Brooklyn. Their daughter was a physics student at Canarsie High School, where I taught for thirteen years, from 1989 to 2002, mostly while traveling an hour and a half each way by bus and foot.  Of course, I was younger then.

The daughter is now a mother, with two boys. Her elder son is a student at Brooklyn Technical High School, in downtown Brooklyn, near Manhattan.  I once also taught there, as a sabbatical replacement, for a term in 1988. 

The daughter told me that her sons loved the scent of the spicy fish I used to cook in the evenings. So I gave them samples of that cooking.  Her mother, also from (another part of) China, gave me hot peppers and other vegetables from their backyard garden.
   

David A. Boody Intermediate School (IS 228), Brooklyn,
2016 June 22, Wed., 3:15 pm. © Arjun Janah
 
I was one of a group of teachers who graded the NY State Physics Regents
exams here: June 22-24, 4 pm to 9 pm & June 25 Sat, 8 am - 12 noon.

   

Shadows, of tree branches and of a human with a book-
bag, cast on the pavement outside IS 228, Brooklyn.
Early afternoon, a day after the summer solstice,
2016 June 22 Wed, 3:16 pm.
 
© Arjun Janah
(The human's unfinished cup of coffee is on
the pavement, in the shadows of the leaves.)

 

Sunset over Brooklyn, taken through the wire-grill of a window at
David A. Boody Intermediate School (IS 228), Brooklyn,
2016 June 22 Wed, 8:28 pm. © Arjun Janah

Sunset over Brooklyn, with the Verrazzano Bridge to Staten Island at the horizon.
2016 June 23 Thu, 8:21 pm. © Arjun Janah
 
(I placed my phone's camera-lens in a square in a window-grill in IS 228.)

  

At El Charrito Jr., a Mexican family restaurant near IS 228, Brooklyn,
2016 June 24 Fri., 9:38 pm. © Arjun Janah
 
I used to stop here after work at nights for a soft taco.

El Charrito Jr., 2016 June 25 Sat., 12:11 pm. © Arjun Janah
(The restaurant was not yet open for Saturday.)

Fort Hamilton Parkway subway station, Brooklyn, 2016 June 28 Tue, 10 pm. © Arjun Janah
(Except in central parts of NY City, the "subway" trains mostly run on elevated lines.)
I was going home after work at a federal election poll station, 5 am - 9:30 pm.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Crossing over the Pole, on a Cathay Pacific flight from New York
to Hong Kong, en route to Beijing, China, 2016 July 5th, 6:14 pm EDT.

----------------------------------------------------------------------
   
Note: a related short poem, with the same title, is: Fools 

( http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2013/05/fools.html ) 
   

Love’s Labor Lost? – II

  
Love’s Labor Lost? – II
   
How many poets, in how many tongues,
Have written verses, squeezing into lines,
That fit within a page, the wisdom, grief
Regret and joy they'd gathered, each, through lives
That soon would end?  How few are known today?
How many precious notebooks thrown away?
 
How many theses, labored on for years,
Reside in folders, doomed to dust, decay?
How many painters never sold a piece?
How many Einsteins couldn't get their chance?
How much of labor and of beauty lost?
How much of truth that never saw the day?
  
And yet—a labor is its own reward:
A poem or a a painting, done, fulfills
A need no praise or payment ever can.
A shelter, in an attic or a ditch,
From all the ravages of peace and war—
Plus time—are all a being asks for this.
 
A parent or a teacher, nurse or aide
Can spend a life in caring and in toil.
The worker in the mine or factory,
The peasant who must labor for his lord,
For all their work, receive a recompense
That rarely matches what the labor's worth.
  
What enterprise or government could do
Without the labor that the beings do—
Employed, enslaved or doing of their own
What can't be set to rules or supervised
Without reducing it to lifeless form—
The labor of the dead that's dull and dark.
  
The spirit that is calling us to work—
Be this to feed ourselves or far beyond—
It functions, in constraints, in spite of these.
But those who seek to tame it never will,
For it's by nature wild.  It lets us give
What can't be got by pay or punishment.
  
2016 February 21st, Sun. 4:47 am
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, New York  
---------------------------------------------------------  
Related:  

• Love's Labor Lost--Broverbs for Valentine's Day   ( http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2016/02/loves-labor-lost-broverbs-for.html )
• Broverbs of Pain 
  ( http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2016/01/broverbs-of-pain.html )  

The Poets

 
The Poets

I asked a poet, “What do poets do?”
She answered, “We attempt to speak the truth,
as we perceive it, through the flow of speech,
and only rarely are we paid for this.

“We each must toil at other things to earn
the leisure that we need to write our verse,
and though at times we might get some acclaim,
the poets true prefer the wage of bliss.
 
“For poets, like the rest of humans, are
as filled with vices as with frailties.
Temptations rise, but those of wisdom know
their verse is still their truest sustenance.
 
“So should they caper with the passing troupe
and cater to the ones who suffer from
the damage wrought by commerce to the soul –
or should they write for those who nurture mind?
 
“They do not fashion what they write to please
the critic and the fashion of the day.
They choose to write instead to please themselves
and those not jaded, those who still have heart.
 
“We see, around us, beauty, ugliness –
and kindness, cruelty.  We stand in awe
beneath the sky that is our window to
the vastness of the universe beyond.

“And each of these is cause enough for each
to pause and then reflect – and even ask
those questions that have each been asked through time
and yet, like every breath, is each as new.
 
“We do not listen to the cynics then.
We write instead on what we sense and feel,
on what we think, on what is wrong and right.
We say, to those who’re jaded, “Wake and see.”

“We learn the forms, the disciplines, but then
We break from them, for we are not their slaves.
Respecting still the past, we walk awhile
with current trends, then go our lonesome ways.”
 
And so she answered me.  I thanked her then.
I’d fancied words – and so I’d thought to earn
My living through my writing.  Hearing her,
I told myself I’d better think again.
 
2015 April 8th, Wed.
Brooklyn, New York
  

Cruelty is Zen

   
Cruelty is Zen
 
You can rail against the madness,
You can work yourself to death.
Until the workers wake up,
The lash is what you'll get.

Why butt your head in fervor,
Until you've brains no more?
The wall will never crumble
Until you're joined by more.

You can follow, quietly, conscience,
But beware that this is known.
When you're punished for your efforts,
You will find you're all alone.
 
There are those who value labor,
There are those who think it cheap.
There are those who value knowledge,
There are those who shun the deep.

When the conscience is extinguished,
When the wisdom has been lost,
Then what avails the worker,
Who's the one who pays the cost?

The mother does her nurture,
The father works his day.
And both of them are working
For the rent and bills they pay.

The teacher does her teaching.
But if, at this, she's caught,
She had better flee the system,
For her future, there, is fraught.
 
The banks have swelled with profits,
The hedge-funds daily soar.
And Bloomberg's gone, but Cuomo,  *
At us mice, can sit and roar. 

And now, he throws us morsels,
And we run to gather crumbs,
As our union-heads, say, "Listen!
Those who're voting no are dumbs."

Can a wolf become a rabbit?
Can their Andrew be our friend?
When his hand is further strengthened,
Will we ever see the end?

There's a culture of corruption
That is global in its scope.
And until we end that culture,
For a better, is there hope?

We can see the children troubled,
We can see the children spoiled.
But can we see the reason,
And why our labor's foiled?

The quick and easy answers
Are often not the truth.
The reasons may be simple,
But you've got to find the root.

For we adults, we are troubled,
And we adults, we are spoiled,
Though there's many, who may labor
And be saddened this is foiled.

The forces, strong, of commerce,
They have made, of virtue, vice –
And so, of vices, virtues.
So the city isn't nice.

Our values are degraded,
Our honesty is fled.
And lies – and those who're liars –
They're ruling us instead.

We are all in need of money,
But this surely can't be all.
For the simple act of nurture
Makes a culture rise or fall.

When we're racing for the money,
When we're harnessed, blinkered, then
The sanity is squandered
And the cruelty is "Zen".

I have labored and I've acted,
But the time is growing nigh,
With my strength and wisdom failing,
For retirement, with a sigh.

So I doff my hat to workers
Who have time to organize.
And I hope that they're successful,
And that some of them are wise.

Is there wisdom in acceptance?
Is there wisdom too in zeal?
It is heart and sight and conscience
That will tell you how I feel.

When the cheaters are the wise men,
When the zealots are in league,
When it's money that is speaking,
Does it matter, how we feel?

We are stranded in the shallows,
As the nonsense keeps us there.
Beware of what is peddled.
To challenge peddlers, dare.

We need wisdom, we need courage.
We must listen, we must speak.
We need action, where it matters,
As we steer towards the deep.
  
2014 June 15th, Sun.
Brooklyn, New York
  
* Michael Bloomberg, former three-term mayor of New York City, and Andrew Cuomo, current governor of New York State, moved strongly to curb whatever was left of union strength in New York, while maneuvering, fairly successfully, to keep compliant union leaders from coming out strongly against them. 
   
Bloomberg and Cuomo, along with the owned mainstream media, have worked to further the interests of the affluent and powerful elites of the financial institutions and other large corporations, with support from the federal (currently, Obama) government.  They also have the backing of the political right, the "center", and those who are on the left on "social" issues (such as gay rights) but not on issues that might lead to giving workers a voice.
   
Unfortunately, many workers have been brainwashed into divisions along ethnic, class and occupational lines.  Divisions have also been created between workers in the private and public sectors.  And so we have been conquered -- at least for now. 
 

The Harder Route

The Harder Route
  
When we have labored, tried to do our best,
And yet we know that even more remains,
Then what is left for us to do but breathe
And take a moment for ourselves to rest…

We each have conscience.  Some may pay it heed
And others not.  And who are we to judge?
And yet, we know that when the stakes are those
Of life and death, for conscience, there is need.

So what of when it’s future lives at stake,
The lives of children, those we teach at school,
Or those we counsel, when they need support?
We then can choose to either toil – or fool.

The rich make rules we workers then obey,
And even when they test our hearts and sense,
So many choose to do as they are told,
That one, who doesn’t, falls, to strictures, prey.

So when we’re in a time and place where scams
Are so accepted that our honesty
And all our labor brings us punishment,
Then should we say, “It’s all a travesty?”

And so be like the rest, or still resolve
To do, what conscience clearly asks of us,
Whilst knowing, all our work will not suffice,
Nor all our wits, to tangled problems solve?

There’s surface and there’s depth in all we do.
By habit, we can choose between the twain.
The easy route is that of looking good,
The harder, that of toil – and danger too.

2014  January 16th, Thu., 8:26 pm
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, New York 
  

The Poet’s Complaint

The Poet’s Complaint

I met today, amidst the snow, a man I’ve known awhile,
Who stood in ragged clothes, while I was bundled head to feet.
A poet was this man, and when I asked him then, discreetly,
Why he did not dress like me, he answered, with a smile,

“I dress the same, no matter what the season.  There are trees
That clothe themselves throughout the year – yet are, in winter, bare.
But just as there are men like me, who, whistling, blizzards dare,
So there are evergreens, like pines, that winter cannot freeze.”

But I had grown impatient.  So I cleared my throat and said,
“I’ve known you now for many years, and so I’ll speak my mind.
‘To those who best apply themselves, to them is Fortune kind.’
If only you were working, you’d be better clothed and fed.”

The poet, he was silent for a moment.  Then he turned
Towards me and he smiled again, although I knew I’d wounded.
“There’s work and there is work,” he said, “and just with that, I’d end it.
But I have also known you long.  Our friendship, each has earned.

“And so, I’ll speak now seriously, no longer just in jest.
I feel I should explain myself, at least perhaps to you.
For I have lived for long – and so, with years remaining few,
I should not leave, misunderstood by those who knew me best.

“I’ve lived a life of poverty, as others often said,
And yet not lacked for anything, except what can’t be bought.
By most of the Enticements, I have never yet been caught,
Except the Muse of poetry, to whom I’ve long been wed.

“So when I’m dead, if burial of ashes then is fit,
Upon the tombstone, you can write, ‘He wrote his fill of verses,
And for this crime, received in time his fill of all our curses,
But never seemed to mind – or ever made an end of it.’

“And if my writings then are burned – or verses thrown in trash,
Remember then, that though I worked as hard as any other,
I never did, throughout my life, cause much by way of bother,
And neither did my labors or my verses garner cash.

“So if I’m judged by standards that are mercenary or
Derived from views that value only what is deemed ‘productive’,
Then surely I will be condemned.  For I was neither active
In such pursuits – nor think that these are all we’re living for.

“But if I still have one complaint, it then is surely this –
So many ways there are to live awhile and then to die,
And yet we spend our lives ensnared by every dressed-up lie,
While leaving naked truth aside – and so, our chance of bliss.”

I’d listened to his verses, in his singsong nasal mumble,
And when he stopped, I saw that he was shivering from cold.
And if I were a braver man, or harsher, then I'd scold
This poet for his foolishness – that came out in a jumble.

But being who I am, I only told him, “I have listened.
Perhaps you ought to hurry now, to where you can be warm.
It’s freezing – and I fear that, in these clothes, you’ll come to harm.”
He turned to leave.  And at his chin, I saw a drop that glistened.

2013 January 4th, Sat.
(stanzas 2-5 added Sun., early morning)
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn  
  

The Small and Easy Lie

            
    The Small and Easy Lie

Of all the means that are employed
    To render workers slaves,
The lie is used, most commonly,
    By each new crop of knaves.

But sadly, it is workers, who,
    To falsehoods, then accede.
And every time we do, we let
    The master-knaves succeed.

For when a job's impossible,
    The shortcut then is used.
This sets the stage for tragedy,
    As lackeys watch, amused.

For conscience is an organ, which
    Will wither, when suppressed,
And gains in strength, when what it says
    Is followed or expressed.

So when we use, in what we do,
    The small and easy lie,
We then should know, the truth begins
    To suffer and to die.

"But facts are facts!" you may declare,
    "And truth is truth." maintain.
But when awareness, memory
    Have faded, lies remain.

And when we've built a structure on
    A base that's clearly false,
That structure is a jail-house, which
    Imprisons, till it falls.

And workers then will toil and strive,
    Not knowing history.
And when they fail at what they do,
    It's not a mystery.

But failure too will then be used
    To sell yet more of lies.
So be aware, for every lie,
    A bit of freedom dies.

And good intentions, too, are vain,
    When sight is so obscured
By lies, unchallenged, mounting up,
    That illness can't be cured.

The jungle we are in will clear,
    When each perceives the truth,
And then proceeds to, one by one,
    The tangled lies uproot.

The fog that we are in will clear
    When each confronts the lie,
And tells the truth, in private and
    In public, lest it die.

    2013 October 26th, Sat.
             Brooklyn  
   

The Teacher

The Teacher

I came upon a person by the sea,
Of haggard aspect, battered down by time.
He slumped upon a bench with downcast head,
And though the sky and ocean were alight,
It seemed it was in darkness that he sat,
An abject figure, sunk in hopelessness.

I sat beside him, wondering at this.
Had death or separation caused this man
To slouch like this, alone by oceanside,
As breezes blew and all around him seemed
A picture drawn of paradise on earth,
With Nature in her garb of happiness?

So when at last he turned to glance at me,
With a look of desperation tinged with guilt,
I bravely ventured then to ask of him
The reason for his obvious sunken state.
And hearing this, he then began to speak,
With a voice that trembled in its earnestness.

“I am a teacher.  That is all I know.
For many years, I labored at my job.
And all, that's thrown at teachers, I withstood
And tried to teach, so students then could learn.
But towards the end, I burned, it seemed, in fire,
And all my nights were seized by craziness.

“The job, impossible for those who are
Disabled by the human tendency
To do their best, and do it honestly,
To care for those they teach, and what they teach,
I still had done, for many, many years,
And even drawn, from it, my sustenance.

“We teachers earn, as workers, salaries,
But that is all.  Whatever benefits
Our union got for us, that now erode,
Do not suffice for labor such as ours,
Which sucks, from each who labors, life itself,
And leaves behind a husk – and emptiness.

“And though some fall away, defeated, some
Persist, for reasons various, and each
Has self to feed – and family as well.
And some are able, by some magic art,
To distance selves from what they do each day,
And so survive, by gift of provenance.

“And others find, perhaps, a little niche,
In which they may find shelter for a while,
And even, if they're fortunate, a bit
Of satisfaction, as their students learn.
For that is what sustains the teachers true,
Who cannot feed at troughs of callousness.

“For teachers learn, who truly are sincere,
Beyond their payment, never to expect,
From those who run the show, the sordid game,
A word of praise  – or even from their wards,
Who still are young –  and unaware of all
The teacher does, in strength or weariness.

“But teaching, just like learning, is a joy,
And when the ground is fertile, even seeds
By sowers lightly cast, untended, grow
And then bear fruit, with more of seeds in turn.
But others fall on ground that's arid, hard,
And all our tending ends in fruitlessness.

“For teaching, learning need some shelter, space,
Some attitudes from those who teach and learn,
From those who run the schools, who make the laws.
For all our culture did not come from those
Who play at high finance or at their wars,
But those, who wove their threads in diligence.

“There came a time when I grew tired of stress,
Of all my labor past and present and
The prospect of yet more until my end.
And all my efforts seemed a waste of time,
So many hours and days and years misspent,
Amounting, at the end, to nothingness.

“And even then, like a horse that's trained to pull,
I strained at harness, though my load grew such
I only crawled.  But never, even then,
Did I succumb to any of the scams
That pass for teaching and are glorified,
Though none can pass the test of harmlessness.

“For we have students, who have but one life,
And parents, live or dead, who gave them this.
And every day they spend with us is less
From what they have, before they too are dead.
So can a conscience let one sleep, who then
Gives other than his due of diligence?

“Deprived of sleep, I felt that I was spent,
So all, that once had looked alluring, now
Appeared as dull.  And what was savory,
When I was rested, now had lost its taste.
And life itself, with all its promise and
Its pleasures seemed absurd and meaningless.

“The ones I'd loved, the ones who gave me life
Had passed away – and even as I worked.
Not only all my most productive years,
But even those for whom I deeply cared
I'd lost to this, the work that teachers do,
Impossible, in total earnestness.

“For teachers, as I said, to labor true,
Look not for praise, but need – the space to teach.
But even this, to them, is now denied,
And all the castigation of the world
Is heaped on those who labor most to teach,
And they are left with naught but hopelessness.

“And yet, I could not leave my job, because
On it depended life and family.
And teaching was the only thing I knew,
And from that thing, that all my life consumed,
I'd drawn my meaning, structured all the rest
Around that thing – that turned to shamelessness.”

He stopped. The blood, that seemed had drained away,
When first I saw him, pounded in a vein
Upon his temple – and his face was flushed.
He'd straightened, gestured, come to life, but now
Again, I saw, had started to collapse.
I took my leave, in sudden fecklessness.

But when, returning from my evening walk,
I passed that spot, I saw, in gloaming's light,
That selfsame man, that teacher, self-described,
Was sitting there, with eyes affixed on ground.
And seeing this, I hastened then my step,
And passed him by, in haste and wariness.

2013 September 17th, Tue.
Brooklyn
 
On Teaching 

http://subject-teacher.blogspot.com/2013/09/on-teaching.html 
 

With Harlot Falsehoods

With Harlot Falsehoods
                                       
When we've walked the road of verity,
Throughout our lives – with all our human faults,
Abstaining from the vices of the lie –
The path of falsehood then cannot be borne.

And when we've been obedient to the call
Of conscience, ever heeding heart's advice,
To disobey is as a living death,
A torture, hell ascended to this earth.

And yet, observe, how in survival's name,
Or merely for ambition, some, with ease,
Can lie throughout their lives and can benumb
Their consciences and hearts for worldly ends.

And slaves, be they in chains of iron or
Of silver, must obey the master's lip.
And those, who quickest shed their scruples, thrive
And do not shy from wielding lie and whip.

So should we martyr minds and bodies for
The quiet voices that we hear within,
Or should we yield to fear or seek to rise
By doing what we see the others do?

The question comes and must be answered, yet
We seek, from this dilemma, some escape.
We all have duties to our selves and kin.
Should mere survival then be viewed as sin?

And yet, those voices, that we've listened to,
Will not be stilled.  They fill our nights and days.
To path of justice, heart and conscience call.
And every step away dismays the soul.

And those, who've wedded selves to truth, cannot
With harlot falsehoods lie a moment long.
And yet, the webs of lies entrap their souls,
And they are found, where they do not belong.

******
   
The ways, that lead to what some call as "god"
And others, "truth", are varied, manifold.
So each may choose to walk upon the way
That's fit for him or her, while harming none.

And all creation, all that's filled with light,
Has source in this.  Compulsion kills the soul.
But even that, which free creation brings,
Is used to slaughter and to dominate.

How many ways have humans engineered,
To make, of others, slaves!  So all, that minds
Have wrought, in innocent ingenuity,
To free us, then is swiftly turned to this.

So farming gave us brigand kings and turned
The freemen into serfs.  And now we see
Computers, mathematics used to serve
As watchdogs on the herds that daily teach.

It will not be.  We shall not be a part
Of evil, though our backs are loaded, bent.
We'll bear our burdens, labor as we've done,
But will not harm our wards or blur our truths.

Our lives have taught us that humility
That those of hubris rarely see till end.
And yet, whatever remnant self-respect
Remains, demands we do not dance to lies.

For how can we fulfill our duties core,
When heart and reason clearly say, "Do this."
And fear and slavery proclaim, "Do that."?
We choose the freeman's path of clarity.

Whatever punishment that brings, we'll bear,
With inmost beings calm, in dignity.
We'll do our work and walk the path of love,
And that will be, for us, reward enough.

stanzas prior to the break written
2013 September 4th, Wed. night
(after being briefed for two days
on the new teacher-evaluation
system in New York City) and
stanzas following the break
added September 5th,Thu.
and September 6th, Fri.,
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn

 Comments below.