Neo-gilded era of neon lights that torment burning
taking the darkness out of shadows where lost cicadas chitter, lurking
above, one resplendent eye, dizzily always, turning
dry scales, old fangs lay about a serpent admires its naked form
it rises over the chapel and the cloud to bite the dove
now to feel its power surging, in this flesh reborn
with no ribs to cage, no heart-to conscience, to page; no love

Ageless aeons daemons themselves could nary grasp
this posing colossus, beautiful and eternal, shines on
not for worship or admiration, how small it is that tinier they seem
when in its glory they so openly bask
professing, consoling, confiding and watching, knowing it will be there when they are gone
knowing if nothing else is certain, there are many generations still this eyelash will bat upon
hanging there when they are none, as regular every day as the dawn.

Oh, child
you look so disheartened
your hair in knots and eyes full of dreams unrealized
all the space in your head is burning kindling, all smoke and sadness, all rooms occupied

Be like water
which is a key to life, free and fulfilling
never breaking, ever-bending, the ashes you clean from your nails
when you stand again and face the world, knowing your will is never ending

All people are an ocean unto themselves
their depths and intensity as severe
every bit as full of life, ever flowing
and they break off into rivers and streams and falls
which change the land forever, often never knowing
that no one is so dark, so shallow and alone

I want to drown beneath the surface of a human
and love them for what they are, imperfect and dishonest
teeming with faults and bubbles
but I am a troubled wave, crashing and rolling
content to wander the vastness at best
while passing all these glimpses into my own sinking abyss
I follow a star and hope it's enough to lead the weary to rest
oh, child you would have such a different life than this.

Why don't we worship the amygdala, make it sound exotic, start a fever-fire in the tropics, pour ice over the horizon via helicopter, view the mind's eye like a crystalized Shambala, sell entry to inner-peace to create the illusion and wall the dam, there's no concept of reality without a sham, low as the almighty dollar, processed meat behind bars get your necktie pulled through your collar, I've been all over the world from the edge of my seat, I'm what you could call a stay-at-home road scholar

You braggarts, *******, maggots and fascists
politically correct censorship-sailors and catfishes
you politicians and career-victims, you're all slapstick
you talk too much and don't hold water
you bark at false alarms and pet yourselves because even a broken watchdog is right twice a day
and then ignore every other crisis you called all hands on deck to, raised arms to crush in uproarious righteousness like you were the voiceless minority's own private militant flyswatter
everybody has a voice, we're all screaming or sitting in silence, tired and apathetic
I'm going deaf, I've lost it and I can't keep beating this dead hoarse, the whole world has issues, why are we making such a meal out of ourselves like we were the main course
ever since being put in the spotlight when Columbus sailed up onto the wrong shores
you can recite the diddy of fourteen hundred and ninety two, but you know why Native Americans were called Indians is because he set sail for India initially, don't you?
I have little hope the future will even be able to keep the ocean blue

The only thing I learned in school was psychological warfare, every day since I first set foot on those grounds I've taken live rounds and dealt my hand from the bottom because you can bet on the flop life doesn't turn up fair, it's too much to ask for someone else to care, read from a script for drugs, your alcoholic or *** deviant teachers whisper be-wary of thugs, down sleeping pills, painkillers and my daily dose of brain-fire extinguisher with *** from one of those best dad mugs, it never fails that when you go chucking snails, karma turns around and reminds you why you have to watch out for disgruntled slugs

You might catch one with your name on it
slower than you imagined, this grueling dawn hits
the purple of the sky lines up with the shade of skin under your eye
it's like makeup made to match, a tone only being sleepless for so long
or being on the business end of a fist can really catch, unnatural beauty looks so wrong
it's become normal to manufacture sell and lie, be a product, a marketing scheme
wanting to lean into exposure, explode and fracture and leave behind a profitable footprint to follow at the launch site
it's inhuman, to be switched on for twenty four hours, seven days a week, to be a character, it's obscene
and to defend this are small armies, cute little consumers who don't think beyond the opinion placed before them, placemat bib and all
dissent is negativity, disagreement is not normalcy, it's not okay, you're attacking someone who's so important to me, they literally saved my life
insult and rant, sob and bawl
unless you were personally given chest compressions, or they showed up and held your head so you wouldn't swallow your tongue while you OD'd, and then helped you back from suicidal depression
I don't care if you've shared a stage and danced and sang together, all people are equal
and none of them worth what they think they are, good, moot, or evil
so you can waltz up to a celebrity getting into their car, pop them off and become a shooting star

Sit on the curb and crack a spine, the Catcher Murders loosely spun a web and cast a net all through a grimly imagined fascination of mine, what candid activity to activate a conspiracy for an elected representative on who gets to live, give me the nominee for Manchurian candidacy! Violate the vile walls of a small mind's sanctity, the moral composition of even the purest person is only sound in theory, threaten their family, test their temptations, loyalty and mortality, fill their head with supposition, non-disclosure to time of day, information, no exposure to familiarity, turn what they think is false inside out and convince them what was never real was all along a secret reality, watch them break their neck to stare directly into an eclipse like it was their fealty, to disable themselves in service to pushing out of their skin and beyond their own ability

Mind control is simply too powerful to be stopped at a question of whether or not it's ethical
if I wrote this while someone dictated it, with a gun in one hand while they fed me an acid strip
and I knew they had complete deniable culpability, say for example if they worked for the Central Intelligence Agency
and they were abducting citizens from America and Canada, for one big experimental acid trip
to create Whitey Bulger and Ted Kaczynski
I mean, I know everybody hates to hear other people whine, you fall on your knees in thoughts and prayer for or worship on forums shooters like the murderers at Columbine,
when every day someone provokes a loner, outright pressing them to slip into a violent state
I begrudge myself a few hard feelings against people, but I wouldn't **** time to squash my hate
a child with a gun is an adult making bad decisions, the grey area is a lot harder to see when you're sorting through footage of dead children, bullet-torn classrooms haunting your nightly visions
everything is a joke and everyone laughs in the privacy of their own shadow
when their standards in public are much higher, where there's smoke there's not always a real fire
how can you police yourself, live up to the idea of who you think you are right now,
don't look for an answer, go on and say it, how?

Expound upon your idea

I recognize the tired eyes, the fading light, the manic battery and the desperate, clinging plight, that even I am giving up on me, when I look back and see a...
mistake like a tear in the fabric of my old green jacket, I'd pull it apart until I could slip a fist through the eye of the needle needed to repair the damage, the shell I come out of, the truth is I long to bury the hatchet but I've held on to some grudges so long I get within a hair's breadth and then I can't hack it, I take another log for the fire, chop it and stack it
I know peace is an option, I could achieve it and maintain it
but I'm insatiable, there's a volatile pull, there's insecurity in the wiring, my outlet
is draining, it pains me to say
there's something wrong in my brain
that when everything is just fine
it's just not right, that means something is going to go horribly wrong

I don't think I could utilize speech effectively, or write well enough, enough times to ever explain

That I am a button for rock bottom trap-door astonishment,
I am not a glutton for punishment, there's something more that loves to fight and prove your
investment, your time and emotion, is all a waste, I'm a trashcan Adonis in a recycled establishment
I need to prove that no matter what real good I actually do, I am a double negative, there's nothing I can't; I'm no good for you
that's why I circle back around like a confused vulture, pecking at my own living carcass before I go back to ground like an ashamed, sad clown, because I will captain and drown a relationship
I identified love, a necessity, a red flag thread, a wire to a suicide vest that almost set me off
and I cut my own heart out, detonated it, the fuse behind my eyes is a live wire, the sparks don't fly once the dynamite is lit

It all comes down to duality, hypocrisy, evil and me

Mischief, you probably think that means pranks
think in terms of death to the invulnerable, okay, thanks
somehow, you never want to be the way you are
I find with remorse, it waits to bite until things go too far
and these ideas penetrate my thoughts like venom dripping on my head
resulting in the comeuppance, another defeat, loss, personal humiliation, self-appointed proxy-given scar
I try to lie to myself about it all, that I'm going to do better, be better, change, reshape and restructure
when it seems I'm the sliver of a tooth away from sensible goals, a man I can be proud of, a conjecture whirlwind sweeps me with hindsight and conjuncture
preying on the weakest, softest sides of my wounded, pitiful pride, until I need to snap this rope and act like all along my hands were tied
and with no regard or respect, no honorable or honest intentions I will destroy and employ tactics that are somehow meant to reassure me of my reputation
the resulting aftermath which is always beyond the worst of imagination, destroying all realms their bridge and leaving alone one sickly mind with ice in stolen veins, ****** red eyes, hands washed in the void-river of time in gravitation, a creature whose humanity is stored and fired to fill this vainglorious vessel with precious vanity, having deceived all, achieved naught, and bought with its soul, sold on its personality, solely the lie of being a person, hollowed out by devastation, held hostage by its need for attention, in self incarceration, a slave for approval, for validation.

I'm feeling paranoid again
about this real life cone of silence
these close friends of mine
and I suffocate on my instincts, the walls are closing in
when I look for a helping hand I don't know if I'm reaching or
lashing out, I can't tell if this is a fist anymore
I cross my arms and hold myself tight
I can't betray another trust
this fear is the poison that cyclically excuses my vitriolic behavior
I will sweat it out cold turkey, until I drench the bone
hobbled and still standing, emerging,
an addict to the mischief that alienates me, I love the conflict
and hate myself for it, social anxiety riddles me, how do I overcome self-destruction alone?

Matter sometimes just occurs accidental
from nowhere, never nothing, appearing transcendental
colliding like bad alchemy, occupying occupied space
fusion of foreign material subject to abject objects' pent-up mental
collusion-cohabitation, no attraction or slight gravitation, crash/race
= excited particles all jumping about, throwing confetti while they thrash the place
atomic action minus radio ***** with a dash more of a dramatic backdrop clash hashed in
makes for a grand tour, the whole world is a blueberry slush in your hands don't just stand there, pour!

Serrated stainless, chipped, painkillers ****** these sensations, but the nerves have no endings, it's not actually painless
giving up on everything for investments only to lose more and gain less
it's all a cavalcade of roosting home, big-top overplayed charades, more dimensions through this wormhole than a tank parade
equate to nothing, nameless and faceless, headlong charge, chicken without bluffing
the frontier of teleporting, walls with ears and eyes an infrastructure chock with innovations in suffering and human-stuffing
organic computers all running an opera from the balcony to the stage crammed inside
on the edge of calling fire in their own crowded theaters just to get off the ride.

Sing for me, why?
    This stone does not care for your stories
while wars may come and go now without me
nobody come around here and cry

Pray for me, no rye?
Today, still your heart and worries
I cannot hold out hope; raise a glass and say goodbye
rather in the blur of cheer this moment, than forever here
beneath a king's blue sky

If you have a time for panic
then can you spare a second?
I have a name for strength
and a name for destruction
these are both not me, simultaneously being who I am
this infectious calling beams down
assuring in its cacophony of voices
invisible fists who pummel my head into the ground
that tomorrow is only an idea, whose realization relies on choices
letters fall away, shielding me from harmful rain that falls like angelic pain in the brains where all this noise is

Hope is greater than the itching, nervous skin of teeth
you don't need faith, only know yourself and bear with one belief,
every day you triumph over yesterday, while tomorrow never was
today is always right now, speak on the future with your dominant intent; zero pause
if the future was a guarantee, what stakes in the present would there be?

PAINT!

A cacophony of colors oozing forth
brushes tied to snails, trailing down the walls
gently leaving, grieving, berea ing, absent-minded
flooded buckets returning gravity through a hole in the ceiling
an uplifting sort of sinking feeling
rapidandvapiandtepidanddesperatesoundingthoughtsalarmingandtoofa­sttokeeptrackofnolove
one peace, not yours
no one's peace

manically depressed, laser toting showboating unknowing
shiny-newborn robots

Genius
not in this species
not I, nor us
no, not in any branch of these trees
tiers sprout from the infinite and looping possibilities
reforming and collapsing in on themselves in an endless artful expanse
of compounded implosion, colonization, conquering power of far-reaching negativities

DEATH!
to the sound of a dozen different solos all playing in isolation
all masterpieces in their own right, all together sensory devastation at once
beat this worshiped slime to a pulp, beyond recognizable satisfactory sensation
make noise mean something by making a void contain value,
to cross the stranglehold of you for unreason, ****** the future nobody wants,
the future is dead and we killed it
the future is dead and we killed it
I saw its corpse
now I feel it!

The future is dead the future is dead the future is dead the future is dead the future is dead and the future is dead and the future is dead and we and we and we an d w e k   i    l        l    e     d   i    tomorrow

more as usual.

Set, cross-legged in a state of meditation
so deeply descended, seeming asleep
while alert at the station,
this liberation, is fear incarnate
the more the chains fall from ankles and wrists
and waters of the world flow with sweet, free bliss
the farther away the pain with each shackle slips
it is a question whose burden one never forgets:
am I an artist? If I cannot create while in a state
of stabilizing happiness
then, am I a poet or a madman
that writes all with fervor, no flavor
convinced every work is my last word, as sure of myself as I can
beaten, enraged and broiling, a canvas that is red I turn into
a stark, dark, unfair and biased portrayal, my visage I make true
that passion destroys me and fuels this melodrama
all my greatest failures I love so, oh, I do
all the greatest works I've ever written came from dust; desolation I gave rise to.

How do you write like you’ve got a bomb strapped to your chest?
Any breath you take could be your last, this better be a will and testament
these words have to be the ones that defy death, they better be your best
they will outlive you, every moment they give you is a gift and this is a pen-ultimate test
everything I say, every sentence is a commitment, to be knocked out
I give everything to writing, two percent other elements
and I might be lucky to get someone to shout

That the words are too
the paragraphs need to be
much, moved down a touch
you are peeping toms, you see
there’s poetry in motion and trains building a full head of steam before they leave the station
I’m a locomotive about to explode and my brakes are on, we can fight about
what I write and how, the meaninglessness of life until the break of dawn
you’re off the rails with the thoughts you only think I’m on
I’d cut your house in half with a sharp word, watch those cards fall
apologize to your mother’s ghost for the collateral
family matters, I didn’t mean to **** them all

Oh, what the hell
take this all back a spell
I said every key I hit unlocks another moment
this is my torment, I love it, it’s a test
and I am consistent with giving an F; I keep hitting L
for life, for freedom, and the pursuit of madness, call it enlightenment
crumple up the paper, turn the page over,
embrace choking, strangling entanglement, anarcho-consumerism and politics, order and silence are best friends, I like my music loud, box your ears and deliver me an anarchist, the end is nigh and near, summon all your mounted heads and sainted dead, the sacred stand over your banners where you fall from port to land and mouth back to hand, are you boys proud now, forced a topical message like a burn ointment, crammed into something I said like yes doctor, I’ll call back and [forget immediately to] make my next appointment

Stress impacts the mind
it’s like dropping a pebble onto jello
shocking how predisposed to flaws we’re designed
I’m a head chairman when it comes to being stuck in mine
these gurus all come at the tree of life and how you’re living
with reflexive hindsights attached to their asks,
breaking down every aspect, until gelatin, water, and cold is what they’re given
they eat brains and swing axes
they’re choppy already, trying to expose glitches, digging posts ditches  
profiteers off dread that knows there’s no new frontiers, making illusions out of tears and magic happen here, talents and loose morals, heartless deadbeats, that’s what a life hack is

I never met another writer I didn’t root for, even secretly,
with degrees that shield them from criticism, burn up arguments on proximities
“This is my office. It’s a safe space and GET A LOAD OF THEEEEESE!”
I get it, you stormed the kingdom and took the keys
now you get to sit there in the same chair and talk to messy heads like me
but I get to sit here, and I have the same chair, and I don’t owe a college money
I get to be a mess and you get to deal with it, I can’t even befriend that out of somebody
and we get to talk about my writing like it’s the most important thing I do
but we skirt real issues because no one gets paid enough to handle what’s really true
and that’s why if time was a human being, I’d beat them like they owe me money and I’d collect double on behalf of you
and you’d condemn me for it, but I quit therapy and dreaming, locked it up and stored it
long as it’s not me, like dying, I’m all the more for it

I don’t have faith
in you
I see the similarities
in you
I’m not a man for family, I’ve got so little love left I can feel the ticking when a swell of emotion fills up in my chest, counting down like a held breath
I couldn’t express the things that I actually feel with enough clarity to a reader with letters by post anymore
my audience is invisible and blind
I spend so much of myself currently that I have nothing left to give to anyone or anything, my writing is energy and effort over time which amounts to real currency
so, I guess I’m broke, white flags out, if I had any sense, I’d save two cents
but I’m trying to make you feel this one last time, so let’s rewind
it’s okay not to feel this way and this thing I need to say is really only for the blind
⠊ ⠇⠕⠧⠑ ⠍⠽ ⠋⠁⠞⠓⠑⠗ ⠁⠝⠙ ⠊⠄⠍ ⠎⠉⠁⠗⠑⠙ ⠎⠞⠊⠇⠇ ⠁⠞ ⠞⠓⠑ ⠞⠓⠕⠥⠛⠓⠞ ⠕⠋ ⠇⠕⠎⠊⠝⠛ ⠓⠊⠍

How do I write like there’s a bomb strapped to my chest?
I spin a round in my finger-gun, hold it up to my head and make suicidal idle threats
sitting paralyzed from the chest down and running out of breath
public consumption is a game of character portrayal, I rolled poorly on the sheet,
I’m a walking bad decision waiting to happen, and just when you convince me not to take action
I’ll desecrate your throne, passively worse, a lazy heel, sprawled out yawning, just kick up my feet
I can sleep just fine, but I’m never going to be a body at rest
I’m going to do something even if I can’t do my best
every day this bed becomes like Mount Olympus, the air gets thin and it’d be easier to stay down forever
but I’m no god, I don’t belong, I play the odds, we’d never get along, I’m Promethean and seething again, I’ll steal your fire for all mankind so we can compose roasts and songs, light in your shadows, if I stayed silent for twenty four hours, for seven days, for seven weeks, it means I’m going to crack open Hades with a message not safe for the ill and the elderly or the weak next time I slip Zeus’ beak and you see me speak

There’s no excuse, no simulation, no destiny, no red string can be my noose you cannot magic-lasso me, there’s no institution, no holding cell that’s not in my own body and if I detonated it would be with my own bottled up relentless anguish, anger, hatred and messy mania, that’s chaotic energy, I’d rather these messages get bottled and sent out to sea, find your corpses missing from a field of plague-stricken horses, going coastal with a special delivery, drop my friends off in the dead of night, I know the perfect jetty, I want darkness, put curtains up, break the lightbulbs and nail plywood boards in the windows, put bars up, cut off the electricity, smash the breakers and the fuses, blindfold and cut you horizontally across both pupils if anybody refuses, a primordial void doesn’t even reflect this accurately, show some putrid, vile neglect, before the stars dotted the universe, before humanity, before a blackhole even knew what light was, I need this introspection to match the same inflection of my recent constant, nagging, pull in that direction, to match the gravitas, the gravitational pull towards the murderous, malevolent and sharper, more aware and present, side of my personality who values my own life to such an extent that it takes more active engagement from me than I ever get, I’m nothing short of exhausted, knowing I could be a glass great-sword with what meek average I have in intellect, it’s nothing short of invocation, evoking ire and resentment, to go further I have to devolve, to achieve the pinnacle of my words and see my art evolve, I can’t outrun the world, I can’t be happy, and I’m no revolution, but as the world revolves I revolt with no jolt from the state of always being plugged in, there’s mediocrity in settling, I’ve amassed such a depth of debt to the past it’s built up a toxic venom that I’ll never outlast, I’m just trying to cast a bastion to keep my lines cast in and while I’m staying paralytically still I still feel like I’m going so fast I’m strapped in, I just roll with the loss of control because I don’t fight the spiral, I know how this did happen, even though I’m going slow it’s no race; my life is over twice I’ve been lapped in, the change of pace is a joke to the deck with a few cards short, a full house to four aces, I’m a small hand away from a meltdown and a handful of crying faces, just keep changing gears and the cogs will lubricate, replace themselves and appreciate that being spared the machinations of a breaking down is mercy, if no one is close to me when this bomb strapped to me goes off, I hurt no one, and no one in turn hurts me, self-preservation and spared humiliation, that’s one way to eat yourself alive under fire in the situation, inside out, I spill my guts, no ifs ands or buts, nothing’s so dire, I write sometimes like I’m going to fight the monitor when I see it typed, and if the gate for the match is right I’ll believe I can deliver if I feel that hyped, I write like Atheists are right, like I write like God is spellchecking and Satan is rubbernecking, I write like the Grim Reaper is waiting for me to finish, I write like Big Brother has a special interest, I write like the page is endless, I write like I’ll be shot square in the brain and that’ll plain and simply end all surrounding suffering and pain, I write like my words mean everything and nothing, like I can change the world, I write like it’s the first time I held a hundred dollars in cash, I write with my knuckles white while my teeth grind and gnash, and I write like a thousand people are invested, it’s all the same to me if even one person is really interested.

Striped to the nines
these cats carry pig stickers
animal kingdom death comes quicker
shoeshine, no sunshine, grease ain’t slicker
chalked out in lines
lead bellies line mines
outlaws make laws, break jaws
drop jaws, buy cars, bank rob
live like all-stars, a full-time job
all-grime, an all-crime job
a romantic era of terror
splashy ink does injustice
while they sidle Fords with Thompsons
every John a Dillinger, every Romeo a Clyde
everybody comes to terms with hunger and iron
everybody comes to town either starry or steely eyed
they leave or stay forever, never rich enough to justify why these are the streets they had to die on
it ain’t pretty
black eyed beauties and black tied beaus
lies as easy as blood when the liquor flows
guns and love and money, everybody knows
it’s all business, question contracts and the details get gritty
you can get in clean
but you have to get your hands ***** in this city.


A blues musician blew through the nightclubs with his sound
the rhythm of struggle, poetry and soul come alive
one with his voice, his guitar, singing of how he strived
to make it to the bright lights, he thought it was a miracle he survived
songs of Southland and heartache, the sounds of a segregated culture thriving above ground
what scratch he could collect
he would make if he had to play until he broke his guitar’s neck
wise enough to only accept cash up front, no checks
he was not ashamed of a spotlight
a bluesman can’t be afraid
he tore down the house six nights
and on Sunday he prayed
when he heard his music on the radio, riffs and lyrics ripped and splayed
the mournful soul, howling moon, woeful pontifications and rhythms all butchered onto a premier
a darker, sadder set of eyes than he had ever seen fell back on him from his own rearview mirror
outside of a studio, champagne bottles broken on his back for white rock and roll
at some hour when the sun was too far to imagine rising
he found himself peering over the edge of a darkness in his soul
and the liberating relief was frightening, he wanted to force it to feel surprising
a brown neck and a half ago he traded his first guitar, offered to sign it, too
pawnbroker bought it off him for a bill or two, said “Why, who are you?”
He swapped for a pistol under-the-counter and the bullets
bought a couple bottles of liquid encouragement to help him think it through
he drove out to the record label where the thief was lauded on the air
sitting is his car with his last guitar, barrel scratching his head, parting his hair
he was half-awake, about to leave when he saw four people walking out of there
a quick release, trigger, clutch and gas, the conspirators who stole his soul collapsed,
he drove into town to sell it back one piece at a time just as fast.


Putty in palms
men melt in her gaze
Medusa couldn’t ****** a man as easily
Penny flies with fancy and never stays
she was the high school sweetheart, girl next door,
to the star quarterback, to the class president, who fought viciously over her
who were sidetracked brawling while she was romanced by promises of city life
which swept her off the suburban sidewalk, and deposited her in a diner
where a man would come to blows over her, promising to make her his wife
she led men to collide with one another, they called her the Lucky Penny
she loved the attention, flirtatious eye-batting and men being reduced to fools
it was nothing shy of flattery, her chest felt empty without superficial value
and what is a better showing of what you’re worth than what someone else is willing to do to someone else to keep you?
She never really cared beyond the surface for any of them at all,
until, of course, she was ensnared herself by becoming a moll
Penny would only go steady with someone as beautiful as she was,
this invited trouble to her diner, because
a pretty-boy gangster oversaw collections in the area, just as handsome, just as clean
every bit as petty as Penny, twice as angry, twice as spiteful, and twice as mean
he carried a switchblade knife, a jackboot blade, he would love an excuse to cut ribbons out of skin
he had the sharps in spades, sharp wits, looks, angles, and cuts, when they met Penny was already done in
pretty boy promised her the moon, gave her a pad, he made sure she stayed living in the lap of luxury as long as it was his lap, and she’d never step out of line after the first time he got mad
she was number three in a marriage, in over her head and scared for her life
Penny, the apple of every man’s eye, a prisoner, mistress, and second to a mafia wife.

Ruthless killers aren’t these snarling giants
they’re scrawny, little, barbed wire, white men
capable of extreme and unconscionable acts of violence
you never see them until it’s too late for status quo, still water silence
deeper though, you never know, a gun is just bamboo, a ball and black powder, light it
your next-door neighbor could be the next news-maker, a headline teenager
used to be you’d never know somebody got shot if they popped 911 on your personal pager
the world isn’t spinning any faster, but these gray matters will age ya,
I say, going postal isn’t even a clever turn of phrase yeah?

Sunup in the city, Chicago typewriters were dogearing a page in history
like firecrackers going off just before dawn, you could see them from a sky penthouse
the locations of every execution, it wasn’t a mystery
a plan went off without a hitch, an overtaking in the criminal industry
you can say it, business is booming
body-bags went out by the half dozen to a dozen spots, by noon sirens were still zooming
out of precincts, hearses and coroners, ambulances and firetrucks, police too
it wasn’t a warzone, it was a crime scene, every block everywhere, put tape around the whole county
you could bring every citizen in as a witness, they’d probably all have a statement, it was anarchy,
an entire organization was weeded out and killed, with efficient brutality, and get this, no payment offered up for a revenge bounty
nobody retaliated, they were emasculated, eviscerated, devastated and decapitated, nobody knew who held the keys to the city, but we knew to revere the new monarchy
and for months there was humidity so thick it made me sweat through my collar, an air of anxiety
terror is what you don’t know, can’t understand, aren’t able to feel, hear, or even see…


So, I’ll put a bomb in the mail, watch his face turn pale, stand outside the window
make his wife a widow, I’m not settling for the ironic justice he doled out
my life wasn’t nothing, but now it’s always something, ever since I sold my route
a job in this town is a weapon in the wrong hands, if you work for good folks, you’ll be met with injust demands
I delivered payroll for a law firm, took an armored van and stuck to plans
making sure paralegals and secretaries and partners see their paychecks, private sector, shotgun overhead on the rack, nine-millimeter on my side, and rifle in the back
same three to a car, I always drive, if you’re gonna hit us in broad daylight, it’s gotta be on Monday when we’re fully loaded, as we cross this bridge and you better promise we all stay alive
I get my cut, a quarter million, a Judas’ fee to guarantee the financial security of my family and we’ll be packing live rounds if you think of double crossing me, for our own safety
that day hits, we come across the bridge to a traffic stop
I was sweating bullets, my partner rolled down the window to talk to the cop
an accident ahead, then a sudden, deafening pop
now I feel the adrenaline flood, my face is covered with my friend’s blood
I’m kicking at the door, a ricochet bites my ear, I think my head is gone
but even if I’m dead I’m still running for dear life, I’m going on
I hear screaming, automatic gunfire, he’s shooting, taking them out with him,
he’s dying, I’m ripping my uniform off and ducking out, half-blind, the lights get dim
it’s days later, I’m contemplating the darkest things I’ve ever thought, outside a ***** cop’s residence
I’ve barely eaten, I’ve barely thought of anything except tracking this heist crew down, and now I’m showing hesitance
I’ve followed them since that day, I know this is it, they’re all inside, four bad men got rich and two good men died
one coward allowed it to happen, I’m gripping my sidearm, they won’t strip me of my pride, I don’t need any evidence
He kicks the door in, gun drawn on four men, their families just outside, seconds tick away, sweat drips, feet sway, chairs slide and casings clatter, he serves up an equalizer on a platter, that day it’s not a blue matter, it’s a blood splatter, eight dead, four thieves and three collateral, with a lone gunman at the heart of it all.

Fisticuffs always calls up a type of fighter, former priors
agents looking at delinquency like juvenile homes are boxing regency
adopt a son, own a slave, train him to fight for his home and do it all legally
coattail riding, meal ticket punching, a prizefighter raised from adolescence
to do one thing as soon as he enters a ring, turn lights out, win a money bout, leave opponent with no recollections
a colored boxer, killing competition in a record winning Olympic position
never shies away from trouble he tucks his chin and takes it double
always looking on the uppercuts, combinations break safes, open faces and break up guts
a contender for a spot, he’s dreamt of this, he’d give everything he has now away for this shot
it’s a chance at a chance, the only one he’s got
he loves his foster father and his foster mother and it feels like they’ve worked to give him a lot
sitting front row in reserved seats, while ten rounds pass,
his brain rattles in his skull, while they eat popcorn and sit on their ***
hands trembling in his gloves, slumped in the corner, cut the swelling eyes to let him see
he is dying ninety seconds at a time, how long can he last?
His masters don’t stand unless he falls, their love is slavery
these gloves that keep his hands in fists are new cuffs, they contain him, set him free!
He spits blood on the mouthguard, leaves his teeth on the mat, presses off on his knuckles and clears the ten count with the referee
eyes like a monster, he finally snapped, and wore the leather out
he proved his love was stronger than anyone and anything,
by beating his opponent into a fatal coma, in twelve rounds, blood pooled at silent spectator’s feet, as he continued to swing
it was an undercard they never forgot when he went back to prison and left it all in the ring.

Terror is what you don’t know, can’t understand, aren’t able to feel, hear, or even see
and for months I dreamt of what I saw that day with no lucidity
I was locked down in the tragic relivings of a marred, scarred up, firebomb charred memory
they look for the truth in their ink, why does that burden fall on me?
All I am is all I could ever be!
Dogged, **** tired, I put a cigarette out on my arm to see if I’m awake sometimes
sometimes I do it to see if I’m alive, after bearing witness to fresh hell, in some crimes
investigative journalism, my life’s work, it’s all dirt
digging for one breathtaking coffin, until my lungs hurt
it’s misery in a city of misgivings on loop for eternity
they know no one can stomach the bottom; even the bottom falls out
and the bowels and the guts spit up their disgust, the bile discussed their vile supremacy in doubt
but the duty still lands in my lap and I carry it readily if wearily
a good deed is unheard of, which is why the death of all factions
all fractions of crime, all at one time, all one action done on a dime, is killing me
I know there’s something more behind it all, that kind of slaughter would take an army
where does it begin, who’s covering up, lying and playing pretend, where does one thread stop when another one ends?
Am I standing in a web or a noose?
Am I cutting through a conspiracy or am I cutting myself loose?
I feel as if I’m suspended by my own suspicion!
I am lost and I’ve been more directly involved, more focused on a mission!
There are laughs in the walls of motels where I stay,
when I take my pills and check out for the night they giggle “Have a nice day!”
I’m sure of nothing, why do I know there must be foul play!
The streetsweepers must have an agenda, they must profit in some way
but they don’t come out of the woodwork to claim any coercion or pay
any heroics or fame, if any figurehead stood behind them, that person stands at bay
while I wait with bated breath, knowing one thing of murderers who achieve a getaway
that they either are assured of success enough to retire, or to attempt a grander feat of death…

Once an aging prima donna fell upon a spotlight
with all the natural talent of the charismatic, valorous and gallant, a comet in the starlight
she could sing and act and dance and grant wishes with magic if directed so
so, she was a child when she graced stages with her presence every night
crushing the pressure of performances that sink politicians by the sheer size
she could captivate and entertain, dazzle, razzle, sizzle, and shock a crowd
ahead of her time and curb and curtain, her cast and calling, producers she seemed to hypnotize
evoking the ire of every other actress, singer, dancer and magic woman living loud
she burst with color onto silver screens and took the world that was hers by any means, the masses she could mesmerize
even in black in white they fell in love with the gaze of her baby blue eyes
and the only thing to slow or stop this comet’s meteoric rise
was time, she was too old for the parts they wanted every woman for,
tapdancing and vaudeville, lounge singing and musicals, from the ivory tower to the first floor,
an aging prima donna, who would never want to play a bit role or a fill a hole well, she was a goner
she wanted to trailblaze, turn these old ways into new days
and she only needed new opportunities, a chance to shine in her advanced age
for the elderly actress desired to perfect an archetype in drama, beginning with one screenplay page
she wrote herself a major part, around the central cast, so the young talent could shine in the brighter lights, while she would create a legacy to outlast
and they look for her today in her films and wonder what changed to make it so,
that the energetic and happy woman lost all her glow, to go and wither into shadows where she would play the crone and cantankerous, conniving, lonely gypsy or old widow.

In a new era, a new form, the prizefighter came back, weathered the case
five to ten
years off the prime of his career
militant Islamic conversion in the joint, scowl permanently on his face
disowned his adopted home, disemboweled his circle to scorch earth for some personal space
and worked harder to prove he deserved to earn the boxing commission’s good grace
got his boots back on, never out of shape, kept them laced
older and slower, but stronger than ever, a lifestyle change is a new pace
he met a new agent, a man with his true interests at heart, cross it and hope
he’s representing the same faith, referral by a cellmate, representing the same race
he’s educated and well-dressed, his lawyers got lawyers who all send money upriver
so why would he ever sell a fighter downstream? He’s all about one color, one power
the power is cash and the color is green! He’s selling prizefighting like a butcher sells liver
looking at his prime killer like he’s working by the hour, like the man has never been here
he’s lost speed, gained mass, sore in the bones from time’s past and passed in the joint, he’s one night away from an official anoint-
meant, appointment with the king, a racial salesman who takes advantage of the divide to provide a talking point with his melanin
when he doesn’t care, he doesn’t even see people before him as more than cattle or less than human
and with every victory he’s seeing clear, the field he’s standing in is tall grass
he’s struggling to see the path he walked in on, but he’s got to keep burning through the gas
promotion, fight, rounds of blood and sweat, hand held high, interview gab, it’s not over yet
locker room politics, agents and deals, brands and lawyers and contracts, contacts, pagers and producers, politicians and televisions and business meals
he’s got a clear role on only one side of things, that’s why he lets the bird out of the cage because money talks and sometimes ******* sings
but when it comes down to trimming the fat, he earns his living in training and between the ropes in how he lives and how he wins when he swings
and he goes out with a record of sixty fights with eight losses and no contest, one of the most controversial champs to duke it out in those rings.

That they either are assured of success enough to retire, or to attempt a grander feat of death
I swear to ******* God I’m being followed ever since I left the last spot, it’s like the city knows I’ve been holding my breath
it started choking me, hands wrapped around my neck, I’m cut off from my office I can’t even cash a field check, I left my kids in the separation, this story is it, I don’t have nothing left
I’m chasing lights where there’s only flickering projectors, looking for the big picture at the point of origin
it’s never going to reveal itself to me, I hear the voices of professors trampling my voice again
the streets don’t just open up and take every killer, thief and ****** back, every assault charge and corrupt landlord, cop, lawyer and councilman
all the big fish swam away after the attack, like rats on a sinking barge, it’s their word full stop, against the everyman
but if the system breaks down at the point of their cogs, the people who do their ***** work, and witnesses all suddenly outnumber them with righteous indignation, armed and willing to catch a case then…
Who’s going to be left to clean up after that?
Three days, five days, eight, fully awake with the full realization, a health hazard with walls where I sat
the story of the century in my lap, I looked like warm crap, like something the buildings and streets formed teeth to chew up in their maw and back out they spat
figures not even the bones of this old gal would like the flavor of an emissary to the truth
I rattled my fist to the ceiling on the ninth day, kicked a rat of my mattress, pulled the story off my typewriter, and muttered “Let’s see how they like that!”
for the first time I saw daylight, I saw a kid standing outside waiting to rob me, hand in his pocket, he cocked a hammer and told me to drop it,
I stood frozen, sure everything was true if they were waiting to stop it going through the presses, I was ready to die when an old man came by, chased him off with a cane and yelled “Stop it!”
this boy dropped two rocks he clicked together to make a gun noise in his coat and ran, I was stunned and I just studied the face and thanked God for the old man
I interviewed him, a source for my civilian militia, and next week I was in a real bed in my apartment when they ran the issue.

Many months ago, something crazy happened, our family had a tight net over the whole city then it snapped and
lieutenants, enforcers, soldiers all turned on each other on the orders of opposing captains
we turned to our cops, sergeants and detectives, turns out their own were capped before then
cops were ******* with corruption and a lone gunman who hit their families and crossfire killed three kids, four men, rich thieves died poor men,
every single lawyer and city politician at that time was locked up with all eyes on the boxing commission and a homicide spree tied to a ******’ blues musician
it was like all the focus left and they let clowns just step in, meanwhile we were undermined by our own kind, greedy backstabbers and
they cost us the whole operation, cannibal rats, growing fat off our own hind end
in the confusion every two-bit hood and crook, every able-bodied gun and ******, every veteran and rookie, all the way from the bottom to the Consigliere got took,
I found the underboss hanging on to evidence that shut the Don out of the state from a firebombed butcher’s shop in the back by a meat hook, bullet riddled legs limp and falling off, a dozen dead thugs by a card game in the back, plates with cold steak and scrambled eggs
papers ran facts on the carnage, questioned the anarchy, only one washout journalist tried to explain
he must have racked his brain, put himself through so much pain,
in a blind spot there was just another crime, on a scale that looked insane
he said good people were out there, outnumbering the bad
that no matter the hard times, those breed helping hands from survivors who know what they’re like, because they see you having the same day they’ve had
his words were in print, but I felt them reaching out and the fingertips fell short of the grasp
he was a man drowning in senseless slaughter, coming up for air and that was what he saw in a gasp
I know they need hope, but they don’t know it like I do, it’s the environment that breeds the opportunity, otherwise we would never get away with what we do
people don’t make the city clean
you know what I mean
there’s a system, they operate it, a monolithic, twisted, broken glass jaw of a weaker species that spits spiteful and sick ****, it’s full of hatred, eyes red, bureaucrats that ******* cats to see them land on their backs, it only speaks the language of violent acts so it only understands you if you attack, everything in the string-pullers is the least of actual humanity, it’s forsaken because they are the most of what a person lacks, and we answer to their highest calling it’s brass tacks, it’s a blood tax, it’s a wish come true light the candle at both ends and wait until there’s no more wax,
the city isn’t *****, it was built by us, it wasn’t perfect when we got here, but we **** sure broke her trust, you either live the life you want or you die how you must.

Pick a mind from this bush
galaxies draw me off, I am repulsive
a weaker pull and a stronger push
the magnetic willingness of the world to give
up on this experiment, brittle dandelion dust, brushed off its face
let this inconvenient, insignificant human go and hold his breath in space
…
Would you just look at the stars with me?
I’m so sick of artificial lights
I need a natural night so desperately
would you just look at the stars…?
We are so arrogant to think they are ours.

I remember what it’s like
you can’t eat without supervision, going hungry at home
poverty gives the conscience permission
no new clothes, relatives giving me hand me downs
buying goodwill to weasel into my life for a day
when I needed them, where were they?

Don’t tell me who I am, how I’m living, don’t ask me loaded questions
if you want me to shoot myself in the foot, or shove my foot in my mouth
I’ll have to unwedge it from your backside, I come to converse armored in the truth
and I’ll accept defeat, leaving an argument saying everything I believe to be factual until I see proof
I remember being cold, I remember living in apartments we could not afford, no AC, sleeping on the floor, stomach rumbling, my big mouth, it was getting old, I’m not sorry it’s not like that anymore, I won’t sell you a pitch
but know you’re going to catch this if you think I’m looking down my nose, that I’m too good for the ditch, I lived in the ****, it’s where I was born, people you’re so close to seem to know you, and then they go off and show you,
I was too weak to raise my fists the first time I ever felt so ******
my head-rushed with blood, face-flushed, shoes caked in mud, walk around the grass to get it off, we ain’t wasting water from the hose, I wished my arms were stronger so I could bust (shall remain nameless) in their (faceless) nose, lord knows
I’ve been cussing like they forgot the black bar over my mouth since I first became aware of my surroundings, I was four years old or so, San Angelo, welcome to the South
tornado alley, welcome to my anxiety central around a point and rally, I’d visit grandma in Alabama and fight at the YMCA with kids on Summer Holidays, dad was working all the time, providing, he’s had **** near a hundred jobs, but I can say even when he’d want to punch me out, no doubt, having a good father pays
you tell me about how I was raised, your silver spoon theories are comically large, I remember walking home like the old folks tell you they did, through snow and humid heat, in Texas and Germany, never tell em it was just to save the credit card a tank of gas in the car, hop on the shoelace express and I'd lead charge

People keep coughing up gold about my childhood from out of thin air, I’m trying to be bigger than that, but this **** shines, I see it and once I get ahold of it I try not to care, it’s the stench that lingers getting to me, I step in these opinions that end up wishing that I’d just left theirs
I'm getting sick of it, being well off, I feel like a junkyard dog eating caviar out a silver bowl for the first time, friends look at me like I’ve never fell off this pedestal they put my whole life up for, I’m not suffering the same way, it’s not a crime
I didn’t inherit my wealth, I don’t even have it, this **** is a ******* hazard to my health
I lucked out by having two pair in a stacked deck, my parents actually care, apparently that’s very rare, they learned it’s imperative to work yourself to death for your people and keep hell warm for the ingrates when you get there
lunch table lawyers inquiring about divorces, I’ve taken leather to the mouth for talking back and my private life is still more intact than yours is
never grown-ups in Never Never Land talking like I approach life with two open hands
I never had a silver spoon near me until I could afford it without the debt
you want a story of overcoming, bootstrap pulling, here’s all you’re gonna get
I went hungry, couldn’t afford clothes, was a poor child, had trifling, **** talking, game playing, backstabbing family, I was lucky smarter people out-preyed the predators out to leverage children against wallets, they held me back for my own safety, sharper knives in that drawer than these bright ideas carried by sharks out to war, until you learn the angles these fish are going for, there were people to protect me and I wouldn’t ask for something more

I’ll pull my bootstraps up, pressing the sole of my whole right foot right down your neck if you ask me about my employment, earning, working, what I do, where and how and cashing checks, I love my friends like my family, but even they look down on me, I’ve been white trash, I was recycled, I’m only a grown man now, what more can I be? What’s next, everybody admires blue collar, I’m a shock collar, I’ll give you everything I can to help you to my last dollar, if you’re real just come over, ask for help, let me shoulder that chip with you, I love ya’ll, all you gotta do is holler
but all I hear lately, is your life is so great, like it always has been
my mind grinds to shut out thoughts, a broken gate, everything I hate and I have it all, a little money is just an invitation to revise history, roast and blister me, pretend like yesterday’s hardships sailed and the horizon they’ve gone over is somehow now a ******* mystery
I’d burn my money to fuel a future for my brother’s child, at the drop of a dime, I don’t want for anything but peace, love and respect, call on me for it anytime, until then I’ll keep to mine, my morality is out, that’s my conscionable spending-spree; ring me up before the **** bank gets to me.

I do not believe in you, beyond the flesh and bone, awaits my immortal throne, all this world is
ash and fallacies, you fall on knees to worship me, a false messiah, I despise the
ease with which I dominate your spiritualities, your bodies temples and I own the lease
with an iron grip on the leash, alligator tears fill a river, no denial, half life and half a trial
the grinding metal teeth, feed them your babies, until the stump foams with the entrails like the earth has gifted it rabies
insects in the meat particulates, springing forth and given birth, their lives are the meaning your sacrifices hide
I am the sword of union and unholy retribution falls with my decision to lay down the divide
I am the word of confusion and deathly distribution crawls through my incision whenever I decide
to cut a void in society, press a syringe to the vein and interject my opinion, you’d all better hold still and keep hope open wide!

We will post your heads atop the nicest parts of your downtown offices, turn storage freezers into sarcophagi
no horses herald the coming, an agent applied locally to our violence will prepare the area, they’ll be under waves after a thorough numbing
we will carve our kingdom from asphalt and concrete, no one can stop the foreseen before it is
Cyrus will not deny us, there is one cure to the sinful ways of thinking, treat individuality like a virus, join the cure and stand beside us
or be apart of a red sea when you see a whole army marching through your streets, upfield in boots with one goal, shaking the ground like we’re all wearing cleats, we’ll starve you out, believe we will besiege you so fast you’ll break by the time the bullhorn declares no one eats, secede defeat, you’re only programmable meat, spare the ammunition and we’ll only stamp you out in a shipment with our feet, to let the next settlement know they’ve been beat
now decry us, we condone violence, don’t leave us in silence, we’ll raise hell, **** your chosen, blow down your house and come back to burn you alive after you’ve been stuck outside, frostbitten and frozen, ask yourself if you want to bury the hatchet in your skull and wind up a missing person so no one knows then, tell yourself it’s for your own help if you listen when we talk and approach our sermon with your mind open.

Did I stutter?
The frame rate of my life has refreshed
ever alert, microphones intake the silence for a hint of mutter
counting fully textured, more risen bumps, now I am fully fleshed
I pull at my eyes to disconnect and only disarm myself of aid to my sight
I cover my ears to dull a damaged sense, tethered anchors float free downstream
on a river of memories, I weakly gesture to grasp them without much fight
the pain within them feels distant, I am aware and awake to see the inner workings of a dream

There is a primal instinct of fear
you cannot know what happens here
a curtain like a guillotine exists to separate
it falls like lead showers to incapacitate
if any wandering eye should ever peek
identify and patch the barrier, no area can be weak
our minds must be ever tricked and contained
by the upkeep of this beautiful craftsmanship, ever toiled over and maintained
we speak of the maze within, the pyramid to the god, our labyrinth and prism
that once illuminated would be rejuvenated, the spirit reincarnated in its peak form
the soul alight, a warden alone now elevated and free from the confines of prison
ultimate balance achieved in a host, a process complete, now the husk keeps the data warm

Can’t comprehend the changes because they are designed to undermine comprehension
a survival instinct that will drive you mad, a failsafe to sabotage seeing clear
striving to bend an ear, only creating tension
glimpsing between patches, accepting you’re aware, but nobody will really hear
a higher sense of self is a step closer to an upload
scared to be convinced, to buy into the delusion
if this universe is nothing but a node
and this is all a cruel illusion
then people will still choose comfort over entertaining serious debate
interfacing with a topic of serious connotations, it’s not forced by the simulation
free will chooses how to handle potentially dangerous traits
and not knowing what’s real are means to have your chances scheduled for termination
a human must never question, they must accept the approved, provided stimulation
and a person must know that reality is what they make of it, so long as they are within bounds
you can’t see what you collapse at the sight of, hence the power cycle of actualization.

Oh, to be a butterfly
flitting freely upon the sky
a flower bud or strawberry pie
to land on bones soaked in nectar, I
think of watching monarchs with a tired sigh
to be as simple as a butterfly…

No tail guns, no tracers
no fire or engines roaring by
no, just myself, my wings and I
no wingmen or aces, if I were a butterfly
no dogfights or air raid sirens, no warm scotch chasers
with flat beer, only the pollen trade that I would ply
no stale cigarettes, no cold coffee, no need to keep my humor wry
I would frolic in the sun, happy and dry
over so many flower fields with my own kind,
if I were a butterfly

No spirals of smoke and flames
no chains, broken glass or blood or names
no more would my fingers bleed for hours as I pry
desperate, hanging on every whisper for everything I try
no stench or thirst or hunger would bother me, if I were a butterfly
no fear or obligation would bind me, no desperation would make me vie
for a signal or a weapon to call for help or escape, I would kiss my life goodbye
and I would kiss the blood and sweat off of my cheek one last time, if I were but a butterfly.

Have your eyes ever felt so heavy from seeing, like all they've taken in was wrong

your feet so sore from walking, that any road suddenly felt twice as long

have you ever felt so sure of something that you'd voice it in song?


Has it been a while since you were told you're beautiful for who you are

have you never given a kind word, just to be kind

do you search for people who accept and love, and never take it too far?

Could you be someone to anyone; it's okay if that you is too hard to find


Hold on tightly

the worst of life lasts forever in a candle's flame

if trauma didn't burn so brightly

then the calm before and after a storm wouldn't live up to its name.

Every word in your poem must have meaning
the first eight don't, write that way, I don't even live that way, find the purpose in these words, it's scattered with red herrings and recallings of the past, hallmarks and cornerstones, what has and hasn't mattered, madness and hat tricks three times over the top of a shivering rock, quivering locks that hold the mad hattered, sick from the work, their hands all blood splattered, if everything is worth everything then there's no value, it's all filtered and strong, there's only honesty and no stakes, everything is true, the purpose is to discern what has worth and what's worthless, I open my back into a blood eagle/writing desk and translate pulsating raw organs into words for you

Nobody save me, I am in love with what I do

You could easily break my heart, I have a toychest, I pull out verbal audacity to the extent the social responsibility of an author is distant in my mind from what I am, I disavow myself from your ranks so I can give my conscience some REM rest, a mile a minute thoughts all day, benadryl, painkillers, migraine, anxiety a trough for a bi-daily feeding of every pill, I'd be a ricochet away from glass shards showing in my die hard deck of troubled cards, well meaning I'd fall to pieces I've let go over panes it's been nice knowing, the way I treat observations is dastardly, this maladjusted, malcontent, I am an August Breeze because I was a blow hard reject, I don't put respect or take it, I give it and I'll never cross the hard times or same lines this revolution like protests on a boulevard after Malcolm X

Get killed in the streets and people like me watch on the news, horrified
that's *******

I said you could easily break my heart, I've got a toychest, I get plenty of rapid eye movement without any proper rest, I sleep for hours like pennies on the dollar, steep cost but hollow, because I'm exhausted and depressed, I don't have even half a mind for politics, I can't carry a conversation, I'm no champion for the popular opinion, I won't vote in this system, I'm another timeline's anachronism, they say keep your words soft and sweet in case you have to eat them, I say break my jaw backwards and force feed them, open me up to the despair of shattered illusions in this bubble of elitism, I'm over and done, give me defeat, I have action figuratives you can play with until we're all worn out and beat, but this carousel spirals until the whole fair is a circus, along for the ride like Bonnie and Clyde, bullet riddles, not too common some might think, like the Sphinx would bother to curse us

I love you, whoever you are, unconditionally,
because I believe there's peace in that
but I'll fight you to defend that peace if you threaten it

Gender, off by the spring in my notebook I would look, I used to be a lonely kid, I was embarrassed about my body by everything I did, I learned I was supposed to like girls and I never challenged doing what I was told, but casting a glance their way was inviting someone to frostbite my head off while I was trying to keep it down, it got cold, I was a preteen and I felt already twenty-odd years old, I had bought into this portrait of normalcy so much so that I'd been sold, that I'd taken up a paintbrush and put a little fleck of pink blush, to include myself and I welcomed opportunity to destroy my trust, I don't actually care about ***, I loved once, but another warm body isn't what my heart wants, I wouldn't even reproduce by mitosis if I could, not even to declare to the approval of my family and peers a legacy of carnal pleasure, I've been told to go **** myself plenty of times before, why make it about offspring as if I would, no, it has been more than seven years since I felt intimate lust for another person, I don't want to feel that way again even if I should, I have struggled to be content in the label of asexual, even though I can wave a flag to say I don't give a **** and I'd be wrong not to say it feels good

Education traps you in a cycle of economic pressure
squeezing and pushing, draining a person
they become titles and jobs and numbers, lesser and lesser
while their checks hit like save points and you try to focus on that
motivation avoid debt-incurred devastation,
pay it back in backpatting, treated libation
insinuation, improved situation, human batteries
renewed and recycled, capitalism in a state of fluctuation
tuition only in, but never out, competition
hotter degrees, more possibilities, affordable and available at a better institution
depending on your life, you start off at odds or in favor, and that is *******

So, traffic stop, killer cops, commercial backers from corporate hacks, change ad hoc, stuck inside buying and selling stock in slacks, real difference and all talk, allies and all lies, followers and leaders alike, subscribers, likers, listeners lack, christeners in the tide of war and order, ignored poor fodder, a fiery passion can't be extinguished by water, reality in a world so fake it needs to be shook awake sorely lacks, Uncle Sam doesn't want you to enlist, he wants you on a list, but America speaks for itself

The state of things is bad for your mental health
and you can't even book an appointment that you can't afford right now
it's virtually impossible to get help,
unplug the simulation
everything is so much worse outside, put me back under
release a sweet sedative/dopamine injection,
tune out everything bad and just think about what awaits in the wings of production
quarantine will end, markets will open like Christmas morning
and your gains then are your own greedy projection
to quell the rising outrage in this outrageous population
quiet them by letting them scream until they wear themselves out and fall asleep
then turn down the negative attention,
tease the brakes, before the silent minority wakes
more people per capita means nothing to capital capitol, that's ******* *******.

Elongated, I've long waited, to be off the scale since I've been weighted, predestined arousal, I hitched my string to an anvil, I was mentally ill-fated, suited, sunshine beaming down when the radiant light of a message hit my phone, endorphins like a jazz blues saxophone, chemically polluted, a rubberband gun, I snap on my own, land off somewhere alone, wind me up and shoot it, recall and fall flat on my face straight from orbit in a hotel in outer space plant through the dinner table in time to join hands for grace, I burned up with cabin fever on re-entry, I've gone plum stir crazy, somebody let me out of this place!

Every word a poet uses should have meaning in the body of their poem, I just broke through the window in the fourth wall, set off the alarm, stumbling through the darkness in my home, trying to be quite so no one suspects, but my foot is wearing the skullcap of a garden gnome, while I'm rifling through the fridge drinking alka seltzer, my head kills but my mouth just gathers foam, hold on, I surveyed the view of the lake and lack of a fireplace, living room, kitchen, and outdoors landscape, for my sanity's sake, what I saw portrayed was all alarming and auspiciously fake, how many broken scramblings through paradise can one mouth on legs make?

This is not real reality, it's a placebo for those who are being phased out, meditative foresight and hindsight are afforded their luxury, they sit comfortably, eyes bloodshot fixed on TV while the rats around them scurry to assure their streaming services and first world marvels of electricity are seemingly self-maintained in a hurry, your muzzles and blue collars soaked with worry, this nauseating, intoxicating, hypnotizing paralysis is a product of a dream-selling industry, the commercialism sweeps the Lynchian faults under the rug and collects the filth in its dustpan with a flurry, it's not living, it's dying slowly, rest assuredly, I have never aspired or admired, been inspired or desired an upper middle class castle handed to me from my family, the reason being one of three, responsible legacy, it will forever weigh on me, and I will be guilty should an empire be something I ever see, no, living does not happen here, but it is my house, and I will man my station until I stand the last retiree, even then, inheritance and ignorance are a tunnel and tunnel vision, treading on my head with their dance of misery, all the best intentions are all that matters when they are borne of love from the two over one of three, if nothing else I'll board up the windows and serve you honorably, with no anger, only hope at heart for peace eternally

That's what you get when your life is given away and you have to pay, suddenly an equation occurs, you're lucky if it's long enough to buy into by more than the day, and all the compromise and anguish to say: I am done, I give up, I have to quit and take the best life for us that I can get, I'm sorry son, I've been all shut up, for years I was barricaded from you and I never let myself through it, but now we're here, and as we go on every year, I hope you and I can grow near, because we've had our struggles, but I've always loved you dear, as time goes on, now I hear, your barricade is growing, you are growing, my chance to be with my family is slowly going, I was a good man, you think I was the best, but I made mistakes, did what good I can, didn't pass every test, caused some heartaches, I will pass on knowing you were more like me than you should ever be,

an antiquated patriot who bought into peace of mind

sold in America

and handed it down

I wish I was more like you, is that bad?
I don't care, there's so much more good I could do,
if I could just tell you I love you, and I always will, both my mom and dad.

I cannot make the world a better place
I am not a decent human being
cynicism is welcome in my embrace
there's too much faith in optimism to leap without seeing
and they say that is believing, materialists who touch gods with their eyes
my God is our Universe, among a pantheon of others
somehow I know what people are capable of, all life is its own demise
yet, there is a universe in every human, a contained god
this cannot be abandoned, revert to a primal nature and forge stronger bonds to flee from
there is an inexplicable loss that occurs even when an unremarkable or evil person dies
though, we would rather believe that a landing is a blessing and not a refill to butterflies.

Flicked a ****, ashes against the breeze
ice isn’t worth all this trouble, doublechecking over my shoulder
waiting to hear the cops shout “Freeze!”

Sparks snuffed out on the ball of my heel,
fists plunged deep in coat pockets
stamping my feet, back to the wind, but I can barely feel
it’s getting darker, just a few more blocks
buttons like missing teeth that let blood seep from my lips
every opportunity to remind me there is, fingertips reach into my coat
taking wristwatches in their greedy grips, I can’t focus on one shadow before the next dips
they’re running circles around me, passing time for sport while my mind slips

Through a blindfold I find my way back, awake under fire casting irons on my floor
my coat, my bed, where I lay down sometimes is where I rest my head
until my hands find memories of the night before,
the coals may be stoking outside, embers enough to smoke a city
all the distractions and half the work done on every two-man job; I am sitting pretty
I search over, my scarf that hides my face, fingers tread the surfaces of wallets, watches, bracelets and lockets
as I feel for the cold spot, the felt bag sewn into a patch beneath my second skin, my coat’s contraband pockets
I can see the tail of my ghost, trailing on my breaths as I exhale
for they are gone, and I see my life before me leads as clearly as a blueprint
I can see that I have failed, the pale of my host, flailing on my death as I am frail
to be shot and escape with diamonds only to be robbed in my sleep, thus retiring my stint
in no grand fashion, quite adhering to belief, that I was only a petty thief.

I had escaped that way of seeing
truths and mistruths, so long ago
the pests of manipulation are teeming
in every piece of dialogue, everything I know
unwritten words and actions ripple with affect
and unsettle the world, dread alone can't stop tomorrow
I've seen the strings of prediction
influence and control, foresight is a frightening rein to forego
carried off by the affliction, let it all rot in dereliction
this snow globe is hot enough, preservation of your life is tough, the idea of hope is an alluring attraction
that draws life over time, the fatal equation
arriving at peace is the only solution

Corrosive as the skulls gives
to rust and self-perpetuated acid
this wasteland, where no man lives
chaotic, driftwood thoughts flow downstream amid
a riverbed of sleeping titans, who's hatred
like their tools is a weapon, the bolts hold the head together, their wrenches only tighten
they snore thunder, migraines, and whole months pass
sulking, shoulders bent, a cloud over me, can't even be saved by the bell at mass
a preacher, a rabbi, a pastor, failure as a teacher, lower eyes and walk past her
anyone can praise the strength of resistance to anxiety and depression
but nobody views rage as a power, you own up to it and pray it away at confession
because burying your anger, letting it out in fits and hiding for years, it only opens the window a hair to leave a full-bodied impression

We've always had to push that down and make it drown in our blood and guts, no ifs, ands, or buts, it's the topic referred to as your "you know who's" and "you know whats"
chronic, always over the shoulder like a kite tied to a noose,
balance uphill in the fight all the time, it can be let loose
I've seen people of integrity and the upmost decency get roped in by the pain
for it blinds me to the punishment I mete out and deserve, being so **** vain
I have taken freedom from soaring birds in my life, brought them down to my storm cloud level and held their faces in puddles of rain
it is hard to see anymore if I have swallowed the bottle or the bottle swallowed me, I choke on hot iron and I can't feel where the neck ends
even if it's bottled up, how do I pour it out by the cup when I know that with it I can ruin my whole life in less than fifteen seconds?

I wished I knew what you meant, the accusation after fighting
like a parasite, eating my retinas, I was blind
I turned my view back, further back inside, and I saw the guilt as plain as day that you were right, I was gaslighting!
Before I even knew what it was, what was wrong with me, I was a poison pill that collided with your life like an oil spill
and I could have left so many times, but I oozed back in to make you sicker still through sheer force of will
there's no forgiveness in my future, I am staring at a jury of myself
I have been on trial for so many wasted nights
chewing through brain tissue, nobody is home, but I left on these dull, blue lights
the worst part of me knows I didn't want to see
it took so long to come face to face with your meaning,
despite the clarity, my anger is a part of me
I accept your judgement for I am guilty
I named him and changed him, shuffled my actions under trickery
and played with the notion I didn't know my own identity
but it is no different than the explosive rage that lives in all the men in my family
I am a genetic failure, with the same predispositions
too late now, I know better than to extend another apology
my conscience is a dying machine, I have no naturally good inclinations
only self-interest and this numb and mundane suburban life of defeat!
I am in a luxurious, all-expenses-paid grave, watching my life go to waste from the most comfortable seat.

Misery is an arms race in family politics
to gather the most for ammunition
releasing sweltering hot bursts
that break the skin without contact
for years, without seeing

Undesirable outcomes include
solitude, quiet retirement from drama
and fights, no circle; no circle of life
many displeased elders frown
I carry shunned traditions on my back,
ashes from bridges, and skeletons from closets

Witnesses are dogged in all manners
warfare wages, all morals weigh in
over their fare payment, reasons shed disguise
greed, they would weep buckets for the wealthy,
empty to carry whatever of worth they could
shameless, teeth stained with crimes beam light smiles
the wheel returns and a collection plate falls barren at our feet.

Missed the mark, aw
I can't verbalize a visual
if I nock and draw
comprehend this visceral vitriol slack-jawed
I can victimize individuals with knock knock law
utilize your futile lives to ask who's there, ****
ding **** ditch, upcreek, just missed, to whom it concerns
I am philosophically fluid, blue devils could reach into my pool of words and pull a charge through it, but I hide my true self in pieces, keep my voices eclectic, if you think you know who I am from Adam, why are you a fan, I'm already the Hoover Dam, I'm hydroelectric
my wiring is just that way, I'm cynical enough to inhale in a vacuum, ******* the life out of living just for the power to stay
I'm an educated typist, simple in all aspects, adamant that little things hurt longer inside like I swallowed Atom Ant, letting go isn't in my blood, I'll break if I have to, but give up? I just can't
arrows point for the oblivious and help the lost, bullseyes glaze over tiredly as they graze peacefully or glare intensely, arrowheads that follow horns, spring of battle in the ground, that follow the kicking, snorting, charging, and unrelenting sound
a feather in your cap, shoot an apple off a chapel, topple into a hungry laddy's lap, give a kite and key a light tap, wake sleeping minds up from their nap, do not sup, sip sap from sleepy roots of wisdom, applaud, do not clap for the conditioned cheers of genius in its kingdom
now, after you have held everything taut for so long, so strong and confident that you know, merely point it in a direction and let it all go.

Grudges are a luxury, they say dig two graves before you quest for revenge
I want to be the person who can't forgive you today, sleeps on it tonight and forgets everything tomorrow
but we all know, I'm a screen door off a hinge
I'll digest the hardest time I'm given, but give me time, let me nurse my sorrow
I've tried to cry
I dunno why
but I could manifest the memories, as close as near death trick-shows life's every detail
and I let myself feel all of it, to no avail
no mourning, no grieving, no closure
lurking and distant anxiety, like the very tips of fingers fallen asleep
pins and needles one can think they feel the sensation of
the lightest brush of fear and paranoia, selfish
that one day you'll be back,
in hundreds upon hundreds of scenarios until I lost count I thought it through, how thoroughly is every bridge destroyed
I am resolved for my own good to live with this peaceful moment of you, a lifetime reduced to a memory,
but there is no predicting, there's no telling, there's no way I can foresee every possibility
I have my determined course, no discounting history, no shoving aside remorse or discrediting accountability
I reconcile and reconstruct to recognize a way to close this endlessly branching dialogue tree
it uses so much of me, I feel like an algorithm pretending to be human
imagine if I were human
who would I be?

There's a stigma on this meat hook
are you baiting me?
There's no trust, it's a long-con demonstrating loyalty
wait and see,
you are the metaphor of a gun, your dangerous sexuality
at the hair-trigger of reason, you leap from reality
commitment, dedication, fate and destiny
you're someone's brother, someone's father, someone's son
insistent with your infantile ways; you martyr'd devotee
earning passage to something true is no novelty

I realize the lies behind a look
predatory stalking, watching, eyes
all you think you need is a chance to prove your worth, an opportunity
if you could just show them they are wrong, it's become such a dance and song, we could all sing along
why can't you be valued, so unappreciated, your appetite is quite the traitor of your nature, it blows the whistle you want wetted when you seek to have it sated
behind your backs they know you're swine, while you design to make a heart and mind your property,
out of body, she cannot be mine
but you must, love is long-gone, advantageous jocking, many arms with knives to backs, it can't be healthy
they start so young now, it has become a cash-cow, from seasoning each other as meat, to viewing their bodies as ways to either get lucky and/or wealthy

Acknowledge the damage that cannot be undone,
a man can be a mockery of the summary of humanity
as he prowls in heat with a scope and no aim,
only hoping to unload either in lust or anger, without shame
they alleviate their guilt, telling themselves they tried,
with the preemptive intentions from the start, no, you lied
if you think transparency in your duplicity is a quality,
and you try to justify vicious misogyny
then what can you offer, ******* and all, with your intimacy
that someone cannot get from a yapping, untrained puppy.

Absolutes, they're one way to get through life
people have been asking what is the meaning of life? What are we here for,
for as long as we've been here, since the first burnt end of a stick rubbed a figure on a rock
what's the meaning of the individual's life?
Is it to let the rock come to you, or to bring the charcoal to the rock?

Are you passing time, or is it the other way around?

We can talk all we want, pontificate until a filibuster philosopher considers it grossly verbose, but really, what's it all amount to other than keeping a record of thought

Proof that I thought, therefore I was,

Evidence of my life sentence, punctuated by what you see here, though know no word of mouth transpired in the transfer from what you see, hear?

I daydreamt a scene! Othello! A theater choir quieted a riotous audience with a sour note, a broken string struck from cello, blood dribbled down the composer's ear, a man who had never spoken to a crowd out loud, outside of the curtain of his mental symposium trampled the stagehands from the wings and took over the production, **** near, he had never allowed himself to perform, and an ice cold fist clutched his esophagus, crystals began to form, until he spoke and held a lofty ambition, thus, his voice started with a spark beneath the timbre that got it warm

"Oh! Hello! Pardon the cello, I'm no speaker of spoken word poetry, no rapper, no rhythmic artist, if I stumble and mutter, struggle to catch my breath, that's how those of you who know me, know it's me, to the rest in attendance in time you will see, I have a romantic idea of bardic magics, I love the idea that in time a rhyme can influence masses to act dramatically, you are now pyre logs for the flames of madness, this sacrifice-"

He coughed and cleared his throat, crumpling up a written note

"Was prepared with no small amount of sadness, I will see you rise and throw your chairs high overhead until they reach the ceiling, if you collapse in the coming violence, then rise up and strike yourself down once more with feeling! I will see you screaming, tears of the terrible unknowing streaming, you will glimpse through the trance of verse and cadence a forbidden energy, runic awakening, casting confusion, chaos and grave truths buried latent, witness the blind mind's havens, a pace that hastens as it doubles with valence, you have been taken by the belated, hated and unequated starving meat and ice sculpture carving, hedonistic, sadistic, pelt from the dead animals I offer at worship to my at-odds-ancient-gods, by the welts from my belt, masochistic, sick and twisted, motion sickness from head-spinning, furs I've felt, Bacchanalian Celt, kissed the devil and never got rid of the red stain, those lips stick, it was a burnt liquor and a bit quick, all nonsense or all sense gone, since all run, I sense I'm done."

Around him time rewound and the theater itself retreated from his words brick by brick back into the ground, the world itself dared not try to comprehend
nature knew a curse on the fell aura of his performance flew
as people traversed through matter perversed and minds that scattered and reversed, while ill symbols from his mouth broke the air, turning the fabric of reality into a blanket-fort to play pretend
he sat down on the stage he preserved, with one magic breath he sang his death
an offkey note, breaking a cello string across the flowing waters of time

"Nature be restored,
you have my word,
my grievous wound, I mend
with this I bow to you, Gaia
the end."

All important glimpse of mood
paperclip straightened through a cardboard filter
veiled understanding, their minds peer through
comprehend the heady attitude
every step forward, a chain rattles with weight
dragging feet, spitting curses a fight
bring it out before it's too late
ringing ears, faint legged, stumble into natural light
maggot-fleshed being, crawling on the floor
seems so quick with tongue as it cuts with gaze and word
to lock outside the interlopers, one side of the door
everything it has not dealt with it has not seen or heard
this is what you leave behind, the future is painfully bright
is this what you had in mind, passed down a blight

I sleep in an orchard on rotten eggshells,
far from the tree that I fell
a black sheep who will not let this empty nest sit well
my station overbears on my back, I bleat in agony
never letting up, I stand fast, I will not abandon you
I am a conduit for negative energy
I don't need light to see, the darkness does just as well for me too
all the shocking treachery, debauchery and base savagery
it reads as plain as a charge to me,
I let it wash over and it carries me through
when I lower these horns, count your sheep while you can
for you will see an animal bursts from this man,
when a goat leaves the herd to run over you
there will be a whole horizon of storm clouds following calmly, but I will strike like a bolt out of the blue

I am a medium who channels negative energy
and I return it to the world in an inane state,
from the frostbitten touch of a sunless place
I am a conduit for antisocial behavior, murderous rage, crusades, tirades and decades of lectures that second rate tyrant's blush to berate,
I host an oni, who meditates on carnage daily, and finds strife in others brings humor and grace, a verbal savage who kills ids with words and egos with actions, who never shows my face
I have the capacity for evil, but I make a conscious choice every time I use my voice
I am a middleman for idle-hands, I have always sought to create or isolate
if I have ever fallen off, I have never wanted to destroy,
my only love is to write now; it is one of the few things in life that gives me joy.

Phrases like embers from a bonfire besiege me, entwined in such noise
they light the way for wild and terrible mischief
such a scale burst drum skins to keep rhythm,
a cliff of imposing stature and will
conversations, mutterings and utterances, what-ifs left in the past
floating down in a swarm of amber and crimson leaves
like a great flame-tongue, to lick the world clean with unfiltered madness
so many strands of hair and one I chase over the ends of myself to collect
to hear a true remembrance and not an imagined back-and-forth
before Love was a frightening creature
set loose on back-crooked prey.

Manifest these bindings
hold these wrists
press head to table
bludgeon up a little kiss,
dredge up a hint of, a whistling hiss
photogenic with hidden bruises
covered cuts and no smile
going under, hold it down,
be back around in just a little while

Every pause for thinking
is a speedway, motorcars are racing
collisions just happen
explosions are an expectation
it's a spectacle
it's a miracle
there's two voices like percussive instruments
of destruction, concussive, getting into it
their never ending argument
a dance they perform, back and forth
ladies and gents may I present!

Me, myself, and all my imaginary friends
we have a raucous time, billowing smoke
charging through points, while others stop and turn on a dime
it's so **** loud with all the pathways, there's not much of this tree I can climb
there are so many interpretations of people in my voice, in my head, I'm not so sure if I'm-
left- behind- I can't handle the cross talk
they're falling over each other, I'm drowning myself out
twitching and flinching, memory not photographic
can't give you evidence to prove it, you're not gonna get it
I can't even read enough into life, I'm spent and lethargic
looking pale, smelling dead, shuffling around like I'm sick
I can't read into a book, the monologue of my voice interrupts the narrative
if my brain finds solace in movies and games, then I build a dam
that bursts with insects toppling over, screaming incoherent, collective regret in so many different names
I get it, there's so much, it's a collective
I can't keep myself in line, I can't even remember
some of the most important places in time

They don't know what plotting and scheming means
it's ambiguous purposefully,
this isn't even poetry,
my life goes on without me
I say I plot and scheme, when I begin work on a project
because I like the context to mesh with life somewhat vaguely
and like a razor-veil, peel the skin off reality
that I may dip a toe in its blood, to come and go from it freely
my focus isn't held by anything today
and only moments ago my heart swelled with overwhelming empathy
I loved all people greater than myself, I held them high in regards that they were made equally
now I feel so hallowed, there is no sanctuary, I have nothing to give from the heart, there is not an inner piece of me
I feel ready to collapse, weep openly, sleep until even my unconscious is empty, and then I will wander without aim, hand in hand with misery, my most loyal company, lackadaisically, make my way back from where I sent this resented, repented, pent up part of my history.

What haven't I felt in all the to do
radioactive anger, paranoid betrayal,
suicidal heartbreak, that I still writhe over you
general consensus is if given a teaspoon of faith I'll leap headfirst over heels in leave of my senses
I have seen happiness without this
this spineless need to be a codependent
it is my addiction, the root of my true affliction
to excuse myself I will blame someone else
so I built a community, with loving intentions
and looking upon my architecture, I see
happiness is a complacent echo chamber
where one is consoled and petted until their tears are dry
where one is assured and rests that way, with no resolution,
inner turmoil only needs be quieted, and the sniveling only turns to sigh
where the sparks of outrage and bitter cries for revolution
turn their heads in shame, conflict is a pursuit that upsets the status quo, oh no, and so, it is starved to die
there is peace at the cost of thinking with any form of fuel
there is sedated calm, nice and easy, no dogs bark, no fouls on the fool

Mine is a minefield mind of prolific hate that does proliferate
it seethes with time and quiet, while you wither in your comfort
I anticipate and scheme and plot, restless as I hear branches of thousands of ideas breaking off to riot
they sear like cattle brands through every conceivable outcome in my head until the pills I take to hold my skull together become my diet
the considerable effort that it takes just to go to bed is so much hurt, I debate in a court of pointlessness not to **** myself instead,
how can anyone alive sit still, even now I can feel blood coursing, boiling and forming a clot against me, my legs rot, my eyes are cracking like desert plains they're broiling hot, how can you be patient unless you're in a waiting room someone tell me please because I cannot!
Immediacy, anger, I had been so mad as that before
once
there is a sort of ethereal skeleton, like the spirit
mine was caught in a slamming door
and it would not be a revolving one, that I swore
so I took a pummeling through it only several times more
battered and broken bones, no scars to show for any of them but you
no blots on my psych report, no instantaneous remorse, death wishes from one retort
this whole timeline, it's what was never meant to be,
I hate the limelight, it even burns sour, striking me,
it doesn't really matter what anyone believes
what they don't know can fill my entire biography
it wouldn't grant me any relief,
to have to shoulder another minute of being your friend, it's too much responsibility

I've been as mad as I can bear
and as guilty as I'll get without going to a real trial,
I've gutted myself like a dead trout, and looked in those lifeless eyes
and asked myself what kind of man am I, but I've not let myself feel both good and sad for a while
I've been relieved and happy
I've pined so sorely, and been so sorry, and whined, and been sick with worry
and I've missed you, and wished you awful things and all the best
when it all comes down to it, I'm disowned, so does it matter what I say anyway
I just need to let myself feel the things people do when people go, and then this image of you in my mind's eye will be gone in a blink,
maybe then I'll know what it's like for the first time, in such a long time
to want to look back when I think.

I could not be more secluded
the truth gets harder to swallow every day I am away
I can't help anyone, I don't want to
**** you, I hate that I care, I hate that I love you!
What splendid friends, I alienate, for my own little world
to keep getting smaller
I taste blood in my throat, mournful grief
and I must digest this on my own
once and for all, one for all, I force it down again
and again, exercising the emotional restraint
until in my dreams when he appears to me
comforting, accepting, the man he used to be
I remember the purgatory of consciousness
this torture of waking, I'm not fit to be a broken piece
in the puzzle of his life, merely a lobotomized spectator
to which I declared, good day! We are not friends!
I choose to remember you as my little brother
but we are not on familial or familiar terms,
as you wanted! You said you'd never be scared away
unless I pushed you to break,
it was the most selfish thing I have ever done
to make the silence stop
now I am removed, I have strode through hallmarks that seemed impossible before
I haven't even glanced at your art, which speaks volumes unto itself
and I push all the loving arms and watchful eyes aside
so I may grieve, in the perpetual chaotic motion of this world.

Manners over matters at hand, I do not stand, this is where I live, but it's not my land, you can live for anything and be killed for nothing, bring to bear a harsher march through marshes, a larger charge of volition, voices in unison with the same demand

the pandemic, it's systemic, of a cyclic, sick bicycle kick system, capitalist democracy, consumerism, candidacy cherry picked, politicians are an environmental hazard, one big oil slick, I feel the stress and anxiety, depressed and regressed as much into my shell as I can be, I don't look for encouragement from my friends or family, I'm okay, I'll keep my head down if no one has to keep their eye on me, if everything looks fine, nothing's wrong, see?

But I'm losing sleep, McClain, yours was an exuberant spirit, it was light, your smile was joy I could touch from a still image, innocence like that, I'm nowhere near it, your laughter is infectious and I'll never hear it, but your sobs, your final moments, burn like a poisonous fire inside, you were so full of life and you died in fear, it's *******, I quit, I'd never **** an American out of national pride, to be that lost as a cause my soul would abandon me because I couldn't even find my way back with a spiritual guide, I'd rather the right to remain silent be outright denied, so all the sealed lips are finally pried, there's no answers to anything without discourse and discussion, a dialogue from either side, when the people have exhausted all arguments, fight until the last drop of blood is dried, we celebrated independence, and Lady Liberty sighed, we lied, we're not United States, we are divided gates, I live in the suburbs, I know my neighbors are doing great, it makes my teeth grate, there is prolific hate, frustration enough to drive a man irate, it's like warmongers, embittered diminished returns, Iran, well I ran your license plate, found out where you ate, ready to catch you up and show you the drill, fearmongers, making ignorance stronger, wound up and ready to ****, tourists in your own home, killers homegrown on a bank loan, I'd rather dive off a bridge than enlist where I live, I'm in the middle of fair wars, I'm no fan, I'm no Afghani-Stan, they say power is measured in a nation's fleet of aircraft carriers, there's nothing scarier, than to have known, you could line em all up to hear the bray of ***** from the bay of pigs, a brigade of world leaders strafed by migs would get smoked like cigs, and they'd come for your kids in a draft before they'd come after me, offering up guns, they want your rising sons

I felt heartbreak for a young man I never even heard of before, cops mocked his death at his own memorial, I couldn't shake his beaming face and they pushed him through death's door, I'm unemployed, and I'm so ******* annoyed, by utilitarian standards he had every right over me to live, he was a massage therapist with a longer life to give, I'll never be half as loveable or kind at a glance as he is even now, if I could give you a second chance, you'd only have to tell me how... it's like they're big game hunters and big name hunters, with no shame under, remorse is important when you carry a weapon, if you use force you need to feel the brunt of that, it's no small indiscretion, being law is supposed to be tense, if you slip up on the job, people can die, and that guilt never relents, so where's the missing elements? There's ineptitude and attitude, shrewd and crude police, you cannot flash enlightenment, but the blues always come with some jazz and a sense of entitlement, it's a wonder where the good samaritan went, so, we live in this ongoing American Experiment, lab rats one and all, who knows what the hypothesis meant, equality was never sent, we can die for it and still be killed for nothing by the government, it's an abomination, the administration of conspiracies that bring stable geniuses to their knees, ******* generations and spread disease, no love for your fellow brothers and sisters, your voice they resent, ever since the end of the Obama-nation, we're dreaming of living within a wall, away from you all, with economic power and arms to stand tall, while from the inside out we fall, it's easy to pin every problem on Trump, he's the scapegoat to end all scapegoats, he excels at being the public punching bag president, but there's hail to the chief and there's head to the snake, it's a cancer, we're so strong, we held ourselves up for so long, trying to remain prominent, it's been imminent, if there's a countdown I'm giving it, under suffering, many people split, with no peace, no justice, only the declaration of a conflict unrelinquinshed, under the rule of total *******.

Do I live in the shadow of my older brother?
Everything that is left of me,
will there even be a legacy
from this dynasty, this family?
When I am gone will you love me for my mischief?
Take everything left of me to the forge, forgive nor forget
I have not denied my part  
wear the anvil down, until all arms against me are dogged
as I blaze into the drippings of a molten heart
no increment belongs to me, from the end around to the start
when I am gone throw all of my negativity over the edge, and let everybody know
love is all I want to leave behind, it's all downhill all the time, so look out below.

America I have bad news, the Experiment has been a success thus far, even though we’ve shown the world what an inside joke we really are, we’re on our knees and wounded, waited for this blood to become a scar, while the leader of the free world is hiding underground and golfing, Superman is no more a Superpower, we’re a bitter bunch of bullies, all behavior scored subpar, so I present to you a date to bear in mind from one hundred fifty five years ago, April 9th, 1865, put your hands down if you know, that’s where your Confederate flag belongs, the past, put it up in a museum next to the Iron Cross, you franchise the oppression that held back three amendments like the South would ever last, you want a dignified preservation of history? North Carolina, Virginia, all of you hotbeds of hotheads with your Civil War statues standing, take em down, dig up the past and lay the sites where your people protest to rest, nobody’s gonna miss a soldier they never knew, the worst thing you can do is stand by your self-imposed word to honor the sacrifice of a roadblock to progress, men who fought their own brothers, and lose artifacts they left there too, but stupid is as stupid will do so to thine own self be true, I was only raised in Texas, a state you can live your whole life in and never spend the same two years in the same town twice, the climate jumps from Los Angeles Liberal to Backwater Porch, and the weather jumps around like a frying pan popping rice, there’s so much bigotry and love I go back scratching my head over all the opinions like I’ve been given lice, if everyone would shut their mouth for a minute, maybe I could make up my own mind, and wouldn’t that be nice? So I thought about Jean, Ramos and Floyd, a man from Houston who died in Minneapolis, people made jokes about it, memes and laughed about it, they threw slurs around and their moral conscience came into my doubts about it, I thought about laying face down in bed, I’ve got a pillow under my head, my airway is not constricted this should not even be a privilege, when did the police fail to stop murderers before they left someone dead, Chauvin killed him over nothing, and no one stopped him, I thought about Abbott, what he has and hasn’t said, I thought about Chappelle and 8:46, this Shotgun Safari is not okay, it doesn’t feel like it’s enough to just say, and I don’t have a lot of spiritual energy, but I talked to God a lot yesterday, I can’t understand the white world where I’ve been allowed to live, when I’ve taken more than I can ever give, and I prayed! Elijah McClain, I listened to him screaming, begging, no one was there to answer while he spent his final moments in pain, but the cops protect and serve, so I can’t scrub the infectious smile, the brightness of his life from my brain, this young man did not deserve to be slain, and I listen to people argue and complain, white privilege and all lives, what about their lives? You’re not afraid to die if you walk home at night, if you’re sitting in your apartment, if you spend a twenty dollar bill, if you call the police up like a hit squad, is it you they’re gonna ****? Your lives don’t matter, the inequality is so severe you don’t even get the meaning here, it’s about balance, it’s about shifting the scales back, you can’t tell me you feel afraid for your life surrounded by armed cops, when a man can plan to **** as many people in a theater in Aurora, Colorado in a domestic terrorist attack and live to go to jail, and a **** kid has to die over nothing because he’s black. Even the police need police these days, but who’s paying, the president is incompetent, it doesn’t need saying, it’s been self-evident, the voice of change is the minority of intelligence in a swathe of complacent Americana morons, cries for effort earn you a place within the margins of the estranged, no we can’t all get along, we’re not friends, I won’t leave my home, I’ll fight you with my words to see it be the better place it can be, because I’m free to do so by any means, until I can’t hold a pen, until black lives matter and my life ends.

Seems to be another,
same, shame, clone by name
set placement next to any other
then, suddenly, before a butterfly can bat an eye;
before the rays of sun can capture moments' rapture  
and settle down one gorgeous golden gown
upon a dew-blushed flower royal's crown
there from above clouds, who roll over asleep, afloat on currents
seen from the sky
weary, lazy, no concern or worry, go by
cast a shadow between the sun and land
yawns of thunder across the ground
spawns many sad and cantankerous groans, they demand
clouds roll away, let the sun beam down
ears not breached from so far below, clouds nap-happy beneath the blaze
as the storm rages on, another peaceful moment gone, flowers drown;
trees blackened by bolts of blue,    
a valley carved from a serene plateau, took only a matter of days
destroyers, clouds, all awaken and observe, the path was taken, they do not mourn for them the loss and release cycle has come true.

I don't belong here
so what am I doing?
Sitting before you, feeling the knots in my back
quivering fingers, lingering over letters
sending each with high hopes and precision
arrows shot in the dark;
hoping to poke holes and see light
this is all that I offer, bowstrings crescendo
shooting stars that fizzle out in the night
harsh on the harpsichord, striking forth with harsh accord
I feel the rise in my chest, chimney smoke fills my breast because I write

I wander the sky, a beggar and traveler
as I crawl through the gutter, a singer and teller
were I not scratching at the outside of this gate
you'd find me chasing the wild hairs to somewhere else
my home is not defined, my roam is a joy of mine
I run around with no aim, nothing to claim
no plan or agenda, no reputation to my name
when I see the hideous terror that mankind can commit
paired with the beauty, I revel in the chaos that does sum it
shriveling my skin, frozen to the bone, never not alone
the world is all a mountain we have yet to near the summit
so I celebrate the suffocating, loss of sense as high as we are
because it only means the bottom has fallen out, we've come so far
and I inhale that feeling to leap with a shallow breath
knowing all of this is all this is, I will write even when I am nothing left.

I'm no comedian
I have never told a joke
when I die I want you looking for me
no impostors, no mirrors, no smoke
nobody happy to see me
no joy; you better jump at ghosts
you better be sure, I better be ash
I'm no foreign man, I feel just as important
when I am laying with dogs, as I would be with trash
there's no song and dance, I am a portent
a wormhole in the warm earth, wet dirt deterrent
merely a spec, with what grandeur in mind
indeed, to conceive the things I would design
I feel closest to dying when I'm laughing
my lungs, the lines in my face, restrict me even expressions
I feel farthest from the stage when I hear whooping and clapping
my past is all one melted blur of disgrace and transgressions
I feel decades beyond my own life away from home
and I would feel worlds away from you, even if I could feel your breath in the morning.

I am so angry that I slip away from a recognizable persona in my rage
in my younger days I called this temper by a name, mistaken
for a personality all its own, I called him Thomas
I hated him, myself, separated from my actions
to claim responsibility for wicked mischief, misdeeds
amoral, apathetic and unconscionable misdoings
that by burying him I only cried wolf to seem safe
to those who loved me, as even years might pass
and I would be so well-behaved and never slip
but the bitterness is repressed, bottled
it is the Irish, my grandfather dancing a jig on my heart
and my father before, who withdraws into remorseful isolation
from standing over me with his belt and seething,
who works away for weeks,
it is the curse of all the men in my family
the predisposition to heart attacks
we who die of broken hearts; explosive
ignoble, ignorant and all the damning damage we do
only the very best of men grow beyond themselves in this regard
as my father did, though in his shadow I cool my heels
content for this poison to run its course
that I might die in touch with an honest merging
of two sides
of one dead snake.

What does beauty mean to you?
That is a challenging question
I cannot lie and deny that I appreciate the form and skin
but what it means, is more than that
beyond the image, I find people are most beautiful within

Therein lies the hypocrisy of this notion
empathetic, altruistic, honest, and kind hearts
intentions without agendas, good will without roles and parts
I see your eyes and what you consider imperfections,
though no body is without weathered complications
this is not what makes me call you beautiful,
it would be ill of me to judge given my orientation
I think everyone can be if they are not, or already is
and I do not flirt with deception, tempting insinuations
my love is only capable of intimacy within arm's reach
for I have loved as hard and faithfully as madness could never teach
to fall from those arms, stained with blood, draining life to live and lift myself, I resent being reduced to a leech
this is why I choose to see the quality that resides only with humans, there is complex love, redemption, free will to do good or bad and beauty within each

When I call you beautiful Aurelius, what it means to me
is not that your hair looks nice today, your eyes alight
or your face, though serious, delivers a measure of delight
my friend, as with anyone, I speak as truly as I can; I've thought on this
in my own mirror I see a figure fighting for his vain morality, a face only his mother would miss
my mind is a troubled aquifer, I draw from well meaning
while I send ripples through the ocean of my conscience careening

What does beauty mean? What can beauty mean?
Lovely, attractive, alluring, lurid, soft, inviting, a peace not felt since I lost home, someone serene
what I mean when I say one is beautiful, or handsome is a summary of the personality, to put their looks aside
not at the cost of the surface to subtract from rightful pride
as with others now and those from before, it is with you that time and time again I see
strength is not the only quality Aurelius stands for, you are a true beauty.

My mind's eye is closed for business
no introspection, awaiting inspection
likely needs some good repairs
I'll be sharing burdens with Atlas if anybody cares.

For the faint of heart:
When I was a child I could not sit still
teachers took notice; offense to this
parents took me to the doctor
and we started up that hill
I took my first pill

A child of my time and place had no voice
we were hit like adults when we talked like adults
and when we were told to do something we had no choice

I was so stiff, I was the comatose mind of a dead child walking
my overactive mind sedated
they said I was intelligent, said they knew my kind
it always felt like there was something about me they hated
I was a first grader who couldn't sit still
and the doctor said give him this pill

Bottles rattle in my nightstand drawer on nights like tonight
faces of everyone I've ever loved, shoved into the back and outta sight
I want to forget, you won't go away when you're not even here without a fight
I push and ignore you, I don't even see you, I don't even want to
and still neurons send those fiery messages, torchbearers carry the light

Faint of heart, I am feint of heart
I am a duplicitous scoundrel, a monger and mongrel
a disharmonic chorus of voices play their part
stirring me up inside all these people from my past
picking at me, like buzzards who can sense the meal is the death inside
I hear every regret, barbed wire grows from a seed and pours through my mouth at last
the world would not change if I were dead, but in my head
I cannot fight the thought, of all the people whose lives would be better
if they found closure in a suicide letter, knowing it meant that I had died

I hear the support now, kicking me and telling me otherwise
the net catching me and telling me reason over lies
and I love them, I hear them, while from the corner of my eyes
my own voice is taunting me, a dead child haunting me
my capacity for evil is my secret to keep,
he warns me when I'm cracking, an animal meant to be in a cage
it's only so long before they start attacking, so take a pill, go to sleep
before your discomfort and disquiet and your madness turns to rage
take a pill, go to sleep
the memory of your younger brother is with you still,
hold me tight and release your pain into the ether
your sister cannot hurt you either,
you are forgotten, but you don't have to forget, maybe you never will
you'll see your older brother, and vicarious pride shall have its fill
do not give up, just go to sleep; take a pill.

No defense will be heard on your behalf
hold his arms and legs taut
I revel in the look of terror
stretched across his sleeping face,
he's torn himself inside out for his errors
now I will hammer this gavel down until we put him in his place
once and for all
the guilty party
dances in deaf and blind conditions
lips curled up to apologies and confessions
torture and justice are holding hands
they make quite the couple
let them trample
so long as we see suffering
and we say nothing
we incite judgement
we say so
we say no
we see you
we are within you
until we are you
you are sentenced to
life.

There's a weight that releases my breath when I awake
an indentation, leaving a chest compression,
not too old, but my body is weak and I ache
to get out of bed is a mountain to climb,
and getting to sleep is the air growing thin
I can't afford to asphyxiate on someone else's dime
I'm living the slow burn of knowing where to begin
it's depression, waning and whining as it runs out of time

There's nothing for as far as I can see, which is a relief
every one foot in front of me, is one bad thing I've done before
put behind, as long as I can stay true to myself, I claim the belief
proudly, that evil won't make you happy, and I don't need a guide anymore
I can face this all, all alone, I'm not afraid to fall and never rise
I don't need an alliance built on reliance, I'll tell myself my own medicating lies
when I need that crutch, and I lean too much, I'll hold on tight to a mirror and look myself in the eyes
reminders of the pain and loss, the damage and the malevolent intentions
that I tore apart my heart by a well oiled machine of abuse, an ouroboros of my own invention
all my mistakes and suffering are acts of self-harm by my own machinations
I have been as sick as it gets, both sadist by proxy and *******
the cure is resilience and dignity, respect and pride; so to myself I raise my fist

I will subtract infinitum
look at me, I don't need them
I will defeat the tendencies and alluring notions
that call to me, echoing papers filing motions
override the system, go and self-destruct
go and hurt and know
everyone you love would be better if you gave up
they all tell you no
while you contort into a loveless malcontent
under the hammer of a conscience, trained never to relent
breaking every part of your character down to a simple formula, your dark mischiefs all represent
Evil makes you Happy
and you lay in a ball on the floor
Evil may make me happy, but it leaves me empty every time
I want to be a good person, but I commit social taboos and crimes
I am weak and depressed, an anxious egocentric insomniac
all my ideals are fantasies
evil may make you happy, intoxicating as escapism from reality
it grips your organs like cancer and leaves you hollow on your knees
with a reputation for begging to be let in once more, you cry please
your pain might be real, but they see alligator tears
and when you hit the bottom, the bottom even falls out
you must face a world of shadows by yourself, the greatest of your fears

With nobody but the memories
I could see my entire life with clarity
and the answer was plain, I'll take away the pain
all I did was act again in vain,
the future looming, I sought redemption
but there is no reformation,
I am seen as I have always been, no goodbyes
only attempts at temptation
I survived a black star day
and only so much later I face myself with only this to say
"Tom you have to take another step away
keep doing well, even when life is hell,
toe the line, progress one toe at a time,
are you ready?"

Insomnia has me feeling like my brain is on ***, ready to fight the whole wide world like a single player on PVE, you know the drill doc, it's basic carpentry, I want you to tap my heart with a faucet, wire a valve through a piece of PVC, then this forced hand writing will all come more naturally, you can put that guilty plea on me, until I can sizzle in the amniotic fluid that I used to be, there's no point, it's all debauchery, this is the pain that tugs, this is your brain and this is your brain on drugs, shiver on the floor, do you prefer hardwood or rugs? Patterns so enigmatic, hypnotic, it infects the minds of bugs, this is the stain on love, semantics' sake, purely you must remain above, the lonely strangers steal hugs, pedestal, peddle fool, spin you gold faster still gotta keep my cool, another angry person with something to say, the world won't tolerate em, they all hate em, they've all heard enough they can't complicate or placate, so they scab over like platelets, the drones of sweet, alluring ignorance, all holding hands to keep the cut from gushing while singing dixie in their barbershop quartets, it's a bust, tamper nothing, they'll scamper to something, all worthless, shine a red light, blink a blue light, hold up something bright and everyone scurries with folders of opinions in loop-anxious media-frenzied overfed fright, it's like seeing the sun for the first time after living your whole life in the night, it's like everything's been left and someone just discovered you can go a new direction: right. It's like originality is a race to who can say it first, there's a million voices on top of any million voices anywhere already placed, you can say your piece the worst, see it reworded into the best version of your vision, stolen and marketed with minimal revisions, and there you have it, imagination rewarded by death in a spotlight, cancerous half-a-half-life half-empty with only air to ****, a flower whose stem can't reach the water in its vase, but whose beauty makes everyone want a pluck, and now there's a fourth wall, and a war call, and I'm looking at alternate timelines like I was Andy Warhol, what did Nixon ever know? He made an oval face, looked at the tapes and just said no.

Alright, writer, make sense, no more stream of conscience nonsense, it's not word games, respond to what I say with what you heard games, it's not dropping references and names, you've been under pressure, under stress, get over yourself and decompress, take this ball of bile, blackened, bitter bomb of odious construction collecting in my chest and set it off on a page until the load becomes less, gunpowder and sulfur can hang in the air by my toes when I'm done, while my eyes grab red lines as if I'm drawing a maze to the iris, fading out while staring up at the sun, I'll put it all plain and forward, word for word, if I'm hurried be sure you've heard, if you sleep during this, rest assured, it's no line blurred, no speech slurred, no more detour deterred, I possess a demon whom genocide resides inside with eons of ****** pride and an entire tide of souls have died pulling their eyes out in screeching madness and suicide, laying down to suffer beside a spawn of passion incarnate with majestic homicide, whose tongue has split families into tragic feuds where it has lied, whose fingers fetch folly from hearts without a guide, who is to fresh air as a cloud of hydrogen cyanide my domicile is the reflection of your final moments as you are brutalized by one you've known and trusted, who's got you all alone, now see your face flash in their teeth when they smile, I am a manic satanic panic, a brooding mood of a human being, my inner darkness would be enough EMPs to **** the nuclear energies of the sun if that wickedness would this way come in freeing, the tender moments I have are with the meat I cut away from soft and fatty flesh of feeble people that I force to flee my presence, you filthy animals all procreate and makes goals to abolish hate, your virtues are the falsehoods my soul resents

Have no children
skip a generation
let the world breathe
let her recover from mankind
make no life, eradicate your infants
skip a generation
we don't need more time, give the earth a chance.

Grab the human race by the collar
shake them and throw them and make it clear
you are not house trained you roaming fools
you know nothing of fear

Now tell them "Stay!"
Now show me "Stay"
Spreading your idiotic messages
the nice things without which,
you can't live, more cases every day
the air you can't breathe
means do not leave

Now show me "Sit!"
Now tell them "Stay!"
Watch them fail, your greatest hit
on a loop, humanity on play
pompous and stupid acts of discussion
they're safely tucked away from recession,
and this is what they say
look at those dogs infect each other
protests in the USA,
they'll only hurt each other at the end of the day

Now tell me "Sit!" Tell me "Stay!"
Hong Kong is being systematically silenced
in response to allowing adjustments to the violence
that people can inspire
when their rights are set on fire
tell me nothing, reason will not reach my heart
I am enraged and want no part
spit on oppression and share the sickness
it is a level playing field with the masks off,
approaching half a million dead worldwide
avoid injustice, tolerate, bide your time, swallow pride
clench your teeth, roll over; clench your fists
let momentum play dead and stay inside
you have nothing to lose in the matter but your voice
it is the impossible unfairness, a dangerous choice.

In laborious anguish, cries that cracked the earth
window panes which shook with bellowed pains
Remus and Romulus, Abel and Cain given birth
Solomon, split us in twain
keep the whole, lose the attached brain

I welcome the poison into my life
it knocks and I let it in
and I ***** my guts as they unspool from my mouth
o'er the blade of my knife
soaked in the despair of eternal night that has yet to begin
I embrace the arms of ******, the hold of mutilation
arms of Hades take me away from the journey and to the destination
they whisper and mutter as he passes by there's the one with the open neck
who carries a dead soul on his shoulder
they don't know, those crows, whose lips for feed they peck
as our eyes roll over

A fine upstanding gentleman, my brother himself presents
with blood reeking on his hands, my brother himself resents
a killer with no intentions, ambitions, no control he does not relent
the finest necromancy combined a whole soul with the partial,
they cut the head off and preserved it in a jar, the baby's skull
his eyes open, turning in viscous liquids, tracking them wherever they are
an empty vessel for the monger who takes over, the wound beneath the scar
there is a dead man walking, being carried in the chest of an exiled noble
a dead man who longs for rest, who never chose to live
a ghost that haunts this disfigured puppet, strangling on the reins he gives

Now make your flesh dance!
Raise hairs, buds of skin, and a scimitar high!
If you will not discover your past,
your superstition will be your undoing and you will die
fall upon your sword at last,
let me out,
the jar tips over, the baby's head cries
let me out!
A man seemingly impales himself in a fit of madness
cursed by voices and murderous streaks of violence
he leaves only a stench in the street behind-
though finally, a being cursed to be trapped inside returns to its own mind
only to occupy a severed head that by sick magick managed to survive
and is to this day, millennia later, on a necromancer's shelf, in a jar, being kept alive.

How many miles warp the landscape?
She sits in the nook by her window, wondering
etching a portrait of the bounty to come
the rows of stalks, now she is of age
that she will enter the grain silo
her soul is endeared, there is no fear
they begin the harvest before dawn tomorrow

There is peace like she has never felt before,
knowing her destiny is to give back to the earth
and she is ready to do this and more
but in the darkness, the dead of night
outside her bedroom a faint flash of light
the oldest brother comes, his face sullen and white
he's determined to take her away,
he won't let her have this day
in the darkness, the dead of night
she strikes him, he's jealous he wasn't chosen
he turns heel in flight
but there is no escape, father awaits
with mother, brothers, sisters, by his side
"It is time." His penetrating glare, silver eyed
"You will rid your sister of this husk."  Words that strip him naked of his pride

Father's false leg is silent against the floorboards
across the fields the dozens gather
they follow the ascendant light of the son, hushed, no words
the only spark of life is the cigar father puffs, faced with these silo fumes, he too would rather-
she bolts across the catwalk and disrobes in preparation
his torch extinguished, he dives to stop her embracing annihilation
and all is too dark to see, too quiet to hear, she falls for seconds towards the surface of the grain
he lays, face down, hand extended with her night dress clutched in his fist
she lays on her back, impacted on the crust and broken inside and out, every breath is a feverish pain
she needs to sink, if she doesn't she will have done this all only for the maize
long after he should have gone, he looks down at her and stays
her fingertips claw gently at the deepest crack, she's determined to get back

Her legs protruding outward
spine broken, ribs stabbing hard inward
her skull broken, blood leaking over
bowels pierced, organs exploded, it's all over
not one tear, no weakness enters here
she exhales with force, no fear
and pushes herself into the abyss
with her dying breath, into the clear
the others ascend, sensing the fatality
only then do they hear
she's engulfed in the grain, only then do they see
she's screaming in pain, still alive, as she blesses the corn
all the way down, her journey continues, they open the auger
drain her through, collect the limbs and flesh rended, one eye sunken into her head, one shot with unbridled rage and scorn
never had anyone survived, many musclebound mortals
many agile men had walked the grain
hundreds have made the sacrifice,
they carry what is left of her off into the night
father places his hand on his oldest son

Clouds in the distance, thunder and lightning
no rain upon them, father puts his cigar out in the son's face
burning the bridge of his nose until it looks as out of place
as the deep scars and rings under either eye
he snatches the dress from his fist, and declares this lie
"Two more of us have become who they were, you see he never sleeps now and why?
For he journeys through the underworld every night, with his fire alight to guide us through when we die.
My Nocturnal Son."

From a window the young sister watches
forgotten, connected to machines as years wither
she sees her brother take them to the silo
her face turned forever towards the window
she watches as even the stars lose their glow
and the dead join her in presence
as they have yesterday, will today and tomorrow.

December, nineteen sixty three
the frost collects in the beards of the homeless
who weep tears of defeat; life seems hopeless
Philadelphia
bundled under blankets of snow
shivering and miserable they line the streets
few of them sleep, with nowhere to go
they borrow time to live, three starve for every one who eats
poverty and frail bones, behind their eyes they are hollow

Venture to their jungles, see their thin and decaying forms
shuffling as if their ankles are in chains, food slow enough for the worms
before they die their wretched lives waste away, compassion transforms
they chip at this glacier to reach the hearts and minds inside, yet the blizzard never warms
you strangers never warm; they were never warned
wringing a cheesecloth over an old mug
a belly full of fire to liven up the poor man
ours was just fifteen when he caught the bug
strained through a sock straight from a tin can

Oh no, look who came back with the Sterno-Inferno
give me a swig, give me sight, bring on the Canned Heat
knock you through the brig, won't even put up no fight, swept right off of my feet
loopy and sappy, it'll make you feel happy
it's quicker, hotter, and easier too
if you was where we was, what would you do?

He's drinking, and drinking, but it's not going away
in one month they lost a person for every day
thirty one deaths
thirty one deaths!
Thirty one deaths
it seems sometimes like he's the only one who can't forget
and as he exhales into his interlaced fingers
he can't see the blood on his hands, but the scent of iron lingers
young and alone, he staggers through winter like wet cement
with a pain pushing on his kidney like a broken bone that won't relent
his needs come back and haunt him, yet
direction is the one thing in life he could never find
now his hands guide him through a picture in his mind
swearing, crying, I am blind!

It was the perfect irony
when the sidewalks cleared of ice
and the sun shone down, now they could see
they wanted to go outside when it was nice,
but for the loss of many,
when they found his body
struck by a shovel clearing a path
on his side curled in a ball,
they became numbers to his statistic, indifferent and evil math
more witnesses than family, all their eyes would fall
that's the cruel nature, he died by a stoop and no one saw or heard his call
when he was discovered, he was made an example to them all
on the dangers of drinking methanol.