How we Love our Lies
Rapids and river branches complicate our travel
so we sit on our therapist’s couch
exploring our streams of consciousness.
With patience, each shared word
reveals our connected, flowing, mappable life.
How we love our lies.
She promises a map of meaning
for our live’s waterways and destinations.
In the hands of a skilled river guide,
each rambling has promise to point the way.
How we love our lies.
We lay on her sofa, floating trustingly,
letting karma blossom through our words.
Our poems matter — she will unravel the puzzle.
Our streams will lead to Mother-Ocean’s embrace.
How we love our lies.
We conspire with our therapist, the poet of our soul,
to listen and value each bubbling thought as if our own
hoping more-of-me is all I need,
and trusting others will hear and understand.
How we love our lies.
We feign attention to the churning streams of others,
merely waiting our turn for blind babble.
We expect our blaring lighthouse horns
to offer safe harbor for all of our ships.
How we love our lies.
Consciousness is not a stream – it is much uglier.
We pretend thoughts flow from one to the next.
No deep-inner self is to be found in our ramblings.
The poet’s self-indulgence is no one’s pleasure.
How we love our lies.
Neurotic embrace of our mind’s joke.
Valorized words, which others politely ignore,
act as neurotic fuel for our silly poems.
Virtuous inner spams feed our self-deception.
How we love our lies.
I must be a fool,
for I see no ‘stream of consciousness’.
Hell, my mind seems to contain
a drunken monkey in a tree,
spastic popping corn in a kettle,
flying chunks in a blender,
halls of echoing mirrors,
and uninvited streaks in my quantum chamber.
How we love our lies.
Dare I call you “Consciousness”?
How arrogant. May I call you “mind”?
Yes, no Capital “M” for you.
Let us not pretend.
How we love our lies.
Self-satisfied chatter disguised as conversation.
Illusions of “me” magically spun from such a mess.
Self-congratulatory poetry.
No capital “P” for you either, poetry.
How we love our lies.
Lay on a couch and let the pop-corn fly
as the monkey knocks over pictures
of quantum streaks on the shattered mirrors.
The psychiatrist plays a pinball game.
She grabs our machine and shakes it
hoping to get one more bounce and few more points.
How we love our lies.
We publish our stories —
quartering-up for the self-therapy game.
Both of us happily buy into the continued lie
that stream of consciousness is the poetry of a mind
waiting to be healed.
If a stream exists with something constantly present.
If there is a me consistently flowing and moving —
something cute, lovely, darling and precious.
It is “How I love my lies“.
— by Sabio Lantz, 10/3/12
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Prompt: This poem is in response to a prompt by Neil Reid at “We Write Poems” where he invites us to write a “stream of consciousness” poem. Here I have done a stream of consciousness about ‘Stream of Consciousness’.
Pic Credits:
- Mother Ocean: Rick Piper’s Art
- Monkeys: James Grashow, “The Great Monkey Project”
It is very clever and meaty and profound although a tad cynical if not ‘sour’ but lots to think about which is great.
@rosross: Indeed cynical — but should be not be cynical about our delusions. And perhaps cynicism can give birth to fresh, meaty profound joy! Then even sour cynicism can be our friend if used in correct proportions in flavoring our lives.
Nifty. I like that mantra-like “how we…” and LOVE the “I must be a fool” stanza and its follow-up. Be merciless when you edit, but it’s a keeper for sure.
@ Barbara_
I love criticism, correct and suggestions. In case you aren’t following, I will e-mail you to ask: “What comes to mind for ‘merciless editing’?” Thanx
Ha! This conveys its message very powerfully. I especially like the “no capital letter” for you sections. Hoping more all-of-me is what I need – Agh. You are right about all the self-indulgence, for sure. A pretty crazy part of the culture. k.
For me this poem invoked such a case of sad yearning. I think it’s the repetition of loving lies which begins, for me, to sound ironic – as if the speaker wants to stop prerehearsed (psycho-)babble and stop being the fool? There is much to digest in the poem. There are so many beautifully crafted lines, like that opening: ‘Rapids and river branches complicate our travel.’ Beautiful.
Wow…I’ve thought some of these thoughts…
I really like this:
“We feign attention to the churning streams of others,
merely waiting our turn for blind babble.
We expect our blaring lighthouse horns
to offer safe harbor for all of our ships.”
SO true and I like the idea of a small humble “m,” and the images alongside like a scroll inside the mind reeling along with the recording of words.
I enjoyed this “Stream of Consciousness.” Your beliefs and ideas are revealed clearly and creatively.
Bravo! ! ! Love the images of the monkey, popcorn, chunks in a blender..how true.
“How we love our lies” – this is so true – I work in healthcare and see this every day. People search for explanations in irrelevant places where there were never any to begin with and avoid to see the concrete problems staring them in the eye. I love the progressive transformation of the therapy session, from hopeful order to authentic mayhem. Great job!
Thanks: Hannah, myrthryn, happy, Manic and Andra — feels like lots of people understood the poem. I was afraid it might be too abstract.
I think that poets might just understand poets, Are all our words lies…lying, laying in lines just wanting some recognition? Some days there is just a tad more angst to share… and yet there is hope even when we don’t capitalize on specific moments.
Thanks for your visit – I appreciate that you were able to enjoy my ramble.
I have probed and looked — I’m afraid I largely disagree: poets don’t understand poets, JuesPaige, they just enjoy continuing to pretend they do, hoping (self-deceptively) and vainly that others understand them.
if you think that poetry is a joy for noone and all stories should be stripped away why do you write? is that not a paradox?
Hmmm, lucychili:
Where do you seem me say:
(1) “Poetry is a joy for no one” ?
(2) All stories should be stripped away?
To communicate well, you have to address what I wrote, not what you heard.
Of course Poetry can be a joy — even if self-deceptive. All things can do that.
And “stories” can often be revealed to be far less than true.
Hope that helps.