I have learned the language,
And no Holy Grail.
I change my walk,
Down every trail.
I have spoke of your heroes,
In great detail.
I love rap music,
But still no avail.
I want to have a black friend,
But I am too pale.

I lay beneath the freckled, darkened sky waiting for either sleep or you to find me.
I fear sleep will here long before you.

I now know that Fall is here.
I found this out by listening to the season's sounds.
The leaves' crunch, the mountains' air, and people saying,
"Fall is here. Hey, hey, Fall is here."
I have a love hate relationship with Autumn.
I love it, but hate that everyone else does too.
If I was the only person to enjoy the new world's change, then I would possibly the happiest person to carve a pumpkin.

I now know Fall is here.
In the mountains Fall shows itself soon and strong.
By people wearing coats no matter what the weather.
Honestly, why do people so this.
I love fall too, but the gods of weather and season do not just decide to change by you wearing too many layers of flannel.

I now know Fall is here.
The smell of Fall is sweet and fresh.
All my female friends light pumpkin and apple candles.
This unusual act spits in mother nature's face as if saying  hey I'm going to take what you did and light it on fire and sniff it.

I now know Fall is here.
The nights seem long and undisturbed.
Except for me rambling about how much I dislike people who like fall more than I do.

Well you see the thing to understand is poetry is a gospel to the world.
At first you feel as if it is oppressive chains tying you down to the soiled earth with every simplistic tick tock.
That is at least until you discover this world has no rules for an adventurer of free verse.
Your words now flow like an expeditious brook as long as you use metaphors with pretentious words.  

However rules exist it is plain to see.
Some poems go aabb.
Those are simple ones to find.
Those are the ones stuck in your mind.

Now one more step, aabbc.
Those are a little more artsy.
You draw your crowd in.
Get under their skin,
And finish a little bit different.

And now it's time for set number three.
One that can simply astound.
The great, magnificent abab.
Those make a poet nearly profound.

There are  couplets, sonnets, and monoryhms.
And now for the last one, all in good time.
I wanted you all to hear them like chimes,
But all that I had I left you in these lines.

When I look in the mirror I see a failure.
When I look down I see unaccomplished feet and unskilled hands.
I have mentally collected every synonym for  disappointment,
Loser, loafer, underachiever.
The worst part is others see it too.

There is a phrase, jack of all trades,
But is that really what I am?
I am certainly not good at really anything.
I'm mediocre at best, no more no less,
So am I a trade-full jack?
If being not bad is what I am,
I guess it could be worse.

My shadow seems to follow me.
I catch it everywhere.
I can't seem to loose it.
I swear upon the book of common prayer.
I found it once behind me.
Our twisted love affair.
It seems to chase my actions.
Distant like the great Altair.
Yet close oh so many times,
With such pernicious debonair.

Remember when we were young?
We talked of love, life, and songs unsung.
Now we talk of battles sprung,
And friends that died by coal miner's lung.

One drink we have to remember,
And once again to fight the weather.
Remembering our times together,
In this oh so bleak December.

Remembering our good friend Saul.
Beside out brothers we did crawl.
Mortar shot was our close call,
but for him his final fall.

We drink to Keith and James and Floyd
Who's childhoods war destroyed .
They now rest in the great void,
While we sit here, drunk, unemployed.

Now the cold flintlock requests.
Our minds the alcohol possess.
Gun to the temple feel the stress.
And the trigger I did press,
And with a bullet my soul confess/

Broken glass of a window pane;
Broken home and a widow's pain.
Tears hang off a foreclosure notice;
The ones who are left hurt the most, ever noticed?

Easiest way is the one seen before;
Today her daughter will only be four.
Her daughter's aunt will raise her sure;
She heads for the cold forsaken shore.

Jagged rocks and gulls pass by;
On the cliffs, her last good bye.
One step, her love she longs to see;
Her limp body soon claimed by the sea.

I transpose a verse in perfect harmony.
Specks of self-loathing fall from pitch and pattern.
Words backfire, break, and delude,
Into nothing more than a harmony.

I break apart a God complex larger than myself,
But still find I am the root of an apathetic religion.
I am broken, brittle, taut, but untaught,
I am nothing more than myself.

I speak to ears from days of lore.
I send for memories ago.
Passages forgotten, buried, and bruised,
Forgotten with the word of *your.