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

I’ve accepted it’s not my place
I try to tell you, I can’t feed your face
Whenever you want, at your pace
But you are persistent, insistent
Staring at me, at the island, “feed me, feed me”
I walk away back to my bed
I lay down, you’re disappointed instead
“We saw you, you went to the fridge
Why didn’t you put something in our dish?”
It is cute I have to admit, at some point
I will submit. But sometimes, I can’t resist
“Meow, meow, fill our dish”
How many times do I have to say no
“Meow, meow”, you won’t let it go
You own my chairs, you own my bed
You won’t let me sleep in, I’ll soon be dead
OK OK, THERE, HERE, YOU’VE JUST BEEN FED.
(end)

My cats always follow me to the kitchen even when it is not time for feeding them. They give me a disappointed look when I walk away from the kitchen.
They think everything is theirs and I am here to serve them. And they are not wrong.

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

The artist, the medium, the pallet
The instrument, the implement, intent
The explicit, ambiguous, innocuous
The selfless, selfish, confessed, obsessed
The notes, the volume, the silence, defiance
The rawness, refined, inclined, undefined
The obscure, obvious, oblivious, confounding
The artist can print, paint, sing, write, dance
But it is the viewer, that takes the glance
And may see what the artist does not.
(end)

In my 30 plus years of writing poetry, I have long since learned, that while you can have intent in your imagery, and love a particular line you write, it may not be the focus others have on that same piece of work.

That always pleasantly surprises me. I reposted my poem “My New Affair” today and someone liked the line “you look like you love coffee, or is it tea” line. While my favorite line was about the girder in that same poem. Point is, people may focus on another part of your work that they like, always take it as a complement.

https://brianjamesrationalpoet.blog/2022/09/27/my-new-affair/

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

I know you are there, I can’t see where
Come out, come out, but you don’t dare
At this blank screen, in frustration I stare

Neurons, my neurons, won’t play fair
Static, chaotic, erratic, television’s glare
Curled up and sleeping, my cats don’t care

The canvas invisible, I can’t repair
The negative exposure is unaware
Undeveloped , dead at the scene

This unwritten poem is quite obscene
No topic at mind to write about
My keyboard cold, I want to shout

I know you are there, I can’t see where
Come out, come out, but you don’t dare
At this blank screen, in frustration I stare.

Empty tank, empty pool, giant sink hole
Like a fool, I think to myself, I have the tools
My easel of balsa, I can write no jewels

Collapsing in the gust of exasperated breath
This famished artist, can’t pass the test
This fledgling chick, fell out of the nest

The raptor’s distraction, kills my passion
Swoops down on me, prose cataclysm
Scattered thoughts, causes a schism

Do I continue, do I give up, do I break
Is that enough, to give me energy, once again
Today my enemy is my trusty pen

I know you are there, I can’t see where
Come out, come out, but you don’t dare
At this blank screen, in frustration I stare.
(end)

In the lines of Sylvia Plath’s “Stillborn” this is yet another poem about writer’s block I wrote.

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

Darkness
Is the color of loss
The emptiness void
Knowing of time lost
You cant rewind the clock

Darkness
Is the forest
Under shadows in the night
Even a mere rustling leaf
Can give you such a fright

Darkness
Are lips not met
Not saying “I love you”
Living in regret

Darkness
Is the poison
Chalice
Filled with hate

Darkness
Has it’s enemies
That all should
Embrace

Darkness
Cannot defeat
Empathy and compassion
We should want
In every human.
(end)

Another poem inspired by “The Creative Chick” and her poem “Unafraid” here on WorldPress.

Satiation Of A Grifter, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter)

How did it come to this, why did it get this far?
How did the former guy, drag us into the bizarre
Off a cliff he’ll take us all, willing to crash the car
His lawyers ditch him in droves, because they passed the bar

Never satisfied with anything, always wanting more
Denial of ever doing wrong, rotten to the core
Narcissism above all else, fancy’s himself into lore
Grandiose toxicity, verbose to the point of morose

Gross is his lexicon, limited like a child
Spewing like despot, increasingly desperate
Show up to his insurrection, be there it will be wild
Pathetic existence, he must face sinew resistance

The words above the sculpture read “The world is yours”
The loudest thud is when that ego hits the floor
His followers are the ignorant sheep, shutting all the doors
Lavishing undue praise on the authoritarian, wanting a civil war

We must do, we can do, no choice to, do so much more
To prevent the propaganda to win, everyone should abhor
The rise of fascism, we see before our eyes, defeat his bullying
Vanquish his dangerous lies.
(end)

I don’t think it takes a slide ruler to figure out who I am talking about.

Nothing To Bragg About, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter)

In the Tar Heel State, the powder blue white ram
Shed the vestiges of the horrors of owning another man
It’s not Tony Braxton, though I am sure she’d be proud
That glorifying a Confederate General, is no longer allowed

To adorn that Fayetteville Airborne Army base, by name
The haters of this positive change, insanely like to claim
We are erasing history, heritage, white guilt we want to blame
This is not the case, he belongs in history books, museums

Not to honor him, but a lesson to never repeat, that vile grim
Stain on our species existence, the racist insistence
That they are inferior, a shallow exterior, shackled beaten
Disgusting justification, left in stagnation, of wanting to keep
Separate bathrooms, water fountains, keep MLK off the tops of mountains

But it won’t happen, humanity is learning, ditching, leaving
The cruelty of the past , the rebel flag won’t last, the future dye is cast
The seditionist is dead and buried, love should never be worried
The Army all the same, gave the base a new name, I like this new refrain

“Fort Liberty”.
(end)

Army base formerly named after Sick vile asshole monster Braxton Bragg has rightfully been renamed Fort Liberty. Assholes who owned other human beings do not deserve positions of honor. They still should be taught as part of history in history books and in museums as lessons of what not to do to your fellow human beings. But they do not deserve monuments honoring them.

This isn’t about shaming white people who did not live back then. I am white. It is about remembering so we don’t repeat the same horrors. Nobody born this century or the 20th century is responsible for their ancestors owning slaves. But to not teach the raw real brutal history of slavery, and the history of segregation and lynching, would be a dereliction of responsibility. It is vital to face this harsh history to maintain the health of a free society.

Even today, there is a fear by whites of being replaced. Yes you are going to be replaced, I am too, so are all 8 billion humans worldwide, because no human lives forever. The real fear all people should have, isn’t of pluralism, or migrants, or blacks. The real fear everyone should have is of the propaganda of “otherism”.

Changing names of anything, removing statues that honor our species worst instincts is not “cancel culture”, it is adapting to the recognition that we have a common existence in our humanity.

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

The elephant in the room wants everyone to assume
There is bias political weaponization, doom and gloom
Cries of fascism, cries of communism, cries of persecution
Retribution, they blame the institutions (when not in power)

Hitler had his rivals arrested, Po Pot, Mao
Stalin and Castro too , and exactly how
Does this equate to America and it’s fate?
Fallacy of equivocation, their garbage in translation

It is true, those dictators did do what they did
But America has grand juries and defense lawyers instead.
Dictator’s rivals don’t get due process, they just end up dead
What the elephant in the room really does dread

Is accountability, and no amount of deniability
Can change what the former guy did
Nobody forced him to lie about the documents he hid
5th Avenue braggart will murder democracy with lead

Mussolini now lives in Mar A Lago, not the White House
If he had Nixon’s GOP, he would have been gone, long ago
The Grand Jury is picked by random lotto
Of this pool the President does not know

The elephant puts on a crafty muddied show
Sycophants work for peanuts, they won’t go
Say goodbye to our Republic if he wins
Palm Springs becomes Italy once again.
(end)

I should not have to explain what this poem is about knowing everyone knows what happened.

The Right is playing the Hitler fascist playbook by doing what Joseph Goebbels did in their propaganda “Accuse the other of what you are actually doing yourself.”

Since day one, even long before his first impeachment, during his first run, the former President undermined the trust in our institutions. He attacked his own intel, the media, and his political rivals in a very fascist way by scapegoating them and vilifying any question to his status and influence and power. This is the same tactic Hitler used. Blame everyone for your ills, falsely play victim, and then offer yourself up as the only solution.

Our jury system is being attacked now too, because he doesn’t care who he hurts or the fact that if we lose trust in our jury system, we really will be done as an open and free society.

His rights were not violated when he was first asked for the classified documents back. He lied to the National Archives when they first came to him. They did not have him arrested, they simply kept asking him for them and he kept denying it. Finally the National Archives had no choice but to report the failure to the FBI DOJ, the DOJ then had to report to local authorities and a Judge to issue a warrant to get the documents. It was not a raid, the compound was not torn up, nobody was handcuffed that day. They took what they thought was what Trump said all they had. That was a lie. He still kept documents even after he was asked if that was it. They eventually months later, came back with a second warrant and found more.

Now, in a REAL dictatorship, you would not be presented search papers, they would just break down the door, and ransack whatever they wanted, and there would be no “scope” listed in the warrant. “Scope” is a list of specific items or an area, and even can include specific areas of a building, and anything else not in the warrant cannot be used in a court of law. Trump’s rights were not violated in this entire process.

Now, more specifically, juries. Hitler and Stalin and all the other monsters I listed above, didn’t have juries. They would just have their political rivals executed, sometimes in public. There were no defense lawyers for those political rivals, there were no Grand Juries, there was no ability for a defense lawyer to partake in jury selection, those monsters just murdered their rivals. Trump had lawyers present at the Grand Jury, and he will also have defense lawyers in the full trial and his lawyers will be able to partake in jury selection.

So if Biden is such a dictator, why is Trump still alive? Why didn’t Biden have him killed right after Biden took the oath of office? No, Biden isn’t monster or a dictator. The MAGA sycophants want you to believe he is a dictator because that way they can keep power. But more to the point, if Trump can successfully sell this bullshit, that he is the victim, he gets to avoid accountability.

You are not the victim Trump.

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

In a concert
There is a last note
In a book
There is a last page
In a movie
The credits always roll
While time will
Always take it’s toll
Enjoy it while it lasts
For tomorrow
Is always extra.

Always Bet On Black, By Brian37 (AKA Brian James Rational Poet on FB/META and @Brianrrs37 on Twitter)

I am glad my panther does not bother
I am glad I don’t get under his collar
I am glad he is domestic and is not taller
Because he if he was he could make me holler

I am glad he isn’t a Navy Seal
I am glad he isn’t a Ninja that is real
I am glad he isn’t a crow or raven
If I were a sheep I’d be mutton

He is furry, purry and healthy
Silly, funny and stealthy
While he can’t make me wealthy
He can silently sneak around me

He’d make a great October decoration
Hitch a ride on a broom, witch with a declaration
A carved pumpkin could be his companion
He’s everything Halloween can imagine

He could be the the Karate Kitten
But he’s grown and his name isn’t Danial Son
He blends in to the shadows, and sleeps on my pillows
His name is Anneplath, and he’s the cutest fellow.
(end)

Anneplath, pronounced “Anna-plath” or “Anna-pleth” is a boy cat, he has grown up and gotten real big. His sister Kelly is a Calico, I named her after Jaclyn Smith, because two months before I got the pair as kittens, I got a Tweet from the real actress.

“Anneplath” is a hybrid name of two of my fellow poets “Anne Sexton” and “Sylvia Plath” thus “Anneplath”. And it is appropriate because he is dark and many of their poems are dark.

The funny part of him in reality, is that if he is in a shadow even during the day, I can walk right by him even if he is in front of me and not see him. I especially have to be careful when feeding him because he likes walking around my legs.

I just wrote this poem because, like almost every day, he picked a very good spot right laying on my bed, and because I had no lights on, he just blended into the wall behind my bed which is dark in color as well. Sometimes my anxiety makes me think maybe he darted out the door when I take out the trash, but the truth is he is strictly an indoor cat and he is afraid of the outdoors, at least for now.

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

Don’t ask me how I ended up
Left of center west of Adelaide
It was a concoction of my R.E.M.
Something my slumber had made

The traffic just wasn’t right
I had just left my dorm room
Trying to call my mother at night
The cockroaches gave me a fright

I had no money, my passport gone
I found myself wondering the streets
Looking for help, what went wrong
9 thousand miles away, how did I go astray?

I was worried what my mother would say
I knew her panic would never go away
If she couldn’t contact me this very day
I was desperate to get to her, had to find a way

Then suddenly on the side of the road
A family in opposite traffic walking their dog
I waved at them with tears in my eyes
I explained to them I didn’t know why

Didn’t know why I ended up here
Left of center, west of Adelaide
They lead me to their home, I had made
I asked them about the creatures on the way

The scary ones that could kill me any day
Like the spiders and snakes, oddly enough
I wasn’t worried about the salt water crocs
I have heard of the jellyfish in the shape of a box

They told me I had nothing to fear
That the danger wasn’t that near
But this movie suddenly became foggy
My restlessness made me groggy

Where was a phone, a phone, a phone
I wanted to call home, my home, my mom
Suddenly it was all gone, all gone, all gone
The reality of daylight’s dawn

Kelly stirring in her crate, breakfast wont be late
Her brother insistent too, their meal overdue
I had to take the trash out too
This oddity, Odyssey, sadly finally through.

Mom, mom, mom, I wish I could talk to you.
(end)

I had a dream where I woke up in a college dorm room full of cockroaches, don’t ask me why. I fled outside and found myself somewhere in Australia, but couldn’t figure out where. In reality I have been to Australia, just not Adelaide. But in this dream I kept on asking people where I was, and they kept on saying I was slightly west of Adelaide. I was also worried about getting a hold of my mom because I didn’t want her to worry. In real life my mom would get worried if I didn’t call her the instant I got home.

So in this dream I panic about the dangerous animals as the family is guiding me back to their house. In reality animals don’t bother you unless you go looking for trouble. So finally we get to the house, and I start hearing rustling in a cage, and in reality it was Kelly trying to wake me up because she wanted out of her carrier, and her brother Anneplath was making noise too. Today is trash day too. So I never did get to talk to my mom in the dream. When I woke up, it made me sad knowing she has been gone for 6 years.

The city of Adelaide is at the bottom of Australia not quite the center of the country.