advertising poetry
since we're out of order
we've never been that productive
With a little help of Nicholas Manning. Mustread!
3.4.07
26.3.07
missionstatement of the walls
fly’s open peeks through a chink inside a bedroom is unfolded a tower
rooftree a forest history in annual rings we revolve around doubt
it makes you strong a stone in a pond the work of a god under a dense foliage
we have all winter to be naked when it freezes and it frosts it is too quiet
to be ashamed.
traces of a blessing fan out waste water sewers lay low lovers musty shags
in a caravan in a log cabin a perspiring ski instructor little backroom or broom closet lawyer
with a preference for anal and all the way little sweetsweatsorrows
a trail of virgin salt crystals a sea of beauty long gone
has it’s price the humming of the scratches, it completely livens you up
desert rose, brittle you prance and glance you’re invulnerable may any one by accident
crush you you’ll slip through fingers like sand, you’ll lead astray oh hold me leave me let me
join you inflect you mortarmartyr me with all your feet standing ground refusing to lie down
keeping you up right dividing the earth in balance keeping things in the dark staring looking up to the sky
sticking heads in the sand you don’t want to see what’s on the other side
there’s green grass growing, ivy
is slowly squeezing your spine to smithereens
(god is challenging your response at all times)
21.3.07
If I ran the internet - Rives
More on Rives?
Official Website
Full text (transcription):
Intro:
I wrote this poem after hearing a pretty well-known actress telling a pretty well-known interviewer on television: ‘I’m really getting into the internet lately. I just wish it were more organised.’
If I ran the internet
If I controlled the internet?
You could auction your broken heart on Ebay
Take the money, go to Amazon,
Buy a phonebook for a country you’ve never been to
Call folks at random until you find someone
who flirts really well in a foreign language
If I were in charge of the internet
You could Mapquest your lover’s moodswings
Hang left at cranky
Right at preoccupied
U turn on silent treatment
All the way back to tongue kissing and good lovin’
You could navigate and understand every emotional intersection
Some days I’m as shallow as a backing pan
But I still stretch miles in all directions
If I own the internet
Napster Monster and Friendster-dot-com would be one big website
That way you could listen to cool music while you pretend to look for a job
and you’re really just chatting with your palls,
Heck if I ran the web
You could email dead people
They would not email you back
But you’d get an automated reply
Their name in your inbox
It’s all you wanted anyway
And a message saying: ‘Hey, it’s me. I miss you.’
Listen you’ll see, being dead is dandy.
Now you go back to raising kids
And waging peace
And craving candy
If I designed the internet
Childhood-dot-com would be a loop
Of a boy
In an orchard
With a ski pole for a sword
Trashcan lid for a shield, shouting
‘I am the emperor of oranges’
‘I am the emperor of oranges’
‘I am the emperor of oranges’
Now follow me OK
Grandma-dot-com would be a recipe for biscuits and spit bath instructions 1-2-3
That links with hot-diggity-dog-dot-com, that is my grandfather
They take you to gruff-ex-cop-on-his-fourth-marriage-dot-dad
He forms an attachment to kind-a-ditsy-but-still-sends-ginger-snatch-for-Christmas-dot-mom who
Downloads the boy in the orchard, the emperor of oranges who grows up to be
Me,
The guy who usually goes too far, so
If I were the emperor of the internet
I guess I’d still be mortal, huh?
But at that point I would probably already have
The lowest possible mortgage and the most enlarged possible penis, so
I would outlaw spam on my first day in office
I wouldn’t need it.
I’d be like some kind of internet genius.
And me,
I’d like to upgrade to deity and maybe
Just like that
(p-o-p)
I’d go wireless.
Huh.
Maybe google would hire this
So I could zip through your servers and firewalls like a virus
Until the worldwideweb is as wise as wild and as organised
As I think a modern day miracle-slash-oracle can get, but
Oooooooooo, you wanna bet just how whack and un-p.c. your Mac or PC's gonna be when I'm rockin' hot-shit-hotshot-God-dot-net?
I guess it’s just like life
It’s not a question of if you can
Its, ‘Do ya?’
We can interfere with the interface
We can make you god hallelujah the national anthem of cyberspace every lucky time we logon
You don’t say a prayer
You don’t write a song
You don’t chant an ooooohm
You send one blessed email to
Whoever you’re thinking of
At
Dadeladatatatatatatadadeladedadeladedatatam-dot-com
14.3.07
Who framed Roger Ballen? man on verandah
(Photo: Roger Ballen, Man shaving on Verandah, Platteland, Western Transvaal 1986)
surrounds us with housing. given the insanitial impetus
we grow closer to one
another photosynthesis
in the dark
cells are murderous
we are all
but one
overcome
the armour
dies another time
the body being confident
more in than out
it breathes
a contorted fist
after some time
traces
of reproduction
every where
www.rogerballen.com
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