Death stopped by the local coffee shop the other day
sat down and said to me
"What the **** is wrong with you PEOPLE!?!?
You have me working non-stop
I never get a moments break
The only family I ever see is War and Despair
Dream, Life, and Love won't even talk to me
And ever time I seee War
all we do Is sob uncontrollably
Despair is the only one you've made happy
and she is absolutely miserable about that
SERIOUSLY... what is wrong with all of you?"
She paused, stole my coffee
Got up, flipped me the bird
and as she walked away said
"I'm done... you are all on your own..."
And I wondered what would we all do
with all our hate in a world without Death
In a world where we couldn't run around
senselessly killing each other

We have to strive forward with hope
no matter how hopeless it seems
or we lead our children into a life and world
where only nightmares and worry
rule as kings and queens

I want to die hungry
I want to die knowing life meant something
I want to die with piles of work unfinished....
unfinished poems
unfinished books
unfinished illustrations
unfinished paintings...

I want to die knowing I tried to my very last breath
to make this world a better place
that I tried to shed light into the worlds darkness
that I tried to transform something cold
and heartless and ugly into something beautiful

That I did not turn a blind eye
to the poor and the hungry and the homeless
That I spoke up when inequality was still a monster
guarding capital hill
and its stash of gold and treasure for the 1%

That I acknowledge that white privilege
was a serpent in the court room
devouring real justice
while turning a blind eye
to the crimes of daddies little boy
who just made a mistake for "twenty minutes"
over and over
again and again
in and out
in and out
for "twenty minutes"
and why should "twenty" consecutive "minutes"
of poor choices ruin his whole privileged...
I mean promising life...

That white privilege was obvious
when one person convicted of ****
walked free in three months
while other men just accused of ****
found but not proven guilty
spent decades behind bars
to only be eventually freed
when their accusers told the truth
about how they had lied
and none of it happened
and if you can't guess the difference between the two
you probably believe the world is flat
and that white privilege and climate change and global warming
are paranoid delusions of people who are lazy and worthless
and want something for nothing

That the dead no matter their color
still need to see their murders pay
for what they have stolen
what they have broken
and the pain they left behind
when they decided that when
they "feared" for their life
it went from to protect and serve
the community and the people
to I'm going to **** this *******

That I knew that #blacklivesmatter
was a call for justice and equality
not special treatment or supremacy

That the vocabulary of my sons heart
did not know the word hate
other than when he said things like
"YUCK!, I hate GREEN BEANS!"

That he not only understood kindness
but he knew and lived by its importance
that he strived for compassion and empathy
that he treated generosity and helpfulness
as a responsibility to those in need
that his pursuits of happiness
included helping others in their pursuits

That he loved and gave with a heart
that was always full
that was always hungry
from the time that I leave him
to the time he takes his own last breath
that he lived
to make this world a better place
that he tried to shed light into the worlds darkness
that he tried to transform something cold
and heartless and ugly into something beautiful

She kept the beauty of fairy tales
fluttering about her heart
and the reality of heartache
in the paint strokes of her eyes
she was always
a tear away from suicide
and a dream away from life
she walked the line between fiction and love
on a rope made out of razor wire
and whiskey shots mixed with turpentine
her feet could smoother burning coals
and bled and wrote stories
no one dared walk behind
she could speak in languages
only the stars and the leaves
could understand
and she sang to both
whenever they asked
she knew how to swim
but preferred the feeling of drowning
the cold searing pain
of lungs unable to take a breath
the fear and rush of staring
into the dark unknown
she would get lost at sea
to find her way to oceans end
where mermaids and starfish
waited to hear
the fluttering of her heart
as told by the beauty of fairy tales

How do we save a world that doesn't know it needs to be saved from itself or even worse just doesn't ******* care to be, a world full of people who are more comfortable with the idea of living with fear and hate in their hearts than the thought of looking at the world through kind and compassionate eyes, people clinging to old ideas passed down for generations and the latest religious fade and diluted dreams of national pride were no one is really purely this or that but all a bunch of mutts whose grandparents ****** on all the different continents but since their parents ****** under some specific flag they want to believe their better than some one else because their parents ****** under some other flag and it gets all jumbled up and none of it really matters because the only reason any of us are here was because we got lucky when we won that first race of our lives after shooting out of our dads **** into our moms ****** and that little miracle should be enough for us all to go around high giving each other our whole ******* lives even if it was just blind luck because lets face it we had no idea what was going on when that happened but somehow we lose sight of how strange and bewildering and beautiful the creation of each one of us was and how lucky we are to be here and between the then and the now we somehow let the precious gift of time go to waste on things that have little to do with what life should be and somehow as we have the opportunity to make the world a better place, a more peaceful place, we are doing the exact opposite, we have the chance to learn from one another and about each other on a higher and easier scale than ever before but instead of communicating with thoughts and ideas and dreams we let fear drive us forward and we continue to spread hate with lies and bullets and bombs and wars and there isn't any need for any of it but we stay complicit and turn the other way and we avert our eyes from the homeless and the hungry and the abused and the abandoned and we make ourselves feel less guilty by blaming the victim without bothering to hear their story because if we stopped to listen and stopped to look and see who they really are we might realize that they are more similar than different and that their lives matter as much as our own and we are all just a bad throw of the dice from life taking a turn for the worst and we forget that nothing in life is guaranteed, not its length, not its quality, not the good vs the bad, none of it, but we walk around as if death is on our side and we have all the time in the world and the world is crumbling before our eyes and we are at a war with stupidity and somehow we are ******* losing and all you need to do is look at the big orange baboon "running" America and the horrific people he's surround himself with and the hateful **** being spewed out of the mouths of some of his supporters... its nothing short of heartbreaking, I mean really ******* heartbreaking, from the tiki-torch carrying polo shirt khaki pant wearing white supremacist, who are easy to joke about but non the less dangerous, to the random people yelling at anyone who just happens to look foreign in a public parking lot, not knowing that their parents ****** under the same flag and in fact they have ever right to be here but you know why know the facts when its easier to hate and its all just too much to believe but here we are moving backwards instead of forward and I sure as hell don't know how to save a world that doesn't know it needs to be saved or doesn't want to be saved but for what it's worth I'm not going anywhere and I'm here for you or anyone else who needs to be seen or heard or loved because the ship might be going down but we were all born swimmers or we wouldn't be here in the first place so lets swim and remember how strange and bewildering and beautiful it is to be here and make the most of what little time we have left because a day or a year or decades will all pass in the blink of an eye and if we can't put out the fires let the ****** world burn and dance in the glow of the flames

I want to feel your
lips full of poetry
bleeding out a verse
of pleasure over
a rhyme of sin
with fairy tale eyes
whispering of secrets of lust
and promises for love
hold you until the end of time
and hang our story
from a branch
of the tree of stars
where beneath the roots
we will steal the crown
of butterfiles
and throne from
the queen of bees
and float down
the river of eternity
and dream of reading
each kiss we share
from your lips
full of poetry

Driving down the road
of the last summer afternoon
a tear of joyful sorrow yawning
in the corner of my eye
as the echo of laughter
from the last months past
run through the halls of my heart
and I wonder where has the time gone
where have the nights snuck away to
and the days run off with
and how I wish we had one more week
one more month
one more forever summer more
to have the earth spin in place
and have you not age another day
one more late night science project
and one more chapter
of one more book
one more lazy day
of sleeping to almost noon
one more day of sun and fun
one more day of running laughter
and lego blocks and movie tickets
and Donkey Kong and Mario
one more day before
the morning school bell rings
and takes and adds another year
that will pass to quick
and end too soon

Never lie to the same poem twice
save it for the next one
or better yet don't tell it at all
for a lie no matter how beautiful
it may sound
or sweet it may taste
rolling off the tongue
will always leave behind
a sour smell
to linger in the mouth
of the past and present
and more often than not
carry knives into the future

Never kiss a new lover
with an old prayer on your lips
it will not bloom
to love or lust
only heartache and embarrassment
be alone and lonely and miserable
until there is no stain or trace
of old fire burning
or cinders glowing
or ashes still smoldering
forming the face and the name
that no longer cares
for your prayers

Never tell the truth to a kiss
that whispers only lies
when speaking of love
and dances with serpents
that tend to planting seeds
of venom and lust
in the skin
and the core of pleasure
that will only wither
and rot on the vine

be patient with yourself
be kind to yourself
time and life will pass
and pass too quickly
and pass too slowly

wait and listen

you will find
what you need
as it finds you...

unexpectedly

and then you can
kiss the love
that whispers in dreams
while only speaking the truth

it's in the lush lips of her smile
and the stars that freckle
her cheeks and her nose

the soft beat of her heart
just beneath the flannel cloth
worn over her chest

the poems she keeps
in the pockets of her jeans
and the legs they cover

the songs of her milky skin
and its playful sins
and haunting seduction

part dream
  part lust
    part love

it's in all that she does
and all that she is
and all that is beautiful

Momma..
do I have to ****...
momma
do I have to die...

Yes baby...

why?

For freedom...

what's freedum?*

It's an illusion baby,
It's just an illusion...

She was made up of earth and poetry
a silk garden of flames
that bloomed flowers of soft lust
the sun had adorned her skin
with small kisses that stained her face
with stars shaped like freckles
and the moon wove its magic
from the colors of her eyes
she was goddess and muse and woman
and all the things that made life feel beautiful
her blood ran with the indigo rivers
along the mountains of eternities horizon
and she hypnotized with slow poison
from the drunken haze of midnight ***
and her velvet lips could mend the broken
and raise the dead with just a dream of a kiss
and she only had to show the skin of her neck
to make fools out of mortal men
who let prayers of sin seep from their hardened
and wanting desire to know who she was
under her jeans and shirts and nakedness
when she unfolded and dripped and moaned
and took and gave and offered and devoured
from light morning kisses and drowsy eyes
to bending over the kitchen sink
with just enough skin exposed
to plow and grunt through the day
and fall into frenzied sheets
of ***** deeds under the moon
and exposed secrets of lost pleasures
only known by those that have swallowed
the fires of sin and the blood of honey
and in the aftertaste she lingered
with a hint of her earth and poetry

Time falls backwards
and we are lost
and we are weary
and the ignorance of pride
over flood the streets
and there is no peace
among those with hate
in their hearts
and they can burn torches
and spread violence
but we will stand our ground
until we bleed to death
and we will stand hand in hand
and protest until our final breath
but we will not back down
because we cannot back down
we must strive forward
hand in hand and heart to heart
for were hate goes
only blood will spill
their children's
and our children's
we will only survive
and set time right
by walking hand in hand
brother to brother
to sister to sister
to father and mother and child
with our hearts to our hearts
and I'm not proud
so I will beg
please...
before it's too late...
let love rule

So simple and complex as your lower
lip parted in the slightest  
as you barely make a sound
and something like a wicked
and wanting smile
draws me into the web of your charms

How easily you have seduced
with words of secrets and of truths
and so willing have I been tied
to the shadows and the light
of the stories from the scars
haunting the hallways of your heart

Stuck between a slow moving dream
and a quick fading life
your voice drips with poetry
of honey coated lust
and whispers songs of love
in the lost language of the sea

And nothing is said
as your mouth forms a smile
and your lower lip parts
and if it weren't for the complex worry
of having to say goodbye
maybe it would be as simple as saying hello

The nature of war blooms bullets and bombs
in battlefields of glory
that quickly turn into gardens of grief
rained down upon with the blood of innocence
lost to hate fueled by years of violence breeding violence
and the coffins fall in place as the body count marches on
and spit shine the corpse for the beautiful parade
for the heroes of war and the soldiers of peace
who sleep with the horrors of what they've seen
and the horrors of what they've done
tucked away tight and safe
inside name brand body bags and precisely folded flags
and what victory can be seen
in the tears of a mothers heart
or the pride in a fathers eyes
and the nature of war blooms on
as the cannons keep roaring
and the political speakers keep up
the rhetoric of violent ballets of misinformation
to keep the war machine grinding
the bones of new enemies
with the same old perpetuated propaganda
to keep the masses foaming at the mouths
to dress up in uniforms of legalized ******
and the casual lie
of the freedom everyone is fighting for
and it's the iron fist that controls the land of the free
and it's the strong arm of might
making everything alright with the nature of war

Playgrounds turn to battlefields
as our children grow into children
who **** children
and it's always us vs them
as sneakers filling with sand
turn into boots filling with blood
but blood is cheap
and easy to make
the less we educate
the more likely our babies
will make babies of their own
while they are still babies
so take away birth control and information
and it doesn't have to be safe ***
as long as they keep getting pregnant
consensual or ****
lets keep that fetus safe
we need new feet to keep marching
to keep those old war drums banging
late into the night
to keep our enemies hating
on what we do because
they just don't get our idea
of what it means to be cool
it's live by our cross
or die by our sword
in the might of the dollar
and the words printed on every coin
we know we're always right
so military or civilian just bomb them all
and let god sort them out
because blood is cheap
and the dollar needs
  more
    more
      more
of that beautiful thing we call war

I see the darkness in the world
and stare into the corners of its ugly truths
and witness the obscenely criminal neglect
of our own humanity
I hear the silent echoes escaping the abyss
from the pleas of the lost and the lonely and the desperate
and I recognize my own voice among them

I feel the fear of love being lost and thrown away and ignored

And I hurt and I weep and I worry

But I do not turn away
not from the darkness
or the ugly truths
or the criminal neglect

I break the silence and scream
to the lost
and the lonely
and the desperate

And I reach my hand to love
for I will not let it get lost
or be thrown away
or ignored
and i will not let it die in fear

For without love
the world would be swallowed by darkness
consumed by its ugly truths
crumble from its own neglect

but with love
we can survive the darkness
sink to the bottom
and rise back out of the abyss
help the lost and the lonely
and the desperate and our selves

and we can hurt for love
and we can weep for love
and have no need to worry

World War Death
It's time to take our last breath
The king is dead
Long live death
One too many bombs
One too many times
One too...
One two...
Left
Right
Right
Wrong
Whose side is god on
Whose prayers does he answer
Whose prayers does he refuse
Did heaven and hell lose track
Of what all this bloodshed is for
Is it pride and money
Is it lies and corruption
Is it just business as usual
Changing the rules of chest
Rearranging the squares
of tic-tac-toe
Shine shine shine
Press and fold
Body bags by the dozen
Coffins and tombstones
Waiting back at home
Blood is cheap
And easy to make
Keep them dumb
And on their knees
Pumping out fresh
Meat for the teeth
Of the old blind dogs
Of hate and war
And keep them poor
So they have no choice but
World War Death