Schizophrenia Poetry
by
M. Stefan Strozier
Published by World Audience, Inc.
25 Sickles Street, #6E
New York, NY 10040
Phone (347-523-9727); Fax (347-523-9727)
Contact: Mike Strozier Strozier@worldaudience.org
ISBN 978-1-934209-07-3
10-digit ISBN 1-934209-07-4
© 2006, M. Stefan Strozier (www.mstefanstrozier.org)
Cover art and design by Christopher Taylor
Copyright notice: All work contained within is the sole copyright of its author, 2006, and may not be reproduced without consent.
World Audience (www.worldaudience.org) is a global consortium of artists and writers, producing audience and The audience Review. Please submit stories, poems, paintings, or photography to: submissions@worldaudience.org; please send inquiries about being a reviewer to: theatre@worldaudience.org.
Schizophrenia Poetry
By
M. Stefan Strozier
A World Audience Book
September, 2006
____________
New York, NY
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………………….9
Sponge Bob…………………………………………………………………………………………………13
Paranoia……………………………………………………………………………………………………….15
Waking Dreams……………………………………………………………………………………….…16
A Moment……………………………………………………………………………………………………19
Scream…………………………………………………………………………………………………………20
Free Verse………………………………………………………………………………………………...…21
Home………………………………………………………………………………………………………….…22
Snowy Ridge………………………………………………………………………………………………..23
The Heights…………………………………………………………………………………………….……24
The Graveyard………………………………………………………………………………………….…25
Flying…………………………………………..…………………………………………………………………31
The Sheriff……………………………………………………………………………………………………33
Hard Turn…………………………………………………………………………………………………….36
Voices……………………………………………………………………………………………………………37
Scarecrow……………………………………………………………………………………………………39
Charlie Rose…………………………………………………………………………………………..……40
8 Prepositions…………………………………………………………………………………………….41
Ode to a Firing Squad……………………………………………………………………………..…42
Are The Wolves Going To Attack? ……………………………………………………..…44
Poetry……………………………………………………………………………………………………………46
A Monument…………………………………………………………………………………………….…47
Rugby Scrum……………………………………………………………………………………………….49
Hey! Mr. Blind, One Eyed Giant, Nobody Tricked Me Too! ………………..50
Poems…………………………………………………………………………………………………………..53
Death…………………………………………………………………………………………………………….55
To my children, Jay and Carolyn
INTRODUCTION
The line between sanity and insanity is often a fuzzy one: perhaps almost as fuzzy as the line between truth and fiction. For most people, it’s easier to get through the day-to-day busyness of modern life by drawing that line, however arbitrary, and making sure that we’re on the right side of it. Those who don’t seem to fit can then be classed as “other” and kept safely out of our perception. There are times when I wonder whether we don’t fill our lives with non-contemplative activity solely for the purpose of avoiding the kind of intense contemplation that could easily pitch any of us, whatever our “classification,” into a world that appears, at the very least, unsettling. Unfortunately, for those brave readers who have picked up this collection, it isn’t going to be so easy to maintain that sense of differentiation. The poems in M. Stefan Strozier’s Schizophrenia Poetry tend to pull the reader directly into the beating heart of madness. There are hallucinations, fear, paranoia, darkness, and pain, but it isn’t all negative. There is also pleasure, wonder, and even, at times, a sense of superpower as the poems move beyond the abyss towards the creation of a viable perception.
Allow yourself to be taken into the poems, and at times you’ll find yourself lost in Strozier’s maze, face to face with a deadly Minotaur; but not without Aradne’s thread. Keep your wits about you and you’ll emerge in light. Schizophrenia Poetry is full of poems that touch on insanity certainly, shedding light on the daily struggle for simple survival that a schizophrenic might face. But they are more than that. The poems in this book will change the way you perceive what can only be called, in this instance at least, an altered consciousness rather than an illness in search of a cure. But they also touch on something common and familiar, the work collectively slouching towards a sense of order and reason. The poet’s search is everyman’s search: for meaning, for justice, for sanity, and above all, for self-knowledge. After reading these it is impossible to simply distance yourself from the schizophrenic poet who forms the narrative “I” in this work, or to point a finger and say that this is something unknowable, untenable, or plain old “mad”. The spectrum or continuum along which Strozier’s poetry moves is one that will be immediate to all readers whether they’ve struggled with the fickle flashings of the mind or not. Poems like “Waking Dreams” or “Scream” are familiar enough dream landscapes. Others like “The Heights”, or “Voices” could just as easily be read as the pain of depression, desire, or any artistic longing as a struggle with hallucination. The final poems in the book muse on the nature of poetry itself, and the poet’s role as seer, truth seeker and truth maker and end the book on a very positive note.
There is order in Strozier’s art, and a strong literary heritage that calls up Dante, Greek mythology, Blake (as any poetry which deals with visions does), Vonnegut, and even tainted icons of modernity: Quentin Tarantino, Bob Marley, and Sponge Bob Square Pants (a character that would give anyone nightmares).
Many of the poems are acrostic, self-referential, and heavily invested with rhythm and sound. Although there is certainly an air of seriousness about the work, there is also humour, as in the Bukowski inspired “Rugby Scrum” which brings literary “hard hitters” together in for a game of football. “8 Prepositions” gives the reader a lovely little poem of sardonic grammar, or “Charlie Rose”, which explores the writer’s struggle for recognition in a talk show world. The metaphors are strong and original, the work thoughtful, wrought, powerful, and in the end, positive in their approach to what some might consider a debilitating topic, never mind condition. Strozier never lets either the schizophrenia or the pain diminish what he is aiming for: those poetic moments which achieve transcendence.
Magdalena Ball
The Compulsive Reader, http://www.compulsivereader.com
Sponge Bob
The Satanic demon
Sponge Bob Square Pants
Came to me
Either in dreams or daydreams
Sponge Bob Square Pants
Explained,
While looking around,
Very suspiciously,
That it was all
A big conspiracy
And that they were
Coming to get me,
And take me away
Well.
Sponge Bob Square Pants
Kept flinging skinny arms
In front of him
And behind
Like crazy,
His eyes in one place –
Not at me
I felt as if I was slipping
Into schizophrenia
I felt like I was falling,
.
.
.
.
Into schizophrenia,
Again
So I pointed out to Sponge Bob Square Pants,
What if the conspiracy is true?
Sponge Bob Square Pants
Turned his eyes
To the other side,
And they stayed there,
Looking away from me
Sponge Bob Square Pants
Said,
“I am only going to tell you this once.
I need you to come with me.”
There was a very strange
Pause
Where
Nothing was said.
“We have to defeat the conspiracy.”
His eyes met mine.
I said to Sponge Bob Square Pants:
“Lead the way.”
“Let’s go.”
He looks back from time to time,
With those eyes
Paranoia
I am going mad,
In this room,
In front of this computer screen,
Following these words,
Along this page.
This is a regular event.
I am mildly bothered by it.
I do not think you understand.
There are things,
Slithering under the door,
And hiding in the shadows
And, the omnipresent,
Government spies are
Watching me
Despite this logic:
“Who cares?”
The aliens, however,
Are most certainly observing
Me and the government spies.
In this era,
There are also regular people
Watching me
They’re watching you, too.
I am watching you,
My dear.
Waking Dreams
There was a time when
I did not have anywhere
I could call home
I was awake because
Sleeping was difficult
Well, after several weeks,
I entered the world of dreams.
I spent a lot of time in the library,
Reading,
Writing poems, like this one,
Observing,
As a huge black fly
Flying around the room,
Before slamming into my right eyeball;
Two gold dragons in the bushes,
On the other side of the glass –
Beyond them, hiding,
A praying mantis is poised to strike,
The dragons.
A cockroach, three feet long,
Moves toward me,
Scurrying across the table
Now it is on my jacket,
Crawling up my sleeve
Voices scream,
Over a unknown sound system
Turning to listen,
I see there is nothing there
(The voices are there.)
Forms are morphed into other things:
A headless astronaut –
Also speaking,
A giant snake,
Patterns on the floor,
The ceiling, the walls, my eyeballs.
Rather than diminish,
These things grow, exponentially –
Each image, scraping a fork across a plate of china,
Inside my brain.
Here,
Follow me,
This is the place,
Beyond the abysses;
I see clearly through fogs,
Where backwater channels,
Struggling against time,
And cosmic forces,
Desire not sleep;
But to meet,
And flow,
Forever
Where
Both
Death
And reality
Are mired, sloshing,
And mirrored are dreams,
And imagination, as it should be.
It is in that place I am now
And, when I arrive here,
I never want to leave.
Perhaps, you can
Understand me
I only want
To stay
Lost
For all
Eternity –
Perhaps, you
Cannot understand;
For you, only two things
Are certain – and no more:
Reality and its banal clichés –
For, if you would simply allow
Your mind to sail through, you
Might make it to where I am –
Maybe, not quite as close;
But nearby;
I’ll watch
For you.
A Moment
Trees rustling, daytime –
Raining; dark clouds, scattering –
Relief for waning hopes
Setting sun breaks through,
Even it is blocked.
Human cries,
Car brakes, screeching,
Buses hiss
There is no end,
No answer – nor, justice:
Reason or purpose.
I dropped this piece of paper,
From a window
On the sixth floor –
Apparently, someone has found it
Scream
I hope we weather this storm
Weather the storm weather the storm
Whipping through the hollows
Screaming for recognition
In my heart
In my weary heart in my weary heart
And your tired eyes and your tired eyes
I can see in the storm
Searching like the wind,
For harbor in my arms
I hope we weather this storm
You and
I
Free Verse
Pausing for a moment,
Writing in my diary,
Bored of pained torment,
A demon, red and fiery
Slowly rose above my soul –
Succubus, she once was my muse
Too long I paid her high toll;
I have the power to choose
Confusion left my mind
How can I live without her?
She was cruel and unkind;
But she made my pen purr
Now, there is only hard, cut form
I created a new, sculpt whole
Without shelter, I am the storm – a
Unbendable, magical soul.
Home
Leaving the train,
Walking inland,
To find my soul
And my self,
In this bustle and hustle
Seem to have
Come up missing,
Many a year now
Searching for that place,
Once called home
Memories flash like lightning,
Swaying weeds, and strangeness,
All the same
Refilled distant voids
And slow, cold, corn syrup,
On hard pancakes
This ordinary place,
I see is like all the rest
A cats vexing gaze,
Enters my mind for an instant –
There; but not
Uninvited
Standing in the cold wind
A storm is coming
The weatherman said
Snowflakes start to blow past my face
Squinting my eyes,
Mornings past, waiting,
For my father
Hands numb now, waiting,
For release,
From this cold,
Cold,
Someone else's home.
Snowy Ridge
I wrote some poems and saved them on floppy disks
And a few were lost,
Along with some stories.
I have lost a lot of work over the years
I guess it is inevitable for every writer
There is, perhaps, nothing in life worse
Than losing a poem or a story
You tend to remember it
The way you remember good things;
Still, this poem had meaning
Because at the time I wrote it,
I was starving
In the day, I went to a university library –
It was open for some reason –
in Las Vegas.
I would spend the whole day there,
Reading and writing in a cubicle,
On the top floor
It was at a certain point of my development as a writer,
When I put my heart into my words,
Before I leaned how to cut my heart with a scalpel,
In order for my heart to bleed effectively,
In the darkest of colors.
In the morning, I would look across the city,
See tiny people and cars and houses,
In the distance, there was a snowy ridge,
Its miniscule valleys, trees
Roads, disappearing into the trees;
Houses to either side, scampering up the base;
But mostly there was only the snowy ridge,
Stretching straight across the skyline,
Jagged, all alone
I have never been one to get sentimental;
But did I ever want to be at the top of that mountain
The Heights
In wandering up to an overlook,
Where the sky is clear and blue,
And birds circle high in the air
The city stretches into distance,
Abated by treed hillsides
I am welcomed here,
By no one and nothing
The river is to my left –
Strong; but barely discernable –
Behind me, there is a tourist castle.
I smile at the secret I hold.
The Graveyard
This poem is written in 69 rhyming, heroic couplets. Many lines have additional, internal rhymes. The couplets alternate between six and nine syllables. Both lines, of every couplet, follow the exact same metrical pattern. The patterns of every couplet are different.
uando noe fummo fatti tanto,
ch’al mio maestro piacque di mostarmi
la creatura ch’ebbe il bel sembiante,
d’innanzi me si tolse e fe restarmi,
“Ecco Dite,” dicendo, “ed ecco il loco
ove convien che di fortezza t’armi.”
Com’io divenni allor gelato e fioco,
mol dimandar, lettor, ch’I’non lo scrivo,
pero ch’ogne parlar sarebbe poco.
Io non mori’e non rimasi vivo;
pensa oggimari per te, s’hai fior d’ingegno,
qual io dicenni, d’uno e d’altro privo
(Canto XXXIV, Dante’s Inferno)
At the edge of the universe, there's a low wall
All of poetry's verse could not fathom how tall
But, if you surmount it, 'long it you'd walk, never ever reaching tomorrow
Longer than the sleeping, white-eyed dead stalk, whose dreams of sorrow you should borrow
The wall's windward, forever; leeward, end of time
Just like paintings sever; so too, limits this rhyme
And there, if you get hopelessly lost, listless drift, as your mind's darker side,
Appears to have a violent cause – seems to rift; nay, it cries, ‘I have died.’
§ § §
I see two horsemen, with starry cloaks, heavy cowls;
I say (so low), “I’m sorry;” and, let loose my bowels
These predators of weak and weary; I see under hoods, keen eyes fiery
A premonition…poppies, heavy as my heart – sinking, red – twists wryly
‘Click-clack’ – slow-pace – to my face; speaking, gargle-voic’d,
“Cold tears race, laced with the imagined lie they’re moist;
“you are a pall pawn, locked within a cosmos endless: time’s sad capsule.
In this outer ring, hell is oblivion; and darkness, evil’s vestibule.
“This illusion is made master by feeling pain,
as confusion is blanketing your eyes like rain,”
One says; and, grasps for his whip; ‘crack,’ round around tight, the leather bounds…“Oh, please!”
Now, he pulls reins to his black shoulder; I kick, dragging my feet, rasping knees
Cold assails, as Hades’ teeming, blinding blizzards
Horror tales; demon statues; gargoyle wizards –
Carved iron, bronze and gold and silver; wyvern, imp and hell’s chimera;
Battles, executions, souls a burn, adorn each massive, metal vista
My dread, it lingers, finding two – three – broke fingers;
Now, distant doorbell ringers; strange bird malingers
The filth and dirt I taste on tip of tongue; in corners, black snow pack’d in place
With laughing rage a rider’s flung his hood – an undead, smiling face
“Fools! What have you done to this…this…there’s only one?
Oh! I will have you…run!…both put in the hot sun!”
My vision is fading peacefully, lying facedown, in a wide courtyard,
Some twenty or thirty voices are talking insanely in this psyche ward.
§ § §
I wake to incense, pearls; the tapestries unfurl
A candleholder curls: soft, delicate whirl
A purple, ripe, half-bitten plumb, on top of burgundy-cream mitten
The silk is black; and, sternly written, stare eyes, speaking desires smitten
In thistle bed narcosis, nestling nightingale
‘I’m gonna shoot my wad Ө the spliffs!’ – more voices rail
I feel stinging pain of release – don’t resist – oh…If I dreamt in day…
She’s a consistency…grease; and, then speaks (I have not the breath to say),
“Your name? – I’m Persephone, the wife of the devil.”
I get up quick; and, moan, huskily level
I see two doors – one red, near the bed; one black – far – near faded tapestry
So I bolt, dead ahead, as a colt, I, myself, am told, ’no causality.’
“I’m glad you came!” she exasperatedly pleads;
“I love you,” pines she, made tame – mounting tension seethes
“I fear you, all the same,” I mumble, grasping, turning, shiny brass handle;
And, knocking down some of the candles, stumble; lying, “Hey! My name’s Randal!”
Door flies open; and, into a looming, dark hall –
– tight gloom; senses are booming; my leopard claws mall.
§ § §
“Hello? Is someone there?” I remand; but there comes no reply – (someone’s where?)
(Sometimes, I survey one lone petal’s edge, of a red rose; and, love is there.)
“Narcissus.” He’s lit a match; and, a torch flames
He’s a silent mime; I watch, as the ash rains
“Do you know of…?” (Loathing for whom confusion is – like – a lot of lipsticks.)
“Yes; you are referring to your goddess? She’s a concubine, with two dicks.”
“At least a married woman and I didn’t dine!”
“That’s – like – assumin’. Go that way, for labyrinth time!”
The tunnel is six feet wide; and, rocky dirt, like coal miners’ shafts – (I know)
He walks on the left side; turning aft, I see light close quick (a boat I row)
I trip on an adz, curse in full; and, wipe my brow
“Pasiphae loves bull – knife let – out comes no cow.
“Daedalus, word architect, built labyrinth – mind-like – nineteen hundred four; and,
Inside: horns, hoofs, curding straw rind, Minotaur huffs, puffs; and, goes where I plan.”
I ask this iconoclastic idol, “Who am I?”
“Well, fantastic,” he says; and, his ending is now nigh,
“You’re the Master of Insanity; the Schizophrenic Man of Letters.” ۞
I disappear into a porthole; as kindly manatee unfetters;
Popping out: confused, dull-witted, slow to roll;
Standing, I bemuse, clear sight is in my soul.
§ § §
The walls are tall; torches are alight up high; the rest almost pitch black
I step ahead, tight, my three left fingers rap; the rising heat, harsh blast ╬
I walk, trying to stall my rising fear at bay ╠
I turn corners; and, meet small t; three choices lay ╩
I go right, due to easier rhyme; and, now I hear a faint, sweet, pure music ╝
The off-beat sharp, on certain notes; but in slow time; the song rolls strong ♫ reggae [ sic ]
Slithering through number 4; then, lettered L ╦ ╚
Gliding along, like a silent whore…what the hell? ╬
It’s Bob Marley! – wailing Running – hell ° bent – Away on golden 6-string g’tar
“Come ere, rude boy,” → thus, I’m sent to him, hypnotiz’d by melodic rebar
“Dread naught, dread; weak is drawing dreadnaught; but dem smote,
Speak jah boy’s speak: Every need got ego feed it,”
Says he, vanishing in full; suddenly, bursting the void, is a creature
With a bottom of a man – torso a bull, I run faster than future
The bull is pursuing – gaining – what says prophet?
“Oh, Narcissus – you are flow’ring – ya’know, I’d bet…”
The beast rams his horn between my legs, hoists me – I speak prayers to a deaf god
The bull stops; and, flings rudely I → gold door, I see; and, standing…a spent rod
“Charon, pausing ferry: he admires, adores you,
muses came to bury; they found your stem in dew.”
§ § §
On the other side is chaos → tongue-tied turquoise giraffes canter, cripple
Lovely maidens Bacchus calls to; someone Claude, insects, demons, worms in apples
Ocelots gnawing Nazi orgies; maelstrom rules
Overhead, pterodactyl sorties fly in schools
Atta is being pluck’d by praying mantis, his soul rent into tiny pieces;
Gone, his religion, eyes; the shade is lying in sad sorrow – it’s his own feces
I search for the path, desiring leave – no séance
Though curiosity’s wrath, it lies and taunts
Through the mindless confusion, I hear again the soothing voice of prowess
It is lion. He says, “How you doin’, rude boy? Look: Ahead is fortress;
۩
now, we’ll fly over Dis, so you can meet you: It.”
Reckon; Jah’s magic bliss is carry’ng… mind … seize … fit …
§ § §
I open my eyes → darkness; I step slow; and, a strong pair of – I think – hands…
I’m shackled in cold, stale room to hard bed; and, I groan low – these are harsh lands
I yonder see a slim yellow moon sequester’d
I ponder, feeling – well – mellow, tar’d and feathered
Now is rising, back of mind, a voice resounding, beyond walls of fogs
Like the sound of double redound, voic’d of ship’s horns, within ancient peat bogs
“Who is speaking to me? What’s happening in here?
Listen, ghost! I am me, not we – you keep your fear!”
“I’m touch’d, branded – seem so beholden – to have you near; all’s forgotten
Things best, us between – you, me – even-and-Steven, you, which I’ve begotten…”
“Listen, you – a-k-a – me; it’s time us two we
talk; I am so…á la…oh….it’s wrong to woo thee….”
“Ah ha! Into middle mind’s eye comes a little riddle – where are fiddles?
Precede kings and bridle, camping sites and dragons, what by? Compounds? Titles?”
“The enemy of nouns! I win; but lived sin
to deserve evil kin; (he crawls beneath my skin.)”
“You getting feisty, precious little bitch? Why don’t you shut it! Guards, seize him!”
“You are a witch! Hey, wait! There’s something happ’ning here!” I’m yelling hoarse, wits dim
I’ve grown fangs; lapping my skin is tiny red flames;
Gnaw, rip, tear, shackles away as tin; I toss reigns
I throw a leather strap around a neck; I hear it pop – a loud pa-snap!
Un-hog my strap, I rope lasso a peck: A rabbit, snake has tied in wrap
Squeeze It to death, just like Dr. Octopus;
Exploding lab of meth; spilling down couscous
Raising my arms up high, I am yelling, “Never clangor; and, thus ranker,
neither from Burma, Bangladesh, Bangor, Budapest,…the Duppy Conqueror!”
§ § §
I lie still, drained, like a dry gin mill’s still
My will beat, barren; I’ve my fill, Kill Bill’s pill
From down the hall, undead and painful screams: loud and grating reality
These are the dead, you, who approaches here; strange are words of painful rhapsody
Ten thousand years hence, you’ll not read this – or, if so,
Say, “Simply mad, he, since minds craz’d, logic can’t sow.”
Here’s a lunatic; yet, perhaps only truth survives; for, where are your words?
This is one more question: evil truth; are humans a thing of God’s words…?
Down icy waters I drown, driven mad by sounds
And, freezing cold, now my heart, ever-slower pounds