I Don’t Watch Nature

25 Jun 2018 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 2006, circling round nature, definitely didactic, our times our culture Tags: a mixture of making fun of myself and gorgeous nature.

I enjoy making fun of myself in poetry. At the moment, I’m editing “Definitely Didactic”, my upcoming book. I came upon this one a few minutes ago and had to laugh. Here it is for your delight. It is rather charming, actually.

I Don’t Watch Nature✍️

I don’t watch nature half enough:

Too busy doing other stuff.

Ducks are floating on the lawn;

A pigeon hawk, confused and young

With mouse in claw,

Flew, fell or jumped from roof this morning –

Thump, bump, yellow eyes, a glory.

Rain is almost Noah high.

I’m scrubmarined in bubbly tub

Fixed on a phrase or thought abstract,

Or marinating foreign food,

Playing jazz, perfecting Bach,

Unaware of lake-y wood

Concocting soya dish and bean,

Consuming caffeine in between

(I’m such a fraud).

I don’t watch nature worth two pence;

I don’t see: that’s a different sense.

Universes die, go by, while I,

All stultified eat pie,

While planet spirals downward.

I Don’t Watch Nature 12.11.2006

Circling Round Nature; Our Times, Our Culture; Definitely Didactic; Arlene Nover Corwin

Nothing is Sacred Anymore

08 Mar 2018 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 1996, 2018, God Book II, our times our culture, our times our cultureII Tags: What is sacred?

I write everyday. This daily practice leads more and more to ignoring the past. Here is a poem – as newsworthy as ever, from one of my books published 2012 called Our Times, Our Culture which I happened to be going through this evening:
It’s page 162 of a 302 page book; was written in 1996.📢✍💭

Nothing Is Sacred Anymore

What’s sacred?
Internet is not, although it’s taking over.
Governments are not.
They’re only lots:
Persons without names;
Offices in frames.
What’s sacred?
Art’s unstable. So’s the food
And dreams meant to enhance the good;
Buildings meant to further faith –closed six days in a week.
You can’t get in
And so you sin.
If you’re the type who needs to speak
To God in such a place, you’re lost,
Tossed out into the street ‘til Sunday.

What is sacred?
Maybe nature’s underlying laws and change.
Maybe fire. (Not guns on the firing range)
But all the universes’ suns; first cause;
Laws of truth; you, me.
I’d hope that something’s sacred
Even though I cannot see it.
Something’s there that’s worth the prayer:
Something holy in the air.
Perhaps the problem’s in the word –
The nothing/something word absurd.
A thing with no- some- can’t possess
The ring of sacredness.
So why should I be disappointed,
Cynical or sad
When this world is an un-anointed
World, and going slowly, wholly mad.
Is sacred scared (of being sacred nowadays?)

Nothing Is Sacred Anymore 4.8.1996 Our Times, Our Culture; God Book; Arlene Corwin

Olympic Games Nineteen Ninety Sex (a reminder for the 2016 Olympics too)

06 Aug 2016 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 2016, our times our culture, our times our cultureII

A sister poem to The Doped Olympics. This one was written in 1996 for the then Olympics when fashions seem to have gotten that bit more exposed. Not always a welcome sight.

Forgive me God, forgive me folk,
I’ve got to make this little joke.
I’m not a girl who’s often vulgar-
After all, I practice Yoga,
Keeping mind and body pure:
Mostly mind. But I have eyes,
And one Olympic year the sure-
Fire fashion for the thighs
And loins were shorts exposing all.
When I say all, I mean the ball,
The bell, the jock-.
God, how they knocked!
And while the race was being clocked
The racers showed what Adam hid;
And while I tried to watch the race
My eyes kept dropping to that place.
I couldn’t help myself. They slid
To dingling, dangling, banging things –
Some small, some large, and all these kings
Of sport diminished in my eyes.
I didn’t wish to see their size,
For I was there to see the sprinters
And the long jump and the discus,
Knowing that they’d spent long winters
Practicing like titans. Now the viscous
Summer days, all damp and sweaty,
While the world with its confetti
Waited to exalt its heroes,
It was long, short dicks that hit my eyes.
May athletes, trainers, sponsors wise,
Fashion moguls on the rise
Remember, modesty is also prize.

Olympic Games Nineteen Ninety Sex 8.16.1996/ revised 8.6.2003/revised 8.5.2016)
Our Times, Our Culture;

arlenecorwinpoetry.com/duanespoetree.com/youtube

And Tracks Of Deer Are On The Grass (the sinking of the Estonia)

25 Sep 2014 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 1994, 2004, 2014, birth death & in between, birth death & in between II, our times our culture, our times our cultureII Tags: the sinking of the Estonia

*Estonia sank September 28,1994 At the time I had no idea the impact it would make. The death toll being ‘only’ six hundred something.

** 20 years later. I have never sent this poem out into the Swedish world.

It is now the weekend of the 20^th anniversary of the Estonia tragedy. We now know that the death toll was over eight hundred fifty. The poem is going out.

And Tracks Of Deer Are In The Grass

Last night a ferry sank.

I couldn’t sleep, and drank in

All the waters of the deep,

With, now nine hundred two and seven,

Called in minutes back to heaven,

Shamed and hesitant to write the question,

How long did it take to die?

Tortured by a string of pictures.

In the end, what’s left is I.

Always, only, left, the same old

I-in-the-shape-of me-oh-my,

For even while the world goes under,

I-in-me is what is left.

Through someone’s blunder,

Stunned, bereft, yet left to be,

I owe it to the passengers

To not think sentimentally;

Feelings squelched, brain observed,

Grateful, yes, and still unnerved

I see no other answer

Than to carry on the I and Thou

Till all gets answered

Through some tao,

Some mystic sweet know-how.

Half-guilty as the hours pass,

The light of day comes through the glass

And tracks of deer are in the grass.

And Tracks of Deer Are In The Grass 9.29.1994/2004

Birth, Death & In Between; Our Times, Our Culture;

Arlene Corwin

One Or Two Bangs 2002

31 Jul 2014 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 2002, God book, our times our culture Tags: one or two bangs and you know what I mean.

A Couple Of Bangs

I was standing on my head and thinking:

One or two bangs

And the knowledge could go;

Just when I’m learning

To use my computer!

One or two bangs

And we’re scraping for scrap,

Riding on horses

(If any are left),

Charting new courses,

Bereft

Of a map,

Lighting and warming with flame sparked by flint,

Barter our mint,

Clothes made of lint.

Two generations, the knowledge could fade,

Memories turning to legend and shadow.

Just when I’m learning to turn on the Net!

I haven’t begun to discover things yet.

Damn!

A couple of bangs, a volcano that’s spewed

And the whole thing is screwed:

E-mail, airplane, trip to the stars –

(If not to the stars, then to Venus or Mars).

I was just getting used to the silicon chip,

Miniaturized lightness, plasticized hip;

All this could go with a couple of bangs,

A forty day rain

On a main plain in Spain.

God, don’t give up on us,

Rescue us,

For we’re too few bangs away.

A Couple Of Bangs 10.18.2002

Our Times, Our Culture; God Book;

Arlene Corwin

Inclusive/Exclusive 5.3.1995

14 Jul 2014 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 1995, definitely didactic, God book, our times our culture Tags: one of my favorite ideas

Inclusive Exclusive

I heard them talking.

Back and forth they talked about

The universal gout;

Secular society’s exclusion of the concept ‘evil’.

Focusing on genocide – pride in killing off a race –

They harkened back to World War Two –

To Pole, gay, Gypsy, Marxist, Jew –

When one mustachioed-crazed face

Decided to kill off a race that never even was a race.

“How does it come about, they asked.

-And how can we prevent it?

There was rabbi, priest from West, East.

“Can we kill the killing beast

And turn the killing to a feast

And universal peace?” They were erudite alright.

Not right, bur erudite.

One said that we must teach the whelps.

Education is what helps.

One said that we can’t burn the seed,

So punish those that do the deed,

Chase the villains, make them bleed –

Justice must be served and seen. The cause was man alone.

But where was God, I heard me groan.

The priest and rabbi, smart but green,

-Oh God was there, but cause was man.

The cause was man?

How can the cause be man

When God is absoluter than…

First cause and seed, the first split second all decreed.

All that follows fulfills need.

It seemed so plainful clear to me.

It followed as the night the day

That even murdered masses stay

Within the scope of God’s good meaning.

If God is and still they die,

There’s meaning somewhere in the sky

And meaning must be dying’s seeming,

Any other meaning dreaming.

Back to rabbi and to priest:

Back and forth they sought solutions.

I could see a key, a yeast

Which, when increasing, chokes pollutions:

Leave the club that says “exclusive”.

Join the club that has “inclusive” on the door.

It isn’t easy not to hate, not easy to include the Yids,

The blacks, the gays; teach yourself and teach the kids.

But it’s the gate. We are the geno of the cide

Try taking God on this queer ride.

A good way to begin; to make a circle drawing in

Someone whose eye you catch,

Who chances near, who seeks your ear,

Who forms the batch of living skin

That happens to fall in your patch.

Include the wretch you are, as well.

Tell, yell and ring this bell.

To make a heaven out of hell, include!

Inclusive/Exclusive 5.23.1995

Definitely Didactic; Our Times, Our Culture; God Book;

Arlene Corwin

Nothing Is Sacred Anymore 1996

09 Jul 2014 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 1996, God book, our times our culture Tags: it's still all God

Nothing Is Sacred Anymore

What’s sacred?

Internet is not, although it’s taking over.

Governments are not.

They’re only lots:

Persons without names;

Offices in frames.

What’s sacred?

Art’s unstable. So’s the food

And dreams meant to enhance the good;

Buildings meant to further faith –closed six days in a week.

You can’t get in

And so you sin.

If you’re the type who needs to speak

To God in such a place, you’re lost,

Tossed out into the street ‘til Sunday.

What is sacred?

Maybe nature’s underlying laws and change.

Maybe fire. (Not guns on the firing range)

But all the universes’ suns; first cause;

Laws of truth; you, me.

I’d hope that something’s sacred

Even though I cannot see it.

Something’s there that’s worth the prayer:

Something holy in the air.

Perhaps the problem’s in the word –

The nothing/something word absurd.

A thing with no- some- can’t possess

The ring of sacredness.

So why should I be disappointed,

Cynical or sad

When this world is an un-anointed

World, and going slowly, wholly mad.

Is sacred scared (of being sacred nowadays?)

Nothing Is Sacred Anymore 4.8.1996

Our Times, Our Culture; God Book;

Arlene Corwin

Winter Surprised Us 2002

19 Jan 2014 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 2002, circling round nature, our times our culture Tags: with climates you never can tell

Winter Surprised Us

Winter surprised us this mild October.

Just when I’d praised an October so sober.

Eighteenth October and snow started lightly,

Thinly – but whitely. By night we

Were covered when you’d just predicted

No winter at all,

A long, long, long fall –

And lo, winter beauty!

A plow does its duty.

Trees haven’t even shed all of their leaves

Which, snow-driven leaf,

Will freeze green in form.

Mean or indifferent: a deviant norm.

October’s too soon, too darned premature;

Caricature of what winter should be,

When and how. As for me,

I’ll just put on one more layer, more heat;

Eat more meat:

All that adapts.

I’ll vocalize more,

Use store of potential in and around;

Hope that it’s not one more sign of abuse,

Product of industry’s chilling excuse.

Snow in October astounds and confounds.

Snow in October feels downright perverse,

But sooner than later one’s forced not to curse,

But sign truce with the pines and the firs and the spruce.

The end of confusion is peace.

Winter Surprised Us 10.19.2002

Circling Round Nature; Our Times, Our Culture;

Arlene Corwin

Some Societies Don’t Succeed (& Die Out) 2013

07 Oct 2013 Leave a comment

by arlenecorwin in 2013, definitely didactic, nature of & in reality, our times our culture, our times our cultureII Tags: dying societies, living societies, societies, the world

Some Societies Don’t Succeed (& Die Out)

Serbia,

Albania,

Romania,

Russia when

Collecting and collectivized;

New York City – glamorized;

Wall Street,

Stocks and bribes;

Europe’s Union;

Diverse tribes,

Countless sects,

Deserts, plateaus,

Dialects

Domiciled the planet round:

Any clique that’s too elusive,

Any band that grows too large,

Clubs exclusive,

Groups that charge,

Marginal

Or just corrupt;

Lavish, wasteful,

Or just not

Industrious enough,

-Isms driven, too spread out,

Democratic

Or despotic;

Canon,

Custom,

Weather,

Greed,

Curiosity

And trade:

Qualities that steer and lead

To vanishing.

Some societies succeed

And die away.

But one man left,

That’s all you need –

Someone left alive and well –

Someone left to tell.

Some Societies Don’t Succeed (& Die Out)

Nature Of & In Reality; Our Times, Our Culture; Definitely Didactic; (revised 10.7.2013)

Arlene Corwin