I Visit the Lady in the Depths

Where are you?
I shout
Loud!
For
The Lady of the Depths
“I am not at your beck and call”
I hear her voice
It’s not soft
And quite clear
But I don’t know where
It’s coming from
I thought that
We had become one
Some kind of self actualization
In Progress
1%…2%…3%

Prepare for descent
It is time
I visited
The Lady in her home
Since
She won’t pick up her phone
–
“Who dares come?
Fee fi fo fum”
I hear her joke
While I soak
In my inner being
(Where meaning
Is a fun treasure hunt
After I jump off my punt
And dive down, deep below)
While boats merrily row, row, row
On the Lady’s ceiling
Where the yatchs go sailing
While birds swoop down
A showdown between realms
When the dolphins jump out
Along with some trout

The ocean sky
Meets the ocean depths
And The Between:
A contested border
In a joyful game
Between creatures

“Fee fi fo fum”
Her echo
Draws me out of my reverie
Shall I compare thee
I begin to say
To smooth the way
To cover up
To disguise
My momentary distraction
There is no reaction
So I do not continue the sonnet
I’ve forgotten most of it anyway
Hey
I say
“Hey”
And just like that
The distance closes
The welcome mat is out
And a bouquet of roses

I do however say
A Hail Mary
Out of habit
I never quite know
What’s going to happen next
When I’m with her

Deep Dive

Let us go then to the ocean
First over,  then on, then in
A graceful dive with a little splash
A baleful jive with Davy Jones
Splash splash splash, but there’s so much trash
I’m prone to panic
Haven’t earned my gills
In this oil spilled subnautica
Dying coral and octopii
Beseeching,  begging, asking why
There’s a message in the bottle
With half a litre of kerosene
Something obscene
A tribute to Molotov
Set loose from a flotilla
Of politics
Always dirty
Where the enlightened leader
Celebrated
Christened
Cut the ribbon
Of the eight billionth kalashnikov
Ever made in the world
In this world
Stirred and shaken by a bond
Of sheer utter depravity
This world
Beseeching,  begging, asking why

Let them go to the sky
While we dive beneath
And drink our sorrows neat
Raging and complaining
To mermaids and sunken gods
To doubloons being corroded by
the tides,  moods of the moon
Let us carve our runes
on rotting wood, while misunderstood skulls
muse on their lives… I charge by the hour
Five smiles, paid in full
And they can’t be sour

Let them go to the stars
In their cars
Through VR
While we dream of submerged caverns
Listening to the vibrations
The machinations
Of the Empire of Man
Toy soldiers cultivating metal hearts
Juiced, and let loose
On an unsuspecting populace
A zombie apocalypse
Is already upon us
But it’s not on the news
Dead eyes holding AR 15s
AK 47s
KKK 666s

I don’t blame them
For their escapism

Games of power
Propaganda
Thrones
Bananas
Loans
Hasta Manana, Senorita
if you don’t get mugged and murdered
on your way home
Fear is in the air, that’s how they want it
When people are scared they don’t think or care enough
Divide and conquer all the tableware
Six forks, eight knives and twelve silver spoons… enough
for each chair at the table?

How do you justify an offensive war?
Human lives exchanged for money and power
Thousand dollars a soul
Munchausen theatrics to assuage your conscience
Let them explain their guilt away
We have no time for that today
Tuesday
The dolphins have come out to play

No Muse ♿️

The Ladies
The muses three
Were they all just me?
I have a theory
Four years ago
I  imploded
Scattering my psyche
Scattering my soul
But can those
Ever be truly destroyed?
Disposed?
Deposed?
I don’t know
So,  four years ago
I split apart ( I lost my deep abode, my robe and my pet crows)
Then the Lady of the Depths
Took a step
Showing me chaos
Within my cocoon
A safe balloon
Floating in a thunderstorm
I transformed
From a sleeping corpse
I began to dream
And write poetry
Then the Lady of the Robe
Draped a cloak around me
And brought me out
Into the secular world
I began to grow interested
In things outside my coffin
I quit my bad habits
And head banged to Black Sabbath
‘War Pigs are playing pick up sticks
While they float on the Styx
They are a single step away from death’
Is what I understood
Though Ozzy said a lot of other stuff back then too
I leaped Into the year 2022
The year of the hellabaloo
(Baloo? Bear necessary?
Not really)
I now lived within Time
And not dead in my bed
Finally,  came the Lady of the Crows
Not so long ago
I began to feel again
Since I don’t know when
Before,  only annoyance
Now,  joy, sorrow, rage
Feeling sage
I can even blush rosemary
While I save some thyme
I have begun to meditate
Gluing myself back together
The seven chakras
Are spinning dreams
That I can remember
I still have 30% of my strength
Iron measure
200% in six months
Is my target
I’ll mark it
On my calendar
And meander
Towards it
For I follow
The Dao of Chaos
1 year of conflict
5 years of reflection
Ad infinitum
A perilous path
But it suits my biochemistry
And manic depressive psychology

(I hit a wall with my drawing, and started meditating and reading. I am working out a little…indoors. I’ll start light, and increase the intensity gradually. I had broken my L4 earlier (herniated disk) because of bad form. I think it has healed, even though the doctor said that these things never heal… I’ve become really weak compared to before. I got so immersed in all of these activities that I couldn’t scrounge up the energy to write poetry, but I’m feeling really good today. Don’t know when I’ll post again. Maybe after Easter. I should have finished my books by then. )

Thus Spake Tanmay (ustra?)

Whoa! I can feel things
Does this mean I’m human?
Then why am I afraid
To display emotion?
Stifle it up inside?
Stiff upper lip?
Not when I’m writing
I can’t give my muses the slip
Here I can roar
Let my feelings soar
Lose my readers more and more?
Who am I writing for?
I don’t really know
For me? For you?
Perhaps for them?

It’s a primal urge
To roar
I do it with written words
And try to make them soar

(A repeat rhyme

I know…I know)

Meditation
Slow my breathing
Feel something kindling
In my abdomen
I twitch
A petit mal seizure?
It lasts for a few seconds
And I feel pleasure?
Happens every time
Like an orgasm, I suppose
But not of the flesh
It tingles from my spine
All the way to my head
That’s the way
The Lady of Crows
Would have me write
I pray before the Depths
I study before the Robe
And do some freaky meditation
(Kundalini?
Houdini?
Spaghetti)
Before the Crow
Wtf is happening to me?

Terror, pleasure
Joy, suffering
A real mixed bag
When the three start singing

A long introduction
For a short poem
Here we go

Through the eyes
Of the Lady of Crows
Which took me some effort
To control

I see clouds
Floating like driftwood
A rainbow
Light-show
Drawing them in
I see an ent
Conducting an orchestra
Of wind and colour
He thinks he’s in charge
But he’s just moving his arms
In a frantic effort
To keep up to the dance
Of the Universe
He’s constrained by the form
Imposed on him
By the spirit of this age
Who will not allow him to be free

Now
The afterword…
I’m not trying to sound mystical
Okay,  maybe just a little
It felt like squeezing a lime
Salt and sugar for the rhyme
I only lack soda
Won’t get it in the coda
I guess water will have to do
So boring… boo hoo
There was that whale thing in Fantasia
That felt like anesthesia
Was it Sibelius? I’ve forgotten
Middle age memory… rotten
The point is…
I’m finally getting to it…
I am just a guy
Making a beverage
And giving you a taste
In exchange
For the possibility
Of a like and a comment
And perhaps I also feel the satisfaction
No,  the delusion,
Of creating something new

The Lady Said, “Caw”

The Lady of the Crows
Where did she come from?
I don’t really know
And in such a strange form

Why are my apparitions all ladies?
My sub conscious mind
With its roots in Hades
Should be more gender neutral?

But it just doesn’t work
‘The Lord of the Crows’
Lords sound like jerks
Jerking off to the public’s woes

Victims of stereotyping (they)
Deep within my scary mind?
I don’t know,  I’m just swiping
away at a keyboard of some kind

Anyway,  there’s a Crow Lady now
Along with a Robe Lady, and a Depths Lady
I don’t where they came from,  why or how
This whole phenomenon seems quite shady

The Lady of the Crows
Just stares at me
Creepily
While I hear a giggle
From the Depths
Scary?
It should be
But it isn’t
Didn’t
I already see the face of Rahu?
Nothing is scarier than that
You can take my word for that
A ten banana score on acute fright
A scale measuring neither left nor right
Though I did try and fight
I woke up from that nightmare
And I was really pissed off
Even angrier than when
The Snake Queen  stole my chastity
Or when the witches tried to find my locality
It’s all bloody crazy
Now there’s a third Lady
And they give me strength (maybe)
She came to me during Lent
Is this some significant event?
Will my poetry be filled with caws?
Will a murder descend from the sky?
Literary murder
Not literal murder
And not a flock either
Caw caw caw
My psyche raw
My persona in the draw
Safely locked away
Taken out only for parties
I get it now
The Depths bring clarity
It’s easier to see the surface of light
When I’m drowning in darkness

Dainty Lady of the Robe
Her  geometric abode
Is a feast for my brain lobes
Easily accessed by road

Caw caw caw
Breaking the law
Seeing on the saw
Revealing all my flaws

Where is my soul?
I only see a hole?
Is it still whole
When my thoughts are divided?

Dissonance,  resonating
With consonance
“But they’re assonating
Boyo”
I can hear one of them
Whisper

Whispers of the universe
That I can no longer hear
I know that they are there
It really sucks that I’m aware
But I can’t get any closer
To hearing them

A real Shem
Stuck on an ark
And then busy
Reproducing
But ten bananas
For the plot pacing
His heart was racing
After all that sailing?

Dark night of the soul
Or eternal damnation?
I’ve got three ladies for company
A lady’s man of perdition
My inner search for meaning
Just a meaningless shag
After a ragtime dance
In a cantina that needs cleaning???

This Lady of the Crows
I don’t think I like her
But that just goes to show
I’m still far from being whole

Is she a part of me
That I’ve long repressed?
The thought leaves me depressed
I didn’t think I was this ugly

This poem makes sense
But perhaps only to me?
It might need a disclaimer
So that’s just what you’ll see

Ahem ahem

The contents of this poem
Are subjective
Any interpretation
Should be made with caution

Steam of consciousness
Rising from the bath tub
And in there three ladies
So much innuendo, hubba hub…

But all symbolic
They are fully clothed
PG13
One even covered by a black veil
Hail, Hail,Hail
Lady of the Crows
Welcome to the team

My Art Rating: 0.5 Bananas 😭

I wanted to do something special
Something big,  something beautiful
For my month iversary (with digital art)
And all I had was a digital canvas
Filled with a substandard copy
And chaotic brush strokes
I wanted to break something
But those days of rage
Were long behind me
Weary acceptance now
…
Then the Lady appeared
“Why so glum
Why so mum
Say something
Anything
Even about nothing
Like you sometimes do”
If I rated my drawings in bananas
I told her
I was sure
It would be half a small one
An underripe and damaged one
“You may not manage one
Now”
She said
In my head
“Transcendent paintings
Are de rigeur
Sure
But they take time
And a special sort of inspiration
Don’t force it
I’ll still endorse it
Your new found purpose
You’re very earnest
And now you know
That grey has a thousand shades”
I had never read the book
Or seen the movie
BDSM was not my thing
I wouldn’t play that game
Even for someone wearing my ring
“I meant real colour, silly
Look at where your mind wanders
Next you’ll tattoo a fleur de lily
And claim to be Molly Flanders”
Who was Flanders, Molly
And why would I engage in such folly?
Was she the Marchioness of Flowers
That most mystical place
Filled with artistic grace
Where the muses sang
And the timbrils rang
And the lyres laid
With violins and made
Stringed babies
…
Violence and lies
Bad pun
…
Never mind
…
Anyway,
Where the muses sang
In time
Always in time
These were no maenads
But my muse seemed quite mad
Maybe she was half and half?
“Don’t worship the golden calf”
She said
“Muses and fuses,  mere tools
Use, misuse, abuse,  refuse
But don’t let them control you
Or you’ll end up  at war
With your psyche
And without electricity”
It was then that I realized
That I needed to back everything up
And stop sipping from the cup
Of laziness
My craziness
Was a tool too
That could be used,  abused,  misused But not refused
Every part of me was a tool
I just needed an instruction manual
Are we dual?
Did my boot contain a window to Ubuntu?
You and I
I asked the Lady
Two in I? II Roman style?
My mind was focussed on advaita
But I needed more data
To make a reasonable hypothesis
On my life’s purpose
The Lady blew a raspberry… pi
“Remember the porpoise?”

I remembered
My first poem of chaos
Where I had to choose
Between a fish and a gun
But got jailed for contempt
When I grew unhappy
At the settlement
Was all of this
Really nonsense?

“Chaos, my dear’
She stroked my cheek
“Apeiron, the unknown, the deeps
Where discoveries sleep
You need to dive down
And almost drown
In madness
To escape the blandness
Of safety and sanity
If you want to be
Pioneer
Discoverer
Inventor
Dreamer

The ers kept coming
Like pleasant humming
I listened to her sing
And no longer felt the sting
Of my horrible artwork
With its stupid lighting
And toddler level anatomy
Colour blind shading
And clueless values

“There you go again!”
The Lady stamped her feet (cute)
And disappeared

The Lady and the Art Novice

The Lady of the Depths
Crept up to me
From the Apeiron Sea
She had noticed
My focus
My drive
My bee hive
Of digital paint
And control Zs
She had observed
My dedication
My latest obsession
My reformation
That verged on monomania
I hadn’t felt like this since the intrigue at Ruritania
She said, with a smile,  “Draw me”
But I wasn’t ready
I distracted her with some astral tea
Happy,  she let me
Make my excuses,  many and plenty
I didn’t know if she’d get insulted
When an unflattering portrait resulted
She’d end up disgusted
And I the culprit
So she went back to the Depths
And waited…
And waited…

When I draw her, I plan to use this picture as the reference, for the clothing at least, but I am not ready to even copy it, let alone use it as inspiration…

My Totems, Visions, And Other Strange Characters

Are they characters I made up?

The Lady of the Depths
The Lady of the Robe
The Lord of Shadows
The Shotgun Crones
The Perverted Hero
The Priestesses of the Garden
The Joker Sage
The Dwarf Rishi
The Philosopher Foetuses
The Nefarious Nefertiti
The Curandera
The Culinary Witch
The Unwell Cosmic Tortoise
The Sensuous Queen of Snakes
Some evil demigod fucker in a white mask

Maybe the witch, the curandera, the philosophers, the shadow lord, and Nefertiti
                    But I don’t know about the rest

They haunted my dreams
         They taught me things
                   They spoke to me
           And showed me scenes
I don’t claim to be a prophet
Or a shaman
          A warlock
Or a wise man
          I am no mystic
And can’t use Fate’s chopsticks
                                   To pick out my fortune
From a jar of cookies

I may just be crazy
Measured in bananas
Singing so many songs
From Led Zeppelin to Santana
I’m not original
          But my visions are
They aren’t me
                    They’re fucking stars
Twisting and shrieking
Singing and persuading
Whispering and pleading
Narrating and educating
Calming me or agitating

Left to my own devices
              My writing is bland
But when I bring them out
I love what happens about
In my head and in my world
We create things that I’m proud of
Even if the posts are unread
They’re actually undead
                                                    Zombies
That constantly inspire

Most of these ‘people’ disappeared
When the Lady came out
From the Depths

My method has changed
I don’t remember most of my dreams
I just hear the Lady’s whispers
I sort of miss the others
Except that giant masked fucker
With the 3×3 grid of commas
No idea what the symbol means

And let’s end with a fib
Just because…

I
Write
Of things
I don’t know
Visions say hello
Just like Marlon Brando’s offers
They cannot be refused, no… but they can be reused
Recycled, reformed and transformed
I’m delusional?
Probably

I write
It
All down
Now
.

I’m Not a Boar!!!

“Go with the flow
You are the man with the show
Don’t stop to say ‘hello’
And do not pass go”

I heard her shuffling rhyme
I watched her dance in time
Through the air above
Wind carrying her body and words
While I drank toddy and slurped up curds
Banana fritters for dessert
While my soul withered in the desert
I felt deserted
By my family and friends–
Many of them anyway–
My presence ruined their day
They didn’t so much as say, ‘hey’
I felt desserted
There’s chocolate in the fridge
And sweet banana chips
In the snack box
Sugar is toxic
But
Food brings comfort

I used to bench 120 kg
Every day was a date with the gym
It started as a whim
But turned into an addiction
I’m beginning to get fat
It’s what happens when
You maintain your appetite
Without any activity
Four years of sleep
Have ruined me
I have to start again
Start small with twenty
I’ll probably sprain something
I’ve already injured my wings

HIIT!!!

Can’t fly no more
I used to soar
Wasn’t a boar
…
I mean bore
…
But I’m no boar as well
At least I hope not
Perhaps I’m a boar
Who dreams he’s a man
And this is all a nightmare
I’m being tricked
By the gods of dreams
That’s quite wicked
And cruel
I eat gruel
For breakfast
But I over do lunch
I am too lazy to cook
I’d rather read a book
It’s inefficient
The way I do things
I’m a perfectionist
In the kitchen
And it takes me
Two hours
To make chicken curry
…
Half an hour to buy the ingredients
…
Fifteen minutes to wash the dishes
…
Fifteen minutes to eat
…
Three hours for a meal
Thank God I’m not French
Or I’d be spending half the day
Cooking and eating
Does eating pork
Make me a cannibal?
No! I’m no boar
And this is no dream
I have to stop
Coming apart at the seams
I have to take responsibility
Manage my property
Enrichen my spiritual poverty
And make it past mid life puberty

“By my toe!
Nice flow!!!
But you can do better
Maybe next time
There will be more rhyme
And you’ll stop talking about fetters”

She wants me to stop now
So I’ll make my bow
But, holy cow!
It’s been a while
Since I wrote this way
It feels good,  I say
Maybe someday
I’ll write like this again
…
Probably Wednesday
But I won’t promise when
The flow comes and goes
Unlike my woes

A/N: I’ve just realized that I’m actually a pretty good cook. It just takes too damn long for a single meal that’s over in fifteen minutes.

I’m Not Damned Yet

Stuck in my hell house
Bare of even a louse
I sit on a chair
With nothing to do
Memories of what was true
Hair raising adventures
Overtures of good company
All gone now with my past
Every second now is torture
“That is because you pine
For what you do not have
Learn to love your solitude
And learn to love the world
Equally, at all times
You will then desire
What is best”
She speaks from my soul
But does not rhyme this time
Is it still her?
It doesn’t matter
I am not whole
And stuck deep in a hole
Within a house in hell
“Desire is good
In small quantities
Like chaos
But not like this
Pay heed now
The crows outside
Are also you”
Those murderous crows
How can they be me?
She is sowing confusion
Because she’s just a delusion
An Illusion of a personality
I created from the depths
I am lost in the deep
Shipwrecked
Rejected
Dejected
Alone
“I am with you
I am you
You must teach the crows
And turn them into a flock
To follow you”
A flock of crows?
It’s time to expose
Her bogus lessons
They’re  murder
And not sheep
They’re looking for meat
To feast on. Me! Her deceit
Is now out in the open
Hope is fading fast
I don’t think I can last
In the hell house
“You will learn in time
To love this house
You will learn in time
To tame the crows
You will learn in time
To fly outside”
Thrice will I learn
And then no more?
A long lesson
Or is my life so short?
“The lesson never ends”
Wait…
I think I see
My life depends on me
To be happy
But I always seek
What I lack
“Do that healthily”
Not give it up
Like a bad habit?
Look at what I inhabit
I see now what you are
Chaos in order
Entropy in a fixed form
Eden in Mordor
A tranquil storm
A paradox of opposites
Yin and yang
A boomerang
Balance
“Not yet”
Is talking to you madness?
“The grace of solitude”
And what of the sadness?
“The sin of solitude”
But I have learned kindness
“A blessing”
I have lost friends
“A curse”
Give me your purse
Where you store your fortune cookies
I’ll make bets with the bookies
And then buy a new persona
To add to my wardrobe
With my winnings
Three shillings
Is enough
“Enough!”
Fine
I’ll muse on your words
Even if the odds
Are against me
…
There is no harm
In singing to the crows
Maybe they are like saplings
And will grow some shade
With love, water, soil and sunlight
“Acceptance first!”
Right…
Maybe one day
When they are no longer a murder
I will teach them to play
With the toys in this house
I’ve already thought of names for two of them
Huginn and Muninn
Maybe