Kalliope



Means "beautiful voice" from Greek καλλος (kallos) "beauty" and οψ (ops) "voice". In Greek mythology she was a goddess of epic poetry and eloquence, one of the nine Muses.  


 Join us every Tuesday afternoon at the Daily Kos community political poetry club.

                    Your own poetry is always welcome in the comments.

                       Bongos, berets & turtle neck sweaters optional.                                

                            The keyboard is mightier than the sword.    
       

In houses of the dead,
surrounded by remnant atoms of
men and microbes,
recite to roadside retread gargoyles.
Baked black tails hide nothing at all.
Wire-clawed rubber-hide monsters
bask and broil on asphalt beds.

Our lives are filled with now.
We are forever.
Forever we are
pulled into the next
fragment of eternity.
Leaving behind a million of moments,
we cannot change an instant.

We are judged in the light
shining behind us,
condemned for the crimes of ancestors
whose virtues are reckoned our sins.
If we burn our books to toast cheese,
our grandchildren may hate us for it,
despite their taste for Edam on whole wheat.

They will damn our eyes, our bones, our funeral suits,
until well past lunchtime.
Let us drink to the damned.
Whatever popcorn-souled preachers may say,
the unfaithful departed
have a rightful claim
on our remembrance.

Drink to those whose cesspools we must drain.
Toast slavers, killers,
petroleum distillers.
Up tumblers to lumber barons.
Tipples to coal bosses who smudged our brows.
Without the will to mend what's broken,
their legacy is ours to the last generation.