Wang Zen, home of poetry, spokenword poetry, slam poetry, slam poetry lyrics, state of mine t-shirts, Wang's Kitchen CD, Now and Zen Alarm clock, lyrics, poetry slam, and all things Wangzen
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Wangzen.com 的汉语版本
Chinese version of Wangzen.com

Me río en la cara del tigre
danza en el carbón ardiente
me enorgullezco en la supervivencia
desde el puño a la besó

arrastra sus huesos en un puñado de cenizas
acariciar el club, el amor lo que destruye

Persigo horizonte
con el cabello de la persona que me amaba,
y el cuero cabelludo de la que me luchado
Montañas de otoño, dar paso a devolver el valle
valles dan paso a los ríos
los océanos y las costas y montañas se elevan de nuevo

Estoy disminuyen y golpe
Toco tanto cielo y el océano
esperanza para la gran reunión
pero los corazones salvajes ritmo débil
cuando se enfrenta con la derrota
Firmo términos de la vista marchita
El vencedor promesas de última hora al alcance del oído
promesas delgado como el papel en que fueron escritos en

Y cuando voy a ver a mi ser querido de nuevo?
soñando con que detrás de las paredes de piedra hechas
Y cuando voy a verte de nuevo?
mi novia ruborizada, lleno de orgullo?

votos hechos en las llanuras fracturadas
ocultar la tectónica
tsunamis tragar todo lo que una vez se levantó tan majestuosamente
"Me encantó lo que me rompió"

separar los fragmentos, reconstruir
la historia rota, siga las
huellas de lo que conquista
tirar basura meseta limpia desértica lo que los héroes de este siglo trae

Sólo esta cesura de mentiras para romper la continuidad de la desesperación.
Un paréntesis de lado en una vida de afecto pasivo.

Yo soy el roto
la sombra me llevó
que es la que ha inspirado?
Un prisma a través del cual la luz torturado oscuras vigas
manchas entre el agua clara, el bufón
sonrisa pintada ocultar el frío, la distancis

Estoy frío y el sueño me elude
¿Dónde estabas cuando llegó la oscuridad?
Una espaldas vuelta, cara a los pastos calentamiento

Lucha me santuario
¿Qué? ¿Dónde?
y lo que se ha roto no puede ser reparado
un río se seca
un quilla buque encalla en bancos rocosos
una campanas doblan:
siempre ... es para siempre ...

Poetry, what it is

What the hell is poetry? Is poetry just prose that ignores line length and proper grammatical structure? Is poetry just pretty words strung together with line breaks taking the place of punctuation? Is poetry the freeing of language from any constrainst to get to the heart of meaning? If it don't rhyme, is it still poetry? (heh)

I'm going to go out on a limb here, and talk about poetry from my somewhat limited knowledge. Please feel free to spank me if I am off in any way. (But, as you all well know, everything on the web is true) In Greek times poetry was separated from the narrative, the term being "lyrical" or to be "accompanied by the lyre". To be sung. It had more to do with music lyrics and reading (sung) aloud, which seems to make poetry relate to the spokenword movement of poetry. Poetry has a long history of being read aloud, to make the words come alive, from the ancient Greeks, to the Hmong oral histories in Laos, and the Sandinistas reading poetry by candlelight in their tents at night, to the Beats reading in cafes, and now the slammers and their spokenword. What to make of it?

Beyond the rigid forms such as Haiku and Sonnets with their syllable length and number of lines, with sonnets and other poetry forms ending in rhyming words in particular patterns, poetry takes forms limited only by the imagination, which is to say they have no limits at all. But, as a friend has told me, if all things can be poetry, then shit can be poetry. Yeah, well, the same argument has been used for art in general. The bleeding edge of poetry and art will always try to free art from the constrainsts and forms of the past. And sometimes the bleeding edge borrows from the past a la Ezra Pound and now hip hop with their "sampling". Anyway, just a Monday morning brain spill...anyway, feel free to talk back.

Looking for my photography site? Click the photo below:

Orpheus Rising chapbook now available from Cafe Press. This is a collection of poems strung loosely upon the skeleton of the Orpheus and Eurydice myth.
This chapbook was the product of a one-man show put on in Denver in 2004.

Help me to believe

I'm too damaged to believe in fairy tales and true love
the synchronous intersection of time and place and chance
Luck to me is endless preparation meeting fortuitous opportunity
in other words, we make our own luck
But despite my broken body protests
against hidden monsters and happy endings
I feel like I've prepared my whole life for you

Are you the girl I can put my faith in?
A permanent fixture in my mental storage
complete with knickknacks and commode?
My mind is filled to the brim with brown hair and blue eyes
an intellect to be reckoned with
A singular talent in a one-hundred pound package
We see eye-to-eye in a non-physical physical way
You caress my furrowed brow with cool hands
clever hands that put the fix in
cradle my love-addled head
dreaming of travel in rice-producing lands
China and Thailand and Japan
taking and taken with you
Dreaming of a life of ease, with you
I place my fragile faith with you

Here's my heart, a three pound thing
the heart is a muscle made of sinew and veins
powered by life
forcing blood with bellows and shouts and synchronized valves
through vessels ocean-going and exploring
machinelike, and sometimes it's stiff, and sometimes like stone,
and sometimes freezing cold
A frigid thing melting at your furnace touch
the kind that movie stars bestow, like you
the kind that blues singers do, like you

I'll buy what you're selling and sell what you're buying
and let you rearrange my mental furniture
putting in pedestal sinks and hi-volume commodes
the kind that when you flush the Atlantic Ocean dips an inch
(never did like to flush twice)
with you I'm wasteful, spoiled and rich
with you I'm chocolate cake and champagne flutes
with you I'm a triple-shot espresso - hold the lemon twist

Like Lon Chaney, I'm a monster undeserving of you
but like all monster flicks, I get you in the middle
and when gut-shot by clean-shaven heroes
and you see that, really, I'm the prince
I'll get you in the end too

Hold my hand and kiss my burning lips
try to put out my eternal fire, I triple-dog-dare you
write me a fairytale, full of monsters,
and darkness, and a damsel distressing,
and muscular heroes who save you in the end
write me a fairytale full of hope and fire and true love

And help me, please help me
help me to believe.

Video
New Videos of Java Me Darkly and Nostalgia, directed by my good friend Dave Felknor available for the web. Real Player, AVI, Flash and QuickTime versions available. Letter-boxed...for your pleasure.

WAP enabled
Wangzen is now available to the mobile masses. Point your WAP enabled phone's browser to: http://winksite.com/wangzen/poetry.