Category: 2022

Teacher’s Day – 23rd June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 1 Comment

Oh, the pretty girls must perform
The majority sweat to conform
Candles lit and incense burned
Bless today for what was learned

Rigid rows and rigid rules
Sets the tone within the schools
Passive acceptance, the cultural norm
Here’s Pavlov’s children to perform

31st Oct 2024 – Shared with Ragtag Daily Prompt – rigid

Unsolicited advice is the junk mail of life.

Bern Williams

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful to find the Yousician offer to upgrade to play loads more songs cheaper than my current subscription – how good is that!?

The Week That Was – 9th September 1979

The Devil’s Despair – 22nd June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ 1 Comment

Scrabbling around in the emptiness
Finding only scraps of dust and hair
Searching for long-buried treasure
To sate the devil’s despair
Concentrating all the kindness
Praying for a new light to shine
Longing for a fuller measure
To shiver on down my spine

As any gardener knows, the vitality of a garden does not end with a harvest. It simply takes another form. Gardens do not ‘die’ in the winter but quietly prepare for another season.

James Carse, Finite and Infinite Games

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful that there were banana cupcakes left at work yesterday so that I could fill up as I knew I would get home late.

The Week That Was – 2nd September 1979

The Rock Of Truth – 21st June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

Standing on the bank of the river
Sympathies for those floating by
Your tears will cleanse your heart
You cannot comprehend my cry

I am the truth as rock
Stood for a million years
Listening to your sad songs
Whispered between your tears

Empty is your heart and hand
A touch so inviting and smooth
Your house without mirrors
To view your soul to soothe

Long you looked in ridicule
Shackled to the ebb and flow
Grabbing onto sparkling gold
And screaming to never let go

Imagery inspired by a Khalil Gibran short story

15th Jun 2024 – Submitted to RagTag Daily Prompt

Our diversity is not a reason to hate each other. Quite the opposite, we must admire and respect it.

found at Khimushin Alexander, original unknown

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful that my brain was keeping me happy yesterday. It was a fun day at school with no teaching and lots of kids always wanting to talk with me.

Duk Dik – 20th June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

Always active, nervous twitching
Under the skin, blood is itching
Actions precede thought
Which evaporate to nought
Leaving all around you bitching

11th Sept 2023 – In Thai ‘duk dik’ means constantly moving around. This phrase can be used for my students in most of my classes.

The highs and lows I have known have turned me inward to the point where I’ll never feel anything close to normal. I don’t feel isolated, I don’t want in… There’s no confession to make, there’s no truth burning to come ripping out of me… I will always make relationships with people an approximation of a relationship. I think that’s better. I think things are more beautiful when you’re on the outside.

Henry Rollins

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful to be able to find the books I want to read from Dasa Books in Bangkok or even able to order from overseas using Amazon.

Hip Streets – 19th June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

Those hips are shaking
On the teenage Instagram
Whilst mine are quietly aching
Getting as old as I am

What the hell are you grinding?
Ass jiggling to all your friends
I really don’t need reminding
Of all these sexy new trends

I’m getting too old for this stuff
No way I can compete
I’m old enough and seen enough
Off to hip replacement street

Submitted to Weekly Prompts Wednesday Challenge Streets

The Truth is simple but the Way of Man is hard. First you must learn to control your self.

Mike, The Man From Mars, Stranger In A Strange Land by Robert Heinlein

The Observational – 18th June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

When there’s nothing to say, don’t say a word
Even in silence, a meaning may be heard
Beaks may be flapping, yet nothing said
Silence all the yapping, shut up instead
A life without drama is much better observed

I guess the only time most people think about injustice is when it happens to them.

Charles Bukowski

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful to sleep through my alarm this morning. Out for the count and I think I feel better for it.

No More Maus – 17th June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

Burn the books that shook and rocked
Ban the guns all cocked and locked
Pay the man a corporate donation
Say a prayer to save the nation
Scoff as the rest of the world is shocked

The end of days, the Rapture foretold
When shock and awe have taken hold
Scrambling with a personal hell
Now has come the time to tell
About all the lies that have been sold

Most people would rather argue about reality than do something about reality.

Ryan Holiday

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful to see the birdies able to fly – or just trying for their first times. I hope they can avoid our cats.

Not So Sure – 16th June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

What the hell was that dream?
Our little band of brothers
Was on the run from ‘the man’
Though why I’m not so sure

We were on the move
Trying to stay one step ahead
We had the guns and merch
It seemed too much to carry
We couldn’t load it all up in time
And one by one, we were picked off

Then it was just us two left
You and I became slaves
To the over-mother, naked
Forcing us to drink her ejaculations
In the hope of impregnation
For a new master race
To take over the changed world

2000AD is a future past
Eugenics, so last century
Dreaming a fever dream
Not so sure what’s real anymore

We choose to believe that the game is fair…we prefer not to think too much about the depth of our liberty to choose.

Robert Greene

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful to get free milk coffee with my regular fruit yoghurt drink I like. Nice!

Fatman report

How You Know – 15th June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

When the phantoms come knocking at your door
Is when you forget what you’re fighting for
When modern society has you paralysed
Is when your violence makes no one surprised
When the ghosts and devils now created
Are apparently let loose unabated
When it’s impossible to live free from stress
Is when you begin to more enjoy your mess
When the threat of losing all value you hold
Is just a pretence to be following what you’re told
When life is lived in constant threat and fear
Is how you know that the deceivers are here

No one is smart enough to be wrong about everything.

Ken Wilber

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful for ant spray. I don’t like to kill things but those little bastards get into everything. I just want them to go away.

A Dark Past – 14th June 2022

~ shaun tenzenmen ~ Leave a comment

When there’s no light, a sunny attitude will light the way
There’s a grain of truth in any story so I’ve heard them say
The windows into the past took us to a world away
The light that gave us colours, a rainbow no longer grey

We are inhabitants of a factory so huge we can’t even see it.

Henry Rollins

Gratitude Journal

I am so happy and grateful for my aching hips – reminding me to move and stretch more.