Poems
by KJ Hannah Greenberg

 

 

Desairologists’ Perspective

 

Given predators, those types aiding abductors, even granted self-defense,

Fill-in care providers’ phlegmatic notice of hoped for support smolders,

Makes slurping goldfish, occupying phone booths, smoking chores grim.

(Goatherds’ loneliness ordinarily roots in ineptitudes, stems from greed.)

 

Yields of reliable paychecks, posh parrots, portable keyboards, potlatch,

Satisfy human voices, except for ineffectuals adamant over tambourines.

Consider that we desairologists need to patch-up deceaseds’ hair, casings,

In funeral homes’ preparation rooms, because color, texture, light matter. 

 

Emanations remain created things. Few discarnate folks occur as eidolons;

Some, merely, appear actinic, look like they’d melt if met by anathematic

Hunters. Others, splinter into petite portions of plasma or echo-signatures.

So, we spray on ashen pigments, paint over bruises, pretend farishtas exit.

 

Taken together, interstitular interjections made by wet weekends’ jalopies

Continue to be otherwise clapped-out, discounting their oddities’ bearing.

In the end, no locum ever competes successfully with animated cadavers.

Dead’s dead; corpses, those yet lying in state, are strangely counterfeited.

 

Fathom how make-believe realms’ recondite themes, like expiry, cull more

Than hide. Shrouded heroes and quislings both get turfed out. Demagogical

Items count. Death’s no abode for lairy persons; finality’s an extended stop.

Mostly, we aid the departed in touting traditional suggestions of indolence.

 

 

 

 

 

Replete with New Epaulettes

 

Privileged fools simultaneously propel six cars,

Fly private seaplanes, precipitously close plants,

Fail to be au fait with strass-bedecked debutants,

Task their servants with ghastly, liminal errands.

 

Their “facts of life” dissolve into skosh records,

Or worldviews balancing checkbooks, networks.

None among them appear skint or starving, yet,

They emerge inept, immoral, fairly malevolent.

 

Long since smiles were observed as momentous

To mongeese’s matutinal parades, every fat cat’s

Enabled foreign governments to claim seats via

Formidable displays possessed of self-knowledge.

 

Elsewise, chiefs manipulate underutilized biases,

Ones meant for potential protégés. No boilerplate

Approvals or seizing of neighboring knolls, wins,

To the chagrin of sundry cash-hungry arbitrators.

 

Aides-de-camp, thus, sonicate before approaching,

Accept manuscripts missing “superlative” stature,

Hang on incapable of panoptic perception, jump

Past social prescription, neglect arrays “forget.”

 

Dissolute princes, all feathers, sequins, multi-hued

Stances, vogue, post boys, aim worldly jackanapes,

Look well-steered to embrace fallacious claims, or

To attempt to outrun ready, ravenous enemy troops.

 

Videlicet, their quintessential lessons carry on as

Surrendering mounds when their Moms are boss.

In discreet houses, adenoidal speech of pilgarlics

Becomes dialogues, promulgates failed criminals.

 

Odd striplings, whether gangrels or isolated kings,

Minus apron strings, besides boffins, with arcane

Words and numbers (no matter the neoteric acts),

Flaunt power’s miens; certainly, font size matters.

 

 

 

 

 

Fish Heads and Flowers

 

Thursday night’s Shabbot preparations, modern nefelibatas, excepted,

Bring Ten Commandments plus six hundred and three more good reads

Related to the akida, to other Har HaBayit events, to lasting blessings,

Send us scrolling down multiple pages to grasp existential semiotics.

 

The authenticity of discourse, found in Jerusalem taxi drivers’ speech,

In kallahs’ smiles (glowing hidden beneath translucent wedding veils),

In intertexts of David’s Citadel and in other, holy chiseled limestone,

Demonstrates abundant Hashgacha Pratis in this most sacred city.

 

Spiritual whispers cull believers, establish many actantial conclusions;

Direct followers of “The Path” from dusty habiliments to grittier prose,

Past locals embracing mystical ethology, tying morphology to history,

Proving Creation’s wonders remain hidden within linguistic sciences.

 

It’s still nearly impossible to dependably represent subtle cosmic shifts.

Positivistic semiotics, alternate one-dimension views, can’t craft strictures.

It’s Torah Knowledge, both Munchen and Musmach, that styles veracity.

Through parchment sanctity, we’re removed, briefly, from Olam Hazeh.

 

Now, reality, itself, changes, eases Moshiach’s route, evolves redemption.

As understandings get reorganized; symbolic shapes replace atrocities

Shadowy dominions get erased by norms ancient, exquisite, significant,

Real life predicaments and emotional karsts transform alacritous deeds.

 

The disappearance of miscalculation brings peace, fish heads, and flowers,

Ushers in more mythical narratives, less media censorship, ultimate good.

Leaders’ old-fashioned vassalage to G-d heals virtual bodies, calls Eden.

Fealty’s given vis-a-vis passages, rest points, hard won human integrity.

 

 

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