Author: shaun tenzenmen
Australasian DIY music specialist and practising poet, amongst other things
The attentive ear
Narrative Hallucinations – 1st December 2024
Data streams into the dark box
The causes not yet known
A search for the secret locks
That experience has shown
Spittin out its predictions
Before the data confirmed
Holding onto convictions
Of what’s already learned
Narrative hallucinations
Reinforce the box and harden
Exponential calculations
Grows the shadowy garden
Inspired and paraphrased by David Elikwu ‘All In Your Head’
Round Holes – 30th November 2024
Often bewildered
A cultural disconnect
I don’t belong here
I don’t belong anywhere
A choice I made long ago
Another planet
Aliens walk among us
A sideways side-eye
Weird welcomes may be hiding
Daggers and fists held in check
Heads down and bum up
The square pegs will never fit
Scared of the unknown
A slow assimilation
Under cover of the night
Who am I to say?
I’m not one but the other
Out in the wide-open
Searching for a hole to hide
Keep quiet, wait for my moment
It’s us versus them
Until accommodated
Compelled to fit in
Or stay along the margins
Til my tribe reveals itself
Often bewildered
Aliens walk among us
Scared of the unknown
Searching for a hole to hide
Til my tribe reveals itself
A garland tanka shared with the Moonwashed Weekly Prompt – Otherness
Life Is Pain – 29th November 2024
With my demons, I wrestle
While probing fingers point
Storm clouds gather undecided
In search of a swollen joint
Tickled tortures beyond pain
With needles under nails
Washed away on the tides
Of one-too-many fails
Without you, I would no longer exist
Shared with dVerse Quadrille #213 – with
Screaming Seagulls – 28th November 2024
I lost my mother
When the screaming seagulls fell
Our house now a mausoleum
–
Rebuilding a life
A family of my own
Will be my only revenge
This mondo shared with #TankaTuesday Poetry Challenge: Silver Linings. Image found at Palestine Will Be Free Substack
6th Dec 2025 – Shared with Poets and Storytellers United #206 – everybody scream
In Opposition – 27th November 2024
Defined by dualities
A refusal to conform
There’s no moral dilemma
Opposition being born
What sacrifices are made
Challenging the status quo
Protest against injustice
Opposing the mainstream show
Countering counterculture
The margins are underground
Narrative struggles remain
Where opposition is found
The conflict of one’s desire
Families beggar belief
Carving out personal faith
Opposition brings relief
Shared with Poets and Storytellers United – opposite concepts
The Greatest Happiness Possible – 26th November 2024
Look deep into the eyes
Of the cat and dog freed from its cage
There to be seen
The root of all human happiness
To chase around the beach, cuddle and engage
Inspired by Existential Comics 566 (excerpted)
24th Sep 2025 – Shared with dVerse Poetics Tuesday
The Modal Headline – 25th November 2024
Learning what to ignore
Can lead to learning more
Is this really news?
It may be just for views
Does the banner fright me?
Is it true? It might be!
You must stand up to defend
Cos this could be the end
Any should or would
Could be understood
What it means to kill
It will, it will!
Any headline and byline using modal verbs can safely be ignored as news.
Peripheral Vision – 24th November 2024
It was only a moment ago
the skies spoke to you the possibilities
wider and deeper than a young mind could conceive
Then, as if to ruin the show
came the treadmill of responsibilities
now a raging river to erode all that you did believe
Do you see it standing there?
A black doorway in peripheral vision
a slow beckoning of danger, awesome and ajar!
Will it lead to a new life somewhere
and are you ready for this decision?
Where else to go once you’ve already come this far?
Inspired by a part of this article in The London Review of Books called Gloves on by Anne Carson, discussing dealing with Parkinson’s.
My Good News – 23rd November 2024
The word is a reckoning
So roll up your sleeves
Bring order to the turmoil
Your monologue believes
Codify your weary soul
Give fire to your blues
Step up towards your God
Confront him with your news
Inspired and paraphrased (as ever) from the Red Hand Files #297
10th Sep 2025 – Shared with Poets and Storytellers United – something good
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