Saturday, August 19, 2023

Deliverance

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS


Deliverance

 

We don’t need words that tickle the senses

But fall short of coherent message

We don’t need poetry that dances on

Starlight but never touches the core

We don’t need magicians that conjure

Silken roses from puffs of thin air

But never pierce the boundaries of thought

 

We need words that hit hard as fists

That move the passive soul into action

We need poetry that rides the waves of

Passion to a destination of outrage

We need conjurers to transform the silent

Masses of the uninformed and unengaged

Into dedicated armies of change

 

We need artists with a social range

Writers who will open doors of power

Voices that rattle the tallest towers

Leaders who rise to the critical hour

People who deliver times of change

 

Thursday, August 17, 2023

Killer Flames

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: GLOBAL WARMING


Killer Flames

 

The curse of Prometheus is upon us

The light of the heavens

The warmth of the gods

The greatest gift ever bestowed

Become the destroyer of man

 

Once we knew how to control the flames

We employed them to cook our food

To warm our homes

To bring light to darkness

To mold metals into useful form

 

But that which once served humanity

Has now become our enemy

A killer of our people

A destroyer of our abodes

 

We must learn again how to use fire

We must learn how to control it

We must learn how to defend our homes

Our schools and buildings

Our towns and cities

From the devastation of runaway flames

We must work to balance the forces of

nature – wind, rain, fire and ice –

or the forces of nature will work

together to destroy us

 

Wednesday, August 16, 2023

Visions

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS


Visions

 

Visions of ethereal beings

Floating through my mind with care

We cannot bring them down to earth

Reach out and touch them if you dare

 

We are stuck inside an empty room

That has no windows and no doors

We cannot see what fortune looms

But still we’re crying out for more

 

And the ghosts of past keep singing

And the bells inside are ringing

And no one has anything to say

They shrug as I go on my way

Stuck in a room without doors

And the crowd calls out for more

 

I go downtown to find a preacher

Wearing a vest and a tie-dye tee-shirt

I’ll ask and he will have an answer

If not the dance let it be the dancer

 

And the visions dancing through my mind

I lay it down and let it unwind

She says relax, have a drink of wine

Before I know it there’s no more time

No visions when you’re running blind

Just a feeling that we’ll never find

The answers that we left behind

 

And the visions slowly fade away

There’s no one left but we must stay

Goodbye to dreams of yesterday

Relax and watch the spirits play

Monday, August 14, 2023

Power & Obedience

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS

 

Power & Obedience

 

“The man of virtuous soul commands not,

nor obeys. Power, like a desolating

pestilence, pollutes whate’er it touches;

and obedience, bane of all genius,

virtue, freedom, truth, makes slaves of men,

and, of the human frame, a mechanized

automation.”  Percy Shelley

 

Thou shall not yield to power

Thou shall not blindly obey

There is no power in heaven or on earth

That commands the heart of virtue

 

Power poisons the soul

Distorts all sense of fairness

Takes a hard and heavy toll

Shatters empathy and care

Destroys the heart of all humanity

Lays a giving cupboard bare

Replaces virtue with mere vanity

Leaving us to blindly stare

 

Obedience without reason

Feeds the worst of humankind

Fosters greed and brutality

Strips the obedient of their pride

Tips the balance of duality

Destroying us from inside

 

Give the power to the wise

Let only virtue rule the day

See through the politician’s lies

Let the righteous light the way


Sunday, August 13, 2023

The Good Old Days

 RANDOM JACK POETRY HOUR: LIFE SONGS


The Good Old Days

 

In the good old days

We never questioned our parents

We respected our teachers

We obeyed the police

We did as we were told

We said yes, ma’am and no, sir

Please and thank you

We never rocked the boat

 

Then the sixties came and

all hell broke loose

We questioned everything

We demanded honesty and truth

We demanded answers

We saw injustice and fought back

We resisted authority

We broke the rules and made our own

We smoked pot and dropped pills

We refused to blindly follow

 

In the good old days

We were “free white and twenty-one”

Now we are just free

Free to be, free to think and

Free to question what

those good old days

were really like