Strider Marcus Jones's Blog: https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.wordpress.com/, page 2

Thankye Editor Barbara Leonhard for publishing my poem The Ascent of Money on MasticadoresUSA on 17th June 2025 . I appreciate your awesome support of poets and poetry.

“THE ASCENT OF MONEY” by Strider Marcus Jones

MasticadoresUSA, poem, poetry, Treasured Contributors

“THE ASCENT OF MONEY” by Strider Marcus Jones

the stars are those
we have forgotten
both living and dead,
floating in clustered constellations
not labouring in rows-
with hair growing grey
and teeth going rotten
singing songs, God's godless pray.
harvesting crops.
chants drowned in clocks
of tobacco and cotton,
the peasants and slaves of civilised nations
duped by liberty
in recent history-
dug out canals, made railways and roads
out of tarmac to tread-
into factories
like tribal junkies
hooked on cheap gin and beer instead
of joining the cholera's watery dead-
ten to a room in a slum and lead-
like human batteries,
sleeping without moonlight
on sarsen stones,
or druid voices in their homes-
where thoughts have no dreams or flight,
just sleep, recharge, get bled.
you have to be poor,
to think utopia
can be something real-
not to exploit or steal
that ambrosia aura of women and children and men
for the spoken wages of despair-
that suck you in,
glad but grim
when times' clock punches that card by the door
and mass myopia
conditions all to labour, keyboard and pen
for food and shelter with a roof and fourth wall
shanty made out of cardboard, wood and tin
in sunny Sao Paolo, where the samba rain leaks in
while orphaned children beg and play
eating the forage of capitalist waste
dodging death squads night and day
imitating Socrates at football to hope to taste
what's inside the cold, glistening towers
casting invisible powers
behind the smoked glass and soldiers of stone
leaving blood and bleached bone
from over there-
where the ascent of money doesn't care
about it all
because its infinity is small.
 
Copyright © 2025 Strider Marcus Jones
All Rights Reserved

Strider Marcus Jones is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal 

https://lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com/.

A member of The Poetry Society, his five published books of poetry https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.wordpress.com/ reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms.

His poetry has been published in over 200 publications worldwide including: Dreich Magazine; dyst Literary Journal; Impspired Magazine; Melbourne Culture Corner; Literary Yard Journal; The Galway Review; Cajun Mutt Press; Rye Whiskey Review; The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; and Dissident Voice.

Delighted to have my revolutionary poem Water and Mist published on Latinos USA – English Edition 16th June 2025. My thanks to awesome editor Barbara Leonhard.

Water and Mist by Strider Marcus Jones

poetry

Water and Mist by Strider Marcus Jones

Published by Meelosmom on 16 de junio de 2025

let the world do what it does,
and when the desert
comes for us
we will be water-
so the seeds of new ideas
can replace the wars and fears
of decadent thrones
spying on the homes
of those they slaughter.

bring on the peoples revolution,
that returns our stolen
land into our hands
from these swollen
fat cats, with their final solution
and fascist FEMA plans.

let the world do what it does,
and when the guns
are turned on us
we will be mist-
eclipsing everything they’ve done
when we resist.

strike them like ghosts
in the halls of their hosts,
topple their temples of sin-
dissolve all their banks,
then their missiles and tanks,
leave no corrupted survivor-
cleanse what’s within
for a new way to begin
by severing each head from this hydra.

Copyright © 2025 Strider Marcus Jones
All Rights Reserved

Strider Marcus Jones is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal. A member of The Poetry Society, his five published books of poetry reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms. His poetry has been published in over 200 publications worldwide including: Dreich Magazine; dyst Literary Journal; Impspired Magazine; Melbourne Culture Corner; Literary Yard Journal; The Galway Review; Cajun Mutt Press; Rye Whiskey Review; The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; and Dissident Voice.

Thanks to Editor Agron Shele for publishing my 5 poems in the superb Atunis Poetry. Delighted.

Strider Marcus Jones (UK)

AUTORE

Strider Marcus Jones (UK)

Published by

agronsh

on

June 14, 2025

Strider Marcus Jones (UK)

Strider Marcus Jones – is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal: https://lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com/.

A member of The Poetry Society, nominated for the Pushcart Prize x3 and Best of the Net x3, his five published books of poetry https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.wordpress.com/ reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms.

His poetry has been published in numerous publications including: Poppy Road Review; International Times Magazine; The Galway Review; The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; The Lampeter Review; Panoplyzine Poetry Magazine and Dissident Voice.

ELSEWHERE, IN ANOTHER PLACE

There’s an evening coming in,
Like wet towels
With heavy jowls,
To snoop, and listen in.

Walking under it,
Intimate in touch and face;
Our mood moves with it,
Elsewhere, in another place.

Thoughts cascade like rainbows,
As words said, reach the sky;
Love touches love, and knows-
Sometimes, there is no why.

Beyond this moment, who can say-
What is meant to be:
In the hot rain, boughs beckon and sway-
Uncontrollably.


SEPARATE PIECES

follow me
down the fathoms
of forgiveness
like ghosts
who heal and hope-
to that room
in the mind
where contentment
resonates
with longing
for love to fill
its vacant chair
and mould it to us both.

i can’t go on
like separate pieces,
that move around each other
but never touch
in their courtship
on the board-
and yet,
so many things
you say and do,
won’t go away
and fill me still,
with points of possibility
as the Great Wheel of Time
revolves
in harmony and confusion.

unconscious moments,
call out
to chance and circumstance
and weave away in dreams-
orchestrating
opening gambits,
to suture sensual seams.
two hands touch
and influence fate
as they move around the squares;
time curves,
then unmeasures words-
and their endless game goes on.


SO IT GOES

when i look back
in a moment
of quiet acquired dignity
that comes to some
with age,
it is with patience,
for i was much the same
when everything seemed bigger
than it was
as uncertainty
wore the other shoe to confidence
and followed it step for step.

the energy of youth
that often acts
without respect and understanding-
to bluff and blag its way
in fashion and musical rebellion-
skips like stones
on the ponds of those who have it all
from Parliaments revolution-
but their ripples wane
through treacled trends
in this dumbed down democracy
soothed by drugs and drink.

apathy watches and laughs
at these new roundheads and royals-
jigging their booty
to tunes composed
by capitalist cavaliers-
wearing each despotic Emperor’s new clothes,
and a known assassins kiss of death
waits for anyone who questions-

so it goes.


VELVET TANGERINE

i was drinking tea with Dali
in an underworld cafe,
arguing down his table
on General Franco’s hand-
when The Persistence Of Memory
that melts my pocket watch
made time less rigid-
so i fell with names and numbers
into old obsidian dreams-
where your long legs pointed
from six to twelve,
then nine to three
when you bent them-
for me to play and pleasure
each exotic segment
of your velvet tangerine.
Dali left the table
to meet Picasso in Paris,
while my benzedrine mind replaced-
the soft and spent infinity of your face.


DOUBTS AND DEMONS

We all have doubts and demons
About ourselves and life;
But overcome their reasons
And love will conquer strife.

We all want perfections hum,
In a real and abstract way;
But our flaws make us human
And their judgment turns us grey.

Yet, to love and be loved in kind,
Transcends this clouded plain,
And calms chaos in the mind
To co-exist, or wane.

Delighted to have my poem Does Her Far Beauty Know published in the International Times Magazine on 7th June 2025. My thanks to the editors and Nick Victor for his superb Art.

DOES HER FAR BEAUTY KNOW | IT

DOES HER FAR BEAUTY KNOW

does her

far beauty know

where my thoughts go

without her

when i walk

in lush rain lashing down-



squatting in enclosed fields

of remote wheat and barley

around told feudal cities and towns-

to talk

to fate and how it feels

to be emptied entirely

of hopes sounds-



these evolutions

fill rich men’s purses

and revolutions

are poor universes

that try to bend

the unequal

to be equal

without end.



does her

far beauty know

where my thoughts go

with her

when i walk

in lush rain lashing down-



soaked in moments come to this

paradise and precipice

belonging

bonding

thoughts

serendipitous

blowing into us-



gives shelter to the self

of us and other else-

unlike bare rooms we rent

to leave behind

when change moves us to fit

into it-

with only our echo and scent

of passion and mind.
.



Strider Marcus Jones
Picture Nick Victor

.

Strider Marcus Jones – is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal https://lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com/. A member of The Poetry Society, nominated for the Pushcart Prize x3 and Best of the Net x3, his five published books of poetry  https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.wordpress.com/ reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms.  

His poetry has been published in numerous publications including:  Poppy Road Review; International Times Magazine; The Galway Review;  The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; The Lampeter Review; Panoplyzine  Poetry Magazine and Dissident Voice.

.

This entry was posted on 7 June, 2025 in homepage and tagged , . Bookmark the permalink.

Delighted to have my poem Dark Drawn Man published in the International Times Magazine on 31st May 2025. My thanks to the editors.

DARK DRAWN MAN

DARK DRAWN MAN
dark drawn man

in two – legged sedan,

Diogenes least

the more i am.

a worn down crease-

opens

like blotched butterfly wings,

that drop in tokens

on imaginings-

lost, but living

through drought and giving.



dark drawn man

of wiccan, glam

rock and folk-

who likes a smoke;

hermit and ham,

sometimes a dam

for the waterfall

of it all-

bohemian and gothic,

romantic, hypnotic,

un-photographic

hates cam.



dark drawn man

whose thought beats flam

on sticks

of words

his focus and blurs

without tricks

of prussian blue

and cadmium red

the way Modigliani drew

his mistress on his bed.



Sophocles was right!

the darkest days, catch chinks of light-

running out of Ram,

but love is who i am..



Strider Marcus Jones
Picture William Skilling

Strider Marcus Jones – is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal https://lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com/. A member of The Poetry Society, nominated for the Pushcart Prize x3 and Best of the Net x3, his five published books of poetry  https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.wordpress.com/ reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms.  

His poetry has been published in numerous publications including:  Poppy Road Review; International Times Magazine; The Galway Review;  The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; The Lampeter Review; Panoplyzine  Poetry Magazine and Dissident Voice..

This entry was posted on 31 May, 2025 in homepage and tagged . Bookmark the permalink.

Delighted to have my poem Clouds of Chaotic Crowds published in the International Times Magazine on 24th May 2025. My thanks to the editors.

CLOUDS OF CHAOTIC CROWDS

CLOUDS OF CHAOTIC CROWDS

by Strider Marcus Jones

Smitten-

Bitten

Like Faustus-

Leave the house dust

With fool’s gold

Unsold.

This conveyor belt lair

A castle in the air

For Dante’s dreams of doubt

To wander about

In, with voices that pretend

To be a different friend-

Oh my, what a frame,

Too big to blame

And beyond a simple say

To save and stay-

So, close the dungeon door

To be what you were before

And walk away

Into the clouds

Of chaotic crowds

Falling as rain

On sterile plain.

.

Strider Marcus Jones
Picture Nick Victor

.

Strider Marcus Jones – is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal https://lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com/. A member of The Poetry Society, nominated for the Pushcart Prize x3 and Best of the Net x3, his five published books of poetry  https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.wordpress.com/ reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms.  

His poetry has been published in numerous publications including:  Poppy Road Review; International Times Magazine; The Galway Review;  The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; The Lampeter Review; Panoplyzine  Poetry Magazine and Dissident Voice.

Thrilled to have these six poems published by the sublime Ultramarine Review in Chile on 2oth May 2025. Superb website with excellent content. My thanks to the editors.

https://www.ultramarinereview.com/post/six-poems-by-strider-marcus-jones

Six Poems by Strider Marcus Jones

In and Out Arc

i’ve joined this cast

pressed against the glass

breath condensing,

unsure if the audience will applaud

what is flawed.

some work, ends up poor

for being rich,

every sentence sensing-

swollen and sore

if you over scratch the itch.

i’m still a tramp,

living rough in the park,

seeing light glow different in the lamp

of its in and out arc

as a confused skylark-

sings out of tune,

and scrapes its feet, like a displaced rune

on dry stone walls

and enclosed fences

into decorated halls

and empty envies.

i can cope,

with the trope

and metaphore of a tree,

that roots itself and branches wildly

random as before

without being cut to make a door.

fate is not intangible. it understands,

how a rebel quill in a broken hand

can dig truths out of ancestors and famined land.

In the Notes of My Guitar

i discover who you are

in the notes of my guitar-

love songs

sad songs,

good wronged

grown back songs,

plucking soft and strong

in nowhere

for somewhere

to belong.

chords fill the space

around the beauty of your face,

with lyrics in the breeze

on this road of serendipity,

where silver trees

mark the way to go, and be.

Black Witch

the way you drink your beer

straight from the bottle-

my low civilisation could topple

over you.

some talking dirty in my ear

while you ride at full throttle,

i’m in deeper than the darkest shade of blue-

straight down the middle

head thrown back and giggle

bowstring

rocking

finger plucking

blue grass fiddle-

harbour in oblivion

black witch of obsidian

born in that pavillion

the empire new.

My Old Socks

my old socks

sheath the feet

that fill my boots

to walk on land.

hard hands, sweating like peat,

still break rocks

in imprisoned heat

born trapped roots

in dynasties of the damned.

the faded thread-

diminishes in duty until dead

while famous patterns

conceal what really happens-

their reasons behind closed doors

gain ignorant applause

for wars

and poverty

rising from floors

of serial

imperial

cruel pomposity.

Those Leaves on the Pavement

from bud to life to death

membranes of breath

rustle

and hustle

for water and wind

in self similarity

without clarity

doing the wrong thing.

each tree, is its own fate

landing in landscape

rooted in class

morphing into towers of steel and glass-

those leaves on the pavement

rejected with resentment

turning brown

no history written down.

some of those leaves

are people we know-

but who perceives

why we let them go,

after mistakes

into what waits

with nothing to show

when time shakes.

I Want What Ordinary Others Want

i want

what others want-

synchronicity

and simplicity

in life of free will-

sharing some land

i can work with my hands

no more slave still-

time trapped.

lines tapped.

steps tagged.

voice gagged.

this elite mafia

of Orwell and Kafka

has built Metropolis

on old Acropolis-

reducing proles

to zombie roles

in constitutions

of constructed evolutions,

with blood to dust faiths

riding like dark wraiths

bullets shredding

bombing and beheading

the innocents

and dissidents

to steal their lot

and not share what you’ve got.

Poetry collectionHomelessUrbanGuitarSocks

Really chuffed to have three poems published by dedicated editor Nolcha Fox in Chewers by Masticadores on 20th May 2025.

3 Poems by Strider Marcus Jones

3 Poems by Strider Marcus Jones

SHEDDING CLOTHES

some soul exposed
open closed
looked at
put back
where it was
because

because
it was done
being in sun
unalterably changed
randomness rearranged
moving on

moving on
rising out of what has gone
through opaqueless
weightless
windows
shedding clothes.

~~

YOU’RE SO OPEN, BUT SILENT TO YOURSELF

you’re so open, but silent to yourself
like messed books lying on a shelf-
some unfinished, others read,
now in someone else’s head.

reason meets reluctance to be heard
by what is fascist and absurd,
so walk through wind wild grass
and outlaw canyon pass-

touch the rainbows in the rocks
time beyond our conflicts clocks
in shaman trance understand
truth transcends books banned

and all the lands stolen
through greed swollen-
return when nature’s fate
destroys hubris and hate-

so be gone a while
belief in a smile.

~~

LOOKING IN LOVE’S GLASS

looking in love’s glass
at what we have drank
and haven’t drunk
to quench our thirst
slow and fast
not the first
not the last-
beauty is flesh
is your womanliness
and i find
your mind
grows branches into mine
we climb-
so compatible
and indelible,
to others forgettable
crashed dream
on screen-
we know
we go
out of scene

Copyright © 2025 Strider Marcus Jones
All Rights Reserved

Delighted to have my poem The Portal in the Woods published in the International Times Magazine on 17th May 2025. My thanks to the editors.

THE PORTAL IN THE WOODS

Please specify the group

← A kind of Psych-Fest!

Floxus →

THE PORTAL IN THE WOODS

Seeing somnambulist sunrise

Through open window

Touch your face

After love rides

On moon tides

In ebb and flow

At tantric pace-

Love resides

Tasted

No asides

Wasted

Spices of the flesh

Soaking rooms in Marrakesh

How I ate your truffle in Zanzibar

While you smoked my long cigar.

Back home-

Tribes of bloods

And druids roam

Seeking out the overgrown

Portal in the woods

Where we handfast

In this present of the past

Dance chanting

In stone bone circles

Like ooparts

Practicing

Magical arts

Settling

What chaos hurtles-

Reconnecting rhythms

In living and dead

To those algorithms

In natures head.

We are rustic-

Romantic

In land and sky

The  air  fire  water

To warriors who slaughter

If Us or Them must die.

We wake

For clambake

Pleasure

In a cauldron lake

Of limbs together

Then cut sods of peat

From the bog under our feet

Exposing the pasts

That never last.

.

Strider Marcus Jones
Artwork by Paola Minelli

Strider Marcus Jones – is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal https://lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogspot.com/. A member of The Poetry Society, nominated for the Pushcart Prize x3 and Best of the Net x3, his five published books of poetry  https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.wordpress.com/ reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms.  

His poetry has been published in numerous publications including:  Poppy Road Review; International Times Magazine; The Galway Review;  The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; The Lampeter Review; Panoplyzine  Poetry Magazine and Dissident Voice.

.

This entry was posted on 17 May, 2025 in homepage and tagged . Bookmark the permalink.

← A kind of Psych-Fest!

Thrilled to have my poem CUBIST GHETTOS published in International Times on 10th May 2025. My thanks to the Editors.

CUBIST GHETTOS

CUBIST GHETTOS

I think

To shrink

The distance

Of resistance

Inside self

To all else-



Knowing

Showing

Vulnerability

In the mystery

Leaves what is closed

Openly exposed-



To explanation

Under examination

When there isn’t one

That hasn’t gone

Until roof floor and sky door

Are no more-



Only roulette rubbles

Of drone troubles

Imprisoning

Reasoning

In cubist ghettos

Wearing jazz stilettos-



Flashing flamingo legs

To pink paradise Harlem heads

While new trees grow up mute

And ripen with strange fruit

Some whites too this time

A drowned boy me and mine.


.

Strider Marcus Jones
Picture Rupert Loydell



Strider Marcus Jones – is a poet, law graduate and former civil servant from Salford, England with proud Celtic roots in Ireland and Wales. He is the editor and publisher of Lothlorien Poetry Journal https://lothlorienpoetryjournal.blogs.... A member of The Poetry Society, nominated for the Pushcart Prize x3 and Best of the Net x3, his five published books of poetry https://stridermarcusjonespoetry.word... reveal a maverick, moving between cities, playing his saxophone in smoky rooms.

His poetry has been published in numerous publications including: Poppy Road Review; International Times Magazine; The Galway Review; The Huffington Post USA; The Stray Branch Literary Magazine; Crack The Spine Literary Magazine; The Lampeter Review; Panoplyzine Poetry Magazine and Dissident Voice


This entry was posted on 10 May, 2025 in homepage and tagged Rupert Loydell, Strider Marcus Jones. Bookmark the permalink.