20151005 (imperialism)

Personal inertia is a self-stopping

Mechanism everybody wants self-

Starters but nobody wants guys

Who shoot from the hip or go off

Half cocked note the gun analogues

To be assertive but not aggressive

Where to draw the line for there are

So many toes to stub ten of your

Own and another ten for everyone

Out there is almost an argument

Against placing your foot in any

Door rocking any boat speaking

When everyone is accustomed to

Silence so what do you do when

The train we’re all on is headed

Across a valley where the bridge

Is no more do you single-handedly

Grab for the air brake or quickly

Call a committee to discuss last

Wishes pass paper around to pin

To the bodies that will inevitably

Die in the crash except there is

No such air brake you’ve been

Screaming like Cassandra for years

Now since disaster hasn’t come

You’re written off as a kook just

Another lost soul in a sandwich

Board warning of the coming end

While the parties proceed but

You are no longer invited I’m 

Most afraid of those who trust in

God those congressmen who cite

The bible and say rainbows are

Promises we will never again

Be destroyed I’d first ask to see 

Their grade in biblical exegesis

Then audit their recent sales

Of lowlands these are the kooks of

Which we should beware who assure

We’ve paid for the most powerful

Military ever who can obtain whatever

We want by buying more bombs

More bullets blasting opponents

Out of our way count our successes

How can we lose what with all our

Secret development labs cracking

Nature open in every way to yield

New methods of killing using them

In proxy wars as if we were a 

Worldwide military McDonald’s 

Market testing degraded

Uranium  in Fallujah night

Vision googles in Somalia 

Plastic grenades in Afghanistan

Once this huge machine is grinding

It will take a little more than sand

In the gears to stop it so many 

Depend on the spending that keeps

It all going major universities would

Fail whole industries halt so 

Many thrown into breadlines 

Because you in your so-called

Prophetic vision refuse your role

In the imperialist mission

c. J.S.Manista, 2015

20151004 (perception)

What are you looking at

Is a lot harder to answer than you

Think the first illusion of vision

Is we are seeing something

Outside our bodies as if this

Is not taking place in our heads

The conundrum is ground for

Matrix Inception other movies

Chuang Tzu started it off with 

His remark after he had dreamt

He was a butterfly he was not sure

He is now not a butterfly dreaming

He is a man more recently Descartes

Divided our heads from our bodies

Thought he must exist because he 

Thinks as the basic certain truth

Were it so simple Aquinas

Advised perplexed philosophers

To lay bricks a while jar 

Themselves back to reality

There’s a lot of illusion in perception

That helps us to see things as they are 

Ever wonder why the moon near 

The horizon looks so big

Put your head between your legs

See the moon lose its larger

Aspect immediately

I won’t explain just try it

I’m looking at a flat screen digital

Display on my retinas the images

Are upside down but we’d have

A horrible time if we really saw it

As upside down my left eye 

Sees everything a little different

Than what my right eye sees

Rather than confusing us the errors 

Create depth a mathematical stunt

Which enables us to see near 

And far if we burn an image

Into our retina we sort of see it

Even when we close our eyes

Or turn away yet that’s not the

Image we see when somebody

Asks us think of a stop sign

What we see isn’t the thing

And it isn’t that burn-image

If that image-not-image grows too

Real we lose sight of what’s

Ahead run off the road lose 

Our place in the lesson

Are daydream images what

We see in dreams nightmares 

Which can appear frighteningly 

Comprehensive feeling hearing

But it’s not what’s out there

Early philosophers concluded

Only a spiritual capacity could

Let us compare sight of a square

With blind touch of a square

Incomparable sensations yet

Definable in essence few accept

Spirit now as an explanation

Sentient beings are able to become 

An I who can sleep and persist

Yet it’s our nature to require 

Even the obvious to have 

An explantion

c. J.S.Manista, 2015

20151003 (resumption)

Sophia, neglected for a week (not really, Tony, my pet sitter, plays with her daily), insists she is next in the scheme of things. 

Coming home to spoiled milk

Vinegary OJ last time I traveled

I now buy smaller volumes use up

As much as possible bequeath 

The rest to my pet sitter

Returning means replenishing

It’s easy to forget from

How many stores I procure

Sustenance but with a newly

Formed resolve to stick with 

My dietician’s instructions I

Set to purchase no forbidden

Fruit which I did numerous

Raw vegetables each needing

To be cut and trimmed measured

Distributed to clear plastic storage

Containers metered nightly 

For dinner as one vegetable 

Enough others for salads made

In one large batch depending on

Bowls and bowl wrap available

I can sometimes get three

Salads from one fix hardest are 

Fruits which have all sorts of

Proscriptions for instance

Pretzels and pizza are not

Fruits no matter how much

Pineapple is slathered over them

I might as well be an alcoholic

In recovery I'm allowed so

Little I don’t drink I found it 

Impaired my judgment my life

So I figure pie is fruit right

Which is why I like cake with

Cherries on top that’s mostly

Fruit it’s complicated I always end

Up not having bought all on my 

List scheduling second trips

Unless I can get it at the next store

For protein a large roaster from

Which I can make all sorts of

Stuff which almost always

Tastes like chicken strange

First day back to a clean house

I’ve messed up my desk with

A week's opened mail the 

Kitchen with roasting pan

Various cutting of vegetable matter

Fixed two all beef weiners 

High faluting for hot dogs with

Catsup mustard that last little

Bit in the squeezy-easy

Trickles down as I repeatedly

Smack the top on my desk

Find lettuce leaves that in

The hiatus did not turn to

Slime mix in a sliced tomato

Mushrooms cheese shredded

Through an all manual four

Sided trapezoidal device 

Unchanged from my mother’s

Day taking care not to bloody 

My fingers as a FaceBook friend

Has limit the number of topics

To write about for the next day’s

Blog reconcile myself to sleeping

In my clothes snuggle with

Dog and cat 

Cat

Let the cat in

Go back to bed 

Hope for the best

c. J.S.Manista, 2015

20151002 (radical politics)

Before I left I promised Peg

My co-protester of four years

That I would appear for the 

CWRU medical school march

Demonstration for Medicare-

For-All national day of action

She apologized if this would

Conflict with my son’s future in 

Medicine with the country’s 

Desperate need for universal

Health care not that Andy will

Ever see me chanting what do

We want health care when do

We want it now everybody’s in

Nobody’s out we want health 

Care not corporate welfare

Typically nobody there from 

The local media if he sees it at

All it would likely be from me

Borrowing somebody’s file

Footage everybody using their

Phones to broadcast the local 

March to the coordinating center

Too low profile for the FBI who

I am certain have my pic from

The Washington war protest in

2011 despite all the University

Circle police the Case Western

University police the city of

Cleveland had an officer assigned

To accompany us on the way

First asking do you have a

Permit following a prompt

From some person at the other 

End then who’s your

Sponsor for this action then

He hung back and let us

Thirty citizens or so have a

Snatch at our first amendment

Rights of speech and assembly

Granted some in the march 

Had a distinctly Asian or 

Hispanic air about them

I have learned such foreigners 

Can often be from families in

The states longer than my 

Polacks citizens to boot I

Saw no turbans that sure sign 

Of radical Islam among us

But surveillance can never be

Too much just never know

When those socialists in

Medicare for All don’t start

Shooting at crowds of good

Amuricans with the AK-47s

They’d whip out from under

The North Face fall jackets

Or from inside their CWRU

White coats after all what are 

They bitching about they got

Their God awful Obamacare

That’s killing our jobs and 

Sending them overseas now

They want us to give free

Medical care to illegal

Aliens just to keep them

From dying here in the good

Old  U S of A

c. J.S.Manista, 2015