Not Poetry. Quatrain Verse in English & Swedish. Dagsverser. On the Mundane & the Arcane.
What’s our species doing here
and ‘here’ is now ‘being where’?
While our human brain humongous
now scattered on screens shiny
(devices which grow like fungus)
our intellect stuck tiny
Critical thinking frail
Listening response deadpan
Suggestions captious, stale
Shortened our attention span:
“What again was the question,
did you ask: Where’s the restroom?”
+)
captious = tending to raise petty objections
Written originally just after the 2016 Trump & Pence election:
A Nation deeply embroiled
directionless & despoiled
Prez-elect narcissistic:
a bully chauvinistic
His VP pietistic:
prim, clean cut, jingoistic
In tawdry turmoil
they’re each other’s foil
In historic campaign brashest
nation’s figurehead now vile gargoyle
premonition neo-fascist
to which in cowardice we recoil
Entering frayed fantasy
we’re dragged into anomie!
+)
-anomie = a state characterized by a breakdown or absence of social norms and values
-foil = a person or thing that makes another seem better by contrast (although how could it work in this case?)
-gargoyle = an ornament consisting of a grotesquely carved figure of a person (though here perhaps a carved figure of a grotesque person?)
Common sense loses all traction
in ever contagious anomie
Hearts losing courage for action
in free fall from erstwhile apogee
Our faux free-willed self-containment
shall assure the same result
of our chasing entertainment
an indulgence we exult
as well acting out blindly
in feckless ways unkindly
Below blown sea fowl
ship with ardor
tossed in storm’s howl
steers for harbor
Of shelter beseeching
to dock in snug port
though shore leave but fleeting
if crew doesn’t comport
So here’s your lonely life, sailor!
The open ocean: Your jailer!
I just don’t like to stoop down
to place my dog’s fresh poop
(risking stains on hands or gown)
into a bag by scoop!
So I let it lie where left ad hoc
malodorous, right on the sidewalk
But my neighbors got it handled
as dog poop sticks bit like glue
When they get home (here I’m candid)
they just scrape it off their shoe
I allow my neighbors
to do me kind favors!
We ‘commune’ by bumper stickers
and by thought-ending cliches
Feebly democracy flickers
in such debased a malaise
Ever sillier, who’d thought?
Uninformed we get out of sync
society’s bonds worn fraught
Civil discourse gone down the sink
Now in anomie mired
entertained on apps agile
In fantasy conspired
reality’s grip fragile
But what a way to go
when wishing not to know!
To logic & hard facts
I’m recalcitrant
They may hinder my acts
when I gallivant
When finding pliable ‘facts’
I’m thus salivating
as they justify my acts
Aptly stimulating!
Civil or in brawl
I’m the victim
Watch me whine & bawl
here’s my dictum:
Between ‘wants’ & ‘needs’ little daylight
Furthermore I ain’t contrite, all right?
Winter rages bleak & cold
then merely click ‘unfriend’!
For Spring soon to burgeon bold
just click ‘like’ to impend!
Climate change talk we won’t brook
cannot by hoodwinked eye be seen
It lacks button on Facebook
anywhere in front of our screen!
What’s Fantasy and what’s Reality
long since blurred in Mainstream Media
Drenched in torrents of triviality
by enablers of Acedia
Unbeknownst benighted
watch us grin shortsighted
+)
-acedia = not caring or not being concerned with one’s position or condition in the world
The moment after crashing
time seemingly stands still
“You are alive!” keeps flashing
in vertiginous thrill
Crashed by distracted blunder
as no one did contrive
Withstood a thrust through thunder
to find oneself alive!
Then rest of day oxygenated
in pain, dazed while exhilarated
Word ‘complicated’ is in fashion
hence lacking in restrain & ration
When someone says: “Hi, my name is Matt!
What’s yours?” Don’t feel obligated
say: “Can I get back to you on that?
it’s (majorly) complicated!”
That’s how to ace the coolest phrases
among those faddy fleeting crazes