In Absentia

In Absentia

What else is an Anti-Poem

Apart from a conspicuously absent

P O E T ?

Any other definition pales by comparison

And rapidly devolves into teleological complexity.

For it's the absence of agency that gives such automatic writing

Its characteristic conjunction of internal monologue wed to external function.

Doesn't rhyming just grind your gears? Yet we must continue despite dysfunction...

Consider it a vocational hazard or simply a byproduct

Of leaning into measured meter.

Half the time not even trying

Then suddenly it's a three act play at local _______.

Jeer if you will but the show must go on still as gnashing teeth

Bare to grin their chagrin.

Keep your hands behind the railings

It's a gamble when you're all in.

These baskets aren't about to weave themselves—

By the way, what's the point again?

AWOL balls to the wall; fine featherless friend!

Share |

Anathematic

Anathematic

The Academy could never cage

Such a singular bird as THIS ONE.

Wait a minute and hear us out before running away, will ya?

Give the thinker-soldier-tailor half a chance to spin his yarn...

Espy with thine own little eye:

The know-it-all experts each have a blindside

To them we represent a broad Generalist rebirth;

Our Flagship sails forth from an unsanctioned port of berth.

Autodidactic tactic oft redacted

But since at any rate, too few pence are ever earned

Let's then leverage what we've learned

And turn it against those whom would sell said knowledge back to us

A credit at a time whilst worldly wisdom is bought up by another wealthy white Trust.

Here hollers that voice midst the hinterlands

Where ideals still dwell amongst stellar stretches

And sleepers dream deep along with both Piscean fishes ♓️

Secured at their center via subtle ~ astral ~ tether ~

So dispense thy nickel and dime in this well—to fulfill ambitious wishes!

Author's Note: If you enjoyed this piece then you may want to read its poetic predecessor: Paradigmatic.

Share |

Dactyls & Diphthongs

Dactyls & Diphthongs

Actions speak louder than words.

Nonetheless – Poetry – is word in action:

Apple of discord rolls onto floorboard...

Either side of a wide divide claims an axiom.

 

A story untold since storied days of old;

Æther off Emerald Tablets

Breathing out beautiful worlds.

Neither wealth nor fools' gold can ford first+final /Fold/

Let's tune it down a key or two.

How'd that song go again?

Bibbidi-bobbidi-boo!

Rerunning boob tube lines, which hold us forever fain.

Artistry isn't lost (though many can't glean this gloss).

{Eagle-cum-mockingbird | comes across cuckoo too}

Thus we must thaw like the permafrost to find

♠Ace♠ in the moss hid from view.

Share |

Keanu-Isms

Author's Note: Written in honor of Keanu Reeves, on his 56th birthday.

---

Keanu-Isms


Oh most excellent one

Few other stars are equally serious yet fun.

Verily Bertolucci could see the little Buddha in thee.

You brought Bodhi to the breaking point by the sea.

Need for speed taught tough lessons

About skirting dangerous liaisons

Like Count Dracula's evil

&

Advocating for the Devil.

Much ado about nothing adequately fits your critics.

Only Neo can overcome controls outside the Matrix.

Stay vigilant street king;

A scanner sees darkly through everything

But you're no regular Joe

So go Johnny go

From Utah, to Don, then Mnemonic, Constantine, um? And Wick.

You've got plenty of action left—even after that last flick!

Recommended Readings:

Official Keanuism

Urban Dictionary Definition

Full Filmography

Share |

Interstate Studs

Interstate Studs

Three of us there, in our early twenties, during the late nineties. Standing outside the roadhouse restaurant, shooting the shit by the doorway. Tanned and tired from our long weekend in the woods.

Then that good looking girl came; a stranger in our midst. And she says: "Hi!"

We three respond as one: "Well hello."

She smiles radiantly before going inside.

"Do you know her?" Michael asks.

"No," Rami replies.

"Oh. Guess we're just a bunch of interstate studs then," Michael muses.

We break out in loud laughter!

This is all the heaven anyone ought to need...

Share |

Slalom!

Slalom!

The style guide of tomorrow
Isn't the same as today's.

Try to keep up slo-mo

Or we shall have to part ways.

Being at the center

Listen for gaps in between ———

The artsy and the ritzy can be hard to tell apart.

Let's meet somewhere in the middle.

Go ahead, get a head start...

Oh hi again, how you been?

Air's quite keen from here on out.

Now like a washed up itsy-bitsy, we're winding wildly down spring's *spout*

Share |

Re-fix

Re-fix


React against inertial forces

Realign energy vortexes

Rearticulate ageless phrases


Rebuff untoward advances

Reconstruct deconstructed nuances

Redress any inherent imbalances


Reengage reader's mental faculties

Reform grammatical casualties

Regenerate like crab apple trees


Reintegrate the least of these

Rejuvenate tamed inner beast

Release pheasants for hunt and feast


Remorse isn't worth dwelling on

Renovate; evaluate pro & con

Reorient the Western canon


Repetitio Est Mater Studiorum

Requisite knowledge stumps all but some

Resolution makes such depths easier to plumb


Retrain senses thence cleanse lenses

Reuse outdated references

Revise whatever the tense is


Rewired synapses sing grand symphonies

Reword what was first heard from aborigines

Rewrite old scripts to grant grand epiphanies...

Image: A pheasant in flight may symbolize abundance and creativity.

Hear It Read Aloud by the Author:

Share |

Urbane Combat

"For personal reasons, the Anti-Poet is a sniper. He fights for the same cause, but with a totally different technique. He does not declaim the soldier Poet, but supports him from afar, although his method may seem ambiguous." ~ Nicanor Parra (1914-2018)

* Author's Note: The proceeding is a poetic sequel to this previous piece > Trench Trap.

---

Urbane Combat

Pinned down

Between

Readerly Lane

And

Writerly Way.

Our assault

On The Base

Is stymied

By its Superstructure.

Rejection slips

Surefire as grenades

Render silent

Valiant voices.


The advance guard

Betrayed us

Mission Imperative updated

Æsthetic regrouping.


Got bookish agent

In the crosshairs

But rival choppers

From Major Publishers

Drop manuscripts overhead!

Share |

Philip K. Dick Kick

Philip K. Dick Kick


Earth to VALIS, do you copy? Come in VALIS!

Your violet fire sometimes seeps in through 
The bars of our black iron prison
But we lack the sacramental Anokhi
With which to effect any liberation.

Shhh... keep it down will you?
Lest Big Noodle be listening
For it may report us to the authorities
Who are in league with Belial.

That little black billy goat
Sure ain't kidding about.
He'll eat the love out of your heart
And leave nothing there but hate.

Our whole universe is as mad
As this writer kicking a dead Horselover
Just to chew on pseudo-religious Fat
Always hoping the Divine Will invade us.

Meanwhile our Messiah is M.I.A.
Like Bishop Archer dying by the Dead Sea
After treading past miles of arid dunes
(two coke bottles weren't enough to stave off thirst).

Earth to VALIS, do you copy? Come in VALIS!

Share |

Aliquid Stat Pro Aliquo

Aliquid Stat Pro Aliquo


Literal ontology is not what it used to be.
Why, there isn't even a text on this page
(at least not until an ideal or implied reader perks up)!

Indeed, postcolonial discourse is no more.
Constricted within these passages
This premature reading comes too close.

Forget any affective or intentional fallacy...
Such old criticisms may have applied to the Western Canon
But we're way past that now.

Insofar as The Sign is concerned
One must needs muster
The mastery of metonymy.

Ecce Signum
Arbitrary equivalence doesn't add up.
There's more than meets the eye to our inference.

Something stands for another?
Maybe so; yet what are 'things' in themselves?
You can't write about perception without referring to its percept!

Images: Two basic models of Semiosis according to A) Ferdinand de Saussure, and B) Charles Sanders Peirce.

Share |

Sententious Sonnet

Sententious Sonnet

Now who could fill the shoes of Petrarch today?

Vox Dei may perhaps sway the mind of a logician

Running the gamut from pedestrian to patrician.

Attentiveness is key, to keep many balls in play.

Heave the anchor ho and pray Aquilo's gusts won't betray

As we set sail like the Argo on its perilous mission.

Till simile’s soil 'til dragon's teeth foment sedition.

Do not stray from battlefield—dilettante—join the fray!

Oxford might have us keep ‘shtum’

‘cause the scheme here goes athwart

And this theme seems desultory.

Pollice Verso (with your thumb);

May these thoughts on art impart

Aesopian moral to our story.

Share |

Ant-Ology

"Go to the ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways, and be wise."  

~ Proverbs 6:6

Ant-Ology


Dali and Escher both depicted thee true.

Thy red brethren bore away the last of the Buendias.

Vedic scriptures equate ye with former Indras.

Thou art also mentioned in the canon of Buddha Dharma.

Aesop contrasted thine industriousness to the grasshopper's frivolousness.


Aldous' big brother Julian Huxley wrote the book on these.

Leiningen was hardly an even match for them.

H.G. Wells knew their empire all too well.

Every Emmet, is one, but doesn't know it.

They do go marching ten by ten—then the little one stops to announce: "The End!"

Images: Ant by M.C. Escher [1943] (top) & The Ants by Salvador Dali [1929] (bottom). Both tinted blue only herein.

---

For more on Ants, see: Formidable Formicidae.

Share |

Rickety Rope Bridge

Rickety Rope Bridge

Mustn't forget YOU

Aren't worth fretting over

Haul the trash out tonight

Strike flint by blue moon glow

Reflected across serene waters

Ship down among sunken treasure

These moments they flee

Mark it on new calendar:

Yesterday—we went our separate ways

~(STOP)~ time! Sunrise reveals

The charred trestles of a crossing

Under which tamed ponies wild about

Face it, we're past reconciling

Such differences when walking

The smoldering gangplanks.

Share |

Lorem Ipsum

Lorem Ipsum [ Latin, n. ]: Also known as: Greeked text, blind text, placeholder text, dummy content, filler text, lipsum, and mock-content.


Lorem Ipsum


MEDIA capta ferum victorem cepit ...

(Lingua Franca narrat mendacium semper).

Credat judaeus Apella, non ego!

Iuventus stultorum magister —

Mutatis Mutandis; varietas delectac.

Bis dicere: docendo discimus.

Ven, nescis cui bono?

Nemo enim potest personam diu ferre.

Inter arma enim silent leges.

Sapere quis in culpa —

Nicto ergo suum cuique ;)

Nosce te Ipsum!

Share |

Auto-Critical Critique

Auto-Critical Critique

For starters: this writer usually adopts the voice of an entire chorus; a stance that wears on one quickly. Royal We remains prevalent but the first person is frustratingly nowhere to be found!

His compositions are topical and tend toward metaphysical abstractions, which hold only loose relations to their titles. That is likely the result of having read too much John Donne or Andrew Marvell.

Additionally, there is an acrimonious overuse of verbosity running throughout his strident phraseology. Prosaic sentences seem to go on indefinitely while poetic dalliances devolve into nothing more than mere drivel.

Alliteration becomes campy deconstruction ~ Punctuation is eccentric to the extreme — following a logic all its own¡ Grammarians would wince as arrant arrogance flies in the face of traditional technique. Here even rhyming rings untrue due to syncopated timing ...

Such pretentious devices instantly turn off most readers. Yet for some unexplained reason, their forced application seems altogether deliberate. Perhaps said fact corresponds to the conceited claim that this is indeed "Anti" Poetry.

Regardless, he will never amount to anything in a world where book sales mark success. Long gone are the days when people actually analyzed writing and considered it an artful pursuit. With attention spans waning away rapidly, each l e n g t h e n e d letter hammers another nail into his categorical coffin.

* clang - clang - clang *

Share |

Mirror-Rite

Mirror-Rite

Within the inverse universe
Altered states are at their worst.

Prime Directive may come first
But in a second, creeps bloodthirst.

Opaque looking glass doth stain
Another pane replete with pain.

It may strike one as insane
But think it over — wrack thy brain!

If Memory Alpha serves its function
We can repeat without compunction ...

Kill the lights and chant an injunction:
Reflected Mary — merits expunction!

Share |

Oxy-Morons

Oxy-Morons


Let's engage in a productive waste of time;
Confusing to one's taste buds
Like a slice of sweet key lime.

Organized chaos thrives
Online throughout the web.
Cracking tasteless jokes
Like an aristocratic pleb.

Acting cruelly to show compassion is
Contradictory as a rich man wearing rags
Then setting off a brand new trend in fashion biz.

So hold what's left and write
From center of prefrontal cortex.
Cause bears forth its own effects
While old wrongs are all aright.

These sharps may sound retarded — thus they cleave in manner trite!

Share |

Dada's Bratty Brainchild

"In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy, growing heavy for the vintage." ~ John Steinbeck

Dada's Bratty Brainchild

-I-

Outcast in banishment

For going anti-establishment

But will not bother with lament

Cause if we blather on—inclement

It goes to show zero increment...


-II-

Diplomacy remains a crude implement.

Harmonize notes upon your chosen instrument;

Compensate for the crowd's lack of merriment.

Distill wrothful grapes when they doth ferment,

Then flying colors shalt highlight thy Dadaist experiment!

Share |

Avian Auguries

“The Eagle never lost so much time as when he submitted to learn of the Crow.”

~ William Blake; Proverbs of Hell

Avian Auguries

Ever since the grand Conference of The Birds
Those warbles of wisdom have gone unheeded.

Nowadays rare Aves fly in via the feeder's
fenêtre, and peck at what seed they can get.

Picking that which suits according to need;
Nary an awe-inspiring deed. But brook no regret —

While Osprey and Kingfisher compete
We carry on with Metaphysical conceit:

A solitary Nightingale sobs softly to be freed.
Ibis bills are crooked, unlike the Great Egret.

Aquila and Cygnus scattered across cosmos as screed
Give this sextet many an aigrette for anybody's tête!

Image: The "summer triangle" (et al) drawn between three lucidae: Altair, Deneb, and Vega.

Share |

Meta-Poetics vol. 4: Remission Restatement

Meta-Poetics vol. 4: Remission Restatement

The professed goals of this present iteration of Anti-Poetry are hereby chartered as follows:

1. To exercise the English language to its full extent; exhausting every conceivable coinage within its written corpus while simultaneously crossing borders into neighboring lexicons like Franglais & Latin. 

2. To bring archaic and defunct terminology back into circulation, chiefly as celebratory "camp". Also to plumb every possible meaning for any taken term.

3. The recapitulation of rhyming schemes will be utilized for the purpose of introducing variations on classical meters and themes.

4. Challenging the normalcy of self-centered auteurs is imperative. There's an unspoken distinction between those who work only for personal benefit and anyone who actually advances our overall art.

5. Have no fear about fielding neologisms. Wright out original witticisms to further ludic logic.

6. Instill in writers and instruct readers on novel ways of verbal expression, especially regarding metaphysical impression.

7. Demystify poetics while demonstrating the sway that language often has us under due to unconscious tendencies.

8. Turn every old adage and proverb upon its head. Leave no stanza unturned!

9. Inject Etymology, Linguistics, Philology, and Semiotics to revitalize versification. Incorporate technology, for instance:

Right Justification.

10. Raise the bar for future generations by letting loose unmatched fléchettes!

Read the rest of this series -- > META-Poetic

Share |