De Rerum Natura

tebodesign — Sat, 03 Sep 2011 22:40:56 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
This poem is an intellectual challenge. Titus Lucretius Carus (99BC – 55BC) wrote De Rerum Natura (On the Nature of Things) to remove from his mind the supernatural and the fear of death. He expounds on the philosophy of Epicurus, promoting atomism, the idea that all matter is derived from unseen elementary particles. This of course clashes with metaphysics manifested as in religion. Thus the work was repressed and forbidden through the millennia only to resurface in the hands of great thinkers. To place all this into a short poem was indeed a challenge.

De Rerum Natura
(On the Nature of Things)

The atom exists
wrote poet Lucretius
two millennia ago
He knew it existed,
not what it is.
It was always there,
always will be
Nothing produces nothing,
cannot produce nothing
so there is something
Fortuna made it him

Dangerous idea
to be basic material
Incompatible as we fear
raging angry gods,
haters of pleasure
Monks aghast hid it
behind a rigid
wall of ignorance
until rescued by
Poggio Florentinus

Innumerable atoms
collide randomly in space
forming complex structures,
that revert to atoms
We from celestial seed
whence all evolve
last not forever
Only atoms are infinite
Epicurus saw results
sans hierarchal confines
Machiavelli to Montaigne
to Newton and Darwin
Jefferson and Einstein
Atomists all finding pleasure
in knowing the secret
of the ancient light
Dust to dust

by Duane Robert Pierson, 2011

To learn more about Duane Robert Pierson and his work
go to www.integritaspublishing.com

The River of Bees

tebodesign — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 20:09:33 +0000

Our thoughts on this poem:
We post this poem by W.S Merwin to celebrate his being selected as United State’s Poet Laureate. He is one of our favorite poets, and this a preferred poem from his collection. As we pass through the years these verses resonate with us, particularly his last line carrying the poignant statement that we are born not to survive but to live. A very good poem when we are so exhausted from discord and dealing with polarity of thought.

The River of Bees
by W. S. Merwin

In a dream I returned to the river of bees
Five orange trees by the bridge and
Beside two mills my house
Into whose courtyard a blindman followed
The goats and stood singing
Of what was older

Soon it will be fifteen years

He was old he will have fallen into his eyes

I took my eyes
A long way to the calendars
Room after room asking how shall I live

One of the ends is made of streets
One man processions carry through it
Empty bottles their
Image of hope
It was offered to me by name

Once once and once
In the same city I was born
Asking what shall I say

He will have fallen into his mouth
Men think they are better than grass

I return to his voice rising like a forkful of hay

He was old he is not real nothing is real
Nor the noise of death drawing water

We are the echo of the future

On the door it says what to do to survive
But we were not born to survive
Only to live

Over the Barricades

admin — Sun, 04 Apr 2010 19:20:10 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
Daily we are frustrated by the state of our nation and the world. Most provoking is that history has been forgotten, that the epic struggles to improve the human situation, the victories won long ago are now lost to the collective memory. We are aware of the old adage that history repeats itself and today we observe that it does in substance. It is apparent that because citizens do not know what social, personal and economic freedoms were won in the past, many are now being led to align on the wrong side in the current struggle. Please note that we not against capitalism per se but that we are for restrained capitalism.

Over the Barricades

Workers of the world
Hear the call once again
Arise wage slaves
Awake befuddled masses,
you conforming idiots,
my fellow Jacobins,
children on the Third Estate.
Unite! Unite!

The great American dream,
exposed as a pyramid scheme
The capitalists seized it all
A tyrannical global
hegemony of wealth
grabbed the earth and
poisoned its vapors,
optioned the very fuzz
on our juicy peaches
Endangered species
convert to extinct species
Our waters brewed into
a mammoth bowl of spumy swill,
all art a numbing televised
morons’ extravaganza,
our rich loamed fields sprinkled
with grotesque faux mansions,
our idols gross icons of greed
Eons of fuel production
squandered in two centuries
We, a once rational species,
now gnawing materialist insects
An oligarchy of ruthless
accumulators enslaved us,
horribly transformed us
into toadying serfs

Once again
sans culottes
we will man the barricades
sing songs to the common man,
throw off the shackles
of smothering indebtedness
Freedom is to not feel
the grinding oppressive boot
upon one’s neck
while being indentured
to another’s quest for wealth

by Duane Robert Pierson, 2005
from On Reviving a Lost Revolution
Integritas Publishing, 2006

To learn more about Duane Robert Pierson and his work
go to www.integritaspublishing.com

Excruciating Tremor

tebodesign — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 17:21:18 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
Each day we read several newspapers and web news sites. On every page there is horror, corruption, and all the maladies attributable to the human race. They are so many, so relentless a dynamic, that we fear becoming become inured to their presence. Most disconcerting is our knowing that most people are totally unaware.

Excruciating Tremor

These are not pleasant sounds
assaulting our reluctant ears
and provoking pitiable tears,
a steady beat of cries, whimpers,
and horrific screams menacing
our persisting innocent dreams

What species is this,
what raging bloody foul creation?
Can incrementalism be applied,
a varied depth of revulsion
to raging indiscriminate slaughter,
loathsome bloodletting hatred
denying rational description,
to cold vacant morality
that leads to lopping off limbs,
wanton rape of women and children,
selling women into sexual slavery,
permitting rape and sale of children,
stealing the food of the starving,
shredding cultures for coins,
creating child warriors?

Is there a quality to be found
in killing without torment?
Can humanity’s senses be so dulled,
awareness of outrage so benign
that we can be at ease,
can nod in acknowledgement
that we can smile and enjoy
our resplendent consuming trivia
while begging pleas for mercy,
excruciating screams of terror,
death chortles rend this planet’s air,
an element that we share?

These are not pleasant sounds
assaulting our reluctant ears –

by Duane Robert Pierson
2010

To learn more about Duane Robert Pierson and his work
go to www.integritaspublishing.com

A Poem Called Despair

admin — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 16:49:20 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
This poem written several years ago proves that nothing changes. Reminders of all that is wrong with our civilization, not only the detritus but also the simulacra – junk and lies, constantly disrupt the pleasures of daily living.

A Poem Called Despair

Life transverses
from the gentle
leaf kicking autumn walk
into an abyss
of tormented anxiety,
a reptilian vortex,
a spring steel boa crushing
life and happiness.

A rich green algae soup
dotted with broken Styrofoam cups
sucks up the oxygen.
A raging determinism
of persistent scum
debases civilization.

Cultural homogeneity
within a thick crystal globe
now shattered on a city street,
contents spilled
into the fire breathed wind,
the residue
lapped up by predatory rodents.

The human spirit climbs
into the clean clouded blue sky
lured by hypnotic Sirens
and then it dives
into a perverse garbage dump
of markets and greed.
Voracious rapacious capitalism
clothed in the faux fur
of a cuddly teddy bear.
It chews the flesh,
slurps the blood,
excretes polyethylene scat.

Where resides happiness,
whither dwells love,
snuggles contentment?
They slumber beneath the detritus
of human folly
and profane ignorance.

Simple pleasure costs a buck
Love a hardened diamond
Happiness a punched ticket
Contentment a butterfly
in a bug zapper.

They shout at us
A chorus of babble
that never ceases.
Idiots gibbering
superficial gunk
and calling it gold.

by Duane Robert Pierson, 2005
from On Reviving a Lost Revolution
Integritas Publishing, 2006

To learn more about Duane Robert Pierson and his work
go to www.integritaspublishing.com

Poetry of Blood

admin — Sun, 22 Nov 2009 23:23:54 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
Daily we are overwhelmed with accounts of cruelty throughout the world. Foremost in magnanimity is genocide, the attempt to wipe out an entire people. And what do we say when such an effort is masterminded by a poet. Such is the case with Bosnian Serb Radovan Karadzic, being at long last brought before a United Nations’ war crimes tribunal for ethnic cleansing of Croat and Muslim men and boys during the 1990s.

Poetry of Blood
Bosnian Serb poet Radovan Karadzic
to be tried for war crimes including genocide

the fiend is a poet
an artisan of verse
and an ethic cleanser
finding pleasure in tormenting souls
seeing beauty in rivers of blood
hearing music in the screams of rape
creating genocide sung in poetry
long ago garlanded by a Bishop
in his masterly The Mountain Wreath*

visualize semantics of ritual murder
where cruelty reigned supreme
found deep within the depths
of heartless negative compassion
with massacres honored as victories
where hatred grows like wildflowers
in a farmer’s fallowed field
where some welcome beauty,
others see rapacious weeds

extermination is total victory
cruelty executed most supremely
pious sanity of the righteous
devoted followers of the deity
who injected primitive dogma
into an ancient peasant’s mind
oh, we cry for the nobility wrung
from a wretched poet’s soul,
perverting lyricism to sing of death

by Duane Robert Pierson 2009

*A classical poem written in 1846 by Bishop Petar II Petrovic Njegos about a Christmas Eve massacre of hundreds of Muslims, an event inspired by another bishop, Bishop Danilo.

A Potent Blend

tebodesign — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 12:20:26 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
Wealth and its accumulation inspire within us very mixed emotions. On a macro level we can see that the growth of wealth as manifested through accrued capital is invaluable to growth and progress. At the micro level we all profess to like our comforts and security. The difficulty and our revulsion come with wanton greed and excessive accumulation, inevitable consequences of unrestricted capitalism. Thus we witness history’s relentless cycle where a few end up with all and revolutions occur as those left out demand equivalence.

A Potent Blend

The regal concoction
A ponderous cell of pomposity
signifying extreme wealth,
unfettered privilege,
and absolute power.
Collectively wearisome,
pusillanimous dilettanti
unctuously infatuated
with self importance,
possessing all but soul.
A mixture obnoxious and lethal
perched atop the human pyramid,
call them monarchs, aristocrats, plutocrats,
they are difficult to suppress
impossible to exterminate.
Irrepressible, they inevitability
reappear like rats in a slum.
From Solomon, to the Ancien Régime
through the Gilded Age, to today’s
golden apex of capitalism,
they smother the common people
til these wretched souls again rear up
and smite them down.
Absolutely addictive
these insatiable agents of covetousness
never have enough,
they must have it all,
righteously claimed through contrived virtue.
Finally and always the blade falls
as the merciless rabble cheers,
égalité a satisfaction
that never arrives
within a cyclic revolution.

by Duane Robert Pierson
from On Reviving a Lost Revolution,
Integritas Publishing, 2006

André Chénier – Kill Your Best Poet

admin — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 12:18:29 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
In impassioned times events can go very much awry, reason has no sway. During the French Revolution the Jacobins imprisoned 31-year-old poet André Chénier, primarily because they were suspicious of his views. They forgot they had him in prison until his father learning his location came to ask for his release. Having his presence called to their attention they promptly send him to the guillotine where he was beheaded on 25 July 1794, two days before the fall of Robespierre and his own guillotining ending the Reign of Terror. The excerpts presented here, translated from the French of his Ïambe IX, are a last act of defiance from this brilliant poet. (Ïambes are poems in the iambic meter, a form close to prose that preserved classical form without diminishing the power of the message, or attack.)

Ïambe IX

Like a last ray of light, like a last summer breeze
Color the end of a beautiful day,
At the foot of the gallows once more my lyre I seize.
Perhaps I’ll soon be on my way.
               . . . . .
My life is Virtue’s concern.
A decent man, whom outrage has fed,
In prison, awaiting his turn,
Lifts higher his speech and higher his head.

Save me. Preserve an arm
To hurl your thunderbolts, a lover to avenge you.
               . . . . .
Oh my pen! poison, gall, horror, God of my life,
Through you alone I carry on my strife.
               . . . . .
No one would remain and move history to record
About so many just people massacred?
To console their memory, their widows, their sons,
So that abhorrent highway brigands
Will tremble at their black portraits in paint?
To descend into hell, like a saint,
To tie the trifold whip, by vengeance praised,
Already on those perverts raised?
To spit on their names, to see their sentence carved?
Come now, stifle your cry;
Suffer, heart full of hate, for justice starved.
And you, Virtue, weep if I die.

by André Chénier
30 October 1762 – 25 July 1794

Ignorance

admin — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:43:21 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
We are amazed at how much we, as people supposedly living within a highly advanced civilization, are influenced by unfounded opinions, myths, superstitions, conspiracy theories, and similar manifestations of unintelligent thinking. Although not a new phenomenon, this communal failure of reason remains dangerous to the welfare of our country and society.

Ignorance

Civilization’s disease
mutates into diverse factions
Its guises are many
Myth its cloak
Superstition its vehicle
Conspiracy its fertilizer
Into the minds of the masses
blinding the eyes of reason,
it is deceptive
for the bearer is ignorant
of its affliction
It creates faith,
energizes its growth
like a benevolent malignancy
It hosts a frightful weapon
wielded clandestinely,
dousing enlightenment,
causing darkness
wherein its spores thrive
like mold in a cave

by Duane Robert Pierson

A Ride on the Sorry Side

admin — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 16:39:26 +0000

This poem’s conceptual genesis:
There are occasions when we encounter everyday life in a different context than that to which we are accustomed. The poet has experienced life at all social and economic levels, however, the incongruities can make a very vivid impression. This idea arose from a trip on the Metro number 8 bus in Portland, Maine.

A Ride on the Sorry Side
The Number 8 Bus

The Metro cruises the streets
its platform reaching out
like a mechanical reptile tongue,
slow and grumbling,
to raise chairs and walkers
of a city’s downtrodden load,
heavy, infirm, and destitute
Their every chore major labor,
the sadness of exiguity,
declares pity a useless notion
as reality is hardened beyond
condescension of conscience
Too much, too much
A bus ride through
a mean existence
while investment banks
run their power algorithms
churning gigantic paper profits,
generating obscene bonuses
for arrogant pirates of commerce
They too have their rides,
private planes to luscious estates
and ever bigger yachts
The obscenity of comparative contrast
shakes the temperate soul
dampening any passion of hope
as poor people’s coins
jingle into the collector

by Duane Robert Pierson
To learn more about Duane Robert Pierson and his work
go to www.integritaspublishing.com