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Oct 7 · 211
Early-to-Mid-Life
Derby Oct 7
Thirty and a few days
it's come this far
and feeling as if
already halfway there:
is this crisis?

forget all i'd loved
forget this i've cherished
c'est la vie

say less to me
and sail i might
like magellan,
erik, his son leif,

i'll leave soon
for that spice
cowper said
gives life all its flavor

oh, billy boy
you might've been onto something
but my heart's will
disagrees
with my penchant
for curious wild imagination
and dreams

and all that could have been
all swept by wind
as sand in a gale.
Jan 2021 · 1.3k
Miss
Derby Jan 2021
Singing the way rain sings
in a deluge of dawn fog,
driving through like cutting knife--
a hot blade in butter--
this engine putters
and pushes on,
sweet, so sweet the tune,
lost in a mist
his voice echoes
like billowing clouds,
she rests on her pillows
in wait,
for he'll be home soon.
Apr 2018 · 586
Egg Yolks.
Derby Apr 2018
I don’t know that I trust myself
To keep my brains like a raw egg
When the time comes (when I’m supposed to know what to do)
And not to crack my skull,
See my brains drip into the bowl,
Mix them up for a broken yolk,
And then pour them into the pan
So they can scram(ble.)

Sometimes I wonder
If I’ll have to salt them
or add any pepper
or just dig in.

Sometimes I hunger
To know everything
Sometimes I feel so engorged
I’d rather know nothing.

The worst part is not knowing
That the worst part is knowing.

I want to hate my own guts
But that’s--that's utterly nuts,
For it’s never the guts
Should be disdained—
It’s the yolk in my egg, or
The stuff in my brains in my head.
Derby Jan 2018
All we love is lost
in lusterless light--
like a lunar colorscale--
when care is forgot.

Take good care,
lest y' lose what y' love.
Jun 2017 · 514
Trailing
Derby Jun 2017
[Part 1]

So far behind
Though it seems I lead the pack
My heart does beat
My lungs, they breathe right back

I am alive.

Sometimes it is as if
Death has arrived at my door
Progress has come to a halt
My dreams deprived of anything more

Am I alive?

I am become a stagnant pond
Where wind will howl not,
nor warmth bid his welcome---
The cold, it chills the marrow of my bones

Am I dead?

From my purgatorial porch, I perch to view the news,
My peers about me move along with time
Whilst I float in drollery, prentending to flow the same---
Apparently convincingly so

I cannot be dead.

Mind and muscle try, but do not succeed
There is no regress,
But they dig a deep ditch,
Down in which I have made my mess---

I am stuck.

[Part 2]

Each success is one step ahead
Each failure, three lessons to learn
Overcoming mistakes should put them to bed
And the next two steps are two steps earned

I can get out!

Eyes see forward, not behind
Let the brain leave the bad in the back of its mind
So then it may focus on what it has gained
The next few steps are the few that remain

I am alive!

[Part 3]**

So far behind
Though it seems I've led the pack
I need not worry
To accept the gruesome facts

I will make it!

I am not standing water
Nor am I stuck between life and death
I am alive, *******,
Hear me take a breath!

I just have to snap out of it and get back to walking.
Apr 2017 · 905
Life Lessons
Derby Apr 2017
When I was three years old,
I came face-to-face with Allen Ginsberg for the very first time.

I hated him.

In my own little three-year-old way,
I thought he was a mean, rude, nasty, ornery old *******.
But when I turned twenty, I learned the truth:
He was a fearless, bold, no ******* old *******--- he wasn't the only one.

The world wasn't meant to be seen through rose-colored glasses,
but to be witnessed on our feet in the present and off our lazy *****.

Mankind was meant to live and die
in an adventure, seeking peace through trials of wrong and right,
not to bask in a stagnant bath, nor stop in the midst of a path
to a future bright, though out of sight,
for this is no way to thrive,
but to live and die a treacherous lie.

Here in the first world, we are afraid to suffer,
but eager to ****,
to conquer,
to ignore internal issues.
[Pay no mind to the men behind the curtain, the have their own agendas, and we allowed this--- we voted them in!]
We are afraid to be wrong,
but fearless to fight
a battle with no true end in sight.
We will never fix the problem,
nor repair the damage we create,
if we all just sit on down,
grab our egos and *******---
[Spoiler Alert:
There will be no ******, no explosions of mental ***, no parade, just *******, horseshit, and all the other **** that comes along when we bite off more than we can chew and still force it through our systems;
blow it out your ***** and let's get a move on,
we've got things to do and places to be!]

We talk in circles,
we talk of change,
we talk making a difference,
we talk in circles...
see what I'm say'n'?

Politicians are a sham,
Real people lose the race, whether slow and steady, or fastly-paced,
so they **** out of it all,
as they had no business running in the first place.

We the people are dis-

organized
and dYsFU[ckIng fu]nctIonal;
all too lazy to gang up and be the CHANGE we seek,
so we
file
in
line
and fight over our spots to sit in a seat on a ship sailing its way south
d
o
w
n
****'s-******'-Creek.

In twenty--- hell, thirty, forty, fifty years,
we've made little progress,
but we've got iPhones and Wi-Fi, and people going to Mars,
We've got technology never before imagined standard in our cars!
Now, ain't that just swell,
ain't that spectacular?
We're all going to hell
for ******* our own blood from our own ***** like an auto-fellating, narcissistical Dracular.

What do we do? Where do we go from here?

If Ginsberg, Bukowski, Poe, Dante, Plato, Socrates, Freud, ******, Christ, Caesar, Shakespeare, Lincoln, Lee, Brooks[1], Miller[2], my parents, Mr. Pete Rose, Franklin, all my friends, and a million other folks taught me anything,
it's that we're all *******,
we're all sinners,
we're all losers, occasional winners,
we're all *******,
we're all wrong, though sometimes right,
we all live,
we all die,
we've all got **** going on in our lives---
and what I've learned from all this,
was that I can do better,
YOU can do better,
we can ALL do better than we are doing right now,
that we are each unique, but we are no different from one another, we are human beings;
we can learn and teach, and we must do this always,
from day, through night and to each and ever other day.
But the most important lesson above all:
Don't be such a *****, whatever you DO do,
simply try to understand,
for all the world's fate is in our own
feeble, but hopefully growing hands.
[1]--refers to Mel Brooks
[2]--refers to Arthur Miller
Derby Mar 2017
A thought, off the top o' my head--
't rings aloud like the crack o' thunder,
then 't bangs around, and 'tis no wonder
I'll get no sleep 'til I am dead!

The tremendous ache,
the pounding pain,
an evil, Abel-less, headly Cain,
a godless, disastrous, Earthless quake--
I'd just like some sleep!

"Rise, my body" calls out my brain,
"we've got t' write all o' this down!"--
but yet, still a clamor at my crown.
A pen and pad I 'wake t' grab,
Then my thoughts go down the drain!

Int' the cabinet t' pinch a pill,
I take 't with juice,
relax and loose,
and wait for the pain to finally ****.

Off t' sleep just one more time,
then another thought my mind comes to,
I whisper t' myself "oh, shoo! shoo! shoo!"
but it stays, it stays-- such a tragic crime!
I'd just like some sleep!
Something I think we can all relate to. Isn't it great?
Derby Jan 2017
Come on and dance with me
It’s easy if you try
Come on and dance with me
Follow my lead and glide

Slip in the mud
Racing through your blood
You’re as good as gone
Drifting away with eyes half-shut

Come on and dance with me
It’s easy if you try
Come on and dance with me
You’re stepping out of time

It’s a living Hell
Cold sweats, puke, and pain
Your skin goes blue
When you drink the blackened rain

Do you want to dance with me?
It’s easy if you try
Come on and dance with me
As we fall down from the sky

Oh, come on and dance with me
It’s easy if you try
Come on now, dance with me
And I’ll shiver down your spine

The warmth is gone
The rush is fleeting away
You’ve nodded off
For the last time

You’ve come here to dance with me
So give me your best try
You've tread upon my dancing shoes
It’s now your time to die

Come on and dance with me
It’s easy if you try
Now, tell me 'bout your dance with death
Was it worth the high?

Come on and dance with me--
Title obviously a play on Poe's "The Masque of the Red Death." Where Poe's piece was about plague and disease, this piece is such for drug use, namely ****** (hence "Brown Death," "Blackened rain" "mud," and other such references). Drug use and abuse is an epidemic here in the United States. It is a disease, it can almost be described as a plague. This is just a quick poem (song) about the true hazard of drug use. The high is not worth the side effects, the psychological and physiological addiction, the pain and suffering, and the effects on others the drug(s) cause.
(You know exactly what drugs we're talking about here.)
Dec 2016 · 316
Dying and Going To Hell
Derby Dec 2016
I’m goin’ to Hell
Ain’t no one gonna stop me
Oh, I’m sure goin’ to Hell
As quick, as swift as death can halt me

You know what?
I’m A-okay with my fate
‘cause I’m goin’ down swingin’
Like the champion of the world

I’ll be dressed-up in my favorite suit,
Relaxed in my favorite chair
Sipping down my favorite *****
Without but a single care

That’s when ol’ rattle-bones
Will show his teeth
And point his finger at me
Wave me on, and down we’ll go

I’m off to Hell
And I haven’t a regret
I’ve lived a happy life
And happy is as ready as set

All that there is left
Is to just
Go,
And ain't no one better stop me.
Dec 2016 · 1.3k
The Lecher
Derby Dec 2016
Never he was an honest man
Who prides himself
On wanton expeditions

In a field of truth
He lies, entangled in conceit
To win that which he desires –
It is only but a game.

Mind not his mental means, nor manner –
Be he sane or psychopath –
But the strategy by which he plays:
Cheat, deceive, manipulate,
Overcome, and conquer your carnal estate.

Twisted tales, spun with golden thread
Crafted by careful practice and confidence
The master of charisma in his own head
Is no Eros, in any sense – Erosive, yes –
He is only what you want but for a brief moment
Be suspicious and expect this ever-real Narcissus.

A lecher he is
A Greek God in wish –
Nay, he only lives in the fantastic,
Though he roams about us
In a surreal bubble,
Where love comes to pass,
He is ever-so subtle

He markets himself as a Rembrandt,
Although more a moke* than baroque,
Something which he could never see
Staring into his reflection so blindly.
At a cost, worth more than his fee,
This cheap knockoff of Sal Dali,
Would sell you his love
For a buck forty-three.

Beware the lecher.
*Moke is a British/Australian slang term for donkey or *******; a fool, representing the folly of man.
Dec 2016 · 963
Guts
Derby Dec 2016
I contend
That I have
Never
Hated the guts
Of another human being

For the guts
Are not
Responsible for
The actions
Taken by their host

Nor are they at fault
For the decisions
Made by the mind
Of a madman

The humble guts
Are only but
Organs with purpose:
Digestion
And continuation
Of life.

I have
Never exclaimed
“The nerve
of some people!”

For the nerves
are merely devices
through which
a person
may harness
the sense of
feeling

But some people
Go on
Through life
Without feeling
Things like
Remorse
Humility
Pain
Emotion of any kind

I pity them
And I ponder
I envy them
At times
And
I am fascinated
By them

Sometimes
Pity crosses with
Envy
And I ponder again
Intrigued –
All three.

I wish to know
How to be
A wretch
A *****
A *******
A criminal
An *******
A licentious *****
A nuisance
A mean *******
But feel nothing at all

I want to know what it’s like to be cold and callous and without regret or remorse
Without a single ******* care in the whole entire world

But all I can do is speculate
That it is
Unlike anything;
Just like nothing at all:

Emptiness without knowing what fulfillment is
The coldness of not knowing the definition of temperature
The hardness of living life as compressed carbon atoms also known as diamond but without knowing I am or feeling like a jewel

I may not quite myself be a gem
But I can feel
I can hear loud and clear
I love to be whole
I love to be warm
I love to love
Because I am not a wretch
I am not a *****
I am not a *******
I am not a criminal
Or an *******
Or a licentious *****
Or a nuisance
Or a mean, cold ******* –
At least for the most part

I am
a human-*******-being
And I will never try
To be anything but.

It was
Never guts
It was always,
Is,
And forever will be
Folks with their heads up their butts
And brains in the drains
Who waste
Our precious air
And time.

One can certainly say
They feel it there
But alas
That is not
Where
The choice is made
Nor is that feeling
What upon
the action is taken.

One should not hate
Another one’s guts and nerves –
It should be
The mind within the brain
Who takes all the blame;
Everyone else is just doing their jobs.
Nov 2016 · 437
Nightmare.
Derby Nov 2016
Last night I could hardly sleep a wink my kitchen sink went “tink tink tink” with water drops on metal, “Stop!” I cried and tried to settle back into bed and off to sleep, and then, just then, I felt a wind cold at my feet—it was the fan, I left it spinning, I pulled the chain to end its sinning, it was Too. ******. Cold!

I snuggled back in and shut my eyes, not two more minutes ticked on by when I heard the buzz of a little fly, I thought: “why, oh, why does this remind me of warplanes up in the sky?” I fought not in war, but more in slumber, I need to upgrade to a sweet Sleep Number! Or some kind of bed that doesn’t creak when I lay me down to get some sleep! I pray the Lord my soul to keep, but if I cannot get this rest, He’ll have to take it when I’m dead, like this fly who just Won’t. Stop. Buzzing!

I smack the fly out of the air, scratch my head, run through my hair, now all is silent throughout the lair—until my cat, out of nowhere, pounces my belly and shoots a glare as if to say “I do not care,” he meows and growls just like a bear—at least to me it sounds as such, but then again, I’m losing touch! The clock tick-tocks, I’m still awake, I lie back down for my own sake, my eyes shut slow, it’s going great—and then, just then: It’s an earthquake! No—it’s just my cat running around on the bed chasing his shadow on the wall, because somehow, light still finds a way into my room at night to entertain this creature. Cat. Please. Stop!

With curtains closed and all gone pitch, I scratch the light right off my list, same goes for that one last itch down on my back—and it got violent, but I got it—now the room is silent! So one last time, I curl on up and drift away, I’ve got to say, it feels great! I thought my soul was about to break, I fall asleep and claim my stake, my dream is—wait, I’m awake!?

It was all. A *******. Dream.
Oct 2016 · 921
Soliciting the Devil
Derby Oct 2016
Off to Hell I go,
With hat in hand,

I ring Dark Lord's doorbell,
"Brother, can you spare a dime?"

"Go back to Earth!"
He yells.

But I look around this burning realm,
and see no necessity to need,

I turn my eye back to him,
"But sir," say I,

"This place is better than that
from whence I come."

With flame from mouth, he retorts
"This is the land of eternal suffering,

of physical torment for all of time!
Are not you convinced to remain on Earth?"

But I am not.
Oct 2016 · 666
Columbus Day
Derby Oct 2016
Honey, I
Both envy and
Hate
Your exes,
Though they may only be but
A letter to
You now.

I hate, hate, hate
Everyone who
Found you and had the
Chance
To explore you
Before I could have ever
Known.

Though you would not
Be who you are now,
and I know I am being
irrational,
but I never wanted to be
Christopher Columbus
“Discovering” your land.

Maybe, though,
For once in my life,
My lateness to the game
Is not actually a bout of
bad-timing
But actually the
Perfect point
To have entered,
For it seems I am
Winning
Whereat which I would
Usually
Strike out.

Oh, honey, I
Am still jealous and
Spiteful
Of all those boys;
They were pirates
For your
Innocence and
Your willingness to lend
A helping heart
Plunderers
Of your love
Thieves
Of your breath
Your kiss,
The vulnerability
Of your body which I
Now embrace,
They were waste bins
For your time
For your energy
For your senses

And even though you showed
Most of them
False emotion
Handed many
A replica of
A genuine smile,
Some still got through
Your breastplate
Dealt you plenty a blow
and painted your
organs black
with scars and tar
but yes, you do
Still
Have a heart,
and yes
it is red
and steadily pumping
somewhere in the pitch dark

Honey, I
Do not pity those fools
For I know what we are is
True
A delicate rarity for you

As well for myself, I can safely say
I will be
your alphabet
Starting with
“A”
Any number you can imagine
Stretching any direction from zero
In any combination,
All expressions and equations,
Your mathematic hero

Although I’m
Tardy to the party (if you’ll pardon the cliché)
It seems
It’s prime time
For us to trip and fall—
And that’s…that’s just A-Okay
(If you’ll pardon the cliché)!
Sep 2016 · 954
Haiku #2
Derby Sep 2016
Semitemos efil t'nia straight-
forward, os uoy yam deen ot
egnahc ruoy evitcepsrep.
It's all about perspective-- read carefully.
Derby Sep 2016
Bread is body,
blood is wine,
die on hill
become divine.

I am God?
Is that right?
Please don't pray to me,
Jesus Christ!
Sep 2016 · 726
No Smoking!
Derby Sep 2016
No smoking,
It’s bad for business—
Unless it’s beef or pork or something of the sort

But in my booth,
I bicker back and forth with peoples’ busted lips
Puffing butts between impolite breaths; ******
Conversation pits brain upon
Besieged brain,
Neither knowing
Quite what to say, and the words just keep on a-comin’

Oh,
These fools’ flows flail desperately,
And thusly fail to fulfill their purpose

Such unintelligible folks spark my plight—
Oh, I can read just fine, but I could use some light—
I need a cigarette!
Sep 2016 · 450
Finity
Derby Sep 2016
Life and money and time are
Finities
I can only escape in death
And yet
I feel free and
Adamantine, unlimited and
Everlasting—
But only for you.

It is as if
You are dead to me,
I to you—
In a good way.

Are we alive and
Finite?
Or dead and
Without bounds?
Perhaps a bit of both,
For our hearts beat
Just the same,
Though we are, too,
Dead inside—
In a good way.
Sep 2016 · 690
1970
Derby Sep 2016
Every day, even the nonreligious boys knelt and bowed, so as to pray,
“Oh dear God,” they’d say, “Let me be the predator and not the prey!”
April came, and for months we sang
A sweet song about running away
Not ‘cause we were afraid,
We just didn’t want to stay
We wanted to escape--
To take the A-train to the planes at Da Nang
And go home.

So we heeded the word
And we ran through the jungle.

Who could have ever guessed that a hamburger could be so unappetizing?
Here’s the truth: that ain’t ketchup, and this ain’t child’s play.
No Red-Riders or Daisies
These toys are real and so is this pain.

If you’re lucky, you can be saved
If you’re lucky, it might just rain
If you’re lucky, they’ll cancel the game
If you’re lucky, you’ve got today.

And what we imagined when we were tots
About the war our fathers fought
Was all fun ‘til we were caught
In the A Shau Valley with jungle rot
Starving half to death for a C-ration box,
Brothers dying left and right—even if we could, we wouldn’t watch
We had our sights lined up to fire shots
Leaving behind us all our guts
No time for stomachs ******* in knots
No tears, no fear, we’re here to give ‘em hell
And that’s our job
So that’s what we’ll do.

Search.
Destroy.

No sleep for days, a **** sure bet
That sick feeling you’ll need to use your bayonet
‘cause some poor *******’s so unfortunate
To stumble upon you and take what he gets
Surprise, surprise: no peace this year for beloved Tet
“Happy New Year!” are they ready? Are they set?
For two years, their leader’s dead
And the VC’s still such a threat
Both sides take turns mowing down men they’ve never met
They want and we want each other to quit,
That’s what we all expect
But it still hasn’t happened yet.

It’s been five-plus years and we’re still here
Taking baby-faced rookies hardly old enough to drink a beer
Turning them into hardened men through blood, sweat, and tears
Black or white, straight or queer
We’re all equal on the battlefields
We don’t come cheap, but we come at a steal
Valuable and worthless at the same time
It all depends who you ask, the folks at home or the men on the lines
And everyone in between has a different answer too
Olive-Drab boys filling combat boots
A couple thousand bucks for already-dying shoes
To ****** the roots of a foreign land where none of us belong.

Why can’t we leave ‘em alone?
No time to ask questions, just follow your orders:
**** and survive,
Do your damnedest not to die,
Then you can get on the plane and fly.

Fly on home, under one condition:
Survive the brimstone and ******,
weather the storm and see the calm.

Been here 3 years myself, and I heard stories--
Got letters from buddies who made it safe to Uncle Sam
“They hate us back here. Why?”
I ain’t quite sure, man!
Life sure gets different real fast when you’re face-to-face with an enemy
And in a split second, without a thought, you snap his arm and stab his throat
Then lie him down, walk away, and that very same day, go write your girl back home a love-note.

Sure, it’s gotta be nuts to them folks back home, staring into the deep and empty eyes of men who killed and died
Out in those jungles where their country’s pride learned to hide like a silhouette when you **** the light.

It’s gotta be nuts trying to adjust to waking up in a comfy bed without seein’ someone dyin’—
The paranoia of stepping outside to grab the morning paper, which could **** well be a landmine.

Oh, the things they must hear!

Deafening silence.

Deafening silence, through which, if you listen close enough, you’ll hear the shells burst and the bullets fire all day and all night.
And you’re just plain crazy.
Is the mailman a friendly?
Is the neighbor’s kid deadly?
It’s sure gotta be terror.
Pure terror.

I’d say I’m coming home, but I wouldn’t want anyone to feel the sorrow
Or the pain or the guilt or any disappointment when I die tomorrow.
The truth, though, is that I’ve been dead for three years and change now.
Nobody lives. Nobody makes it here,
We just
Drone along, and
Run through the hell we’ve come to know as Vietnam.

Any man who says he’s “fine”?
Well, that’s a **** filthy lie,
For we’ve all come to run through the jungle
Not to live,
But to die.
Written intended to be almost like a letter back home from the perspective of a battle-worn veteran of the U.S. Military in Vietnam.

The narrator is, in my perspective, a 21-year-old soldier who no longer dreads death, nor does he really care or put much thought into whether or not he will live or die; he has lost plenty of friends, as well as any purpose to make new friends in Vietnam. He initially wrote this "letter" to send to someone--anyone--back home, but he never wrote a name or address on the envelope in which he keeps the letter. He kept it in his footlocker, left at his base after writing it. Every now and then, when he got back to the base, he would read it over again and see, because it is the only thing that could make him weep--the only source of any true emotion or feeling he could muster up. He never sent it back home, and, as an epilogue, he survives the war, and returns home the next year, as his deployment had finally expired. He returns to civilian life, suffering the failures of social and romantic relationships, years of heavy post traumatic stress, and unreasonable disdain from his countrymen, until 1975, when there comes some sort of relief: the war is finally over. He goes on to live a fairly ordinary life, though he still suffers from the effects that war can have on a person--often suffering in secret. Decades later, while looking through some storage, he recovers the letter he wrote to nobody but himself. He weeps again, as he had in Vietnam, for all the memories come flowing back. However, re-examining the letter makes him feel much better, much clearer, and much less stoic and stagnant.

Heavily-laden with Vietnam War and period references.
Sep 2016 · 677
The Valley
Derby Sep 2016
In glorious swoops of courage, the birds’ talons grasp tightly to bloodied men.
Fearful.
Hopeful.
Their silver wind of relief has finally begun to blow.

Though always late, the hawks arrive just in time.
Looking back, the stories speak gruesome truth:
X-Ray was Hell; a no-man’s-land of loss and meaningless fire.
The shed of red life, salted tears, and deep-tissue scars
Has been argued to be worth the ****, sweat, and northward hate for which they feel so deeply;
Debated from the lips and tongues of penguins who live in an idol home of marble and comfort,
A place where mice need not be afraid of man nor hawk,
But should be always mindful of the snake.

The question stands:
What is this all for?

The golden years of reminiscence have passed us by;
Boys have become men, men have become droids.
And these ironclad mechanisms of sacrifice have leaked,
Laughed in the yellow faces of destruction,
Cried in the sweet solace of dreams,
Yet, they remain stoic in their duties.

They are forced to rust.
Forced to fall apart.
Forced to learn
How to replace and be replaced,
How to break and how to mend,
How to hang on.
How to let go.

In the dense forests of struggle,
They play hide and seek with figures unknown:
silhouettes of themselves and each other, as well as those who they are obliged to send to a boggy grave.

They play this game,
They lose this game,
Handing life and limb for a cause which is not their own;
Hardly any cause at all,
But a cause manufactured to rescue that of another.

Brothers departed kiss the white clouds of peace,
Thanking God for the homecoming.
Men enduring thank God for another night amidst their dread,
So to savor every last breath.
Pray for death, hope to live.

Beg the question:
What the Hell am I doing here,
On some other man’s land,
Where my nose does not belong?
Innocent farmers.
Or are they suckers?
Or are WE suckers?
Pawns.
Pawns on a chessboard. Dots and arrows on paper maps.
Statistics.
We’re just a game played by children half an Earth away.
A game where
Some men are lions, some men are wolves,
But all men have learned—if not by now, then soon—
That “friends” equals pain.
And pain is suffering.

Pleading for the answers,
When’s it subside?
When’s it take a back seat so then we can move forward with our lives?

It doesn’t.

It engulfs you.

It becomes your life.

Your dreams.

Your stories.

It becomes you.
Old, frail, desensitized, and stone-faced you.
And at such a young age.

“War is Hell, soldier.”
Welcome to Vietnam.
Written from the perspective of any given man who was a part of the U.S. Military's combat units in Vietnam between 1964 and 1975, intended for the folks back home, as well as those young men who wished and/or were soon to become combatants in the war.
Sep 2016 · 1.4k
Love, For A Night
Derby Sep 2016
Firelight, ‘fading quickly from the quiet night,
O, fair queen,
Quell my fearful dreams, and
Be here while I fall asleep.

Flame
Slowly snuffs itself,
Choking for oxygen, so to stay alive,
But alas, at last, it dies.

No longer was her stay
Than but one phase,
As the moon hid away
Into the black.
A mockery in the sky,
She darkens the dusk, and
Passes us by as she tries to keep it alight.
But alas, at last, it dies.

As departs the dark,
Ambitiously arrives the day,
Who leaves but no need for fire’s blaze to stay.
Sunrise, sweetly presenting in sightly colour,
She slightly flutters
Peacefully
Into uniform blue,
And soon,
A new slate.

Last night, fire did fade swiftly,
Whistling wonderfully as her ungodly gasp failed to remain alive;
To keep alight.
O, she tried,
But alas, at last, it died.
And just as so, she and I.

But what is love?

Whether love for tomorrow
Or love for a night,
Love is love.
Right?
Sep 2016 · 300
Haiku #1
Derby Sep 2016
I would like to write
the proper poem for you—
Aw, ****! Outta words.
Sep 2016 · 1.3k
I'm A Liar
Derby Sep 2016
This is not about you
This is not about me,
This ain’t really ‘bout anyone-y, honey;
I’m a liar, for Christ’s sakes!

Sure, sure,
THIS one is about me,
That much I can say,
But everything else?
‘Twas all fake.

I am an ink-and-paper conman,
Because that is how I choose to make a living.

Hate me, if you so dare,
For if you do,
Then you, too, hate the likes of
Rowling and Twain and Wells and Hemingway
Shakespeare and Spielberg and Lucas—

Oh, yes, read up,
Lies upon lies in black-and-white!

We are similar in such a way
Which creates alternate worlds and feelings
And beings of different kinds;
We are those who love to implant things
Into your subconscious mind.

What is true to you,
But false to all,
Is the picture you happen to imagine
When you flip pages and have a ball!

Semantics, my dear,
It is what takes you on a trip
Across a flexible lexicon
Where words are invented and used anew;
Where instead of shoes, you wear foot-canoes.

Your favorite books and movies and songs,
All figments of enigmatic mind,
But,
Is it really all that wrong?

Our lies are
For your enjoyment,
And the good of mankind,
An escape from what’s real,
It brings you to light,
Without this work,
There’d be no color to life.

And that’s why we’re liars
In black-and-white.
Derby Sep 2016
Love is no drug, you fool!
It would be more accurate to say it is a state of emotion and affection,
of care and awareness,
of conscience and consciousness,
all brought on by a series of complex chemical imbalances and reactions in the brain.

Yes, in the brain,
not in your heart,
not in your bones,
not in your muscles,
but in your brain.

If love were a drug, you fool,
you would take it in by needle and syringe,
inhale its smoke,
ingest its fruits or flowers,
drink its enchanted elixir,
let it fizzle and dissipate on the tip of your tongue,
or worse yet,
open wide—it’s a suppository!

Yup, that’s right,
right up the *** with your love—
if it were a drug, that is!

Just suffice it to say,
love is not a drug, you fool,
It just happens.
Sep 2016 · 10.2k
Baby Lightning
Derby Sep 2016
I remember not too long ago I was just a little boy playing ball in the park it was Little League in the heat anyone in south Florida will tell you “it’s normal” and it’s true it really is normal.

Then it began to rain lightning struck the adjacent field and left a **** in right somehow for some reason the lightning warning system never sounded its fifteen second alarm I wonder why.

Imagine this

A crash as loud as if you were wearing a stainless steel stockpot and someone struck it so hard with a metal spoon and soon you were knocked so silly you felt like the Liberty Bell the day it rung then cracked during the funeral of former Chief Justice John Marshall and you thought you were dead too.

I thought I was a goner so I bolted to the dugout like lightning no pun intended but I didn’t want to be toast.

As the team sat there each about eleven and twelve years old we counted seconds between lighting and thunder between light and sound and what we felt were going to be the very last seconds of our young little lives how naïve we were.

One lightning strike cracked so bright it flashed me to today and here I am at twenty-two not dead just yet and I’m not quite sure how or why maybe there’s a purpose maybe there’s a meaning to life it’s a philosophical thing to sit and contemplate existentialism is such a weird weird thing I think.

I have come to believe that there are multiple reasons for life and one’s to die one’s to survive one’s to figure out every answer to every question and acquiesce all that which satisfies our wants and needs and one’s to love and give and take and share a life and one’s to see all there is to see like cityscapes and oceans and stars and countries one’s to see even more like frowns and births and smiles and deaths and one’s to eat all there is to eat and to drink all there is to drink until we finally figure out a way to accept the inevitable.

Or is the inevitable not inevitable?

What if there’s a way to live forever and there are no consequences extraneous to those of regular everyday life and you can choose to accept the inevitable when you choose to realize that it sure is inevitable?

Ooh-aah! Ain’t that a concept?

This is not quite what I had in mind at birth I thought it would be smooth sailing between fits of crying and long hours of slumber and meals and short naps and diaper changes and seeing my parents’ faces and those of all others gazing about me in awe and wonder and amazement and pride and love I was a deity!

Relative to twenty-two years one figures out that being a god is very short-lived and that twenty-two years ain’t very long hardly even a quarter of the way to the brink of a timely death.

Maybe when we’re babies we’re gods and idols and think about this babies can rule the world if only they knew they command the highest of all expenses in the whole entire world and families and friends willingly shell out money and goods and services for such a tiny little sack of fat and muscle and fastly-forming bones and brains.
Babies are ******* gods.

But gods no less.

My God I wish I was a baby once again.

But I’m twenty-two and slowly but surely growing old living through each quickening day by day by day and so on and so forth it’s been a fun trip so far and I am sure not done so long as there isn’t another flash from the lightning to send me straight to forty-four or eighty-eight—it doubles every time ain’t that a ****** shame?

— The End —