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From Tales of Café Apollinaire:
Variations on Distilled Dreams
PART I
- Refugees of Bohemia -
At the end of the night
After leaving Café Apollinaire
poets & artists stroll arm in arm
along the shadowy streets of Paris
in the twinkling yellowish glow of gas-lights
inebriated by heady discussions
& wine & absinthe
Fire-Dragons circle the moon
St.Denise wanders around
holding his severed head in his hands
cynical Gargoyle Stryge
sticks out his tongue from atop Notre-Dame
returning to humble ram-shackled
cold dark garrets in the squalid slums of Bohemia
on dead end streets in rambling
make-shift cheap rat-infested
rent by the week hotels
a crazy maze a virtual rabbit warren
new sections added on willy-nilly
eating one meagre meal a day
lighting candles stuffed in old wine bottles
dripping with hardened wax
struggling through another night
of a thousand hours
hearing a series of single gun shots
the sickening splashes of water
another poet or artist a genius
a third rater a poser
caught up in Romantic delusions
ends a life not worth living-
at the end of all our struggles
we shall be carried out
in a coffin by strangers
abandoned in a common grave
or in a grand funeral procession
a multitude of mourners
led by a New Orleans Jazz Band
through the Gate of St.Denis
to the Cemetery of the Innocents
left to ponder eternity-
TALES FROM Café APOLLINAIRE:
Inside the Jumble Jar With Marauding Mobs Of Lobtsers
Café Apollinaire : Variations On Distilled Dreams
Part II
Tristan Tzara & Hugo Ball mock
all these foolish feeble artistic
psuedo-philosophical aesthetics
become Surreal become Dada
howl moan sigh shout screech
speak words at random
at random words speak
speak letters not words
in telegraphic dots & dashes
in smoke signals
too much ink has been spilled on paper
no need no point in crying over it
misunderstood words slithering into hiding
hissing about to strike
misunderstanding hiding slithering words
leaving us dying from meaning
shapes of sounds
shapes of pictures
shaken around in the Jumble Jar
sifted from your head
love death fear
what colour what shapes are these
the picture a puzzle a muddle
dreams nightmares encryptic symbols
hieroglyphics signposts of inscapes
inner maps of the abandoned mines
objects of outscapes inverted
in the mind's eye searching deep within
where words cannot reach
where visions slumber waiting
for the call-
rambling meandering
interior monologues
dialogues of imagined self & soul
of the deluded Mental Traveller
on the experiences of the senses
forcing meaning
light strikes an eye
turns to color a world of light & shadow
color dripping on objects
a continuously moving film
twisting frames into order
sequences jumbled
in the jumble jar
behind our eyes
visions wondrous unspeakable
plunging beneath the surface
giving birth to new myths
others see in dreams
some never go there
some murder dreams on waking
playing in the fields of Archetypes
of fears & fantasies
a poet being attacked by a potbellied stove
being chased by marauding mobs of lobsters
men in bowler hats raining down
melting clocks searching for friends
proselytizing giant Leopard Slugs
on every street corner
no longer there searching for the room
house or apartment where you say you live
a thousand miles from where you are
detachable penises running wild
vaginas with double rows of teeth
all dislodged spread out shamelessly
on the dinner plates for all to see
two scorpions fighting to the death
a straight razor slices open someone's eye
quest sitting around a table
on toilet bowls politely
moving their bowels at Bunuel's request
a feast to feed our heads
at a Banquet at Café Apollinaire
inside the Jumble Jar-
PART III
This New & Improved version of the poem Café Apollinaire is subtitled VARIATIONS ON DISTILLED DREAMS.
In this section we meet Marcel DuChamp, Andre Breton, Erik Satie & talking baguettes so enjoy !
TALES OF CAFE APOLLINAIRE:
VARIATIONS ON DISTILLED DREAMS
Gordon Coombes
At Café Apollinaire two aspiring writers
writing alternate pages to a novel
have hung each page upon the walls
of their cluttered dimly-lit cockroach
rat infested undersized apartment
hoping somehow out of chance
during the night the story
will piece itself together-
In his hands an innocent poet holds the moon
in his eyes he holds moon beams
undermines sanctioned madness
conjures a garland of flowers
tossed around the moon-
Poets Artists chain-smoking cigarettes
sharing sweet weed magic-mushrooms
Absinthe & Laudanum drifting about
talking of God & art
from Mount Sinai to the sermon on the Mount
from Allah Brahma & Buddha
to Thor Oden Apollo & Zeus
to Isis & Osiris & Ishtar
cannibalizing art & culture
from Impressionism Cubism & Realism
to Expressionism & Surrealism
Dada to deconstructing
another cup of coffee -
Erik Satie's tables & chairs
composed of musical notes
fill our Café where
Dali's melting clocks hang on fleshy walls
dripping spilling onto the floor
outside men in suits & bowler hats
rain down cats & dogs
Pontiff Andre Breton excommunicates
artistic heretics who fail to follow
Surrealistic Manifestoes-
Angry snarling insulting waiters
serve dishes of stewed art & poetry
some insist on it being raw
others want it over-cooked -
Acting very serious very busy indeed
Marcel Duchamp beavering away
says everything is Art
places written labels on everything
" This is a table " "This is a waiter "
"This is a Urinal" then with a flourish signs his name
someone shouts "Dada Lives"
another shouts "Surrealism Lives"
& a fight breaks out-
On Tuesdays the International Socialists
meet at Café Apollinaire
all the heavy weights & light weights are there
sing a medley of tunes
fit for the Barricades
raise the red flag of Bolsheviks
take a vote toss Lenin Stalin & Mao
out into the streets
let us speak of them no more
dreaming of the Paris Commune
of storming the Bastille-
Eight feet long Baguettes begin to speak
baguettes with arms legs eyes
order coffee & brandy
the library around the corner
has called the police the book shelves
stuffed with big rude cynical Baguettes
the Deli next door complains
they have no Baguettes just stacks
of half- baked books
all done in the twinkling of an eye-
of half-baked books
all done in the twinkling of an eye-
The band plays songs from
the Tibetan Book of the Dead
the Book of Psalms & the Vedic Liturgy
the patrons of the Cafe rush about shoving their way
to the dance floor to do the Can-Can -
exotic erotic desert flowers
of Georgia O'Keefe
are tended by the staff & regulars
of Café Apollinaire -
Nietzsche in inch-thick eye-glasses
out of breath & pale
arrives with Zarathustra
singing songs of the Nibelung
stands on a table preaching proclaiming
the death of God the will to power
time for the Over-man the new improved man
being taunted by a surly dwarf
Richard Strauss applauds
Wagner storms in with his entourage
of Tristan & Isolde Siegfried & Brunnhilde
the Valkyries come swooping down
carrying bags of Gold stolen
from the Rhine Maidens
all waiting & praying for the Götterdämmerung
Twilight of the Gods to cleanse the Earth
longing for the fiery storm
of the all consuming Rajnarok-
Rainer Maria Rilke waxes poetic
about invisible Angels
hovering all about us
cries out for Love Eternal-
day in day out night after night
so much time so much energy wasted
poets & artists argue over everything
the vivi-sectionists of art & poetry
cut slice dice hack away
reducing works of the imagination
to lumps of lifeless flesh
on a cold shiny sterile metal autopsy table
discounting this & that as arbitrary
inane banal purely decorative
not fitting the proper form-
Neo-Classicists Romantics Realists
Imagists Symbolists Futurists
Fauves & Fascists
Expressionists Impressionists
post-impressionists Folk Artists
Poets of the streets Mad Surrealists
Dadaists Confused Cubists & Sentimental Socialists
Anarchists & Revolutionaries fill the air
with thundering uproarious Rhetoric
throwing words & food at one another
an improvised comic opera
a burlesque of buffoonery
throwing chairs overturning tables
beating with their fists the air
& faces of their enemies
wits dim-wits half-wits
drawing swords hand-guns rifles
dueling to the death
with eight-foot-long baguettes
over aesthetics metaphysics
& who is to pay the bill
for the evening's Banquet-
Elijah gets up from his appointed seat
shakes his head in disgust realizing
the time for his return has not yet come-
PART IV
TALES FROM Café APOLLINAIRE:
VARIATIONS ON DISTILLED DREAMS - Elijah's Judgement
...wherein we meet Georgia O'Keefe , Nietzsche , Wagner , Strauss etc.
by Gordon Coombes
exotic erotic desert flowers
of Georgia O'Keefe
are tended by the staff & regulars
of Café Apollinaire -
Nietzsche in inch-thick eye-glasses
out of breath & pale
arrives with Zarathustra
singing songs of the Nibelung
stands on a table preaching proclaiming
the death of God the will to power
time for the Over-man the new improved man
being taunted by a surly dwarf
Richard Strauss applauds
Wagner storms in with his entourage
of Tristan & Isolde Siegfried & Brunnhilde
the Valkyries come swooping down
carrying bags of Gold stolen
from the Rhine Maidens
all waiting & praying for the Götterdämmerung
Twilight of the Gods to cleanse the Earth
longing for the fiery storm
of the all consuming Rajnarok-
Rainer Maria Rilke waxes poetic
about invisible Angels
hovering all about us
cries out for Love Eternal-
day in day out night after night
so much time so much energy wasted
poets & artists argue over everything
the vivi-sectionists of art & poetry
cut slice dice hack away
reducing works of the imagination
to lumps of lifeless flesh
on a cold shiny sterile metal autopsy table
discounting this & that as arbitrary
inane banal purely decorative
not fitting the proper form-
Neo-Classicists Romantics Realists
Imagists Symbolists Futurists
Fauves & Fascists
Expressionists Impressionists
post-impressionists Folk Artists
Poets of the streets Mad Surrealists
Dadaists Confused Cubists & Sentimental Socialists
Anarchists & Revolutionaries fill the air
with thundering uproarious Rhetoric
throwing words & food at one another
an improvised comic opera
a burlesque of buffoonery
throwing chairs overturning tables
beating with their fists the air
& faces of their enemies
wits dim-wits half-wits
drawing swords hand-guns rifles
dueling to the death
with eight-foot-long baguettes
over aesthetics metaphysics
& who is to pay the bill
for the evening's Banquet-
Elijah gets up from his appointed seat
shakes his head in disgust realizing
the time for his return has not yet come-
TALES FROM Café APOLLINAIRE:
VARIATIONS ON DISTILLED DREAMS -
PART V
Tower of Babel
wherein we meet Wordsworth, Blake, Lewis Caroll,
Rimbaud and ,Necrophyliacs etc.
At Café Apollinaire
wordy wooden wordsmithy Wordsworth
tirelessly works with anvil & hammer
on wrought hot iron
erecting a wretched tower of Babel
in a field of golden daffodils
trailing clouds of glory
the visionary Blake bastes
& bakes his brain
in visions of Angels & demons
of Heaven & Hell
of Innocence & Experience
of gentle lambs & ferocious tigers
of weepy chimney sweeps
blasting the Satanic Mills
of the age of reason
crying out of the wilderness
in a hair-shirt & ashes
on a roof-top gnashing his teeth-
The romantic poet
wearing a green absinthe stained shirt
recites for the one for whom he lays his heart bare
wrapped in her cloak of cool blue shadow
of smouldering cinders
of passionate mysterious eyes
presents a bouquet of purple perfumed flowers
whose lips speak in satiny mauve tones
brings her the head of Medusa
he holds in his hands
dripping blood into a basket of pomegranates
& golden apples of the sun
fiery stallions neigh & snort loudly
dreaming of pulling the sun
stamped with delicate butterflies
all to no avail
she averts her eyes
gets up from the table
in search of someone & something else
A seminary student
with patience & compassion
talks to the Mad Reclusive Monk
to cheer him up
to get him out of his shell
fears the wounds go too deep-
Lewis Carroll sits sipping sips of tea
before returning to the hunt
of the sly slippery Snark
quotes Zen koans
of caterpillars slugs & bats-
Under the cover of night
Gabrielle Rossetti claws through graveyard soil
in desperation
to steal his manuscript of verses back
placed by his lover's coffin
in a moment of manic posing
of romantic mindless madness-
Classicist & Neo-Classicist
paint pious Biblical scenes
scenes of ancient Greece & Rome
sad melancholic scenes
scenes of jubilation
all in exacting details
painting the rich & kings
Queens Dukes & Earls
into these scenes
Nobles & the Medici
standing round about
in a stable in Bethlehem
weeping outside the tomb of the Nazarene
on Golgotha kneeling at the cross
writing thousand page long novels
of pseudo-realism
parceled out in chapters
at a dollar a line
in a popular newspaper
the longer the better
giving the public what they want
paying heed to their supportive
& complaining letters
for poor sweet little Nell
little Doritt or Oliver Twist
of pity & too easily spilt tears
of the superficial sentimentalist -
Tales From Café Apollinaire:
Variations On Distilled Dreams
PART VI :
Boisterous Walt Whitman And The Death Of The Muse
Boisterous Walt Whitman celebrates
the Body Electric plays prophet
peddles his book of Blades of Grass
pestering patrons -
Merlin the Poser sets up shop
dressed in a black cape
uses a wooden walking stick
covered with carvings of snakes & runic signs
removes the Death card
& the Hanged Man from the Tarot Deck
to ensure brisk business-
Yeats pulls up a chair begins his commentary
on the ancient mystical Druids
talks of an armed revolution
out of which a terrible beauty is born
introduces himself to an invisible elf
refuses to leave the Café all day
fearing the slouching beast outside
dreams of the Isle of Innisfree
'til someone reminds him
there are no Cafés there -
Virginia Wolfe tells tales
of picnics at the lighthouse
her hearing impaired waves thundering
crashing all about her
she leaves stopping here & there
filling her pockets with stones
preparing for her journey
beneath the rhythmic grey Atlantic waves-
There is a poet here
who echoes the despair of Baudelaire
making his own funeral arrangements
desiring to be cremated his ashes ground up
into flour for making Baguettes
his blood purified & blessed
distilled fermented made into wine
left for a year then drank
by his mourners some perform a Mass
here is his blood here is his flesh
others wearing prayer-shawls & yamakas
recite the Kaddish -
At night Surrealist-saboteurs
agent-provocateurs anarchists
of all types & brands
paint trees orange & purple
use pressurized paint-guns at random
redecorate the sky
hang paintings from sky-hooks
laying rich lush green carpeting
on the streets hang bouquets
of baguettes from lampposts
cover rocky-cliffs & mountains
in rainbow coloured satin sheets
hang bags of coal from the ceiling
of Café Apollinaire setting loose
Giant Leopard Slugs & snails
to crawl over tables & chairs
outside Vampire Bats & Vultures
circling as we eat our meal
provided by the Ancient Mariner-
The romantic poet wearing a green
absinthe-stained-shirt recites
for the one for whom he lays his heart bare
wrapped in her cloak of cool blue shadow
of smoldering cinders
of passionate mysterious eyes
whose lips speak in mauve tones
presents a bouquet of purple perfumed flowers
brings her the head of Medusa
dripping blood into a basket of pomegranates
& golden apples of the sun
fiery stallions neigh & snort loudly
dreaming of pulling the sun
stamped with delicate butterflies
all to no avail
she averts her eyes
gets up from the table
leaves without a word -
Someone announces poetry & art are dead
the Muse standing amongst us
collapses on the floor
we can hear her death rattle
she shows no signs of life-
TALES FROM Café APOLLINAIRE
VARIATIONS ON DISTILLED DREAMS:
PART VII
A SEASON IN HELL
Every night at Café Apollinaire
is a season in Hell for some
Rimbaud knew all too well -
The Marquis DeSade tells his tale
of a quarter century in jail
his deeds exaggerated
confusing his fevered imaginings
of sordid collected tales
of mad orgies of flesh eating
of drinking & bathing in human blood-
Classicist & Neo-Classicist
paint pious Biblical scenes
scenes of ancient Greece & Rome
painting the rich & kings
Nobles & the Medici
in a stable in Bethlehem
weeping outside the tomb of the Nazarene
on Golgotha kneeling at the cross-
Bertholt Brecht is busy
organizing the waiters
for a protest for a strike
what the staff here endures
is cruel & unusual punishment
threatening to shoot themselves
in the foot & in the head
" Oh a stage show " someone cries out
" No it's performance art " cries another
everyone cries
into their beer & coffee-
Someone wearing a tall pointed hat
reads a poetic drama
with numerous characters
all with speaking parts
so he gives instructions
" When I raise my left hand thus
for this character
I raise the right hand for this one "
& his right & left leg
for others nodding his head three times
for another & on & on
the dramatist reads twenty more pages
raising arms legs nodding his head
belching coughing farting a few times
who knows what characters these are
no one can keep track anyway
finally finished all tired out done in
taken off the stage on a stretcher
to an ambulance waiting outside
there's always one on call
at The Cafe Apollinaire -
the posing poet pens more lines
stolen from all who come & go
indifferent to their quality
a born thief & a rogue
all of life a preposterous piece of poetry
waiting to be written down -
Camille Claudel sculpts stone into flesh
reveals sensuous flesh in blocks of granite
obsesses over her love for Rodin
reveals scenes of her private life
locks herself away with a hundred cats
going mad imagining enemies everywhere
smashing her statues into pieces -
We hear rumours of a sly misanthropic
fearful would be Jesuit who watches scenes
gruesome & cruel of tortures brutal & ingenious
bodies left to rot in deserted woods
in empty apartments til the stench is overwhelming
shooting beating to death survivors
of a ship wreck watches with delight
a rogue shark tearing apart flesh & limbs
of swimmers having a taste for blood
he sits in the Public Gardens
on sunny sunday afternoons
with a revolver shooting pigeons
watching them wrything as they die-
The xenophobic Apothecary
Thomas Dequincey finding his calling
sets up shop selling raw opium
shares his paranoid racist hallucinations
of the decline of the west
being swamped over-run
infested by the yellow plague
of the teeming masses of immoral
demon worshiping Asians
running amok viewing life as cheap
he fears the lower classes of London
in their impertinence rising up
going beyond their station
destroying the God ordained social order
everyone lines up for their daily supply
buying their Absinthe from Doctor Ordinaire
to add a different tone to their visions
taking cocaine peyote LSD heroin
to blow open the doors of perception-
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NOTE: THIS POEM WAS PROCESSED THROUGH THE REMARKABLE PERPETUAL POETRY GENERATOR
copyright held by MANAGER & PROPRIETOR OF Café APOLLINAIRE!!!!!
Anyway here is a poem which I first composed about a dozen years ago & has gone through several transformations to to
the present version found here.
From : Tales Of Café Apollinaire: VARIATIONS ON DISTILLED DREAMS-
-- PART VIII--
-The Surrealist Poet of the Café Apollinaire as Art Exhibit-
At Café Apollinaire the Surrealist Poet
after he & the Café had become well known
asked a sculptor to make a statue
to take the poet's place at the café
at intervals of each day
to give him some respite
a life-size mannikin with moving parts
like mechanical oversized dolls
of ancient Persia
to sit at the corner table
by the window overlooking the street
in the Café Apollinaire
with all the paraphernalia
associated with the Surrealist Poet
resembling the poet in every detail
fooling many newcomers to the café
sitting there with a cup of coffee
a cigarette which one hand lowers
to an ashtray then raises to its lips
takes a puff the head moves looking
out the window turns again
with a pen in the other hand
moving hovering above
the open note book waiting
to be written upon
surrounded by stacks of books
borrowed from the Public Library
just around the corner
of artistic movements
all those 'Isms' born
in such a brief span of time
from Impressionism to Expressionism
to Pointillism Vortexism
to the wild Fauves to Dada
to Surrealism to Cubism
to Futurists & Realists
to Photo-Realists Pop art & Folk Art
all at war with one another
all claiming to be the true voice of Modern Art
each a genius of one sort or another
all these works of Art & Music & Poetry
biographies & autobiographies
passing the time giving some solace
to the Surrealist Poet soon wears thin
no end to naive idealistic romantic poets
& artists soaring above mundane concerns
dipping pens & brushes
in the same well of inspiration-
til history intrudes upon the pastoral dreams
& fantasies of the romantic surrealist poet
opening those all too real books
opening Pandora’s Box unleashing the Furies
of the tragedy of humanity’s pride & folly
of the triumph of Tyrants & despots
Emperors & Kings & Queens
destroying in the name of God & Power & Greed
enslaving millions to perpetual poverty
as the High & Mighty rule the world
with an iron fist & the boot to the throat
of social histories & aesthetics
& the admixture of politics & history
& centuries dripping blood
& all those idealists & romantics dying for some cause
& failed revolutions & the horrors of war
& religion & science run amok
our dreams turned into a world of ashes
under ten thousand mushroom clouds
while thousands are tortured murdered
beheaded blown to pieces
strapped to the mouth of cannons
in the name of this country or that
in the name of one God or another
while the Angels look down & weep
as all these lost souls strike the drums
sound their trumpets of war
leading the Big Parade of millions
into the slaughter houses
& other persistent visions of madness
til poets & sages take refuge in the wilderness-
Now the Surrealist Poet is able to roam
about the City's streets
no longer chained to that Chair
& that Table holding court
pestered by would be poets
taken in by his self-manufactured mystique
forced to dredge the sea floor
reliving his life for their distraction
edification & inspiration fulfilling his role
of poet laureate of the oh so cool crowd
at Café Apollinaire-
Tales From Café Apollinaire: Variations On Distilled Dreams
PART IX: EPILOGUE
Tales from Café Apollinaire is
a work in progress
a work in process
a poem a vision of a poem
trapped in language
a painting of an ethereal vision
a series of paintings a collage
a montage of a thousand stories
of a thousand characters
all of it cut & dry
all of it bleeding from each part
into another filled
with false endings
we become Brahma in eternal sleep
becoming Vishnu spinning dreams
becoming the creator of myths
becoming Shiva destroyer of worlds
becoming destroyers of our selves
becoming the creator of worlds
becoming a slave to reality
becoming a slave to imagination
becoming the master manipulator of words
becoming wedded to words
becoming divorced from words
becoming prisoners of words
becoming prisoners of Café Apollinaire
becoming liberated at Café Apollinaire
we reconstruct ourselves at Café Apollinaire
we deconstruct ourselves at Café Apollinaire
we dissolve into points of light & colour
as we become part of a Surrealist painting-
We are in a Global Village plugged in
riding the cathode tube waves
of silver screens
riding binary codes
from silicon chips
on fiber-optic mercurial wings
Technicolor frescoes bombarded
by points of light
on moving mirages of montages
transcending virtual reality
transactional quasi-truncated interactive
multi-media megabytes
giga-bytes of satellites
in the dense sea shine of silicon chips
on information highways & byways
breaking down illusions of distance & time
as simultaneity becomes our overarching
myth making reality
in a magical surreal stream
of flowing images
in a single crystal moment -
Sending messages
beaming them off of Satellites
in space & back again-
Between sender & receiver
the message is garbled
twisted mishapened
sounds intelligible
the clockwork wheels inside your head
grind away at the words
finding your own meaning
to swear allegiance to
to take offense to
words a poor substitute
for the pictures & visions inside of us
for the emotions inside of us
ideas swirling about
at first a tidy painter's palette
paints becoming mixed
colours & shades changing
each new set of eyes
perceives differently
beautiful mundane grotesque-
the grotesque as fascinating
as the beautiful each touches
some ancient primordial part
deep inside of each of us -
Mythical Prismatic Paris
shimmering yellow glow of gas light
a beacon in the dark fog draped world-
The Eiffel tower a lighthouse
a guide to wandering artists & outcasts
to erect the New Jerusalem
of wandering minstrels
prophets & visionaries
for the future struggles-
Beaming mixed messages
from the Eiffel Tower
to the tower of Pisa
to the Statue of Liberty
to the Empire State building
to the exploding twin towers
to the opera House in Sydney Australia
to the Bushmen of the Outback
voyagers in the Dream-Time
to Red Square to the Kremlin & Lenin's tomb
to the SOS signal from the dying
in Tennehmen square
to the Great Wall of China
to the crumbling Berlin Wall
to the ancient temples of Ceylon
Tibet Thailand & Laos
to Tokyo Hiroshima & Nagasaki
awakening even the burned dead shadows
to the Townships of South Africa
to the African grasslands
to Kilimanjaro mount Everest
to rumbling & growling mount Fuji to the Swiss Alps
to the Rocky mountains to Mount Blaine
to God's Golden Tablets signalling Joseph Smith
Conning or Enlightening a multitude of followers
wandering in the wilderness to find a home
to the Andes to Devil's Rock
to the Hanging Rock
from Parnassus to Olympus
to the indifferent and callous Gods
to the Colosseum
to Socrates pestering his fellow citizens
to the Delphi Oracle
to Virgil leading Dante
into the unforgiving Inferno
to the stoney rock face of Toledo
to sun-drenched Madrid
to the Moors & Jews in Andalusia
exiled or tortured and burned
by their malicious Christian neighbours
blood atonement & sacrifice for their God
to the killing fields of the Balkans to the Black Forest
to the killing fields of Cambodia
to the killing Fields of Rwanda
to the killing fields of Iraq
to the blood soaked Temple of Baal in Babylon
to the Sahara to the Badlands of Alberta
from St.Denis Gate to St. Denis Cemetery
to St. Denis Mountain on the Bras d’or Lakes
to Kelly's mountain & Cape Smokey
which is in plain view of my front door
from Robert Burns' statue proclaiming to the world
'A Man's A man For A' That'
on Spring Garden Road
in the fog encased Port of Halifax
to his statue in Red Square
And all Shall Brothers Be
but the world takes no heed
to Karl Marx's statue in Hyde Park
to the Taj Mahal to the Wailing Wall
where devout Muslims and Jews pray
& then spew their hate & mistrust
to Vatican City where truth & humanity
are left to rot
to mount Sinai where Moses
bowed & cowered before his God
to Mount Ararat where sits the Mythic Ark
to the Martello Towers abandoned
in New Scotland & on Sandy Cove
to James Joyce that fearful Jesuit
to Leopold Bloom cooking kidneys for breakfast
to Molly Bloom lounging in bed
in a pure stream of consciousness
to Allen Ginsberg waving a Holy Sunflower
early morning hang-over
beside the railway tracks
behind the odorous slaughter house
in San Francisco where the Beats take refuge
to sex obsessed whore-mongering Henry Miller
drinking his morning Café au lait
and a cheap bottle of wine
to Charles Bukowski searching for food
to feed his machine
preparing for another bar-room fight
he is certain to lose
to a thousand poets painters novelists
all prowling the streets of our urban nightmare
all left in desperation
broken by a godless universe
left Howling and braying at the moon -
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