The Mad Philosopher Poem by Raj Arumugam

fiddle the broom
tumddeli the ocean;
claw the sky
hurkling the meadows:
water in the deserts
and sands in the oceans:
the mad philosopher
has seen all contradictions
and lives his eternity
in sanitary conditions


what is the point of it? asks the child and I say, it is all pointless, that is the point – and the child points to me and says: This is the mad philosopher… the mad philosopher spins little stories out of his past and his mind - and he, the mad philosopher, makes words stand upside down...


little spider
little spider
what are you weaving?
I’m weaving a trap for the world
a mousetrap for the world
but it’s I who keeps falling


Ophelia, Ophelia - darling Ophelia, did I not love you enough? Did I not deceive and make false promises enough? You drowned deliberately, sweetheart – did you not worry, sweet darling, the water and sand will spoil your clothes?


and I am walking through the garden
and I say:
little round earth
blue globe
clasp everyone safe in your
clenched fist;
for some you throw mad
in your gravity thrust;
you’ve failed, earth:
and the mad philosopher will
fix you in the constellation of stars


you, you lazy fat bat on the fruit tree, hanging with your robes folded like Caesar’s toga, what are you smirking about? wipe that smirk off your face – remember fool, it’s easier to see the mad philosopher certified – but the madness within oneself, that one does not easily see…


and simple flowers
make complex poisons:
ask Caliban’s Mother,
she should know


4 men in a room; only 3 left.
what happened to the fourth?
Hamlet killed one justly and legally
and most spiritually
for that man kissed a brother’s wife
while Hamlet was studying grammar
and the verb ‘to be’…
and he could not see what Hamlet saw –
and so Hamlet made pudding of him
and put it
with the vinegar in the wine cellar…


ah, spider – live the life of a saint though nobody does, and saints kill reality for the illusions they are burdened with…


the mad philosopher will sleep now, and when the philosopher sleeps, when I the lunatic sleeps
the world sleeps
for it exists only in my waking hours
and so when I sleep and snore
the stars sleep
and the sun sleeps
and the moon snores aloud
and all manner of creatures sleep
but they stay awake in my dreams
and when I rise again
I bring them forth out again
and they exist as long as I am awake


what is the point of it? asks the child and I say, it is all pointless, that is the point – and the child points to me and says: This is the mad philosopher… the mad philosopher spins little stories out of his past and his mind - and he, the mad philosopher, makes words stand upside down...


…and I tell you true, I tell you tales of mystical Albion:

King Lear had
countless knights
but his daughters
gave him
a thousand nights
of horror and insanity