Often the news gives me the blues
I really ought to choose
to simply refuse
I mean really, what will I lose

Schadenfreude?
no that isn't it
truth is stranger than fiction
more like a fascination with the surreal
or a blinded  self-affliction with the scroungy real deal

Talking heads  that speak for work
punctuate sentences with erratic  head jerks
nobody normal talks that way, they ask  rhetorical questions
when the answer's are known, they’re killing time
“rephrase the question, run the clock  out
a commercial will spare us the embarrassment of doubt.”

Take’s a special person to face each new day
with zillions of prying eyes  hanging on every word you say
the mendicant voyeurs  of utter destruction’s  charming new  day
the slashing  machete melt down of the abject speakers foray
"Oh say, can you see  by the dawns early light"
What's become of your people  and their obsession with fright
desensitization  is paramount  to  achieve  an abeyance of light

Frankenfoods, and "side affects" hideous monsters in the making
high resolution mayhem require victims for the taking
awaking half-dead like Dracula’s  each dusk
they'll find a cure, there's another vaccine, there’s always dumb luck
maybe you won't be the sucker that makes that dreadful scene
bludgeon your mind with a another  faker, a different fresh  news team
fobbing  your leery eyes you ponder “they can’t  possibly all be  the same!”
different day, different month, different  year, same game

You wanted to hold all of the suffering of the world
In the palm of your hand
And when you saw it would not fit,
You quietly slid some into your pockets
And beneath your pillow
And between the pages of your notebook,
Struggling to comprehend why every tear was shed.
You tried to save the drowning man,
To keep him from slipping beneath the turbulence of the sea
For the last time.
But you slipped out of happiness
The way one slips out of her daily routine.
Losing sight of the sunlight shining on the sea
And the children's laughter echoing from the shore,
The world faded to black and white.
And as the water filled your lungs,
You realized that all of that suffering was weighing you down,
And the drowning man was much farther out than you thought.
So silently you sunk, deeper and deeper,
Watching the fractured pieces of your black and white world,
Disappearing above you.

I am tired, I am worn
For this is the calm after the storm
Heart beat ceases to race
Everything seems to fall into place
Take comfort in cycles and patterns,
Separate the insignificant from what matters
History repeats itself they say,
The universe works in funny ways
So push thoughts of growing older,
Of growing colder, of forgetting to be bolder
To the back of my mind
Shelved away somewhere difficult to find
And think instead of stories that turn out okay
Think of the sound of waves and rainy days
For I am slowly breathing
Almost sleeping
Nearly dreaming
Simply being.