I feel the strands push through my scalp for blue skies
Grow up, grow tall, then steeple palm to palm
Praise the sun! but where's the sun?

Legend says it's there to reach for men with means
If love, if happiness, then just take a grip
Praise the sun! but where's the sun?

Preach goodliness like you've the throat, the road to heaven
Preach to us like you'll sell deviants the verse

Raise the men! but what's a man?
Praise the sun! that never burned.

I'm over. I'm over.
Been over all along.

We dream
we want
the awards you take
We dream
we buy
the hypocrisy
We dream
we want
the new days you describe
in your speeches

The soap box betrays you

Twitter. Tweeting. Facebook. Facade.
Insta. Instant. Dopamine rush.

If you could separate your self from the stage,
that would be great.
-- but if you're going to make a political statement
while accepting an award for your humanity,
you might want to think about what your
individual actions tell the world about you.

Who will listen?
Who will ask?
Looks like money once more
takes the last laugh.

Broke, sitting with half plate
Pasta, butter, spice
Shuffle through my old clothes
I used to look nice

What is nice, but smaller?
Smaller, smaller, still
String bean and potatoes
Go fine together

The grocer tries to tell me,
"Divide, conquer, divide."
"What is nice, but smaller?"

I guess the grocer's right

What if I just sat myself in the chair with open ears to silence?
In quiet, would the voices play over and over, even then?
What if I unplugged myself for a moment, no longer?
Would it be time enough to see the vitriol I become?
In quiet, would my love be renewed?

In quiet, would I realize the pain created by hating the hater?
More than disparate views, I hate anger. I hate violence.
The master's walls resist the master's tools, I read it.
Even she, she would despise my guise. "Oh, really?"
She'd maybe say, "Get lost. Be gone." I feel it.

What do I do when I'm part of the crew hated?
Do I spend my days hiding or out fighting?
What do I do when I'm part of the crew hated?
What if I want to change minds and hearts slowly?
What if sudden, forceful changes break us?
I think you know the answer -- we're primed to explode

And I don't
Believe a racist, transphobe will ever love me, or learn me.
And I don't
Believe a word, a turn of phrase, deserves a bullet in the brain.
And I don't
Believe for a second that I'm anything but truly naive.

And I don't
Believe that's bad.

Sipping on OJ after ***, after ******* on a cigarette
   Night outside grows frozen as Autumn slips into Winter
She the Fire sleeps deeply, deep inside of me
   She's determined to hang moss bangs over Her face
      Block Her view from death's stony stare
         She's determined to sleep forever

What if I cut, what if I dig the skin to wake Her?
                   What if I starve the stomach?
Heave the breast toward the hand upon the chest with razor?

We all need Fire in the coldest days
Don't tell me   I'm in control
As you speak them, I speak too
We all say
   We all say
Don't tell me   I'm in control
We all break
   We all break
We've all broken ourselves

She's determined to sleep forever
   I'll
      wake
         Her

Not thoughtless
   enough to  ****  all day long
Not thoughtful
   enough to  escape the hood
Not petty
   enough to  market my  ancient little lies
Not honest
   enough with my  self  to
   out  grow  these twisted  vines

   All along, I've been
friends, only with the pen
   The pen is kind to me
when  I've  blown  my
chances, myself
   Slice  a  Y  you'll find
   The  heart  is  pa - per
   The  blood  has taken ink

   All along, I've been
friends, only with the pen
   All along, I've not been my own  by
extension, not myself
   No way I ever was
   If you could only see me now  my
friends

5 0 0 pieces or more
spill over six accounts
5 0 0 holes for fingers
opened over my skin
so  when  will i learn
to use my feet to seek?
so  when  will i learn
the blood  i  squeeze
will in time run dry?
the gills  that i cut
will swallow the knife?
no time better than now
no time like the present
  to remember to breathe
remember to walk toward
  not away
a comet on legs leaving
trails of  meteorites
no  time  better than now
the ropes of the past lace
through the toes to the wrists
how long has it taken?
how lucky am i that i
filled the flesh canvas
with angry scars and
still  have the  knife?
5 0 0 pieces or more
spill over six accounts
5 0 0 holes for fingers
opened over my skin
the detective is done
with the cold  case  blues
the detective is done
penning I 2 U s
there are enough mountains today
tomorrow and on for the detective
to be insane as long as they want
the detective is done
  with  the  cold  case  blues
   so case closed

Set the mood
Redline
Build the hill
Fill that stem
Inhale. Hold it in.
Take that breath
Relax. Just relax.

I'm  waving the smoke away
Both hands  extensions of
the atrium  that primes the pump
I'm  beating as bleating
Green veil  is parted re  -  vealed
Reveals  the one I'm afraid of  -  the
old me

I'm  counting days defeated
Dead days  used my blood took
the look that I sculpted and weaponized  - it
as something other

Set the mood
Lazerhawk
Build the hill
Fill that stem
Inhale. Hold it in.
Take that breath
Relax. Relax. Relax.

How am I  a slave to myself  I wonder
I wonder

How am I  a slave?

How am I  a slave to myself  I wonder
I wonder

I  ride the ghost train
I  deify  the old ghosts  -  I
I  never meant to board forever  -  I
Am shadow. Am product. The Ubik.
I  deify  the past as answer  -

nothing left to say
nothing left to say

(01101100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01100100 01101001 01100101 00100000 00100001 01101100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01100100 01101001 01100101 00100000 00100001 01101100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01100100 01101001 01100101 00100000 00100001 01101100 01100101 01110100 00100000 01101001 01110100 00100000 01100100 01101001 01100101 00100000 00100001)

This is nonsense
Non-sequitur
My care's breakfast
Love break away
It's gone by night
It's out of sight
What you take away
You **** out right away
I go forgotten
Not about to let on
That I want you back
Inside my ramble
Its the bramble
Push your arm through
If you can't or won't
Don't fret,
I've got money for the TriMet
This is nonsense
Non-sequitur
The hidden truth
between the words

Hear the heart cry
**** the lungs dry

I give you time
I give you sweat & blood
I give you devotion
I give you love
In offer

Bite the lip numb
Make me succumb

I give you time
I give you sweat & blood
I give you devotion
I give you love
In offer

Angels of envy
Give sacrifice
While I admire
The view from here

In quiet night
In shapeless shadow
I scry & chant
The view from here                                                         hurts.

I'm lucky that my *** drive started when I was young
It leaves me my future wrapped up in silence.

Bored on the internet, so see what I find.
I'm taken back to that moment in the past
When I met the droop-eyed star and starlet.
Look what Twitter has. Their pale face framed
and recreated, pixel perfect, inundated.
Talking in circles.
Talking highly of
Your self --
Like you're above the tower seat of power,
In the clouds. You're a mental case. How
you gonna love yourself so much?

I was told to never
light a cigarette
I did

He died and I
watched him
******* leave
me, nothing to be done

Lifeless and gray,
drained by day,
during his last week

Prey to the image
of the epitome of
masculinity

Cool, cool shades
Cool, cool leather
Jacket & boots

What do you want to be when you grow up?
One massive, tumescent lump

The water burns my toes cold
It wasn't worth the wait or the waste for this day
I feel like the love I gave you
I really gave to myself because I saw me in you
Now that we're both gone
Would it be so absurd to truly love ourselves?
Spying through wires in space
You look rough, almost like you never learned
If you saw me would you say I'm better?
If you looked would you take me for someone else?

If I met you again, I'd put the past behind
In the end, the most difficult truth is,
we were looking and lost, fundamentally flawed
nothing more

What if we could make a place ours?
Fire for heat, flat for wheel, safe.
Free from the warning orange.

I stopped caring.
A view of the world outside
escapes my morning eyes.
I eclipse you.
A view of the world outside
reveals wire frame in black.

The sky is wide. I'm just beneath heaven.
Have you ever felt as close to god there?
On the Earth turned cement dry?
In the dregs where lines divide?

I stopped caring.
A view of the world outside
escapes my morning eyes.
I eclipse you.

I regret that I see lines, instead.
One triangle on its head, risen
above the sun, above the moon.
The sight of you, deprived,
drives me back inside.

----------------------------------------------

Felt mostly alone.
Never deprived.
Unhappy with life,
still overjoyed.
My mama stole my name.
My sister got her's took.
Pass the line from child
hood into adulthood,
looking like,
I know, I'm sure I know
I can't owe you money, yet,
I've never lived
on my own.

That's still true, too.
Don't know the sound of silence,
so when it's been most quiet
staying with roommates,
I take my chance at pretend.
I wake up dying, laughing
and crying at ghostly degrees
floating with motes of dust
on the sunbeams
crossing my mattress
in the living room.

Felt mostly alone.
Uneducated.
Contented by kicking cans, though.
Contented in stinky briefs,
and the shirt that's food
for my closet moths,
looking for cheap ways
to express the illness,
the anger I hide.

I believe, that some use our backs
for stacking currency. For work.
Invisible work, deep under the radar,
pack mule to their nickel,
fifty-*******-cent pieces
and dimes.

I'm staring at pennies
they leave me to roll,
already rolling, like
they expect me to catch up.
The secret is:
they want it
so badly --

So game over. I ain't playing
no more, when the piece I play
climbs the backs of friends,
my brethren of the low-low,
one space at a time, with dice
cooked, favor to snake eyes

I'm not chasing pennies
if I'm so close to the floor
I'll always be carpet,
I'll part the lint and braid
to love what is free.

I'll always be base
to love what is free.

We've our grievances
right
here in hand

Blood soaked envelopes
stamped
sweat and seal

They use empty truths
to pitch hate
as a promised land

They sell their answers
used, as is
to the fearing masses

And they do so
dirt cheap
dirt cheap

From a throne
of our skulls
and ancient
bones

.our ******* bones.

The last letter you sent to me
simply read, "Z"
as if you wanted me to see
it was too hard
for you to
complete my name,
even after everything,
still, you can't even
press it with a Bic
into some Hammermill

So, what can't they see?

The last letter you sent to me
read like a eulogy
for the woman you were
The praise was put on pretty thick
By your description
anyone else would see
me as biohazard, medical waste,
another toxic taste,
highly addictive, overwhelming,
an overall detriment
to your mental health

So, what can't they see?
Lover from another over moment,
what can't they see?

Doesn't matter how I conduct myself,
certain ears listen to certain mouths
regardless of the content, or the timing
There's been a Jean-Claude in pink
since the beginning, sitting in the trees
taking notes, waiting for the moment
I reveal something petty and honest
in a rare moment of our honesty

Feel free to rake up my mistakes
If you want to do us both, anata,
we'll need a bigger ******* rake

So, what can't they see?
Lover from another over moment,
what can't they see?

She said, "Hello. You look like ****."
I said, "To what do I owe this. . . this compliment?"
A double whiskey on the house
I said, "Fine with me, I always take the first one free."
"But you've been here all night," she said,
"In fact every single night this week."

Hope stands monstrous in the door
Can't tell if it's as it is or if it's my eyes swimming
Memory's a funny thing, because from what
I remember I never was a drunk
Just everyone on dad and grandpa's side
Cruising all the way up the line

Now, reflection's come to cast
proper shadow 'cross my heart
in clouded mirrors with lights off
I outsmart the faint voice
No hands, ******* in the dark