Poetry Corner: “Bruno the Barber’s spoilt moment”

Bruno the barber’s spoilt moment

For years while toiling in an office tower
Bruno was my barber

full of stories of wonder
being the consummate barber requires both cutting and conversational skills

On vacation to Nova Scotia
a stop for lunch
of clam chowder and crackers to munch

Such clam chowder Bruno had never ingested
but after leaving while driving and his chowder was being digested
in a panic he realized he had left his camera behind
and his carelessness jostled his mind

Rushing back to the eatery to recover his precious apparatus the front doors were locked
so off to the rear and a knock on the door and his camera was recovered
but by the garbage dumpster he hovered
and from the shock he barely recovered
that wonderful clam chowder the feast served to a hungry man
was from a Campbell soup can
Bruno gave a deep moan and blurted out “What a scam!

Robert K. Stephen

Poetry Corner: “Hysterical silence”

Hysterical silence

Canadian Rocky Mountains with majestic craggy mysticism
awe inspiring
timeless
proud
towering over Ken and Barbie dwarfs
with mobile phones assaulting the peaks with pictures

Soon their blind eyes tire
such strenuous activity
they can see the damn things on their screen at home
so it is off to air conditioned retreats
of polyester and synthetic leather
deodorized compartments of the living dulled

Down the road another scenic lookout
more corrupted little chocolate smeared faced children
stuffed at the simulated logger’s camp
“all you can eat buffet”

Belly protruding leader of the family pack
Bermudian shorts brain a member of the Senior Management Team
hunter of the high dividend
bought wife with gold and diamonds
that mean so much
and even more to the neigbours

Again all gather at another lookout
object of mockery that they are
the silent massif roar
in hysteria
kings and queens of it all

Robert K. Stephen


Poetry Corner: “When New York City wasn’t such a friendly place”

When New York City wasn’t such a friendly place

At first what appeared to be a menacing glance
late at night you can never tell
but there is more
as the steel rips through your soft belly

Mocking Thanatos
has conquered Eros
who
weeps
in silence
amidst the red flashes

Robert K. Stephen

Poetry Corner: “Behind the Iron Curtain before the fall of the Berlin Wall”

Behind the Iron Curtain before the fall of the Berlin Wall

Being a party member is a responsibility
We serve the people with our utmost ability
So to say we obtain the privileges of an aristocratic nobility
is sheer and scheming capitalist naivety

We serve our mighty land and people
merely a gunshot (as Beria would say) away from the Kremlin steeple
we labour night and day in offices located anywhere from Georgia the wonderful land of Comrade Stalin
to cold little towns like Aldan

Just because we have a five star flat off the square
shows how much for the people we do care
why then your sarcastic stare

I’m nothing but a hard working man
so why the comments over my Black Sea tan
and that expensive Swiss electric fan?

My suits from France
are needed for an occasional diplomatic prance
not for my personal prestige to enhance

My Zil with a chauffeur
is provided to me as I am not a loafer
in fact I am in it now to visit Iraqi foreign minister Soffer

Being so busy it is imperative we have our own stores
not because of corrupt mores
that you suggest make us rotten to our cores

We are still members of the proletarian kind
and your unfounded accusations are but a product of a capitalist roader mind
to suggest that to bourgeoise lifestyles we have fell
and I respectfully say to that you can go to hell

Ask any of our folk
and suggest to them we have privileges and they’ll take it as an ill joke
and perhaps to you deliver a warning poke
we are no different than them
our happy and content comrades would heartily agree
if not you probably think I’d expel them to the cold Siberian degree

It’s this Solzhenitsyn chap who has caused such a flap
with his groundless crap
but our censors were on the rap
and he was liquidated from our map

Every citizen is free like me
oh why can’t you see through all this propaganda of the CIA
and for once agree with me
all we do is administer
and if the skilled like me become a Politburo minister
what in the hell is no sinister

Poetry Corner: “Hope”

Hope

You-
held me spellbound
freshness
not of plastic concocted standardized perfection
your smiles in my direction were of courtesy
civility
and cultured background
I tried to touch but you needed everyone
those surly and ugly butchers of your beauty
oblivious to you

they thundered over you
leaving their hoofprints on me
ripping and agonizing torture

I tried to heal
you pushed me roughly aside
but you knew
didn’t you?

Poetry Corner: “The hunters”

The hunters

Ladies and Gentlemen they say
Kill at the office
or in the factories all day

it really matters they say
to show them you are the boss of the way

like the sheep they hunt there must be leaders or the flock will stray

is it really this way
for them animal and man is eaten off the same tray

But
they
proud self proclaimed hunters are crawling parasites
sucking the blood of the innocent
but virginity is made to be given away
as innocence is in its dying day
the façade of peaceful co-existence will fade away
and the angry will rip the leader parasites off their backs
and hurl them
under the wheels
of angry tricycles

Poetry Corner: “Optical Illusion Oasis”

Optical Illusion Oasis

People sitting under the great Canadian fright
drinking heavily in the village of neon light
pretensions of affairs being outtasight
really nothing more than a heard of uptight
matters really aren’t all right

Such a pathetic sight
it’s strongest on a Saturday night
people with nothing to do
except play acting cool fools
floundering in the human cesspool

Death should be superior
come join me now or tomorrow
for you’re already dead
what really can you ever do in life
I tell you that you are needless and superfluous
like the pieces of gum
the black suited monsters
crush without pity on their way to paper colonies
refusing to hear the cries of the crushed innocent

come join me in the land of the insane
where every day does not end like some futile game
soulless butchered minds craving dead maggots
that’s what we are
no schools of respectability
only dens of perverse sadistic crazed nobility
souls of the living cry to join us
yes I’m Lucifer but which hell is better
yours or mine
you may find out in due course of time

Robert K. Stephen

Poetry Corner: “Ode to donald trump”

Ode to donald trump

Dear me it wasn’t such a shock
when donald trump was ousted from the flock
his picture everywhere
even where one had to go
but he fell so low
where did your friends the fascists go
most of America has woken up and hates you now
you’ve got the popularity of a turbuculean cow

But not all is doomed as you sit in your cell
for in 23 Hitler didn’t do so well
your type still abounds
and not even “democracy” chases them off the grounds

But in the end Hitler, Nixon, Samoza and Mussolini couldn’t withstand the frost
so donald get lost
did you direct the mob to put Vice President Pence in a noose?
if so donald be prepared to be trampled by a moose

Poetry Corner: “Downtown Treblinka”

Downtown Treblinka

hemmed into hamlets by the awesome guardposts
the weary beaten stagger
into black Calcuttian holes
to be transported to prosperous futility
whisked by gleaming publicly funded expense
only marred by the spots of the unhappily assimilated
broken only by their black boots
stomped through lack of humanity
or lined up on the wall of advanced humility
or
cutthroat bestiality
experimented on by clever wizards
soothed by taxed juices and coloured flashes
that numb
and bring “round the clock relief”
to the voluntary prisoners
and arthritic stricken

Robert K. Stephen