Laurence Reads or The Poetry of Not Complaining
I know, this is a cop-out on my part, but today I just don’t feel inspired to complain about anything new. Here’s some poetry to fill the coloumn space and there might be more of it coming. I need to focus on the real craft of poetry/spoken word and only rant more occasionally. These are all relatively recent and so far unreleased. I might include more classic pieces in the future.
Laurence Tenenbaum reading poetry, bass in tow, on JC Sunshine's Fireside Chat
The World of Highways
Fords, Fiats, Fargoes, Falcons, Freightliners, and Ferraris fly down the road
As do
Horches, Holdens, Hondas, Hyundais, and Hinos
Down the Highway
To the city
That’s down every road.
The keys to the highways are in your hands
Where traffic is light
And roads are nice, and smooth, and twisty, and fun to drive fast on
There ain’t no Smokey-Traps around for miles
And just for the trip we drive down
In Mercedes’, Mazdas, Mercurys, Merkurs, Macks, and Maseratis,
To experience,
In Eagles, Edsels, and Excaliburs Equipped with Ecklers and Edelbrocks
The dance of the drive
In Datsuns, Dacias, Daewoos, Dahitsus, De Sotos and Dodges
So many machines
Exciting madness
Down that endless
Highway.
So the adrenal glands activate
In the
Porsches, Plymouths, Pontiacs, Panteras, and Passports
And the
Chryslers, Cobras, Chevrolets, Caterpillars and Cadillacs,
The
Talbots, Toyotas, Tatras, Tatas, and Travelers
And in the other hundred thousand or so marques,
In the idealized highways of the world.
The Man From Mars
Outside
The coldest red desert
A rover moves
There is a man
At the central control
Talking to the man upstairs
On a telephone
Far away
The rover travels
Collecting red iron dust
Rust on its bulky tires
And back at Central control
There is a man
Coming to supply the machines
The rover operates
Being driven by remote control
From a great distance
The operators must be patient
Transmission takes time at these distances
And a black-suited salesman arrives at Central Control,
(Solo)
the rover stops still
and doesn’t move anymore
collects the data,
and transmits it back.
And the man from Mars
Buys the rights
And takes control
At Central control
The man from Mars takes control
Of the machines
The man from Mars now sells
Chocolate in the vending machines
Of Central control.
Useless worn-out tool
I know what and who I am
I’m not proud,
I should be ashamed
I’m running around in circles
Where I get enflamed,
I don’t do very well
When it comes to a fight
My brawn and wits are dull
And there is no light
Save the neon, that old neon sign,
And the headlights of the cars, as they drive on by
I receive regular insults and blows
To my low self-esteem
My very own ego,
Deserted me for the other team
I know I’m a weakling, a moron, a parasite, and a fool
I’m a rusted, useless, worn-out tool
(Solo)
I am a weakling, a pushover,
A parasite, and a fool,
I’m a boomerang kid, and a worthless, useless tool
When it all comes down
To the wires,
I try and try, like a fool
But I’ll never
Get that jar opened,
‘cause I’m a lonely, useless, worn-out tool
