So Long

[Manna]

I don't think people have changed in the last 45,000 years or so, give or take 30.

[Boss]

You don't think that because you think too much. You have been programmed to since you were a little girl.

Imagine a little, hey. What do you think the hippy generation was all about? It wasn't only easy sex and LSD. Manna, see what can be rather than what 'should be' - what science or religion tells us. See beyond word and number into a new reality - one soaked in love and co-operation, one soaked in mutual trust. Mohandas Gandhi envisaged this way. So did many others. Just the art of living in peace - Men can do it.

Okay, I give in. I understand you come from a scientific background. You must be aware of probability, of chance. In all likelihood we're gonna' blow the fuck out of each other. BUT, there is a possibility of the world developing into harmony. A world where every soul knows peace.

Manna, let down the blinkers and see it, just imagine it. And tell your husband and daughter, too. Then all of us will understand that Man can change, has in the past and forevermore will. Our 'hero' insists, "I've seen the future brother it is murder". But what after?

Adam

[lizzytysh]

< * Psssst ~ Adam... Manna is one of the most imaginative people I know. Though she's learned it and done well there, she's not stuck in the rigours of science . * >


~ Lizzy

[Boss]

for Manna, I can be a right shit


The Eagles encourage
in this 5am dawn
the West calls so slightly
for the sound of the free
And I dare not answer
else I'm due for sedition
or judged as the beast
in some maniac pulpit

And Henley explains it
this USA woe
and mostly I know it
from television show
An old Rambo doll
a big mac and fries
a Walt Disney dollar
the country see-through

But she is the pulse
of our imminent 'morrow
in our lost cautious realms
these wounded aged kids
She is the promise
of sky blue and white
Democracy's coming
to the US of A

She'll not be too ready
midst straitjacket faiths
deceit politicians
businessman stench
They'll go on the sly
like some Benedict Arnold
but they'll not win the war
Love walks bold new paths

The day it calls out
from Omaha Beach
Ho Chi Min City
Baghdad and Kabul
Our sadness is sanctioned
for the tide she is in
with blood and with flesh
but our Heaven shall close

Your sons they will break
your daughters shall weep
for a fallen old hero
defending her honour
Star spangled banner
no presidential crap
a man off the streets
a king you will get

America, America
you are hereby done charged
from the guts of this life
and it's crooked sick men
Care for the twisted
do not turn your backs
on the hungry, the homeless
the desperate, the ruined

And you will bring closure
to this warring sex theme
you'll celebrate difference -
a man knows where he sits
Goodbye Mr. Pepsi
so long Mr. Ford
Wall St. all smashed up
it will never return

Just watch the beginning
life will be so bad
like a Letterman joke -
it couldn't get any worse
But you're the big player
this empire is charged
to exorcise sarcasm
and murder the lies

And your courage, your grit
knows the arse-end
of hate
America, America
you have been charged
called from the ether
which is proper noun
mysterious scheme

You have been charged
to open up souls
rescue desolation
kill all the banks
You hold tight to animal
plant all the trees
you cradle the cloud song
close to your bosom

And it is now coming
nothing can stop it
a nimble Astaire
a most worthy Lincoln
Bond up together
it is coming for good
nothing can stop it
nothing could dare

[Manna]

Brother, you are not a shit. I am glad there are hopeful idealists such as yourself in the world, seeing and encouraging the rest of us to look for the light.

[Boss]

Desert Woman

You waver in
the breeze
you falter in
the chat
you buckle to
the tide

and this so
adds to your
wonder


Lady

the day stretches out
what does she think?
and the moon affects her
no Armstrong
or Aldrin
tv is just noise
the markets mean nil
as long as she gets
her tucker and kip
this little lady
hates cats
and big flies
this little lady
loves tickles
and sofas

this little lady
knows more than i


And we are the lucky

And we are the lucky
who can read
the computer
we are the lucky
who have cars
motor scooters

And we drink fine coffee
from Brazil
packed in Spain
we drink fine coffee
in chalets
with no pain

And we're not a coon
a nigger
a jew
we're not some jap
some dago
on cue

And we sleep in beds
fine feather
and down
we sleep in beds
think 'they' are
the clowns

And we horde possessions
a house and
a car
we horde possessions
must buy that
sports bra

The wheel it turns slowly
the spokes and
the axle
there's coming a time
when we'll need more
than Paxil

The wheel it turns slowly
it laughs at
our diamonds
our microwave dinners
quaint phones and
fake cryin'

The wheel it turns slowly
by that horse
at the mill
the tree that is dying
but our eyes
set to kill

The wheel it turns slowly
on religious
intolerance
the air that I breathe
is my truth
no indifference

The wheel it turns slowly
it's wrecking
your house
and you can eject me
one click
of your mouse


Thank you Manna

[Boss]

G'day,

it's been a long journey. It'll be over soon. This is my last post on this thread. As I walked through desert streets, caught buses and planes and stayed in cities I never thought possible in my humble little life, I thought. About me, about the world and how she stands right now, and about the people I know here. I didn't intend to post poems, but the opportunity kept coming up. I took it. It was good. This is my last poem.

What is past and what is future

Will you be there
when they call out
“Lord save us, Lord save us”?
When they sing
tributes to Lenin again?
When your mother’s on Diazepam
and your sister’s freaking out
on crack cocaine, on pot?

Will you be there
when they exterminate innocence
from the lonely, scattered places
she hides in today?
When trees are confined
to backyards and animals to zoos?
When people kill wantonly -
there’s no justice to stop it?

When governments are
superseded by finance tricksters
who give a lazy billion to charities
like Ronald McDonald House
just to ‘get you in’?
When orthodoxy has her
talons in all things?
When there is a correct way to cry?

Will you be there
when your water is undrinkable
your rivers silted and stagnant?
And they still keep buying,
still fuck around on their wives
still are so horribly bored
they find peace on internet forums
every day, and every night?

Will you be there
when the dollar wins in the West
and militarism in the Middle East?
When this concoction meets head on
and Holy is not invited?
How will their machines
be restrained?
My G-d, will they stop?

Will you be there
when the warnings of the prophets,
the ancient ones,
are not heeded – laughed at?
When the drive for perfect orgasm
perfect breasts and perfect penis
reaches its climax
for the upper middle class?

Will you be there
when the movie
you’ve wanted to see all summer
is canned by the critics –
and you don’t go
because you ‘believe’ them?
When you can’t utter your name
in fear of your father’s fist?

Will you be there
when the number one song of all time
voted by the listeners
on 96.1 FM in Perth
is Highway to Hell by AC/DC?
When some illusory battle between
a god and a devil
does not recognise love, anymore?

Will you be there
when children are ignored
their needs not cared for
their love worn out?
When they scramble for a buck
to buy their surrogate mother –
a line of speed, a fix
a carton of Jim Beam cans

Will you be there
when music becomes predictable?
When the suicide rate climbs higher?
When almost all religion believes that
their saviour will save them, exclusively?
Will you be there when the dance dies?
When the fire goes out?
When the dance dies?

Part (II)

Will you be there
when we begin to plant trees
when we find alternative energy sources?
When technology knows a way
to desalinate vast supplies of sea water
to feed our barren wastelands
where we can grow food to feed people?
Where we share one glass of wine?

Will you be there
when the guns fall silent?
Will you witness it on cable tv
witness it through your window
or witness it in the field?
When the sirens ring out
the bands begin to play
and the women weep in happiness?


The poem is unfinished. I'd be honoured if Manna finished it. Part (II) is about the positive change that will take place on Earth. Part (I) will soon be the past. C'mon Manna, give me a hand, hey?

Thank you to everyone who came along. You all kinda' stood by me. Thanks.

Boss

[mat james]

No!

[lizzytysh]

Hi Adam ~

I hope you keep posting here, poetry or otherwise. Your comments have too much of a sound of futility and finality to them. Are you considering suicide? If you are, please promise me you won't until you seek help. I know this may sound melodramatic, but people say goodbye in so many different ways. I want to know that this is not your purpose. You have too much going and too much to live for to do otherwise. Are you talking about the end of the world or about the end of you? You have no reason to stop posting here. You have no reason to stop writing poems or posting poems or really even to finish your own. You have the positive visions that many lack and we all need. My concerned feelings are real, Adam. Even if you make fun of me for expressing them, that's fine. Just please let me know what's going on with you and if you're okay. Privately is fine, too, Adam.

I love you, brother. Please don't take your own life, Adam.


Love,
Lizzy
Elizabeth

[Manna]

Hello Adam. I don't know what to say, but you have given me a lot to think about today. I didn't take your words as suicidal, but I know you have been in that place before, and I don't think Lizzy's concern is unfounded. I took it as a desire to help me see, to help me be hopeful about the future. I took is as though you're giving me an assignment, and your concern for me is heartwarming. Adam, I don't know what to do. I'm here.

[lazariuk]

The poem is unfinished. I'd be honoured if Manna finished it.

Looking at that brings to mind something that I think about often and that is that we have a blind spot. It,s important to understand that you cannot see all of the landscape on your own. At least it was important for me, you might say that it saved my life.

[lizzytysh]

Dear Adam ~

I so hope that Manna is right in her interpretation. I don't want to edit my original posting, but want to be more complete when I say I love you, my dear brother, my dear friend. You are important. You are important to me. We've shared a lot over the years. You've suffered a lot of deep and severe, personal losses; and you still love the same woman, after many years. You've felt deeply down, yet you've also felt optimistic. You've become a finer poet over the years. I look forward to what Manna does with her assignment; which it remains, regardless of my interpretations. I like what Jack has said and it's very true. Sometimes. others can help us see what is just too vast to see on our own. I want to read your own responses, Adam, to all of us.


Love,
Lizzy
Elizabeth

[Manna]

This morning I dreamed I was in a house and the house kept changing. You could go into a room, and exit and come back in and it would be a different room. One room looked like a classroom, and later it looked like a junk room. Even the passageways were subject to change, some like hospitals, later old and wet with hardwood floors like an old school. I wanted to find a teacher. And I was looking for a day I’d forgotten; I had been golfing with my dad the day before. There were many people in the house, and each had something to find, and each had something to teach. I think I was looking for a lecture, and some people had already seen it, but they couldn’t tell me where to find it because the house kept changing. One man had seen it in a drawer, but it wasn’t there when I looked. I caught a glimpse of it being projected through a window.

Somewhere in Australia, it’s the wee hours, and I hope Adam is sleeping his imperfect rest, dreaming of every man. And I hope he wakes soon. Wake now, Adam, this day is too heavy for my little shoulders.

[lizzytysh]

Dear Adam ~

I hope you're reading this or will read it soon.

You matter, Adam.

I'm worried about you.


Love,
Lizzy
Elizabeth

[lizzytysh]

Hi Adam ~

I've reread all of your poem and your posting through a different light. I'm hoping that this is only your last poem on this thread and that there will be more on others. I hope that the way I read this previously was a mis-read and that I'll see you here, again, tomorrow. I hope you laugh at me for my misinterpretation.


Love,
Lizzy
Elizabeth