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Jul 2019 · 93
Augur of Silence
Dan Hess Jul 2019
By way of fate
you separate your heart
from what is real,
for in your knowing imposition,
you exhume appeal.

It is to turn away from flowing,
that you learn of ever growing
things within your own pariah's haven.

Patronize yourself in madness;
flicker in the dark.
Surround yourself with solitude,
and isolate your art.

You are the voice of ages.
You exist to turn the pages
fate is writ upon,
and wrought from nothing,
you will carry on forever.

Hark, your inner voice
is stark and screaming.
Rise.
Uncompromising
in your gleaming
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Another cloudy day
Much to my dismay
Of course, the wind
Ever befitting,
My thoughts, rescind
Somehow both fleeting and constant

As my mind turns to nonsense
Much like my whims and woes
The rain begins to fall
The wind and I dance toe to toe

Before I think to regret it all
Before a drop might meet my face
My feet will shift, and nature, race

And though I truly know
That it will only grow
The world beyond me, now erased
My cares beseech my woes

We danced a lifetime
Storm and I
Forever, without a cause
Yet never to wet, mine
Still I'm dry
Thus met, am I, with thunder's own applause

The clouds finally clear
The sun, a spotlight, sheer
The wind implores a journey to bore
And carries me to nowhere near
Yet, still, I look before
And am consumed by fear
Knowing again, I'll meet the storm
Jul 2019 · 59
Begrudgingly in Disparity
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Keep smiling your
Empty Smiles
You won’t be feeling them
For a while
If you keep wallowing
In your bile
You’ll never change, love

So keep
Rising from your ashes
And avoid those
Painful clashes
Of emotion;
Mental thrashes
Eased by your
Favorite drug

Once all of your
Traits have changed
Will you
No longer be deranged
Or just in a
Different kind of cage
Walk off the stage, love

Spectacular,
though you may be
You’re not a spectacle
Don’t you see
And this receptacle
To your grief
Should be disposed of
Jul 2019 · 64
Visceral Exposition
Dan Hess Jul 2019
The panic
The dread
The manic depression
Ah, but so life flows!
The love
The hate
When things are great
Ah, how life does flow!

In angst, we dance, for we romance, of how our lives might go!
And ever a stranger, but never in danger, for ever might life go on.
Jul 2019 · 74
The Ghost
Dan Hess Jul 2019
The plumage of eternal sin
wherein the magnitude of all
aghast and umbrage black
should lie upon
the loft of casting's sorrow

An empty locket
shedded promises
gold now worn as jaded copper
faded through the gilded clasps
And ever noire, to your reflection

Press within
The mirror, more to hold
The soul of songs you've lost
To setting frost of vague emotions

There is no picturesque
In somnolence and rotting
So dispense of what's forgotten
Reinvigorate your urge besot

You are nought and augur
Yours are liminal and soft
Solace brimming signals
To alliance of the
Prescient
Jul 2019 · 65
Air Head
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I am vapid
Bombastic
Desire
Wishing for depth
On an empty canvas

I am specious awareness
I am explosive emptiness

I am invalid
Invalidated
Left to crawl
On rugged pavement

I am a zephyr
Collapsed
In a zeppelin

Attached
To the ground, and
Expanding
Without rising

I am evidence
Of evanescence
Wishing to swallow
Whole
The world’s incandescence
But only discarding fragments
Of immortal light
Jul 2019 · 117
Dark Baron Mephistopheles
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Thunder beckoning my tribe
Of foreign hunters from the sky
I fly on wings of solid steel
Centuries of anguish to appeal

He rides the lightning from afar
While trailing from a shooting star
The fiercest wind, a crashing sound
Mephistopheles inbound

The Satan's spawn, demon of wrath
Is on a malevolent path
Onto a rendezvous of  souls
Intent on taking all control

He hunts the weak to gain his power
Until will come the final hour
A battle between beast and man
The fight to take the promised land

In days of six and nights of five
The promised one will be revived
He will forsake his own
To sit upon his mighty throne

The innocent will be beguiled
All hatred will be reconciled
But this will all just be a hoax
And the world will be engulfed in smoke

Miasmas of the blackest night
The death of innocent by blight
Inseparable of death
Inoculating breath
Is taking hold of me
Suddenly I can see

And from the sky there comes a sound so loud!
In my mind I am alive again, though gasping for air.
I say please, save me!

They take my hand and I'm above the clouds.
And lighting fills the air.
And everything is energized, we're floating!
And I can see myself over there!
It's not over; he's back, the final conspirator!

So I grab hold of him, and I start punching him, but I'm just a boy!
They were there with me, my comrades, and they attacked him with the various building blocks.

But he unleashed a fearsome attack. All from his body it exploded. Shrapnel made a mark to me.
I fall feint.

And when I wake up there he is; Mephistopheles, standing over me.
I say, Mephistopheles! Why??
And he say, because there is no point!
And I say, what does that matter? You don't need a point to be happy.
He said, now, that happiness isn't everything. And he stabbed me in the neck.





But in my very last breath, no longer inoculating me, he say that it is to live that is to mean and that death is just to be as much.
I gasp!
Then it all fades again, this time for good. But the last thing I see, my comrade is falling down upon him and the final blow ends it.

Yeah, he got his wish.
Jul 2019 · 74
Child of Night
Dan Hess Jul 2019
What should behoove the moon lover
Who dances in the light of night;
Who tarries under darkened cover
Ever exploring beauteous blight?

Who should implore the deadened door
Of solitude and somnolence
To show ut'whence does light dispense;
What harbors in the depths of dense?

What should behoove the moon lover
To open eyes to darkened skies
And pray to stay another night
Within the depths of all that dies?
Jul 2019 · 88
Alliteration
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Affluent arrogance; an agonizing atrophy of all
Posthumous punitive parties pose problems to the proletariat
We watch and wait; wallowing in waste while watered down
Gullible, greedy, gaining ground; good God cannot give solace
Torment to the trees; taking without needs
Nature now naked
Horrific is human habituation
Jul 2019 · 85
Depleted Ambition
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Myriad despondencies
are born in me behind these walls
Where I can see what I might be
But cannot grasp from daily droll

I push, persist, to make ends meet
But in the end what I must greet
Is driven to me: mediocrity

Afflictions brought forth from the mind
Where sheltered, crippled, nothing aligned
And in myself I cannot find
The truth of self

So I retire upon this shelf
My sanity to be remembered
From this eleventh of November

I have given up on ambition
For life dealt me an ill position
Which cannot be regained
In a myriad of pain
Jul 2019 · 72
Emotional Contingency
Dan Hess Jul 2019
A complex; standalone
A shade of monochrome
-in the visceral war zone
A shield becomes a home

I sit in contemplation
Compelled by isolation
Abandoned indignation
A train stuck at the station

A fog of midnight blue
A baseless, abysmal hue
No heed for what to do

A distance from the crowd
Held in cerebral shroud
No feelings were aloud
The knight was just too proud

A mission to remember
The pains of last November
Was not one with the gender
You cannot be too tender

Insipid disconnection
Can find no resurrection
The self forgets retention
Plunged from its own discretion

In the end, I am not sane
There is no purpose
Life is in vain
All things are worthless
No care to feign
I lose inertia
I end the game
Jul 2019 · 45
Family Matters
Dan Hess Jul 2019
As I gaze out, as I peer
Inconsequential, infant fears
Of petulance in every mirror
As agony grows ever near
As groans of surplus renegade
Emotions made to separate
Invocation resonates
But constipation iterated
Articulation dominated
Sentry fire of retrograde abominations
Aptly aimed at insecure infatuations
Toward a higher instigation

Where elation loses patience
Only minds can ease in latency
To be deceived, time after time
By mischief of the darkest kind
My own retention in-sublime

Though everywhere I turn
I find many options to be learnt
I find my bridges ever burnt
But not by me, my heart exerts
A longing for companionship
And loneliness will ever hurt
Until I reach abandonment
Until they see no more of me
Until they hate my every ounce of self
My every whim, desire, my needs
It threatens their securities
Indeed, I am burdensome
They see me as a mist, because I come and go
But never leave a trace or reason
They see me as a cyst,
because I linger ever growing, ever taking
They see me as a waste of space
with no haste to change pace
They want me erased, and I know why

Without proper alibi,
I have to reason to survive
I stretch emotions, time to time
to make ends meet and feel alive

But inside, ever, I will die,
consistently, and over again
Each time I sin
to retire my insignificance,
get high and make the most of it

Just to forget the ****
they admit to my indifference
Rip from it all instances of failure
to make clear my selfishness

I'm fading, and I can't turn to them
They don't believe I'm even sane,
so what's the point?

Who's playing games, here?
I'm just trying to maintain my happiness
before I explode
Jul 2019 · 75
Godhead Desires
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Oh, supple godhead,
I must partake of your fruit
to sate my interminable appetite

My mind is agape
with nonsensical rambling
My heart is in flames
and my body is eroding
But my soul soars ever further

Though you, heroine,
carry the sun on your shoulders,
My burden is superfluous still
We call to arms the hand of man
Stopping the world in its tracks

Until we drift through cold,
and blackened space,
or smash into the sun
Burn all our coal
Our forests wither
And still we dream of angels

Inside ourselves is a cocktail of opulence, greed
Ignorance, intermeshing substitutes with needs
Illusionment our only passion, for we bleed
But we escape our pain with substance

And in altitudes
above our perception,
you sit
And watch
But do nothing
Jul 2019 · 69
Lost; Elation
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Lost
Stark, implicit misery
Bequeathed to me in infancy
An ill begotten energy
A life's supply of empathy
Through entropy on canopies
Of broken dreams, remedially
Weave, wake world of my empty

Intruding soul upon this blissful inebriation
Waning me from observation
Reservation from oscillation
of constant monotony

Inadequacy
Petulance, wanton aggravation
Though grown, eloquently
dispensing of my qualia born enemy

The self its own; but reverie
I find myself in symphony
My very soul
Elation
Jul 2019 · 87
Mind Bogglers
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I covet the silence
Lost in my mind
Each day when they rise
And begin the rampage

The clashing
And piercing
And smashing
The booms
It irks me
And aches me
With rage
I'm consumed

I'm a stickler for grace
And they're like a stampede
And I'm hiding away
Because this, I don't need

The sun dips between
The shadows of clouds
And in darkness I'm shrouded
When light is so loud

He ninnies
She lingers
But I'm out of breath
My silence a marked
Reason I am bereft

Slam the door to the wall
Make the house shake and fall
There's no reason at all
But you feel powerful
Quickly, coarsely
Not thinking at all
Going through the motions
Your energy tall

You disturb me
Unearth me
I can't get a break
So don't ask why I'm angry
I can't concentrate
Jul 2019 · 106
Nigh Can Ether Flow
Dan Hess Jul 2019
2:37am

Spells of sonder sink within my soul
If only to love and be loved
When one so misunderstood can take glimpse
And hearts beguiled by coalescence
Whereupon the mind recoils
Emotion stands on high

Whence fleeting youth foretold of recompense
Allude to thee, take refuge in my heart
O, piercing wind, subtly showing strength
Encompassing earth, untouched
My mind will flitter, clinging close
Adjourning hastily toward
(Un)destination
Together, as one, in truth
Transcendent

Passerby within my mind
Your camera clicks may part
A darkness thick as endless night
With limited reach, alas, does penetrate the light
And so, my candle sparked, I hop aboard
Catch the train; soul of yours, headed toward
Another night, without reward
Another fight, more endless scourge
But nothing quite, can be ignored
Or recommended for
As we are weak and worn
As we are different forms
Pretender, sure, in truth do you bore
Shelter self within the walls of my cerebral core
And do implore
Your every wish, without, needst lore
And every instance sworn

Open ended, gratuitous, and transparent
Synergy restored
As love is love, and hate is more
Individually wrought, but torn
Taped, remade, forlorn
Alleviating self, amor

So, and so, as one, we charge forward
So, and so, in confidence, we pour
-emotions into crucibles of halves of selves, before
But now, as one, so absolute are we, for
Each other's heart we bore
Dan Hess Jul 2019
A demon came, and against his shadow,
pressed, I basked in blindness
My heart, he closely observed
and noticing its weight,
thought to offer me a kindness

He asked of me to sell my soul
In exchange, no more would my sorrows be
His promise was of lighter a heart,
a swifter step, and sadness left behind me

I told him this, in quick retort,
for I am no ordinary fool:

Although I may carry a burden
superfluous, indeed
I am a poet, sir,
and thus,
in this forever,
a heavy heart will I need
Jul 2019 · 160
Languish
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Petulance
The redundant quarrel
The mind betwixt in atrophy
Though only psychologically
It rapes the soul, the mind of idle insanity

Jaded, wax upon the distant periphery

Perceptive filter overrun and clogged
And emotionally, numbness
In indignant retaliation, drained, apathetic
Pleasure turns to irritation

Socially, drugged, to mask
the pain of aging without progress
As if dragging myself through sodden debris;
gore, filth, disgusting
I am unclean
Jul 2019 · 65
Vises
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I need to get a grip
on these vices
So I can loosen their grip
on me

I need to
dismantled the mechanism
of my discomfort

I need to
unscrew myself
from the iron grip
of self destructive behavior
Jul 2019 · 80
Resolution Revolution
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Summerset
By fall beget
Where'n winter comes
With much regret

Scintillating spring
What wonders you may bring
And round we turn
Cyclical burn
Upon my frail skin

In January we begin
Life anew with hopes to win
In February, thoughts of love
Carried by wings
Of harken dove

In March, we march
For luck, we do embark
Upon the journey
To April's storms
May's flourish

June brings tunes
Familial revery
Many grooms
And brides, aplenty


In July
We ask not why
For celebration
Lights the sky

August turns
An auburn red
Reminding us
Of winter's dread

September,
Such a hopeful thing
Academic inklings
And much respect for those
Now long dead

October tells
Of Christmas bells
Of gluttony
And feast wrought
Stuporous spells

November sings
Gratuitous
Chiming
Christmas bells ring

December dies
Until what lies
Beyond us, again
Rebirth implied
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Doubt is a gift
For in questioning
We free ourselves
No longer but adrift
Upon a sea
Of possibility
Where currents
Dictate personal hells

Instead
Choose to swim
Find a shore to lay upon
And carve your mark therein
Upon the sands of time

Despite
The rising tides
Of faceless fate
A passerby
May learn your name
And for a time
You will be one of many
Jul 2019 · 121
T'h[e] Sesquipedalian
Dan Hess Jul 2019
By acquisition of perfidiousness,
  superabundant equanimity serves as cynosure
for perspicacious circumlocution
  Extricated from acumen by coruscant conviviality
     prescient luminescence elicits magnanimous ebullience
   Profundity wrought the saxicolous
    Winebibber, penultimate in cupidity
    Unencumbered by concupiscence
   in which anomalistic accoutrements might unto be bequeathed
Alas, only by auspices, might idiosyncrasies be brought to be remunerative
As such, in trust, bellwether, to excogitate and make usufruct
is as to find parsimonious, what opulence incorrigibly writhes therein
By hedonistic primal instinct, chase, to what is callipygian
Jul 2019 · 78
Tiny Pixels, Big Picture
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Specious conversation
Of day in and day out
The lives of many
Concerned with who did what
How he or she
Said this or that

He was
45
She was 19
She did not know
He had two other
Lady loves

Nor, that he was 260 pounds
And balding, gray haired
Barely able to walk a mile
She loved him for his kindness
He loved her for her hips
And her *******

As did he love the others
For their buxom figures
Alas, he did not love himself
And thus he hid from them
His fatal flaws
Behind a screen

Joking of how stress
Is more potent than
His addiction
To the nicotine
That blackened his lungs
And bragging to a young man
Far more genuine
Just as he wished he was

She was 36
She looked 50
She worked two jobs
At 10 an hour
To support her fleeting family
Wishing she was struggling
A bit more with finance

Wishing her son was not taken
By the grasp of a depressant drug
Injected in the veins
Ten too many times

As did she wish
She could abscond from the local crimes
And live in luxury
Not far away, but in a safer place

So, I told her
Of my story of success
And how my brother
Had lived through
What her son had not survived
I had no words to comfort her

They were each 17
Constricted from individuality
By the strong grip of capitalism

They spoke in envy
Of how an older coworker
Was brazen enough to be accepted
For his long hair, and baggy jeans
Paid more, not for his drive and resolve
But his familiarity


I did not respect them
Until I came to understand
They only wished to be like me
Untied from the system
Outlandishly myself

I thought, "How tiny minds might think,
In vapid ways
To cope with the meaninglessness
Of their existence."

Not now, though
I see the truth
They move through their lives
Step by step, one foot ahead of the other
Working toward what I have taken for granted

He asked me for a cigarette
Offering his last seventy two cents

I gave it freely
Not to **** him more quickly
But to quell his demons
So he could live another day
Believing in the world
Which crippled him

I have come to understand
that insignificant, trivial things
hold importance in numbers.

Most people live
to be a part of something greater,
but in recognizing the bigger picture,
I have failed to see the purpose
of smaller things until now.
I never sought to belong.
I never wished to contribute
to arbitrary, mechanical actions.

However, I know now
that to become greater,
I must find something worth being small for.

In order to be what my identity stipulates,
first I have to achieve the stature
to exceed my shadow,
so that I might stand tall and bask in the brightness.
Jul 2019 · 70
Depression
Dan Hess Jul 2019
A flicker
The darkness parts
An expanse of black water
Slow ripples sway the boat
You are the sailor
Whispers call out from the dark
And speak your every deed
They know your name, your face
Everything
But of them, you know not
They torment you with reprehension
Remind you of your plights
And that, alone you are
Upon a sea of black
The ripples grow to cresting waves
The boat begins to sway
The whispering becomes a roar
Sharp, echoing through the dark
The voices scream
The boat rocks,
But still you are aboard
You clutch your lantern tight
And try to cover your ears
But days pass like this
Then weeks, then years
The resolve you once had
That innate, human determination
Has since dwindled
The screaming has blended
into your own thoughts
It is white noise
And still you are afloat
However, without hope
You plunge into the sea
Of your own volition
It is then you realize
The sea is thick, caustic
Not unlike rubber
To swim you must be strong
The sea has a will of its own
Currents form beneath your feet
It pulls you into the deep
You are drowning
The lantern's glow shrinks
Until nothing is left of either of you
Jul 2019 · 100
Existentialism
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I seek for an amenity
To this disease inside of me
Which aggravates my energy
Extrapolating violently
Ironically, I'm logically abusing rationality
Irrationally exacerbating deductive realities
Which are bound to me in stagnant times
When my mind flies to other fallacies
I have to be strong but I'm just breaking microscopically

I'm always thinking too much
I can't stop, I just rush
I'm overwhelmed, but I can't touch the point
but I'm inbound and I won't disappoint

My thoughts are always chasing me
Tied down by acute empathy
And sympathy is not for me
Cause I can't bring myself to see
What is to come, what cannot be
where I will be eventually

Spirituality, obviously, must be bound to physicality
And so I ask you, how could we describe our own psychology?
An amalgamation of the slightest mental energy is quite the anomaly,
How can we help ourselves if we're just damaging humanity?

If you ask me, when our brains gain new insight
We can think in different ways and make change
Make the world bright
Let's share our claims with all who complain
And share peace and make things right

It messes with my head a bit that our mind processes everything,
That's all we ever really experience
We'll never be able to get inside someone else's head and test drive it.
Jul 2019 · 83
I am a clone
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Shots fired.
Casualty at 100%
Nothing is lost

Candid natural mutilation
View life from behind a fissure
See no truth that is not gain
Sacrifice null to the wisher

Those who fight for value
Corporeal nonetheless
Are made up to be heroes
And momentarily addressed

A cannon is an instrument
With blood the field fills
But who will be left standing
To write the final will?
Jul 2019 · 68
Spectacular Pain
Dan Hess Jul 2019
It was 3:00 pm on a Saturday
When I heard the sirens
For the fifth time this month
And watched as the paramedics
Carried his near-lifeless body to the ambulance
On a stretcher

I had planned to make this day
My escape, again, like
Every weekend I had
Just to forget
That we were constantly inching closer
To the realization of how fragile life can be

I knew then there was no escape
We could only hold tightly to the threads of hope
That tied us to a better future
Even as they acted as tourniquets
Which threatened to break our bonds
Sever our grip
Leaving us to bleed our unchecked emotions
Onto the always spotless floor
Which was her escape

We all have one
But his was fatal
And ours were not
And we could only watch and wait
Wonder whether there was
a God watching over us
Or our prayers were just
there to sit in our heart
And hold back our tears

So I stepped outside
As the neighbors did the same
And we gathered on our porches
Smoked our cigarettes, and watched
Because the pain of another is a spectacle
Jul 2019 · 84
Incidence Over Intellect
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Intelligence is irrelevant
Without offerance of incidence
To displace the weight of ignorance
Your inference is lauded in inconsequence
So take pleasure in existence
By making efficacious
Your predisposition to seek opulence
For, nor humility or ingratiation
Shall exceed the levity of elation
Wherein flux of information shared
Might unto oneself represent
Human glory, thus defined by presentation
And as such, we exhume growth
In spite of evanescence
Jul 2019 · 68
Water is Emotion
Dan Hess Jul 2019
When he was a river
she was a storm cloud
and where he raged on
she followed
til he reached
a pinching point

He slowed
She swelled
He was coerced by the terrain
She was perplexed by the zephyr’s flow
But the pressure was undeniable

They took from each other
As they took to the currents
And offering change
They stayed enigmatically constant

As heat, like fire, made her rise
It drew them further apart
But, alas, still they were caught
In each other’s embrace
Now, only larger than life

Soon, she was full
And heavy, she began to fall apart
In silver lining, meeting his stream
They ran together, aligned
and coalesced with mother earth

His dams ran over,
his shores sank into themselves
They became one
And finally, meeting the delta
They were introduced to something
bigger than either of them
Jul 2019 · 51
Inner Breakage
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Through emotion
Every aspect of existence achieves vibrancy
Every whim becomes a dream
For it is love that connects us
For it is beauty that inspires us
Doubt that impedes our worth
It is happiness that elevates us
Sadness that innovates us
And anger that inhibits our thoughts
Above all else, in the deepest crevice
of our conceptual reality, it is hope
Hope that brings light
to an otherwise interminable darkness
Reaching out to grasp a token of worth
Constantly moving forward
Despite ignorance in surplus
We are creatures of change
Hope
Love
Warmth
Inspiration
All things are brought back
to a belief in a better world
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I think fast, hop straight to analysis
Delve deep, ask too many questions
Even if I know the answer,
I'm just dancing in the act of it
This much expansion of my cognizance
Is really quite liberating
But who am I kidding?

I'm just
Setting myself up to be ******
When I act like a nut
Asking questions of such
Which should be plain to see
Putting myself in a rut
I'm just greedy

Or maybe I don't trust myself?
Maybe I'm just an oaf.
Or, perhaps I'm just going to hell.

What a joke, I'm just swell.
I'm a stand up guy.
Don't make me choke.
I can tell.
I'll be fine.

Don't you see,
I've been doing
The very thing
I've been describing
This entire time?

But it is so sublime
Quite enticing to rhyme
What beauteous words
You can combine

And yet, when beautiful things become masks of truth,
they are nothing more than fodder for pigs.
Jul 2019 · 65
Lotus Flower
Dan Hess Jul 2019
If I am so inclined
To find myself
Of higher mind
Then I must be aligned
With true discretion

I am entwined
With humankind
To flitter on the wind
The fateful, new direction

So I must bide
In the divine
By keeping that within
Thus making thee
My essence

In walking blind
Into the light of time
Agape; akin
Transformed in efflorescence
Jul 2019 · 76
The Information Paradox
Dan Hess Jul 2019
We are aflame with the infinite potential of the universe.
Thought, fluctuations of temporal acuity;
through entropy, and change
And, a gravitational bonding with our surroundings
We become whole, we become one,
But we live on as ourselves

The phenomenon of perception
Is a captive dimension
bent on gathering information
dilating, extrapolating, and innovating
We are manufacturing change
We are proliferating violently

In this surplus of information,
comes a need for capital in-satiated
So, though infinite the universe,
our resources have slowly faded

And perhaps, in an alternate time
We may find greater minds
From out of the sky
Or perhaps live on in peace
And share equally
So that we can make the best
Of our environment, and selves
And coexist
To find higher meaning

But in our current state,
At the cusp of civilization
There must be massive change
Or only death

For light-years come between us
And ignorance impedes us
From finding higher meaning
Before we have destroyed ourselves
Jul 2019 · 39
Life's Great Spiral
Dan Hess Jul 2019
The curvature never ends
Life is ongoing
Things change
People grow
We are here to learn

So maybe I don't know
Maybe there is no truth
The truth is,
I don't know where the future will take me

I don't know what I'll do tomorrow,
or who I might become by then,
or even if I will wake up at all
I don't need to
I know where I've been,
and what I've learned,
and who I've touched

I WILL NOT GIVE UP

There is more in store
I may never find out who I am,
or if there's someone I'm supposed to be

I WILL make mistakes,
but I will relish
in the lessons they offer

So I have no fear
I may not rush to my grave,
but I don't fear dying

I believe in God's plan
WE will make it through this
Keep on spiraling to oblivion!
Jul 2019 · 163
Capitulations of Ascension
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I climbed the mountain
Took the plunge
And fell in fear of flying

The moment came
I gave my way
And then found myself rising

I soared so far
And saw the world
From visions in the sky

I ran amok
And with some luck
I kissed my fears goodbye

I hovered there
Up in the air
Til winds exhausted me

Then landed back
Upon the ground
And walked
But still was free
Jul 2019 · 86
All Significance
Dan Hess Jul 2019
How meaningful, the meaningless
For it to still exist
What is the nature of becoming?
Where do we reminisce?
Where is the place to take the space
And fill it full of stuff?
Where is the change, to rearrange
and what's left in the rough?
How, be it said, should we instead
Take shape in different ways
And what aligns with all we find
To wake us through the day?
Dan Hess Jul 2019
To lie beneath the willow tree
And wonder what wistful tombs beget
In troubling oneself with repercussion
Ever yet it torments

To lie beneath the willow tree
To see, the beauty captivates
And in myself, I challenge thee
One's own perception elevates

Of this and that
And what to be
And traits meant to conciliate
To wonder what one might become
If to stop hating thee

To lie beneath the willow tree
And watch the clouds drift endlessly
To see the world in jaded green
Where all things are forgotten

To ask oneself what they might be
If not to ask what is
To pursue thine own dreams, endlessly
Nary wondering what one might give

To lie beneath the willow tree
And watch the clouds go by
All changing form, but ever set
On reaching for the sky
Jul 2019 · 55
Chasing the Sun
Dan Hess Jul 2019
There are so many wishes we make in life
But wishes are jaded opportunities, lost to time
If we are to make of ourselves, what we admire
At every turn, we must scan our surroundings
Look inside ourselves, and ask what makes us whole

Next comes the hard part
We must break our minds into fragments
Give up the wholeness, that sanctity of being secure
In order to follow our dreams in waking
We need to hold onto those pieces that shattered
In such a way that they can be repaired

Like puzzle pieces
To a picture that can never be fully seen
We zoom out as we move forward
And build ourselves into something incomplete
But ever growing

So wish for becoming
And cherish your imperfections
This is what dreams are made of
This is why we are free

We are not meant to understand life
We are only meant to love the beauty it brings
And chase the sun
Even though we know it always ends up sinking below the horizon

Don't forget to stop and admire what you don't understand
One day, when life passes you by, you may be those blades of grass
Those flowers that color a field grown wild
And although you may be stepped on, bent, and withered
Someone will find you, and they will see your beauty
In this life and the next
You are lovely
Jul 2019 · 69
I NEED A HUG
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I don't like to be touched,
so I avoid letting people hug me.
I don't want them to realize how tense I am;
I don't want them to notice
that my muscles are hard as rock,
and full of grooves,
and constantly contorted out of shape.

I don't want them to know I am in pain,
and they are my medication.
I don't want to get addicted
to the temporary solution
brought about by a love that will not last.

I don't want to cling
to the embrace of a friend,
while telling myself
I will never find the love I truly seek.

And, for a while, that all worked out fine;
I became immune to the throbbing,
and the pain of anxious tension;

I was able to hide
behind the mask of indifference,
and in doing so I grew numb;
but, after more time had passed,

I grew colder;
the space between my two empty arms
grew more vast, and the heat dissipated, and
now I feel so heavy, and slow, and tired;

now I can no longer walk this path alone;
now I need a hand to hold;
now I need these arms
to be filled in yours, elusive lover.

Please find me... I am hurt...
Jul 2019 · 60
Pantoum
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Emotion is a catalyst for dreams
Desire is an unmentionable ceremony
Frustration elicits response
The fact of the lie is godhood

Desire is an unmentionable ceremony
Lust begets catharsis
The fact of the lie is godhood
The creator is an irony

Lust begets catharsis
Admonishing is the truth
The creator is an irony
Everything is forgotten

Admonishing is the truth
The angels are crestfallen
Everything is forgotten
The earth turns to hell

The angels are crestfallen
The demons are but pawns
The earth turns to hell
The men turn to swine

The demons are but pawns
Of devils made by gods
The men turn to swine
Primordial reactions

Of devils made by gods
Frustration elicits response
Primordial reactions
Emotion is a catalyst for dreams
Jul 2019 · 76
Questions
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Inconsequentially manifested
Proliferated; undefined, and unattested
Regurgitated, made to be insanity
-indeed- a redigested infrastructure
cannot save humanity
We have to be a family
To make our own prosperity
be proud to be what you refuse to see in you and me
And I can't breathe,
it's overwhelming to believe
what we achieve without further discretion,
no obvious direction,
time showing a reflection of infection
or a massacre or maybe just old age
but when we age we get weaker
and feel deeper
think we were more before
but I can see what we become
is an example of our past.

Who makes you who you are if you're always changing?
And where would you be without yourself?
What comes after death?
And is there a heaven or hell?
Or just a system of realities which are constantly rearranging?
And is there god?
What is the mind, and what are the odds that we exist as such intelligent creatures?
And what does life teach?
How do you define importance?
What does waging war solve?
There really are no answers; even while we're curing cancer countless lives are being lost.
And at what cost?
And where's the man in charge of all the death?
Where's my cut of the check?
Where are these dreams I was promised?
Jul 2019 · 64
Autonomy
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Ironically
Your position
In industry
Is to listen
To those above
In hopes of learning
What is right
Ignoring lifelines, tools, and insight
Even though your heart is yearning
Independence, innovation, new products still glistening
In spotless eyes, through mystery
You only need to stiffen
Stubbornly, surreptitiously
You practice new autonomy
To lead yourself to mending lives once bound to ties
Of day to day, and by and by
A loss of life to society
Regulation bound by autonomy
Dan Hess Jul 2019
I wish to rest
In the cradle of your mind
And feel your perspective

From the inside out
And I wish
You’d see mine
So I could finally feel
Something is certain

I am cast upon a dream
To find a true connection
And become something
I can be proud of
But moreover, something
that will continue to grow
Even after my death, a legacy
To hold faith that the things you love
will continue to see and make things worth loving

I have forgotten prayer
And I fear insolence
For I fear I am un-pure
My very essence
I have deviated from a path, so long now
I have no faith in guidance,
for my fear is wrought in doubt
And I trust nobody

I share this pity with no man
In truth, I give them glimpses
But my aura cools, and it can sink
Still, weighing me down
Striking my heart with rods of steel
It has weighed upon me
This is not poetry
It is alleviation,
of words too long unspoken
God, I beg you, unbound me

Bless my aching heart
I just can’t fathom living here
With no rapport, and nothing
Stagnant air can bring about a heavy heart
I’m not feeling strong
So obvious, I call out to the dark,
Where nobody listens
If only a voice would soothe me
If only I could not fear to let down these walls

I don't even know what I'm doing
just meandering, aimlessly
eloping with my echoed soul,
my true companion
a voice inside me, which soothes,
and warms my heart

Who guides me, always, through the dark
And radiant are we, for lions break their necks
When we shall stand against them, unwavering
When we shall show them mercy
Even in pain, I remain my own man
And I hold a heart like gold
I swear it

Can someone just grab be by the neck
And kiss me
And remind me that I can love again
That the fire’s still burning
And I just need to breathe
And I can feel okay?

Could you imagine what it’s like to just become someone
And then to be that guy who used to be someone
And then your mouth’s on the barrel of a gun
And you wish you were back in that, time
You wish you could love, and have fun
Like you’re not anyone
And there’s nothing left to run from
So you just, let it end

It feels like ***, if I knew what that was like
But it’s more like I’m just floating, dreaming
I can’t think about the bad things
I just want to sit down and watch the world go by without me
It’s never been about me
I’m just lost in this place
But I feel like a wanderer
Now
It’s been so long

but, is there ever truly an eternal image of oneself?
Are we truly who we are,
or is this all just a clusterfuck of circumstance,
and thought, based on trivial, random experiences?
And what do I give a **** if my life means anything,
if I have to go through pain to find anything?
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Strange of you to measure fate
by way of every step I take.
When surely whether I trip or not,
I'll find the path goes ever onward,
and always get back up again.

What is this plight of which you speak,
and why does it daunt you so?
To where do you, too, disappear,
when your mind seems to go?

What is your sight, this dismal night,
and what wonder might it show?

Ah, but to know is to not know,
and in my mind, I am bound to the "although."
Without a doubt, it allows to me grow,
but I am lost in the lies I might sow.

Alas, there is no threat below,
as what reigns above should alleviate my woe.

Yet, my fate is sought,
and his is bought,
and I am transcended
by way of my thought,
and your view is concerting,
but ever diverting,
from what is but nature of rot.

Do you see what can be
of an old willow tree,
when a branch is newly planted
in the ground at your feet?

It is similarly true
of what you can do
with a concept all *******
and taught in your thoughts,
for your words are but seeds,
for a new willow tree,
or instead, are they branches,
maybe?

Water your tree,
and from words,
weave worlds of wisdom
within wistful watching eyes
of soft, metallic gold,
and you will learn
the ways of the souls of old,
and you will become what you seek.

Let the passion of eternity
drip from your tongue
like pure decantations of light.
Breathe in the winds of life,
and bridge the gap
that separates dark from light,
and cast your might upon the shadows
to form a picture,
then turn,
and from the cave,
walk into the light of day,
and gaze upon the open sky,
and feel alive, for the first time ever.

Like namers do,
practice an exercise in becoming you,
by seeing without eyes.
Let it go,
so the world can flow,
into itself, and continue to grow.

Then take a stand,
you are no ordinary fool,
no ordinary man!

To be as if without,
and take hardy in faith without doubt,
is as foolish a foolishness
as a fool can spout.

This is a journey without end,
there is no good found in the pretend,
so take your path,
and remember to laugh,
and take pride in the "rule of the bend."

To know you do not know,
is to allow yourself to grow,
but there is a reason
for the change of the season,
and sometimes
you just have to follow the road.

You must abandon identity,
to grasp the root of everything.
You are existence, and all is one.
There is no partition,
only illusion of separation
begat on subjective interpretation.
There is no divide,
until it is recognized inside.

See without eyes.

Choose to feel otherwise.

Everything will coincide,
as it has already,
and one must only open the mind's eye
to grasp the light
without finding themselves to be blind.
Jul 2019 · 48
Humans
Dan Hess Jul 2019
Humans; label and categorize; nothing
Jul 2019 · 50
Yesterday
Dan Hess Jul 2019
A shred of bliss lies only an eternity away
A catastrophe of blight
Reminiscence withholds dismay
Onset eternal night

The past contains a pain
By which we suffer in the present
But cursed is it, time's dreaded reign
No kingdom evanescent

A militant resistance
Will not end the loner's grief
No matter how persistent
His life is very brief
Sep 2014 · 670
O, Henrietta
Dan Hess Sep 2014
Oh, Henrietta come to me, my queen of what's forgotten
In life you were a troubled thing, and now you have but rotten
A misdemeanor commonplace to you who sees the world
Your liveliness has been erased, and with it, thoughts unfurled  

Oh, Henrietta come to me, now, whisper in my ear
For what can be made of a blissless journey, when you have disappeared?
Feb 2014 · 5.9k
The Horseless Jockey
Dan Hess Feb 2014
Happenstance to the melancholic gives leave the sin of pride.
Inbound reconnaissance tells not the bearer of influence.
Squeamish at first: a foreshadowing of calamitous bonding.

A space between the mark of corporeal and the ethereal; a stringent hiatus
That which rattles the concrete foundation of morality is scarcely a malleable recourse.
Regret stains the unfounded soul: an enigma of ephemeral perforations.

A separation of the unmitigated humanities; misandry topples the writhing snake.
Impact; a cleansing of the maker's flaws integrated solemnly.
Complacency arrests the administration of the abhorred; unbridled is the autonomy of a guru.  

Ambivalent giftedness burdens the reliant and haughty.
A flick of the tongue brings forth the cinema mortem.
Castaway: alone to wade in the sea of obscenities.

A temporal causality allows no mourning to abscond.
Negligence is not the enemy, but indulgent wrath.
Hesitant: a stroke of qualia begets the end of a maiden.

— The End —