Venetia's posts with tag: poetry
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 in memory of Nadia Anjuman my silence is not golden
it echos
finding acceptance and fellowship in fertile fields,
resonating in impoverished hovels and improbable minds;
its sound is brassy and smacks of the vulgar,
a broadsheet that some disdain, to read
while others consume, as if it was water, for the parched. it is a tune with distantly evocative, yet provocative lyrics
one can still hum the catchy melody;
it is nouveau riche
attempting to breach pristine walls of entrenched
thoughts and habits. out of necessity and the need to survive
it has become brave, brazen and bold
in abattoirs
where too many are indifferently tossed,
as forgottened human meat,
where flesh
is content to be both prosecutor and co-defendant
in it's own miseries
or fears to give voice to discontent
while others, yes, I speak of these others
who watch with rage, in their veiled eyes...
who whisper their revolt
and compose their anthems...
their silence is not golden,
either. by vee ghozlan art - http://www.goessoftlyishere.com/images/graphics/silenced.jpg
 Often enthralled with my own cutting, ornate, brilliance
and pithy pronouncements;
inadvertently
occasionally
I trip over my arrogance
and tactless verbosity
only to land flat on my ego. The price of this rapier conceit
is a sharp, bruising experience;
despite the protruding steel, viewed as innocuous.
Failing to announce "en garde"
my wit is unable to discern
between the innocent and the guilty
the participant and the spectator.
Its blunt foil wounds the humble sparrow
as well as the gaudy peacock. Intelligence and cutting wit
are not necessarily
survival traits. by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile art - http://images.vghozlan.multiply.com/image/1/photos/upload/orig/Ryf5gQoKCo8AAG4iBxs47/1.jpeg?et=Qd%2Bg%2BSS8XxLCLZQ4B8QZkA
 With a magnificent dramatic manner
she swoons in a forlorn heap
before me
in response to my refusal to indulge her latest request.
I am reminded of her potential. She is provocative
with the possibilities of Hatshepsut 's stature
and a gaze that hints of majesty,
exotic lands and fragrances,
and regal miens
of scientific brilliance and discoveries
brave new worlds
of inspired words and philosophies
and profound contemplations
of new creations, formulas and fabulous inventions Then my minx of a daughter
looks up at me
a look of willful amusement on her gamin face
and returns to being my inexperienced child. Youth is a mixture of actor and pope,
prince and pauper,
politician and negotiator;
A simple no
often results
in Wagnerian dramas,
sighs and soliloquies
until tomorrow
when she has new desires, wants and needs
and more conflicts
with parental dictatorship by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile art - http://images.vghozlan.multiply.com/image/1/photos/upload/orig/Ryf5gQoKCo8AAG4iBxs63/1.jpeg?et=WkXGdScwMcm%2BqfqX1sUZlg
 | Skimmed | Aug 17, '07 12:30 AM
for everyone |
 Men talk of peace
but prefer to make war;
a friend tells me
it is the testosterone
in man and his superior
intelligence
that drives the suicide march to our better built
mousetrap.
We are both
exterminator and dead vermin. Man's tunnel vision,
is an extraordinary thing;
if we go the way of dinosaurs,
perhaps the cockroaches and rats
shall inherit the
earth
and the size of their brains,
limit
their depredations. Upon a reflection,
I know
a poet must write
and this blood spilt,
is his ink
the tissue, his parchment. What would I feed my compositions,
my composed admonitions,
if not for human follies?
It is a parasitic occupation.
by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile art - www.seaboarcreations.com/.../mouse-trap.htm
 you were my muse
the griot of my vanquished history
the crescent of my fertility
the flint struck upon the rolling stone
the rosetta in my missing codes love, you were my muse
the raconteur of my much repeated stories
the auctioneer and owner, of treasured tomes
the playwright who knew both nadir and denouement
the table of contents in an old weathered edition querido, you were my muse
the string plucked on the scarred instrument
the note that echoed in my barren chambers
the premier danseur in a ballet, for two
yes, baby, you were my muse you were also the bell jar that cracked, when I fell
leaving
me
alone
and
broken
amidst
all
the
sparkly
insignificant
shit by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile art - http://images.vghozlan.multiply.com/image/1/photos/upload/orig/Ryf5gQoKCo8AAG4iBxs85/1.jpeg?et=LPBxf8huV7%2CauiQoAstHxw
 Without warning,
the banshee sang;
mistaking it for a screech,
I ignored the atonal admonition,
to treasure life,
and prepare,
for the inevitably of death. She sang with thunder;
an outpouring of impending woe,
subsequently, dismissed,
as the rantings of an angered,
spirit. The banshee articulated sadness;
a scream buried within,
grief, the rending elegy,
stripped of polite, subdued,
lacy hankerchiefed tears. It was a wail,
the personification, and the premonition,
of my loss.
by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
 Inspired by my friend, Deb Averting my gaze, I walk pass the art store display; impulsively, I turn back, entering the store. Immediately, I am immersed in the smell of charcoal and pastels, acrylics and oil paints. Smell can be a tyrant, allowing no comforting obfuscations. It transports me back to the days, when geometry, was more than mathematical, squares, triangles and circles, were more than precise shapes, when the eye was sharp, my hand sure, and Pythagoras was conquered by Cezanne; they were sublime moments, I recall. Without thought, I reach out, hold fingers outspread, over neatly aligned tubes of paints, the riot of colors vie for purchase and canvas; but visibly, my fingers tremble. The eye has become clouded, the hand, is unsteady. In resignation, I turn away, just another patron of the arts. by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
 It seems the nutcase contingent, once again, has taken umbrage to my "decadent" poetry. A friend thinks that they are trying to "save" me...Well my holy little busybodies, grab your Korans, Torahs and Bibles...I am feeling a wee bit provocative... but I gotta question...if my poetry makes you crazed, why the hell do you keep returning to my blog? The idiot contingent thought the poem, "Divinity" was a request to date someone from Africa/the Mideast...and sent garbled requests to have cyber sex/exchange emails/or chat via Yahoo messenger...um....LMAO...I think I am gonna stop reading messages from strangers... On a serious note - the art is from Vera House and âÂÂincorporates colorful images from adult & teen survivors of domestic and sexual violenceâÂÂ. Holding me by my hair, believing his hands are caresses, he carelessly unclothes. In his haste to strip me a button falls off; I watch, as it drunkenly, rolls off the bed, onto the richly carpeted bedroom floor, where it lays abandoned. Lips mouthed onto my grimaced face, he whispers, I love you; still semi-frozen in an all too familiar shock, my pleas and cries are alternatively heard, as counterpoint in between, the notes of a torrid love song, playing on the radio. Both the lyrics and cries, fall on deafened ears. It is a bizarre tableau, where terror is suspended, a second seems as long as, an hour. When finished, he makes that male obscene grunt, you know the one, when they are satiated and ready for sleep. As the wetness seeps against my leg, he repeats again sleepily, contentedly, I love you. Turning to the wall, I mutter over my shoulders, me too, while wondering, if I am a conveniet trash receptacle, to my husband. by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
 I am no prophetess
or prognosticator
my words are ofttimes
thoughtlessly tactlessly said
I am no seer to embroider, emboss or foretell
fate
the spindles stabs, thread frays
my fabric is torn
the weaves are woven
unevenly and fashioned into funerary garb
although I have been made rabid
my madness is not contagious
occasioned by bouts of clarity
and undeniable truths
sometimes
hallucinated incoherent pronouncements
only my sisters understood by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
Note: The Goddess of Necessity, Themis, brought forth three lovely daughters, known as the Moirai (Fates). All living things must eventually submit to these divine daughters of Zeus and Themis. Their names are: Koltho (Clotho), Lakhesis (Lachesis) and Atropos.
Klotho spins the thread of life, Lakhesis determines the length of the thread and Atropos cuts the thread when the proper time has come for death. They are also called the Moirai to denote their descent from Moira, the original goddess of Fate. They are not to be confused with the Furies, who are the daughters of Nyx (Night). They laugh at our feeble attempts to cheat them because they always prevail. They are also known as the Moiras or Keras.
| Divinity | Jul 12, '07 12:21 AM
for everyone |
 To my daughters, Ariana, Shai, Rissa, forever gifted and divine, my friends - Deborah whose words creates and touches the divine, Jus' Tammy, who finds the divinity in spaces in everything, Krystal, Bunie, Rifka, Steph, who exemplify divinity and Jonea, always artistically divine... My friend Deborah, posted a poem, which started me thinking about the divinity in women. I did a bit of research and was amazed that women in the so called pagan religions, had reached positions of power and were subservient to no males...Jews come close to explaining the female nature of God, but not close enough (IMHO)...Wiccans are much more in tune with the idea of the divinity in women, without the Madonna/virginal tones of other religions... today I read that god is found in the spaces
in between people
I have been seeking the godhood
all my life
odd where it has been discovered not in the great cathedrals
with their flying buttresses
sycophant priests and richly bejeweled splendiferous popes
not in the achingly beautiful pristine synagogues
with their endless rabbinical squabbling
and arguments over who is a Jew
not in the geometrically perfect mosques
frozen in time
lamenting their former days of glory
and scientific advancements not in any of these holy places
where woman is representative of sin
and Eve, Mary Madelene and Lilith
are unrepentant whores and temptresses
where sex is a hidden dirty sin
its pleasures shunned
and its sacredness
denied
earmarked strictly for procreation
or places where the godhood has been sacrilegiously schizophrenically
split
and only the male nature of god
is divine
the female aspect suspect, submissive and inferior
and given insincere verbal homage
where faith in the unbelievable
is preferred over knowledge
pain and suffering
blithely explained as the human lot I have witnessed the divinity
in the words
written by poets
art
created by artists
music
performed by musicians today
I discovered divinity and the godhood
in spaces between me and you
by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
art - http://images.vghozlan.multiply.com/image/1/photos/upload/orig/Ryf5gQoKCo8AAG4iBxs133/1.jpeg?et=8codbx8w3x6fTvPp1gyOzA
 on my computer I can chat with a Buddhist from Nepal explore mysticism and the nature of the gods exchange subtle insights on mysteries and conundrums with an aborigine from New Zealand debate the effects of misogyny on girl children with a Yamamano from the Amazon I can exchange verbal challenges with a theologian from an Italian seminary rebut and rebuke an urbane oilman in Dubai with my scintillating wit intrigue a politician in Thailand with profound political insights behind my computer I can play the game none is the wiser of my sex what can't I do? I cannot force men to stop being monstrous towards women imprisoning behind veils, burkas, hassidic tichels and shpitzels stoning and murdering in pursuit of a dubious honor preserving male prerogatives and pleasures via female sexual mutilations and castrations shackling minds by the ignoble means of poverty, ignorance and illiteracy raping and subsequently arrogantly compounding the crime by telling the world it is our fault my sisters what differences exists between me and you? whether in the west or the east the south or the north our chains and fetters are a matter of degrees or latitude we are their mothers, wives, and sisters aunts and cousins their neighbors 50% of the world's population with less than 10% of the power and none of the justice I tire of begging at the table, for the scraps of male indulgences by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
 ...a writing challenge by Tammy; although still a work in progress...
i measure time
by the slow beats of your heart
in the quiet exhalations of breath
as we lay
niched i have awaited epochs
eons
the birth of mountains
could not have filled me with as much
awe
a precambrian worshiper at your temple
where love layed macroscopic
paleozoic, mesozoic
unflowered and fossilized
separated from you only by mere
skin
and time
there can only be now
as i live, breathe
you by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
 A Lullaby for Friend
lay your weary head down, close yours eyes I would croon you a lullaby if I could your body, a finely made instrument is more than note on someone's measure or discarded badly written symphony deserving of more than a breve* for even the brave require succor and time lay your weary head down, close your eyes my friend
note: breve â musical notation, interval of a rest, marked by a sign indicating the length of the pause.
For an Unknown Lover
selfish woman that I am when he is silent and gone i wonder what painting remains unpainted what poem remains unwritten what kisses remain ungiven life is more intense when my lover is here
| Secrets | Jun 14, '07 12:15 AM
for everyone |
she didn't conform to the specifications of the town's genteel womanhood
quirky with a glint of the rebel
and a sophisticated je nes se quoi
she could be seen throwing a football
with the neighborhood kids
conduct a rousing debate with staid bureaucrats
or dance a wild flamenco
at neighborhood celebrations
there was a touch of mystery
to her hazel eyes
the red flowers in the wildly spiralled Afro
peasant blouses and hand painted skirts
suggested a panache for life
we mere mortals, were bemused
at a woman of such strange juxtapositions
in this small rural town as a child
watching her hands as they danced in the air
punctuating her remarks
they told me tales, conveyed emotions
without those appendages
she would have been rendered partially
mute she carried a tattered notebook and a yellow Bic pen
with a nibbled end
and was seen scribbling
in the grocery stores, as she waited in lines
between the loads of laundry, late at night
as we slept
conversations often were abruptly stopped mid-stream
momentarily
with one up regal upraised finger
hurriedly writing a word, a phrase, a line
less she forget the inspired thought
and then with a fey smile
would resume her narrative we always suspected she was writing
pithy, profound essays
long philosophical dissertations,
perhaps even the occasional grocery list
when she died
I discovered boxes and boxes
of notebooks
marvelously written poems
dreams, hopes and fears for her children
passion felt for her lover
a deep sorrow at injustice
secret thoughts of a woman
we never knew
I grieved again
for the mother i dreamed of
by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
 I was the bough that witnessed the sudden plummet to the earth the single crystal tear that ran unexpectedly from the corner of his eye the note in the sibilant silences hovering under discernable decibels of a hero's celebration like a thief lurking in his hidden lair I grieved for my Grendel though he be monster dunno, where this poem came from...hero's are often celebrated yet the monsters they kill are oftimes remembered, as well. ...I think of the parents of monsters... we love our children, monster or angel... by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile art - http://images.vghozlan.multiply.com/image/1/photos/upload/orig/Ryf5gQoKCo8AAG4iBxs195/1.jpeg?et=mGLfP0Ks%2CDnYFTYe2eOheA
| My Siren | Jun 5, '07 12:19 AM
for everyone |
 skin delicate and parchment thin
she lays seemingly quiescent and fragile
upon her pastel bed
of washed-out out pinks, mint, and mauve
with a sigh, she raises her hand
outstretched in a silent plea
lashes fluttering theatrically
demurely
against this backdrop of artifice
a subdued beauty
i am mindful of a snake
that basks in the sun until disturbed
by the unwary
she is as weak as a cobra
my hypnotic Siren it is the stilled things the pregnant expectant silences that assassinates
The Sirens were giant, winged creatures with the heads of women. They lived on rocks on the sea, where their beautiful singing lured sailors to shipwreck. Odysseus filled his sailors' ears with wax so that they might sail safely past the Sirens. by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile art - http://images.vghozlan.multiply.com/image/1/photos/upload/orig/Ryf5gQoKCo8AAG4iBxs211/1.jpeg?et=Gc4UySG2FT0fAzN2Xbni%2Bw
 a new poem to piss someone off, *shrugs shoulders* he sits in the front
periodically catching my eyes in his
rear-view mirror
nods and smiles
politely asking for directions
in his precise accented english
fingering my star of david
i surreptitiously eye the turban
and his black skin as the scenery flashes by
the brain compares this hardworking man
to the words that nightly flash across my tv screen
jihadist terrorist muslim fundi insurgents
all three billion of them
idly
i wonder why christian fundi or jewish fundi
does not elicits such fear
their histories are equally bloody
my cabdriver
has no knowledge
of the thoughts that are in my mind we arrive at my home
with payment and tip
in his very human hands
graciously he thanks me i have survived a muslim-jewish encounter
just two exhausted hard workingmen
linked by a ride
in a taxi
a new paradigm, in a new land
vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile art - http://images.vghozlan.multiply.com/image/1/photos/upload/orig/Ryf5gQoKCo8AAG4iBxs235/1.jpeg?et=OSfB2l3BtE6NwCneHYi6JQ
 disclaimer: this poem is about me, my mother and my son. we speak to each other with such artificial heartiness proximity reminds me too much of your failings much easier to chat by phone it is a lifelong sentence a burden to bear motherhood with it's implied loves and losses carried such sorrow and confinement that you ran away thinking to flee responsibilities abandoning me to fate yet forever chained to you by blood and dna there was no instruction manual or blue print defining how to be a mother you thought love would suffice no teacher to elucidate today, if graded you would earn a F for failure a C for cowardice and a D for denial your motherhood having been forsaken while the innocent faltered today repeating over and over i tell myself i am not my mother despite having failed my own son if i cannot forgive you how can he ever forgive me a cycle repeats by vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
 she whispers that sheâÂÂs tired they scream âÂÂfightâ and with their love hold her hostage she looks at the medicines that decorate her bathroom they tell her that modern medicine is such a marvel she lies awake at night wincing in pain at every movement they tell her to leech joy from every single moment as she lays dying she wonders if anyone is really listening Heavens Hope
heaven is a fevered hope for the dispossssed a mirage that blooms as we lay dying it is a placebo to sweeten a soured mythos a carrot to dangle before the unrepentant it is the payout for living the lie of sacrifice the reward for being the wolf's willing sheep it is the willful blinders donned to avoid seeing that we are born, we live and then we die food for the feasting crows vee ghozlan aka butterflynxile
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