Before he came along poetry for me was simply for boring old people. It was daft and lifeless. It had no relevance to my life.
Then Howl came along.
‘I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn looking for an angry fix,
angelheaded hipsters burning for the ancient heavenly connection to the starry dynamo in the machinery of night,
who poverty and tatters and hollow-eyed and high sat up smoking in the supernatural darkness of cold-water flats floating across the tops of cities contemplating jazz,’
I was about seventeen and it opened my mind like a knife. Poetry could be aimed at me. It was relevant. It was hip and it meant something.
I could identify with those young men who had rejected all that this miserable society had to offer with its concrete, mown lawns, car washing status symbols, war, pseudo-religion, hypocrisy and plastic. They were prepared to starve and even kill themselves seeking something real and meaningful. They wanted life rather than slow death, art rather than entertainment, kicks rather than passivity.
Quote number 4 – Bob Dylan – It’s Alright Ma – I’m only bleeding
Once again this is quite a long quote of a poem/lyric that is one of Bob’s best – but then he was covering a lot of ground in this diatribe of vitriolic social comment.
It was written in the sixties but still is relevant today.
Look at the themes of hypocrisy, understanding life, impotency in the face of the establishment, religion, education, lies, the rat-race, politics and how to ignore all the pretence and senselessness of modern life.
The opening stanza itself is a poem – life and death and trying to understand what is going on – there is no sense in trying – it is beyond human understanding. The light of life can be snuffed out in an instant by a knife. The light of the sun blotted out by a balloon. Life is fleeting and the darkness comes quick.
The imagery is dense.
This quote is full of quotes – (he not busy being born is busy dying) (Don’t hate nothing at all except hatred) (it’s easy to see without looking too far that nothing much is really sacred) (I got nothing ma, to live up to) (who despise their jobs, their destiny) (meanwhile life goes on all around you)
The whole poem is a mess of quotes. I think I’ve fulfilled my challenge fifty times over.
Bob Dylan was a genius. I think he got caught up in the machine and it nearly killed him. He reined in his talent.
I urge everyone to go back to those early sixties albums, dig ’em out – they are full of mind blowing gems of social comment and thought. The man is a genius.
If you try to take the establishment on you end up getting injured badly. But it’s alright ma – I’m only bleeding.
Here’s a sort quote:
‘Darkness at the break of noon
Shadows even the silver spoon
The handmade blade, the child’s balloon
Eclipses both the sun and moon
To understand you know too soon, there is no sense in trying
Pointed threats, they bluff with scorn
Suicide remarks are torn
From the fool’s gold mouthpiece the hollow horn
Plays wasted words proves to warn
That he not busy being born is busy dying
Temptation’s page flies out the door
You follow, find yourself at war
Watch waterfalls of pity roar
You feel to moan but unlike before
You discover that you’d just be one more person crying
So don’t fear if you hear
A foreign sound to your ear
It’s alright, Ma, I’m only sighing
As some warn victory, some downfall
Private reasons great or small
Can be seen in the eyes of those that call
To make all that should be killed to crawl
While others say don’t hate nothing at all, except hatred
Disillusioned words like bullets bark
As human gods aim for their mark
Made everything from toy guns that spark
To flesh-colored Christs that glow in the dark
It’s easy to see without looking too far that not much is really sacred
Our preachers preach of evil fates
Teachers teach that knowledge waits
Can lead to hundred-dollar plates
Goodness hides behind its gates
But even the President of the United States
Sometimes must have to stand naked
An’ all the rules of the road have been lodged
It’s only people’s games that you got to dodge
And it’s alright, Ma, I can make it
Advertising signs that con you
Into thinking you’re the one
That can do what’s never been done
That can win what’s never been won
Meantime life outside goes on all around you
You lose yourself, you reappear
You suddenly find you got nothing to fear
Alone you stand with nobody near
When a trembling distant voice, unclear
Startles your sleeping ears to hear
That somebody thinks they really found you
A question in your nerves is lit
Yet you know there is no answer fit
To satisfy insure you not to quit
To keep it in your mind and not forget
That it is not he or she or them or it that you belong to
Although the masters make the rules
For the wise men and the fools
I got nothing, Ma, to live up to
For them that must obey authority
That they do not respect in any degree
Who despise their jobs, their destinies
Speak jealously of them that are free
Do what they do just to be
Nothing more than something they invest in
While some on principles baptized
To strict party platform ties
Social clubs in drag disguise
Outsiders they can freely criticize
Tell nothing except who to idolize and say, “God bless him”
While one who sings with his tongue on fire
Gargles in the rat race choir
Bent out of shape from society’s pliers
Cares not to come up any higher
But rather get you down in the hole that he’s in
But I mean no harm nor put fault
On anyone that lives in a vault
But it’s alright, Ma, if I can’t please him
Old lady judges watch people in pairs
Limited in sex, they dare
To push fake morals, insult and stare
While money doesn’t talk, it swears
Obscenity, who really cares propaganda, all is phony
While them that defend what they cannot see
With a killer’s pride, security
It blows the minds most bitterly
For them that think death’s honesty
Won’t fall upon them naturally
Life sometimes must get lonely
My eyes collide head-on with stuffed graveyards
False goals, I scuff at pettiness which plays so rough
Walk upside-down inside handcuffs
Kick my legs to crash it off
Say, “Okay, I have had enough, what else can you show me?”
And if my thought dreams could be seen
They’d probably put my head in a guillotine
But it’s alright, Ma, it’s life, and life only’
Nick is a great humanitarian and all-round nice guy. His intelligence soars through all his work and raises his genius in songwriting to pertinence.
This quote in the lyric/poem from The Magnificent G7.
The world is run by a group of seven powerful countries. They are represented by seven men. They have the power to end poverty, create peace, stop environmental degradation, end overpopulation and make the world a better place for all human beings and creatures.
Instead they wrangle over self-interest and greed.
Meanwhile the poor starve and the wild-life is slaughtered.
‘Poor men can hope but there’s not much time You have the power to banish the poverty
Holding their fate You’re living in a movie But you are only seven men Really only seven men You are only seven men they are nations
Break them some bread for their children Who are their dreams who are their future
Holding their fate You’re living in a movie But you are only seven men Really only seven men You are only seven men they are nations
Mountains of money Mountains of grain Mountains between you Mountains of shame
Holding their fate You’re living in a movie But you are only seven men Really only seven men You are only seven men they are nations’
I would suggest you should go out and buy all his CDs –
Then go and purchase all my books!
I’m sure that would make us both very happy and solve all the world’s problems overnight! And you’d all enjoy yourselves into the bargain!
If you would like to try one of my books they are all available on Amazon.
My second quote is from Roy Harper – from the poem/song I hate the whiteman.
It is not a song about racism or against white people per se. It is not about colour at all. It is about the mentality of European culture that has swept over the world and is presently swamping nature and all other cultures.
It is a poem rejecting the greed and power seeking and violence of western culture. Its alcohol, nuclear bombs and environmental destruction in the name of progress.
It is a poem that rejects those values in favour of a life-style that is in harmony with the planet.
It is focussed on the life-style of the North American Indians who suffered genocide from the European invaders.
‘Far across the ocean
In the land of look and see
There once was a time
For you and me
Where the winds blow sweetly
And the easy seas flow still
And where the barefoot dream of life
Can laugh and cry it’s fill
Where slot machine confusion
And the plastic universe
Are objects of amusement
In the fiction of their curse
And where the crazy whiteman
And his teargas happiness
Lies dead and long since buried
By his own fantastic mess
For I hate the whiteman
And his plastic excuse
For I hate the whiteman
And the man who turned him loose…’
It’s a long quote but one of my favourites. Roy was, and is, one angry mother. He thought there was a better way to live – so do I.
If you would like to try one of my books they are all available on Amazon.
Quote 19 – Christopher Hitchins – Earth as a penal colony.
‘My own view is that this planet is used as a penal colony, lunatic asylum and dumping ground by a superior civilisation, to get rid of the undesirable and unfit. I can’t prove it, but you can’t disprove it either.’
These are my six books of poetry. They are available as paperback or on Kindle from Amazon – all for under £5 for a paperback. You could buy the whole lot for just £27.62!!
They are not conventional poetry books. They are like you find on my blog with a page of explanatory prose followed by the poem. The prose is as important as the poem to me.
Henry Miller has always been one of my heroes. He lived a life that was wild and creative, outside of the rules of society, yet with morality and passion.
I idolised him.
He was like a 1930s Beatnik in Paris!
I could write quotes all day they are all so brilliant:
‘The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.’
yes!!
‘I have no money, no resources, no hopes. I am the happiest man alive.’
Yes again!! To live wild and in the moment!
‘Every moment is a golden one for him who has the vision to recognize it as such.’
If we could only live naturally again. In tune with our needs.
The moment one gives close attention to any thing, even a blade of grass it becomes a mysterious, awesome, indescribably magnificent world in itself.
All life is a mystery – a wonder – awe and majesty!
‘The only thing we never get enough of is love; and the only thing we never give enough of is love.’
How true – love is all you need.
‘Chaos is the score upon which reality is written.’
The chaos of quantum and multiverses.
‘One’s destination is never a place but rather a new way of looking at things.’
The journey is what it’s about – extracting every nuance and joy.
‘If there is to be any peace it will come through being, not having.’
Feeling – loving – doing – being.
‘Back of every creation, supporting it like an arch, is faith. Enthusiasm is nothing: it comes and goes. But if one believes, then miracles occur.’
I believe we can change the world. We can build a positive zeitgeist.
‘The real leader has no need to lead – he is content to point the way.’
Henry pointed the way for me!
These are my six books of poetry. They are available as paperback or on Kindle from Amazon – all for under £5 for a paperback. You could buy the whole lot for just £27.62!!
They are not conventional poetry books. They are like you find on my blog with a page of explanatory prose followed by the poem. The prose is as important as the poem to me.
Codas, Cadence and Clues – £4.97
Stanzas and Stances – £5.59
Poems and Peons – £4.33
Rhymes and Reasons – £3.98
Prose, Cons and Poetry – £4.60
Vice and Verse – £4.15
Science Fiction books:
Ebola in the Garden of Eden – paperback £6.95 Kindle £2.56 (or free on unlimited)
Green – paperback £9.98 Kindle £2.56 (or free on unlimited)
Rock Music books
In Search of Captain Beefheart – paperback £6.91 Kindle £1.99 (or free on unlimited)
3&sr=1-1&keywords=opher+Goodwin
Other selected books and novels:
Anecdotes-Weird-Science-Writing-Ramblings – a book of anecdotes mainly from the sixties and other writing.
More Anecdotes – following the immense popularity of the first volume I produced a second
Goofin’ with the cosmic freaks – a kind of On the Road for the sixties
Quote 18 – Martin Luther King – Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.
‘Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.’
Well everyone knows his great speech in Washington. But that wasn’t all he was.
He was someone who embraced people of all races, opposed the war in Vietnam and fought for justice.
We need more charismatic leaders like Martin Luther King.
These are my six books of poetry. They are available as paperback or on Kindle from Amazon – all for under £5 for a paperback. You could buy the whole lot for just £27.62!!
They are not conventional poetry books. They are like you find on my blog with a page of explanatory prose followed by the poem. The prose is as important as the poem to me.
Quote 17 – Phil Ochs – I’m Gonna Say it Now – Words about speaking out.
Phil Ochs spoke out. He was strident about equal rights, peace and freedom.
‘So I am just a student sir
And only want to learn
But it’s hard to read through the risin’ smoke
From the books that you like to burn
So I’d like to make a promise
And I’d like to make a vow
That when I’ve got something to say, sir
I’m gonna say it now’
It seems to me that if a person has something to say they should speak.
It is no good drifting along without engaging with the mad things going on. You cannot divorce yourself.
If there are things you disagree with then shout!
It won’t make you popular. It won’t make you friends. But you’ll be able to live with yourself.
These are my six books of poetry. They are available as paperback or on Kindle from Amazon – all for under £5 for a paperback. You could buy the whole lot for just £27.62!!
They are not conventional poetry books. They are like you find on my blog with a page of explanatory prose followed by the poem. The prose is as important as the poem to me.
