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Arms Of Fire

Arms of Fire

triggers of collusion
mounted
and loaded
into
empty apologies
carefully worded
so as not to
cause disruption
in
cash flow

lives
obliterated
decimated
and families crushed
beneath the blow
of
out-laws…
steel barriers to
justice
and any care
for
humanity

what can your money
buy you?

when
your bullets
have
crushed a nation

and a gun
can be gotten
as easily
as
a
lollipop

it is on you…
it is
in
your hands

filled
with the blood
of deceit
and greed
and
silence

and the
cold truth
of a country
who
is
buying
and selling…

it’s soul

Cynthia Adler
February 2018

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Wind Chime

Wind Chime

Cement corridors
cracked with the weight of
unfulfilled expectations
crammed into old
discarded
Duane Reade plastic bags
and toxic water bottles
lined up in perfect disarray
like some half crazed
chorus line.

Glazed eyes wrapped in saran
keep out the cold
housed in grey and
lifeless skins,
which scurry from a yesterday
desperately
into a hope of a tomorrow
with silly putty promises
made of cheap Styrofoam
lies.

Satan’s fracking auction
held on every back street
and
alley way,
closing out estates of the soul
and suffering children
with a “what am I bid for that?”
bought and sold politicians
with two faces carved into
either side of their
head
promising everything,
while bargains are made with a devil
who never gives anything
for free.

Alice in wonderland
how serenely and solidly you sit
while a bloody grassland
framed in filth and chemical poison
lies at your feet.
ice caps crying,
boiling and melting
into a
no-man’s land.
bees in a disappearing act
form hideaways
that become
burial grounds.

Play your music you pied pipers
dancing down your
cast iron roadways.
play for all you are worth
because your fireplaces are burning
and your faces are turning to rags
and when your crying children tire
of their pacifiers,
they will strike the set
and pull the curtain
and the next thing you know…
dinosaurs and loincloths…

So take notice
and brace yourself…
the change is coming!
and if you do not rise up
all will have vanished
leaving no trace of what was
except for perhaps
some old Duane Reade plastic
bags
blowing somewhere softly in the wind
around some old rotting huge
landfill spaces.

A wry reminder of the price
of things
to come.

by Cynthia Adler

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Boomer-angst

“Boomer-angst
or
Trust No-one Over 90!”

Trust no-one over 30, was the early Boomer cry…
they’re too old, and do not get us and they couldn’t if they try
but we were pretty stoned and somewhat coked and pretty spent…
and that’s why we got it wrong,…cause it was 90 that we meant!!

See, 90’s text while walking and their falls are pretty gory
(but so do 20 something’s too, but that’s another story!)
and their hearing is quite off and they just do not care to see that you’ve padded up your bras so you can look like you’re a D!

And they aren’t impressed with your resume points
or that you still insist that you roll your own joints
or that you are in touch with the youth of today
(though you don’t understand half the words that they say).

See, those 90’s it seems just don’t get it at all
they just sit there with blank eyes or stare at the wall or they lay in their beds with a mucous filled cough
then say, “I need a nap…so shut up and screw off!”

Yes, we know in those fun days of 20’s it seemed
we would laugh at those 30’s and hope they got creamed
but we should have said 90…cause that’s what we meant
cause our kids are now 30 and paying us rent
and we’re sixty and over and still kicking ass
so we’re happy to give all those 30’s a pass
but the treacherous ones are past 90, I fear…
and we have to remember that
each passing year…
so when we’re getting close, then 100’s the shot
and it may not be fair…

but hey…why the “F” not!

by Cynthia Adler

 

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Occupation

Occupation

Intensified collective
rising up.
A sea of oppressed
soul marchers
making way onto the
encrusted infrastructure
of a diseased corporate
takeover.

Pulling to task
the empty heartbeats and frozen veins
that have served
death warrants
onto the very lifelines of
a nation.

A slam bang chess game
played out
in secret halls,
on fattened hills
and greed-fueled exchanges,
using humans as
pawns and guinea pigs
while spinning
empty promises
leading up to a fast
and blindsided
checkmate.

The crowds will expand
in volume,
in voice,
and in controlled rage.
This frozen sand pile will never move
unless drowned
in its own underlying
whirlpool
wrenched from
its posts
pulled from its locked down
moorings
and stripped of its
power.

The voices are growing
and they will shake
the demonic giants
who have planted poison,
raped, pillaged, gagged
and cut the flow of
human dignity.

The people are collecting
muscle,
mass,
infusing the
airwaves
and
holding fast
for an end
to
this endless
nightmare.

 

But what will they do
as winter’s air rushes in,
as encampments freeze
and long for shelter.

The mad dogs are waiting…
waiting
for the mass retreat,
the slinky back down,
for the faceless ones
to finally
go home.

So the people must move…
into second phase
stronger,
more daring,
shaking the foundation,
roaring into the ears
of the lions and bulls
that change is here…
game over.

by Cynthia Adler

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The Myth of the Movies and Aging…in America

The Myth of the Movies
and Aging…
in America

by
Cynthia Adler

“Age is on the page, my man,
and because I don’t believe…I
retrieve… any year I want!’
Man D. Kool
“Rapper”

 

Let’s just start with the biggest myth of all: “It ain’t gonna happen to me!”

How many times did we catch ourselves in a mirror and go, “who are you?!” And that’s only when we hit nine years old, after we got so used to our eight year old face which still had some baby fat left on it!

We are a country obsessed with youth.

And that is why in this culture, we cannot bear to see our movie stars age. They are our idols… mirrors of who we are…and mirrors, of where we are going. And this is why so many film stars go through some painful and complicated processes to try to fend off those passing years. Some, have wonderful results. And some… fairly devastating ones. Those, unfortunately, find it hard to get cast in front of a camera anymore.

And often, many of those procedures are not reversible.

So, why is it unacceptable to see our film stars age? Simply because it forces us to see our own progression in years, and in this country, it isn’t fun to do that. So, what kind of a society would make it a crime for our movie stars to be human, to have a certain lifespan, and to change with the years as they progress, with humor, dignity and a sense of acceptance?

America. The United States…

Take a look at France, Italy, and England for instance. As their stars age, they are revered, given many good parts and are never judged by a TMZ or a rag magazine for an uneven jaw line or some creases in the skin. What would Anna Magnani, a long ago Italian iconic movie star, have done if she were thrown off the cinema map because she never had plastic surgery? Magnani remained a star in Italy till the end of her life. (With some sexy roles, by the way…) George Clooney put it so beautifully when he wrote an article about plastic surgery on male movie stars in this country today and said that some of them were “frighteningly unrecognizable”…And what if Maggie Smith were born in this country? Would she remain in the public’s eyes as brilliantly revered as she is today? Does anyone talk about her physical appearance or that she needs plastic surgery to be accepted on a screen? How about Helen Mirrin, Charlotte Rampling? Women allowed to age beautifully without the full knife, without being judged or ending up on the cover of a rag magazine, or worse, becoming the butt end of a bad joke.

Nope…it’s a bit of a wicked double standard here… and women in this country suffer from it the most. It’s no wonder that so many girls are getting surgery at younger and younger ages. They are getting the message fast…”you must not age here…it is a crime”…and if you do, “no one will want to look at you.” So, what are we telling these girls? And what are we telling ourselves.

We are frightened to death of the inevitable! And looking at our idols age, makes us unbearably frightened. Because to us…they are the mirrors of where we are all going. And that, in this country…is just unacceptable!!

Movie stars who are no longer with us, if they have gone at an early age, their image has the best advantage. Marilyn Monroe is still one of the most adored sex symbols of our time. But what if she had lived. Where would she be now? In her late 70’s and wrinkled but perhaps enhanced? And lets face it…would tons of men be drooling over her body parts, looking at her old movies or publicity shots?

Uh uh…I don’t think so.

It’s a bit of a ratty game, and we buy into it to the max.

The beauty of accepting ourselves and the process we call life, might change a lot of things…There’s nothing wrong with a bit of a tuck here and there, but an unrecognizable face can kill more than a career…Just ask some of the movie stars who did it and lost.

Life is inevitable. Moving time is inevitable. But loving yourself and accepting the passage of time…if enough of us did it, it might just give Hollywood a message…”Wake the f—- up, and honor the passage of time in your stars! Talent gets even stronger as the years move on. Talent doesn’t age…the inner spirit and lust for life doesn’t age…it’s just the outer cover that does.

And that is the inevitable…
for everyone.

 

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