may we all be heard
words are bells
let them ring!


Thom World Poet Austin, Texas, USA
Global Radical networker and activist for promoting the live Creative Arts,
at every possible opportunity, especially in his home-city, Austin, Texas, USA


Monday, May 31, 2010

WHAT WOULD NICK TRAVIS DO?

He would turn up at his own wake
and jam with any band that played in tune
He would trade witticisms with musicians
(and back the poets ,too!)
He would ask for peace universally
and do so in a peaceful manner
He would travel anywhere to share these views
Yesterday,today,tomorrow
Happily ,there is a little bit of Nick in all of us-
and that is why we gather
If we could share his energies
his goodwill and his laughter
all wars would cease
His bass would be heard forever
as it is,he has moved on
from this human space to another
And we must talk of Nick as when
he shared his life with us/and trust
there will be more than a little bit of Nick
in many more of us
TONIGHT 5pm 3600 south 2nd
2nd remembrance jam in honor of Nick Travis

Sunday, May 30, 2010

HUMANANTS(introduced species)

Aggressive they are,breeding in zones
where once ants lived peacefully
Malvinas humans fighting Britants
Making earth areas into dead zones
BP ants like Romanants corporate Empires
Human ants are crossing borders-no berms can stop them!
Arizona ants ,Tejas ants,they fill homes
chopping trees to make permanent nests
wherein they breed like suburbants
Exterminators in Nazi Germany and Russia and China
have attempted to control the population
but humants are everywhere now-even on space stations!
Antarticants and Arcticants displace polar bears
There seems to be no final solution!
Plagues of these humants merely stopped them for a while
and diseases like polio and smallpox and AIDS have failed
In the Outback,giant ant nests remain -as evidence
of previous ant civilizations that co-operated together
Corporate humanants and working stiff mutants
have built over every ant colony
Competition for food resources has reached war level-
oil and water wars make more earth uninhabitable
Perhaps these humants and mutants might consider
allowing space for more species other than themselves?
All evidence suggests otherwise!They are territorial and aggressive!
They bite the hants that feed them.Some are poisonous and toxic
Beware Humanants!Soon they will displace all other living species!

MEMORIAL DAY 2010

i remember you best at the peace demo streets
we were all wanting harmonies /survival)
they are thin as our hair/but they still persist
while the wars 1000 bodies devour
The only weapons we shared were our laughter
you with guitar/her with her songs
(it was a miracle we are still here)
Song Of Experience said old wise Mr Blake
(we believed /everyone was a prophet)
Now the streets are for police /and our memories
are strip searched and mined for nostalgia
Was it our youth that sent us out so
pure with a passion for living?
Somewhere in time,we became free verse and rhyme
became extinct as our "peace,love and freedom!"
Endless as wars /bottomless black budgets
even if we spoke,we are sidelined
for jobs are the bait that traps youth with a gun
to kill others as their only occupation
and its no longer draft that makes for hard rain
it is the prospect of paid volunteerism
Talk with the young though ipod and ipad
they see only laptops as dancers
i remember you best when we all walked for peace
We got age/perhaps a slight wisdom
Memory a hotel/we check out early
leave the room empty for the next generation
will want to remember their bravery soon
We are all here under one moon
Only some will be leaving us soon
wanting to be remembered,too..
FOR ALL CIVILIANS

"WHEREVER TWO OR MORE GATHER..

Old churches are closing,consolidating
as congregations age,die,become divided by doctrines
Even the best pastors face recession tactics
Even the most loving communities cannot afford them
We are seeking truly humane beamings.She is one of them
Jamaican,black,large as love and twice as charismatic
She it was who visited hospital when my beloved was ill,and
Reverend Bobby has only days with us before she must leave
She is a gypsy sans portfolio-no church has opened their doors
to her special care or pastorship-so she must leave
We gather in the Green Belt to remember St Phillips
That church too closed due to diminished attendance
and the past attendees have brought food,drinks,and children
to remember the community that once sustained them
Creek water is still and quite polluted
Saturday is summer hot and quite humid
We wait and talk and chat and listen
amused by the miniature circus of tiny children
like waiting for Godot,the talk is of past,and
Reverend Bobby did not arrive before we had left
Kindness always finds a home.She is loved and beloved
Somewhere,someone knows her-or now knows of her
Please tell her we are all homeless in a recession
but we still treasure her smile and loving wisdom

GEMINI SEASON

At Frances Badgett's Birthday Party
i was asked"do you have any in Spanish?"
She wanted her mother to read the "poesia"
"Ne hablo espanol"...I asked her to translate
then found another poet's bilingual book
enough to bridge Tejas with Texas
She was satisfied then(although she did not read it
When the KINDLE executive was questioned
about ebooks and ipads and competing formulae
he said "less then 10% of Americans are serious readers"
Tonight they cook jalapeno peppers,sausage,steak and chicken
My vegetarian friends get guacamole and a tray of vegetables
Bottles of alcohol stand ready to fall
An ipod plays loud songs from tiny square speakers on the wall
Smiles burst from relatives,workmates,friends and all
the dogs are slipped meats from the tables a la Elizabethan times
We are always primal.Every age is now.
Gather your love to add interest.Invest more!
This birthing season means children are watching
as elders seek wisdom in doing more than surviving
Her job is serving repossession notices in a recession.
Her work gets larger every day.Tonight she relaxes
in the company of those who trust her
And poetry can wait..

Dennis Hopper, Cinematic Iconoclast, Dies at 74Saturday, May 29, 2010 5:45 PM

Always one drug ahead
and in the portrayal of Lost Angels
He showed the dark side of the 60s
survived artistically and cinematically
until,in our time,at 74-gone.
Always we see him as young
Rebel on the range with attitude
BLUE VELVET menace,EASY RIDER style
misogynist,artist,party animal(he inhaled!
legend in Hollywood among gossip columnists
"Living life to the lees!"-now he leaves(involuntarily
Like Hunter S Thompson,part legend,part lame
he brought authenticity to his acting fame
directing and writing scripts he acted in
working with the best and blessed in Lotus Land
He stamped his style upon so many mediocre films
We may never see on screen his like again
This is to thank him for those adolescent visions
that sustain us all through APOCALYPSE NOW!(redux version)
When life and art are one-our time here is done...
I am not sure if they screen Dennis Hopper films in Heaven...
(he never made a PG version....

CONTEMPORARY CLICHES 101

ARISTOTLE 101
I do believe we are evolving
via shock and awe to BP spills
forced to refine our behavior
so plants and animals might survive
and thrive on this multi-species globe
This is a closed system.Teleology demands
consciousness at all levels
leading to philosopher-Queens smarter than bombs
who do more than lay down their life for their families
They pave new ways via example for peaceful co-existences
Look in the ruins of modern cities!
Permaculture farms and community gardens
Volunteerism and heroic examples.The only way we can live
is with each other -gentle as lovers,softer than friends
able to forgive because we dare not forget

WOODSTOCK 2010
Hippie commune as Temporary Autonomous Zone-
wherein and whereby we gather discrete as particles
each with private withdrawal space/so that each
might remain the center of their own autonomy.
Open mikes and Community Festivals
diluting toxic fears with non-chemical smiles
adding to each the All.Atman Universal.
So we might replace the "i"that blinds
us to multivalent possibilities inherent within
this tiny spinning island that we must live within

ENDINGS ?-or beginnings?
We all know one who slipped across teh borders
whether to leave his body suit down by the river
or zip angel winged into Forevers.Their endings continue\
to haunt us with the possibilities of consciousness-
they may be gone but grains of their sand
lodge in the beach of our burials.
Whether or not we return or remember
it is what we do in this moment now
determines what happens in the next...

Wednesday, May 26, 2010

NAKE(MYSTERY)ISLAND

"We used to canoe /kayak upon these waters"
"Imagine the surprise when elementary students
found a huge turtle in the clearing-
then a snake slithered across their path!"
Circles old as fire gather to be with each other
Each carries a plate of happiness,a pot of harmonies
This can be anywhere-a dedicated space/a sanctuary
for the unknown travelers to share their wings
Imagine it is May ,and night,with cloud covered moon
Imagine that a raft conveys you from that pier near Youth Hostel
to the treelined clearing on Snake Island
You have brought food and guitars
in the name of some Argentine Revolution
(and it is true-one or two will dance and sing..
Usually it is the fool moon that calls-
yet now the need for gathering is paramount
and reason can follow afterwards
Tentative songs begin-old as folk,new as now
Voices are raised to sing-sweet and low,lovingly
Each visitor self-initiates with welcoming invitation
to add their hearts stone to the soup of the night-
both Austinian and Argentine.This could be anywhere-
a peaceful zone beneath the radar-away from traffic noise
with an unknown crew,singing the stars to sleep
until the hour boat comes,and it is time to dream

Sunday, May 23, 2010

THE PIES OF CHILDHOOD

cheap,generic,with kangaroo and donkey
Part of the abattoir pleasure between caramel gravy
was to spit out the inedible gristley bits
eat the heated meats,and ponder upon English origins
Between flaky crusts,an ocean of unknowns
List of contents Australian fauna/introduced species
Now my tastebuds recall me back again
to Yatala with my sister to eat the past
(but it has changed again!).Expensive
and fresher,with hundreds more flavors
now vegetarian options -more than cottage pies
and pies with peas-a menu of McDonalds proportions
welcome me to History of Pie#101
I eat steak and kidney.I eat the generic
I ponder seafood pies (absent)
and wonder if the history of Australia
is between the lips of each Aussie pie.
Devoured at footy matches,with beer to drown in
as a meal on building sites,and now with me
recycling recycled meats,asking the impossible-
that one's past can stretch into our present moments
and become a repast rather than a mere temporary meal
FOOD FOR THOUGHT on Mya 23,2010

Saturday, May 22, 2010

before this moon becomes the sun

reflect upon .moon waters.calm.still.
dreamfish slaptailing sandbars
starfish sprinkling skylines.cloudfish ocean sky.
rainfish splotching windshields.windfish sailing yachts
nightfish tidal lights.dayfish incoming light.
soon Empires will shadow ,crack and fall
another cycle round one sun.cannot return
even dreams burn.even memories Polaroid.
youfish swimming upstream.mefish watching television.
midnightfish hunting moons.morningfish awaiting dawn.
surrealists gather in bent boats.curled canoes.bright flower petals
ask that artfish and peacefish be allowed inn
Room on this Arkfish wishes all of every to survive
Particle fish filleted by harsh glare Light
(safer in shadows(fish bite!) Fisherpersons gather nets of night
shred in waters of delight/let moonfish escape
like dolphins,whales,turtles -our ancestor fish
mass graves.Tinned and canned and cut up like moonlight.
Eye of fish as dull as classroom.Winged,finned,freedoms-gone!
Ghostfish seek their family memories in ponds of farmedfish.
Wild extinct.Labels lie!If we were wilde-
would we ever be caught in rhyme?

Friday, May 21, 2010

Global Law

i see no global law that binds
influence is the best medicine
coupled with example post articulation
remedies exist /solutions are at hand
what is needed now is fewer rules of law
and more love to implement alternatives

ask your art,your songs,your poems where they stand
each is as individual-woman,child,man-
all have passages and stages of initiation
we are all endlessly beginning again to understand
we are not in control of this planet
this one world is teaching us again
what is necessary is to align ourselves
with greater wisdom as this planet dreams us
into and out of existence

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

DONKEY KONG

Day trippers post Mothers Day-bus from Banyo
to toilets in a country town
because there are none at the donkey farm!
Mule/burro/ass/donkey-NOT a horse
Outback days/heavy lifters-happy to serve
Stock protectors-from foxes,wild dogs,dingos
Desert creatures-so they don't need food or water
Sure-footed and willing to learn the ways of ropes and harness
They have caried loads since Jerusalem
5 million feral in outback desert regions
Culls have wiped out the wild in Queensland
yet they linger/hidden in ravines/beneath trees
hard to see from a helicopter-Northern Territory/West Australia
German "donkey lady"rescues them-from knackeries
dumped on her property/abandoned after failed enterprises
She has 29 now -all named and in her will
She has tamed and resc ued over 500
She will not extend her hand to other animals
yet a singular dromedary lingers with her beloved burros
("he thinks he is a mule,too"she explains)
Photographs of World War(Simpsons)donkeys are produced
She explains their many modes of usefulness
As guards and guardians,pack animals and desert travellers
We photograph and puzzle as to why anyone would wish this-
to rescue an animal classified(like the dingo and fox)-as a pest
Then I look again at the aged in this coach
tourists on a day trip to a donkey ranch
Their load in life nearly ended-seen as pests by all their young
They have come to see their reflection
as they file back on/with only a look
at fences and harness and duties to carry
Four legs good-two legs too old
We leave the donkeys on their own
proceed to our stable homes

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Qantas flight 16 diverted to rockhampton

Fog in Brisbane.Promised storms did not arrive
Bright sunshine to welcome.So we drove to University of Queensland
Two years ago,my father died and left his only body for research
Each year,the University honors such donors by invitation
Professor Wally Wood started small-but now 89 people
last year gave their only holy body for research
We are among hundreds of relatives and friends of such-
the Governor General of Queensland among Vice Chancellors
and dignitaries of all shapes and persuasions
join Imans and rabbis and christian ministers in expressing gratitude
for those who left their body behind them for science
needs such physical evidence to learn to heal and cure..
A choir strikes up songs of joy.Wally is 75 ,still full of joy and love.
He speaks of the necessity of adaptation,change,and scientific research
with an abundance of gratitudes directed towards those present who shared
belief in something other than themselves.We listen,then pick up flowers
and handwritten notes of thanks written by present day students of anatomy
My father was honored by name in the Book of Remembrance
I have already given my only body (posthumously)to science
This remembrance/gratitude ritual was/is worthy of his life
We drive away from Queensland University,bonded by generosity of spirit
And the notion that our bodies serve useful purposes
both now and in these lives beyond our tiny span of time
TOGETHER on May 6,2010

Monday, May 3, 2010

COWPAT POETRY

I heard an old time cowboy
speak of lands now long time lost
of cattle driven crazy
by new dudes at high cost

They drove longhorns to market
all the way up to Ft .Worth
It has become a tourist attraction
Among skyscrapers=stockyards!

Now longhorns are a relic
like cowboys long time gone
Pilgrims with their digital cameras
replace their cowboy songs

Old cowboys are retirees
or greenhorns on a lark
The stockyards soon to be replaced
by another jogging park

And we are as those cattle
We herd and stomp and stamp
for admission to tourist attractions
costs as much as our lost lands

So-cowboys of another time
Come gather in your ghosts
like bison/Native Americans
We cannot pay the cost
of what is lost
gone from us.
dust.

ONE MORE SADDLE EMPTY NOW
one more cross to bear
He rose in to the sunset
We never knew where

Now cowboys are our history
live only in museums
He tried to rope and brand but
only in his dreams

He followed all rodeos
Eight minutes in the air
A wild horse beneath him
Tossed him without a care

Broken legs and arms again
(adjusting to the pain)
Now he has finally gone we know
We will not see his like again

Thanks to John Levacy for Cowboy Poetry Workshop@Forrest Fest April 30/May 1.