SONGS

"Polar Bear"

So Small I was,
So small I DREAMED,
So small I longed for an IGLOO.
My dad told me that when I grew OLD
I could do all IGLOOS that I wanted.
Without ever DOUBTING that, dreams
Never left my mind, but when it
Was time, all ICE was MELTED by the
SMOKE of MACHINES, so big without AIM
So big WITHOUT DREAMS.
So big without my egloo

Title: Mutter Natur

Erde ist in meiner Handfläche
Das Leben füllt meine Lungen
frische Luft frischer Atem
du wächst du erschaffst
Ihre jede Bewegung fasziniert mich
Du gibst mir Leben und ich gebe dir deins
Das Geschenk der Schöpfung liegt in Ihrer Handfläche
Ich mache mir Sorgen dein Griff ist zu hart für die Schöpfung
Ver Sprichst du, vorsichtig zu sein?
Lassen Sie sich nicht von Ihrer Macht überwältigen?
Meine Liebe zu dir ist stark, aber ich fürchte, deine Gier ist stärker
Du hältst den Tod in deiner Handfläche
Ich sehe Zerstörung in deinen Augen
Was ist mit meiner Liebe passiert?
Du hast meine Liebe für selbstverständlich gehalten
die Erde die ich in meiner Handfläche halte
ist hart und leblos geworden
Beton erstickt das Leben
Lichter blenden die Sterne
Ich halte jetzt den Tod in meiner Handfläche
die Erde, die du einmal so sehr geliebt hast
ist dein eigenes Beton grab geworden

“In the Car”

A slight humming calls out to me from the driveway
And its vibrations add a slight tremor
To this slow and boring day

Mami has come home from work
I wait on the sofa
1 minute
Otro minuto
10 minutes
Otro minuto

Puede ser que esta just talking on the phone
Maybe with that old coworker, Joan

But I like to think she is repeatedly breathing in and out
Thinking of the old ways she used to live about

Sailing through the cayos of Chichiriviche
Now entrenched with the slimy slick tar oil
Or in Abuelo’s small avioneta or Tio’s lancha
Now covered with the rust like hues of copper foil

Thinking of when that man in scrubs came by with Abuelo’s fracaso
And said the words that would soon bring her to make another caso

A new life in an unknown country with a strange language without the assistance of any familiar smile
No beach
No cayos
No avioneta
No lancha

Just work and more work and more on top of that
to sustain the new partner that she would carry along for 9 months

Maybe those countless minutes in the car could be an
Escape from the pivotal character who defines this new life

Now, the humming grows stronger
Now a combination of my foot slamming against the floor
The beats of my heart grow longer
I can’t comprehend things wronger
like the hate for the people along her

As we get ready to work while the sky is still full of stars
You ask us where the papers are
We live in communities trying to recreate the same comodidad of our old streets
But now my favorite mercado is a multi thousand dollar building of suites
I try to walk across the small joke of the community park
But the cracked sidewalk leaves a bloody mark
The growing cracks diverging across the yellowish walls of my townhouse
Remind me of how my spanish starts skid away like a mouse

I do remember those late night when the kitchen light
That shone bright
With the papers across the mesa
“Ay, esto si me estresa”

The engine shuts off
And off come the lock

I’m sorry Abuela
When you said Schokolat, I said Chocolate and I always corrected you
I’m sorry Abuelo
That I no longer visit the same house in which I grew with you
But I’m really sorry Mami
That I never realized what you gave up for my different view

“Issues” by David Rosario

I rarely get asked about what I think
but when I do, I truly don't miss

The world around us seems to matter
let's come together
better late than never

Let’s have conversations that aren’t so comfortable
Shed light on things that are important

To the people that say learn the language here
Como me vas a decir
a hablar la lengua de aquí
cuando aquí es donde nací.

You’re mad
You’re furious
I understand
But listen up, bitter man

Education is key and you are the lock
simply grab it turn it, not even a lot
Learn a language, a skill, just something new,
educate yourself about current issues

And to the supposed BLM allies,
Go off,
Show off,
your fancy feeds,
while people are dying, crying, barely surviving,
it's not like one post showed you're not trying—
BLM isn't a trend,
surprise saying the n-word behind closed doors still offends
Its sad, people only care about themselves
hidden inside an inner shell
that doesn't budge or break or babble,
about the things that truly matter

As a Catholic, it pains me to see people cause so much destruction in this world
As a human, it also pains me to see how people are willing to rip each other apart because of closed stubborn mindsets
I barely watch the news to avoid all the bad that goes on
But when I do turn it on, I see nothing but violence
People hurting one another because of their race
People hurting one another because of their gender
People hurting one another because of their religion
People hurting each other over the things that should unite us

As a Catholic, I see how people look at me
They think that I’m biased because I follow what Jesus says
And nobody else
They believe I do not know enough about the “real world” to make my own decisions.
I see people destroying churches and statues
People who laugh in our faces as if to say:
“There is no God.”
“You have nobody.”
“You are foolish to believe some God will save you.”
Although no one has said it directly to me, I feel lit
I see it in their actions towards me
In the way they speak to me
Either to protect me or laugh at me for thinking differently
With the people I am with, I may be safe from it
But take one look at the news
And deep inside, you’ll find it

“Leftists Burn Churches, Scrawl Death To The Nazarene”
“Vandal takes baseball bat to Catholic seminary in Texas”
“Amid tumult over constitution, Chile watches two churches burn”
That’s only this weekend.
In the past years, on the news we see attacks
We see judgment
We see people hurt the Church

Abortion.
I am against it.
Under my own morals.
I am against it.
“You just say that because you’re Catholic”
“It’s because you’re Catholic”
“What if you weren’t Catholic?”
“Form your own opinion”
Every time.
Yes as a Catholic, I am against it.
But as a human being.
I detest it.
Abortion.
The killing of another human being
Because it’s not a fetus
It’s not a clump of cells
It is a human being
It is a baby
It’s a life
No one says:
“Congrats! You’re having a fetus!”
“Are you excited for your clump of cells?!”
No
It’s always:
“You’re having a baby!”
“Is it a girl or a boy?!”

The life of a child is in your hands
But you decide to let it go
You decide to kill it
A child that could have made a change in the world.
Gone.

Yes, people get raped
But did you know
That is only one percent of all abortions are because of rape
The other ninety-nine percent is because she chose to

But no matter what I say
My point becomes invalidated
They overrule my thoughts and opinions because of a religious bias
My opinions have been formed on my own
My God just supports what I have to say
And it is seen in the Sacred Scripture as well.

A Catholic
Do people respect me or make fun of me silently?
Why is it that when I have something to say about a social issue
No one wnats to hear
Why is it that when my churches are attacked
I don’t see the news riled up
I don’t see people speak out about what happened to my religion?

No, it’s overlooked.
“You’re Catholic. Shouldn't God do something about it?”
“You’re Catholic, shouldn’t this not happen?”
Well it does happen

As a Catholic teenager,
I go to school knowing that my beliefs would be tested.
Many Catholics are persecuted
North Korea, Afghanistan, Somalia, Sudan, Pakistan, and more
Persecute Christians and Catholics as a whole

Religious beliefs are persecuted everywhere
Maybe not as harshly in this country
But in other places, you see how churches get burned
You see the statues fall and be destroyed

People have no mercy and no heart and soul
What is the need to hurt others
What is the need to destroy?

Black-

Look, black is beautiful, black is excellent
Black is pain, black is joy, black is evident
It's working twice as hard as the people you know you're better than
Cause you need to do double what they do so you can level them
Black is so much deeper than just African-American
Our heritage been severed, you never got to experiment
With family trees, cause they teach you about famine and greed
And show you pictures of our fam on their knees
Tell us we used to be barbaric, we had actual queens
Black is watching child soldiers getting killed by other children
Feeling sick, like, "Oh wait, this could have happened to me"
Your mummy watchin' tellin' stories 'bout your dad and your niece
The blacker the berry the sweeter the juice
A kid dies, the blacker the killer, the sweeter the news
And if he's white you give him a chance, he's ill and confused
If he's black he's probably armed, you see him and shoot

Look, black ain't just a single freaking colour, man there's shades to it
Her hair's straight and thick but mine's got waves in it
Black is not divisive, they been lyin' and I hate this
Black has never been a competition, we don't make it
Black is deadly
Black is when you're freezing in your home and you can't get sleep but never feeling empty
cause you got 20 cousins in your country living stress-free
Walking for their water, daughter wrapped inside a bed sheet
Black is distant, it's representing countries that never even existed while your grandmother was living
Black is my Ghanaian brother readin' into scriptures
Doing research on his lineage, finding out that he's Egyptian
Black is people naming your countries on what they trade most
Coast of Ivory, Gold Coast, and the Grain Coast
But most importantly to show how deep all this pain goes
West Africa, Benin, they called it slave coast
Black is so confusing, cause the culture
They're in love with it
They take our features when they want and have their fun with it
Never seem to help with all the things we know would come with it

Mudarse a U.S.A

Mudarse a los Estados Unidos no fue nada fácil,
Despedirse de personas que amas no es la mejor sensación del mundo,
Ver sus caras tristes hacen que quieras quedarte,
Pero saber que no puedes no tener oportunidades ahí te hace pensar lo contrario.
Uno se pregunta: ¿Cuándo los volveré a ver?
¿Los volveré a ver siquiera?
Simplemente son preguntas que no pueden ser respondidas.
Recuerdo minutos antes de salir al aeropuerto,
Ver mi casa por última vez,
Mi habitacion,
Mi cocina,
Mi sala de estar,
Ver la vista por la ventana,
Donde rei y llore,
Donde viví toda mi vida.
Es extraño este sentimiento,
Porque aunque aquí tengo mejores cosas y vivo mejor,
Eso era lo único que conocía.
A veces estoy nostálgica.
Lo que es irónico, porque en verdad no quisiera volver.
Tengo la teoría de que en realidad lo que extraño no son las personas,
Ni los lugares,
Sino que en realidad lo que extraño,
Es el recuerdo que tengo de ello,
Todo lo que queda ahora es eso,
Un recuerdo.

In 1865, American slavery was supposedly abolished
Yet, I am left astonished,
That we ignore the countries that are consistently demolished
So that our capitalistic goals can be accomplished

The average American does not think,
About the African children in the Ivory Coast
Who work tirelessly like incessant machines,
Just to provide the West with cocoa beans
When we’re not even the ones who deserve it the most

We do not consider the environment
When we combust an excessive amount of fossil fuels
For simple goods like clothing and toiletries and accessories made of jewels
All out of self-assumed entitlement

It is not difficult to understand
That it is unsustainable to raise billions of animals in vast amounts of land,
Only to meet consumer demands
That over the years, have gotten way out of hand

Global warming won’t care about our fears
If we don’t do anything about it in the coming years
Denying it won’t make it disappear
Only change will, one that happens across the entire Global sphere

We cannot keep diminishing our biodiversity
Whether it be through cutting trees,
Or spreading disease
This issue alone will cause a lot of adversity

To minimize these problems, we must examine solutions
And take down the various institutions
Who emit CO2 and exploit workers amongst many other harmful contributions
We must do everything to limit the amounts of pollution,
And for this to work, we must be prepared for a massive revolution.

I Imagine
I imagine a future where everyone holds hands in unison
Where never a colored man passes by a white parent that in fear brings closer their son
I imagine a future where never a person of color gets pulled over and doesn’t know if they will see momma again
Where police officers and normal people alike treat people of color they so deserve
I imagine a future where social justice isn’t a controversial or political topic
Where I see love between all races and don’t worry that it’s just because I’m myopic

I imagine a future where everyone works together in peace
Where all people regardless of color work together to save the polar ice sheets
I imagine a future where I don’t hear about a new animal being endangered everyday
Where there are people who respect the environment and who to protect it go out of their way
I imagine a future where all the beautiful habitats aren’t dying due to human ineptitude
Where people are environmentally conscious and don’t see the effects of global warming at every latitude

I imagine a future where hospital bills don’t prevent people from getting treatment
Where people like my grandmother don’t have to pay obscenities to prevent detriment
I imagine a future where healthcare is provided to all regardless of their ability to pay
Where the bottom line is helping people and lives are saved without them worrying about bills at the end of the day
I imagine a future where moms don’t have to see their kids die nor kids their parents die from cancer
Where we have finally come up to cure this despicable disease and kids grow up to be dancers and dreamers

I imagine a future where my brothers and sisters aren’t killed on the border
Where people fleeing injustice don’t walk into worse injustice in the name of order
I imagine a future where this immigrant nation isn’t run by xenophobes
Where people can freely move to this country and not worry about being looked at like a space probe
I imagine a future where parents helping their kids don’t look over their shoulders for ICE
Where parents can come from poverty and give their kids an education and only worry about ice at barbeques
I imagine a future where I don’t have to imagine

Wir wachen ängstlich vor ihnen auf,
Wir werden immer von ihnen aufgehalten,
Wir versuchen zu protestieren,
aber nichts hat sich geändert.
Wir haben Angst, dass sie uns töten werden,
Wir haben Angst, dass sie uns einsperren werden,
Wir haben sie jetzt zweimal gefangen,
aber nichts hat sich geändert.
Ich denke wir müssen warten,
Wir müssen sitzen und den Schmerz ertragen,
gegen diese hoffnungslose Welt,
Ich denke, nichts wird sich jemals ändern.
Sie tragen ihre Abzeichen mit Stolz,
Sie sagen, wir müssen nicht so sein,
Wir haben jedoch das Gefühl, dass keine Optionen mehr verfügbar sind,
Um schwarze Leben zu schützen.

Justiz

Was ist Justiz?

Wer spricht für die stumm?

Sind unser Rennwagenen wichtiger als die Bauen?

Warum kann das 1 prozent über jeden Grund reicher werden, wenn die Armen täglich absterben?

Was ist Justiz?

Warum haben wir Waffen um die unschuldig zu toten?

Warum können wir sehen einander als nur Personen nicht?

Was ist wichtiger ein Menschenleben oder unsere Stolz?

Unsere Stolz für ein Land gebaut mit Anspruchsrecht, ein Land aufgeteilt in so viele Wege

Wie können wir in Treu und Glauben befürworten ein Land mit viele Systeme das

bedrängen viele personen allein basiert von die Aussehen oder ob deine Religionen

Warum können wir unser Planet sparen ob wir sparen Flüchtlinge, die geisteskrank, und Kinder; ungeboren und geboren ähnlich?

Was ist Justiz?

"Witchgrass"
by Louise Glück

Something
comes into the world unwelcome
calling disorder, disorder—

If you hate me so much
don’t bother to give me
a name: do you need
one more slur
in your language, another
way to blame
one tribe for everything—

as we both know,
if you worship
one god, you only need
One enemy—

I’m not the enemy.
Only a ruse to ignore
what you see happening
right here in this bed,
a little paradigm
of failure. One of your precious flowers
dies here almost every day
and you can’t rest until
you attack the cause, meaning
whatever is left, whatever
happens to be sturdier
than your personal passion—

It was not meant
to last forever in the real world.
But why admit that, when you can go on
doing what you always do,
mourning and laying blame,
always the two together.

I don’t need your praise
to survive. I was here first,
before you were here, before
you ever planted a garden.
And I’ll be here when only the sun and moon
are left, and the sea, and the wide field.

I will constitute the field.

https://readalittlepoetry.wordpress.com/2005/09/29/witchgrass-by-louise-gluck

This one is a multi-lingual "trans-poetic" attempt to look at sustainability and maybe to some degree justice in a broader "Global-Cultural" sense:

"Babel al Revez"

ז הָבָה, נֵרְדָה, וְנָבְלָה שָׁם, שְׂפָתָם--אֲשֶׁר לֹא יִשְׁמְעוּ, אִישׁ שְׂפַת רֵעֵהוּ

δεῦτε καὶ καταβάντες συγχέωμεν αὐτῶν ἐκεῖ τὴν γλῶσσαν, ἵνα μὴ ἀκούσωσιν ἕκαστος τὴν φωνὴν τοῦ πλησίον

Venite igitur descendamus et confundamus ibi linguam eorum ut non audiat unusquisque vocem proximi sui.

Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another's speech.
Genesis 11: 7-https://www.kingjamesbibleonline.org/Genesis-Chapter-11/

DESCENDAMUS ET CONFUNDAMOS (redux)...
breve nuestra historia desde el diluvio
queremos una existencia mas firme
sicherheitshalber zu Gott hinauf, nur uns,
Ihn, festzuhalten, aber ER SELBST sein?
just trying to have a name, make a stand
but points skyward and shouts: “look!”
ansiosos nos miramos y nos preguntamos
¿Qué dicen? ¿Lucro? ¿QUÉ?
was genau haben wir wahrgenommen,
bevor wir nicht mehr zu gucken verstehen?
dumbfounded and crestfallen, grunts
where words were, like breath knocked out?
¿el choque de algún ejército magno abatido?
ein feuriges Angesicht krachend ins Innere versetzt?
Some pitiful old god sent crashing down to mock us—now?
era como un milagro que aún parecíamos entender
la última palabra común y mirar para arriba
auf einmal die Panik wegen der Höhe
allein zwischen oben und unten, wie ein Nichts
fight or flight feels right but we just sit and stand at first
like frozen on our ramps and scaffold perches
entre nosotros nos seguimos entendiendo bien
a los otros ya no. ¿así se podrá seguir?
unsereiner versteht sich wie immer
aber was für ‘n Unsinn reden die andern auf einmal?
Poise in the vertiginous workplace vanishes
as language becomes frantic noise
bajemos—steigen wir ab—let’s get back down
dandose cuenta de los pajaros pasandonos
un momento uno se imagina alas, no parece justo
früher so feste Backsteine zerbröckeln sichtlich
waren für verzweifelt fliehende Füße nicht gedacht
finding our own at tower’s foot we, all, look up and then around,
eyes full, how can what we have done become what we will do?
nos dispersamos, accordandonos de vias plumosas de aire
wir verstreuen uns, im Gedächtnis die Umrisse des Turms als Kompass
we scatter trying to remember, as those of the flood remembered for us.

https://translate.google.com/?rlz=1C1CHBF_enUS906US906&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hl=en&client=tw-ob#auto/en/

(work-in-progress; poem performance with Bruegel's painting of Babel https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Pieter_Bruegel_the_Elder_-_The_Tower_of_Babel_(Vienna)_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg envisaged)

"Ein transpoetischer, logisch-philosophischer Klimasprachversuch"

"Was sich überhaupt sagen lässt, lässt sich klar sagen: und wovon man nicht reden kann, darüber muss man schweigen.“ Ludwig Wittgenstein

Klar sagen wärmer werdende Winde:
geschorene Gletscher glitschen,
Gewirbeltes wirbeln Wirbelstürme wieder,
wobei sich brüsten verwüstete Küsten,
und in eislosen Leeren,
plärren enteiste Eisbären.
Im strengen Sinne tritt nichts
und niemand über die Ufer mehr.
Überschwemmtes überschwemmt Überhitztes,
immer weiter nur überbraten und versalzt.
Andererseits sind Firewalls
längst wörtlichst zu verstehen
-und höchst beweglich, zudem auch
die Feuerwirbelstürmedurcheinander.
Geheimnisvoll bleibt nur die Befindlichkeit
letzter funktionierender Klimaanlagen.
Das zu Machende schon gemacht,
das Gemachte offensichtlich und schwerwiegend,
wird Werdendes gewesen
und Seiendes schon geworden sein,
und die allerletzten Zweifler nicht widerlegt
sondern umständehalber still.
Der Nivellierung, die wir eingeleitet
und der wir schichtweise heimfallen,
werden wir nicht fehlen, zum Glück.
Doch darüber muss man wohl schweigen.

https://youtu.be/wmL2wW9oHq4

“Transzendentalpoesie”-
Maybe no surprise where I'm coming from poetically. This may be obscure but it shouldn't be:
——————
The most famous definition of transcendental poetry is given by Friedrich Schlegel in the Journal Athenaum (1800):
"There is a poetry whose One and All is the relationship of the ideal and the real: it should thus be called transcendental poetry according to the analogy of the technical language of philosophy. […] But we should not care for a transcendental philosophy unless it were critical, unless it portrayed the producer along with the product, unless it embraced in its system of transcendental thoughts a characterization of transcendental thinking: in the same way, that poetry which is not infrequently encountered in modern poets should combine those transcendental materials and preliminary exercises for a poetic theory of the creative power with the artistic reflection and beautiful self-mirroring."[7]
Friedrich Schlegel writes that transcendental poetry should present the act of artistic creation along with the created work of art. In this way, “this poetry should portray itself with each of its portrayals; everywhere and at the same time, it should be poetry and the poetry of poetry.”[8]
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transcendental_poetry
——————-
Imagining a “transpoetry” as a jazz-inspired, tech-leveraged Slam version of Transzentendalpoesie.

In the same spirit, please feel free to share not only your own poetry but also your thoughts about what poetry is and does!

"A trans-poetic logico-philosophical climate-language-experiment"

“What can be said at all can be said clearly, and what we cannot talk about we must pass over in silence.”
Ludwig Wittgenstein - Tractatus Logico-philosophicus.

Clearly say winds becoming warmer:
Shorn glaciers glide,
cyclones cycle stuff back around
so that ghost coasts boast,
and in iceless voids blare
de-iced ice bears.
In a strict sense nothing and nobody
is rising above the banks anymore.
The overflowed overflows the overheated,
continuously broiled and salted.
On the other hand,
firewalls are
long since to be understood most literally
-and very fast, along with
the fire-cyclone-entanglements.
Mysterious remains only the location
of last functioning air conditioners.
What to be done already done,
the done obvious and ponderous,
becoming will have been,
being already have become,
and the very last doubters not convinced
but still, owing to circumstances.
The leveling which we started
and to which we fall home by stratum
won’t miss us, fortunately.
But surely we must pass this over in silence.

https://youtu.be/oHuFQ9KggW8