Moloch

Moloch
    Moloch whose love is endless oil and stone!
                                             –Allen Ginsburg
Drilling   spilling   pumping
                                                blasting
                                                      
removing every mountaintop
to find the pearl
of great price
casting the star
named Wormwood
into every river
made bitter
unwilling to say—Enough!
until every son and every daughter
has passed through the fire . . .
I stand off
and see the smoke of burning,
and the circle-jerk
of those who wax rich
through the abundance
of her delicacies.
O God!                         We all
(yes, stupid fuckers one and all)
invoked this beast insatiable
conjured
him from the smoky pit in order
to have our way with him,
this pet that does not merely
bite the tit
that feeds it—
it devours all
sometimes slowly
                              over time
sometimes
                   in one huge gulp.
——————————–
Tonight is beat poetry at dVerse MeetingtheBar. Even if you aren’t up to writing tonight, you owe it to yourself to head on over to read Gay’s informative article. I took inspiration tonight from Ginsburg, John of the Apocalypse, Jeremiah the Old Testament prophet, and human greed and stupidity. Seemed like a good blend for a beat poem to me.

32 thoughts on “Moloch

  1. and the circle-jerk
    of those who wax rich
    through the abundance
    of her delicacies. …oh yeah, you got it…cry it out..
    they probably wont listen but…bite the tit, yes…
    burn our earth…there is profit in it
    even if also our death

    Like

  2. did my comment get eaten…? ugh

    def. an interesting mix for a beat poem…the son and daughter part .. and not willing to stop in the name of profit..ugh… a sad truth..

    Like

  3. Superb – the precision of your language and your metaphors addressing the great carnage being done to ourselves and our planet in the name of MORE and GREED – taking themselves down with it for that temporary fix. Excellent piece, thank you.

    Like

  4. Thanks Anna–no matter how hard we try, we are all complicit to some degree–at least those of us in developed countries. Though there are some brave few who have opted out, turned completely self-sufficient–but then again, to run to the hills is also to remove the possibility to enact positive change. We seem stuck in it, for better or worse.

    Like

  5. Thanks Claudia–Ginsburg especially among the Beats used biblical language and cadence to get his point across. Very powerful. The OT prophets were not opposed to coarseness and shocking actions to win the ear of their audience either. Which one went for a few years naked? . . . Ezekiel I think. That kind of thing demands attention!

    Like

  6. Thanks Gay–great prompt! I can only take partial credit for the language and metaphors, since I intentionally tried to tap into the righteous indignation and condemnation one finds in the biblical prophets, much like Ginsburg was able to do with wonderful effectiveness.

    Like

Leave a comment