Poetry – Purpose – An epic poem that covers the span of history and all human philosophy.

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I had this idea that I wanted to create a poem that summed up the whole philosophy of human beings, their history, purpose and future. I wanted it to be monumental, all-encompassing and intricate. I knew that if I could just get the rhythm, rhyme and metre right I could create such a wonder that it would sweep the world and be transformational.

If I could only create a poem of such perfection, power and truth that it would pierce the psyche of anyone who read it, awaken passion and go off with the force of an atomic bomb into the subconscious. I could start a revolution that would alter history.

I would change the world for the better. If it was good enough, pure enough, magical enough, it would create a positive zeitgeist that would sweep all in front of it.

The future would be perfect. If I could describe a purpose for mankind that would grip everyone’s imagination so that anyone who read it was instantly filled with revolutionary fervour to make the world a better place. The poem would detonate in the minds of all who read it and spread round the world like a virus.

This is that poem. The rhyme, metre and scope have been crafted. The logic is so intense it burns into the soul. I think it is going to change the world.

It is the whole purpose for living!

PURPOSE

To gain wisdom;

To create,

And make the world

A better place.

 

Opher  19.7.98

Poetry – Psychological Dust – A poem for Peace Love and Happiness in the future. Optimism and idealism rampant.

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It is a lovely thought to imagine that one day this turbulent species of ours will mature, that all the stupidity of violence, hatred, racism, sexism and war will be consigned to the history books.

Instead of being directed by selfish greed we will build a new future of love, harmony and peace. We will live sustainably and at peace with the rest of nature and no longer feel pleasure at other creatures pain.

We can all dream.

It is a vision worth working towards.

I wrote this poem in the hopes that the future will only contain the psychological fossils of all the nasty things. Hatred and cruelty will be psychological dust in the human psyche. Their memory will be so faint that there will nothing of their form left.

We will all be the happier.

I work towards creating psychological dust.

 

PSYCHOLOGICAL DUST

One day xenophobia

will begin to rust.

People will smile

and help each other

And fall about in lust

They’ll make the world a better place

Solve every problem — just

And hate and war

And nastiness

Will become

Psychological

Dust

 

 

OPHER 11.5.98

Poetry – Progress – a poem of despair at the stupidity.

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We are currently over seven billion strong and heading for ten. We are consuming land, forest and fresh water in an inexorable, escalating greed.

Our journey is guided by those who stand to make the most. It is profit before sanity in an ever increasing rush for wealth. Greed and selfishness rule. Wars are waged, people exploited and jungles and animals sacrificed.

Where will it end?

There is an inevitability about the end.

That is the game we are passing down to our children. Yet everything is sport and distraction to take your mind off the stench in the air.

We put on the designer clothes, don the make-up, douse ourselves in perfume, consume the alcohol and head for another mindless night. Who knows – we might get lucky?

We could pull.

But hey – we are all being pulled!

PROGRESS

This is the age of progress when no minutes are the same

Crashing through the global wastes as we play the game.

Possession is the mandate and ownership the key.

Seven billion strong and striving on

When what is really owned

Is you and me.

 

In the world of progress the planet’s a car boot sale.

We are all hunting for bargains and doing very well.

And who’s to tell the mother not to kill for her child.

Wrestle the land and make a stand

Fencing bush to make it safe

Managing the wild.

 

Five TVs is progress;

A car and house and wife

DVDs and mortgages,

Safety through this life.

 

We consume the labels and go playing status games

Nature in its reservations to sell for business aims.

And those that own the most are setting all the rules;

Ethics and morality, leisure banality,

Managed for our consumption –

Making us the fools.

 

Torture still has its place and war still has its day,

Vying for the power to control the market play.

We can all win a fortune and be part of the elite.

Who cares for the species, the water full of faeces?

The air, the land

Packaged oh so neat?

 

What eyes guide us through all this possession

With promises of ownership towards consumer heaven?

What rights can one man have in the midst of seven billion?

And is there any meaning? On this journey leaning

To religion and politics

As we make another million?

 

Progress has a virus

Implanted in our cortex deep;

Within our genes a callous killer

Feed us nightmares in our sleep.

 

I leave my children to control, in a candy cotton world,

Guided by the unseen eyes as the future does unfurl,

Fighting rearguard actions to find a better way,

Where progress won’t mean egress,

And diversity can thrive

To make a better day.

 

Opher 3.8.00

Poetry – Pop Songs – A song about the trivial nature of Popular Music.

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There was a time when Rock Music was saying things about the human condition, taking a stance against the evils in the world and leading the moral crusade. The music had poetry, meaning and substance. It was an art-form to be taken seriously. It stood for something.

With the death of the sixties dream the quality and substance drained out of music. Pop singers were back to the same trivial level that we had in the early sixties.

Pop music was reduced to producing froth for adolescent kids.

Where’s the music with teeth? The poetry, passion, musical brilliance and artistry?

The world has many colossal issues that need addressing. Once bands like the Beatles, Captain Beefheart, Country Joe & the Fish, and song-writers like Roy Harper, Bob Dylan, Phil Ochs, Frank Zappa and Joan Baez were producing music that challenged the best in Classical and Jazz and addressing political and social issues.

Why has it all become so superficial? Who pulling the strings? Surely it can’t just be Simon Cowell who is to blame?

Is Pop music now no more than trivial pursuit?

Pop Song

All these Pop songs are about love

I got nothing against it but Hell,

There’s so much more below and above –

The words, the politics and hard sell.

What illuminates the human state?

What reveals the journey? The mind? The fate?

 

Somewhere at this very second there is

A man planning to inflict pain.

He feels the right is his

And he does it all for gain.

Why do we have to live this way?

Is there nothing a singer’s got to say?

 

So people live among the flies and rats,

Because we all want another DVD,

And babies vomit and die, politicians lie through their hats.

But there is another way if we could but see.

There is more to life than possession.

Having so much is the great obsession.

 

Out on the piss having fun and on the pull,

Mindlessly consuming pleasure, seeking satiation.

Something’s missing in the midst of all this bull;

Like some spiritual, mental constipation.

Religions all pull for power.

Politician’s votes are producing planes into towers.

 

Inside I live; inside I die;

While you just want to get laid,

Following the fashions and giving it a try,

Hoping to impress and make the grade.

So let the babies die in the shit.

No religion points a way out of it.

 

All these Pop songs are about love.

I’ve got nothing against it but Hell,

There’s so much more below and above –

The words, the politics and hard sell.

What illuminates the human state?

What reveals the journey? The mind? The fate?

 

Not Pop songs.

 

Opher 24.12.01

Poem – Pointless Singularity – A poem about purpose in the face of a meaningless universe – love.

Posted on by Opher

I wrote this poem in response to the questions from religious friends. Religion gave them purpose. They cannot live with the knowledge that the universe happened by chance and our lives have no ultimate purpose.

I can.

The meaning and purpose in life comes from what we believe in and fight for. I believe in creativity, love, justice, freedom and equality. My morality is based on those things too. I do not need religion to give me purpose or morality. Mine morality is clearer because it is rational and has reason. It makes sense because it is for the greatest good. I respect all life, people, the planet and myself. I do not require a god to furnish me with instructions.

My purpose is to create love, happiness and make the world better. My art, writing, travel, wonder, reading, love, enjoyment, awe, social work and politics give me fulfilment. I do not need eternity nor heaven.

This poem is about love.

POINTLESS SINGULARITY

Pointlessly crawling and scrabbling up the beach

To question the wind and stars

In a universe that is beyond the scope of sighs.

 

Meaninglessly scribbling and cajoling through the ideas

To challenge the sense of nothing

In a dream that is full of where’s and why’s.

 

Using the sky as my signpost

The countryside as an endless poem

I tend the fires of desire

Recording the lies of the facts I’m knowing

If you pass me in the meadow

Strangely smiling as the cows chew cud

Stop and exchange a pleasant thought

In awareness that we share the same blood

Though meaning may escape us

And the idea of destiny is quite absurd

We’ll know more than teeming masses

Of the transient human herd

And the love we share will provide the purpose

 

Opher 16.1.96

Poetry – Pinochet – a poem that suggests we should bring all the World leaders who have practiced genocide and torture to justice.

Posted on by Opher

Pinochet_-_KissingerAugusto_Pinochet_-_1995

Nobody should be immune from justice. The tyrants and torturers should be hunted down and put on trial for their crimes.

The United Nations should be the world court. The charter of Human Rights should be sacrosanct.  No exceptions.

Pinochet was put in place by the CIA. They overthrew the elected government of Allende because they considered it too socialist. Pinochet proceeded to arrest, torture and execute all who stood against him or offered criticism, including the Folk Singer Victor Jara who was brutally tortured.

Pinochet was supported by Thatcher. He should have been put on trial and locked up.

There are thousands of similar tyrants and torturers who need to be brought to justice. There should not be anywhere safe for them to hide.

My one hope was that their conscience must plague them. They are human. No matter how desensitised they become, no matter how justified they feel, there must be a small voice that needles them with the shrieks of the tortured.

On those dark nights do they have nightmares? Can they ever be happy? Does it ever pay?

That’s what I put in this poem.

Pinochet

When a dictator speaks

Everyone takes notes

But does it pay?

Pinochet?

 

When a torturer

Applies the leads

Everyone

Concedes

But can you make it pay?

Pinochet?

 

If I had my say

It’s as clear as day

There’s no way

You could make it pay

Pinochet.

 

When a murderer

Uses a bucket of shit

And holds your head

Under it

On your say

Pinochet

Can you live with it

That way?

 

Opher 4.9.99

Poetry – Over the Weekend

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I’m beneath the sky now. I no longer have to sell my time. My day is my own to do with as I please.

I choose to spend it writing, reading and travelling, seeing my family and laughing with my friends.

That sounds like freedom to me.

I loved my job but I begrudged the time. There was so much to do and not enough time and energy to fit it all in. It seemed that you spend your life wishing for weekends, holidays and time off to recover. it was intense.

OVER THE WEEKEND

Over the weekend and under the day

Buried in work with nothing to say

I’m not over the weekend but I’m under the day

Busy selling my time for a dollop of pay

 

When I’m over the weekend

I’m bought down to ground

Stuck under the day

Subject to the pound

 

We’re all living tomorrow

Stuck in today

Running low energy

Hard into decay

 

Life could be a weekend

Lived in a sigh

Where under the day

Means beneath the sky

 

OPHER 12.2.97

Poetry – nOTHING hAS nO mEANING – a poem that says we should live in the moment – There is nothing after.

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I wrote this back in 1997. The idea of living for eternity in some sort of paradise or hell seemed rather bizarre. After the first zillion years anything would get boring; even heaven would be hell; we’d probably be begging for oblivion.

I want to live —- but I’m certain I don’t want to live forever. It’s bad enough with a rainy week.

It idea of paradise (with virgins thrown in) is a distinctly human concept. When you think it through it is quite appalling.

We all want to live forever in theory; we’d love to meet up with loved-ones and friends, but the reality is a different kettle of fish.

We’d all like the idea of divine justice and that all those callous bastards of ISIS get their come-uppance. But in reality that is not going to happen anywhere but here.

We have the moment we live in. We should cherish it. It has to be enough.

There is no meaning to be found in the universe. Even that will peter out into darkness eventually. But do not despair. We can live now. That is what is important. Enjoy it while you can.

nOTHING hAS nO mEANING

You can flee a country

Across the sea

With time

Escape the world;

Perhaps the galaxy.

But no matter

How far

You pierce the sky

Eventually

The universe will

Wither and die.

 

You can’t escape everything

We’ve all been, done

Or seen

Given the inevitability

What can any of it

Mean?

 

The sun will die –

The great attractor

Suck us in.

Planets collide

And all life end.

How can you win?

 

Life being but an instant

Fashioned from some cosmic clock

It’s just the way that we live it –

The way we think through the plot.

No matter what you do there’s

Just one chance to get it right.

Face up to living with

No room left for flight.

 

You can’t escape everything

We’ve all been, done

Or seen

Given the inevitability

What can any of it

Mean?

 

You can believe God’s visions.

You can dream of past lives,

Reunions in Heaven,

Or Paradise with ten million wives.

You can recite a trillion fairy tales

Because we all ache to live.

But if you think it through for ever

Religion’s got nothing much to give.

 

A mystical dream of oneness

In which we all play a part

Your Karma guides you through it

Stored as goodness in your heart.

God watches over you

Recording every sin

Making heavy judgements

About what you’re busy doing.

 

Heaven’s getting crowded

And Hell is even worse.

The first zillion years

Seem to go the slowest.

Eternity in the sweetness;

Living in the light,

Seems to have no purpose,

Future or delight.

 

Believing in God

Doesn’t take you anywhere.

Of course, it’s not intellectual;

 Some fancy thoroughfare.

The mystical divine

Isn’t something to be scoffed.

So put your life on hold

And get those caps all doffed.

 

You can’t escape everything

We’ve all been, done

Or seen

Given the inevitability

What can any of it

Mean?

 

Opher   25.10.97

Poetry – Nothing lasts – a poem about polyverses and eternity written in 1999.

Posted on by Opher

You might get a dog for Christmas but our atoms are eternal. We heat them up with our bodies and let them loose spinning faster. They come and they go. Every three months we have replaced every cell in our bodies. But the body remains. We are like the river. The water flows through but the river looks the same.

Already I have your atoms in my body. I have everyone’s; everyone who ever lived. We exchange atoms daily with every breath.

In the cosmic dance around us the universe is running down; entropy rules, and we add to it with our activity.

But then our universe is probably one of an infinite number – the polyverses of eternity – and our atoms may yet live forever with a hint of the spin we gave them as they passed through.

Nothing Lasts

Nothing lasts forever

Except this solar breeze

Even that will dissipate

Within the last big freeze

 

I give these atoms spin

I let loose energy

Adding to the cosmic dance

Through each and every day

 

My atoms mingle with you

As we struggle in the storm

Upon yet another beach

Where each new universe is born

 

Opher 27.5.99

Poetry – Welcome to New Eden – an ode to the superficial, consumer society.

Posted on by Opher

Aaah – the future beckons. We will all be consumer units in the concrete and glass enclave, our every need catered for, our every thought directed – something for every whim and every whim induced.

We shall be happy and satisfied as we sip our medicine and go where directed to sample what is provided for our delectation.

Our world will be fully sanitised and safe. All will be provided. We won’t even have to think.

New Eden

While sandcastle civilisations wait for the rushing tide

Welcome to New Eden where we’ll keep you satisfied

We can shape your imperfect body and soothe your troubled mind

Sanitise your lifestyle and make your stress unwind

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

 

You’re a chosen stakeholder in our glittering merchandise

Buy your way to freedom where ‘don’t think’ will suffice

Never ask the questions except to scheme for more

Satisfy your hungers in New Eden’s superstore

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

 

Never count the costs when your credit is on tap

Earn and spend forever with a knick-knack in every gap

If you want to see a tree we’ve plenty in the museum

The entrance fee is very small and you don’t queue long to see them

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

 

Last season’s fashion? Just throw it in the bin

Make space for the new styles screaming to get in

Nothings built to last in this throwaway society

Don’t glance sideways through the windscreen while you’re so hale and hearty

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

 

I hope that you like concrete, tarmac and glass

We can get you anywhere, comfortable, safe and fast

Get it down you, bring it up, you know it does you good

You never have to question who directs the neighbourhood

You are the chosen one

Welcome to New Eden

The fun has begun

The fun has just begun

 

Opher 19.2.01