Number 9

 

Then, being struck by a swift-sudden chill
Groaning & shivering, bodies froze still

One man stood mumbling, looking out the gate
The dream through which moments ago I came
He began to stir, pacing & waiting
Noticing me, he approached debating,

& you! Do you know, what it is to be?
Oh Hannah, my Hannah, I/m so sorry…
Being in time, time in being; I wrote…
Never mind the swastikas on my coat,
I told a thousand Jews a thousand times,
Intended to change things from the inside.

Interest lost, he turned back for the door
Though he muttered, he spoke to me no more

I waded through vapor rising from ice
Bodies frozen still by their own device
& across this sheet was Ronnie Reagan
Freezing, begging, with the other masons

I neared the middle of the frozen room
There He was feasting; guarding the blue tomb

You are the Beast & this is your disease.
I did as you pleased; me, you must release. 

Must I now? You, junkee, know what I need?
I/ve truly seen you. You live on your knees.
Yet, still quite curious, please do pray tell:
What would charm you from a warm home like hell? 

I must confess, I sizzle with the best.
But I/ve nothing left & there/ll be no rest.
My suffering is, with or without you.
Turn me loose, I gave the devil his due.
I/ve learned the truth from you, oh Prince of Lies

He stretched open his mouth & outpoured flies
Their buzzing a noise I did recognize
My alarm buzzed; the dream now realized

An American Rising

I The Circles Revisited I

I’ve convalesced with the best

You can see my footprints

Across the Margate Sands

Somehow lived to bear witness

To Eliot’s Waste Land

What I’ve known I now believe

A moment of dying

Turns eternity to beauty

Letters; shades of their former selves

Never fail to form the words of Gods

Archaic languages spoken fluently

Dreaming dead dreams of desolation

Obtained my very own, house of pain

See much denial but we’re all the same

Release me from the benediction of being alive

A blessing not always a guarantee life

We dead reside where death is the inspiration

No longer vainly, I commit suicide

Not for myself, but to acheive spirituality

Traverse through the means of verse

Descend into the limbo so rehearsed

Where there is nothing divine

In this dark comedy

Only the “comfort of being sad”

Converse in ranting-ramblings with the insane

Stained from the sins of an absent dad

Circling the seventh circle with Plath & Cobain

Soulless souls lost in this abyss

Said T.S.,

 He’d show me fear in a handful of dust

Forsaking the God in which they trust

& I nod down to number nine

There, politicians;  preacher/nationalists

Beckon me to invoke Ezra’s influence

Bestowing sight in a land of the blind

II Number 9 II

Then, as if struck by a swift-sudden chill

Groaning & shivering, almost seemed still

One man stood mumbling, looking out the gate

The dream through which moments ago I came

He began to stir, pacing & waiting

Noticing me, he approached debating,

& you! Do you know, what it is to be?

Oh Hannah, my Hannah, I’m so sorry…

Being in time, time in being; I wrote…

Never mind the swastikas on my coat,

I told a thousand Jews a thousand times,

Intended to change things from the inside.

Interest lost, he turned back for the door

Though he muttered, he spoke to me no more

I waded through vapor rising from ice

Bodies frozen still by their own device

& across this sheet was Ronnie Reagan

Freezing, begging, with the other masons

I neared the middle of the frozen room

There HE was feasting; guarding her blue tomb

You are the Beast & I am your disease.

I did as you pleased; me, you must release.

Must I now? Here you dictate what I need?

Best not hesitate! On your knees & plead.

But still quite curious, please do pray tell:

What would charm you from a warm home like hell?

I must confess, I sizzle like the best.

But I’ve nothing left & there’ll be no rest.

My suffering is, with or without you.

Turn me loose, I’ve given you more than due.

There lives no truth in the Father of Lies.

With that he stretched his mouth & outpoured flies

This buzzing a noise I did recognize

My alarm buzzed; the dream now realized

Ashes To Ashes III

The power of the prodigal son

He returns to resurface

As his life renewed begins to surge

How your home has missed you

Crying out to forgotten kingdoms

& you return with empty arms

But soon to be filled

For forget this unforgiving nepotism

& their esoteric whisperings

They fear that which has nothing to lose

& we’re penniless but priceless

For fire has tempered steel

We all wield the power to resurrect thyself

Can’t be explained until it’s learned

Until you are burned

Baptized through fire; my sins I will purge

I ascend from the circles

Back to this land of the truly lost

Entombed fabrication of commercial realities

Where every act of love has its cost

& it’s burying us alive

Here I find myself amongst

Manifestations of manufactured identities

I once mistook for individuality

Don’t step over that line

Your neighbor is watching

So soon it is that I curse my return

Sometimes a journey so dark

Can illuminate where a better life finds rest

Granting great passion to kings

Inspiring songs poetry sings

Those moments pop legends sing of great glory

But we, the weak

That sought little reward to no avail

We pursue the darker/deeper quest

Yet, one way or another

Lord of the kingdom or Prince of thieves

We all search for an empty Grail

& I am just too tired for their games

Not matter how eloquent

I leave with the loves lost too soon; leaving

For the shores of Avalon

To draw from its winter waters

To extinguish infernal burns

Go gently gather my ashes

From the lands they’ve been scattered

Collect them in a Grecian urn

END…

(excerpt from ZENspeak ©2013)

Buy ZENspeak publication now at:

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official website:

http://zenspeaknine.com/

Join The Ninth Circle

When I first started writing on WordPress, I had a target goal in mind: to search the artistic WordPress community for like-minded individuals and start an artistic conglomeration of street artists. What is a street artist? Well, that is a difficult question to answer. I’m not sure that I can even answer this clearly. There’s the street artists like Banksy and Fairey. Which further begs the question: is a street artist just a graffiti artist? What is street art? Maybe, I can not answer that directly either. But what I can safely say, is that I will know it when I see it. Now, I can tell you what street poetry is. Basically, street poetry is spoken word in written form. It is an interchangeable form with its sister art, the spoken word. Street poets write about the social issues and injustices of the world around them. They write about the real. The real shit that is happening around them and to them. This conglomeration of like-minded artists will be called The Ninth Circle.

In the Divine Comedy, Dante poetically illustrates the Ninth Circle of Hell as the domain of the traitors that betrayed their fellow-man. The politicians and bureaucrats and judges and papacy. Not much has changed here in the 21st century. It is our dream; to gather a conglomeration of disenfranchised-starving-street-artists to help those, still lost in the darkness of the ninth circle, and artistically aid their ascension from that circle to achieve their true potential.

Our goal will be to create a non-mainstream movement in painting, poetry, writing, music and any other artistic endeavor that is creatively aligned with the Circle’s agenda.

And what is our agenda exactly? To create pure art and help others create a pure form of their art by providing them a network of other street artists that offer creative support, collaborative efforts from our other artists, and promotion from a social network able to reach thousands when all the artists of the Circle pool their publicize resources together.

We accept everyone with work that is artistic and relevent to the world around us.

We don’t have to supplicate or compromise our works to a system that sees profit as the only merit that art has to offer.

We will always support our brothers and sisters in the Circle.

With a unified effort of considerable talent, we will create an artistic movement that operates and changes on its own terms, and must be recognized by the mainstream.

If one makes it, we all make it.

Nobody who puts in an artistic effort gets left behind. NEVER…

Join The NINTH CIRCLE; for soon, we will be legion…

Carl-Paul Henneman

www.zenspeak9@hushmail.com

To the starving artists of the NINTH CIRCLE

In the Divine Comedy, Dante poetically illustrates the Ninth Circle of Hell as the domain of traitors that betrayed their fellow-man. Politicians and bureaucrats and judges and papacy. Not much has changed here in the 21st century. It is a faint dream, bordering a whisper and a scream; to gather a conglomeration of disenfranchised starving artists to help those still lost in the darkness and artistically aid their ascension to achieve their true potential. We are The NINTH CIRCLE and we are legion…