by Jack Ramey | Jan 11, 2019 | Jack Ramey, Poetry
. The Iroquois called you O-he-O, the Wyandot the Oheezo, which some took to mean “sparkling,” others “white,” while the French took it to mean “beautiful” :– La Belle Rivière, the beautiful river they called you and they were right, at times you are white, at times you sparkle like diamonds in the sun, and you are always beautiful in all your moods – muddy brown from spring rains, or placidly green, silver flowing water, bringing life and death to all who live and grow beside your thousand mile length three centuries ago or today cascading down from Allegheny and Monongahela confluence sliding by stone age huts and Adena conical burial mounds high up on hills and always bloody, bloody throughout your mythic history of discovery, war, and conquest. Twenty-first century versions of those same huts still on the same hills, or perilously hugging your banks which sometimes you overflow north and south flooding their dirty basements just to show them they might be a bit too close: back off, you say, give me some elbow room, some space to change my course as you wend your way down to meet the stuttering Mississippi, and so on down to dark and broken New Orleans where you spread yourself out upon the vastness of the deep. <br> As a poet, I am fascinated by the metaphysical, mystical, and metaphorical nature of rivers in general and the Ohio River at Madison in particular. From my home, high on a hill overlooking the Ohio River and downtown Madison, I am able to experience the daily changes in the relationships and moods of...
by Jack Ramey | Jan 10, 2019 | Jack Ramey, Poetry
. 1. A great bronze god This morning Swollen and muddy, Slowly silting down, Muscles rippling like some Giant water stallion, Moving past Broadway, past Elm Past the geese at the floating marina Past the stacks of the monolithic power plant Past all the bare and sunken trees To list round the bend at Hanover, Moving his way on down to Louisville, New Albany, Evansville, Memphis, Cairo, Mississippi! Carrying the weight of thousands of lives. The dead are with him as well as the living: Dead logs and dead bones, The ghosts of those who perished in his flood In their perilous leap toward freedom, Ferried long ago from Milton’s shore Or Indian Kentuck by reckless boatmen, Indiana Charons rowing their dark breathing freight to Elysium. 2. The beginnings and endings Of all things tucked Within your liquid furrows, Your deep rollings, As church bells toll you On your cyclic way to a shared oblivion: Hart Crane’s great wink of eternity, Whitman’s mighty I-am-Thou Shine with the sun On your burnished surface Issuing forth vague promise Of some hidden covenant to come, Some secret bargain With forces unknown; And one day all will be revealed As the prophet saith When the weight of all this water Unseen and teeming With life and death Comes at last to rest In the dropless one-time silent sea. . As a poet, I am fascinated by the metaphysical, mystical, and metaphorical nature of rivers in general and the Ohio River at Madison in particular. From my home, high on a hill overlooking the Ohio River and downtown Madison, I am able to experience...
by Jack Ramey | Dec 31, 2018 | Jack Ramey, Poetry
………………..- .– for the corporate heads of Honeywell Hiawatha combed the snakes From the mind, preparing the way. Preparing the way for Tadadaho, Keeper of the fire of the One United Longhouse of the Haudenosaunee, The people of the longhouse, who Keep the flames burning By the shores of Onondaga Lake Where the Tree of Peace was planted Long ago and the weapons of war Were cast into the abyss To be washed away forever. But forever is much too long a time, And the weapons of war Have changed. And the snakes have returned In factories. War clubs and tomahawks Replaced now by sodium chloride And ash byproduct and god knows what Other chemicals dumped Into the holy lake by corporate enemies Of the earth: Raping our mother with No regard for the future generations: The unborn faces in the ground, The ground now filled with filth. The pure silver lake is now a cesspool Of mercury and feces: one of the most polluted Lakes in America, where effluent From a waste plant flows unimpeded into it. No swimming allowed. But poor blacks And hungry immigrants still fish Her fouled waters and sicken from the catch. The place chosen for the continuity Of rational existence, of how to be a true Human being walking the ways of the Creator In the days before colonial greed Is now the most polluted place in Iroquoia, Now called Syracuse New York Where once crystal waters brimmed with fish, Place for deer and beaver to drink, Place for the people to drink, now unfit for creation Making a mockery of the Great...
by Jack Ramey | Dec 10, 2018 | Jack Ramey, Poetry
On Grafton Street a legless busker Begged a tune from his plastic flute Gazing the while at his missing feet By Saint Stephen’s Green With the swans and the palms and mist And the rain and his upturned orange cap Lying filthy and empty on the street As Christmas shoppers Rushed on by towards Dolce & Gabbana. The ghost of Joyce appeared by his side And chided him for a no-good boy-o Stuck here forever, out only for The price of the odd pint. But a pint is comfort at least at last And salvation across the long wet night Huddled up in a thin worn blanket. O the buskers and the beggars On Grafton Street by the high-priced Gaudy shopping lane with golden lights Strung all overhead and foreign greed all in the air....
by Jack Ramey | Dec 9, 2018 | Poetry
Barely contained laughter slicing open the heart of the matter exposing the irony or hypocrisy of all our tendentious moments here on this long wave we’ve been riding for half a century. Jack, I see you now in old man’s shoes, a linen suit, a straw boater and a bright red jazz bow tie dancing with diaphanous Paula on the hard wood wedding floor dreaming of Morocco’s hashish crowded streets, or the horses you trained in Maine, or all the great friends you made and loved in Kent and Youngstown and Cleveland and all over the world too many to mention and who loved you back for being true to art and true to humanity and for giving much more than you took. Featured Art: Jack Carlton’s Observations & Impressions, The Morgan Art of Papermaking Conservatory The Vindicator: Jack Carlton’s story unfolds like his art. Shaped and layered with rich and varied experiences that inform his work with images, languages, and methods that became entirely his own. He was a vagabond at heart. Traveling from one place, one medium, one idea to another throughout much of his illustrious career. He lived and worked in Morocco, parts of Maine, Ohio, and the city of Boston, with short stays in New York City, in between, while making, teaching, and selling art to move on to the next place he should be. Carlton exhibited extensively throughout these regions and beyond, finding places for his work in public and private collections in the United States, Europe, and North Africa. He was commissioned by the Vietnamese architect to King Hussein II to portray the Mausoleum of...
by Jack Ramey | Nov 14, 2018 | Jack Ramey, Poetry
Today light conquers darkness good triumphs over evil knowledge beats ignorance as millions of Hindus light lamps and decorate floors with colored rice and sand and flour designs designed to banish the dark side of the universe from their little corner of it where they are doing all they can to push back darkness and ignorance and evil into the far corners of the rooms they live in. This high holy day and festival cries out to be celebrated here in The Land of Creeping Ignorance the land of ten million guns the land of double talk and new- speak, of hatred and intolerance of violence and daily death in school yards and churches and nightclubs. We all need to light some lamps and make mandalas on our living room floors. Today please. This darkness that surrounds us, will drown us all. Featured Art: Indian girls lighting candle and clay lamps for the Hindu Festival of Light via Wikimedia Commons Khokarahman [CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0)] Related Article: What is India’s Diwali Festival? Diwali is India’s ‘Festival of Light’, a time when people come together to celebrate good conquering evil, light conquering...
