Expensive and poor,

religion is just
an expensive and poor
substitute for simple
or animal connection.

America

Dreams
are oracles
that few can interpret;
but fantasies
are desperate.

"The land of the free"

is one of only a few
from which the poorest
cannot escape.

Which is why
there are no American
refugees.

The only time

that I like civilisation
is when I am confronted
by its ruins
and its ruin.

Trees

give more than they take.
Is that why we cut them down
instead of worshipping them ?

We don't say

'Beware of Trojans bearing gifts',
since almost all of them were slaughtered
except Æneas, his father,
and some anonymous others.

The Trojan horse
was Greek, of course.

In the afterlife

everything goes very
very slowly
because we are still
very old.

This is excellent in orgies
but not so good
in offices.

George W. Bush was quite right :

there is no word in French
(or any other language, except Japanese
which uses the same word in the same way)
that corresponds with the English word
entrepreneur.

Entreprise in French means 'business',
and un entrepreneur is anyone
who does a job for money or reward.

(This, of course is neither an apophthegm
nor a poem.)

Civilisation :

the war against the longing
it creates.

Who

would not be wiser
if s/he had a
frugaliser ?

click here to learn more

Switzerland

Just reversing the colours
of a flag does not diminish
your insanely profitable crimes.

Francis

For the rich
the rarest luxury
is poverty.

from the Library of Zion

The most prized
bookmarks in history
would have been manufactured
from the undecayed
pressed foreskins
of leadingNazis.
But few or none were made.

'Love'

is the most expensive way
to learn humility.

The Thief of Time

I so look forward
to my suicide.
But when and where
I can't decide.

Click on the image to read the poem

Most information

is useless
(if not dangerous)
without the information
to inform it.

And so it goes...

Man was ever cursed

with
too much imagination,
not enough empathy.

Superlative

(inspired by Orhan Veli)

FOR ANGELOS PETROUTSAS

I love thin hairy bearded men,
I also love hunky working men
and sexy men on the dole
(I'd make the latter piles of toast) -
but I love thin, hunky, working-but-
unemployed, bearded men the most.

Ergmadromic

football's
goal-driven skill
displays the spoiled infantilism
of the European will.

Suicide

(inspired by Orhan Veli)

I know
it isn't easy to live.
I know very well
that living isn't easy
Especially if you
(think you) have to shave.
But dying's no doddle either,
guys.

To leave this world
when you decide you've
had enough
is not the easy option
that you think it is.
Let me tell you
it's only for the bravest
of the brave.

The greatest curse

of communism
was that it strengthened capitalism.
Millions were sacrificed by the one;
millions continue to be killed
and maimed by the other.

Beauty

(inspired by Orhan Veli)

How beautiful the colour
of fresh green tea
is
in the morning
in the fresh air.
How beautiful
the fresh air
is.
How beautiful that tree.
How handsome and how
venerable the waiter
is.
How beautiful the tea.

Every blithe attempt

by the millions of Irrational Optimists
to justify their doctrines
adds to the planet-sized grounds
for rational pessimism.

Like woodworm

in the roof-beam
we rule the world.

Pro Patria

(inspired by Orhan Veli)

Many died
Many more were maimed
Some gave speeches
None spoke out

Shoplifting :

somebody
has to do it.

Sexiness

(inspired by Orhan Veli)

Where
where is my sexiness ?

One of Satan's minions took it,
couldn't sell it,
couldn't even give it away -
so he threw it away.

O where O where
is my sexiness ?

Rueful

Torturers get very tired.

Travelling

(inspired by Orhan Veli)

I have no intention of travelling.
I am happy in these gorgeous gorges
of the Aveyron.
But if I were to travel
I wouldn't go to Beijing,
La Paz or Mafeking.
One day you might think
you've seen me making
taking magic potions
somewhere beyond the seven oceans,
farther from here than eerie Pyongyang...

but I told you:
I have no intention of travelling.

Homework

"I am a voluntary patient.
"I am a voluntary patient.
"I am a voluntary patient.
"I am a voluntary patient.
"I am a voluntary patient.
".. .. .. ............. ..........
"I am a voluntary patient
in this perfect ward."

Our prejudices are foisted on us (chiefly by the press)

Most drug-dealers make less
than the minimum wage.
They trade for about 6 months
and live with their mothers.

Between the known

and the unknown
are the brilliant mind,
the rotting heart.

To be no longer

To be no shorter
A trice on a bicycle
An ape on an icicle
A sperm-aborter
An old shame-monger

From pilgrimage

to tourism

From prophets
to advisors

From hermits
to loners

From saints
to surgeons

From hatchetings
to holocausts

- We bathe in Progress ?


for Kalliope Amorphous

My contribution to Universal Ignorance Day

is the proposition that the world is God's junk DNA.

Christmas

decorations insult a tree
with the flim and sham
and flummery
we shroud ourselves in.

Without earplugs

life could well
become intolerable.

I live

(as the Germans say)
'Like God in France'
- in France.
But
thank God
I'm not God.

On the fishmonger's slab

the frightful
symmetry of suffering.

God didn't die

- he/she/it/they
witnessing us
just lost the will to live.

On the planet of screaming trees

the many-headed monster
of deception is also
a democracy.

The Only Church

that is not evil
is the church of
Dog.

"Homosexuality",

like life,
is a condition
whose cure is simple
but not easy.

We think the world

is full of what we know.
But it is filled with
what we'll never learn.

The Destruction of America

White people spread
like disease through the world
their banners infected,
their meanness unfurled...

Where monotheism was imposed

(in Arabia and the Middle East)
the terrible results are now
reverberating.

Sow the patriarchal wind -
and reap the bloody,
world-destroying hurricane.

Ideas are terrible :

they separate us
from each other
and everything.

Henry Ford

had to hire 900 mechanics
in order to find 100 who would
work on his toxic assembly-line.

Nine out of ten were real men
in those days. Now ninety-nine
out of a hundred are deodorised
wage-slaves - thanks to evil men
like Henry Ford.

Many victories

are Pyrrhic.
And all are hollow
as Hell.