We were also fortunate enough to dine with him earlier that same afternoon, and through our conversations, an image has been emerging of an affable and thoughtful man, a shrewd and discerning figure who is happy to give insight on topics with which is familiar while intelligently shying away from spouting off on topics with which he is not. When asked about the recent raid on the homes of protesters at the Republican National Convention, Hitchens admits that he heard police forces involved had used pepper spray, but not much else. Why use pepper spray, he muses? "Because they have it."
When probed on his opinion on the current presidential candidates and how he might vote as an American Citizen, he states that he doesn't think of any of the candidates as particularly presidential, and he supposes that, like many of today's prospective voters, he is not sure of what to do. He expresses concern over Obama's assertions of belief that Jesus died for his sins. "How he knows is beyond me," he quips. He says that McCain doesn't strike him as the type to spend his time "thinking about the supernatural." He also states that he is under the impression that McCain is more interested in the defense of secularism, and sees he war in Iraq as an attack on theocratic fascism. In spite of the that fact that I am someone that does not personally support this war or war in general, I cannot help but respect Hitchens's views. He is quite obviously well educated on the topic and has clearly thought his position through. He says that in his eyes, the reasons for opposing the war are "more dubious" than the reasons for staying in.
In reference to the vice presidential nominees, Hitchens states that he is wary of Biden, a Catholic and a man that he sees as ill-equipped for the job. He is displeased with Pailin's appointment, as well. She is "a woman designed to please the fundamentalists," according to Hitchens. He adds, as occurs to many of us, that her nomination was a ploy to earn votes from constituents eager to vote for someone of like genitalia.
Expanding on his feelings about the Iraq war, he admits that he is not sure if the goal of theocratic obliteration can be realized, but that it is not an excuse to give up the fight. He does, however, feel that the war has brought sufficient degradation to Al Qaeda, and that this in and of itself can be seen as a victory of "calculable proportions."
Our interview cut short, Hitchens is presently whisked away to take his place onstage, where he delivers what I will term nothing short of a powerhouse performance. I have learned that there have been detractors to Hitchens's oratorical prowess on this evening, based on everything from what the man was wearing to how much money he may or may not have been paid for his appearance, but to those of us who were paying attention to his actual words, (a novel idea,) he shone with all the exuberance and cleverness that is typical of his public speech. And yes, he is caustic at times and refuses to back down in the face of utter nonsense. Is it that he was unduly rude, or is it that our audience forgets who they are going to see on the way out the door, or may, perhaps, just be a little too fucking sensitive? But I digress...
Prior to their debate, a friendly conversation had taken place betwixt Hitchens and Turek, which rightly set the tone for the evening's festivities. Eagerly shaking Hitchens's hand, Turek tells him what a fan he is. "It's early," replies Hitchens with a playful grin, eliciting a knowing laugh from those present in the green room (Turek included). Hitchens makes good on his humorous prediction throughout the ensuing debate, trouncing on Turek's arguments as well as many of the long held tenets of religious superstition as only he can.
Turek's arguments, admittedly, are stale, illogical, and frankly expose the author of I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist's ignorance on the subjects about which he so emphatically writes and speaks. He also chose to ignore the university's request to refrain from discussing creationism (your humble narrator and Hitchens politely refuse to use the euphemism "intelligent design") as if it is a viable fact and not the psychotic argument of desperate fiction that it is. He claims to support the big bang theory, asserting that he "know[s] who banged it." (You can't make this kinda shit up.) He tries to morph the Second Law of Thermodynamics, Einstein's theory of Relativity, and a number of other scientific and mathematical principles to suit the needs of his Christian philosophy without ever explaining how or why it relates to his beliefs.
Among his crudely wrought and terribly egocentric claims is his belief that the planet Jupiter was created specifically to divert "cosmic dust" from hurtling towards Earth, supposedly providing proof of the existence of a divine creator's foresight. When Hitchens confronts him with the fact that popular scientific opinion holds that Earth shall almost certainly be destroyed by cosmic forces at some point, Turek is quick to backpedal and claim that God will surely prevent this from happening when the time comes. Apparently this guy has no idea how many Christians out there are wringing their hands in anticipation of the apocalyptic destruction they feel they've been promised.
His other postulations are familiar to anyone who has spent time on an atheist message board; that human beings are incapable of conceiving of an abstract concept like morality (that's right, good v. bad) without God, that life certainly could NOT have arisen from randomness, blah, blah, blah... I stopped trying to give his arguments respect when he, in what appeared to be all sincerity, asked for an atheistic explanation for how DNA came to be. Clearly this is an individual that has not done his homework, has maybe never heard of abiogenesis, at the very least obviously does not have a basic grasp of the notion of slow change over time. As I stated to a member of Turek's camera crew who later interviewed me, I feel I could have successfully dismantled his tired and egregiously foolish arguments.
Hitchens could have run circles around this guy while being waterboarded, and one almost feels a twinge of sympathy for his victim. As eloquently and passionately as he always does, he condemns the system that tells people they "exist solely by someone else's permission," that they are doomed to the "mind-forged manacles" of hellfire and eternal damnation, and rails with indignation against the sadistic servility that binds us all in debt to a fictitious deity. When asked by a clearly flustered Turek to define in atheistic terms what is sinister, Hitchens replies sharply, and with the single word, "masochism." When again later bombarded by Turek as to what he believes to be the origins of evil, Hitchens again quickly replies, "religion," adding that true morality "comes from humanists and has been stolen by religion." The power and timing with which he delivers these simplistic but profound words is spot on.
Hitchens also explores his irreverent and whimsical side, cracking jokes and making reference at one point to an episode of Family Guy (Peter mistakenly assumes his Cheerio's are spelling the message "Ooooo"). When asked about his view of abortion, he concedes that it should be avoided if possible, but it is necessary to have available in situations where birth control fails, for example. He adds, though, that if views of those such as Aquinas are taken into consideration, and sperm can be counted as a form of human life, "then handjobs are genocide." (Amid the subsequent laughter, he mumbles "and don't even get me started about blowjobs.") When asked what gives life purpose, aside from exalting the joys of sex, he also admits to indulging in the pleasure of "gloating over the misfortunes of other people." (His delivery is such that the less clever members of the audience may have wondered if he was kidding.) Hitchens also tells us that when asked what, to him, are the two most erotic words in all of language could be, he replies slowly, "captive audience."
Clearly this is a ma after my own heart, or at least my intellectual sensibilities. He is a skilled and entertaining orator, creative and knowledgeable thinker, and we who are alive today are quite lucky to be able to share this point in time with such a magnificent proponent of secularization and individual human right.
Frank Turek would appear to agree. As he had Hitchens sign his copy of God Is Not Great, he made sure to audibly reassure him that he was still, indeed, a fan.
Details of debate live HERE.
In other atheist news, I shall be attending Edwin Kagin's Answers in Atheism radio show for the third time the Thursday following the debate to discuss my experience. Should be interesting.
I'm sure I'll post some personal musings and links to the subsequent video I'd imagine will come of this debate as well.
There is yet another angle to the factory farm issue that most people might not take into consideration, and that is the issue of well, filth... We squeal and throw a fit when we find out a restaurant prepares the food we eat in an unsafe and disgusting environment. Hell, as Americans, we nervously dive for the hand sanitizer and Lysol spray if someone sneezes within a mile radius of us. Grocery chains now provide Clorox wipes at the entrances of their stores to wipe down their filth-ridden shopping carts. (Howard Hughes really was an innovator ahead of his time. Just imagine what kooky stuff he'd be making bank off of right now if he lived in our age of misophobia...) The Board of Health has very stringent guidelines under which salons, tattoo shops, and any kind of food vendors have to operate. But what about the places where the food initially comes from? What about the killing floors of factory farms? What about the cages and crates in which the animals are raised in the first place?
For your consideration, I submit the following...
2. Factory farms by their nature are unsanitary and potentially unhealthy to human beings.
Aside from the cruelty (which I am doing my best to totally circumvent in this tirade) and the environmental damage factor, meats and other products that come from factory farms are, well, gross. Living conditions on factory farms are gross. We eat animals that wade in their own waste...
"Inside the densely populated buildings, where they are confined their entire lives, enormous amounts of waste accumulate. The resulting ammonia levels commonly cause painful burns to the birds' skin, eyes, and respiratory tracts." -Inma Estevez, “Ammonia and Poultry Welfare,” Poultry Perspectives (MD Cooperative Extension), 2002; 4 (1).
Take the burning of the animals out of that, and any way you slice it, you've still got animals marinating in ammonia. (More precisely, marinating in their own excreta.) If the chemical does that to the birds that are forced to live in it every day, just how healthy can it be to ingest their meat?
"Decomposing corpses are found in cages with live birds. Tens of millions (approximately 14%) of egg-laying hens die during production each year." -USDA APHIS VS, Reference of 1999 Table Egg Layer Management in the U.S., January 2000., USDA NASS, Agricultural Statistics 2007.
So we've got animals crammed into cages marinating in ammonia and rooming with rotting corpses. Mmmmmmm.
"In the midst of avian flu outbreak in Darjeeling, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals India (PETA) released graphic undercover video footage of crowded and filthy conditions on chicken and egg factory farms, which leading health experts – including those at the United Nations – blame for the spread of the deadly H5N1 strain of bird flu. The report documents the scalding, starvation and mutilation of birds as well as the potential for the spread of disease from chickens to humans." -The Himalayan Beacon
I also found a link to a site which hosts a number of videos specifically concerning the health risks involved with eating animal products, one of which gives us a glimpse at why pork poses such issues...
Diseased Pigs Wind Up on Our Plates
I've mentioned before that livestock accounts for a tremendous amount of the corn and soy in this country, but what else is our dinner eating?
"Just take a look at what's being fed to the animals you eat.
Same Species Meat
Diseased Animals
Feathers, Hair, Skin, Hooves, and Blood
Manure and Other Animal Waste
Plastics
Drugs and Chemicals
Unhealthy Amounts of Grains"
-UCSUSA.org
Really?! ...Really? Animal waste? Blood?
Are you fucking kidding me?!
The same site goes on to say:
"Feed for any food animal can contain cattle manure, swine waste, and poultry litter. This waste may contain drugs such as antibiotics and hormones that have passed unchanged through the animals' bodies.
The poultry litter that is fed to cattle contains rendered cattle parts in the form of digested poultry feed and spilled poultry feed. This is another loophole that may allow mad cow agents to infect healthy cattle."
...And:
"The advent of 'mad cow' disease (also known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE) raised international concern about the safety of feeding rendered cattle to cattle. Since the discovery of mad cow disease in the United States, the federal government has taken some action to restrict the parts of cattle that can be fed back to cattle.
However, most animals are still allowed to eat meat from their own species. Pig carcasses can be rendered and fed back to pigs, chicken carcasses can be rendered and fed back to chickens, and turkey carcasses can be rendered and fed back to turkeys. Even cattle can still be fed cow blood and some other cow parts."
I really haven't eaten all day while doing research for this blog.
Here's one last tidbit I'll drop in this category before we move on.
"Animal feed legally can contain rendered road kill, dead horses, and euthanized cats and dogs." -UCSUSA.org
Yup... ROAD KILL.
R O A D K I L L.
So what say we, intelligent mammals with brains six times larger than they ought to be for our body mass? If the axiom rings true and we are what we eat, how do we feel about eating manure, blood, roadkill, harmful chemicals, etc.?
rush as shuttering flutters
closed -
with them comes
euphoric melt
without the need to
dose.}
Sprawling thru the mindscape,
the Blank Canvas,
the Clean Slate,
I carefully unpack the things
I've bottled up to date...
Fitful hands
& wanton tongues
& flesh on heathen flesh -
two infidels in union
are by nature
wholly blessed!
Unabashed,
sans inhibition;
exploring,
tasting,
more!
(Such is reptilian impetus
from diapsid wisdom's home.)
And oh, to finally know you,
to lick
as flame
your skin -
to take vow and to
consecrate
would sanctify our sin.
And oh, their crews have fiction,
(you know better than
would I,)
Agnus Dei would be I
then
within your ghostly eye.
A beacon is your altar.
Your word, "woman,"
swears me in.
I sacrifice most humbly
of myself
to wicked whims.
Each gasp,
each moan,
a song of praise
unto thine wond'rous ways;
"O, Father!"
echoes out
her throat's
most passionate display.
As currency I offer
(as our Eve did to her own)
a mouthful of my knowledge,
and a space in which to grow...
Sun in which to beat
new wings
still first ecdysis fresh;
still wet with hope and
promise
of a Morning Glorious yet.
I shan't wet feet with tears and hair
as did the Rabbi's wife,
but shall provide a lamp to serve
as ample guiding light.
Together
we will learn just what
it truly means to
Live
beyond the grasp of guilt and fear,
but what we have to give.
We'll trace our path thru
Yggdrasil
from root to greenest branch,
and build our own
mythology
and take each second's chance.
The rapture we shall bask in
will drown out
the Falsehood's din.
Enlightenment will then outshine
the Endtime's vapid kin.
While they search for a Savior
we shall find it in ourselves,
enshrouded not in mystery but
the curious urge to delve
into pursuit of truth,
the undiscovered,
yet unknown...
And we will share our findings,
testify unto the clones,
the Men created Equal
who must thirst as you and I
to be quenched in different waters
than the brainwash of denial.
We'll carry on the torch
of rawest reason's mighty glow,
passed down from our Prometheus
to thwart Dark Age undertow.
And with no one would I rather
take on such a lofty aim...
I take up Hunger's invitation,
so your innocence I claim,
only to replace with
inner strength
and trust in self;
I'd defile virgin wilderness,
I'd burn text from mildew'd shelf
before I'd dare to compromise
the virtue of thy heart.
Instead I offer eager hand
at our winding pathway's start.
Here's what I had come up with...
( Click! )
P.S. This blog allows comments from non-lj readers!
I enabled anonymous commenting, which I didn't realize hadn't already been done. This means YOU can respond, should you choose to do so, to any and all of the asinine things I've been babbling out into cyberspace.
"The underlying presumption -- that a human being has some kind of property rights over another human being’s body -- is unspoken because it is assumed to be obvious. But with what justification?" -Dawkins
Original article here...
Beautiful stuff. I wish these sorts of things were more obvious to the public at large. I wish we didn't all have this intense fear of allowing our loved ones to experience love and sex with others, to allow them to experience life to the fullest, for their heart to be as fulfilled as possible. I am not immune to this kind of thinking. I feel jealousy, though I know it is irrational. I also stopped eating meat when I could no longer ignore all the reasons I shouldn't. I refused to continue going to church when I realized how little I believed what was being said, how little of it reflected how I actually thought and felt. I need to shed this jealousy. I want to be able to give someone the opportunity to explore themselves that I would appreciate being granted myself. For a long time I've been interested in the swinger and polyamorous lifestyles. I do not think all people are wired for monogamy.
Just as there are different sexual preferences, I believe there are a limitless number of relationship configurations that might be appropriate for different people at different times. I'm in a place in my life where I don't think monogamy could possibly be for me. Maybe this will change in a few years... Perhaps, like bisexuality, it is a lasting condition. I know myself and my heart. I do not personally like the idea behind monogamy, and I believe it to be fundamentally unhealthy for me. I think this is the case with other people, too. I would like to be in a situation where I would be okay with having a primary partner, but also allowing that person and myself to enjoy sex and possibly also relationships with other people. Ideally I'd like for this to be my life, but I've been told so many things about relationships, about cheating, have had my feelings hurt over this kind of thing so many times... It's a clusterfuck.
I hope to get there someday. I'm doing away slowly but surely with the superfluous programming I've been fed by society my whole life, with the bad habits, the illogical tendencies, the nonsense. It's a bit like spring cleaning for the mind. Jealousy is that box in the corner of the attic I have been avoiding. It's covered in cobwebs. I need to just pitch it.
I also had this video pop into my head lately and thought it would be good fun to throw it up on here... As anyone might be able to guess, I'm not a fan of Fred (godhatesfags) Phelps. I found this smashing video once upon a time of Michael Moore giving him the business. I have to share...
Michael Moore vs. Fred Phelps
It's a short post today, folks, but I've got more brewing. Hope that's enough food for thought for this round.
Hearts,
Me.
So for those who haven't heard the term, what is a factory farm?
"Factory farming is the practice of raising farm animals in confinement at high stocking density, sometimes used more generally to describe operating a farm as a factory, as is typical in industrial farming by agribusiness." -Wiki
Without too much extraneous bullshit, I'd like to get down to brass tacks. Factory farms are inherently bad for everyone except for those who stand to yield a profit from them, including the consumer, the environment, and the animals that are produced and held on these farms. As Americans, we have what can be described as an unhealthy detachment from our food. We eat foods processed in such a manner that they only vaguely resemble the original ingredients from which they are derived. In particular, meats are processed and presented in such a way that if we choose not to think about it, we never have to be confronted with the concept of where it comes from, what went into making it, and whether or not the animals suffer on the way to our plate. Indeed, I've run across many people who openly laugh and scoff when I mention the fact that I not only refuse to eat meat, but that I abstain from buying and eating products with milk, egg, or honey ingredients, as well.
I try not to be too judgmental, for I remember a time when I pictured milk coming from cows who are hand milked one at a time by a kindly farmer on a family-run farm. I recall thinking all eggs came from similar farms, owned by decent, hardworking people, from chickens that were allowed to roam free and enter the coop to lay their eggs at their leisure. I pictured Tyson buying all their meat products from farms not entirely dissimilar from old re-runs of Lassie I'd seen as a child. It could have been pure naivete, but this is how I honestly thought. I think this is how most people like to think the world works.
Oftentimes I get the argument from Christians that "God put animals here for people to consume," or "cows are made to be milked by human beings," or "what else could a cow be for? It's one, big, walking piece of meat." (This last one is especially amusing, considering all the growth hormones administered by human beings in a conscious effort to make cows even bigger pieces of walking meat.) I would assume that for those that know I am an atheist, it would not be hard to understand why I am of a different opinion. For some, it is. Some people have never given it a second thought. God put animals here for us to eat, and who am I to defy God? The Bible has a lot of conflicting messages about what is clean and unclean to eat, but at one point Jehovah tells us...
Genesis 9:3 “Every moving thing that lives shall be food for you. I have given you all things, even as the green herbs. But you shall not eat flesh with its life, that is, its blood.”
So no vivisection or blood drinking, but go apeshit otherwise.
As a student of biology, evolution, zoology, and so on, I understand things a bit differently. I know that a guy with a ZZ Top beard and a white bathrobe didn't painstakingly place animals on the surface of the Earth like a child arranging his toys for display. ("Zebras go here in Africa, kangaroos in Australia, and cows and chickens in America!") I know that every species that exists today only exists because of a series of processes including gradual change over time and trial and error that took place over billions of years. What does our friend, acclaimed author, ethologist, and Simonyi Professor for the Public Understanding of Science (Oxford), Richard Dawkins have to say about eating meat?
"What I am doing is going along with the fact that I live in a society where meat eating is accepted as the norm, and it requires a level of social courage which I haven’t yet produced to break out of that. It’s a little bit like the position which many people would have held a couple of hundred years ago over slavery. Where lots of people felt morally uneasy about slavery but went along with it because the whole economy of the South depended upon slavery."
So basically, I don't like the fact that I eat meat, but it's fucking everywhere.
I feel you, Richard, I do. In the era of the Baconator at Wendy's and mysterious beef ingredients in McDonald's french fries, it is kinda fucking hard to avoid. Do I think that's an adequate excuse to throw in the vegan towel and go back to consuming rotting carcass? Not so much. Do I admit that it is difficult, almost trying at times to exist in a world, a culture where meat is so readily and almost exclusively available? Of course it is. To continue Dr. Dawkins' analogy, just because it was hard to oppose slavery, does that mean it's okay to hide your head in the sand? I personally don't think so. If I only have to amend my eating habits in order to boycott an industry that thrives on animal torture, excessive waste, and negative consequences to the environment, then so be it.
Many intellectuals try to hide behind the argument that the act of not eating meat is taken on purely for emotional reasons. Because we vegans don't wanna hurt the cute widdle animals kinda argument. Allow me, over the course of this series, to present some arguments that aren't based on the fact that animals are tortured and abused to obtain meat and dairy products. (That being said, it still escapes me why, precisely, that isn't a valuable enough argument. If you wouldn't pull a cat's skin off while it was still alive or shove a live puppy into a meat grinder, I don't know why it's okay to do it to a calf or chicken.)
But let's get into this finally...
( Part I: Factory farms hurt the environment )
I find that I collect quotations. As I've said before (and will likely say again) I believe in allowing someone else to do the talking if they've said it better.
--
"What's happening in science is the most interesting thing in the world, and if you don't agree with me just fuck off, because I'm not interested in talking to you" -Alun Anderson, Editor-in-Chief of New Scientist
"Jesus didn't die on the cross so you could touch your dicks together in front of my cereal spoon." -Louis CK (satirizing faith-based homophobia)
"We don't have a word for not believing in Zeus, which is to say we are all atheists in respect to Zeus. And we don't have a word for not being an astrologer." -Sam Harris
“I can now look at you in peace. I no longer eat you.” -Franz Kafka
"Truth, in matters of religion, is simply the opinion that has survived." -Oscar Wilde
"...One of the truly bad effects of religion is that it teaches us that it is a virtue to be satisfied with not understanding." -Richard Dawkins
"If the history of science shows us anything, it is that we get nowhere by labeling our ignorance 'God'." -Jerry Coyne
"Even without religion, we can become a good human being." -Tenzin Gyatso, 14th Dalai Lama
"Mystics exult in mystery and want it to stay mysterious. Scientists exult in mystery for a different reason: it gives them something to do." -Richard Dawkins
"The one process now going on that will take millions of years to correct is the loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us." -Edward O. Wilson
"There is no superiority of one color over another or one ethnic group over another. Intelligence and stupidity are evenly distributed across the planet." -Fatimah Jackson
"Thinkers may prepare revolutions, but bandits must carry them out." -Ingrid Newkirk
- Music:The Mars Volta, "L'Via L'Viaquez"
- Mood:amused
(^Not a typo.)
Heathen
(Chorus)
Hey there, nonbeliever,
hey atheist heathen,
just where do you think your soul will go
when your body dies?
Hey there, nonbeliever,
hey atheist heathen,
just how do you know what's right from wrong
when you have no God?
1.
You sell out your soul
to the next highest bidder,
You're no better than a prostitute
(who earns an honest living)
all the while you plug your ears,
lie to yourself and to your children.
You inflict them with
your isms, and your fears,
your superstitions.
Teach them how to hate
in the good name of religion,
tell them that their God is thirsty
for a blood sacrifice.
(Chorus)
Hey there, nonbeliever,
hey atheist heathen,
don't you think he sent his son to die
so we would survive?
Hey there, nonbeliever,
you godless, mongrel heathen,
when you burn in Hell you will regret
how you spent your life.
2.
Hey now, pastor, you're the monster
with your crooked rook and flock,
why don't you finally do some good work
after all your flimsy talk?
Do you believe in half of what you say
or is it crowd control?
How do you ever sleep at night
knowing what you do by day?
You teach the crowd to hate,
to persecute for their religion,
tell them that their god is thirsty
for a blood sacrifice,
have them cut their willing throats,
have them pay the final price.
(Chorus)
Hey there, nonbeliever,
hey atheist heathen,
why don't you join the feast of saints
while we chew the fat?
Hey there, soulless demon,
deplorable heathen,
repent now while you have the chance,
your time is at hand.
3.
The message should be peace and love,
a brother's understanding,
it's not all just a contest
to prove who God loves more.
Don't you think if God was real
he would love all of his children?
Do you think he'd pit them all
against each other like this?
--
This one's not quite finished. I do intend for it to be a song. In my head, I envision a conversation back and forth between an angry mob and a "heretic" tied to a stake or locked in a pillory, the choruses being the mob, the verses being the prisoner responding. I tend to visualize scenes with songs, and I would love to turn this into a song and shoot a video for it. When the cannibalistic insinuations come in, I picture the crowd rushing after the lone heathen and pulling them apart with their bare hands, stock footage-type images of packs of wild dogs tearing apart a carcass edited in and all. This mindbaby has been incubating for a while.
--
I Take Pictures
(Chorus)
In the night time I am
dreaming
(I am dreaming x2)
My heart sings songs
of when we will be
seeing you again
1.
When I go to take a picture
(take a picture x2)
the camera eclipses
everything that isn't
you.
When the images are crowded,
I cannot get through for all the
pleasant thoughts I think of you.
When I start to come unraveled,
I take a breath and
think of when I'm
seeing you again.
2.
When I look into the mirror
(in the mirror x2)
I wonder if who I am
looking at is really you.
When my body gets so lonely,
she and I are with ourselves
and I'm pretending I am you.
When my hands, they want
to wander,
I'm pretending they are not mine,
I am pretending it is you.
3.
In the daytime I am
not me.
In the daytime, I am someone
that I do not like to be.
I am longing in the daytime
(in the daytime x2)
to be dreaming so that I
can drink your beauty once again.
For in night time
we are lovers,
(we are lovers x2)
and at night you come
and tell me how you
dream of me the same.
--
Obviously also intended to be a song. Written for a female I was crushing on for a time. I would also love to see this with an accompanying video. I picture lots of scenes of women longing for each other, sharing glances, familiar touching, that sort of thing. I picture geishas serving tea together, barely letting their thighs touch as they sit beside each other, trying not to catch the other's eye. I picture finger-wave blondes dancing with male partners, all the while staring uncontrollably at the other female across the room. I picture two butch, nearly bald thin girls in a prison shower bathing each other... All the ideas of women loving each other I personally find appealing. The song would be sung in a very breathy manner. Too bad I don't have a recording studio and world renowned video director at my disposal... Haha.
--
An Ode to My Persephone
At times I am afflicted
by a raw and gnawing
hunger...
(Visions catch the flashbulb lightning -
I'm awake,
and I am dreaming)
I think about how strange
it is,
this grinding, hot desire
is
to wrap my eager fingers,
crooked knots,
around your hair,
(like silk ropes of
Kyoto,
keeping flesh cocoons
in check,)
pull in tighter,
and now tighter,
and cock back sharp,
exposing
the warm, albino porcelain,
vellus hair -
forbidden fruit,
your shapely, quiv'ring, neck;
how I would love to play up on this
with my nose, my mouth, my breath,
to hear your own breathing hasten,
watch your eyelids flutter closed.
How I would love to smother
your wet mouth's timid chastity
and drown you in my kiss;
imbibe your aura,
fin'lly taste you,
lick your essence from its source.
And how polite convention,
monogamous constriction,
impedes such wild craving,
tames it cruelly into cage.
Notions of what mothers
and what wives "ought not to do,"
(under jealous, androus eyes,)
fogs the scene and robs the beauty
of our stark infatuation.
And Oh, how this reminds me of the sudden
all in all
of a previous lifetime's foibles
in these matters of the heart.
I once was wholly mystified
(another of your sisters)
and let such daft convictions
cloud my sense,
eclipse my reason.
I have told you of this sorrow
which still lingers in my soul,
and I have vowed not to relive this,
for I know what madness follows.
Nor would I wish this for you,
or the vilest scourge on Earth,
but would relieve your husband's duties
from his shoulders, from his loins;
transform his cold neglect into
rapture, ecstasy!
Take on his so-called burden,
satiate his love-lorn bride...
Remind you how it feels to be
the object of one's coveting,
a magnetic, ripened bloom.
I have not stamen to your pistol,
but shall show what skill and ardor
can be applied to petals
that cry out not for pollination.
And how I would be honored
to teach you in the ways
of the Daughters of Bilitis,
as did Sappho with her pupils.
To be first to share that joy with you
alone would be enough;
to expand you,
help you realize
all facets of yourself.
I myself have known this,
such
invaluable enlightenment.
To present you with this gift
would be
to me
much more than pleasure.
To make you feel alive,
to bask in your fresh glory
would rejuvenate within me
ancient embers that have smoldered
in the sacred, silver altars
of our huntress, Miss Diana,
who keeps her lunar satellite
eternally in orbit
to intoxicate her subjects
into worshipping each other.
Her gentle, impish whispers,
carried with the nightly winds,
are repeated from within me
when I glimpse upon your body.
I do nothing but count days
until
these lurid, crippling fantasies
make their way into reality,
at sweetest, longest last!
I wait for invitation
by your word,
your hand,
your eyes,
(I admit anticipation
titilates,
antagonizes,)
but til then I am content
to take in your company
in delicious, frantic gasps
and think on what is to come.
--
There are many mythological allusions in this one. I still enjoy celebrating the folk stories and characters from various cultures around the world. Plus they work so nicely for love poems! This one was written for Betty, the girl who ultimately dumped me. Ah well, I got a fine poem out of the deal. So often that is all that remains from fallen civilizations and romantic entanglements - poetry. There are also nods to previous works in here. Most notably the poem/song directly before. In the words of the insanely attractive and talented songstress, Amanda Palmer, "...Don't tell me not to reference my songs within my songs."
I'm sure I'll post more when I think of them or run across them.
- Mood:creative
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