I won't be shamed
For the things I've done
The lives I've taken
I do what I do
For a reason.
My family and I
My brothers and sisters
We fight for your right
To call us killers
And spit in our direction
I once said I was a wolf
But I was wrong
For I've faced the wolf
And his savagery knows
No bounds
So we vowed to protect you
The innocent
The sheep
For the herd has us
To defend
And avenge it
The Sheepdogs

The man
Born of pain,
Gallevants
'Cross the stage,
To the cheers
And the jeers of the people.

He dances
All day,
In the sun
And the rain,
As his fears
Become more and more real.

He keeps
The charade,
Tries to fight
Through the haze,
As the music
Calls much darker evil.

Till the man,
In his prime,
Turns away from
His life,
And he watches
It all start to crumble.

He's so sick
Of the dance,
That he keeps
Falling flat,
Of his heart
That was ever so fickle.

To his head
Held a gun,
Not in love
Games or fun,
But the dancer
Had naught left to live for.

*Bang

I'm adrift
on a shifting sea of sickness.
The battered boat breaks the waves beneath me.
Crimson clouds circle overhead.
Coughing gulls wing their way to shore.
The sun beats down
Branding my body a ****** red.
I'm not sure how I've found the will to survive.
But I will say...
Things are so much more peaceful away from the rest of humanity.

As we're caught,
Trapped,
And dragged along,
Unwilling,
In this sweeping tide.
As the hands wave by seconds,
Into Minutes,
Into hours.
As time drags us,
Heads bouncing against the concrete,
We seen to have given up.
With each second pass,
A heart stops.
With each ****** minute,
Another man has lost his sanity.
Another family,
Lost their son.
We are a strange race.
Creating constraints that bind us,
Almost as if we need that reminder.
That no matter what we do,
Where we go,
Who we defeat.
The ticking counts down
Until it is our turn
To be launched into the abyss
Off the second hand of
A
Ticking
Clock

Unlucky 13,
I feel your pain.
Your loneliness.
Those around you are seen as normal.
You do not look very different,
Yet, for some reason, you are marked.
I've followed the same path,
And I've found myself
On the sometimes non-existant,
13th floor.

Crossed stars mean nothing
Except an extraordinary battlefield
When wronged lovers return for vengance

Well ****.
Ha, that could be the name of my autobiography.
Anyway...
Once again, people have grown infatuated with the words rolling off my tongue.
They sound pretty...
But do you really understand them?
You see me every so often,
But do you really know me?
I'm sorry.
I don't do it on purpose.
I don't want to sound conceited, but...
It just happens.

There's no point
In telling people what they
Want to hear.
What they really want
Is a reason to strike back
At a world they imagine
Has wronged them.

You drifted off,
Around 11 O' Clock,
On line 8 of page 9, Chapter 1.
I feel a sense of pride
That my voice can soothe you to sleep.
Nobody else that I know of
Has that affect on you,
I can't wait to pick up where we left off
Tomorrow night.

I sit and ponder
How a steady mind
Can pick through a pile
Of cluttered characters
And combine them
Into words that can
Change the world.

A lost cause never makes a good lesson.

It's unnerving
To scream silently
Into a void
And be greeted
By deafening silence

I don't need an army.
I don't need people to relay orders.
I don't need tanks or mortars,
Missiles or grenades.
I've always fought my own battles.
And I've always fought them alone.
I've never needed anyone.
And usually I lose when other people get involved.
Step back.
Stay out of the war.
Find your own battle to fight.
I am my own legion.
And as long as you don't intercede,
I am guaranteed victory.

It's painfully easy
To share a condescending veiw,
Even when more will change
With action than will with word.
Yet another lecture is what I get.
I'm fully aware I disappoint you.
You've made it widely known.
But I'm not sure I care anymore.
It's just as easy in my mind
To splatter some ink onto the page
As it is to splatter my brains on the ceiling.
I guess we'll see which hurts less.

I was wrong.
Eventually, a rifle warms up,
After you put a few hundred rounds through it.
People, however,
Grow increasingly colder.
They're much more difficult to operate.
I'd rather hear the percussive beat of a bullet firing
Than I would the angry, unfounded accusations.
The recoil into my shoulder is better
Than the pangs in my chest when I realize she never cared.

A few fleeting words for a faraway friend;
Welcome back.

Sometimes,
I want to burn.
From the inside, out.
Until I'm nothing but dust,
Memories blown away with the wind.
Do you know
Where I can find
Something to accelerate the agony?
To help me burn quickly,
Yet spare me no pain?
Oh well...
If you find anything, give me a call.
I'll take it off your hands.

Hello.
Surprised to see me?
I said I would return.
It's just happened sooner than I predicted.
I'm doing well.
I've returned,
A king to his kingdom,
A lord to his manor,
A master to his craft.
Now please, shoo.
There is work to be done.

I've worked for months,
Trying to build something sustainable.
But when I get angry,
I feel an urge to burn down everything,
And start over somewhere else.

The Devil stopped me today,
On my way back around
The cyclic road we walk.
He folded his hands and sighed,
His eyes soft and sad.

"Mike." He began.
"I'm sorry. I have to stop you.
You've had your turn around."
He beckoned me towards him.

"You know of those you've hurt.
Of the damage that you've done."
Here his eyes seemed to harden.
"You can't make up for the mistakes that you've made."

"Even Gods have their time.
Let your tongue of silver rest."
He tilted his head.
"No punishment awaits you."

"No pain.
I know that every moment
Of existence pounds in your temples.
You wish for an end."

He taps his foot and a hole splits
The Earth.
"Come with me. You've already had your torment. I can stop the voices."

He nods to me.
"I can stop the pain."

The Devil stopped me today.
At the crossroads of time and space.
He made me a deal.
A deal I couldn't refuse.

My soul.
For the end.

Outside the window
Resides a colorless world.
The cloud is gray and all else is white.
The pane is dotted with elegant flakes,
The roads and walks are covered.
The perfect day for staying in,
Wrapping up with your love
Under a warm blanket.
And maybe later,
A war with projectiles
Of packed frozen water,
Perhaps?

An empty hallway lit by a creeping gloom.
Walls lined with old photographs,
From past, present and future.
These alternate with sealed passageways.
The door behind me is bolted shut,
It is impossible for me to return there.
A shallow fog clutches the floor,
Rolling towards the far end of the hall.
It seems like it's trying to pull me along,
But I brace myself by leaning back.
No doors are open,
So I wait in the hallway.
Maybe I won't be stuck here for long.
Maybe...

I walk a slumbering city,
Shuffling through an endless inky cloud.
90 minute walk to the house.
I can't even call it home anymore.
Home is where the heart is
And my heart can't even find itself.

"I don't want to live."
The dead man sobbed.
"When life begins, everything else ends..."

I drown the sorrows in the strongest thing I can get my hands on.
An acoustic guitar thrums in the background,
The light rapping of a hi-hat keeps pace.
My eyes are bleary and half focused,
A tear runs a track down my cheek.
I wake up in the morning,
The speaker still on
And still going.
For a moment,
The world seems better.
Until the yelling starts upstairs.

The number has doubled.
Our ranks are swelling.
Together we are ubstoppable.
One Silvertongue is a menace.
Two is a storm.
I bid you welcome, Old friend.
Better or worse,
Change is change.
We have change in common.
And of one thing I am certain.
I've missed the mystery man that you once made me.

Fire can purify.
It can purge.
Burn away the excess.
Melt away the impurities.
Would it work for me?

Should I start taking gasoline shots,
Light a match,
And swallow it?
Will the bad burn away?
The anger, pain and hate?
Will it evaporate?

Will I be reborn,
Like a phoenix in the flame?
Or will I be scattered across the seas,
Ashes in the wind,
A sudden flare from a dying star?