Not a lot has changed inside
From who I used to be.
I’ve gained wrinkles and gray hair
But that’s just humanity.
It doesn’t change the facts at all;
I am still who I always was.
It’s the packaging that changes
And that has a reasonable cause.

When I forget something
Folks call me old and senile
But, the fact is that I have
Been doing that for quite a while.
Ever since I was a kid
As a matter of pure fact.
So, don’t mislabel something
That is not an aging fact.

And when I groan a bit
When rising from my chair
It’s a bad habit I learned
Long ago, some bad where.
It is laziness and whining
And that’s the pure truth.
It has nothing to do with
My distance from youth.

When my eyes get misty
At something I may see
It’s not that old age has
Has totally overtaken me.
It’s because I’ve been around
For enough of these years
To recognize the feelings
That go on behind tears.

So tip your hat to me, my friends
And you surely won’t go wrong.
There is a bit of credit due
For sticking around this long.
It has given me some vision
Due to plenty of hindsight,
To make better decisions now
And to make most of them right.

You put my head up
Among the stars
And help me hear
The cosmos sing.

To me it was epiphany
But it didn’t mean a thing
To you, at least not enough
To realize I was enchanted
Like a school kid of twelve
With that first strong crush
That turns the heart to mush
And the knees to jelly.

It puts a fire in the belly
That time can’t quench.
I felt my gut wrench
And clench and flatten out
So much I felt a shout
Coming on like a scream
But felt that would seem
To make me look insane.

I am doing it all again,
That childhood love attack
Was dragging me back
And away from today
When my heart wanted to say
Words that meant something,
But to you nothing.

My head is still in the stars
Which must be where you are
Because you are not here.
Nowhere near any more
I was just a love chore
And, your work done
You are gone.

Pity would be no more,
If we did not make somebody Poor;
And Mercy no more could be.
If all were as happy as we;

And mutual fear brings peace;
Till the selfish loves increase.
Then Cruelty knits a snare,
And spreads his baits with care.

He sits down with holy fears.
And waters the ground with tears:
Then Humility takes its root
Underneath his foot.

Soon spreads the dismal shade
Of Mystery over his head;
And the Caterpillar and Fly
Feed on the Mystery.

And it bears the fruit of Deceit.
Ruddy and sweet to eat:
And the Raven his nest has made
In its thickest shade.

The Gods of the earth and sea,
Sought thro’ Nature to find this Tree
But their search was all in vain:
There grows one in the Human Brain

The deeper I go
the darker the day,
blue turns to grey turns to black and
it's hard getting back.

I grab onto daylight which for now is the skylight
and the colour returns to my cheeks,
time speaks quietly to me, inaudibly,
I only see the light.

At the zenith, the nadir is clear to me,
each holds itself to a certainty
an effect which though true gets
lost on me,
I only see the light.

The deeper I sink and
the darker I think, I think
I think myself into a
quandary, in
silence the colours come back to me,
like troops on the long march to victory
and time chatters on quite
incessantly.

I just want to lay here, stay here, waste away the day here,
I want to scrounge on my dreams as I lounge on it seems that's not one of the options you give.

In this state,
I wait and
I wait.
I could lay here forever never knowing what living was or could be believing I'm free
streaming through consciousness
a pawn in some game where the options are a stalemate or death.

Still laying here, inert and obeying the law of gravity
waiting for some opposite attraction or a
magnetic impulse to give me traction and
I wait
and
the weight
is
at sea level
quite bearable.

Did I really sing through the early spring and coo and bill with the daffodils, howl like a wolf at the moon, watch the rising of the tide, was that really me inside looking out?

And lay bare when the Sun became the name that I called you by, did the stars ever twinkle so sweetly in the sky at night?
How dim now the light seems in those memories if the might have beens had been definite.

Winter spills more than rain on me and these weary eyes can see the end.

Christmas lends to me one more holiday with the family and the ones I love and then it takes back what belongs to it with interest due.

If I knew at all anything at all I know ****** all about it at all.

And the spring will come, the daffodils, the Sun and I'll have gone.
Fair or
unfair it's all
that
and
Lemons.

my eyes opened to find
the thin lizard dawn gleaming
after the gutter drank its' fill
of the moon last night
the tambourine
buried in my lungs still
vibrating like these walls
papered with cheap roses

last night i found comfort the
only way i know how
in situations like this
beside a girl wearing
a pretty ribbon
twisted around her waist
pomegranate lipstick
wet clay & tragic glitter
smeared across her eyelids

we spent the night
roped together by
half-removed clothing
& my fingers third
knuckle deep
counting the pulse
of the heart
of the universe

while the wild fox
barked on the hill outside
& the mockingbirds
played riffs in the lilac bushes
her ******* ran tight
around her shins &
she sputtered the dark
lyricism of bees
twisting her tongue
backwards around
itself in my ear

our bare bellies
slapped together as
my tongue found her
tooth enamel &
the trees formed
a tight center loop to
harness the sky
for us & i
held my breath
waiting for her
to breathe first

i can feel her chest
& plump **** now
quietly throbbing
against the tight young
flesh of my back but when
i roll over & see her
eyes darting
green like a thin
ocean laser avoiding
my dynamic gaze &
her pouty mouth emitting
a pink yawn i can tell
she's unhappy & ashamed
of me

i tried to run
my fingers through
the butterscotch tumbleweed
of her hair but she just
popped her gum
& sent me
high stepping through
the soft warm mud
& chest high cattails
of her driveway
callow under the clouds
stuck like gnats to
the fly paper sky

Watching the clouds,
they seem to stop and
to start,
as if they are scared that
The sky's falling apart.

The wind whistles  erratically,
it's  a drama Queen,
emphatically.

I'm tucked up in bed, but with wild
horses for brains I'm being led to the conclusion,
that I need a rest.