The Placebo Diaries (2)

M.M.;

——- we who occupy ourselves

——- fear the rainbow

——- in our shadows

who dares measure the contours

of Placebo Town?

the kingdom outside the Placebo Walls

— the lunatic fringe —

people with excess time

think about recurring themes

constantly trying to unravel meanings

worship drugs for spiritual sustenance

(+) slaves to that craftily devised

to beguile our eyes

we who occupy ourselves

fear the rainbow

in our shadows

D.R.;

In the sin bin
of Colosseum Armageddon
Doctor Jekyll was mixing up
the Apocalypso medicine
Pyrocumulus Metamorphosis
he lovingly calls it
Doctor Jekyll knows very well
it’s my personal favourite

The game outside
was going all to hell
The Russians had joined forces
with the Ottomans
Israel was about to fall
What would happen next
… no one could rightly tell
Mr. Hyde was trying to hide
in a march for Confederate pride
with refugees climbing the wall
The remaining mercenary forces
were turning tail
or switching sides
Where was Vague Rant
the derelict street prophet
when you really need him?
Doctor Jekyll attempted a rescue
with a pharmaceutical cocktail
but it was just another brick
in a Pink Floyd concert
as the final siren began to wail
at the Colosseum Armageddon
It was then
that a little white rabbit
with a fluffy tail
pulled me out of a black hole
that was inside his top hat
thus breaking the spell
God only knows who actually won?

M.M.;

one thing to say
about Pink Floyd material
“history disguised as prophecy”
Roger Waters tight
in Franciscan circles
they try to focus on him
but he is too significant
for the earth

— BEASTS OF THE APOCALYPSE

they called me backstage
after the concert
desperate to see my scars
the big cuts

backstage with Roger Waters
wearing my new astronaut-grade legs
men with colored horns
straight and curved
I saw Miles Davis
who has long been dead
he was kissing a surrogate bride
she was a topless recipe
I wanted her in the worst way
to perform acts and join the scenario to witness heaven
from a great distance

D.R.;

I completed my pilgrimage
to the graveside of Syd Barrett
Patron Saint of the
Medicated Collective Consciousness
As Pink Floyd had promised l was
miraculously cured of trypophobia
and left without a trace
of deep purple thrombosis
Saint Syd was duly canonised
when Cardinal Feelgood
confirmed the prognosis
Upon Syd Barrett’s gravestone
conveniently located
in the dead centre
of the Placebo Town Square
were engraved the words

… Wish You Were Here

M.M.;

my favorite wall hanging in Starbucks:

“the more heinous the wickedness
the closer the day of redemption”

I read that sign
and I’m afraid to go outside
to live in a world
where worse is better
— Paradoxical Placebo Town
where beautiful flowers raise
above greed and blasphemy
and bloom reflections from heaven

I was dead
with no suitcase packed
way behind in my Spanish lessons
my ticket says Mexico City
not heaven celibate
and reasonably pure
now I’m dead with no suitcase
my ticket says Mexico City
and I don’t want to go
not even close
I read all those books
stayed up late praying
the good Michael, a sweetheart
giving to those less fortunate
lending a helping hand

D.R.;

The Placebo Town Motto:

“If you pay the bill,
you may keep what you kill.”

It is the cold hard
code of the road
that the Placebo town’s folk
endeavour to live up to
If you’re all mixed up
and lost in a fuddle
just take another pill
Mother’s Little Helper ®
has proven most popular
There’s never an excuse
for not being useful
like being caught
in an existential muddle
It’s not good for business
and is regarded by most
as a sign of rebelliousness
To be frowned upon
by the industrious citizens
of Placebo Town
can only spell trouble
Always remember
and don’t be forgetting
they keep what they kill
if you fail to pay their bill
Look what happened
to Martin Luther King Jr.

The bitter thrill
of touring Placebo Town’s
Zero Ground
where the Tower of Babel
was bought down
leaves a hole in the soul
of a heart cold and brittle
The spiritual
in a little green bottle
dissolves your future
as it absolves your past
The label ever poetic ;

“Dr. Jekyll’s Fantabulous
Cure All That’s Kronic Tonic!
Mr. Hyde highly recommends it.”

Last responders
thirsting for a taste
of that heavenly anesthetic
now buried knee deep
in Babel’s demolition waste
Home sweet home of Vague Rant
the derelict street prophet
From the residual radiation
he can unravel
in every forked tongue
known to man and angel
whilst gesticulating wildly
in sign languages alien …

“Cease your endless
burning of incense
to the Queen Pagan!
No more the pouring out
of drink offerings
to her golden child,
Jumpin’ Jack Flash,
that smooth singing raven,
Nimrod the Rockin’ Babylonian.
Call no man Holy Father.
The House of the Holy is a
mansion found only in heaven.
Not even that Vicar of Pachamama
is truly worthy.
He’s just a Mother Earth Goddess worshipping minion.
Within a stir-fry contagion
from Hell’s Kitchen, he,
and his blasphemous following,
are bringing down a Jeremiah curse
on this God forsaken Placebo Town!”

~ Vague Rant, the Street Prophet

D.R. words by David Redpath ©2021
M.M. words by Michael Lewis ©2021

🎨Artwork by Multiple Michael © 2021

https://multiplemichael.wordpress.co

92 thoughts on “The Placebo Diaries (2)”

      2. Like liberation disguised as religion,
        or bondage in the name of submission.

        “I assure you and most solemnly say
        to you, everyone who practices sin
        habitually is a slave of sin. Now the
        slave does not remain in a household
        forever; the son [of the master] does
        remain forever. So if the Son makes
        you free, then you are unquestionably
        free.” ~ Jesus (amplified)

        Liked by 1 person

      6. My understanding of it I think comes from, ‘history repeats itself’. But since it repeats in the future, at present history becomes a prophecy. Hope I’m making sense 🙂

        Liked by 2 people

      8. Knowing the fallen state of mankind,
        no need for prophecy as the future
        is self-fulfilling, like a self-saucing
        pudding. Sowing and reaping in a
        world of tribalism and chaos 🌍
        unbridled greed and corruption 🌎
        As Leonard Cohen once said . . .
        I’ve seen the future, and it is murder.
        But on the positive side . . . 🌞
        hope, faith, and love, will out live the
        trauma of this current darkness 🌚 😎

        Liked by 1 person

      12. Being a stranger in a strange land and the absurdity of all the strangeness, I think is best articulated in Camus’ ‘the stranger’. The first and the only time I read it was some twenty years back and still remember every bit of it (not word by word of course :))

        Liked by 2 people

    1. I pinched that motto from my old
      alma mater. They seriously applied
      it to inter-school sports, especially
      the ones involving water 🤕💦
      The Daliesque artwork is all
      Multiple Michael’s, of course 🎨

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      Reply

      5. ROFL ; that is probably a wise move, David; anything can eventuate in these uncertain times 🙂 a helmet with two horns would be a suitable riposte to any untimely advances — by Fate or any of its misguided minions 🙂

        Liked by 2 people

      7. that is of great comfort, David, to your readers! You never know what those pesky aliens will get up to given half a chance? I wonder if David Duchovny, aka Mulder, could be called upon to assist?

        Liked by 1 person

    1. May the Disney + 🌻🌈🧚‍♀️🦄🌷go
      with you, on your mobile device.
      In Placebo Town 🌃 you have
      nothing to fear but the Placebo
      itself. But that Delusional Town is
      something else … a real downer 😎

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  11. Such a paradoxically comforting psychedelic coffee-shop commentary. I loved some of the artwork too, particularly the flower one and the sayings beneath… “where beautiful flowers raise above greed and blasphemy and bloom reflections from heaven..” …sigh, wouldn’t this is the thing to aspire to? At least I think so, most days… (when I’m not busy composing hellish poems, rubbing my hands with glee… that I promptly cast into the flames from whence they came, once higher aims very reluctantly return to me… ;)).
    You and Michael make such a great team, beautiful to see. 🙏🌀🙌💗

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    Reply

    1. Thank you psychemphatically, Lia.
      As it happens, I do my best work
      in the coffee shop. Michael must
      do his in the flower garden 🌼🏵️🌸
      as that blooming line 🌻 is his 😎
      Words birthed on Mother Earth
      and spoken in places heavenly
      Words that survive the flames🔥
      Poetry with that scent of eternity ♾️

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

  19. I really love these paintings and these verses, David.

    Love the line about the Vicar of Pachamama.

    Inspired a few verses of my own.

    “The Vicar of Pachamama is in Iraq
    holding interfaith services atop a ziggurat
    feeling a pagan stairway to placebo heaven is where it’s at
    feeling that old tower builder Nimrod was a really cool cat.”

    The ziggurat was a spot of sacrifice to ancient moon god Nanna
    But Francis now sees it as a very ecumenical Copocabana
    Down at the Copocabana
    where Hellfire burns one’s fleshly banana.”

    Liked by 2 people

    Reply

    1. 🔥🍌 Ouch‼️

      Thank you muchly, Christopher.
      Nothing the Argentinean Papa
      likes more than a coup d’état.
      Always plenty godless to sacrifice
      to that lunatic divinity, Nanna
      (No relation of Nana Mouskouri).
      Not to mention the occasional
      disobedient priest fed to the Junta 🙊
      After a love fest with the Ayatollah,
      Pope Francis rocked the casbah.
      Much to my surprise, he made it
      out of Babylon still relatively alive 😇

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      Reply

  20. Always the utmost pleasure to read your art of words and images. I always feel in awe and find myself rereading them several times. Nothing sugary about this poem…truly the real deal!!!😇

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    Reply

    1. In the realm of relativity, a theoretical
      herectical thank you Cara, from me 😎
      This diary entry is a collaboration with
      Multiple Michael, who also supplied
      the artistic ammunition 🎨

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      Reply

    1. Thanks for appraising this
      collaboratorial and somewhat
      apocryphal offering, Dwight 🙏
      Pyrocumulus Metamorphosis
      will cast a cloud over your very
      existence❗⚡so my advice is
      to resist, cease, and desist 😎

      Liked by 1 person

      Reply

      4. Common sense ain’t that common 🤔

        “Opinion is really the lowest form
        of human knowledge. It requires no
        accountability, no understanding.
        The highest form of knowledge is
        empathy, for it requires us to suspend
        our egos and live in another’s world.
        It requires profound purpose larger
        than the self kind of understanding.”

        ~ Bill Bullard

        Liked by 1 person

  22. Pingback: The Placebo Diaries (2) – Blogul lui Roman

    1. I once went on a pleasant
      octoplasmic romp under the
      sea, in an octopus’ garden
      in the shade 🌊🐙🎶
      John does have a turn of phrase
      when it comes to the esoteric 😎
      It may be just a phase, but I’m
      sure he’s into the psychedelic.

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      Reply
  24. Pingback: The Placebo Diaries (2) – Culgrin d mayor

      3. Well it is hard to remember each fallen robin…but G-berg and Georgie let their gimmicks go rotten so they died of hepatitis in upper Manhattan…they were just two of my friends and they died died…I salute you brothers! (sorry Jim Jim)

        Liked by 2 people

      4. The King is gone, but he was no
        Johnny Rotten. But then again, is
        that the story of Leonard Cohen?
        My minstrel was sentenced to
        death for being out of breath,
        by the beat poets with nothing
        left. He did a solo imitation of
        a white man imitating a black
        man singing ‘I Did It My Way’.
        He should never have shot the
        sheriff after quitting the band.
        Things happen in Placebo Town,
        Kings with broken crowns,
        that I’ll just never understand.

        Liked by 1 person

      5. What are you gonna do when they come for you, though? Our boy didn’t stick Punk Princess in the bathroom of room 100, I betcha. You know how it is when the deal goes down, sometimes no one can even remember what day it was. Sid never stood a chance. Nor did Nancy. Just two more people who died died. Johnny Rotten was an act. Sid was real…real something….

        Liked by 1 person

      8. Gary’s pièce de résistance
        performance was undoubtedly
        ‘Lost in Space’ … where he took
        the money, and the piss. He played
        a human/arachnid hybrid. Too bad
        the movie was a piece of shit.

        Liked by 1 person

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