Howard Yosha Poetry

Welcome to Howard Yosha.com

Go where paintings illuminate poetry

Poetry by Howard Yosha Coppywright 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007. Contact me at proprietor@howardyosha.com

My underground art

has The power to offend shock my words

living in your mind under supremely foul duress , disturbing all listeners.

On the page my poetry reads like a master piece

but on stage my voice does not

agree with poetry reading hosts and slam poetry judges. Competition is not my friend,

in poetry slams I get slammed. My poetry

performance has never been featured. Dull and lifeless

my voice rattles making me seem like a slacker

pot head looser one vial shot of a cracked head

Taking my seat after my performance the crowd parts

No friends in the audience congratulate, my spoken word is death, My poetry makes me an outcast from the poet In crowd. After hearing my performance poetry

my dates stand me up, my wives leave me,

people forget my name. Do not judge me harshly

my drunken or hung over listless lifeless soulless

act makes me a member of underground art.

Living in the shadow of master author's lime light. My outcast class of poet cowers, scurrying back to write in solitude. When you finally read my poetry...

My drinking drug consumption schizophrenic dysthymic depressive writing will prove to you my life was lived.

When you read my poetry...

My written words will haunt you forever, long after my demise, after you forget me,

When you read my poetry...

My voice will live forever in spite of your hatred, my writing will finally make you my friend.

When you read my poetry...

My featured poetic engagement will be like a book tour in your head, you will never forget

Conversation with Inspiration

If you could interview Inspiration,

What would he say?

Inspiration, why are you everywhere,

But your voice is soft?

In my world, I am Inspiration screaming as loud

as I can. Hear me! Wake up!

But in your world my voice is hard to hear,

Like when you are driving down the road,

the radio is turned down, it is very soft,

but behind the DJ board in the radio station,

the pods are turned up, all the way to the red,

as loud as they possibly can go.

The treble is turned all the way down,

the bass is turned all the way up,

the DJ is screaming at you from the radio tower,

Inspiration is screaming at you,

but when you have the radio turned down

you can't hear me,

When you are listening to me

the eye of the beholder has many facets like a diamond,

everyone has a different vision of what I am,

like visions of God, I have been seen in many facets,

Jehovah, Buddha, Mohamed, Jesus, Abraham,

I am a man who inspired the words written in the bible,

I am the spoken voice of religious icons,

hear me clearly and follow in their footsteps.

Tune me out, shut me off, and you wont hear me.

Throw away your troubles and follw me

Throw away your Religion and follow me

Throw away your guns and follw me

Throw away your goverments and follow me

Pick up freedom and live with me

Pick up god and live with me

Pick up crayons for coloring and live with me

Pick up love and live with me in peace.

Poetry by Howard Yosha Coppywright 1996, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004. Requests for publication email proprietor@howardyosha.com

How to Become a Tax Deductible Poet

Buy a computer for your new tax deductible home office,
Self-publish books and write off the expense as a business loss,
Tack on registration fees for you new web domain,
Advertising accomplished by mailing 9000 libraries requests to carry your book,
Buy a car to take you on a book tour,
Write off the depreciation the mileage and the gas,
Invest in sales of writing, book festivals, conventions,
Poetry contests and self-publishing becomes a liability
When you start to win contests, sell books. Become one of the 20,000 professional poets
a year who graduates from college. You will make a living on TV shows
like HBO Def Poetry Jam and in commercials for soda pop like 7UP,
Not only will you become Poetry.com and Poet Laureate,
But you will have strict fiscal policies and you will never pay tax again.

_________________________________

Expensive Addictions

smoking cigars like driving expensive cars
coffee nicotine Starbucks 4 dollar dream
writing self publishing MFA workshops agents
alcohol
it is not possible to go through life without an addiction or habit
exercise dancing dating equals porking in crowd maintaing
looking good like Michael Jackson with TV newscaster facelifts
sex with you high school sweetie then you wife then lover, orgies, hookers lap dances dowloadabe orgasm

_______________________________________________

Inspiration is... Softly Loudly Screaming

Inspiration is...
...In any town, in any place, like your town,
...Opening your eyes,
...light seeping through door cracks,
...Waking from lowly dungeons in filthy hovels,
...Kicking you in the head,
...a hammer called light,
...Sweeping you off the floor,
...your thoughts climbing into the air
...Reflecting off the eyes of tractor trailer rigs on the highway,
...Staring you down,
...screaming thoughts that never may be heard,
...As soft as the whispering breathing of the earth,
...As loud as cyclones flying over oceans, meeting you,
...Bleeding into your spine, a seminal fluid,
...Etching words into your head igniting explosions.

If only You were listening...
...listen,
...listen,
...listen

_____________________________________
WD Snodgrass has a dog with my name

Not properly attired in shorts and a football jersey
at Hollywood and Highland I arrive early
to read poetry at the International Society
of Poetry Convention, not waking, poets forgot
the 7am early morning reading, my hunger
an unquenched poetic thirst, I enter the Renaissance
Hotel restaurant, breakfast is good, but not
for 12 dollars, the matter de sat me
in the corner, no one could see me, I could see
everyone. Jesse James said never sit
with your back to the door, you may get shot,
As I start to eat my cassadia
WD Snodgrass is seated next to me
Like a crazed stalker fan I jump to his table
to give him a copy of my book. WD
said I don’t want to be your teacher or your mentor
I just will say one thing, thank you.
I signed my book I love your poetry, Howard Yosha.
I sat down excited unable to swallow, moth full of glue,
WD Snodgrass got up came to my table to bother me.
He asked what is the derivation of your name?
Yosha is Hebrew for Joshua, Yashua
He said I named my dog Yosha from a character
from Dostoyefskis book Brothers Karamosof
his life patted my bowed head protected by a glove,
So dumbfound, My claim to fame,
WD Snodgrass has a dog with my name

_________________________________
In Secret Love

Lusty passion toward coworkers is forbidden
in the rule book of married cheaters.
C.P. may never know she is the object
of my passion the source of fitful sexy dreams.
Finding this secret heat may be born from our lack of love
is my best guess, or maybe our attempt to destroy
our marriages. Lying truthfully is infidelities' goal
When we find we need sexual variety after
our nuptials, the rulebook of infidelity states married
cheaters both have something to loose,
Our much better chance to hide forbidden lustmaking.

__________________________________
Conversation with Courage

One Nation under the courageous efforts of man
Our strongest endeavors are founded by courage
My name is courage!
If you find enough courage you can do anything
Life force listens to the voice of courage,
On the brink, When death is near
Your most intimate friend is fear,
But if you have enough courage you will live forever
Writers and poets will recognize your courageous effort
And write your song of experience.
The strongest substance on earth
Has been the ink in the pen of a writer,
Words of courage tell stories of martyrs
Immortalizing proud dead with unflinching courage
The slightest touch of my pen will make you live
Forever, these indelible words are an army
At my back, filled with the uneraseable,
Unflinching immortalized regiments, Vietnam soldiers
Victims of terrorism from nine eleven,
Mad Bomber dead of Oklahoma City,
All mark time in step with four star generals
Of my army of courage, Martin Luther King commands.
My brave cavalry of JFK, Joan of Arc,
Abraham Lincoln and Jesus sit atop
The four horses of the apocalypse, reigning in the end
Of time with all their courage,
As you stand at the brink of death, I will be with you
If you have courage, You will join the ranks of the immortal
Army of courage, look deep inside,
Find the strongest human emotion, write
With the blackest ink to turn the weakest pawn into a Queen,
Our words written of these immortals will march over the earth
Until courageous lives are hammered indelibly in history
There will be no end of time if you have enough courage
There will be no starvation if you have enough courage
There will be no war if you have enough courage,
The courage to resist the end is within everyone,
If you just have enough courage

______________________________
the last electronic gasp of our dying printer

the new printer makes no noise when you ask it to print,
we wonder where is our document? oh! it’s done,

but our last printer committed suicide
and this new printer will too

after we work it to death. our poor enslaved printer
made grinding groans, almost human cries,

don’t print any more - i beg of you,
i’m going to end it all by jumping

off this desk! with its last fan wafted breath
it cried a last electronic gasp,

i am obsolete,
soon you will be too!

the man in our machine swooned a death knell
suffering his last day, spitting ink onto our paper.

______________________
I'm NOT GOING OUT THIS WAY GOD DAMNIT!
War is death when my soul screams out FUCK GEORGE BUSH
but my mouth is silent. A pawn on the USA Battlefield
I am a potential victim in World War Three, life is shit flushed
down the toilet of injustice under the tyranny of false freedom
under the religious right rule of Christians and Jews fighting a holy war
against Muslim Mujajadeem. Why believe in God or Religion
when the enemy combatants all believe in the end
of the world, FUCK RELIGION, I'm NOT GOING OUT THIS WAY
GOD DAMNIT! FUCK ARMAGEDDON, you slimy religious zealots
preying for the end of the world, preying an eye for an eye
YOU KILLED thousands of us on September the Eleventh,
WE WILL KILL Millions of YOU and send you back to GOD!
I WANT TO SHUT MY EARS TO CALLS FOR WAR from doom preying hawks, but I can't,
I know my enemy to better know myself,
I WANT TO CLOSE MY EYES TO ALL WAR CRIMES,
but I can't,
All war is a crime