The Death of America

America as the storybook lie is dying a horrible death. It’s like it is being strangulated over a 12 part multi season Netflix series. The America of fabricated dream is gasping horribly for air while losing control of its bowels as well. This is an awful but compelling show.

The rise and fall of the American empire in four hundred years is not much to brag about. It was devoted to the whore Progress, the modern god of corporate and industrial bliss. No god has been so elevated to have been so degraded, so quickly. She is a pathetic deity, a goddess of pocketbook change and twisted smile.

America was going to invent a New World based on genocide, slavery and indentured labor and call it Paradise. This is what we are clinging to: the American Dream as it bleeds into the American Nightmare.

The American story is about the abuse of Nature. It had its roots in England, but quickly surpassed its beginnings by extraordinary effort, which gave birth to the meme of Exceptionalism. America, as it turns out, was destined to do what no other nation could do: inaugurate the fag end of the Kali Yuga.

We have done something amazing! We have abused Nature with such rapacious extraction and infernal fire to generate capital like no one else. We are the armies of Mordor!

The volcanic orange fury of exalted greed has vomited the bipartisan Lord of Power, King Baby Trump, to bless us with his fuming diaper that will choke us to death.

 

 

 

Share
Posted in articles and notes | Comments Off on The Death of America

Beloved Archives Running A Con.

Nosh Anzar, shyster in chief at the archival and publishing enterprise dedicated to Avatar Meher Baba and based in NJ, has just announced he is auctioning off two dozen or so Baba artifacts, including a signed copy of God Speaks and a copy of Stay With God signed by both Baba and Francis Brabazon.

Anzar states in his online announcement that the upcoming auction is a fundraiser to purchase a bigger archival center. It is vitally important that Baba lovers not participate in this unethical attempt to yet again raise money for a project riddled with dishonesty. It would be aiding and abetting a dishonest project in Baba’s name to do so.

A central problem to this attempt to raise money for a bigger and better “House of the Beloved” is that it sets a precedent in the Baba archival world in monetizing priceless Baba artifacts. Another problem is that it violates the trust of the many donors to Beloved Archives that gifts in Baba’s name can be sold off to the highest bidder. A third problem is that Anzar has unethically obtained Baba artifacts and is now possibly liquidating them for cash. A case in point is the suitcase full of artifacts that Anzar wheedled from the feckless Peter Townsend of the erstwhile Baba centre, The Oceanic.

Delia de Leon gave in good faith to Townsend as the benefactor of The Oceanic many priceless Baba treasures including a signed copy of God Speaks and a copy of Stay With God signed by both Baba and Francis Brabazon. Are these the items now up for auction? Where are these items and the suitcase full of Baba treasures that Anzar so gleefully announced he had obtained to aggrandize his archival collection? Have they been returned to their rightful place, the UK London Baba Centre, or are they now up for sale?

This story is a shameless disgrace and a humiliation to the living memory of Avatar Meher Baba.

Share
Posted in articles and notes | 3 Comments

Fascism, American Style

Fascism, American style, is gathering force and moving toward a decisive culmination or, possibly, a muddling apotheosis.
 
Fascism in America is a direct result of neoliberalism in league with militarism. The deregulation of capitalism- the unleashing of corporate greed, the ascendency of the Pentagon and intelligence agencies and the venality of Big Media has led us to the reign of King Baby Trump. We deserve the crown of colossal stupidity that he so blithely wears. Our political economy for decades has carefully prepared for his seizing the throne.
 
Republicans and Democrats are united in their corporatism and militarism. All differences are superficial. The political class is as base as paid assassins. They are murdering America with patriotic zeal.
 
The only party seemingly capable of bringing us back from the brink of disaster, the Democrats, are as addicted and addled as the zombie Republicans to the heroin of faux patriotism based on military machismo and corporate profit. This includes almost everyone in Congress.
 
In a decisively conscious and unconscious way, American fascism is a desperate response to environmental degradation and global warming which are indicative of the utter failure of capitalism. We are now living the Great Denial, the dimly recognized horrid truth that the goddess Progress is a whore.
 
The great worry and tragic probability is that American fascism will only be strengthened by the economic collapse that is surely coming. King Baby Trump is the beginning, not the end, of a dynasty. And this will be true no matter which party wins the Presidency and controls the Congress.
 
The greatest American, Dr Martin Luther King, prophesized that America would lose its soul to economic exploitation (corporatism), racism and militarism if it did not turn to love and justice.
 
And this is what has happened.
Share
Posted in articles and notes | 1 Comment

America, Land of Amnesiacs

A problem of a homogenized society is the inability to remember. The cauldron of American patriotic identity demands forgetfulness. We are not our past, but some nationalistic stew that demands we lie about history.

The genocide of the First Americans is relatively undocumented. The slavery of the African  American is glossed. These twin catastrophes are subsumed in the idea of Manifest Destiny- it was all God’s plan.

Christopher Columbus discovered America, land of the free and home of the brave. Any other narrative is un-American. Such is the tremendous need to repress and prevaricate about the facts.

If the problem of Europe was class and monarchy, the problem of America is the strenuous need to bury the history of rape and pillage that was required to create an “egalitarian” society- one in which only genteel male whites could draft and sign the Declaration of Independence.

The myth of America is a classic example of how desperately important it is for nationalism to lie, and lie again, to fabricate a narrative that sells.

America has always excelled at marketing. America is a con. This is the enduring legacy of a patriotism based on amnesia.

America is all about democracy and free markets, right? This is what we relentlessly preach to ourselves and the world. This is a hundred times more false a narrative than the lie of communism, which is transparent. The idea of democratic capitalism is an opiate that demands an ever increasing fix until corporatism becomes the new tyrannical King clawing on our backs.

And thus came King Baby Trump, the inglorious fulfillment of corporatism as our new sovereign. And The People cry and cry, but the stinking turd of royal greed has assumed the throne- and we can’t account for how it happened.

 

Share
Posted in articles and notes | Comments Off on America, Land of Amnesiacs

Martin Luther King Jr. Lives!

The 50th anniversary of  MLK’s sacrificial death is upon us. He is the “greatest American” for the reason of the complete veracity of his critique of American hypocrisy, venality and hate, and his dream of what might be- and will be by the grace of God: the triumph of love.

He is the greatest American for believing in the triumph of a love that embraces truth and justice as the proof of a American polity that works. America is not a polity that works for a few- the fabulous and filthy rich, but for all. And especially for those on whose backs capitalism and the wealth of nations was made possible to begin with: Red genocide and Black slave labor.

The exceptionalism of America must not be a racist joke. This is the essence of King’s prophetic oratory. For America to rightfully aspire and claim the destiny it longs for, it must deserve it; Americans must rise to this task of acknowledging and redeeming its tragic history.

The problem of racism, economic exploitation (corporatism) and militarism is as American as apple pie. It is a problem that appalling few Americans grok. The liberal elites- forget about conservatives, can not grok the enormity of the problem. Our first biracial president could not grok the enormity of the problem. Our first female Democratic Party nominee for the presidency could not grok the enormity of the problem.

Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren can not grok the enormity of the problem.

Congress can not grok…

What is wrong with America?

The most simple and cogent answer is that ideological corporatism has America by the balls. America is run by corporations. Politicians are owned by corporations- AND special interests, which are in turn exploitive and racist in nature.

American foreign policy is completely corporatized and racist. Saudi Arabia and Israel are the two most jingoistic nations in the world. Both are fully dedicated to a sick and racist faux religious nationalism. Saudi Arabia claims to be the guardian of Islam’s two most holy places of pilgrimage, Mecca and Medina- but has utterly defiled them with a materialistic fanatic iteration of revisionist Islam. Israel has done exactly the same with its embrace of  Zionist Apartheid. Both countries have  become  fantastic vortices of raging religious nationalism- but are America’s best friends in the Middle East.

Is there any wonder how and why America has such a raging problem with corporatism, racism and violence? America’s foreign policy is the mirror of its own domestic catastrophe. There are more blacks now incarcerated than were held as slaves at the time of the Civil War.  This was exactly what MLK talked about so eloquently 50 years ago: our domestic racism is conditioned and guaranteed by our corporate violence abroad. Halliburton invaded Iraq and murdered brown bodies with “Shock and Awe” even as corporate greed twisted politicians to criminalize and imprison brown bodies here in the land of apple pie.

But the greatest American lives on; Yes, the greatest American lives on!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Share
Posted in articles and notes | Comments Off on Martin Luther King Jr. Lives!

No one knows the way of Mary, matchless lover (Happy New year!)

No one knows the way of Mary, matchless lover;
With each breath, she anoints her beloved savior.

No one knows the way of Hallaj, Master of Truth;
His rolling head is forever full of joy and mirth.

No one knows the way of Mira, praising Krishna,
lost in song and dance for beloved Gopala.

No one knows the supreme way of San Francesco:
perfect poverty, suffering, longing and canto.

No one sings and no one dances for the Now-Christ:
Religion is now a feel-good prosperity heist.

Come the day when all media is smashed, and song
Is the coin by which all strive to forgive all wrong.

Darvish agrees the revolution will not be televised-
Mary, Hallaj, Mira and Francis will be reprised.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Share
Posted in english language ghazals | Comments Off on No one knows the way of Mary, matchless lover (Happy New year!)

Rumi quatrain, 419 Foruzanfar

I said, because of my longing for you, I’m nuts!
Do I see your chains of curls in my sleep, or not?
He replied, shut up! Why spin a yarn about this:
Crazy and asleep? What phooey, O one well taught!

Notes: Like the chains that restrain the insane, chains
of curls restrain the crazed lover. But as a rule, the crazy
are insomniacs!

گفتم که ز عشقت شدهم دیوانه
زنجیر ترا بخواب بینم یا نه
گفتا که خمش چند ازین افسانه
دیوانه و خواب خه خه ای فرزانه

 

Share
Posted in quatrains translated from Rumi | Comments Off on Rumi quatrain, 419 Foruzanfar

Christmas Prayer

Fall rain on the shame
of the politician;
wash away the blame
of our corruption.

Fall rain on the shame
of mighty Big Fist;
wash away the blame
that lies in our breast.

Fall rain on the shame
of We the People;
wash away the blame
of our civic babble.

Fall rain on the shame
of the whore Progress;
wash away the blame
of our lewd Congress.

Rise Sun in our heart
with your burning light;
burn away the dark
blame that fills our night.

Share
Posted in english language ghazals | Comments Off on Christmas Prayer

Crazy my love for the Lover beyond reproach

Crazy my love for the Lover beyond reproach;
Alas for the heart that drinks her poison hooch!

She gave me her lips again and again, but now
I can’t remember who, or when, or where, or how!

My memories have all gone the way of whirling dust:
All my thought dances about in pure spinning lust.

I dance with a Jinn who has stolen my rhythm,
And leads me about with an Anatolian spin!

But her eyes! They are lies; yes they are lies that cheat
And inspire me to drink yet again with glances sweet!

All my life lies between her lips and my divan;
Her taste lingers and excites- but the sober yawn!

The fault, my dear, does not lie with the beloved,
But with the artless Darvish drunk and decrepit!

 

Share
Posted in my own poetry | Comments Off on Crazy my love for the Lover beyond reproach

Nationalism and Chauvinism

The great problem with our Orwellian New World is the collapse of genuine spiritual common ground within and among nations and the rise of arch chauvinism as a failed compensatory strategy.

The US, Great Britain, India, Russia, China and France, on the one hand, and a great number of other nations on the other hand, have all collapsed into pathetic national narcissism. All the gods of the world’s religions have become vampires bleeding their victims to death.

Judaism, Christianity and Islam- and Hinduism and even Buddhism as well, have proved to be bankrupt strategies in informing the public with a sensibility that works.

Israel is nothing but a chauvinist Zionist lie; the West- but especially the US, is nothing but an inverted Christianity worshiping the Cross of Corporatism; Islam has become a metaphor for suicidal zealotry and Hindutva little more than religious fascism.

State sponsored terrorism has become the normal response to unruly former colonial subjects. The US in particular has taken it upon itself to punish not only its own citizenry but that of the world for not submitting to its ordained exceptionalism.

With every passing day, the US is proving that it is the lumbering giant that will shortly tumble out of the sky and split its head open for all to applaud and lament.

 

 

 

 

Share
Posted in articles and notes | Comments Off on Nationalism and Chauvinism