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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
 Posted - Mar 04 2014 : 6:34:27 PM
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Feeling Frisky?
The writing and editing have been more slippery than normal lately, as I've been on an intrastate and intraprison version of the federal system's interstate "diesel therapy", where a prisoner is moved so quickly and often that his mail and property can't keep up with him, wearing down his will and ability to act. It's typically reserved for gang leaders or those fighting for one pesky constitutional right or another. I've been cast in the latter role, my prayers set on disability accommodation so I can keep writing - what else?
So should you wake up one day feeling frisky rebellion against Big Brother's most indecent underbelly, wind up all those unfocused frustrations of yours and pitch a swift script to the bucks I need to carry the fight forward - via even a single dollar to my sister's PayPal account at rknuttila@gmail.com . It's the thought that counts - especially now - but if you do it drunk, your tipsy self just might interpose to add or transpose a digit or two - who knows?
Sure, there are a gazillion noble causes out there, but this slightly ignoble one needs a little lovin' too. And you know me to run right at the surface so you can watch in near real-time the ripple effect of a kind touch. So, if you might, trickle down just a little bit of that good old voodoo economics. If it's got to be done in BitCoin instead, gimme a bit o' time and I'll perform that miracle too. Working together, we can force a bifurcation in the balky stalk of Correction to create a more secure niche for yours truly, for of the small income for which I've fought, so far there's not!
- Ananda T. |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 04 2014 : 10:57:13 PM
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Baby's Way
(with apologies to Tagore)
From him something sagging like a curd soufflé
at last miscarried, pooped out and gave way
and then down sprawled Baby with a lusty squall
cradle, diaper, fontanel and all!
But it's an easy thought to see it matters not
if he even sports a lobe or crumb of snot
for his heart-strings are a lovely lute
and he's just so darn delightfully cute!
- Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Mar 16 2014 12:24:11 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 04 2014 : 11:04:54 PM
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My Personal Pleasure
Hello, Ecstasy, my old friend
I've come to see you again
for even prison life can be made an art -
a painted pony before a manure-filled cart!
Baptized into the religion and ministry of language
prose and poesy are bodily nutrition and spiritual food
without their daily composition, my own would shrink away
so as the canaries in the whim-bearing mine-drift of my mind
inquire into their health and know that of mine!
- Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Mar 16 2014 12:26:39 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 04 2014 : 11:09:42 PM
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Heaven Enough
O Lord -
If I love Thee to gain Heaven's felicity
pray deny it all to me!
And if I love Thee to turn aside Hellish wrath
pray place it direct in my path!
But if purely for Thine own sake need I love Thee
pray leave it be, as that is Heaven enough for me!
- Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Mar 16 2014 12:28:21 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 04 2014 : 11:20:12 PM
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Neruda
Neruda, sunburnt wizard
I see just what you've done
lines diced and jullienned into a word blizzard
desert market harvest delivered on the run.
Spurning old rules
of stanza, meter and ryhme
(at least in translation - is that really you?)
I've tried a bit, but more would prove a crime.
For, my virtuoso Chilean brujo
a barren ground sun has wound your pen
whereas I'm tossed in a wavy flow
at times of the sea, at times equestrienne.
But all to the better, each to their own
both for love, I for mine, yours for thee
for if all were ditto, all were clone
what a monotone droning world it would be!
- Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Mar 16 2014 2:48:34 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 04 2014 : 11:42:01 PM
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Reunion
This year's last leaf left high and dry shivering
forest dryad, pressed bare-breast against a cold hibernal sky
have not all your parti-colored clanmates one by one long since
flown the nest in a sudden leap and grateful spiralled sigh?
Consummate connoisseur of beauty, reluctant to rest
tho erenow you've gathered and gleaned all the best
of vegetal delight: every blushing sunrise and rubied sunset
each darting flight of bright gorget, every rainbow's pennant crest!
Delicate dreamcatcher, you've worn yourself to the thinnest slip
wavinh that ravening palmate web of fine-spun variegated thread
heaven's daintiest sky anemone, most gossomer of sheer filigree
dressed in briefest negligee, isn't it high time to hightail it off for bed?
Deciduous dream, leaving your topsy-turvey pole dance on public display
yet refusing to share that proudly well-endowed summertime harvest
only teasing from afar, then sending lonely signals by leafen semaphore
all the while the real party's underground, in a rock'n grotto love-nest!
For all your woodland friends are there, teeming, teaming head-to-tail
and bundled beneath their cosy patchwork plaid quilts of earth
so give your hoop skirt a rustle and come sail down on the hustle
to burrow back into Gaea's warm womb and the wonder of rebirth!
- Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Mar 16 2014 12:36:50 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 06 2014 : 4:20:27 PM
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Flame Whisperer
Friend of the friendless, servant of servants
embracing the untouched, kissing the lepers
soft on the hardened, easy on the difficult
attending to the absent, waiting on the tardy
rescuing the resistant, promoting the backward
abiding the impatient, overlooking the obvious
looking after the wandering, caring for the careless
ministering to the sinning, tending to the terrible
crossing all boundaries, judging no man
all these things and more I gladly do
for I oft’ may be any one of them too.
So I lay down among the most reviled
the hungry ghosts, the lost yogis
the supposed or self-proclaimed perverts
the Serpent or Sun worshipping converts
gladly, gladly – but most particular of all
those devoured complete by enraptured Flame
who in sibilant blue dance lightly flickering
for while consumed in the highest ecstatic heat
all souls are equal, all souls may meet!
- Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Mar 10 2014 4:58:28 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 25 2014 : 5:52:03 PM
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Enough of Thought
Poet-
learn from the birds
flit, fly
......hop
..........hop
..............hop
sometimes
just the lightest
touch
upon the page
is
....enough
.............of
...............thought.
-Ananda T. |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 25 2014 : 5:56:43 PM
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'Nuff Said?
The moon hung like a bell a-tolling
and set my mind a-right a-rolling
so I stretched my hand out like a snare
and snatched me up some poetical air
so tho some say rhythm and rhyme are old stuffed heads
I suggest you stay put and read on - 'nuff said?
-Ananda T. |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 28 2014 : 2:54:18 PM
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Falling Away
Is there another place, another way, another home?
I've stayed on so long, I'm made of prison stone
that time has carved upon, and indelibly shown
that prison sound and sonance, they lift up and they fall
but they will never fall away
prison dirt, musk and dust, they lift up and they fall
but they will never fall away
prison stains, tears and pain, they lift up and they fall
but they will never fall away
no, the frowning towers and scarred-up boles
of prison yards, tiers and segregation holes
will never topple, erode or decay
only the bodies and souls of men pressed between them
will forever, like leaves, perennially fade
and finally fall away.
-Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Apr 08 2014 5:08:54 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Mar 28 2014 : 3:11:23 PM
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Story Teller
He was a Navaho storyteller (and part-time soak)
and always ready with a naughty novel joke
called me his brother, as together we walked
faithfully cheerful, even tho he was being stalked
by the most violent lot in Midwestern cellblocks
but unfearful we stood, back to back, hip to hip
for such was the nature of our kinship
(having simply shared far too much to be scared)
so we were rightly seen as the very best of friends
the very best of buds, as they say, to the end
but how could I know, much less comprehend
that it would end so soon, by a brutal act
in a pool of blood - just yesterday - to be exact.
Yahzee, just yesterday, I heard you call my name
and three tiers up I saw your beloved face framed
by the cell door being locked for your own safety
but later opened in error when the whole pack gained entry
-with their razors-
So now there's only this pathetic little poem as eulogy
for, Yahzee, my friend, I'm simply crying too hard to see
but now, tho alone, I will try to do better by you:
I will walk your walk
I will talk your talk
I will be the storyteller.
-Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Apr 08 2014 5:03:49 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Apr 07 2014 : 5:34:32 PM
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Heaventides of Night
Even a man in extremity can know a little serenity - Ananda T.
Thru my lancet-narrow window slit
I watched falling shadows fold and knit
unguent fibers of puce and plum
sumptuous spectrum of a plunging sun
supped by vespers honey-tongued
with slanting draughts of dusk's decantings
and final thoughts of day's enchantings.
But then darkness reclined groaning upon the land
and reached out with long groping hands
to where I sat in my cloistered home
seized my mind, struck me blind, an island
in a meaningless sea, outcast and alone.
Time now held strained in a bitter spell
and imagination only stirred the inky well
but then, in the wake of a ghostly abstract
opened a break thru the opaque carbon-black
that poured from hidden quarter a milk-lacquer tide
to rinse and revellie the trees erect
like tinsel-tipped lances with shafts of jet
that chipped at Heaven's scarlet anthracite
to parry the shores of encroaching night!
My soul now gazed in blind devotion
at a scene sweet-glazed by a lactescent ocean
a candescent flux into which I tucked
where gloom ducked back, having lost its pluck
but still the wonders were not near done
and indeed, the best were yet to come.
(big inhale)
For first shyly peeping, then boldly sweeping
a swollen globate moon of flaxen full oblation
shrugged away Her seven veils of enshrouding clouds
then sailed like a rounding dhow of pearly light
up from the sill of the world, bounding prow of white
carving argent arcs thru cloudbanks calving in flight
and bowsprit splitting the frowning brow of night
thrusting tusks of ivory gleaming thru the gloaming
musth-laden dusk, to my adoring eyes then seeming
to shimmy thru my window-slit and hit the flagstone floor
with the clank of a solid silver foundry plank
then melt to a vastly expanding sterling pool
that illumed every somber corner of my room!
And therein, by means of a recurrent dream
again had arrived my burnished Lunar Queen
to tip from Her full and sultry lip
a celestial cinematic stream of posied cream
to which I dip, to ever sip
and hope to never wean - would you?
(*puff* *puff* mirabile dictu!)
-Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Apr 19 2014 4:07:27 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Apr 08 2014 : 10:18:36 PM
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Revised Version
Flame Whisperer
Friend of the friendless, servant of servants
embracing the untouchables, kissing the lepers
soft on the hardened, easy on the difficult
attending to the absent, waiting on the tardy
caring for the careless, looking after the wandering
rescuing the resistant, promoting the backward
ministering to the sinning, tending to the terrible
abiding the impatient, overlooking the obvious
crossing all boundaries, judging no man
all these things and more I happily do
for, transparent-hued, I take on all others' colors too.
So I lay down among the most reviled
the hungry ghosts, the lost yogis
the Serpent or Sun worshipping converts
the supposed or self-proclaimed perverts
gladly, gladly - but most particular of all
those devoured entire by enraptured Fire
who in sibilant blue dance lightly flickering
for when consumed in highest ecstatic heat
all souls are equal, all souls may meet!
(Besides, I look so good in blue.)
-Ananda T. |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - May 30 2014 : 09:50:16 AM
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From a Torn, Grey Sky
It was not a sound
to which the earth was used
so shook off
in watery echoes
as the lone goose flew
slowly, each wingbeat
another sobbing woodwind cry
low over the gun-pits
where he last saw
his mate.
-Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on May 31 2014 5:06:22 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - May 30 2014 : 09:53:12 AM
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Quiet Pond
For a sapphire ring of light to glow
the elfen forest people know
that one must set a magic stone
in just rightly and just so -
ker-plink!
Lo! - and the world is filled with magic.
-Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on May 31 2014 5:08:59 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - May 30 2014 : 09:55:59 AM
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Do It Again?
Dear, naught would make us more akin
than soul to soul and skin to skin
the nature of a whole within
I'd find myself with you again -
may we?
-Ananda T. |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - May 31 2014 : 5:14:02 PM
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Bee's Lament
Blossom
naught could make us more akin
than soul to soul and skin to skin
the nature of a whole within
I'd find myself in you again.
Dawn-kissed petals with beads of dew
I'll dive headfirst in ravenous mood
more tremulous than you ever knew
so please say yes, I do, I do!
-Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Jun 06 2014 10:02:11 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Jun 01 2014 : 6:29:32 PM
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Separation
Twin baby sister
stillborn
ever wiser than me
what did you see in the world
to refuse passage?
Bella Donna eyes
(I could tell)
of dark-lacquered sky
eyes to die for
was that why? was that why?
was that why you stayed behind?
I recall the warm pulse
in the hand that held mine
as we tumbled and explored
our world, ourselves
and each other, not knowing
one from the other, and thus
so utterly complete.
But then
pulled apart at our most tender
I found myself foreshortened
my wholeness a halfness, sheared away
for as much as I groped throughout the air
your hands, your eyes
were never, ever, again there!
And who was there to grieve
in the joy of a birth – a boy!
but me, who knew the sorrow
of a bow, without its fiddle
doomed to forever pursue
the skirts of elusive melody
without ever again embracing
the whole embodied song.
And now
I hope the earth has held you
as gently as you once held me
and that again we might be joined
there in death's eternal womb
to tumble together, forever, thru time
curled at first like question marks
but dissolving, and then resolving again
all our boundaries and separations.
-Ananda T.
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Edited by - anandatandava on Jun 06 2014 10:08:24 PM |
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vanbach
Vietnam
1 Posts |
Posted - Jun 02 2014 : 06:03:15 AM
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I have no idea, but I am glad AYP is able to get to someone in prison, and it makes me think about donating some AYP books to a local prison books project!
Thanks for all your responses! |
Edited by - vanbach on Jun 02 2014 06:23:04 AM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Jun 05 2014 : 4:03:07 PM
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Raison d' Etre
Awoke face-down among my papers
best of dawning at my labors
for true it is I belong nowhere
I have learned how to get there:
all these squiggles, all these marks
"the longest journey," the saying starts
when -
each word's a step, a long incision
all meant to broaden my inner vision.
-Ananda T. |
Edited by - anandatandava on Jun 06 2014 10:00:27 PM |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Jul 16 2014 : 5:04:30 PM
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Well, in between disasters and after much editing, I have a 100-page poetry book about ready to go. I don't think the world is ready for this, and that's even with the naughty poems and "The Passtime" pushed aside for later.
I'm also going to be entering as many poetry contests as I can afford in the hope of snagging a mentor, some operating capital, and at least a neutral review. (Like: "Whatthehellisthis?!")
I'm polishing my work, I was troubled by how much of it ended up being colored by, or actually on the topic of prison. This is certainly not what I intended, but the struggle for raw survival (which has gotten worse) requires a different sort of catharsis. Here's to better days.
Anyway, what I wanted to ask was what sorts of resources are available for discovering poetry contests and managing their pursuit. I have a 2003 Writer's Market which, tho dated, shows the potential breadth of contests, but what tools do serious writers use nowadays? What websites or apps are available. For example? Is there an online Writer's Market, or something better, like with scheduling for submission, for example? |
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Anima
484 Posts |
Posted - Jul 26 2014 : 6:04:50 PM
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Namaste,
I've enjoyed much of your writing. Try www.pw.org. That is the web address to poets and writers. Publishers tend to hold the contests, but I have never entered one, although I have researched a few. Money and published work are often awarded to the winner. Generally, submission guidelines and schedules are different with each publisher. Smaller publishers hold less competitive contests, but larger publishers offer better prizes. It's a very tough market. All the best to you.  |
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anandatandava
USA
215 Posts |
Posted - Nov 29 2016 : 1:33:57 PM
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Greetings from the other side.
Given how much pain I spun off into the AYP community before disappearing, I felt I should apologize and give an update. (By the way, I'm writing this on my own 7" Android tablet, on which I can send/receive email thru jpay.com--it's not perfect, but better than nothing.)
After 15 years of struggle, in Feb I finally received my brain surgery (VP shunt--there should be a cool video of the procedure on YouTube), and am now living in the system's medical unit. The neurosurgeon had to assure me the procedure was reversible before I went ahead, for, as St. Teresa and many other ecstatics before me have stated, I would NEVER have chosen to be healed from the spiritual wounds I had known and wanted to get back to. (All seems well in that regard.)
Neitzche said something about the dangers of fighting monsters, and it indeed proved true. My battle for medical care crowded my mind right off the spiritual/ecstatic path, and for that I am deeply sorry. Having no sense of time, I don't know how long I was lost, but I always remembered that deeply reverberating Love that resides just under the surface of things, and knew I wanted return to it as soon as it was safe to begin closing my eyes again. I may be at a point where I can do so, and just have to get back into the habit.
Friends tell me I'm much calmer now, but that might be mostly because I've stopped fighting (an age-old lesson in peace), plus all the things I learned about myself from pre-op brain testing. (Maybe not everyone needs an objective perspective on the reality they perceive, but I feel I do.) Also revealed or verified was what I had long suspected--plus a good bit more--of the neurological sources of my meditative intensity.
As far as walking and talking and thinking in a straight line goes, the surgery may have occurred too late. My MRIs look much the same, indicating either that my brain had 'stiffened' too much to come back into compliance, or that I have the wrong setting (1.5) on my fancy externally-programmable Strata valve. The old me would be trying to determine that, but right now I'm just savoring the fact that they at least gave me the CHANCE of more normalcy, so will let it go (forgive to live) and turn my attention back to the often delightful abnormalities fate or God has afforded me. Besides, I have another parole hearing in 8 months, and we'll see where things go from there.
What I DO know is that the proper care and feeding of this brain involves writing, but I don't think I should clutter this forum up any further with my drivel. So perhaps you would be so kind as to provide an opinion on the following technological scenario :
Where should I look to plant my words such that--
1. The writing gets hosted for free.
2. I can come back at any time to put in changes/adds/deletes.
3. I can, ideally, import and update my entire Word file of more polished
pieces in a few easy steps.
4. Relatively automatic creation of a navigable table of contents.
5. Simple stats. I cannot overemphasize how fulfilling it was to watch the read count go up on my AYP topic string (5468). It was like Facebook friends: possibly of little meaning to some, but to the lonely--the only community they have, veritable food and and nectar to the soul. So, in the end, it didn't matter WHY anyone read me--only that they did. At least I wasn't crying into an empty abyss, and for that I thank everyone who hung with me. And if I said some outrageous things at times, I am sorry. I was really falling apart, and had my neglectful foes in mind, seeming to hope they'd read me and react in SOME way--even negatively. (And indeed they did try to read my words at times, but didn't know what to make of them--can anyone?)
The other option I have, of course, is to simply dissolve into intense spiritual/physical ecstasy all day, and try to NOT write about it. That way I'm not bothering anyone. The best kindling for those fires is reading the words of others who "go there". It's not just WHAT they describe--it's the sense of shared communal experience piled on top of it. And this makes someone expressing a simple kind/positive emotion to me the next best thing.
Toward this end, does anyone have any recommendations of books or articles or wesites concerning intense spiritually-tinctured ecstasy of supernatural or neurological origins? I'm happy with either, and have no trouble reconciling the two. For although I know the science, it nevertheless strikes as full immersion in an immensely loving and all-consuming God. It carries its own irrefutable proof, reminding me of many things: Rudra, Shiva, the "Fire of Love"--or spiritual heat of many traditions, and especially the "litmus test" St. Teresa gave for mystical experience: if it leads to the love of God and neighbor, it is real; if it does not, it is not. Measuring by that litmus, forgive me for arguing that we should look less to the roots of spiritual ecstasies, and more to their fruits--if good and wholesome, the path is right for that person, and only those who have never felt the touch of such wonders would even try to claim otherwise.
If you choose to email me directly thru jpay.com and would like to hear individually back again, it would help a LOT if you sent a prepaid electronic return 'stamp' with your message. That both verifies your interest in such an exchange, but also helps facilitate it, for the $.40 cost is a big challenge to my part-time wage of $.25/hr. (The pay rate does go up a quarter next January, so there is hope.)
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kumar ul islam
United Kingdom
791 Posts |
Posted - Nov 29 2016 : 3:59:31 PM
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thankyou for your authentic and true exspression of being a soul living in the vessel of the human form  |
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Blanche
USA
873 Posts |
Posted - Nov 29 2016 : 8:03:09 PM
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Hello, Anandatandava-
Good to hear again from you - and watch again your dance in the forum.
Do you still write? What happened with your volume of poetry? |
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From Anandatandava
