The Sophist

2015-09-21 12:00 am

Three loveless dynasties divine.
Providence in sheep inside.
Bleeding,
'Treating to be blinded.
The Feigning Suicidals.

Three peasants covering their eyes,
Not displaying thoughts inside.
Blinded,
'Treating to be bleeding.
A hopeless heart reciting.

Bed made and three pillows aligned.
Love lost 'tween a bout and twine.
Meaning,
Ends of never starting,
Twelve sorrows between two hearts.

Twelve hearts;
Their grief imparting.

Twelve stars align to follow charts.
Cosmic games of skeet in the dark.
Teeming,
Conducted by the stars;
An opera of three parts.

The loveless damned to be confined,
Only singing chorus lines.
Finding love within their sources.
Slamming on their desks with sore fists.

Bed tossed and our feelings opined.
Love found 'tween a tackle and twine.
Value,
Still,
But still restarts,
Twelve griefs of an ardent heart.

Earnestly,
Your soul departing.

The Sophist

2015-06-09 12:00 am

I have grown with the band,
When I couldn't sleep,
When I lack intrinsic wake.
When I watch them take the world;
I feel I do the same.
Symphony for a pilgrim's soul,
Divine beyond these finite words,
I dream to see them live.
That bond will never break.
Forget not,
Those tunes will never leave my brain,
Akashic records play forever;
Even in my grave,
I'll always love those men;
So much it's prolly gay.

wanderer

2015-05-05 12:00 am

I lie eagerly awaiting for your return
exhilarated by the thought of your lips
once again touching my famished soul anew,
then by the light of the moon you hesitantly came,
first, a gentle, subtle caress
gingerly knocking on my sands
then 
a gradual deluge,
enveloping
consuming,
the whole stretch of my being
and as I lie prostrate ,
ecstatic with our intimacy, 

you have once again retreated silently
to the mighty vastness of your benefactor..,

But you shall never be mine,

for the ocean is a jealous lover.
and I am eternally condemned
to be your willing mistress
caught in this perpetual longing
waiting
anticipating
desiring
For the next cycle....

The Sophist

2015-01-21 12:00 am

You know that you listen,
To the heart of my soul,
Beating harder and whole.
Hole deep darker than coal.
I give my volition;
To this part of my role.
Any home is my prison;
When I lack the control.

The Sophist

2014-10-30 12:00 am

Doll Robert in a sailing shirt,
Ever lurks through souls deserted,
Tall akward leaves a trail covered,
Never hurt but he scared the girl.

Aharon Yosef

2014-10-05 12:00 am

Soul filling everything,
You emerge from all,
Thus filling my soul.

Earth is mine mazily,
Will you leave me here, dying?
Between the shallows and the sky.

Nights gallop passing me,
Birds peck out the stars,
Thus we fall so far apart.

Crystal moon, it waits in peace,
Softly as mine eyes take autumn,
No crystal flakes that taste the breeze,
No barcarolle to be sung solemn,

Casting nets emphatically,
Thrashed by your oceanic eyes,
Thus reprising my demise.

I create when I embosom keys,
Muster up thoughts I pull from,
Throwing mine out to the wind,
Zephyrus mine soul in tandem.

Soul filling everything,
You emerge from all,
Thus tearing me apart.

The Sophist

2014-09-25 12:00 am

Decay and the rifle alone. Censored by Gods as 
cold winter snow passes men stuck in glop as 
it blows. Who knows? What the fuck does a soul 
call a home? Accepting ideals without gloves 
being shown. Refuting belief but still knowing 
that something transcends all of time, space, 
math, and the know-how. Gloating but feeling 
in pain for lost souls turned wayward, 
corrupt, or depraved by the fallout.

Take it in, as it turns out, by talking in 
strides with the crowds. Softly speak glop 
when it counts. Slowly speak up, and never 
speak out.

Gord

2014-07-03 12:00 am

Soul searching, to quench my thirst.
Burning coal. Dense smoke. Smouldering.
Yearning whence, we control the hearse.
Returning self-control and sense,
Only to those left shouldering.
Soul surviving artist dreampt the worst:
All of my love to her,
All of her love in return.
All for I have yearned.
Once dreams do I now incur,
Nightmares embraced with au revoir,
Left to die without concern.
Simply to never again be reborn.
Chorus Sings.

The Sophist

2014-06-13 12:00 am

All life delenda est¹,
Heterogeneous minds develop post-deletion,
War, Children, it's just a shot away,
Rape; a murderous arrest.
All life lived best,
Mental quest yearning soul completion.
War, Children, it's just a shot away,
This is only a test.

Footnotes:
1. delenda est latin for 'to be destroyed'.

The Sophist

2014-05-14 12:00 am

Perchance to live in witness,
Stars burst and rearrange,
Radiantly crumbling,
As charcoal'd skies remain.

Bemeeting life with endless bliss,
This bears repeat in ways,
Beyond the charcoal skies and souls,
A single voice remains,
A single man to compliment,
Beyond the stars there lays,
An endless charcoal firmament,
Muse of all my days.

The Sophist

2014-05-13 12:00 am

My Life,
My Soul,
I am my own,
I am my everything,
My Sight,
So Foul,
To live perforce,
To Hell with destiny.

SO FOUL,
FIE SOUL,
THIS AMBIANCE PERVADING
 EVERYTHING.
NO DOUBT,
OR CONTROL,
BEYOND MY SIGHT I DREAM OF
 EVERYTHING.

The Sophist

2014-04-29 12:00 am

I'd strike out the sun for harming sinews,
This service I'll pay myself as a fine,
Enlarger of kingdom if ever I die,
'queathing my soul for the roar of a lion.

I giveth thee lukewarm blood of a newborn,
God my appetite; I hunger for power.
Shrew Lord of perpetual night liveth nigh,
Covered from danger in half-lighted fog.

Co-sign and write before bloodlines congeal.
Our magic will bring desolation to smog.
Fill the lines afore 'why?' and 'oh sigh'
Flog grace and damnation 'till three parts combine.

The Sophist

2014-04-15 12:00 am

Is staff all insubordinate,
Or management defunct?
Will anybody fill the holes,
Of corporations fucked?
Busy-bodied filthy moles,
Art of ethics trumped.
On cliffs she has me climbing poles,
'Till brain's a bluish funk,
In defiance of their shallow souls,
I tie my rope and jump,
Economically concordant soul,
Laughing, I spelunked.

The Sophist

2014-03-19 12:00 am

Hermes carries Lamb,
Across his shoulders,
Across timeless sands,
More he travels;
Still more land.

Crying out in hope,
Kriophoros left his home,
Carried Lamb eyes to our souls.
Mighty messenger of Gods,
Of all the Heavens and Below.

Calamis never same again,
Good Sheppard waits for Lamb,
Prepared to spill blood,
For the better of the herd,
For the chance to understand,
The voice of the Absurd.

Dusti Rodes

2014-03-05 12:00 am

" This next piece of writing, contains strong sexual content material and graphic language. Many people find it both harrowing and disturbing. It depicts and catalogues a series of true-life events. The names have been changed to protect the innocent, of which there is one; the laws of libel prevent my naming and shaming the guilty; of which there are many."

 * Reader discretion is MOST STRONGLY advised - As it may easily offend. For this I make no apologies. Events like these are happening HOURLY all over the world at this moment in time, and society as a whole SHOULD be doing more to prevent such misery "

 ........................................

 " IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE, .....CAN IT?..."

 It's Sunday,
 She's staying at dad's flat tonight.
 She adores him;
 With the trust that is naturally instilled
 In a child.

 Dave, her father,
 Plays cards with his friends;
 While she watches, smiling.
 The pot is short;
 It's his call.
 He must make amends.
 Forty pounds is the bid.

 With a knowing nod,
 Colin folds his hand;
 And taking hers,
 Leads through the door
 To she knows where.
 The now empty bedroom
 That she sometimes has to share.

 Shush - don't make a noise;
 Your stifled cries,
 Will frighten the toys.
 Who sitting in silence,
 Can only watch.
 As Colin slowly unzips his trousers,
 And loosens his belt another notch.
 Her favourite doll, alone in the corner,
 Draped across the wooden chair;
 Can but bear silent witness
 To the saddening pain
 She experiences there.

 Next day,
 She is driven to school;
 By her dad.
 In a tatty Volvo.
 Be-spotted with rust coloured
 Splodges of primer paint.
 A stark anachronism
 Of Swedish sexual liberalism
 The grubbiness of the grey,
 Mirroring the semen-soiled nightdress;
 Of the night before.
 The paint spots,
 Ghostly echoes
 Of dried blood stains
 Splattered on the white fabric.
 Heralding her lost innocence;
 That she would need to wash out
 Later in the day.
 When she finally returned
 To the living hell
 That served as home.

 He pulls in at the pavement
 Saying yesterday was fun
 And that they should do it more often.
 He tells her to take care of herself.
 Sick joke, what?
 But no-body's laughing anyway.
 Deprived of decency
 By her father
 In that he doesn't even open the door.
 She rises from the well-worn seat
 And gets herself out
 Just like countless
 Whores before.

 In some final bizarre sexual gesture
 As he slowly drives away
 He also discards the now empty
 Crumpled, finished cigarette packet
 Aimlessly through the window
 Into the uncaring street.
 It in its turn, would be picked up
 By some scavenger hard up
 On his or her luck
 Anxious to discover
 If it held any small delight.

 And on discovering not, it would
 Be consigned as worthless rubbish
 And be discarded yet again
 To a life on the streets.
 Until eventually, battered and crushed
 By countless uncompromising souls
 It would cease to be recognisable
 For what it once was.
 Circles within circles.
 Such is the life we lead.

 Four friends, sit
 Sharing girlish giggles.
 Talking tampons and towels.
 Discovering the inward
 Functioning of females
 For the first time.
 Smiles, over sharing
 Secrets of sexuality
 With their mothers.
 But she's not laughing.

 Sitting in the classroom
 She is longing to tell, someone,
 About the happenings
 Of the previous night.
 To be able to unload
 All that crushing fear;
 That is building up
 Within her frightened frame.
 Afraid to go home,
 She hangs around after class
 Anxious to explain her reasons.
 But no-one is listening.
 Nor can they read
 The pleading in her scared eyes.
 So she goes home alone, again.

 Sitting watching television,
 A break from the drudgery
 Of endless days
 Doing household chores.
 Fear strikes her heart
 As she hears the key
 Entering the outside door.

 Because the washing has taken so long
 And about it, she cannot tell;
 The dust she hasn't cleaned
 From the TV
 Only causes her mother again to yell.
 Her anger quickly turns to rage;
 Followed closely by a beating,
 And another verbal tirade.
 Then follows the shouting
 And the slapping.
 The angry name calling
 Infers that someone is a whore.
 Leading to her being pushed downstairs
 And landing on the hall floor.

 She pushes Amy into the cellar cupboard,
 Then callously locks the door.
 Leaving Amy, cowering in huddled fear,
 Upon the dark, coldest floor.
 Later, in her room,
 Curled up, tearful,
 Trying desperately to block out the pain.
 Lies listening to her sad sobbing.
 She closes her eyes.
 Escaping sleep is not easy in coming;
 But further along the hallway,
 Someone else is.
 Urgently calling for Amy
 Beckons her to her mother's bed.
 There, between thrashing thighs,
 And deep moaning sighs,
 Amy is forced to give her mother
 Sexual 'head'.

 Coming home,
 To the usually empty house,
 She cannot help but notice
 The smart car
 Parked outside.
 Putting her key
 In the door,
 As she has done
 So many, many times before;
 She is met by Geoff,
 The new man, in her mother's life.
 On the surface
 He seems very nice.
 Picnics of strawberries, wine
 And chocolate ice.
 And even washing up,
 Afterwards.

 School sports day comes,
 Giving her the chance
 To exercise her rights
 As a child;
 To youthful fun.
 Sack race successes,
 Loud accolades.
 Hiding the depths of depravity,
 That lies dormant.
 Buried deep within.

 It starts with a present,
 At bedtime.
 " Put it on, and come and show us how it looks."
 Simple games,
 Amongst the adult friends.
 Pictures are taken.
 Childish at first,
 It soon turns nasty;
 Leading to lewdness and lechery.
 Removing Geoff's trousers and pants,
 While her mother looks on;
 And laughs.
 Then starts the painful ordeal
 Of nightly rape.
 And the utterances of the threatening lie
 That if she ever dares to tell someone
 It would surely cause her to die,

 After a time,
 She can bear no more
 Of Geoff's disgusting behaviour.
 Goes to her father's workplace
 Hoping on hope
 That he'll prove to be her saviour.
 She tells him all
 That's been going on;
 And could she come to live with him,
 Please?
 Fraught with anger,
 Fired by fear;
 He goes and gives Geoff
 A beating with a garden spade.
 In his frustration at failing
 To protect his daughter
 From this pair of human animals
 With their filthy habits so degrade.
 Then he storms out,
 Leaving Amy to receive
 Yet another beating
 From her mother.
 That leads her to being locked
 In the cupboard
 Once again.
 The broken shard
 Salvaged from the shattered
 Kitchen window
 By which her father had entered
 Proves to be the key
 To successful self mutilation
 To which Amy administers
 Readily.

 When the time comes
 To leave her old school
 The teacher's reports proclaim
 That Amy is both clever and wise.
 But they all still
 Just sit and listen
 While her mother
 Continues to tell
 The same pack of lies.
 How Amy sits reading
 Quietly, in her room,
 For much of the time.
 And how she's always
 Out playing with her friend;
 But that is untrue
 From beginning to end.
 The teacher says Amy could do
 With really coming out of her shell.
 Hopes that she'll enjoy her new school;
 And with that, she wishes her well.

 Sitting with her new found friends,
 Thinking that this place,
 Could indeed be really cool.
 Then one says,
 Someone is trying to greet her,
 From a van.
 Parked outside the school.
 She peers across the open courtyard.
 At her father, who's come to meet her.

 Full of reasons,
 Why he hasn't been more often.
 Excuses that money has been
 So short lately;
 Sometimes he hasn't eaten.
 Now he's come to take her out,
 About the true reason for his motives,
 There still exists more
 Than a little doubt.

 Having bribed her,
 With a Big Mac meal,
 With Coke and a Cadbury's
 Curly Whirly,
 He apologises that he has no more sweets;
 But if only he had more money,
 He could afford to buy her
 Lots of treats.
 Then the unsubtle suggestion,
 That she could really help Daddy,
 Just by working the nearby streets.

 Standing on a dim
 Lamp-lit street;
 In her denim jacket,
 And her flowery
 Short length skirt;
 Wearing virginal white gym socks,
 with matching plimsolls.
 Her long hair , shining,
 Looking very much her age.
 Having only turned thirteen,
 But for a little while.
 People, from which she
 Should get only love;
 Blatantly exploiting her sexual genes.
 Although she cannot spell Paedophile;
 She is painfully aware of what it means.
 " For a wank, charge'em twenty five quid,
 If they want a blow-job, charge them thirty"
 Practising that will corrupt her mind;
 Into believing love and sex,
 Is always something
 That is sordid and dirty.

 A sexperienced competitor,
 In these matters,
 Gives her, and her dad;
 What amounts to a friendly warning.
 This particular spot,
 Is her pitch.
 And her pimp
 Will not be so tame;
 So her father,
 Just moves on with her,
 To somewhere else.
 In his dubious quest
 It would seem he has no shame;
 With his repeated attempts,
 To get ' on the game'.

 The local lorry park,
 Proves a likely playground;
 For the sort of games,
 He has in mind.
 Providing a service,
 For all kinds
 Of men.
 The young, the old, and the lonely.
 Not the actual full sex, though:
 But just your blow and hand-jobs only.
 Making sure that the clients,
 Come in style;
 Being very sure to use a condom,
 All the while.

 He does a deal,
 Just for a full blow-job;
 " You know how, don't you,
 just go and suck his prick;
 It'll be all be over in a minute!"
 But it doesn't just take that quick.

 Squatting,
 She gives a blow-job
 To an unknown,
 Standing man.
 While her poncing pimp
 Of a dad,
 Sits smiling,
 In his grubby little van.

 Suck, suck, sucking,
 On a dirty, crusted,
 Foul-smelling prick,
 That's making her feel
 So, so sick.
 Wondering why it is
 That when you
 Want them to,
 they can never come
 Really quick.

 And when it's finally finished;
 She finds the smell of sweat and semen,
 Has left her feeling
 Really sick.
 Dave, buys her silence,
 With a fiver.
 Then he takes her back home;
 Double quick.

 Dusti Rodes (2009)

 POSTSRIPT TO ' IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE. .....CAN IT? *

 " Children have the right to be listened to. The messages that they give us are often painful and disturbing, and challenge our capabilities to actually hear what they are in fact saying and take them seriously.
 Our conditioned instinct is to recoil from what we are hearing and deny the reality of what is being said.
 The act of sexual abuse of a child involves a fundamental betrayal of trust, and an abuse of power, which has devastating consequences for the child. Undermining the basic requirements of a child for relationships built on trust, that are both dependable and loving.
 This gives rise to the premise that children not only have to be heard but also need to be healed from the trauma of such experiences.
 The child's right to be respected as an individual person should be unquestionable; but it is a long way from being generally accepted within our society."

Dusti Rodes

2014-03-04 12:00 am

The Blackbird

 I see him,
 Everywhere, everyday.
 The blackbird.
 Here, near and far away.
 The blackbird.
 Tilling the dark brown soil.
 The blackbird.
 Continuing in his daily toil.
 The blackbird.
 Colliery coal-face in colour.
 The blackbird.
 Eyes that glint,
 With a light,
 Like no other.
 The blackbird.
 I see him,
 On a fence.
 The blackbird.
 In a hedge.
 The blackbird.
 Reflected in a window.
 The blackbird.
 Perched high,
 In a solitary tree.
 The blackbird.
 I see him,
 But does he see me?
 The blackbird.
 Watching,
 Waiting.
 The blackbird.
 Demonic soul-seeker.
 The blackbird.
 Hell-sent carrion eater.
 The blackbird.
 Herald to the Grim Reaper.
 The blackbird.

 And his name is Death.

 Dusti Rodes (2007)

Dusti Rodes

2014-03-04 12:00 am

Jazz Duellin'


"Some people spend their whole lives, and not hear the sounds stored insides 'em. Forgits the notes, jist plays the music.
We's alls gots 'em. Black notes, white notes, notes that's been done stretched, even bent ones. Theys orl ins there.
It's hows youse use 'em, that's the trick! Whethers you beats 'em, till they is blue; or you coaxes them out gently likes fine wine from a bottle, it's up to youse. Some folks puts 'em in orders that mosts don't even finks of! And that's olrights too. It's up to youse. Jist gotta finds your own ways o' makin' 'em sounds... It's orls I kin tells yer..."


He hadn't played the piano in a long time.
Disillusioned, downed by the drugs,
That ran riot in the community and company that he kept.
He had drifted away.
Somewhere. Anywhere.
But there.
Harlem could frighten even the strongest of souls.
And he'd never claimed to be that.

They called him Cajun.
A remnant of time spent in New Orleans.
The honky-tonks, the seedy bars and the backroom bordellos,
That he had often frequented while down there,
In what seemed now like a hundred life-times ago.

But he was back in the old neighbourhood.
He'd come for the funeral.
One of only a few true people,
He could call friend.
Word spread like wildfire, as it does in these times,
That he was back in town.

At the graveside some of the old crew ambled over to him.
Asking the usual stuff.
How's he doing and the like.
Told him they were holding the wake at Creole's Place that night.
And would be sure pleased to see him there;
The brother being a friend and all.

When he walked into the Place that night,
He was greeted by a sight he had almost forgotten.
The air was thick with the smell of stale beer,
Rotgut rye whiskey and weed joints.
The lights, they were turned down real low.
But people saw him standing there,
And still took the time to say hello.

He hadn't even been nowhere near a piano,
In a long while.
They had seen to that.
Six years in the slammer cramps a man's style.
Lithe fingers, gone fat.
The used-to-be so supple sinews now taunt.
He flexed 'em.
They fought back.

The spotlight on the stage area,
Reminded him of those damned searchlights,
That had sent their searing shafts of light skyward.
Cutting into the darkness outside his cell,
Night after night.
Robbing him of the only escape available,
To the inmates of the hell-hole.
Where he had been incarcerated .... Sleep.

Creole, the 'Fatman', on bass fiddle,
'Bleedin' Lips' Murphy, blowing blues horn.
'Skins'Duval, up there on drums.
The Fatman called out, coaxing for him to come up on the stage.

Most folk never really hear the sounds inside them.
But some can't help but create,
The music they were born to make.
Cajun was one of those.
He hears the roar rising from the void within.
Like a volcano.

Molten music,
Stirring deep in the depths
Of his frame.
That must come to the surface,
Like lava, straining to escape the confines.

A piano is made of wood 'n' wires.
Hammers big and small.
Ivory keys that need gentle,
Or sometimes even firm coaxing;
To give their best or better.
To some, it's just a piano,
A boxful of sounds.
A mechanism for making music.
For others, like Cajun,
It's an extension of the soul.

The drums, they spoke something.
Grumbled, mumbled low.
Real low.
The fiddle responded with a taunt strain.
The horn blew for all it's worth.
The note long and very low down.
Somewhere deep, deep in the depths.
They were having a conversation,
Wanting Cajun to join in.
To leave the safety of the shoreline,
And strike out for the deep water.

Then Creole started beating the box,
With his waxed bow.
Stacking the blues.
Coaxing, urging, Cajun to take up the thread.
Waiting for him to do things on the keys,
That showed he was wading in the water with them.
And Cajun answered them all.
With authority.

The dialogue became a monologue.
The piano was doing the talking now.
All everybody could do was but listen.
In awe.
The riffs and licks spoke with an urgency.
They told of places,
That none of the others had ever been to.
Describing pain, that few else had ever felt.
Diving to depths of despair,
Unplumbed by mere mortals.

But Cajun had been there.
Seen the sights.
And he was telling everyone.
That which he had experienced.
Reliving the roller coaster ride,
That his life had been so far.
And he took all those,
Gathered there, that night.
On the journey.


Dusti Rodes (2007)