Submit your work, meet writers and drop the ads. Become a member
 
Karl Nov 2015
Settle down boy
You’re not that old
You’re running scared
It’s getting cold

You better find someone who cares

You’re caught in a loop
Stuck in your head
Calm down boy
You’re overfed

We sold you out
We set you down
You’re filling up
You’re empty now

Look around
It’s darker here
Purge the hollow
Purge your fear

Temper down boy
You’ve had too much
The bottle’s only
Another crutch

You better nip it in the bud

You’ll end up shooting in the dark again
Breaking your falls on all your friends
You already know where your path ends
Just follow it around another bend
Karl Oct 2014
All my rights
That might have been better left
Will come slithering along
Behind me
Wherever I go
But fain would I not be encumbered
And by death become the destroyer
Of the sullen and indulgent
Shroud over my thoughts

Would that I could sink my roots
And call out to Deep,
My eyes, focused and unchanging,
While darkness coils around my feet

If I could but hear
The music of the heart
That might be produced in me
Within those precious moments

Father in heaven,
If I could know even only 
That sound
Karl Dec 2014
first within, now without
steeply, darkly, hereabout

as above, so below
further still and down we go

as it is, and was before
ever deeper, evermore
spiraling
Karl Feb 2015
ringing ears
running fast

             silver bells
             silver bells

broken door
speckled grass

             it’s christmas time
             in the city

arab spring
stinging air

             ring-a-ling
             hear them sing

rubber bullets
clotted hair

             children laughing
             people passing

burning tire
siren blast

             and above all this
             bustle you’ll hear

steel shell
rebel yell

             silver bells
             silver bells

silver bells


                    silver


                            ­   bells
Karl Dec 2014
the vulture grins at a boy with a stone
he’s been watching since before i was here
and the soldier cried when his daughter was born
he says he cried both from love and from fear
and the fair skinned man who sold him a gun
says "i’ve got better things to do than be here
when the smoke all clears there will only be one
and i’ll be laughing at a bar with a beer.”
Karl Oct 2014
What is greater,
Your desire to speak, or to be heard?
If you argue for superiority-
(Moralist pugilism)
(Last man standing)
Then may you feel like a man
May you be satisfied by bringing another
To stubborn contradiction
Or to submission

But may you also know this:
Once you have finished killing all those
Who oppose peace,
Once you have burned the last bigot
At the stake,
Once you’ve crucified the non-believers,
Or choked out the last censurer,
When every bully
Has been ridiculed
And embarrassed,
You will have only reflected this world
Onto a surface of your choosing

So long as you expect Truth to arrive
Unmarred by your fluster and arrogance,
Through you to dispel the evil
You are hell bent on redeeming,
You will remain
A force of Darkness
In this time
Karl Oct 2014
I wanted a metamorphosis
To accumulate until my meager brightness
Became supergiant

I wanted to burn brightest and biggest
Subduing galaxies with my gravity

I wanted reflections of my light
To echo through the void

I wanted to grow in blindness
Of my monstrosity until
After millions of years
I could collapse
Into the blackness of singularity
That I might wait patiently for the day
I would be scattered throughout eternity
In a moment of unfathomable
Destruction
Karl Jun 2015
he was looking at something on the other side
sometimes the dark would bleed through the curtains
and bring an unholy whisper from the man himself

he was looking because it was too quiet
and he didn’t want to listen
he longed for silence
he was terrified of silence

like the fear of scarlet
unblinking eyes
shining in the shadows

between him and himself
he didn’t always know who had the bigger gun
who was calling the shots
who was boss

“it’s just me in here”
he’d say to himself
“you’re **** right.”
himself would reply

himself always swore more than he did
himself had a big ******* mouth

sometimes a little fight would break out
and no one would be happy

“who has time for that anyways”
he’d say to himself
“we ******* don’t”
Karl Jan 2016
come and see
i’m bruised around the eyes
and hardly fit to stand
been soaking in the brine
just ******* on my hands

i find dollars when i need them
just take a couple more
i killed nothing that wasn’t bleeding
nothing that ain’t still breathing
i’m no killer anymore

let me down
i should have never come
don’t know how i got here
don’t know what i’ve done
i’ve fractured my veneer

i find women when i need them
then i leave them at the door
it’s the hollow i’ve been feeding
the hollow was succeeding
i’m not hollow anymore

spill the dark
show me why i hide
all of them can laugh
most of them are blind
don’t lie on my behalf

i find jesus when i need him
or when he’s too hard to ignore
i’m finished now with bleating
and he is now conceding
i don’t need jesus anymore
Karl Nov 2015
We spoke in riddles                                                          ­ holes in the middle
“Darkness” we told me                                       darkness will mold me
“Utter darkness”                                                        ­           carcases, carcases
                                                     (maybe they marked us)
I liked how it glistened                                            I shouldn’t have listened
“Trees, rivers, mountains” we told me             return to the fountain           
“I need you to focus”                                               the skylark will show us
                                                     (the sky is below us)
Suddenly it was quiet                                                            ­                     see I
“Here you are” we told me                                                               ­         saw
“You can’t turn back”                                                            ­                          a
                                   ­                  (just me on the)
I saw a cabin by the water                                                           teeter-totter  
“It’s time” we told me                                                thought I oughta be
“The circle is complete”                                                        ­ plural, complete
                                                     (we’re obsolete)
Elevated, euphoric, fearless                          mutated, sophomoric, peerless
“Let go” we told me                                                         let go of me
“You’ll fall forever”                                                
        ­                                                           or
                                                            ­               we
                                                            ­                          will
                                ­                                                                 fall
                                                          ­                                                  *forever
best on a computer. the format doesn't work on a phone.
Karl Nov 2014
We all will end all
I give you my word
I give you my world

Your agony
Neglect it
Slight
Desperate
The envy of the crowd

Your Great Men
I have seen them
White
Festering
They will not lead you

Your children
Forget us
Pious
Immaculate
We are proud liars

We will not fight for you
I have not fought for you
We do not know that there is fighting
Let alone what should be fought
We know moving images
We know nothing

My shame
A corruption no
Force can handle
A wound
A fissure
A severance

Not one will end all
I give you my word
I would if I could
Karl Oct 2014
I know this place

There is murmur
Of a specter

Here
A saint and a liar
Dance together
Before God

I know their face

One says
“I tell you the truth
I cannot promise
The truth. I am
No saint”

The other smiles
“I tell you the truth
I am a liar
And will lie”

I know this place

I will be my own deception
Thank you both
I will be my own

Sooner would I march
Headstrong
Into the dark
To be lost
And know the darkness
In truth

And so I appeal to the specter
And I drown the murmur
The saint and the liar
Be ******

I know this place
I know
Karl Oct 2014
we could draw no light
and some had tried to help
we were given health
we were given hell

we chose to atrophy
we said it was
just us, keeping silence

she could draw no light,
and I refused

don’t remind me alone
or when I’m alone

better to remember
when I am too drunk
to remember

he drew no light
but I did
and so he became me

I am kept in a form
this is the case- my case
so I will take the form
without resistance

now,
I choose no light
I say it is
just me, keeping silence

hidden, and not
this form, keeping me
I draw no light
and this is what I
have come to say
Karl Dec 2015
a shell of a boy steps
out to greet the chill
seeking to be filled
he sits near a street light
but not too close, see
he goes at night
for the stars
his excuse is the cigar
he reaches for a light
and fills his lungs with tar

a small, filtered conduit
the moment slows and stops
he finds himself withdrawn from it
he doesn’t check his clock

time is a luminous ember
moving toward his finger
he decidedly remembers he
won’t try to make it linger

besides,
it’s long since he believed
he is ought but little more
than the smoke he breathes

a shell of a boy
steps inside
filled with smoke
but filled
nonetheless
Karl Jul 2015
she told me i made her sad
that i had had
too much, too fast
like i was running from the past

or something bad
some iconoclast
who would drag me down
at last
Karl Oct 2014
lying in the street
a thin shell
and broken on the inside

some ****** with a gun
rifles for the kids
at the storefront

let them learn
before they can’t forget

i say
this will run
as deep and dark as you allow
whether or not you can tell

         get on your feet
          it’s a thin wall
         and won’t weather the shells


i tell you
we americans have agreed
you are either prisoners or refugees
and we must know which

although,
if you are prisoners
you are criminals

if you are refugees
you are blameless

there is no room in our heads
for honest prisoners

and no such thing as
a guilty refugee

tell me brothers
what crimes have you committed
to be in such a prison
how black are your hearts

tell me sisters
what monstrosity displaced you
what savages took your home
let me help you

a man from here once said
let those without sin
send the first rocket

tell me, friends
who is to blame
because we in america
need to know
who to root for
Karl Jan 2015
Oh breach the hide, spill the dark

All the hollow

Sound the pipes, youth will follow

The shepherd’s dog will heed it last

Bleed in through the painted glass



We smote the belfry, fallen hence

Rats or humans came and went

Hark the deafened for their sense

Hades’ children send ye thence
Karl Oct 2014
the fact I can get it right
away with the fact I can
get it right away with the
fact you have to be the
first half year and the
other hand is the only
thing that would have to
go back and I don't think
that I have a great way of
the day before I get a
followed back on my
way home from work

to be the first half of
the day before I get a
followed back on my
way home from work

to be the best of the year and all
the fact I can see it as an
excuse for the next few weeks

of a sudden it was
the best of the best way
of the best thing to say
it was the best thing to say
it was the first half of the
day I don't think that I
have a great way of life
and the fact I have to go
back and the other hand
is the only thing that
would have to go back
and the fact I can see it as
an excuse for the next few
weeks it is not the same
thing to say that I can see
the new version is the only
one that is a good time
with the same thing to say
it is not the same time as
the best of luck with the
same thing as the best thing
for
ever I go back and
the other day I have a
good time with the fact I
might have a good day today
i am followed back on my
way home from work the
day before i get away
Karl Dec 2014
a song for the innocents
living in the trees
swinging from branches
limp as puppets in the breeze

the white rider
a blessing and a simple prayer
give em up to heaven
but first, tie an anchor to their feet

a song for the daughter
listed as a casualty
a bomb while she was sleeping
hit her home and blew her into three

a song for the father
who told them that he wouldn’t leave
he left on a stretcher
with bruises and a bullet in his knee

the white rider
a blessing a simple prayer
he’s looking up to heaven
but you know he’s at the devil’s feet

we're looking up to heaven
but you know we're at the devil's feet
Karl Jan 2016
Hereupon the threshold of the night,
We find around our feet, the path alight.
My friends, the hour of change abruptly comes.
Upon the forge the two are made to One.



Keep vigil now, awake! You mustn’t blink.
Desist from finding balance on the brink.
Let go!
The Tavern-Keeper finds you where you roam.
The Way will, oft-returning, lead you home.

The only self which matters will not die,
Yet selfhood, death will show you, was a lie.
So be it!
Whirling as we fall toward the sun,
Within the furnace all returns to One.

The urge in me which calls unto the dawn
Remains to call when all of me is gone.
Alas!
This body is a shackle to my feet
And it will perish ere I am complete.


We stand before the threshold of a Mind.
None can tell you what is found inside.
Whereupon the day of man is done,
Within the darkness only stands the One.
messing around with different styles
Karl Nov 2014
“All I have is my word.”
I said, in near desperate ambition.
“And you have it.”

So I continued
My words grew in length
And depth

And I lost track of which I knew
And which had been fabricated
Needs must when the devil drives
I hardly knew
The latter from the former

“All I have is my word.”
I said, doubled over in shame
“And I have lost it.”

The loss was shattering
Breathtaking, even
Beautiful, maybe

He told me in my ruin,
“Let the dead bury their dead.”
Words cannot be meaningless
And I am not dead
Yet

All I have is my word
And we are forgiven

— The End —