Croton's and their flutes

Croton bore hardened sons.
Calluses ran across their hands,
Warfare bred into their spirit.
They worked the land as farmers
And fought the war as soldiers;
Croton gave them life,
And Crotoniates they were.

When faced with the pomp of the enemy,
They sheathed their swords, raised no shields,
And left their spears on the ground.
For Croton had looked into Sybaris,
Learning of its excesses and extravagance.

So, instead of weapons on the battlefield,
They brought forth flutes and played.
The Sybarite horses danced instead of charged,
And in the havoc, the hedonists were purged.
Their way of luxury was extinguished,
The vestiges of their city scorched.

All that remained was the tragedy—
Of flutes sharper than swords,
Of dancing, dying horses.

---

Homework itemized

 Did you get your homework?
letters, markers and word labels.
Organize and take it to the table.
rack your brain now, margerine.

Did you get your homework?
Open the book, little check stickers.
Understand a percent.
Test in an hour, nutcracker.

Did you get it done?
The weight of the grade.
expectations gain inflation.
The years work pre cremation, peanuts.

It arrived inside an envelope.
You opened it like a present.
But it was obligation.
burning your hands.

Once inside Sybaris mall

 Once I got into the mall, how, I will not say. I walked around the grand shops and their stately gargantuan atriums. The outside was pure palatial swank, the inside pure opulence.

 Hired young people dressed in perfumed orange uniforms came walking up to me.
Their approach was courteous and kind and yet they would start guiding without permission. I went a long with it and pretended it was like a free tour. Their perfume was intoxicating.

I could see people mostly from the rich class prancing about.
Tiny dogs like colorfully dressed rats shivering at the cold internal breeze.
The words coming from my guide all dressed in orange didn't sink in. My mind wanted to create it's own narrative.
I had given the guide the slip and now I was in an incredible gift store.
It was replete with everey curious sort of dinky antique made to look modern.
Enthusiastic conversations bounced off every aisle.

Over illuminated shops with bodycare products boasted aged and overweight women and their even more overweight husbands as customers. It was like watching an aquarium. And as they moved through the aisles it was mindblowing, how their furcoats were not dragging items off their perches.

Meanwhile in the giftstore. Short young men with curly pony tails and black jackets would take pieces off the shelf and narrate their story. But they weren't from history. They were from politically correct films that were rewrites of history sold as fiction.
I loved the gusto. The less culturally or intellectually inclined were the taller almost athletic but still awkward late teens with their full body tats and their first attempts at letting a beard go straight to wisp.
They were just the audience.

Hilarious as it was and as common as it was, I needed to move on, I could smell faint perfume and several mall guide's dressed in orange were approaching.

I looked out and never asked myself as I surveyed each odd crowd, that maybe those few that looked back, thought the sight of me to be one of quite the freak indeed. 

Three pimps and an air duct

 Three pimps sat on the rock wall. They also wanted into the giant luxury mall, but the main entrance was charging too much.
They had items to buy.

Out front there were queues of rich people who were slowly being let in. The three pimps had a map of the mall.
They were searching the outside for an in.

The day was hot and their big coats were sweating them out. I would have teased them
But they looked frustrated and were definitely armed.
I just followed their movements to see if they found their entry.

They walked by another entry, but were refused. I hid behind a tree close by to hear that it was an entrance for the LGBT community only. I waited for one of the pimps to change gestures.
But instead all three started arguing with the guards.

Eventually they all got impatient and continued on. I wasn't ashamed I went before the guards and pretended. But they didn't buy it. One of them was half convinced, but there was a sign behind them that proof on documents was necessary.

They said -Move off we get your kind here everyday. pretending to be something you are not, to get into somewhere you don't belong. 
I looked up the hill where the sun was hitting an aluminium shape. An air duct.

The last of the pimps was crawling in. Conveniently I was distracting this point of entry, as they surreptitiously sneaked in.
Now I'd have to wait for someone else to try their luck at this entry, because the duct was exposed.

Memory and the blue slip

 Imagine losing all agency
all the mind's faculties
becoming blank and useless to the world
Your agenda mixed up

Important meetings on paper
You have now lost
You sit there and wonder
what you should really be doing

What day is it you say out loud
Panic rising
Where's the blue slip with my appointments
You hurriedly check your house

Finally you find it
Just to see you are late for the first one
You get into your car try to remember the way
your hand wanders the passenger seat for the blue slip

It's gone

The secret entrance to the mall

 To get back into hype hotel
You must Lift up the wire
Open the slat on the stairwell
Put it all down again

Sounds easy
you get a leg though
Then you are stuck
A couple turn up 

Both are telling you to go faster
You don't quite fit
The guy who went before 
well he was slimmer

You are so desperate to get back in there
You force your body through
A small piece of wire stabs your leg
You are stuck up to your hips

and all you want to do is be seen there
To buy things and to experience the luxury
But you are trapped in this blocked off stairwell
With two annoying people's voices telling you

You did it wrong

Homesick sauce

 Gerard came out
Aniseed liqour a new kind of talk
None of the sensing feeling
Just the popular sentiment of the day

A shot of something with some water
Blurry lime
Half sincere
but just an escape

Homesickness behind the eyes
Food came late
None of that exotic panache
Just a saucy bowl

Some loud mouths
at the table ahead of us
Orange hair and body tattoos
Quotes from legendary rockstars

Thick sticky cliches that spurt awkwardly
From the overhappy mouth
The excited hearty laughter
Talking themselves into meal

The french man looks on and says to himself
My work here is done
As the kitchen works at snail pace
he pours himself another aperitiff

Complains that its a luck of the draw
That he can't ship them in
Or build a queue
He's the only one waiting