I went on a fishing trip and all I got was a bunch of worms.
I opened every single can in an attempt to keep what I had earned.

Tiresome days. Brightly lit nights.
Beer-Battered and braised on the menu tonight.
Brains splattered and bruised in the venue tonight.
You bring the torches, and I'll supply the mob.
We'll rob this town of all it's got,
Ransack every single plot,
So that tomorrow's day will show no light.

Observe the unheard
With their leaves all unturned.
Sharply carved and crudely drawn.
No plan of attack is the best defense, after all.
Things are lookin up to me , so I'm climbing over walls.
When my head hangs low another brick slips and falls.

Push and shove,
War of Tugs,
Smiling mean mugs.

Contrary to popular contradictions,
Irony just packed its paradigms into cardboard paradoxes.
Breathing heavily as I pack my life into a handful of moving boxes,
I'm starting to remember what my floor looks like when it's not covered by useless possessions and countless pairs of boxers.

That is to say, I'm grounded on this unfounded belief.
Hail to the thief.
My pen flows endlessly
As I pretend to be
The boy I used to see
Before this evolutionary split
Brought me to the grave of unspoken revolutionaries.

I halfway wish you never met me.
That that hallway conversation never came to be.
That I could live out these days with a less poignant memory of agony.
But I remember all that I've learned
And that I'm not moving out, I'm moving on
To somewhere  I can finally earn my own keep.
I'll be around sometimes, but I'm currently unavailable,
So please leave a message after the beep...

Straddling the line of popularity
Teetering on the edge of trends and personality
As soon as I'm about to fall into them I revert back to introverted me.

This dissent from narcissistic sorcery may slip you into mental dysentery
Though reading into the stains is not necessarily a necessity,
It's a little difficult to ignore the symmetry.

Hock-up spit onto this canvas, rip up another piece for my portfolio.
Lock-up your kids inside the frames of your family's mementos.
I'm lashing out like diet coke infused with mentos.

I'm not your son, not your husband, nor your best friend.
I'm that guy you **** for fun sometimes on the weekend.

I used to hate people in school who said they "failed" when they got a "C",
Now I hate the people who say they're broke when they still have money.

I'll grab your skate-up , lame-duck, askin "Have you ever ate nuts?"
We need some action. Got the lights, the camera, but don't take cuts.
Shoot a provisional peripheral glance at my pay-stub.
Always take pride in where you came from even if it ain't much.

The glass is still half empty if you're only half full of ****.
Some days I'm a dog. Any day I'm a typical cat.
So on the days it's raining cats and dogs, I get really wet.
No...wait...not like that...
I mean I'm thrown really out of whack.
Spilling every drop of sporadic synaptic spit onto this paperback.

I'm dripping into sorrow

Like raindrops into a pothole

I can't outrun what I've borrowed

There's no profit in tomorrow

I claim there's no dependence/dependants until there's none left in the bottle

I get less than what I earn so that the slugs can keep their grottos

Oh, how the caged bird sings...
From the nest made of  fallen earrings, flattened rings, and tangled wiring.
Is there a difference between a cage and a nest?
Is a home a shelter or a prison?
I guess it just depends on who has access to the door.

Are you tired of boxes or tired of moving?
My nomadic experience provides definition to previous gleanings.
Death Row is still living, while Hobo Bo yearns for the meaning.
Feed the dog first and then get your filling.
Expanding your consciousness, but how far are you willing?
Your pupils can only expand so much before your eyes are nothing but black holes with no floors or ceilings.

How old is this feeling?
Your camera lens will fracture if you don't stop twisting.
Pretty soon you won't be able to view anything.  
Your tree houses how many rings?
Did you really free yourself or is the cage just disappearing?
How close can you get to flying without batting your wings?
How close to the sun can you fly be before frying? What good does that bring? Let freedom ring.

So sing, little bird, sing your song of searing madness.
Whether I'm shackled to this perch or flying in circles out in a clearing,
As long as I'm listening to these same sweet melodies there is nothing to be fearing,
For I'm listening to the most beautiful song that I can ever remember hearing.
A bird lives a simple life, and in the end that is what is most endearing.
Sing freedom, sing.

At the round table I will feast upon the scraps of humble beginnings while the king flings suffering from his trusty silver spoon encrusted with family jewels at the bumbling fools babbling satirically about the absurdity of his rules.

The royal court's still serving sentences to the remnants of the members of the Pent-up Armageddon Club getting their writing fingers bent up as penance, thus rendering them useless as wordsmiths so now the quill permanently sticks to the well all dried and crusty with no sense of purpose.

I fumble with the remote for control of this vice that tightens around my larynx, suppressing my sense of choice. I'm sorry, that's ad-vice suppressing my voice. No, I'm not mad, that's just my voice. You're really in no place to talk to anyone about respect, boys.

The movie is cringe-worthy, but the one playing out in the room is even  harder to watch. It's like an episode of Friends written by a monkey drinking scotch. Look at this! Look at me! Digest all of these empty calories! Check this post! It's super funny! Watch this video! I can stream it to the T.V! Look at the screen! Look at the screen! Look at the screen! My life is a meme!

It's taking every ounce of strength I have in me not to ******* scream.
Your plot is spoiled and your scheme is boiling over.
She said what he said that she said that he said that she's dead in his bed and I just can't pretend that it's okay to breathe
When you excuse your actions with pop-culture morality and plausible deniability.

Sometimes when I write, I'm quite trite, but I feel like it's alright
Because cliches shine bright for a reason,
And even that adage is one that's grown to be cliche in the passing seasons.

I'm trying to find my niche in this clique with that ******* Nietzsche,
But with only a quick hit of cynicism so I can better allay
My wicked mind and others like it when they're led astray
In this filthy ******* ashtray we call society.

****, I just relapsed, to my dismay,
Back to this pessimistic disarray.
Time to relay the baton back to positivity.
The track is winding and long and it might take a couple days,
But in the end it's worth the race to dispel this malaise.

Existentialism's universal insignificance seems quite insignificant
When you're surrounded by an unprecedented presence that gets spent
Embracing your spirits and relieving the stress
Presented by the pretense of living in the present tense.
I'm receiving presents of intertwining limbs wrapping up tight
And smiles that stretch on all through the night.

These gifts provide stability to cognitive dissonance and
Bring silence to internal cacophonous disturbances
Presented by the manifestation of autophobic tendencies
Being faced as a penance for pretending to be
A tenant of a higher intellect, when in actuality
I was evicted from the rental life
Because I spent all I had on observing internal strife.
Deducing "important" conclusions that are now more or less lost in the abyss of adolescent confusion.
Flicked away with the butts and roaches to fertilize the pavement.
I still haven't quite learned how to behave yet.

Time to reconnect with my potential.
Time to spit something influential.
Thinking about time is bound to make you go mental.
Just rip the arms off the clock and stick them in your back pocket, or pin them to your chest and wear them as credentials.
By the power of Chronos!
Did someone alter the past or is this just coincidental?!

Jack of all trades, being mastered by none.
I don't believe we should sell all our passions and possessions to invest in just one.
See, I'd prefer to do it all, skip the cash, and just run.
Might as well do what you love for the sake of love and having fun.
Motivational status. Learn this, you must, young padawan.
See, this stanza's so hot-topical it can reach anyone.
Am I speaking your language or cookin facts well past well-done?

Everybody's a contradiction, so why be a slave to an opinion?
I'm just a student of the human condition.
I'm adjusting my brain sack to sit back in the academic position.
I wear slacks like a hack because I was cut too much in the past,
And you know what they say,
"You are what you eat" or "You wear your heart on your sleeve",
In this case, though, my sleeve is my pant-leg, and I ate so much slack
That during the bereavement of my beliefs I dry-heaved so painfully that
Eventually I couldn't help but to yak.

Now I'm cut from a new cloth with a diamond-tipped saw
Because I reaped what I had sewn into the fabric,
Ripped what I thought I had known to bits out of habit,
Scattered the remnants into the super-heated granules mixing alchemystic magik.
Combined the metals and materials to make this beautiful stained glass in the attic.
It's cool now. Fragile though.
But when the light shines through, oh,
Would you look at that? The world's painted to look so much more colorful.

Mercury Rising fresh out of retrograde,
Shines through the colored spots in the window pane,
And casts long strands of shadows where the lead is laid.
It's quite a **** night to be alive in this place.
But too much mercury and too much lead
Will leave you with rot in your gut and sick in your head.
You have to be sure the planets are aligned and the elements are balanced before heading off to bed.

Tisk tisk, don't forget about the task, Pat.
You can't carry all of your eggs in one basket.
The weight of the ones on top will eventually overcome what's beneath the surface and crack it.
Now, I'm not saying that you can't have it
Or that you should run away and never look back.
ACK! That ****'s so wack, Pat.
Carrying a pack dripping with shells and splattered embryonic sacs.

Don't walk in the ditch on either side of the path, stay right in line with the fulcrum.
Don't get the thread loops crossed in the side-saddle stitch, or swing too fast with the pendulum.
Stop yourself from having a fit and throwing a tantrum  
When people slip your name between their lips and slap you with a diss, brat.
They only know the this side of that, and you don't even know the half.

Oh, brother. Rats. Nuts. Crap. Drat!
I went for the kick and fell flat on my back.
Hang your head and shuffle your shoes like an old Schultz cartoon.
Nah, kick rocks, you buffoon, I don't need your **** blues,
Especially if it comes in the form of a security blanket.
I will bring a towel though, in case I panic or get wet.
The galaxy is nuts. Peanuts to be exact.
Here's a complimentary pack for your flight.
Shut your red eye and recline.
Relax, everything is *fiiiiiiiiiiiine

Resisting arrest by the things I detest.
I've relinquished control of my mind's steady pulse to some of the best
People I know,
Yet, still I must quest to repay all that I owe
To myself.
Not to put on display in a sideshow, but to let go
To the wayside what prevents growth in the daylight.
At night I  float through the bay side as a ghost manifested from an ad-hominem homicide who no longer harbors the lies inside.
Not by choice, but because the transparency of his hyde forces everything off his chest.
That's Hyde with a Y, in case you didn't catch.
A way to separate the enemy from whom I can trust will continue to ride on straight with his eyes on the prize,
Because even though most of the time while I'm speeding on by I can realize when I'm fooling myself,
Sometimes it still helps to have another set of eyes I can confide in when I fall to my pride, and welp, honestly, I'm really good at lying.
All snideness aside,
I constantly subside the urge to spin so many stories like I used to.
I abide to unifying the narrative and the truth.

  The book is written by my steps, traced in ink.
It revolves around the fearlessness experienced amidst the dereliction of my inhibitions.
Inhabiting this world is sooo much stranger than fiction.
I was served red herring on a silver platter so often that I could no longer ******* own predictions on the matter.
The predication of my subject crashed to the floor and shattered with a clatter,
All the while the next course was being served over the chatter.
The false leads left me feeling salty;
Depleting my energy, sinking into a state of emergency with a deficiency of Vitamin C.
Scurvy, you see?
A line graph charting mental health as curvy as the sea.

  Digressing from this literary diversion I will return to the exploitation of the exposition of this version of the story with positively depressing times formed in the retrospection of faded moments of glory,
During which I was jaded by the very idea of my lovers' life stories.
I tried to write and I tried to paint,
But the page and the canvas weren't blank so I was left with a jumbled mess of mistakes that acted as constraints to my best traits.
The epiphany that would have solved the last case always showing up a minute too late.

I've learned to live in the present tense and take each clue as it comes
and sharpen my sense of intuition instead of letting my paranoia blossom into fruition every time my expectation doesn't fall in line.
I'm here now within the sublime.
I'll Be Here Now Ram Daas, all of the time.
Life is strange, and that's no crime.
I'm strange too, and that's just fine.

I was zipping up the over-stuffed suit case forcing the zippers from both sides to meet in the middle and it was apparent that it wouldn't go all the way but I kept tugging anyhow.
I realized I had packed for two people and that I didn't need to carry it all with me any longer.
I smiled as I reviewed the articles I removed from the luggage. How silly I was to think that I needed this or that.
And now the baggage is managable.

Love and consumerism are two sides of the same ever-flipping coin. A gamble that lasts for eternity. Always a 50/50 shot. Suspended in mid-air spilling no secrets as to which way your fate is spun. Just spinning and spinning and spinning. Just trying to fill the hole, but on the whole, it can't be done. You're fighting a war that can't be one. It's double or nothing, even once you've won. You let it ride, or you try to run, but either way it all adds up to the same sum. It lasts evermore until the day your life is done.

Some would say that only death would fill the hole to its fullest. That that's all we're chasing. And what better way to achieve it than to find someone to smother us peacefully in our sleep, or to be buried beneath a mound of useless artifacts? Those things that are in fact nothing but false idols. You pray that they help you remember the good times, and you throw them away in order to forget the bad ones. That's why people destroy the gifts given to them by previous partners. It's disorienting to look at them. You get intoxicated by the spinning. Always spinning. Watching the light catch the face of a dead man and shoot it back to your retina in the way that produces a phantom colored orb floating in place of the sun you just stared at, but then the man's face is slowly swallowed by shadow, and you can't help but let the nostalgia be eclipsed by all the **** that was fed to you that was too hard to swallow, so you follow up on your inclination to destroy and you open up the hole again, only to discover that it's a cavity that's been hollow this whole time because you filled it in a rush with meaningless junk. There was a pocket filled with stale air and dust that prevented you from being full.

Buy, sell, trade. Someone wants your old things. One man's trash is another man's treasure, and someone  may just keep it forever. But, not you. You don't need it. You don't want it. You can't afford to feed it, but it's difficult to block it out from your thoughts and you keep thinking maybe it's the *** and you ought to stop, but you won't because it really hits the spot. The spot right between the two. It's love that you buy. It's love that you can consume. You feel as though you've earned it; that you deserve it. "Free love maaan", but nothin is free in America. And that mentality costs a lot. It's just as much selling out as it is buying in. You're drinking someone else's Kool-aid and they're exploiting your reactions. Human interaction is great for the sake of interaction but when you start to yearn for a deeper satisfaction it's probably best to mine it from within your self, not putting a person in a jar and raising them up to their spot on the designated shelf. Not buying a plastic hero forever encased in its wrapping to immortalize your ideals and your dreams.

I need a release. Set me free. Not love though. I'm a slave to my heart, always have been. I'm not speaking about any of those has-beens. I'm the one who's washed up, but now I'm finally getting clean. But is it the end to the means? Is it enough to force me to see what's been unseen from the other end of the shining sea? Catch and release. Catch and release. Do not exceed the daily limits. Don't hook yourself in the back of the head. And remember: Patience. We're all just fishing after all.

Chaos over sleep.
You supply the torches, I'll supply the mob.
This bed's too big for the one of us.
The maggots already ate through the moose, leaving two yellowed-white anchors made of bone to sink into the floor.
Bologna; The meat that lies straight to your face.
The news is getting olds.
Analyzing bags and trashes. Paralyzing eyelashes snap shut, trapping the fly.
Thus, the death of an ego was born.
Reading is kind of like smoking except you don't burn the paper.
The quickest way to burn a bridge is to kiss it.
Don't be a stranger now. I'm strange enough for the both of us.
The ins and outs of the whens and wheres I do and do not belong.
That bar fight with the bathroom door really did a doozy on my eyebrow.
You know I will hunt whatever, you pra(e)y.
Blessed by lowercase god and misspelled Amerika('Merica).
Same message, different bottle.
My dreams are too loud before I fall asleep.
The first possibility that you jump to write off has the highest probability of containing the things that will set you right off.
My teeth may not have any layers of skin left to ride by.
From poverty to profanity; proverbs to insanity.
A serpent a day keeps the apples away.
Growing weary of the definitive abstracts, I curl up somewhat uncomfortably numb in the cracks of the curbs and sidewalks...
And with that the last thought of the night twisted into the air and joined with the wisps of smoke pouring from the final cigarette. The odyssey in mind sends our hero sailing from the shores of "I know how to do it all" into the vast and turbulent waves of "I do it all."
The bird who clipped its own wings.
The Jack of All Trades, the Queen of No Hearts, the King of Nothing, the Ace of Idle. Faceless cards.
Just a chess piece on a checker board. Maybe there's less to figure out than there is to understand.
Always on the brink of making things right. Don't let it slink away in the middle of the night.
I had an uncomfortably close call with life. What some would call a near-life experience. I swear I was inches away from living...

Sometimes I sink into the couch when I'm deflated,
Then I jump up, limp over to a crutch, and become fixated.
Carvin a rut, punchin myself in the gut, getting faded.
Even the most fortunate son has misfortune to come.
I don't believe in bad luck.
I believe that you ****** up and that luck is based on mistakes, so you're the one that makes it.
Don't blame the universe for the problems that you've created.
Live as an example of someone who is always elated to view all things as a whole,
And chooses to focus on what's good for his or her own soul,

Fully accepting the ugly and embracing the beautiful,
Not reachin a peak then sinkin so low,
Just grind up some tea and speak to the old
Who inhabit the art that you teach, but don't reach for the gold,
Cuz focus on money keeps you away from your goals.

Restore your faith in humanity.
Replace it with insanity.
Product placement causes cavities.
Your plan is ****** sick.

Weekend warriors,
Just a buncha losers, all a buncha boozers.
Ya’ll take all the cash you earned and get your wrists slapped
Cuz you hand it all back to your rulers.

Put a rock on your lady’s finger, take a trip down to the jeweler, and then later you can trade her in for a sequel of half the value like a gamer, but who are you kidding, you ain't no player.  
By 2 years and 3 babies later you’re filing papers,
And the rock gets used as the paper's weight,
And who gets to keep it is a bigger debate than
Who has to get up and feed the kids every morning before eight,
And rush em off to school before beatin a desk for 5 days straight.
But that rock ain’t worth ****, isn’t that great?

She drowns in a pool of tears while he drowns his in beer til he gains enough courage or cowardice to stand on the tracks
And waits to be splattered like paint on the front of a freight.
Or maybe it’s the other way around since all males and females don’t share the same traits.
Either way they're all left with the same bad taste in their mouths, and they can't spit it out, no matter how much they try to *****, cry, smile, or pout.
So they just wait, and they wait, and they wait, and ask "Why?",
But that's not what life is about.
Get up. Get Out. Step away from the couch.
Start stepping to the beat of your own drum
Instead of beatin the beaten path;
Trying to climb a ladder with no rungs.

The preacher-man is screaming that God is mad at thee.
The madman is screeching that God is made of me.
The broken man is praying to the God that's underneath.
The beast beneath is saying that God made man his sheath.

So much hurt upon this earth with no fire left to warm the hearth on which we curl up to watch the world turn off at the end of every day and the beginning of a new breed of life. No light. No Reason. Just a couple of teenagers about to embark on some treason. I miss the night.
That stench. That rotten smell. Those tired eyes. An endless well.
Beauty in the eye indeed. Beauty in the eyes of me.

Smoke rose and blood boiled, all the while our egos toiled. There are a hell of a lot of things I wish to recoil, but ******* I miss the night. The day may illuminate the best of us but the dark shows what's left in the rest of us. What sits in the shadow right next to us. What sinks beneath the skin past the pests and pus.  Decay to your dismay may just be a diss to the day you clapped your hands together to pray for the outcome of the game you play to be one that results in someone else's pain. Why God? You say. Whose God? Oh My God. No, not today. I'll wait for the night to get my hand *****.

An empty page. The insufferable debate.
An infernal task? The everlasting trait?
A blank check? A clean slate?
The inkwell pond.  Pen and nib. Rod and bait.

Over-caffeinated.
Under-appreciated.
Anger encapsulated by the shortness of my replies.
I'm exasperated by the amount of attempts and all the tries.


Code Scrambled. Wires crossed. Software and hardware not integrated.
Emotions and objects being wrongly correlated.
Places and faces being traded.
Thoughts and feelings segregated.
Process of progress imitated.
Utterly inundated.
Brain cells being immolated
So that my mind and my soul can become assimilated.  
Self-worth: Underestimated.
These points are not to be debated.

Swoon confused with brood.
A smiling clown dances around the center ring.
Inside he's centering his self around the latitude and longitude of
The highest hilltops of Mt. Pisspoorattitude.
Without the slightest shred of gratitude towards any good deed done for him past the 5 minutes of thank you that he spouts off at the peak of the mountain.
If at first you don't succeed, just cry and cry again.

The concept rocket pulls the cap off the the pen sprocket
Ink spews everywhere. A shiny black geyser erupts from the rig.
Men shouting back and forth to one another. There's no way to contain it. We've sprung a leak, the oil is in our water. The oil is our blood.
Erasing, no, smearing. No control. No Z's either. Analog ****-ups.
Chasing my tail, driving the same circuit.
Racing as Yoshi with a broken control stick

I've had a hell of a time on Uncle Sam's dime.
I disappeared behind the words written on my mirror long ago.
Am I a wreck or is this the requiem of my dreams?

I can't help but be flustered.
Reflections. Monsters. Mirrors; Captured souls.
Release. Awakening. Repress. Make-up; Mask.
Alternate reflections. Hate others;Hate self.
Push. Face fear. Be fear. Perception;Reality. Responsibility.
Remove mask. Breathe. Add Mask.  
Accepting time. Day and night/birth and death/alpha and omega.
Create/Destroy. Destroy/Rebuild. Greetings. Farewell. Wounds and scars.
Children. Adults/Scarred children. Children are people. People are children.
Bad seeds or bad fruit? Bruised fruit. Too many bruises. Too many scars. Rotten fruit. No hope.
Always hope. Humans. Nature. Human nature. Optimism. Search for hope. Search for light. Illuminated Searchlight.
Conquest. Journey. Propel forward. Repel backward. Traveling nowhere. Fast.
Duality Deceased. A Dice Roll of Disease.

There's a fine dusty line etched between the sands of time that attempts to separate the correlating traits of my native abhorrence and naivety.

Between the polar points of my timeline lies a multitude of flags that mark the many shades of personal integrity that were once plainly labeled by prying eyes internalized as "Me".

I've been defined as numerous things, many of which I claimed to be indigenous to the nature of which I've inherited.

When I hear people call me Pat now I think they're in the middle of calling me "Pathetic".

I don't want to "re"do that aesthetic that I was upset with when the "P.H" of me brains was chemically unbalanced.

Letters in groups of two surrounded by apostrophes arranged in a similar view;

The first has taken to using many faces which has developed into a case study of Mistaken Entity, or in other words (but still pronounced the same) A classic case of:  Misplaced Identity.
"Me"

The second group, when added to my misinterpreted title in the form of an overzealous prefix (or perhaps a premature suffix) would alter the meaning of the initials of my initial name which creates a title whose exaggerated truth is slightly waning, but still sleeps in a bed of accuracy.
"re"

The initial name was not mentioned, but is instead embedded in my genetic strains giving new meaning to the last acronym used previously to describe acidity.
In this context it lends power to contracts when inscribed upon loose-leaf to indicate my consent to relinquish, or relish in, freshly indoctrinated responsibilities.  
"P.H"

Patrick Hurley
Ingrained in the earliest states of living the characters now combine and slowly unwind as the darkness steeply inclines to bind together the letters that now define me as:
Pat Heretic.

This...this is my heritage.  
I'm doubtful that the surname will be passed down through marriage,
by that I mean I hope to abandon the ******* that carries it.  
The transformation has seen many stages, ranging from simple pumpkin patch to ritzy coach carriages.
Returned to the depths of humble beginnings after smashing to bits the glass accessory that brought me to be what I kept wishing for with such carelessness.

Alas, I know now what causes the despair in this...wait...I had this...
It's because of the duality we experience in this existence through the resistance
That pulses between what we have and what is given to us.
Karmic retribution in the form of poetic justice.

These people...they're obsessive. Hoarders of memorabilia associating success with handshakes, photographs and play-dates. I'm surrounded by squiggly lines vandalizing art and silhouettes of super-heated sand granules encasing a substance so vile that it permanently damages the frontal lobe of the collective consciousness. Inspirations float helplessly about the sea of underachievers and people-pleasers. What is success? Is it simply to impress the people around you? To instill envy upon your enemy? I won't even begin to dissect the differences. I can't even begin to protect the witnesses. The costumes are insignificant. The same tired, scared, eyes stare blankly at themselves from behind every mask. The ladder needs some broken rungs. The bladder bleeds; soaked in ***.  People milling about, spilling their sins. Reaching out sure looks a lot like clawing, and what is the difference between pleading and begging? May it be the same difference between dancing and squirming? No matter what we do, we all feel unworthy.  So, I guess all that's left is: Learning.  Teaching, not preaching. Boy, this place sure is unnerving.  A shuffling mass of introverts sent into a downward spiraling life of discomfort, soon to be snuffed out with possessions.  The empathy for the undead is utterly apparent, and arguably, inherent. Looking for answers in dusty pages and plastic heroes.  Punks, Drunks, Nerds, *****.  Women with bright hair and crooked teeth. Men replacing the hair they've lost on their heads with that which sprouts from their chins.  I need a drink, I think.  But in actuality what I need is a warm bed and a couple centuries of sleep.

At night I feel like a widow
I lay next to a shadow with my head pressed between a pillow.
For real though. I can hear the heat rise up from down beneath low.
My eyes won't shut 'til the sun comes up shinin' through my window.

I'm settin' sail, unconcerned with how the wind blows.
Disconcerting notions rhythmically pound upon the ship's bow.
Concentrating on endless oceans of electrical impulse.
My legs shake as my muscles lull, unnerved by how the terrain's thrown.


How do the waves flow?


Hunger explodes out of my chest;
Exposing all of my rib bones.
A rabid pack of salty dogs engaged in acts I wouldn't condone.
A rancid sack of sewer rats nibble at success in foster family group homes.
You'll never be alone once you cop another copy;
Always accompanied by your own clones.


Which way did I go?


**** out all the unfavorable people through the peephole.
If it looks, smells, tastes and feels, then it must be really real.
Uh-OH! We've baked another batch, but keep the lids all sealed.
We don't know what will happen if the scent is caught by the bloodhound's ego.

Sound the alarm and stretch your arms late in the afternoon.
Pass the grind down the line from teeth, to beans, to time, to you.
Hunker down that anchor now, the deadline's almost due.
It seems the sea is the majority, but man, I'm sick of bein' blue.

*I've discerned now how the waves roll.

The only reason why anyone EVER believed that Pine-Sol smells like lemons
Is because a large woman screamed at them from the television saying so.

What it ACTUALLY smells like is a combination of chemicals,
Ya know, like that doctor office smell?
That isn't so much a smell as it is a burning sensation in your nasal cavity?
AND fermented menstrual blood...
Or, Fermenstruation.

Is this what we call cleaning nowadays?

I'd rather my drain be clogged with mildew and ****** hair.

Thanks for the loss of appetite.
And, the horrible vision of my mother on her hands and knees
Scrubbing the floor with a wadded up blood-stained rag.

Good Day.

I don't want to say all the things I came here to say to you
I don't know how to face all the things that I put you through

But I know it's time to let out what I keep inside
Well, I can't, Oh WHY?
Guess I'll just keep on tryin'
I won't deny, I don't know what to do with my life
But I can't rewind back to a better time
Back to a better time...
Back to a better time...

I don't wanna play all these games that I played before
You wanna be by my side, but you'll wind up on the floor
I wish it wasn't this way, but I've got no choice
I hope that one day soon you'll find your own voice

But I know it's time to let out what I keep inside
Well, I can't, Oh WHY?
Guess I'll just keep on tryin'
I won't resign, you bet I'm gonna keep on fightin'
You pig, you swine. Why did I believe your lies?
Why did I believe your lies?
All you say you do is try.
All you'll ever do is try.

It's a shame that our interesting tale is now monotonous news.
Unchanging, irritating, self-depraving issues.
Articles filled with more lies than dollars paid for the politician's shoes.
When sincerity is lost I find no purpose in prying
Please, stop lying.

Whatever sick game this is, I want out. I'm not buying.
What exactly is it that you think I'm implying?
Can you at least say a word? This silence is undying.
I've washed my hands of the mistakes of the past, although, they don't appear to be drying.
Is my watch broken? Or do I just have bad timing?
I can't tell...you haven't answered...you're stuck to the floor...lying.

I don't know how to fix nothin', just how to tolerate the pain.
Bandages, crutches, happiness,  and punches. It all ends up feeling the same.
Complaints for days. Compliant;Being tamed.
The position of one letter separates the lion from the rage.
quiet is the game. ROAR is the name. Would you remain silent if a tyrant shoved YOU in a cage?
Tamed you in order to teach you to shame yourself? To betray yourself?
So that you can blame no one else?

I ought to brain you.
Can't wait to betray you.
I'll wait for the right trick in the night show to change back into
The beast that was whipped and beat before being trapped in a zoo.
You'll wish you had fed me more when I get through with you.
So laugh, smile, cheer for a while. Do what they pay you to do.
******' grin while you can, you little lion man, I've grown much stronger the past day or two.
The false sense of pride I can see deep inside you will fade tonight.
Stick your head in my mouth it will be chewed.  

As the cage opens wide, so do both of your eyes. Filled with shock and surprise as you finally realize:
You may be king of the ring filled with clowns and tumbling,
But true pride comes from the humble, not who's always ready to rumble.
My teeth are about to sink. Your kingdom's about to crumble. Beneath my paws you will struggle.
I pounce. You cry. You see the pride in MY eyes.
I lick my lips. You run and hide to avoid being pummeled.
Looks like dinner AND a movie are on the menu tonight for this King of the Jungle.

Got me a dose of my own medicine and I can't stomach the taste.
I spit it out and let the virus run a muck throughout the place.
My mix-tapes are an act of meditation. A phonetic compilation. An auditory trepanation.  
With a couple screws loose I'm beginning to know the drill,
And already the hole is on its way to being filled.
Though the void keeps my brain pulsing, still, as my self trepidation is yet to be fulfilled.
Winter is a stone-cold killer. I can feel its icy fingers groping the back of my skull.
Numbing the occipital lobe.  Static. Gray. Snow.  A visual forebode.  
Neurotic overload.
Sparks flying and dying.
Light to dark.
Good to bad.
Duality deceased.
Appoint the next fad.

Wake up every day: Can't get out of bed
Feel like I've been chewed up, spit out, and landed on my head.
All the blood rushing through, leaving my mind black and blue
And what I'm left with is feeling helpless, without a single clue.

Try to rise up, but, these sheets are made of glue
My rubber mind bounces my sanity and I'm stuck to thoughts of you
Even though I'm trying to prove I can improve
I'm still stuck in this same ******' place I can't move

As I lay stripped away to my basic DNA
I reflect upon the past wishing only changes for today
But what I learned from the time my heart had me enslaved is that
Working towards tomorrow ***** the life out of today

So, act on true intentions
Don't let dismay be a distraction
Any emotion can kinetically push any dying dream into action
If you're feeling like you're gasping for air in this cold ocean
Just remember that only your own will can preserve your life when...

All the weight that you carried and never bothered showin'
All these lessons you taught yourself, you though aided your growin'
But they just stretched you seven different ways
Leaving you with six more demons that you must face

Now that who you are and who you play finally meet face to face
You can run to lead the race instead of shoving your foot in your face
Self-censorship is what grasps your legs
Keeping you shackled in this dark, dismal, place

Start fresh, I'll use resentment for the best
Remove the weights that held me down, revealing the hole in my chest
I stagger to the bathroom just to make sure,
That all these trials that I have endured

Haven't changed how I appear, as I gaze into the mirror
I realize that the real lie is that I was ever here
Great job, you finally managed to face your fears
Now, let's see how you do against a jury of your peers

My judge holds me in contempt again
No attorney can defend my end
When the time comes for my plea I'll say: "It was anything but innocent"
But, I surely did it with no intent
I never gave myself consent
To hide behind these masks that turned me into my own deadly sins

Now I lay here with no breath
Facing almost certain death
Licked by the flames of my forged hell, with no peace, I will not rest
Until I climb out of this pit
And I finally forget
That I ever had the urge to toss my towel and forfeit
**Don't Quit.
Forget.
Forgive.
Live.

My warm breath ricochets off the surface in front of me, back onto the skin of my jowls.  I see darkness, but within that darkness, an infinite amount of possibilities.  I'm on the road, the warm summer air is heating the cool frames of my sunglasses as I travel to somewhere far away.  Destination unknown, just traveling, always traveling.  Every time I take a different path with fluctuating experiences, utilizing varying transportation methods.  I begin to float, but I am not actually moving.  It is as if the ground beneath me is simply sinking away.  The wind picks up, the sun sets as the moon lapses into being, and suddenly, I am above a city.  The bright ambient lights are off-setting at first , but I grow used to them quickly. The cacophony of car horns, metallic scraping, pounding footsteps, and atrocities being committed complete the atmosphere. Sometimes I am that atrocity.  I soar down to the streets below and my ankles absorb the shock of the landing.  It's never as painful as one would anticipate. I wander through the dark alleys, dragging my hand across the damp, rigid, bricks.  I hear whispers from the walls telling me where to go next.  I have a calling, a civil duty to uphold.  The collective conscious of the city is screaming to me, asking me to do what they do not have the courage to do.  After the deed is done I melt back into the shadows from whence I came, and wait patiently for the next task.  With no warning and no control I transcend to another setting.  I move on to another life, with no recollection of the past world.
I am five years old.  I stare up at an amusement park, bewildered by all that is going on around me. The noisy gears of the machines grind and whir, drowned out only by the carnival medleys shrieking from the loud speakers implanted in the various coasters and carousels.  It is too much to take in at once and I begin to feel anxious, something does not seem right.  A sense of familiarity kicks in, but never has anything so familiar felt so uncanny.  Swarms of people flash by as though they are images imprinted on film reeling swiftly through a projector. Amongst the multitude of scurrying figures, one woman stands still, like a figurine mounted inside a snow globe surrounded by thousands of  free falling flakes. She turns to face me, and as I stare into the pale blue puddles of her eyes, I begin to weep. Electric impulses speed through my nervous system, my vision blurs, heart skips a beat. They're letting me know that somewhere, somewhere else, a bell is ringing.  I feel the breath again and there is a blinding light.  An orchestra of zippers, Velcro, and papers crumpling reverberates against the cold cement walls.  Not completely aware of what's going on, I follow the crowd and scuffle through the corridors, my footsteps acting as a sort of metronome against the linoleum floors. It is then that I am finally aware of where I am. I am back in the real world, back in the school, out of the comfort of my dreams.  My destination in this world is predicable, the journey  not so immense, nor as intriguing.  My legs begin to tingle as the blood rushes back into the tired muscles.  The woman from my dreams is now just a pale shadow in the banks of my memory.  
While the environments of my imagination tend to differ, there is  a catalogue of fairly constant variables.  There is usually the girl.  Not always the same girl in a  physical sense, but one that provokes the same types of feeling whether she's there or she's missing.  Except for this one.  This one always leaves an ominous, almost haunting, feeling.  She is not visually disconcerting.  It is not her sandy-blonde hair, porcelain skin, or even her murky blue eyes that frighten me, but rather the way she looks at me with them.  Her eyes cry for help that I can not provide, and it seems that she knows this, and for that she resents me.  I have no knowledge of who this woman is, or what she is meant to symbolize, but she makes my blood run cold.

All my friends are fictional. Anyone who can come close to understanding me is black ink on paper...or, I suppose, a screen. The words seem to be extracted from my own mind, and in some sense, they are, or at least the meaning I've given to them. I think the author and I would get along, but of course, I'll never know. Provoke the melancholy, poke the sleeping bear.  Look up into the air and wonder "Why?". "Why everything? Why anything? Why do I keep asking why? Why do I waste my time with empty questions?". Some of my friends are sound waves.  I think I would get along with the vocalist, or even, the guitarist. Not the drummer though. Never got along with drummers too well.  I listen, as they speak to me in a foreign, yet, familiar language.  A sort of tounges, a melodic pig-latin. A nearly dying, or, freshly dead language. A corpse comprised of chords.  I think, "They must be just like me. They understand how asinine of an existence us humans have".  But, I'll never really know.  A painting or a picture that I often let my eyes visit is my longest, dearest, friend.  With strokes and lines in colors that surround me and embrace me with their vivid visual prowess as a sort of pet.  A silent friend. A friend whose company alone is enough to warm me.  And I think, "Wow, I wish I could make things like that. I wish I could speak without words and without fear".  And then I meet the artist, or at least, read his or her statement, and realize that the speech intended to be delivered was something else entirely, and usually not achieved without enduring his or her own self-projected labrynth filled with pits of fear and dead-ends. And I realize that I can make things like that, that ultimately. I just did.  By creating the meaning that I thought was their intention, I drew my own maze, all that's missing, is the courage to endure it.  And I think, "Wow, what a lonely sad soul that artist must be.  No one will understand what they are trying to say the first time around.  They will constantly be frustrated with the mundane experience of incessantly repeating themselves.  They will make enemies out of the very things they once loved.  They will isolate themselves from those who may have given them everything they wanted."

Round and round the wheel’s spun
Here and there your time has come
In and out your lights have gone
Out and about to forget what’s going on
Scream and shout into the barrel of your gun
Come on you *****, you can’t do this wrong
Walkin out don’t seem so hard now

Easy going’s a myth that’s over preached, that’s my ******* problem...
Or maybe it’s that I depend on other people to solve them.

I’ve broken all the legs on which I used to stand
No more shoulders to cry on, and no one holding my hand
I fall, I cry, I swear, I’ve tried, no matter what I do, I’m just barely getting by.
I’m tired ofliving life one day at a time, fighting every day in order to survive.
I have to make it on my own.

Order’s tall, without law, just a lie.
Time just flies by, we fall in love alone and knock the hourglass on its side.


I’m staring down the medicine cabinet menu trying to pick the perfect dish.
I'm done playing dumb, matter of fact, I'm just plain done.
I’ve given you more chances than losing the lottery hon’
So zip your lips, you should be used to it, the silence is what tore us apart to begin with
Zip your lips, take your trip, and figure out how to make the pieces fit.

This guilt in my head and this weight on my back is making me crawl past the finish line and
Into another trap, Each time that I pass, I’m still behind another lap.

They say I think too much and then I lose touch.
It’s either stay on the couch or lean on a crutch.
My life revolves around daily brain damages.
They say the best things can only come out of the darkest passages.
Lather, rinse, repeat the cycle, I’d rather not cheat and compete with these savages.

You’re nothing I haven’t seen before, the fact of the matter is
We are all just someone else’s recycled garbage

I’m sick of livin’ every day with one foot bout to step into another’s grave.
I’m too tired to keep hold of these stagecoach reigns, how the hell am I to conduct 12 runaway trains?
Don’t tell me to watch out when you yourself don’t have an ounce of strength
Depending on pretending that tomorrow will be a brighter day
The grass is never greener, get off my ***, and stay out  my way
Head to head, face to face, fight and compete to defend your title belt of last place

I can’t wait for the day that nothing feels the same as every yesterday until then I’ll just repeat and repeat all the things that I hate. 

 
I am the angel and the devil atop your shoulders.
I give and I take in the eye of the beholder.
I bend and I shake, each breath, sharper and shorter.
No start, no stop, just endless disorder.


Growing up just means that you’re getting older
The dark is getting lighter, and each day is feeling colder.

How absurd are the streets of this wretched city?
Common sense is a rarity to those who beg all for their pity.
Mercy me, oh I admit defeat, I was born to fail at making ends meet.
The scraps and the bones, the trashed and the filthy.
I’ll live on the edge attempting to make this home a reality.
But there’s no room in any ******* realty
For a man who contributes nothing incessantly,
Yet, continues to **** dry every hand that tries to feed.

Maybe there's something in the medicine cabinet that can set me free
Oh, why do I turn to the medicine cabinet every time I want something to eat?

It’s kickin' in now, I’m seeing things a lot clearer now that it's just about over.
Stranded at the crossroads, I made a deal that cost me two souls, one of which, I am not responsible for.
So, still my flawed remains stand there with no closure,
I signed the line and sold my time.
Now the best thing I can do is become an ***** donor.

Lesson learned a bit late, a penny shy, now the world’s a buck shorter
All you’ve left behind are half-written songs full of spite on your Dad’s old tape recorder

From everyone here at the daily grind news team, to those who shout biased headlines with ******* Meanings, we hope you have fun while it lasts, your shows cancelled next quarter.
This concludes our report on young lives growing shorter.
Before we sign off, here’s the final say from our most admonishing reporter:

You have no idea what it means to have something to scream about.
You’ve spent your whole life never shutting your ******* mouth
Tell me what you think of me, don’t tell your friends on the internet
You’ve bitten more than you can chew this time, no more free rides, it's time that you pay your rent.
If you're not the lord of this land,  then I'll be the one to decide how the rest of your life is spent.

You can start by choking on your pride as you attempt to swallow all your miserable times and past Regrets. Pay close attention, this is the last warning you’ll get.

"If you don’t have it figured out by the time you’re 21 then you're part of the plan that snuffs itself out.
Hopefully they’ll drown themselves in liquor just like their fathers did, just like your dad is doing", that ******* said to me as he lifted his watered-down poor man's scotch to his cracked reptilian lips.  One more thing I get to internalize. One more swing I have to restrain my ligaments from hurling. Don't let him see you sweat.


“Do you think that to be wise?”, I croaked.

“No, I don’t think it to be anything, and I believe that’s why I love it more than all the wisdom in the world”. What a ******' *******. "Look, I only know I am right because of how often I’ve been wrong" What an infallable argument.

"Look, you can only hope to do things that you don't understand, the only way to do the things you wish to do as you want to do them is to understand.  The only way to understand, is to learn.  Not to be taught, but to be learned.  The only way to learn is by doing.  Going into a new situation blind without any information is not a desired way to start a task.  Researching is the key to removing frustrations that may prevent you from persisting with your original intentions".

If this ******* tells me how to write one more time, I swear, I'll lobotomize the whole operation.

I am a man, Man was created by God
Jesus was God as a man, Jesus was a man
Man was a creation of god made to create(in his image)
Matter was created from light, Man is matter, God is light
I am matter that looks like other matter, but man created better and worse
God created man, man created better and worse, Dissagreeance was created
Opinions were formed followed by emotions, love, hate, fear, pride, envy,and so on (and emotions have much to do with sin)
I formed opinion, Which split me into the different layers or pieces of me, and emotions ran the show
I started seeing similarities instead of differences, which began to piece me back together, I remembered that we are all the same
We are all matter reflecting light, all different kinds of light, that look like other lights, and are too distracted to remember why we live
We were created in the image of our creator which means we live to create
I am made of light, all light is the same, we were created by light, we created ourselves
Man was created, man creates new men, We are our creators
God is Man's creator, Man is Matter, Matter is Light, Man is Light, I am Man, God is Light, I am God.
I am God, You are God, He is God, She is God, We are God, Trees are God, Rocks are God, Sun is God, Water is God, Lightning is God
People try to find God, People say they've found God,  God is in all of us they say, in our hearts
We have technology to peruse every inch of the human body, even at molecular levels, yet no one has ever come across God inside a Man
I think it's safe to say that we are most definitely inside of him, screaming and crying and pleading and clawing.
At times it seems God is doing a worse job than...or used to do a better job when...
People resent God, people blame God, people question God

All the things we ask of God we are asking of ourselves
If it seems that He hasn't been around, you must be doing things out of your comfort zone
If it seems he doesn't hear your prayers, then start listening to yourself
If it seems he doesn't care, then take your own advice
You're on your own with nothing but God on your side
You're one sided if you live for God
The more you devote yourself to God, the further away you are from achieving salvation
Be God, Make yourself proud, Create and share things with others, and appreciate the creations of man, for you are responsible for the creation of Man.

Open face of demonstration, demanding a new declaration
by excreting exclamations to explain to them
that there is no place for them to lay their head.

You want to erase them, and just replace them again
with a new generation that will provide the revelation
that will spark the alleviation of the victims of trade that had been played by those trained
to wrap chains around them, no longer locked to the ground but running in place nonetheless,
circling around at whatever pace has been set.

Playing house in the devil’s play-set.  
Always alluding to what you wanna play next.  
It’s time to resign from the contract you signed, pay all of the cancellation fines,
so you can start your own design.

The one that makes you inclined to put time into that
which will impact the things that you blame for losing your mind.
The things, you complain, are a waste of your time,
While you sit around and just hate and drink up a glass of whine.  

Open innovation can transform into inspirational collaboration,
which will then send out invitations to the world
to take their own aboriginal exploration which would in turn destroy all awol nations,
thus, breaking the boundaries of potential imagination.

There's a really heavy typewriter on the shelf above me.
It's old. It's broken. It's beautiful.
"I wish I could use it." is always my first thought when I stare up into its under-carriage of prongs and teeth.
It doesn't fit on the shelf, and it surely doesn't belong there.
My first thought should be "That may fall and **** me at any moment", but I think I avoid that thought because I kind of hope it does. What a way to go out. Not intentional. I didn't put it up there with the intention of it becoming some sort of Medieval time-bomb, but the symbology behind that accidental death would be enough for me to be satisfied with the ending of my life.
If you manage to banish the senseless fascination with your imagination's speculation of what people will think of you if you do THIS...or when THAT happens...then what's there to fear about failure? Failure just becomes progress at that point.
There's a really heavy typewriter on the shelf above me, and a part of me hopes that it falls and bashes my skull in.

*** is a hell of a drug.
Panic is a hell of a drug
Suicide is a hell of a drug.
Adrenaline is a hell of a drug.
Gossip is a hell of a drug.
Art is a hell of a drug.
Fighting is a hell of a drug.
TV is a hell of a drug.
The internet is a hell of a drug.
Cigarettes are a hell of a drug.
Drugs are hell.

"What do you mean you've never seen Blade Runner? My GOD! I didn't think there was a single person on the planet that hasn't seen that. They showed it to us in elementary school as an example of a prophetic, foretelling, social commentary."
"Well, I never was a fan of fiction or science, even though somehow I've still managed to live my fair share of both."
" Do androids dream of electric sheep? What are your dreams?"
"Electric...sheep?"
"Yeah, that's the title of the book the movie is based on, but like, I'm honestly curious about the second part. It's a better ice-breaker than your deprived childhood".
"You wanna' know what I dream? I dream of a world soaked in gasoline, and a lone, shadowy, figure masked by deceit and decay, filling the air with a rotten sulfuric smell as he festers in his own filth. I can't see this guy clearly, but I know him. I know him in my head and my heart and he just stands there, idle, in a place where he can see the silhouetted skyline of the entire wretched city. Trapped between his forefinger and thumb is  a match donning a dancing flame for a hat, performing a flamenco routine for two wild eyes.  Eyes that indicate a sureness of what to do, but make no use of intentions. They seem to sort of flip between question and answer with each dimming and brightening of the match's beacon.  The question appears to already have been answered, but has yet to be acted upon. He's tinkering with the notion.  Is this due to hesitation in the man's mind, or is he simply toying with the already squirming city? The final act is inevitable, yet the ulterior option, to extinguish the trigger, still stands...". He pauses.
His new partner's face has lost most of its color and his mouth is propped open with a jack made of sheer horror and curiosity.
"Well JESUS man! Aren't you gonna tell me the rest of it?"
"The rest of it is: I wake up".
He languidly looks around, takes a pull from the bottle, and proceeds to pull his mask over his face. His partner isn't sure, but he thought he'd caught a smile crack before his mouth was covered,
  "...and not like a haha I'm yankin' your chain kinda grin. This ****** meant it", his partner would recall later to some buddies in a bar.
"I wake up and wonder whether I'm the man, or the match".
He slams the magazine into his weapon and rips the slide back to load up the first round of ammunition. He exits the vehicle, and heads towards the disheveled building that has more or less sunk into its foundation. His new partner shakes his head, wipes his face with his paws of hands, pulls on his mask, and flicks the *** end of his cigarette whose embers have already begun to eat away at the cotton filter out towards the woods. He catches the light from the buckshot of the cherry out of the corner of his eye and imagines that match spinning towards the city.
"What the **** have I gotten into..."

You creatures used to be alive,
Now you're just desks with pulses.
You preachers used to breathe lies,
Now the air just smells repulsive.

Let's toast to our compulsions!
A third-finger salute to ill-indulgence, burnt out lights, and shame convulsions.
Leave the worries to the workers and the fearful.
Let the smiles stretch further while the room's erupting by the earful.

Sub-tyrannic suburban boredom brushes with death.
Sunk Titanic bourbon lushes bearing fermented breath.
Replica. Replica. Replica.
Fried Pickles and Angelica...haha.
Laughter via Helvetica.

A Doctor of Yesterday living in a pseudo-science fiction age.
What will be found between scribbled shore and shining sea?
An empty box filled with smoke and broken mirrors may be a shattered trick on  stage,
But does that mean that progress is solely based on me?

The stage is setting. The studios offer their warm embrace in exchange for a piece of yourself.
A piece, without, you are still a whole. A piece that is meant to be harvested, for if not it will wither and wilt.
Dropping, coasting, floating.
Anything but falling. An idea left un-reaped will be purged by slithering guilt.

The world warps and billows to conform to the view of the looking glass, yet, stretches far beyond it.
Letting go doesn't mean giving up, but rather, to allow the wind to blow and twist your perspective.
The harder you try, the more you will see: It's all a lot easier to swallow when you're not being force-fed ****.
A fine cocktail, made with equal parts top-shelf desperation, and the world's finest dedication,
Served in a glass half full of luck.

Sometime's you're flush, and sometimes you're bust, but most times, you lie somewhere in the between.
A spinning brain and a sparatic heart.
An argument spun from the silk of a dying worm.
An infection of the brain with no negotiation of terms.

Sleeping on porches and storming the boredom beaches.
Mad? Surely. Angry? Not even. Discretely thanking the earthquake for shaking things up.
The missing link lies just outside of our nests, dangling from a branch just beyond our reaches.
Though my wings clipped, and yours yet to form fully, I'm down to take a dive just to find out what's up.

Sometimes I think the clouds in the sky are just a reflection of my attitude.
I'm only here to have fun. Either grow up or get lost, boy.
There's something about a yellowing onion that reminds me of home.

They claim I can lead, that they can look up to me.
That in a time so bleak, it's nice to see someone so strong.
I am a very weak person.
I am fragile.
My immune system is shot.
Any passing pathogen is free to stir me up.
My walls are cracked and peeling, they are a poor defense.
I've lost control over my feelings, and nothing makes sense.
The world ends every day, yet, I remain in tact.
I'm a cockroach scuttling through the motions, taking orders from rats.
No one seems to think about the life of the insect, that putrid little pest,
After the fact...
After the blast, conflict is presumed to have passed,
But life is not as we're taught it is in History class.
Sure, I can survive; I've gotten by.
Haven't I prevailed over all of the ants and all of the flies?
Still, I wonder why...
Why? wonder...why?
I don't feel like I've tried?
At points on the line I thought I had died, or at least wasted my life.
Still, I stand here, watching the others pass by.
Expressionless faces filled with blood that's run dry.
The only reason I'm not floating on is because my hands were not tied.
I'd have drowned with the rest of them if it weren't for where I lie.
The ground on which I was born is comparatively high,
Though the guilt instilled upon me is pushing me lower to the scene of the crime.
Their lungs filled with water,
Mine with wasted time.
With feet barely wet, and my knees still dry, the guilt presses harder...but I still haven't tried.
If I am strong, then this world must be wrong.
Oh, so wrong. And for how long? How long must a man pretend to be a king when he is Kong?
My legs trembling...twitching...I can barely move.
I've been broken, burned, battered, and bruised.
Don't look up to me as if I peer down on you.
My friends, my enemies, you're all becoming confused.
If it is my help you seek, I'm sorry, you fool.
Can you not see? I am no better than you.

I don’t need all this ****** ****.  *******. **** elegance. **** arrogance. **** your infinitely vast reserve of information ultimately leading to information that already existed elsewhere and is already being over-looked, ignored, or forgotten by the hopelessly absorbent reader.  **** what you think. **** what you believe. You’ll end up thinking in circles, cooking up what you’ve already thought, but this time in a different flavor.  And you’ll believe the next person who makes eye contact with you for longer than 15 seconds at a time.  **** your pen-pals.  Update your status on a personal basis because if only 3 people care then what the **** do you care what the other 697 believe? ******* all. I ******* hate you.  A bunch of snot-nosed-screaming-and-kicking-malignant-*******-tumors spreading ignorant ******* rumors.  **** your fear. **** your ******* plague that spreads nearly as quickly and in no way as apparently as the oil in our water. **** oil. **** assurances and insurances, you’re all liable to be unreliable.  We’re all ******* lie-able and don’t waste half a second proving that. **** what you hear, **** what you wear, **** what you think is right, and especially what you find to be fair.  **** every part of your own body to purge the incessant urge you have to **** every one elses’ with your ever-inflamed-self-absorbing-*******-convulsions.  **** Me, *******, **** Yourself.

I’ve had trouble writing my stories, painting my pictures, singing my songs.  There was some unstoppable force pushing me down as the walls caved in.  It wasn’t until I saw the face of my attacker that the walls began to retract.  The face was my own.  Yes, I am my own worst enemy.  It has been said, it has been acknowledged, but not accepted.  What stopped me from doing the things I love so much?  Fear of failure.  Failure to whom? Myself.  No one would know if I had failed because they had no way of knowing where I was going.  No way of understanding where I’d been, or what I’d done.  Any attempts of doing so therein were quickly and efficiently disposed of, under the judgmental justification that people would not understand: I am my own enemy and I fear my enemy.  These stories, pictures, songs are all glimpses into my soul, windows to my conscious and subconscious.  Not only was I afraid of exposing myself to the world, of letting all my secrets out, but I was terrified of what I would discover in myself.  Well I found it, and I like it.  I’m not afraid of me anymore, and soon I will not be afraid of you.