When the Himalayan peasant meets the he-bear in his pride,
He shouts to scare the monster who will often turn aside.
But the she-bear thus accosted rends the peasant tooth and nail,
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.
When Nag, the wayside cobra, hears the careless foot of man,
He will sometimes wriggle sideways and avoid it if he can,
But his mate makes no such motion where she camps beside the trail -
For the female of the species is more deadly than the male.
......
"Farewell to barn and stack and tree,
Farewell to Severn shore.
Terence, look your last at me,
For I come home no more.
"The sun burns on the half-mown hill,
By now the blood is dried;
And Maurice amongst the hay lies still
And my knife is in his side.
......
'Twas Mulga Bill, from Eaglehawk, that caught the cycling craze;
He turned away the good old horse that served him many days;
He dressed himself in cycling clothes, resplendent to be seen;
He hurried off to town and bought a shining new machine;
And as he wheeled it through the door, with air of lordly pride,
The grinning shop assistant said, "Excuse me, can you ride?"
"See here, young man," said Mulga Bill, "from Walgett to the sea,
From Conroy's Gap to Castlereagh, there's none can ride like me.
I'm good all round at everything, as everybody knows,
Although I'm not the one to talk - I hate a man that blows.
......
Neither the heart cut by a piece of glass
in a wasteland of thorns
nor the atrocious waters seen in the corners
of certain houses, waters like eyelids and eyes
can capture your waist in my hands
when my heart lifts its oaks
towards your unbreakable thread of snow.
Nocturnal sugar, spirit
of the crowns,
......
Still sits the school-house by the road,
A ragged beggar sleeping;
Around it still the sumachs grow,
And blackberry-vines are creeping.
Within, the master's desk is seen,
Deep-scarred by raps official;
The warping floor, the battered seats,
The jack-knife's carved initial;
......
Bragg's just an ass, a poor leftist stooge
Bought for in full by the Soros machine,
Why target me when he knows he will loose
His obvious intentions malicious and mean.
As to that Stormy, a vixen indeed,
She's now named me ‘Tiny’ can't clearly be true,
Her one claim to fame fueled by greed
The day I first met her is the day I now rue.
......
They built me with their sweats
And enslaved blood
As a high mark of their might
Wearing the chest of Calcuttan culture.
Since then I have been standing strong
On my plastered feet
Like the two mammoth poles bound together
Yet as different as East and West.
Bridging the gulf between the people,
......
i am queer.
i am my school’s gsa
i am asking people’s pronouns
i am a sign on my teachers door that says “all are welcome here”
i am a couple who can’t hold hands on the street without being hate crimed
i am a protest against supreme court justices who live in a world where 7.1% of the population they swore to protect cannot live their lives being who they are unless they are behind the bars of a jail cell and don’t think to do anything to change it
i am the singular pride flag swaying lonely in the wind of a small suburban town in connecticut
i am millions of people who just want to be left alone but who’s mere existence spawns twitter debates with 80-year-olds
i am a romance novel with cartoon drawings of two women on the cover
i am mistranslated bible verses used in arguments against queer rights
......
What qualities make a ‘successful man’,
Is it the tambor of his voice,
Some lofty goals, a lifelong plan,
A steering hand, his knowing choice.
Can compassion play a part
Or is that interpreted as meekness;
Is it wrong to show a heart
Without labeling it as weakness?
......
A little small world, is the one that we live in.
It’s a very little small world in the midst of the space.
It’s a little world, with little room.
It’s a small world of impending doom.
But that’s not the tale I wanna tell,
It’s the tale of all that went well.
So strap on your seatbelt, and enjoy the ride,
cause nothing beats history and standing with pride,
for this little small world, that we call our home.