As I Move On

Better late than never but still too late
Lost in a lonely land alone
To avoid the scorpion-sting of fate
Not for the first time I have known
What it feels like to be played for a clown
Against my will to entertain
Sick sadistic souls in a soulless town
Who find their pleasure in my pain

I stumble into the discovery
That I am still here wiser if sadder
That the fools cannot make a fool of me
The more I think about it the madder
I get and yet not a single regret
Not a cloud in my sky I am too young to die
Even though the misbegotten might not be gone
Soon all this will be forgotten as I move on

Scornfully underestimating me
They have disrespected destiny
Thus they make their fatal mistake
Tomorrow they will be gone
I smile as I move on

+Steven Curtis Lance



Copyright MMV

I like this Steven. Did you get a chance to read "Poetic Revolutions", i'm more interested in what people think about Slam VS Traditional poetry. I'd be interested in your comments especially, if you have time.

Thank you, Mandy. True story!

I like the whole slam thing, just as I like rap. Both of these cultural phenomena are freshening and vivifying streams enlivening the art of poetry.

I am a formalist for many reasons, few of which I understand, but I believe it has something to do with the working out of my Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder and other disorders in a therapeutic way; I was discussing this with my daughter just today. She loves my poetry, and remembers a time when I would fixate on odd and insignificant things and obsess over them, and observed that I do not do that anymore, because my poetry somehow deals with all of that in a healthy and constructive way. I don't even obsess over my poetry, it just takes care of my need to organize, arrange, deal with my life. Like this poem today which you mentioned of mine, this deals with a terrible thing which has happened to me, but writing about it helps me so much it's almost too easy. My doctor has been very encouraging about my poetry, and reads every word with great interest; we have become close and personal friends over my work, and he treasures all my books, as does his nurse.

I am a F**KING punk, for heaven's sake, utterly outside this absurd society and not any sort of conservative at all. I like anything in-your-face. I think slam poetry reminds me of punk rock, and that's cool with me. I'm down with the whole scene. I also, as I mentioned, like rap too, because it fascinates me that it is highly formalized and rhyming poetry, very much like my own.

You are such an intelligent and thoughtful person, Mandy; thank you for bringing this up. Anytime anybody is excited about poetry it is a good thing, so the slam thing is a freshening stream into the river which is poetry.

I hope you are having a good night. I will begin to compose a new poem now, I think.

Here's something encouraging: even though I am such an outsider, and fancy-ass euro-dudes have shat upon me and been pricks to me--grrr--I am becoming a very respected old poet! Ca-razy, eh? Man oh man. What a crazy world.

I like anger in poetry. Anger is a good tool of poetics. It requires special handling, but it is catalytic and powerful. I hope people can feel the anger in my poetry, cuz it's there.

Peace and love, respect and solidarity, and fight the power,

+Stevie

Thank You Steven-
I really do love your poetry and I very much value your opinion! Sometimes I think my friend and I argue for the sake of arguing. I was just very interested in what others thought about this particualr disagreement. I'm glad that I'm not as crazy as I thought I was.

Have fun composing!

PS: I hope u don't mind I took some excerpts from this post and pasted them on the message board on my website. I have a little competition going on with my buddy.