THOM THE WORLD POET: The Daily Poem

Rob Ayling, yer Gonzo Grande Fromage, writes: 

"Thom the World poet is an old mate of mine from way back in my history. Even pre-dating Voiceprint, when I was running "Otter Songs" and Thom's poetry tapes and guest appearances with Daevid Allen, Gilli Smyth and Mother Gong are well known and highly regarded. It just felt right to include a daily poem from Thom on our Gonzo blog and when I approached him to do so, he replied within seconds!!! Thom is a great talent and just wants to spread poetry, light and positive energy across the globe. If we at Gonzo can help him do that - why not?"

WINTER POEMS

ELEMENTS, ELEMENTAL, ELEMENTARY

IF WE CAME FROM STARS

We carry their carbon footprint

Our DNA ancient as starlight

Stars sing in space/they are in a dance

that connects all of us @all times

Astronomy/astrology. Three Wise Men /Bethlehem

All of these stories are stars/as we are stars

Beaming Light among us/and rising and falling

/continuous

Every star song has a chorus. SING WITH US!

HARMONIES

TO BE EUDEMONIC WITHIN SPACE & TIME

To allude to classical lines

To use natural(recycled) materials

To include nature as part (not apart

To open up areas /allow Light in

To be organic, living, breathing

As it is in our bodies, so in the spaces where we live

To build with and for -to let Light live.

From RIVERS & TIDES to mud-brick Cathedral

Everywhere Natural and Living is Holy and wholly helpful

For we only have Space, and Time is counted

And to make and create is the task of our lives

Each one linked by the same necessities

As in beauty and life-let your Dreams Breathe!

A SPARK OF MADNESS

SPARK OF MADNESS Correlations between those

of "altered states"

and those who made art out of chaos

Painters, poets, novelists-surrealists

all used that spark of madness to make art .

Dali's masturbatory fantasies, Baudelaire's praise of

opium ,

Van Gogh's absinthe, Burrough's heroin,

Bukowski's alcoholism-like Leary and LSD

Ginsberg and marijuana

one asks if art is best served by madness or repose

"Kubla Khan "from a laudanum-inspire

visions and projected fantasies

There are so many who do not believe they can

Let them BUY these works

if only to prove or disprove that quality comes

from a "spark of madness!"

TO MAKE A SANCTUARY

a safe space/blessed area

drawn to ancient lines

affirmed in landscaping

Zen monks raked sands

in patterns like the wind

to encourage meditation

Spiral galaxies spin

we are within them

tiny seashells in deep oceans

Moving in a Sacred Way

 where every ending
is beginning/ cycles
You start in art./Life follows
Leaving only photographs
and footprints.

THE LAST ART

"What is it about poetry that people love to hate? Why this periodic denunciation? Why such anxiety and embarrassment about poetry? I got interested in what contempt about poetry reveals about culture." - Ben Lerner.

THE CORPSE OF POETRY IS DISSECTED

AS HISTORY

in bored classrooms by clinical grammarians/

As soon as you utter, you trespass upon meaning.

Speak song, and lyric intrudes

Let the body of language walk and talk, perambulate

and iterate..

Watch how our Inner Sufi animates this world dust

dance floor

Trust indigenous song-cycles.

Learn how ancient these drum beat word rhythms

are.

Then, when words argue back, try to deny rant and

argument!

Stories reincarnate and resurrect.

They flow in narrative streams.

They glow with visions and epiphanies.

THEY LIVE! The death of metaphor is premature.

It serves a vital purpose-to restore depth and significance to speech.

Your word is your bond your stock,

your shares, your instruments of exchange.

Trust your visions! Trust

YOU GIVE AWAY YOUR ART

YOUR LIFE A CO-CREATION

Yet, when you live beyond your love-

a subtle devastation. You still talk to him(or rather

listen)

He tells you to get off your "pity pot" -and star

living!

And your smile shows that you know this is true

But what can an artist do in a Luddite world?

So you downsize to a granny flat and you give your

old art away

to make space for the new and you discover a simple

truth.

When you release all that you have made and given

You become ,anew. Your new creation-is you..

EARTH MOTHER

WHEN FAERIE YOUNG She lived in country

/loved Nature

felt at one with trees, birds, animals

(Not so trusting with humans who seemed to lack connection-

to themselves or all other forms of life..)

From harmonic growing life to finding broken

faith/heart people

she learned older ways again-wind, water, signs,

symbols

How to read /the way to be/when others could not see

her

Her children taught her she was love

having this foundation of connection Others called her EARTH MOTHER

Her white wolf sits tranquil by her side

She lives in forests now/attracts those who pilgrim

come to learn from earth, and need a MOTHER OF

EARTH

to guide them..

Thom World Poet

DANCE MACCABRE

THERE IS THIS DANCE BETWEEN LIFE & ART

It is not like DANCING WITH THE STARS

It is more a danse macabre Your breath & its demise

Your daily/nightly/limited life

Each day has counted syllables

You have enough energy to defeat lassitude

But doctors and health are more than excuses

Your words lay unspoken, unwritten

Your life a story you did not finish'/Your memoir

unedited,

Your EPIC SAGA another bag of dust on the shelf

Unless and until you devote to Muse once more-

to explore the untended emotions, the lost paths the

hidden habitats,

the Light in your eyes will guide you

to spill all those shadows into ink stained pages

which become as wings, and lift your only/many

lives away..

IN ALL TIMES YOU LOVE

morning, kissing pillows that at night have held a

lover

as outside moon witness changes guard with sun

power

Breakfast as you feed upon daylight milk

and the flow of energies gives you reasons to

conceive

Noon, when , paused for reflection, you take time

back to recall

how time for memory is not time lost at all

Afternoon-siesta, where you digest the day to date,

slide down the wormhole of where you were when...

evening , after twilight turns its lemon light into stars

you blink ,remember where you are, and turn your

dream frequency on

Night has come-a blanket sky.

PREFERABLE FANTASIES

WE ARE SAVED VIA ART

Creativity is evolving All energies transform us

We choose essence and direction There is point and

purpose

Even nothing has something to offer

Material means more than spaces between materials

Emotions are a supermarket There is always more

Each moment a surprise Sometimes a fine line between description and result Here be the mojo. And the magic What happens next? Unknown..

WILD LIFE

THERE ARE STILL FISH IN BARTON SPRINGS

small, but visible. There is an eel that sometimes

comes out

And then-those legendary salamanders-tiny,

threatened

Unique to this habitat. All long before a human hand

drank from /

a human body slipped into these cool ,refreshing

Springs

So some say words are flowers on the waters

and the truth is to actually enter the Springs

first by sitting, watching, waiting

next by merging with those waters

which will always be more than we who come as

pilgrims

for temporary admission. Whether drought or no-we

flow

We are the wild life sun sipping by the sides of Pool

We are those swimming in those waters so cool

Fish, eel, salamander ,snake-all take to the waters

We are All water!

DESERT SONGS

WHAT YOU HEAR AWAY FROM HERE

is as old as stone. Flint, to be precise

and it is tuned and attuned

as earth is a song/we learn

to sing along/with and besides/

so we may understand fully/why we hum

/harmonically

as if hearing sounds /beyond our audible spectrum

Deserts know. They hold the wisdom of past oceans.

They whistle winds through them.

Sand and glass notes are heard by desert dwellers.

Stones sing! That is why we value crystals/diamonds/quartz/silicon

Our clear glass world needs to hear again-

the singing distance of deserts

SINGING WITH ALEPPO

NOW WE HEAR THE SAME OLD DIRGE Military

killing civilians.

Civilians paying twice. As in Aleppo.

As in Palestine. As in Standing Rock.

As the last messages filter out /stained with blood

We send our love, strength and support to all civilians threatened with extinction.

Already, hospitals are bombed

Every individual has a name-not just a body count.

Under the same moon, murder is done

Do not blame the moon, nor stars

Guilt does not bring the dead and dying back to life

This is a blues. A keening. A howl.

An ululation for every man, woman and child trapped in their only home

Being bombed as you read this last line.

HOWL WITH ME! Sing with Standing Rock!

THE DOOR OF WINTER IS LOCKED TIGHT

OUTSIDE IS FROST, AND SNOW & ICE

Inside-both fire and feast frolic with a warmth this coolest season would deny.

Inside, we huddle closer in these times

when human heat seems such a threatened species

replaced by gunpowder wars and walls

We are diminished unless and until we seek shelter

within the company of one another/keeps us stronger

Like the fire of your energies, in these dying days will keep ye well enough to breathe through cold, and

snow, and frost

Leave winter outside.. Come inside. With us..