Copyright © E Maria Shelton Speller
Category Archives: God
[The Godforsaken]
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
They knew who first
judged what out of dreams
came truly real*
and he was fastened to a rock
and they knew who
stirreth up the people and dippeth his hand**
in the dish with Judas
and he was nailed to a cross
And they read books within books
about wise and foolish virgins
and signs of the end
and love and judgment
and they heard God talk
through the mouths of men
who talked about him
his son and the holy ghost
When spectators provided the notion of reality
Christ and Prometheus
were objectified and subjectified allegory
spheres of hope and rebellion
courage and prudence
temperance and justice
and how they chose to read it
in the time before terror
depended on what level
they chose to see it
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
They reused and refashioned the heads
of emperors in their own image
because they could
They reinforced power and authority
with legitimate political imagery
like the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses
and General Holofernes
They respected the classical past
in fertile crescents of greed
and rejected classical design
in the center of ruins
They housed the rock in the dome
on which Muhammad ascended to heaven
and hung the Virgin Mary’s blue robe
in Chartres Cathedral
and it did not burn…
When denizens of form said
Nothing is new…
The godforsaken asked
Since when?
since the Lion Gate
since the Great Sphinx of Giza
since Doric and Ionic orders
since the Palette of King Narmer
since the Parthenon
since Stonehenge
Since when?
They stood in the light of starry nights
in the drum, coffers, and concrete cylinders
of uninterrupted space in the Pantheon
and made no apologies for ripping off
master tracks from the past
and heard the hip hop train
sampling every post-hit
with unripe music and blood
and mounted the heads of gods
on the manifest
like the catalog of procreation
in Genesis
They heard his Mother
three blocks away
on parallel streets
screaming redundantly
You won’t take my child!
You won’t take my child!
at the vigil where transvestites
whispered how many times
her child was stabbed in the neck
Lord have mercy!
Who are these motherfuckers?
on the bottom rung of the Ladder of Descent
trying to climb up
on the backs of allegories
floating in fleeting and airy hope
part of the story
part of the sin
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
They knew
that love ends
as it begins again
on rocks and crosses
in books and dreams
and politics and imagery
under domes and temples
in music and song
and blood and death
in stories and sin
and in the hands
of God
the swallows are building.
Copyright 2018 E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
*Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound
** Matthew 26: V21,V22,V23,V25
Purple Verse
A. I. Assignment — A Poem the Gods Would Read [Reimagined]
Happy 2021!
So Keen
THE DREAMSCAPE MEDIA KIT
Our blog ~ EXPLODE – The Writers Environment is a platform for curated and commercial content in an interactive meta-environment… and DREAMSCAPE is the landing. Its an art installation in a digital world…
It’s an immersive ad-free environment that functions like a wikihole — and a literary Pokémon.
DREAMSCAPE is not only a standalone platform but also functions as base camp for the “Inside the [Dollhouse] with the Red Corvette (ITDWTRC) gaming app — that gives users the autonomy to curate their own experiences from their points of view and assign meaning.
When content on DREAMSCAPE tells a story about a beautiful woman swimming in a pool – we want you to see her. We want you to stumble for points on a link you cannot see, fall down a rabbit hole and land in an environment with a beautiful woman swimming in a pool, on the inside of a glass house – in Hollywood Hills…
Like Seth Godin’s Purple Cow — DREAMSCAPE is remarkable because it has to be. Or it’s just another brown cow — an ordinary website — with ordinary content. But Purple Cows need Purple Cows to be Purple Cows. DREAMSCAPE facilitates purple content, purple website design and development, and purple product placement — for purple people.
It is the foundation for curated experiences in an interactive meta-environment that facilitates content and other stories – using digital media and conceptual art that redefines how artists, their audience and visitors experience real and virtual content on several levels. Every paragraph, period, and ellipses is space for discovery.
DREAMSCAPE is a vibe for visionaries — Poets, Writers, Developers, Programmers, Filmmakers, Thespians, Graphic Designers, Artists, Musicians, Directors, Cinematographers, Designers, Educators, Historians, Actors, Conceptual and Performance artists, Photographers, SMIs, VR, WebVR, XR and AI.
It’s what William Gibson described in Neuromancer, “A graphic representation of data plugging your consciousness into a digital world, while watching the physical realm evaporate.”
DREAMSCAPE is where Gibson’s Neuromancer meets Homer’s Odyssey, Basquiat meets Hip Hop, and Hitchcock meets Quentin Tarantino ~ in the one and only interactive meta environment where presentation is myth and “space” is an intrinsic, discrete, and symmetrical experience — for purple people!
WORLDWIDE AUDIENCE REACH >11M
FOLLOWERS ACROSS SOCIAL PLATFORMS >354K
GENDER F: 47% M: 51% Unspecified: 2%
DEMOGRAPHICS 18-24: 41% 25-34: 26% 35-44: 13% 45-54: 9% 55-64: 6% 65+ 5%
LOVE DIVINE VIDEO IMPRESSIONS >1M
AVERAGE TIME SPENT ON DREAMSCAPE 44.48 sec
Acknowledgement:
DREAMSCAPE and the gaming app ITDWTRC benefits humanity as an alternative to social malfeasances e.g., sexism, racism, classism, genderism, ageism, colonialism, colorism, persecution, oppression, violence and subjugation… It is space to dream unencumbered by social impediments – immersed in dopamine and replete with points for discovery. What we experience in RL, we can experience untethered in XR and AI.
© 2020 E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved.
Music, SFX, ASMR, AI, AAC, Gamification and Storytelling on trenchpeople.com.
© 2021, E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without permission.
The SFX Menu Includes
The quintessential sound of the Pandemic thermometer
An environmental protest and chants of children
A Dune character shouting “Freedom”
Cartoon characters laughing at… Idealism
AI woman announcing traffic delays
The nouveau riche exodus on a Spaceship
AI woman announcing the time
The security breach and sound of an alarm
A Rush Hour in India
A Bazaar in Turkey
An ASMR cough
The paranormal voice of a robot
Tape Talk Fast Forward/Rewind
The motif of the Pandemic thermometer
The steam punk sound of doom
The Ditty bop sound signaling the end of the game.
Copyright © 2021, E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten
or redistributed without permission.
Yellow Tape [A Memoir]
Author’s Note: The following excerpt is from the book titled, Yellow Tape [A Memoir] coming in the summer of 2021.
Prologue
I don’t believe in coincidence. I believe in synchronicity.
We were meant to be – because we happened.
We took shelter in dark closets and screamed like tiny Sirens until our eyes were bloodshot and bulging, our ears ringing, our faces slick in tears and mucus, and our legs were covered in urine. Chaperones in an obliged competition for who could scream the loudest and longest interval — to stop MaMommy and MaDaddy from fighting again. We were toddlers.
When there was silence – except for the tinnitus in our ears, our eyes blinked for sound and with unclenched fists we dried our faces with the palms of our hands and the cuffs of our pajamas. Sometimes we looked to each other for muted answers – our eyes suspended like question marks.
I was two years older than my sister, and much taller. I reached for doorknobs above our heads — I slowly turned. We peeked through the crack of light in the door. If the crack was too narrow and my sister couldn’t see behind me, she would get down on her knees and look under the door for shadows. We had this routine, you see. If we heard our Mother moan, I would shut the door again — quietly. We squatted on the floor close to each other for comfort and embraced our knees like pillows against our chests and waited interminably. Twin hearts beating in sync.
I can’t remember when, or how, or who rescued us from the closets… we may have rescued ourselves, quickly scurrying on bare feet to the bedroom we shared. Success was silence, and when there was silence, we were safe. We never looked for our Mother. She didn’t want to be found.
The next morning, my cheerful Mother would fix our favorite breakfast. Pancakes and bacon and sometimes scrambled eggs. We loved sugar, so we smothered our breakfast in Aunt Jemima syrup. With care we looked for signs of injury to no avail. What were we crying about, after all? A tacit agreement that we were silly little girls worrying over nothing.
But we had so many questions. What happened? Why aren’t you sad? What can we do for you? Was it our fault? Did we do something wrong? Why was MaDaddy so mad? Did he hurt you? Do you love him? We always settled for, may we have more syrup, please?
I huddled over my breakfast once to hide the stain of a teardrop in my syrup. My Mother said, “Don’t cry.” as if crying was unnecessary, inappropriate, and a violation of her privacy. Strong girls don’t cry. So we colluded with our Mother and pretended the incidents never happened, and drowned our pancakes in syrup, swallowing quietly, staring straight ahead, wearing our happy faces, our lashes blinking in accord and swung our legs under the table. It was a quiet ritual and the feelings were always the same. My sister and I learned early to swallow our feelings like pancakes, smothered in syrup.
******
I know pain in a vacuum and how hollowness and emptiness can coexist, like a moon that blocks the sun. This morning was metallic like the quicksilver mercury a classmate shared on the playground in a secret show and tell. It was one uncontrollable morning that moved without impediment.
It was my sister’s 10th birthday. My mother was standing at the stove scrambling eggs in her night gown. Out all night, my Father burst into the kitchen. With five children at the breakfast table, he grabbed my Mother by the neck and at the same time pulled open the kitchen drawer grabbing the big knife without looking… as if it were placed there specifically for this one morning.
I bolted from the kitchen on the heels of my Father dragging my Mother out of the kitchen… but somehow, she broke free… running and begging, Honey please, please, I love you… she ran, but not far before he slashed her right buttock with the knife, and I saw white meat… White meat! I ran for help!
I left my Mother. I left my siblings trapped in high chairs, and screaming over bowls of Sugar Smacks… I felt my sister on my heels… we ran down the winding stairs, screaming… determined… pleading, the horror… the mortification! What is going on? What is happening? Call the police! Call the police! But my Aunt, my Father’s sister, called a sibling, a brother for guidance… Call the police! I screamed. I couldn’t stop him. What was I to do? My Mother never wanted to be found…
“Call the police!” I demanded over and over again. She didn’t. Instead she locked herself and her daughters in the bathroom… and my sister followed her there. They barricaded themselves… and I faced him squarely… Pugilists without gloves, without tape, without corners… “I hate you! I hate you! You killed my Mother! You killed my Mother! I hate you.” I screamed repeatedly.
He hit me. A Pugilist hit me in the head. My knees buckled. I didn’t fall. He hit me again. My knees buckled, but I didn’t fall. I would not fall. He reared back and hit me with a roundhouse punch a third time. Boom like Forman punched Frazier. My feet left the floor. I sailed across the room and landed behind a Settee… the back of the chair toppled over with me — and behind the chair I peed on the floor and it ran like mercury. I sat in it and looked up at my Father doe-eyed and mortified. With the back of the chair in my lap I thrashed like a deer hit by a car on the side of a road looking for grace. I don’t know why he came downstairs or who he was looking for. He found me. At 6’ 3’’ he loomed in the doorway like a dark ghost fading up the stairs with the footfalls of an athlete and the precision of his occupation: meat cutter.
I mustered the courage to follow him… Determined I climbed gingerly up the stairs that reminded me of every corner and crack in the doors of those closets my sister and I hid in when we were toddlers, but this time I was alone.
At the top of the stairs, I turned the corner, and my Father was in the mirror in the bathroom cocking a brown suede fedora on his head. He was wearing a brown silk walking suit and brown suede shoes. I didn’t know where my Mother was. I was awestruck. He was beautiful. Fate would have my Mother behind me watching me watching him. I wondered how he could be so cruel, so vain, so cold, so calm, so cool. He didn’t see me, or perhaps he did. I didn’t look for my Mother. She didn’t want to be found.
Quietly, I retreated back downstairs and waited for the Police. I left my Mother. I left my siblings. My sister and my Aunt were still locked in the bathroom, and my uncle had not arrived even though my Aunt called him for advice. Instead, he called the Police. The Police finally arrived, a paddy wagon behind them. A paddy wagon for my Mother! Not an ambulance.
At 12 years old I was indignant. I knew my Mother was not to be treated like a criminal and a paddy wagon was not appropriate for her! My Father should be in the paddy wagon! She was the victim, she needs a Doctor, she needs help, sympathy and proper care. How would they even secure the stretcher in the paddy wagon? They were in the house and up the stairs before I could finish my thoughts. My Mother was carried back down the stairs, and because she always wanted to protect her children, she asked the Police to cover her bloody head so her children could not see what would taint her maternal code of propriety, only her children understood.
My Father was escorted down the stairs like a hero… a god. He was a star. No handcuffs… It was as if the Boston Police knew and respected him, and were impressed with his walking suit, his fedora, and those brown suede shoes. The crowd cheered him! By this time, my Aunt and sister stood behind me. We peered through the curtains at the crowd that gathered to witness the death of my Mother and someone, a young woman pointed at me in the window and shouted, “Look! She looks like a monster!’ Quickly, we closed the curtains and retreated to our separate corners. My aunt gathered the bearing she hid in the bathroom, now on full display and my sister and I shared a gaze and we knew we would never share a closet again.
I had a concussion. No Doctor examined me. It wasn’t confirmed by the authorities. I bargained with God between crying jags until I fell asleep over and over again. My face, my eyes, and lips were swollen and lacerated. My family walked around me as if they would not see me — except to offer soup, and then I would remember why I grieved, why I lay in the same spot on the same couch and again I would cry myself to sleep. They left me there until my eyes were no longer swollen, no longer bloodshot, and my lips were no longer bruised. Traumatized. My eyes didn’t blink, and they left me on my own. That was perhaps the most generous thing they could do, sans calling the authorities to rescue the catatonic child, and putting the son and brother at risk. He was jailed without bond. I saw a snippet on page 10, or perhaps it was page 2, in a little box at the bottom of the page hidden in plain sight, “Colored Man Attacks Wife with Meat Cleaver.”
We gathered ourselves by degrees. I heard snippets of conversation. My Mother was alive… She lost so much blood she needed transfusions and they reached out to other jurisdictions as far as Florida. We had to go to the welfare office for assistance and were instructed by my Grandmother and Aunt to dress down to look poor and pathetic… We dressed in a manner that my Mother would never abide for her children. I overheard a constant refrain. My Mother “… must have done or said something.”
They said a man called my Mother on the only phone in our Victorian house – my Grandmother’s phone on the first floor. Another of my Father’s brothers, told my Father a man called my Mother and chided him to do something!
I was alone in an abyss of violence justified by hostility, doubt, and betrayal. I was convinced they didn’t like my Mother, or me for that matter. My breath was alien, angry, staccato. My Father slashed my Mother’s right buttock and left random slashes on her back. He broke her arm, he cut her skull… and finally, and this was a first — he scarred her face. A crescent moon on her cheek – the symbol for a new beginning.
Because of the institutionalization and practice of The Rule of Thumb, women in Massachusetts endured domestic violence. It was incumbent on women to press charges. The D.A. begged my Mother to file criminal charges against my Father. My Grandmother begged her not to file charges against her son. My Father begged her not to file and guaranteed he would never harm her again. My Mother did not file charges.
The yellow tape was removed from the door. We cleaned the blood and flesh off the floor and the walls, and discarded bowls of cereal abandoned and calcified in sour milk like the bark of a tree my Father fashioned into a lamp, and filled the space with children tethered and tripping over yellow tape that tangles as they grow taller.
My Mother came home wearing a shield of armor – a cast. White, clean, no graffiti. She was proud of that cast – a symbol of survival – of an accident. We were so happy! Our Mother was alive, and even more beautiful than before! I remember my Mother lying in the center of her bed surrounded by her children. One of my siblings ran his hands through her hair, and she scolded him, “Don’t do that.” The polar opposite of “Girls don’t cry.” Don’t make a girl cry. Don’t avail yourself to her body. Don’t break her skin.
My Father stopped by. They had an announcement. He was coming home. My sister and I were bewildered, and disappointed but always respectful; however, upon that announcement, I slowly rose from the floor and walked away without explanation or hesitation.
This time my sister followed me up the stairs to our bedroom in the attic. Not long after walking away from them my Mother did something she rarely did – she came upstairs to our bedroom. She sat on the edge of my bed and gingerly told me my Father said, he hit me because I was hysterical.
I am not a monster! I am not a monster… It’s more complicated than that.
Copyright © 2020 E Maria Shelton Speller
________________________________________________
Edited by Brahidaliz Martinez
_________________________________________________
We loved Anthony…
Spontaneous Ode to COVID-19
Nothing
Nothing
Nothing
No pork
No meat
No GMO
No pesticides
No chemicals
No vegetables
No leather
No feathers
No farmers
No pickers
No corn
No food
No work
No prosperity
No friends
No groceries
No sugar
No fashion
No affection
No morgues
No burials
No speculators
No beauty
No makeup
No vanity
No vacations
No restaurants
No music
No movies
No sports
No theaters
No plays
No crowds
No police
No museums
No cable
No concerts
No chaff
No trough
No travel
No cars
No bars
No trucks
No brick
No mortar
No hospitals
No nurses
No doctors
No assistants
No parks
No prisoners
No tickets
No economy
No gouging
No lipstick
No hookups
No intimacy
No strangers
No kisses
No hugs
No love
No metro
No nursing homes
No taxis
No buses
No ventilators
No PPE
No toilet paper
No democracy
No capitalism
No money
No jealousy
No flossing
No vaccine
No schools
No blessings
No immigrants
No refugees
No freedom
No children
No churches
No humans
No handshakes
No greed
No gluttony
No gyms
God
Copyright © 2020 E Maria Shelton Speller
Artist Statement… Unfettered Birds (WIP)
Introduction
My work explores the relationship between what is real, and what is unreal. With influences as diverse as Yukio Mishima’s Onnagata and 2001: A Space Odyssey. Where words are illusory and freedom is real, and brick and mortar is a wasteland — for mortal dreams and nightmares.
Where categories don’t matter, and you are god… the god of your dreams. My work is a journey – from the perspective of the young prince and princess in Hollywood, Dubai, the Great Caves, and Capote… Where freedom rings supreme and the fiction in your mind comes true — for real.
We launched Dreamscape in a glass cocoon — opaque me and transparent you. Content is buried there — over black people, white people, red people, yellow people, brown people, rich people, poor people, and melancholy. Inside pods power is fetish, and fashion is an avatar. My work explores the freedom to be who we are — dreaming unfettered in space — birds…
TRENCHPEOPLE.COM
Copyright 2020 E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
DREAMSCAPE — Promotional Special During the Holiday Season
Airport Announcement in Manila
[The Godforsaken]
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
They knew who first
judged what out of dreams
came truly real*
and he was fastened to a rock
and they knew who
stirreth up the people and dippeth his hand**
in the dish with Judas
and he was nailed to a cross
And they read books within books
about wise and foolish virgins
and signs of the end
and love and judgment
and they heard God talk
through the mouths of men
who talked about him
his son and the holy ghost
When spectators provided the notion of reality
Christ and Prometheus
were objectified and subjectified allegory
spheres of hope and rebellion
courage and prudence
temperance and justice
and how they chose to read it
in the time before terror
depended on what level
they chose to see it
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
They reused and refashioned the heads
of emperors in their own image
because they could
They reinforced power and authority
with legitimate political imagery
like the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses
and General Holofernes
They respected the classical past
in fertile crescents of greed
and rejected classical design
in the center of ruins
They housed the rock in the dome
on which Muhammad ascended to heaven
and hung the Virgin Mary’s blue robe
in Chartres Cathedral
When denizens of form said
Nothing is new…
The godforsaken asked
Since when?
since the Lion Gate
since the Great Sphinx of Giza
since Doric and Ionic orders
since the Palette of King Narmer
since the Parthenon
since Stonehenge
Since when?
They stood in the light of starry nights
in the drum, coffers, and concrete cylinders
of uninterrupted space in the Pantheon
and made no apologies for ripping off
master tracks from the past
and heard the hip hop train
sampling every post-hit
with unripe music and blood
and mounted the heads of gods
on the manifest
like the catalog of procreation
in Genesis
They heard his Mother
three blocks away
on parallel streets
screaming redundantly
You won’t take my child!
You won’t take my child!
at the vigil where transvestites
whispered how many times
her child was stabbed in the neck
Lord have mercy!
Who are these motherfuckers?
on the bottom rung of the Ladder of Descent
trying to climb up
on the backs of allegories
floating in fleeting and airy hope
part of the story
part of the sin
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
They knew
that love ends
as it begins again
on rocks and crosses
in books and dreams
and politics and imagery
under domes and temples
in music and song
and blood and death
in stories and sin
and in the hands
of God
The swallows are building.
Copyright 2018 E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
*Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound
** Matthew 26: V21,V22,V23,V25
For more purple content visit: https://www.trenchpeople.com/
Directing the Master Scene in the Mirror
We’re standing behind you
The window is your mirror
We‘re filming your reflections
In the window
You can see
The teardrop on her cheek
The other tear — is in your hair
Reach up and wipe the tear
With your thumb
Roll the tear on your fingers
As if water — is on the wings
of a butterfly_
Now, your face is dry
You point and say something
Insignificant like
“See that gas station down there.”
Vignette for Love Divine.
Copyright © 2018 E Maria Shelton Speller
The Wonderment
Why does black on black crime matter less than black lives matter?
Black on black crime is the consequence of a broken man
Black lives matter is the consequence of a broken system
Fix the broken system
fix the broken man >>>>
Copyright 2016 E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Bernardo Bertolucci passed away today, November 26, 2018 — RIP
- The Sheltering Sky
- The Dreamers
- The Last Emperor
- The Conformist
Dada — Lost and Found — Triptych
Doing nothing
and falling
I would be nosey
like numbers on analytics
Floating lollipops and gummy bears
Copyright 2016 E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
On the 48th year since the assassination of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. — the language for this mash-up, was for the revolutionary icon.
Bars and Verses for the South Side (Inspired by Kendrick Lamar’s The Blacker the Berry)
You are here
In front of the Mona Lisa
Provoking six million gags a year
Dismissing she’s da Vinci in drag
You are here
So valuable she can’t be insured
Sfumato eyes and slanted smile
Dangle like sneakers…. on a pole
I can hear you thinking
You are here
You are here
You are here
You are here
Bored with near misses and boors
And the fealty of Jim Crow fifty years ago
Riding a labyrinth carousel in the wilderness
You are here… before the fiery furnace
Freedom not long actually happened
While you were sleeping unaccountable
Transfixed on transitions a half-century ago
Don’t pretend you know what’s going on
We are here beyond the status quo
Beyond owning cable movies until 2024
Beyond the fear of dread before joy
Where do we go from here?
I know, they know, he knows, she knows
Like assumptions on the street is folly
Free your children what can you do for them?
Who are we?
Where conceptions… are constructions
Subject to… demystifications
Like symbols are… adroit for points
Take your children… Over there!
Over there
Away from you
Away from me
Away from them
Away from he
Away from she
Who are we?
Freedom!
You are here
Over there
Away from you
Away from me
Away from them
Away from he
Away from she
Who are we?
Free them!
There are non-profit-tax-exempt boarding schools
For girls and boys who would die on the fourth of July
Because snitches get stitches and fathers disappear
It was an easy sale – – – –
Wooed scholars thinkers and Morehouse men
With paeans and promises for the liberal emergence of altruism
With curriculums and schools of thought designed by them
It was an easier sale – – – –
Bernanke, Chomsky, Aslan, Witten
Micheaux, Baldwin, Davis, Marsalis
Thompson, Sir Timothy, Nash – – – –
Gates, Plato, Picasso, and Sowell
Over there where students create Kickstarter projects
Before the class trip to Paris, France in the fall
Parents watch their children dance under the balustrade
On the sunken floor after the Science Fair on Saturday morn
Where conceptions… are constructions
Subject to… demystifications
Like symbols are… adroit for points
Take your children… Over there!
Over there
Away from you
Away from me
Away from them
Away from he
Away from she
Who are we?
Freedom!
You are here
Over there
Away from you
Away from me
Away from them
Away from he
Away from she
Who are we?
Free them!
Cunning like military brats have to be
Wearing class A red cardigans and purity rings
Watching Venus north of the crescent moon in the dome
Reengineering the next generation
I called myself a Ghost writer
I never claimed to be one
But Talking heads and Rhodes Scholars
Join the flute girls at the grog bowl serving sharp edges and chum
This life is a bizarro disinvestment
But, before you head home by GPS
Where the last honest man is on video
Here’s a bar and verse… for the road
Our Father who art in heaven – – – –
Hallowed be your name
Thy kingdom come
Thy will be done
On earth
As it is in heaven – – – –
Where God given gifts are never squandered
You are here in the foyer with problem and solution
Where common sense is not enough
Where who and what is forever kitschy
Affirmation is a function of negation and vice versa*
Social constructs are under siege and should be
Where talking heads shut the fuck up!
Free them!
You’re welcome to stay for Church
Or join Yogi… Temple
Copyright ©2015 by E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
*Octavio Paz
Transition… (Dedicated to the Survivors of the Charleston Massacre)
In the body of Christ
Du Bois looked at Martin,
“Martin, what do you think?”
Martin looked down
tried to suppress a certain cry
reaching, he wiped a tear
from Du’s eye.
Transcript: Obama Delivers Eulogy for Clementa Pinckney — By Steven Dennis
Copyright 2004, 2015 by E Maria Shelton Speller, Explode. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
The Godforsaken
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
they knew who first
judged what out of dreams
came truly real*
and he was fastened to a rock
and they knew who
stirreth up the people and dippeth his hand**
in the dish with Judas
and he was nailed to a cross
And they read books within books
about wise and foolish virgins
and signs of the end
and love and judgment
and they heard God talk
through the mouths of men
who talked about him
his son and the holy ghost
When spectators provided the notion of reality
Christ and Prometheus
were objectified and subjectified allegory
spheres of hope and rebellion
courage and prudence
temperance and justice
and how they chose to read it
in the time before terror
depended on what level
they chose to see it
Pity
incredible people and prophets
who function as vehicle
for literal, moral,
and anagogical levels of meaning
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
they reused and refashioned the heads
of emperors in their own image
because they could
they reinforced power and authority
with legitimate political imagery
like the Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses
and General Holofernes
They respected the classical past
in fertile crescents of greed
and they rejected classical design
in the center of ruins
They housed the rock in the dome
on which Muhammad ascended to heaven
and hung the Virgin Mary’s blue robe
in Chartres Cathedral
and it didn’t burn
and they appropriated columns
and Corinthian capitals
and called it the holy triumph
of Islam
When denizens of form said
Nothing is new…
The godforsaken asked,
Since when?
since the Lion Gate
since the Great Sphinx of Gizeh
since Doric and Ionic orders
since the Palette of King Narmer
since the Parthenon
since Stonehenge
Since when?
They stood in the light of starry nights
in the drum, coffers, and concrete cylinders
of uninterrupted space in the Pantheon
and made no apologies for ripping off
master tracks from the past
and heard the hip hop train
sampling every post-hit
with unripe music and blood
and mounted the heads of gods
on the manifest
like the catalog of procreation
in Genesis
They heard his Mother
three blocks away
on parallel streets
screaming redundantly
You won’t take my child!
You won’t take my child!
at the vigil where transvestites
whispered about how many times
her child was stabbed in the neck…
Lord have mercy!
Who are these motherfuckers?
on the bottom rung of the Ladder of Descent
trying to climb up
on the backs of allegories
floating in fleeting and airy hope
part of the story
part of the sin
Before the godforsaken
had time to swallow…
He knew
that love ends
as it begins again
on rocks and crosses
in books and dreams
and politics and imagery
under domes and temples
in music and song
and blood and death
in stories and sin
and in the hands
of God
~ the Swallows are building.
Copyright 2004, 2013 E Maria Shelton Speller. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
*Aeschylus’ Prometheus Bound
** Matthew 26: V21,V22,V23,V25