Poetry Archives - Reason Bowl

It Flashes White

by Jason HollandJune 28, 2025

It flashes white. A symposium of life lived. You barely see it pass. Here. Then not. A collection you think. Something done, something accomplished. Existentialist …

Nobody in Particular

by Jason HollandJune 23, 2025June 23, 2025

I was stillborn before I was conceived, raised as a counterfeit human walking among a cavalcade of corpses on blood drenched soil. I took the …

Are You a Valid Person?

by Jason HollandMarch 30, 2024March 30, 2024

Are you a valid person at all? Are you over six feet tall? Are you working an important job? God forbid you’re one of …

The Revolution Will Not Be Digitized

by Jason HollandAugust 29, 2023August 29, 2023

So here’s my riff on updating Gil Scott-Heron’s classic The Revolution Will not be Televised, which I discovered after a quick search that it’s not …

don’t

by Jason HollandSeptember 27, 2021October 6, 2021

A poem on things not recommended.

The Finest in Poop Poetry: The Pesky Little Turd

by Jason HollandJanuary 8, 2020February 17, 2022

The tale of the pesky little turd

Transmute Anger

by Jason HollandMay 9, 2018July 16, 2018

Abuse creates anger in the abused. The anger percolates if left in an undigested state, and the abused lash back at all of creation feeling …

Path

by Jason HollandSeptember 28, 2017

Transmogrify. From rage, to depression, to surrender, to heal, to grow, to reason, to empathy, to dulcet whisper, to song, to dance…to be. To exist.

Go All The Way

by Jason HollandMay 24, 2017May 29, 2017

Charles Bukowski’s poem Roll the Dice tells of the freedom that comes from putting yourself on the line, and holding a line. Go all the …

“If you want to awaken all of humanity, then awaken all of yourself. If you want to eliminate the suffering in the world, then eliminate all that is dark and negative in yourself. Truly, the greatest gift you have to give is that of your own self-transformation.”
― Lao Tzu

“They want obedient workers. Obedient workers, people who are just smart enough to run the machine and do the paperwork. And just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime and vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it.”

-George Carlin

Spanish proverb: honra y provecho no caben en un saco (Honour and money are not to be found in the same purse)

“I could not become anything; neither good nor bad; neither a scoundrel nor an honest man; neither a hero nor an insect. And now I am eking out my days in my corner, taunting myself with the bitter and entirely useless consolation that an intelligent man cannot seriously become anything, that only a fool can become something.” – Fyodor Dostoevsky, Notes From Underground

“A path is only a path, and there is no affront, to oneself or to others, in dropping it if that is what your heart tells you . . . Look at every path closely and deliberately. Try it as many times as you think necessary. Then ask yourself alone, one question . . . Does this path have a heart? If it does, the path is good; if it doesn’t it is of no use.” – Don Juan, Carlos Castaneda

Hunter S Thompson on the 60s & Bay area from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas:

“There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda. . . . You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. . . .

And that, I think, was the handle—that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting—on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. . . .

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark—that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.”

“We don’t receive wisdom; we must discover it for ourselves after a journey that no one can take for us or spare us.” – Marcel Proust

Essays

The Commodification of Art – Redux

by Jason HollandFebruary 27, 2025February 27, 20250

Art resonates because there is something true behind it. All art has at least a grain of truth, and the more truth layered within a…

Essays

Hippie Jesus Isn’t Down with Capitalism

by Jason HollandApril 14, 2024April 14, 20240

I found some quotes in the Bible that I thought were pretty radical to the contemporary mindset. It seems convenient how so many Christians just…

Essays

On Rage and Non-Acceptance

by Jason HollandMarch 26, 2024March 26, 20240

There’s no doubt about it, I’ve struggled with numerous bouts of rage in my life. Those moments have become more rare as I age however…

Essays

Why Peace Is Impossible in Western Society Part III

by Jason HollandJanuary 23, 2024January 23, 20240

“They're profiting from your worry" - Andrew Bird, Bloodless To read prior installments: Here for Part I. And Part II here. In this series…

Essays

Why Peace Is Impossible in Western Society Part II

by Jason HollandOctober 7, 2023May 1, 20240

In case you missed it, part I can be read here. There are common patterns in societies that operate like a giant pyramid scheme. They…