War Against Petroleum

While we are waiting to have in operation alternate sources of energy, we have to fight the petroleum capitalists by slowing down the use of gasoline and petroleum by products. Personally, during the last couple of months I was able to cut back 40% of the gasoline use in my private own vehicle and 16% in the home energy use. My suggestions are as follows:

Automovil use:

1. Only make necessary trips.
2. Plan your trips out so you could do more than one thing when you go out.
3. Keep a moderate speed from 50 to 65 MPH (80 to 110 KPH)
4. Always accelerate slowly.
5. Exercise your body, walk when you can.
6. When you can, use public transportation
7. In my case my car gives me from 19 to 20 miles in the city and from 25 to 26 in the open road. When the times come to get a different car I will look for something with at least five miles per gallon better. The big and luxurious vehicles only makes us more poor and the rich richer.

Energy consumption at home:

1. Do not turn lights on during day time, use the natural light that we already have.
2. Only use needed lights during nights.
3 Minimize the use of all home appliances; irons, air conditioning, electric garage doors, hair blowers and many others.
4. Select food that can be cooked in short periods of time to cut back in the stove's usage.
5. Many vegetables can be eaten raw, use then often.
6. In those places where gets cold, instead of rising the home temperature try to get another set of blankets to sleep and some additional clothing while you in the home.
7. Slow down the use of hot water at home.

These are just few things that I do in my individual battle against the petroleum industry. Each one lives in a different environment and have different needs, though I am sure that each one can prepare a list and be able to economize and to help us win this ballte. If you don't do it for yourself because you don't have the need, then do it for your brother, do it for your friend, do it for your nation.

A place to go

Living in Alaska is a fun ride.

First you need some practice driving on ice
because if you do not, for seven months
you will be a couch potato at home
only looking through the window outside.

Once I went three hundred and fifty miles,
from Anchorage to the northeast I drove
with four grandchildren to see the North Pole
and to see their faces cracking with smiles.

Our adventure up there was very long,
it was fun the pictures with Santa Claus.

Coming back we wanted to see wild life
and went fairly near of Mount Mckinley,
fourteen miles inside among many hills
the snow was falling covering all sites.

There was nothing in sight for a long while
but slippery roads and frozen brooks
then, near us we saw this gigantic moose
with antlers that were reaching to the skies.

It was a trip to talk about with pride.

All Rights Reserved:
Marcos A. Cabrera
7th in the Robert Brewer Poetry Month Challenge

Overflow

There is a lot that the people don't know.

The world keeps up with its eternal glow
without regrets in its fantastic ways,
the wheel of life with its moves is the same
but with every turn seems like we fall below.

The hopes are now a major overflow
and in most cases they end up in hell
though our days are marching into a knell
most actions we posponed for tomorrow.

We are missing so much a healthy dawn
that we can't see the light of a good spawn.

The nations are turning against their own
a big maze seems to be the planet earth
as the wheel turns it keep leaving more dearth
and behind every bust the darkest shadows.

It is time to face the foe with a blow
to take out its guts and to feed our mind,
to see every coin from both of their sides
and then to see what reality shows.

With an open heart the good thoughts will flow.

All Rights Reserved:
Marcos A. Cabrera
6th in the Robert Brewer Poetry Month Challenge

I don't Know

I don't know what to do with my feelings.
They are inside of me, pushing my will
burning in my guts, tearing me apart,
I want to do so much more and I can't...
The social system is moving down hill.
Perhaps we all are standing at a brink
waiting for a race called six feet below;
I feel all over the absence of love,
the hopes for better days are turning dim.
I do not know what to do with my thoughts,
with the thoughts that keep coming from my soul.
I want to write whitout having to spill
the rotten seeds that are crowding the path,
way inside I know tha's too much to ask
the world may not be willing to commit.
I want from my heart to take out the shrill
and to spread out its sap over the land;
and if all the pain cannot come to past,
if in our inner lives we can't be free
I do not know why should I be living.

La decadencia de la poesía

Por los últimos 40 y tantos años, desde que tengo conocimiento de la poesía y de la vida literaria, he notado un constante decaímiento y creo que más en la poesía que en cualquier otro género literario. En mi desagrado por la visualización, he hecho ciertos análisis y comparaciones y sé que hay muchas razones para que ello suceda.

Ojeando algunas de las críticas que han hecho otros, cada cual dice algo diferente al respecto y todos ellos tienen razón en lo que dicen. Empezando por el modernismo que nos mantiene ocupados con toda su sofisticación electrónica, hasta el grado de pobreza económica donde se encuentran enterradas nuestras masas. La evolución general de los pueblos ha dado cambios enormes pero estos cambios deberían ser savia adicional para la inspiración y en vez de deteriorarse, hacerla florecer.

La poesía se ha convertido en un embalaje. Cada escritor busca en el diccionario las palabras que nadie usa para crear algo distinto, mientras que ponen muy poca atención a la rima y a la métrica que por siglos han sido las que han dado belleza y armonía al pensamiento rústico. La metáfora y otras herramientas literarias pensé que se usaban para dar color y lucidez a las palabras sencillas expresadas. Mas, estamos viviendo en una era completamente metafórica donde hay que buscar palabras sencillas para desoscurecer las metáforas y otros.

Hay muchos letrados que se enorgullecen en llevar una enciclopedia en la cabeza. Yo pienso como el famoso Henry Ford, quien decía que el cerebro hay que mantenerlo lo más libre posible porque la función principal de éste era la de hacer decisiones, y no un sitio de almacenamiento. No hay nada malo en conocer pero se hace gran daño cuando no conocemos a quienes nos quieren conocer. Nos encerramos en un mundo sólo de nosotros, en un mundo abstracto cuya luz se queda en el interior de nosotros.

Hoy, es hasta difícil encontrar una editora que quiera publicar un libro de poesías. Hay temor porque no hay ventas. El pueblo no quiere comprar un libro para el cual ni aún el diccionario les puede ayudar a entenderlo. Sin la aceptación del pueblo la poesía es como una flor sin sustento diario; sin agua, sin aire, sin tierra. Y como dije anteriormente, se convierte en un embalaje, en un género vacío. Hasta los declamadores que tanto auge dieron a la poesía tres o cuatro décadas atrás, no se atreven a interpretar lo que escribimos hoy. Aquellos que aparecen se dedican a declamar mayormente poemas del ayer.

Al mundo, hoy más que nunca, le hace falta un resplandor como pudo ofrecer la poesía por cientos de años. A través de todos nuestros países hispanos hay muchos buenos pensadores que deberían ser menos orgullosos de los finos y abstractos pensamientos y ser más sensitivos con las necesidades de pueblos sedientos por entendernos.