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Like Trial and (Also) like Error


by Darryl Price


We sat all in a muffled
little line up, on the
concrete lips of tomorrow's
sleepy chin, like all the world's  
good little children should, as the parade
limped itself slowly by, slapping itself
against the young day's
excitement like a damaged flat
tire, trying its best
to remain inflated

in spite of the spread thin sunlight
on every other surface around. 
Hungry mice were waiting
in darkly camouflaged 
newspapers, like frozen cars
with their headlights on fire.
Another poet I
know might use this unique
opportunity to
also point out their nails
were glowing like sticks of

pink butter. Finally,
the flyovers looked like
a swarm of thrown, black handled knives,
heading perhaps towards
a beautiful magician's
assistant strapped to
a giant spinning dart
board-- like a left over
party favor. All ribbons and bows. When it
was all done, outside was
suddenly so very cold again. 

2010



Bonus poems:


A Short Snippet of Prehistoric Text

by Darryl Price


 

Words are only one
weapon to be fired upon the stupid
enemy's pyramid of ever growing old, growling, groveling greatly gnashing teeth. He can
easily turn simple sounds in
to many snakes crawling against us. 
That's what you must know
from the very start. They'll take
your private tears and
water-board you with
them in an instant. Your amazing, dazzling beauty just

infuriates them all the
more. They have become
mostly animal thinkers by
now. This means if you
turn your back your neck
will most certainly
be crunched with every
ounce of energy they've got. So why
are we still here? We simply
haven't given up

on each other yet,
and because we can
feel the new birth of music
coming up out of even the smallest of
spent to the forest floor twigs and branches. And because 
to breathe is to desire
to always dance. And because
to smile still means that there's at least some
little hope in the farthest away from us limping along set of
stars that we may still see something amazing.They want to force

you to live and die
in their service, but
this can only ever
be a very bald lie. That's
what we've got that they
will not discover
the source of, because
the only way to
find the true source of love is to become the true source of
love. You can't hate your

way into its familiar cottage in the woods. You can't
fight your way through its thickening walls to get at its brightly painted doorway.
You can't bribe your way in. Too bad for them,eh?
They'll gouge out your eyes without remorse, do you understand this, 
but you won't be blinded like them. 
They'll cut off your breasts
but you won't be less
of a woman. They'll
do anything you
can imagine to us to get us to shut up. You

scare the living shit out of
them every second you're around. The sad part is
they were once just children 
like us.Stardust. Earth.Water.
Still they preach their hateful crap
to all who'll listen.
Billions have become
their book burning drones. 
Killing for flags and for pretend
kings. Killing for false gods in between words branded into books of faked humility.

Killing for the twin gods of money and even more money. 
Killing for more dead fish to come flushing down the rivers of glittering chance.For
that brand new car smell. Numb sexual favors.Another billion in whatever like
hamburgers sold. Again
though there's such a lovely little soft and happy
tune floating around here somewhere, there it is, coming from
somewhere else than all this silly mess we're stewing in or is it simply part of the day's certain odor? Can't you hear
it too? What the hell is that sweetness I smell? Will
you tell us once more, oh
please? What do you ever hear the wind saying in the trees where you're at? Say it out loud for the rest of us to imagine we hear it, too. Please. Tell us the real brave story again and again.We love it when you do that part that way.

Darryl Price   032010


Sometimes I forget

how strange the world is. I'm not so worried
about following your rules. I'm much more
interested in being real. I've never believed
in their definitions of beauty. Yet I've already 

seen many miraculous things on just

about every surface. I figure it's some kind of minute
mojo being more cosmic patterns upon another wall 
somewhere. It's all made out of the same stuff.
But even that's not the whole truth. In 

order to get there we'd have to go everywhere

at once. And yet we dance! I don't have to
give you this poem any more than you have to
read it. The sun will burn out when the sun

will burn out. Until then you have to

continue to climb out of yourself 
into the open air so to speak. The story simply
unfolds around you a million times a second like
a pretty difficult puzzle but is it fun or can it be? 

And still we kill each other. That's

the really sad part. We don't even
know any other way. Oh sure there are many here
among us who refuse to fight but they end up dying any way. There's a point to all these words but

you're crazy if you think it's up to me to tell
you what that means. I'm not that voice but I hear
it too. It's coming out of every rock, every drop
of rain,every flower, every particle of air, every 

stitch of clothing, every cell of skin, every bead upon our

silly heads. We take it all way too seriously. Nothing's ever
going to stop the gate from closing in on us but we could
have a picnic among the rising stones and later
count as many stars as there are souls of beings.


d.p. 2009



 
 



The Power
 
I made you a flower thing this morning, but then I
put it back to the way it was. What I mean is I
decided the best way to give it to
you was to simply leave it alone. Does
 
it really matter if it was stuck in the
ground somewhere or growing out of my head? After
all it popped up with your name right on
it and I said,"Hey I know her!"
 
Still it didn't justify any living thing be 
sacrificed to the goddess of the moment. This
is turning out all wrong. Mainly because I
can feel the dreaded them taunting me to
 
get real, buddy. What they mean, what they
always mean, is to just conform. Be like
us or die away from us. Doesn't matter,
either way. They'll rewrite history and there's nothing
 
you can do about it.  I'm just really
glad right now that flowers don't trade in
such utter nonsense.They laugh out loud. They
dance around in the wind and mirror the
 
sun's moves step for step.And they're kind
of really good listeners to boot. They don't judge the speaker of the house.
I can leave them. What they tend to
remember is the way you moved once, dancing among them.
 
Darryl Price


Bonus: lyrics from when I used to write songs in a band--have a go at it--I know you have a guitar somewhere.

I met you on the corner. You said 
you had to hurry, your glasses full of
treetops. I asked them not to worry. But
then you held your wrist out, your clock
was crying "look out!" and everybody saw us,
they took us for a forest, but no
one seemed to notice--our voices nearly choked
us.

There is a song that belongs to you
I thought I heard it just the other
day it's a sad song but it sounded
true something like I love you but
I may not stay that's what they say-ay-ay-ay

There is a dreamer I remember well she
had your face and your sweet sad eyes
she has a voice like a cigarette
but all she knows are the  same old
lines the same old lies the same old

chorus:she said boy don't try to hold me
cause I won't be there only I said
hey I just can't be found cause I'm
still going around and around I'm going around
and around

I built this paper plane to fly us
to the moon with the so blue world
below us we won't come back too soon
we won't come back too soon

chorus

Darryl Price
 
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