• Welcome to Brian James Rational Poet’s poetry blog

    Welcome to my poetry blog. I love reading Plath and Sexton and Dickenson and Maya. But to me, the best poets I have read are the unknows. The giants are great for sure, but the friends and locals and groups are a joy to participate in. I encourage everyone who writes poetry to be themselves. It is ok to have influences, but you should always in the end be yourself. There is only one them, and only one you.

    Let words be your canvas, show them the raw you, in all your happiness and sadness. Show them your love of nature, and empathy and kindness, but also make them think, provoke, even blaspheme. The poet’s job to me, is to never be shy or timid, but use every word in your vocabulary to paint the best pictures you can. Paint your sunrises, your sunsets, your romance, your fears. Paint your insecurities, your addictions, your successes, your tears.

    This blog is dedicated to my late mother Jane. She was my biggest supporter and never let me fall through the cracks. While she was a bit of an authoritarian growing up, that all melted away in her late years, and we grew as close as any parent child could. We had so much fun with our silly car games and rubber duckies, and counting the trees. And our wordplay games, and our thumb wrestling. And forget Yahtzee and backgammon, she always kicked my…… at that. I love you mom. I miss you horribly.

    And also my late best friend ever, Bob. He unfortunately passed away in 2017. He lived in Australia, he was a science geek, and he taught me a lot about debate, and some science. I can only grasp overall concepts, not real nitty gritty details. But he most importantly made me feel comfortable in my own skin. I miss you too Bob.

    Then there is this annoying guy from Okleeee homa, who says “tators”, and “videeeaaaa” instead of “video”. And don’t get John started on banjos. He is my best friend and he is always there for me, and I love that redneck.

    And also Dwayne, Stacey and Vicki. You saved my life all of you. Thank you.

    All poetry posted by me on this website is attached to RationalPoet@brianrrs37, handle “RationalPoet” on Twitter ,as well as “Brian James Rational Poet” on Facebook/ META. And is subject to copywrite on all my pages.

    A Special thanks to Brian Sapient of Rational Responders http://www.rationalresponders.com for hosting my poetry thread for so long. Thank you.

    AND….. YOU are more than welcome to share this link on your social media. Especially Meta and Twitter, but your own social media too. Any help bringing traffic here is more than welcome. THANK YOU. You may not publish individual poems without my express permission. Any links to my poetry must be credited to me.

    This poetry blog may contain some material that may be considered sensitive to some viewers. Reader discretion advised.

    Now, everyone, grab your popcorn, glass of wine, and watch me make a fool of myself. Enjoy.

    HEADS UP….. THERE ARE PEOPLE MIMICKING MY TWITTER ACCOUNTS……

    I only have two Twitter/X accounts. Twitter has now changed it’s name to “X”. So all poetry in this site referencing Twitter is also including the new name “X”.

    “RationalPoet@brianrrs37”
    AND
    “Brian@rationalpoet37”

    I have also joined Facebook/META poetry group “Facebook Poetry Society” Under “Brian James Rational Poet”

    Also I just joined http://www.allpoetry.com under the user name “RationalPoet37”

    THERE ARE MORE PAGES. WHEN YOU GET TO THE BOTTOM OF EACH PAGE, in mice print….. It says “Next Page”. <—-CLICK ON THAT.

    NEW EDIT………


    A special thanks to Zaylen of “Okay Atheists” on the Discord app, for allowing me to guest host this poetry reading available on their YouTube channel originally aired 5/22/23. Here is the link
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_ikCkc7lWE

    If you want to leave a comment to any poem, click on the BOLD title of the poem first, scroll to the bottom of the poem, and you should see a field to leave the comment in.

    UPDATE EDIT AS OF 11/13/2024. I have a new account at Bluesky Soical under the handle @rationalpoet37.bsky.social .

     

     

  • Incandescent Darkness

    Incandescent Darkness, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    The dichotomy, the epitome
    Of the pit in me, desperately
    Wanting to be free of uncertainty

    Candle’s wick, burned thin not thick
    Fading light in Olmec spice
    Blistered tongue , forked of thrice

    They’ve come to play, I have no say
    Vultures wings, block out the day
    Voices in my head make fray

    Head to rest, is not to be
    I am am accosted by anxiety
    Bombarding my brain in cacophony

    It is unwanted company
    My only companion, my only friend
    I want this madness forever to end

    You flirt with me darkness
    Seductive wink, I nod in sync
    I could be gone in just a blink

    Always I feel on the brink
    Pit in my gut perpetual sink
    I can’t make sense of this link

    The brick smashes the window
    I have murdered the sparrow
    Hollow bones void of marrow

    I struggle for time, of which to borrow
    Under my sheets, I hide and burrow
    Hard to wake up, and look for tomorrow

    You see me smile, masking my sorrow.



  • Like A Virgin

    Like A Virgin, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    Deuteronomy 22:13-21, oh what fun
    Besmirch the virgin, what have you done?
    100 shekels, amerce this man
    Fine paid to the father, not this lass

    No thought to her thoughts,
    Or to her injury
    It is all about the male patriarchy
    She is just their property

    Chattel to be bartered, between families
    But if the husband’s accusations are true
    And she is not pure as promised to
    This is what the elders will do

    Stones not sticks, will break her bones
    Crush her skull and collapse her lungs
    Tossed out like garbage
    Though no crime was done

    Do you know a little
    About a guy named Lot
    His male angel friends
    Put him on the spot

    They were weary travelers
    Who had come to spend the night
    But wicked townsmen came to rape them
    Standing at his gate

    Lot appealed to the men
    To do not such a vile deed
    Then offered up his virgin daughters
    “Take them instead I plead”

    If you’re a father with one young and fair
    If some stranger were to dare
    To deflower this maiden’s rose
    A mere fine is to be imposed

    Once again, no concern for the female
    Or to the trauma that has been done
    The father can force him to marry her
    For what least she be shunned

    The ignorance of biology in antiquity
    The stigma of periods, menstruation
    They could not see, the vile motif
    Of bartering purity

    Even the most famous
    Virgin of all
    Barely a a mention
    After Gabriel’s call

    No words on her thoughts
    Her desires or needs
    Just a field for God
    To plant his invisible seed
    (end)

    Yes this is blasphemous, and it is intended to offend. Not out of hate, but in the context of pointing out the ignorance of the writers of antiquity. Purity, even in polytheism was a widespread commodity where females were bartered between families to create economic stability. Nobody back then understood that periods and menstruation were natural.

    Notes on the poem.

    Deuteronomy 22:13-21 basically says that if a man lies about his new wife and claims she is not a virgin and she is, the townspeople will fine him 100 Shekels. But if she is not pure and she has lied to the family she will be stoned to death. Don’t blame me, I wouldn’t write such vile crap.

    Genesis 19:1-11, Male angels come to visit lot, and the male townspeople of Sodom find out and come and demand Lot give them up so they can rape them. Lot pleads with them not to rape his angel friends and offers up his virgin daughters instead. Again, don’t blame me, I didn’t write this vile crap.

    Deuteronomy , 22:28-29, basically says that if a man rapes another man’s daughter, he will be charged a fine of 50 shekels, and the father can even force the rapist to marry his victim.

    And even the most famous virgin in that book of mythology you hardly hear from. A few words at Gabriel’s at his announcement then a few words at his execution. Written as if she was merely a prop.







  • Set Your Flag On Fire

    Set Your Flag On Fire, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    Hey now, it’s the guy in the sky
    Voices in your head, blindly try
    Set the flag on fire, let it fry

    Jesus is king, all drenched in red
    I’ll bet you your land he’ll kill you dead
    Your God boy and their God boy
    Will shoot the other in the head

    Hey now, it’s Allah in the sky
    Voices in your head, blindly try
    Will set the flag on fire, let it fry

    Mohammed is Prophet, all drenched in red
    I’ll bet you your land, he’ll kill you dead
    Your God boy and their God boy
    Will shoot the other in the head

    Hey now, it’s Hebrew in the sky
    Voices in your head, blindly try
    Set the flag on fire, let it fry

    Yahweh is God, all drenched in red
    I’ll bet you your land, he’ll kill you dead
    Your God boy and their God boy
    Will shoot the other in the head

    Cuneiform, Sanskrit, Hammurabi code
    Hieroglyphics, Mayans, Buddha didn’t know
    Ancient ignorance is the arrow’s deadly bow

    Hey now, hey now, burning in a pyre
    All because of delusional superstitious desire
    You’ll selfishly set planet earth on fire.

    Nothing as we were before
    Noting in the future we’ll be
    What truly matters is of now
    Not that of our violent fantasies

    Dominance is a fleeting goal
    It kills the flesh, no peace to show
    Lust for power, blood will flow

    The universe will take it’s toll
    All the gods will be dead, none of us will know
    Now is what really matters, not that of long ago.
    (end)










  • And A Nice Chianti

    And A Nice Chianti, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    2 Kings, 6:29
    On my son I shall dine
    Did you, did you, bring some wine?

    No Fruit Of The Loom underwear
    But fruit of the womb if you dare
    Deuteronomy 28:53, eat flesh medium rare

    Jerimiah 19:9 although frog legs are fine
    Sons and Daughters flesh are thine
    Just remember to bring the wine

    Gordon Ramsey, Anthony Bourdain
    Julia Child have gone insane
    Lamentations 4:10, fava beans once again

    Family family barbecue
    5:10 Ezekiel too
    Finish up, or no desert for you.

    Hannibal Lecter’s lullaby
    Clarice’s placemat is on high
    Just remember to bring the wine.

    I’m just a critic, don’t blame me
    For the writers of past history
    I’m no fan of these gory stories.
    (end)

    It is one thing to put stories of eating flesh in zombie movies or horror/thrillers in Silence of the Lambs. But to value a book that you base your life’s moralities on and believe in a God that would allow, condone, watch and call it a religion, that confounds me. I see no morality in that if you want to believe that is true.


  • 1042

    1042, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter)

    1042, what is my brain going to do
    I was taking a nap in the afternoon
    It was the address I had to get to

    Have you ever heard of shepherd’s pie pizza?
    That was baked in the oven in my head
    This was my delivery, I dreamt of while in bed

    My co worker and I couldn’t get the order right
    We kept on working on the pizzas all through the night
    Every attempt a failure, the crust was such a fright

    Finally I reach the apartment complex
    And run into the actor they call Tex
    You may remember in Ace Ventura

    Rescuing a dog from a brawny brainless brute
    Walker rescuing Alex Cahill from a mountain so remote
    Tex Cobb chewed my ear off while the pizza got cold

    I couldn’t fill out my time card no more pizzas to be sold
    You say this makes no sense, it isn’t meant to be
    Hooky of the mind, in slumber that I see.
    (end)

    So this afternoon I fall asleep and suddenly I am back working at a pizza chain I used to work for and we couldn’t make the pizzas right and kept screwing them up. So we ended up making a small split pea pizza, but in real life I changed it to shepherd’s pie because I couldn’t figure out how to make split pea work, sounded too goofy. As if shepherd’s pie isn’t as bad.

    So I finally get to the apartment complex and the actor Russell Craig also known as “Tex Cobb” was not my delivery but a suspicious guy talking my ear off in the parking lot, and I had to trick him into leaving me alone by telling him 1042 which was on the opposite side of the building in my dream, just so I could drive way from him.

    So I finally get to the elderly couple’s apartment, and because it took so long I gave the the pizzas for free. But when I got back my shift was over and I forgot to clock in so I couldn’t find my time card to clock out. Then my cell phone in real life woke me up and that was the end of a very bizarre dream.

  • A Tap On My Shoulder

    A Tap On My Shoulder, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    Raven’ robe, Rx label, cotton covered
    Calling from the nightstand
    Golden Gate the heights are great
    Just a splash away

    The vulture hovers, the knife in hand
    The bath is warm, the wrist is mad
    The revolver loaded, the temple glad
    Oblivion is all that’s left to be had

    The crow is calling, the train is coming
    Warning horn, on tracks you’re falling
    Peddle down, in your car, faster faster
    The cliff isn’t far

    The belt or rope and ceiling fan
    From this life you have ran
    Future days come to an end
    The skeleton becomes your friend

    Unaware of of what you’ve lost
    The future pleasures are the cost
    There’s always light after the fog
    There’s always someone willing to hug.





  • “I Did It My Way”

    “I Did It My Way”, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    Don’t you, won’t you, can’t you see
    I built and own this factory
    Lucky you, you won the lottery
    Praise me for my mastery

    I made the light and it was good
    Another for night to set the mood
    But now I sit sulking, angry and brood
    Those wicked humans can do no good

    I regret what I have made
    Perfect planning that I have laid
    My wrath will show them by blood and blade
    I will blame them for the mistakes I have made

    To believe this your logic you trade
    For false comfort, in this bed you’ve made
    In old mythology you wallow and wade
    The con in the collar, you’ve been played

    Genesis 6:6 The lord had said
    He regretted making you, yet still instead
    You have it stuck in your hostage head
    That this God is perfect and good.

    This means he can’t be perfect
    This means he isn’t all powerful
    This means he is man made
    This means you can instead

    Kill this mythology, and kill it dead.
    (end)

    “Kill this mythology, and kill it dead” means consider you got it wrong, nothing more. It makes logical no sense that an all powerful God would have such a flawed emotion as to regret doing something if one is to claim they are perfect. If you aren’t making mistakes then there is nothing to regret.







  • Free Will With Fries And A shake

    Free Will With Fries And A Shake, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet On FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/x)

    Lucifer, “Hey God, wanna make a bet?”
    God, “Sure, but I knew you were going to bet me”
    Lucifer, ” I bet I can fuck up Adam and Eve’s day”

    God, “No way, or yes way, I still have the final say”
    Lucifer, “You know that tree in where the garden lay?”
    God, “Yea, I put it there knowing they would ignore me”

    Lucifer, “Ok, Five card draw, duces, aces, one eyed faces are wild”
    God, “What do we use for the poker chips?”
    Lucifer, ” Come on God, Adam and Eve, you already knew that.”

    Adam, ” You’re a dog, you’re a tree, I need another human, I am lonely”
    Eve, “Here I am, I magically popped out of your rib”
    Adam, ” Ummmm. pork ribs, yummy, lets have some pork ribs for lunch”

    Eve, “You have to watch your figure, let me consult this talking snake to see”
    Lucifer, ” Try this fruit, good for your figure”
    Eve, ” Holy crap this is good, I have to tell Adam”

    Eve, ” Adam, this charming reptile gave me this luscious fruit”
    Adam, ” Don’t steal the picknick basket, the ranger wouldn’t like it”
    Eve, ” You are such a fuddy duddy, come on, live a little for once”

    Adam, “I suppose you are right, hey, this isn’t so bad.”
    Eve, “Holy crap why are we naked?”
    Adam, “Lets grab a medieval artist to pant belly buttons on us.”

    Eve, “Even though we are supposed to be the first humans?”
    Adam, “Lilith was the first woman not you, wait, how did I know that?”
    Lucifer, ” You ate from the tree of knowledge”

    God, ” Yea, the one I put there but did not have to. “
    Lucifer, “In a bet we both set up that you didn’t know about.”
    Adam and Eve, ” How can you punish us for that?”

    God, “Because I am a dick.”
    Lucifer, “And I am dick’s sidekick.
    Adam and Eve, “So what happens to us now?”

    God, ” You die, even know I am responsible for creating Lucifer”
    Lucifer, ” This is a boon for me, I get to play bad guy forever”
    God, “Yep, I need you like Yoda needs Darth Vader.”

    Free will with fries and a shake
    Not any sense does this story make
    How is this a choice, if they had no voice?
    (end)

  • Perspective

    Perspective, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    Mr. Owl,
    How many earths
    Could fit in Jupiter’s storm?
    One, two….. three, three

    Mr. Owl,
    Would our sun scowl
    If it new the largest black hole
    Could swallow 66 billion of thee?

    Mr. Owl
    If I counted
    Every grain of sand on earth’s beaches
    Would they surpass numbers that stars reaches?

    Number of stars vs each grain of sand
    Stars obliterate , 10,000 to 1
    2 trillion galaxies add to a septillion suns

    So when you bring me
    Old mythology and claim
    “All this” was put here for humanity

    I see a person without humility
    I see willful ignorance, insecurity
    I see a person afraid of change

    Mr. Owl
    Is only wise
    When he scraps bad claims
    And they meet their demise.
    (end)

    Notes on this poem.

    “Mr. Owl” was a character in a cartoon Tootsie Roll Tootsie Pop commercial back in the 1970s. In it a kid asks an owl in the tree how many bites it took to get to the center and it ends with “The world may never know”.

    But not knowing is not an excuse to plop in gap answers based on old mythology. If our species never questioned social norms, our species never would have left the caves.

    The largest black hole currently known to science is called “TON 618”. Roughly 60 billion of our earth suns could fit into that black hole.

    And if you really want to freak out. The next time you go to the beach, look at a single grain of sand, and know that there are roughly 10,000 stars in the universe for that one grain of sand.

    Now, I am very realistic that on a planet of 8 billion religion isn’t likely to go away. But more human progress has come when religious claims about the nature of life and the universe were challenged, not simply accepted because the church said so.

    Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake by the church for daring to postulate that the dots in the sky were other suns and could have planets around them. That went against the church’s teachings that the earth was the center of not only our solar system, but the entire cosmos. That is one of countless examples where believers in mythology targeted, harassed, bullied, arrested and executed someone who dared to tell the truth and think for themselves.

    Today science denying is used to deny the shape of our earth. It got millions killed during a pandemic. It has taken the rights of female body autonomy away. And most importantly, this dangerous science denying is a threat to our species existence.








  • Based On A True Neanderthal

    Based On A True Neanderthal, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter/X)

    Gary, Gary, quite on the contrary
    Your wife is not a seal
    When she runs to the kitchen

    To get a meal, you took the labels off
    The cans, in order “to gain her trust”
    This isn’t a form of couple’s therapy

    Though you insist this must
    Be the order of things
    The privilege God’s patriarchy brings

    This is just a dog he trains
    Eve is to blame for the fall of man
    Her crime was trying to be equal you claim

    Pleistocene neanderthal, Gary Garry
    You are insane, take your misogynistic brain
    Stick it on the thrown, and flush it down the drain.
    (end)

    This poem is based on a social media page I just went to and it was an asshole calling himself a “theologian”. This butthole wants to turn back the clock on women’s rights, and thinks biblical Patriarchy is good and that “Women fell because they tried to be equal to men”.

    He claims he is giving his wife “therapy” to gain his “trust” by pealing off all the labels off all the cans in the kitchen and telling her to simply “trust” him to know which can is the one she wants. This isn’t therapy, this is like training a seal or a dog. Right wing MAGA Christians are nuts. They are not very far away from becoming the Christian Taliban.