The Revolution Will Not Be Televised -- Gil Scott-Heron

(Poem #60)The Revolution Will Not Be Televised You will not be able to stay home, brother. You will not be able to plug in, turn on and cop out. You will not be able to lose yourself on skag and skip, Skip out for beer during commercials, Because the revolution will not be televised. The revolution will not be televised. The revolution will not be brought to you by Xerox In 4 parts without commercial interruptions. The revolution will not show you pictures of Nixon blowing a bugle and leading a charge by John Mitchell, General Abrams and Spiro Agnew to eat hog maws confiscated from a Harlem sanctuary. The revolution will not be televised. The revolution will not be brought to you by the Schaefer Award Theatre and will not star Natalie Woods and Steve McQueen or Bullwinkle and Julia. The revolution will not give your mouth sex appeal. The revolution will not get rid of the nubs. The revolution will not make you look five pounds thinner, because the revolution will not be televised, Brother. There will be no pictures of you and Willie May pushing that shopping cart down the block on the dead run, or trying to slide that color television into a stolen ambulance. NBC will not be able predict the winner at 8:32 or report from 29 districts. The revolution will not be televised. There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down brothers in the instant replay. There will be no pictures of pigs shooting down brothers in the instant replay. There will be no pictures of Whitney Young being run out of Harlem on a rail with a brand new process. There will be no slow motion or still life of Roy Wilkens strolling through Watts in a Red, Black and Green liberation jumpsuit that he had been saving For just the proper occasion. Green Acres, The Beverly Hillbillies, and Hooterville Junction will no longer be so damned relevant, and women will not care if Dick finally gets down with Jane on Search for Tomorrow because Black people will be in the street looking for a brighter day. The revolution will not be televised. There will be no highlights on the eleven o'clock news and no pictures of hairy armed women liberationists and Jackie Onassis blowing her nose. The theme song will not be written by Jim Webb, Francis Scott Key, nor sung by Glen Campbell, Tom Jones, Johnny Cash, Englebert Humperdinck, or the Rare Earth. The revolution will not be televised. The revolution will not be right back after a message About a white tornado, white lightning, or white people. You will not have to worry about a dove in your bedroom, a tiger in your tank, or the giant in your toilet bowl. The revolution will not go better with Coke. The revolution will not fight the germs that may cause bad breath. The revolution WILL put you in the driver's seat. The revolution will not be televised, will not be televised, will not be televised, will not be televised. The revolution will be no re-run brothers; The revolution will be live. -- Gil Scott-Heron

To Tu Fu from Shantung -- Li Po

(Poem #59)To Tu Fu from Shantung You ask how I spend my time-- I nestle against a treetrunk and listen to autumn winds in the pines all night and day. Shantung wine can't get me drunk. The local poets bore me. My thoughts remain with you, like the Wen River, endlessly flowing. -- Li Po

Autumn -- Rainer Maria Rilke

(Poem #58)Autumn Lord: it is time. The huge summer has gone by. Now overlap the sundials with your shadows, and on the meadows let the wind go free. Command the fruits to swell on tree and vine; grant them a few more warm transparent days, urge them on to fulfillment then, and press the final sweetness into the heavy wine. Whoever has no house now, will never have one. Whoever is alone will stay alone, will sit, read, write long letters through the evening, and wander along the boulevards, up and down, restlessly, while the dry leaves are blowing. -- Rainer Maria Rilke

The Scars of Utopia -- Jeffrey McDaniel

(Poem #57)The Scars of Utopia If you keep taking stabs at utopia sooner or later there will be scars. Suppose there was a thermometer able to measure contentment. Would you slide it under your tongue and risk being told you were on par with a thirteenth century farmer who lost all his teeth in a game of hide and seek? Would you be tempted to abandon your portable conscience, the remote control that lets you choose who you are for every occasion? I wish we cared more about how we sounded than how we looked. Instead of primping before mirrors each morning, we’d huddle in echo chambers, practicing our scales. As a kid, I thought the local amputee was dying in pieces, that his left arm was leaning against a tree in heaven, waiting for the rest of him to arrive, as if God was dismantling him like a jigsaw puzzle, but now I understand we’re all missing something. I wish there were Band Aids for what you don’t know, whisky breath mints for sober people to fit in at wild parties. There ought to be a Smithsonian for misfits, where an insomniac’s clammy pillow hangs over a narcoleptic’s drool cup, the teeth of an anorexic displayed like a white picket fence designed to keep food from trespassing. I wish the White House was made out of mood ring rock, reflecting the health of the nation. And an atheist hour at every church, and needle exchange programs, and haystack exchange programs too, and emotional baggage thrift stores, a Mount Rushmore for assassins. I’m sick of strip malls and billboards. I dream of a road lit by people who set themselves on fire, no asphalt, no rest stops, just a bunch of dead grass with footprints so deep, like a track meet in wet cement. -- Jeffrey McDaniel

Let Me Die a Youngman's Death -- Roger McGough

(Poem #56)Let Me Die a Youngman's Death Let me die a youngman's death not a clean and inbetween the sheets holywater death not a famous-last-words peaceful out of breath death When I'm 73 and in constant good tumour may I be mown down at dawn by a bright red sports car on my way home from an allnight party Or when I'm 91 with silver hair and sitting in a barber's chair may rival gangsters with hamfisted tommyguns burst in and give me a short back and insides Or when I'm 104 and banned from the Cavern may my mistress catching me in bed with her daughter and fearing for her son cut me up into little pieces and throw away every piece but one Let me die a youngman's death not a free from sin tiptoe in candle wax and waning death not a curtains drawn by angels borne 'what a nice way to go' death -- Roger McGough

Nothing Gold Can Stay -- Robert Frost

(Poem #55)Nothing Gold Can Stay Nature's first green is gold, Her hardest hue to hold. Her early leaf's a flower; But only so an hour. Then leaf subsides to leaf. So Eden sank to grief, So dawn goes down to day. Nothing gold can stay. -- Robert Frost

The Looking Glass -- Kamala Das

(Poem #54)The Looking Glass Getting a man to love you is easy Only be honest about your wants as Woman. Stand nude before the glass with him So that he sees himself the stronger one And believes it so, and you so much more Softer, younger, lovelier. Admit your Admiration. Notice the perfection Of his limbs, his eyes reddening under The shower, the shy walk across the bathroom floor, Dropping towels, and the jerky way he Urinates. All the fond details that make Him male and your only man. Gift him all, Gift him what makes you woman, the scent of Long hair, the musk of sweat between the breasts, The warm shock of menstrual blood, and all your Endless female hungers. Oh yes, getting A man to love is easy, but living Without him afterwards may have to be Faced. A living without life when you move Around, meeting strangers, with your eyes that Gave up their search, with ears that hear only His last voice calling out your name and your Body which once under his touch had gleamed Like burnished brass, now drab and destitute. -- Kamala Das

Night Vision -- Suzanne Vega

(Poem #53)Night Vision By day give thanks, by night beware Half the world in sweetness, the other in fear When the darkness takes you, with her hand across your face Don't give in too quickly, find the things she's erased Find the line, find the shape through the grain Find the outline and things will tell you their name The table, the guitar, the empty glass All will blend together when the daylight has passed Find the line, find the shape through the grain Find the outline and things will tell you their name Now I watch you falling into sleep Watch your fist uncurl against the sheet Watch your lips fall open and your eyes dim In blind faith I would shelter you And keep you in light But I can only teach you Night vision Night vision Night vision -- Suzanne Vega