Vaulting canyons soar on high
Shadows vast in orange sun,
Expedition treads the stones
Of exploration Mars begun.
Shifting sands in freezing breeze
Desolation’s red extreme,
Lifeless in the breathless air
As yet, no living thing be seen.

But soon…
Found beneath the rust red plain
Of ancient planet Mars afar,
The relics of an ancient tribe
Of humanoids who fled the star.
Humanoids so far advanced,
Far beyond our knowledge bounds,
Far beyond our comprehension’s
Grasp of that which now, confounds.

Far advanced but still despaired,
Despite the organisational skill,
Destroyed the lakes and seas of Mars
With need and greed and get and kill.
Destroyed the soft green slopes of grass,
Destroyed the gentle surge of surf,
Destroyed tomorrow’s promised day
With need and greed, for what they’re worth.

Buried deep within the sands
Soaring spires of cities great,
Skeletons of millions caught
By greed’s black devastation’s hate.
Greed’s black hand which gambled all
On fate’s capitulated hand,
To smite the delicacy of
This planets eco-balanced land.

Mars collapsed with quick accord
The atmosphere constricted, cold.
Vegetation died en masse
Population withered old.
A frantic few survived to flee
With silver ark to virgin Earth,
(Where dinosaur now roam the shores),
To resurrect a new rebirth.

A new rebirth in promised land
Where old mistakes should not be made,
Where simple rules shall stay the hand
Of they who walk in light and shade.
A new rebirth on planet Earth
Will guarantee a life of gold
To future generation’s child
Who shall, (we promise), grow, safe, old.

Alas- a promise poorly met
A stipulation we decree,
We who stand at ruin's gate
And planetry destruction see.
We, the children's children's child
Who stand in rust red, windblown sand,
Who look towards our distant Earth
Now do declare your promise bland.


Marshalg
On the eve of man’s great push to planet Mars.
25 May 2013
Pukehana Paradise.

Floating through a crowded space
Of turning heads and curious eyes.
An echo of the worlds embrace,
A fleeting struggle your mind denies.

Once accepted, strong, a friendly face,
Yet as earth turns around each day,
Confidence falls, sand through lace.
Each moment poised a shade of grey.

A ridiculous cry you know its true,
Yet something gets ahold of you.
It grasps your breath and feeds your soul
Of bitter noise, now less than whole.

Just snap out of this silly game,
A dangerous sport too much at stake,
A lifes at risk, more than a name.
Endurance more than you can take.

This too shall pass, repeat, repeat,
Struggle on, hold your head up high,
Stand and stay upon your feet
We never want to see you cry.

The Minutes pass by
disregarding my wails.
They don't bother helping;
With only sixty seconds to exist,
I wouldn't expect them to stop for me.

The Hours' fists crash into my skull
creating a constant clangor resonating through my brain
exciting my ego,
electrifying regrets.

The Days...
Oh those god-damned Days.
They see me confused and so seize their chance;
they pull out my feet
right from under my frame,
and helpless, hurt,
I collapse to the earth.
And now begins their fun.

The Months form gangs called 'Years'
and The Years take their turn
breaking my joints, my fingers, my knees,
all my snappable, crackable points.
Curved, crippled,  and creaking,  
I languish in fantasies of what's supposed to be.

Time makes things worse.

A dark shadow moves over me.
I look up  as far as I can lift my heavy head
and like a fat man coming to rest on an ant's back,
I see The Decades with their massive, soul crushing weight
squatting their hindquarters;
oppressively,
down upon my twig-like spine.

This is a merciless beating!
This is the beat of time.

And throughout the abuse,
I crawl, cringe, cower
as safe as can be in a low lying state on the ground,
(which is still six feet too high for all that time cares!)
I hear from somewhere afar
an unfaltering decree
from my maker to me
"Stand up straight! For Heaven's sake!"

I sit in the sun room, I am shaded for the sun
is only newly risen, low slung, just above the horizon,
behind me, over my shoulder, early morn warm

Slivers of sun rays yellow highlight the wild green lawn,
freshly nourished by torrential rains of the prior eve

The wind gusts are residuals, memoirs of the hurricane
that came for a peripheral visit, your unwanted cousin Earl,
in town for the day, too bad your schedule
is fully booked, but he keeps raining on you,
staying on the phone for so long, that the goodbye,
go away, hang up relief is palpable

The oak trees are top heavy with leaves frothy like a new cappuccino,
the leaves resist the sun silvers, guard the grasses
from browning out, by knocking the rookie rays to and fro,
just for now, just for a few minutes more,
it is advantage trees, for they stand taller in the sky
than the youthful teenage yellow ball

I sit in the sun room buffered from nature's battles external,
by white lace curtains which are the hallmark
of all that is fine in Western Civilization,

and my thoughts drift to suicide.

I have sat in the sun room of my mind, unprotected.
with front row seats, first hand witness to a battle unceasing

Such that my investigations, my travails along the boundary line
between internal madness and infernal relief from mental pain
so crippling, is such that you recall begging for cancer or Aids

Such that my investigations, my travails along the sanity boundary
are substantive, modestly put, not inconsiderable

Point your finger at me, demanding like every
needy neurotic moderne, reassurance total,
proof negative in this instance, of relevant expertise!

Tell us you bona fides, what is your knowing in these matters?

Show us the wrist scars, evidential,
prove to us your "hands on" experiential!

True, true, I am without demonstrable proofs
of the first hand, my resume is absent of
razors and pills, poisons and daredevil spills,
guns, knives, utensils purposed for taking lives

Here are my truths, here are my sums;

If the numerator is the minutes spent resisting the promised relief
of the East River currents from the crushing loneliness that
consumed my every waking second of every night of my years of despair
                           divided by
a denominator that is my unitary, solitary name,
then my fraction, my remainder, is greater than one,
the one step away from supposed salvation...

Yet, here I am sitting in the sun room buffered from
nature's battles by white lace curtains which are the hallmark
of all that is fine in Western Civilization

I am a survivor of mine own World War III,
carnaged battlefields, where white lace curtains,
were not buffers but dividers tween mis en scenes,
variegated veins of colored nightmares, reenactments of
death heroics worthy of Shakespeare

Did I lack for courage?
Was my fear/despair ratio insufficient?

These are questions for which the answers matter only to me,
tho the questions are fair ones, my unsolicited voyeur,
they are not the ones for which I herein write,
for they no longer have relevance, meaning or validity,
for yours truly

I write poetry by command, by request, good or bad,
this one is a bequest to myself, and also a sidecar for an old friend,
who asked in passing to write what I know of suicide,
unaware that the damage of hurricanes is not always
visible to the naked heart

These hands, that type these words are the resume of a life
resumed,
life line remains scarred, but after an inter-mission, after an inter-diction, an inter-re-invention
in a play where I was an actor who could not speak
but knew every line, I am now the approving audience too...

But I speak now and I say this:
There are natural toxins in us all,
if you wish to understand the whys, the reasons,
of the nearness of taking/giving away what belongs to you,
do your own sums, admit your own truths
query not the lives of others, approach the mirror...

If you want to understand suicide,
no need to phone a friend, ask the expert,
ask yourself, parse the curtains of the
sun room and admit, that you do understand,
that you once swung one leg over the roof,
gauged the currents speed and direction,
went deep sea fishing without rod or reel
and you recall it all too well, for you did the math
and here I am, tho the tug ne'er fully disappears,
here I am, here I am writing to you,
as I sit in the sun room.

Memorial Day, 2011

"You are beautiful."
That is what they say,
and you reply,
"Thanks, you too."
A compliment, received and courteously relayed.

But what is really meant by this statement?

"You are beautiful."
Implies the speaker has identified that you exist—nothing out of the ordinary, but important nonetheless.

"You are beautiful."
Implies something much more—that the speaker not only acknowledges you, but understands you. It implies they have access to the real you, the one beneath the surface, and that they are capable of evaluating it. Notice that "You look beautiful." is not what has been said. No, what has been said is much more than that.

"You are beautiful."
This is their evaluation. Through the lens of their own perception, what they see when they observe who you are is best described by the word "beautiful". From my perspective, this can only be taken as a sign of deep appreciation, of recognition from one soul to another that on some level, they share the same substance.

Yet, knowing all of this raises a great suspicion. Do those who make this statement truly understand what they are saying? Do they mean it? Did they mean to say, instead, "You look beautiful."? Did they even mean anything at all? Did they give this compliment for the mere sake of giving it, or did they give it with the expectation of receiving something in return?

Do they know of the tension behind your smile? Do they know of the fear residing in the dark pools of your eyes? Do they know that the way you present yourself is often done in spite of how you truly feel?

Do they know, deeper still, of the tiny, yet unwavering flame that burns inside of you? Do they know that underneath the layers of frost that guard your soul is a core of warmth that craves release? Do they know that deep down, you don't believe the horrible things you tell yourself—you can't believe them—, but that it's much easier to pretend otherwise? Do they know that you numb yourself to escape unrelenting pain, often at the cost of escaping joy?

When they say you are beautiful, is it this you they speak of, or is it the you they see but do not understand?

Does their statement stand against who you are by trying to convince you of a self-image you do not have? Does it attempt to ignore, and by ignoring, negate the fact that you possess flaws, insecurities, and imperfections? Does it try desperately to project an image of perfection upon you, as if to acknowledge the truth would be too difficult?

Do they really think you are beautiful, or do they merely want to think it, blindly and without commitment?

Of the answers to those questions I am not certain. But, if I were one of those speakers who dared to make such a bold statement, I would be very careful. For if they are not truly ready to admit with full honesty that they understand exactly the meaning of what they are saying, then they do not deserve to say it.

And if they do not deserve to say it, then they ought to be careful of another thing, too. For if their compliment is not genuine, then the response they receive in return might not be genuine, either.

"Thanks. You, too."
Oh, really,
I am beautiful, you say?
Thanks. You, too.

O' Warped Tour

On the hot blacktop we stand
In front of your various stages

The beautiful bands grace us with their angelic,
or if they prefer, demonic, voices.

O' Warped Tour

The people we meet
Girls in bikinis

Boys with bloody noses
Teenagers sitting on shoulders

O' Warped Tour

Mosh pits in the front
Singing in the back

Crowd surfing
To running circle pits

O' Warped Tour

With your merchants
And band autographs
With your cigarette smoke
And crazy teens
With your summer days
And loud music

We never want to leave
O' Warped Tour
We love you

You gave me a copy of your final art exam piece,
I recall.
It's still stuck right there, you know,
On the wall beside my bed.

Beautiful;
A scene of nature.
Green woodland,
A gentle stream.
There's a mountain in the background, with a castle on top.

And me, in the foreground,
Oh, how lovely of you.
I remember, you took my photo in front of that big green tree.
In the woods by my house.

I wore only shorts and a vest, despite the cold weather.
(I remember the goosebumps.)
I couldn't wear much, you didn't want my clothing to be too visible;
You wanted to transform my body, into the trunk of a tree.
As if, I wore
only bark and moss.
Oh, but why, oh why?

When people saw my bare arms and shoulders, you told me that
they asked you, whether I was naked when you took it.
''WELL, OBVIOUSLY...''
I remember, when you told me what they'd said,
I laughed.

I've never liked my face in that picture.
What is my eyebrow even doing?
And I've never quite been sure about the shape of my cheeks.

In fact, if anything,
I've only ever really liked my hand.
My wrist, quite thin,
and somehow my hand has a delicate look about it;
The fingers curved at the ends,
The cold had made them pink and soft.

Oh but, why, oh why, Darling?
Why of all things,
Did you have to make me a tree trunk?
Strong and sturdy.
With the moss,
And that other tree, the one that clung to me,
Twisting, growing around me.

There's nothing I can do now,
but stand here and watch you evolve.
Oh, you told me to get help baby, but what if I didn't want it?
To me, there's only ever been one solution.

But, you made me the tree trunk,
It's what you did.
And now you need me,
Now you grow from me.
Now you cling to me.

No, I cannot stir now.
For, I am a tree trunk, (I need to be strong and sturdy)
And now I know, only too well, that if ever I were to fall,
I would be bringing you down with me.

Death has many hands to do his dirty work
But one is always occupied with me

His hand is around my throat
Suffocating me

I have a narrow ledge that I like to stand upon
This ledge is called suicide

If I should step off my ledge
Well you know

Death's bony fingers would win my battle
A victim of suicide in his noose

At her desk, paper and pencil forsaken
She sought to create as she contemplated
But the feelings were mixed and shaken
By the quakes of over-complication

Energetically bound, her fingers stroked
As new words would emerge from her mind
And the keys were played like musical notes
Hinting at a thought somewhere betwixt the lines

So she's standing on the edge
Of a book that she's read
At least a thousand times
And the moon disappears
As the storm draws near
But she knows it's alright

Her eyes were closed as she absorbed
The entanglement of perceptions
Owned by the world so wildly perturbed
And dreamed despite delusional deceptions

They had spread throughout her head
As a gas might fill any kind of chamber
With poisonous conundrums that fed
Off the ink that runs on and off the paper

Now she's standing on a cliff
Scribing ancient glyphs
On a computer monitor
Then she thinks of just herself
For once, not anyone else
And comes to find her alcazar

Inside are hooded, masked silhouettes
At a ritual to create disharmony
Heads low, palms up they whisper a hex
Hoping to destroy her sovereingty

As the boiling rage begins to rise
She walks slow as her figure transforms
Walking on all four, she multiplies in size
And let's out a lioness' fearless roar

The wizards hit the walls
But the shadows stand tall
Until a beam of light emerged
From her mouth came wisdom
And the shadows fell victim
To her willpower determined to purge

And she wakes from her nap
She looks up at the screen
And types away
She writes away