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
.

Time is Money?

Time is Money?

Time is more than money, friends,
although you won’t believe us.
We live where time and money are
equated.  It’s atrocious.

Time was there, when money wasn’t.
Time will be, when money isn’t.
Haughty lord or humble peasant—
time is what made living pleasant.

Time is what we lost, as we
exchanged it for the coins that clink.
We’ve lost the time for elders, kids,
for leisure—and to sit and think.

We once had time, in part or plenty—
time for joy and time for grief.
But now we’re robbed of all. I’m asking,
“Who, of time, has been the thief?”

Men are harried and distracted.
Women’s lots are even worse.
Children cannot pay attention.
Yet I sit and type my verse.

When we focus on the present,
past and future fall away.
Time is there, and yet it isn’t,
be it night or be it day.

Should we hurry sex or eating?
Can we speed up love and care?
When the mantra is “efficient”,
who, to pause and see, can dare?

All of art and much of science,
all of nurture, learning, teaching,
all of wisdom—these are timeless,
born from disregard of clocks.

Surely time, like space, has function.
But time and space will still be there,
when you and I are vanished, mortals!
Time and space, we all could share.

But time, like other things, is now
a source of profit.  It’s a factor
that’s essential.  Watch your timing!
Otherwise, you’re not an actor.

See the worker, who must watch
the ticking clock—because the boss
is watching, there are deadlines and
to fuss—delay—entails a loss.

See the businessman, who strives
to squeeze, from out of time, his cash.
No time remains to pause, reflect
on things that don’t affect his stash.

See the parent, with her bills.
working hard, to feed her kids—
and so much more.  No time for her
to stop—or she’ll be on the skids.

In places, it’s the poor who race.
The middle class can take it slow.
In other places, burghers run—
or they’ll be middle class no more.

Run, run, run!  Run, run, run!
Run, run, run—and don’t ask why.
Run, run, run!  And run some more!
Run, run, run—till you drop and die.

No use for you, if you don’t produce
and don’t consume and pay your taxes—
unless you’re Donald Trump.  He hires,
and when your time is up, he axes.

“You’re fired!”  Now, you might survive
or not.  It seems it matters little.
“Go find a job, you useless bum!
Or you’re the wood we’ll have to whittle.”

Jobs and business, bosses, profits,
bills to pay and loans and rent—
these are now our lords and masters.
With amusements, we’re content.

Time is money.  Money's all.
Who has time to pause and question,
"Why this racing?  Who is gaining?
Where's the truth and where's the fiction?"

2017 June 18th, Sun.
Brooklyn, New York 
----------------------------------------------------
 
Related:  Hop  (a shorter poem, for reading out aloud)
http://thedailypoet.blogspot.com/2015/04/hop.html  
   

As Mammon Smiles

As Mammon Smiles

I have walked on city sidewalks
to my jobs and back to “home”.
I have watched the others walking.
I have seen the cars go by.

I have watched the people rushing
from place to place to place.
I have seen the cars that speeded
and I've often wondered why.
 
I think I know the reason—
at least for some of this:
we've learned that time is money—
on jobs—and errands too.
 
And who am I to question
the ones who race to work—
and back again for children
or things they have to do?

And yet I've walked and wondered—
for I have also raced
and been in stress and tension
from demons in the mind.
 
We each have been conditioned
to run when we could walk.
To things that we should notice,
our times have made us blind.
 
The aged are often lonely—
and scared, as savings ebb.
The moms and dads who're working—
they work and work and work.
 
So what becomes of children—
who troop, for years, to schools?
They take their turns as hirelings—
and labors, dare not shirk.
 
The workers spend their earnings
on things that drive the wheels,
the gears, the thrusting pistons—
and now, the pulsing bits.
 
I've glimpsed, at times, the village
where people too would work
and yet would sense the seasons—
with bodies, hearts and wits.
 
There are dances that are graceful;
there are rises, ebbs and flows.
There is work that has its rhythm;
there are things that take their time.
 
There is hurry, worry, scurry;
there are slipshod ways of work—
with our facts and logic faulty,
with our lines that do not rhyme.

There are many who are driven
by the few with inner drives
that need the work of others
so shares and profits rise.
 
And who am I to question
the workings of our world?
And yet, I've walked and wondered
if racing so is wise.
 
But speed is now a virtue—
and slowness is a vice.
So artisans are banished,
and the masses slave in mills.
 
It's “more and more and faster”
that drives the GDP.
The stocks and rents are climbing,
as Mammon smiles and wills.

2016 November 28th, Mon.
Berkeley, California

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 ) 
   

Freedom?

 
Freedom? 
  

http://www.forbes.com/sites/jacobmorgan/2015/01/16/do-we-need-hierarchy

We say, “This is a country free.”
And yet, I’m sure, to a high degree,
That almost everyone I see
Is an “owner” or an employee.

And though some might be both, we know
Our minds are set where income’s more.
And each of us, in verbiage, thought
And action, are, in mindsets, caught.

https://www.cuinsight.com/common-money-mindsets-hold-back.html

For every “owner”, you will find
A thousand of the other kind—
The ones who work, with hand or mind,
For bosses—gracious or unkind.

And which of these, I ask, is free?
And what’s the measure or degree
Of freedom that could ever be
The portion of an employee?

And even he, the boss of bosses,
With minions counting gains and losses,
Must carry too his gilded crosses.
Upon his bed, he turns and tosses.

So when we say that freedom shines
And show contempt for one who whines,
Remember—freedom isn’t guns
Or bombs that make a thousand suns.

Freedom is the lack of debt
And not being caught within the net.
You’ll find your freedom—this, I warrant,
When poised to be, where bosses aren’t.

https://memegenerator.net/instance/25900078

Kayapos dancing, with shorts and sandals on, Brazilian Amazon, by Thomas L. Kelly
http://www.thomaslkellyphotos.com/STOCK/TRIBES/Kayapo-Tribe/i-FqdBkCg

 
But even if you struggle free,
By climbing up the power-tree
Or breaking loose, what happens then
To all, who still are captive men?

A captive woman too must dance
As much in Yemen as in France.
And now, despite the "women's lib",
For women, freedom's still a fib.
 
Some dream that freedom will arrive
On owning Benzes they can drive.
And others aim yet higher, while
They wreak their damage, mile on mile.

There can’t be freedom, when the banks
Get richer, while the men in ranks
Are marching, so that profits flow
To those, who’re wanting even more.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/bill-quigley/ten-examples-of-welfare-for-the-rich-and-corporations_b_4589188.html

 
There can’t be freedom, when there’s war
That issues from the place you are—
Or comes, like dread disease, to visit,
Bringing woe and horror with it.

http://mamaruko.deviantart.com/art/War-is-Fun-172851282

When corporations give the orders,
As humans still are penned by borders,
While money speeds like light, with ease,
Then serfdoms grow and freedoms cease.
 

http://tabaaninga.canalblog.com/archives/2007/08/02/5790494.html

So women in the past have marched—
And others, who had long been parched—
To drink of freedom’s heady draft.
And yet, they’re snared by Mammon’s craft.

http://rrrrodak.blogspot.com/2009_11_01_archive.html

 
So sons of slaves might wonder why
They still must work, until they die,
At jobs they’d rather leave, but can’t,
While hearing still that jive, that rant.

The daughter of a worker slaves
And pinches pennies, scrapes and saves,
But still, with earnings low, may find
A world that hardly rates as kind.

“We’re free!” the politician blares,
And yet our heads are filled with cares.
We’re free, in certain states, to buy
Our guns—but not to question why.

We see that science, much maligned,
Has been, by engineers, aligned
To suit the needs of plebes and those

Who buy, at Bloomingdale’s, their hose.
 

http://www1.bloomingdales.com/shop/product/spanx-shaping-sheers-in-power-line-super-high-waist-914?ID=478659

And so, we’re free to buy the stuff
That’s made by workers treated rough
In distant places, and we’re free
To claw to climb the hierarchy.

And science and tech have brought us things
Like ‘planes that speed on windswept wings
And ‘phones that each of us can carry
And bounties for the military.
 
We’re free: to use, instead of rocks,
Our fiery bombs, with thunderous shocks;
To burn alive, our fellow species;
To strew the planet with our feces!

If this indeed is freedom, why,
Do give me freedom, then, to die.
If freedom truly comes, then whisper,
“That dummy missed it by a whisker.”

But if, as likely, it remains
As distant, query, "Who then gains,
When workers, working ever faster,
Speed the race towards disaster?"
 

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/526850856385202506/

“Produce, produce!” the teachers teach.
“Consume, consume!” the pundits preach.
Who then has time to think, reflect?
To Mammon’s priests, we genuflect.
 
“Free-dumb! Free-dumb!”  Hear that shout
And ask yourself, what it’s about.
Can ignorance let freedom be
What it should mean to you and me?
 
2016 June 25th, Sat. & June 30th, Thu.
Bensonhurst, Brooklyn, New York
 

http://whatwouldjackdo.net/2013/05/if-this-is-what-freedom-looks-like-to-you-lets-call-it-what-it-is-freedumb.html