We are citizens,
victims of a system
of stratification.

We use fiction
to relate
us to them,
women and men,
social programming
for the progress
to do more then
just began again.

While the filthy fat cats
are raking it in
doing more then
making a killing
by selling weapons
made to ****
foreign children,

making profits
off the violence
while calling us
immoral
criminals.

So, we use fantasy
to cross the breach,
break the cranium
so you can see
reality
through
that fictional brew,

and gain compassion
from the stories you read
or the movies you see.

This is the time
to select a brave few
who may follow you
through

I miss the small town girls,
whose names I have
mostly forgotten,
the games of tag,
the make believe scenarios,
the fun we had.

I miss the star lit chats
that the adults had,
while I ran
with flint rock sparks,
and chased fireflies.

I miss the old campground,
where we would swim
in a small sandy pond,
splashing.
When the older folks
dipped in
they got bitten,
but I never felt
any fish nibbling.

These memories
have been dimming
over time,
plus distance
as I swim in
a different
world,

but I was younger then
playing with other children,
innocent.

I miss those moments.

The battle’s done.
the words are spoken,
body tired,
spirit broken.

Thus, I walk,
a flickering flame
that has no name,

a whirling windstorm
that will not
pass this way again.

The fire dims
then expires.
The flesh falters
and there is
no more desire,

and all I was
is left distorted,
passing friendly memories,
into whispers,
then written vagaries,
and on into nothing.

In time I die
a thousand plus
tiny deaths
long after
my final breath,

but whatever
comes after this
I hope the world
was at least
a little bit better
cause I existed.

I am preparing
for the sharing
of grief
as a another doctor
leaves.

Space and time
part like
the red sea.
I believe
the next one
will be good,

but I am emotionally attached
like I was to the last,
and the other doctor who passed.

Christmas time
and I will come home
to find
these tears of mine
are rather silly,
falling for
a fictional character
who isn’t even
dying.

He is just regenerating,
just changing
like we all do
even though
we struggle to
hold on to the past.

Nothing lasts,
nothing last,
nothing………

They agree with me
retroactively,
say they
were always
against the hate,

but I remember when
those women
and men
came rolling in
with their rage,

when they said
the immigrants
were to blame,
when the few
who stood against them
were defamed.

It has happened
again and again,
blacklists,
secret prisons,
social poisons,
marches,
white rage,
fascism.
The masses join in
while we keep struggling.

Then when
peace swings
back in,
when the pendulum
is less threatening
I hear them say
that they never behaved
that way. *******!

I’ll bet their grandchildren will proclaim
“I could never be led astray the same way.”
Then make the same about face.

Man, it is so disappointing.
I get close to exploring
another human’s mind.
A minute or two
passes through
as I share truths
and expect her to
present hers to,

but generally I get
either vehemence
or indifference.
She either gets ******
or merely dismisses
my curious persistence,

and I find myself
alone in a never-ending pursuit
of knowledge
that I never get to share.

Supposedly,
I was wrought
with jealousy.

Justifying,
allegedly,
believing
that it was
owed to me,

cause I was better,
kinder, smarter
working harder
to prove my love.

In reflection
I refuse to admit it,
I’d prefer
just to forget it,

but supposedly
I am to smart
to fool myself.

To tell the stories
I have to run,
have to move,
partly for fun,
and partly to view
the world through
a traveler’s lens.

Cause if I stay
I’ll die
of old age,
and barely
make any change.

So,
I have to
run
to grow,
and share what I know
with all of you.

Its all ok.
Till, it isn’t.
Till, my howling beast
comes to swallow me
as I drown in the hollow
corridors of humanity.

The wails of the hungry,
the horrid screams of agony,
the shelters shattered
in mind numbing madness
made by modern
technology.

Mostly, this doesn’t
even touch me.
I wipe it off,
flap that flak jacket
that is dusty
with the flakes of
the fallen and burnt.

Our history returns,
but I am tired
of playing
the soothsayer
to those who go on
behaving like raving
children slayers.

My spirit becomes
comfortably numb
as I succumb
to my own complacency,
cause to struggle
drains me
immensely,
saps what’s left
of my sanity.

But even in the cluttered corners
the poet philosopher,
lover of literature,
student of history,
cries out to me,
yelling “do not surrender
your kind-hearted wonder,
and sense of empathy.
If you do there will be
nothing left of me
and our withering
humanity.”

There is something there
in the downtown square,
an angel statue
with statuesque hair.

On my way to work
the nightshift,
I stop and stare
at the strange
stationary beauty,

whispering secrets
in her ear
that she’ll never share,
cause she doesn’t care.

She is as hard as metal
but the last beautiful girl
staring up at the stars,
while loud cars
blast by
destroying the peaceful night.

Like Pygmalion
I am in love
with a statue,
but unfortunately
for little old me
there is no
Aphrodite
to bring my beloved to life.

When life is to hard and hurts to much it is love and hope that drives me on. When darkness and despair permeate my world it is love and hope that sustains me. So I thought just so you all know when times get tough when the tragedy is to much please remember I love you all.

The folds of
burnt black metal
pinch his skin,
breaking the flesh
that slips within
tiny gaps.

The knight gasps
as pain explodes
and trickles of blood
start to flow.

To this
his page says,
your forgot your
aketon.

The newly knighted fool
stares and drools,
stuttering “what?”
and the page replies
your underpadding.

I don’t have the time
to memorize
or get stuck on
old lines.

Not because
of new rhymes
but because
my hyper mind
has already
super sonically
jetted to
the next horizon.

The end of the world
will not need me.
The grief I see
will depart swiftly
when my consciousness
cease to be anything.
Death will release
the anguish I breath.

All the books that I read
will crumble like
dry brown autumn leaves.
All those man-made things
will rot, rust, or tumble.

Even our shared history
will recede into obscurity,
then further into
nothingness,
allowing space and time
to completely
forget us.

There is the sound of
bones snapping
acting like
two soldiers cracking
sword against sword
with such a fierce resistance.
It is almost painful
but after
the tension passes,
though I know
it is probably
not healthy
for me
I still crack
my joints
gleefully.

Darkness blooms
like a tattered shroud
encasing everything
around.
The night consumes
with a ravishing
hunger
wanting
all human beings.

Stars barely blink at all.
I watch comets fall.
As they come crashing down
in an era of extinctions,
all that I can see
breeds dark ages of negativity
erasing my humanity.

Love could have been
a lighting force
guiding me to something more,
but truth is the terror.
So, people live in the biasness
that most claim to abhor.

Thus, like the night that comes
I lose all the light I see.
The sick bits of myself
slip away.
Till, I become someone else,
and as a child of the darkness
flee from the hope
of something better for me.

The struggle burns,
scorching scars
straight down
to my bones,
cause I know
I struggle alone.

All the hopeful promises
were like sugary treats gone rotten.
So, I lay sprawled out in pain
a loving body forgotten.
It was only once
she ever said she loved me,
told me all her deepest pains.
I told her she was lovely,
and so splendidly strange.
I’d come over and she’d recline
into the comfort of my arms
and every time I’d find
the beating of my racing heart.
She would tell me to rub her feet
or massage her neck and back,
and though I proved I loved her true
she never let me get farther than that.
I know she had every right to.
It just broke my heart to be so closed to her
and watch her walk off
with some other ****.
All the hopeful promises
were like sugary treat gone rotten.
So, I lay sprawled out in pain
a loving body forgotten.

Money, alcohol,
video games and football
sports entertainment,
movies, cars,
trips afar,
social networks,
****** relationships,
if these are the things
we are run by,
searching for that
purchase high,
working lives
fun put on hold,
as you hold onto
your nine to five,
if all we are
is the desire to acquire
and be distracted
till our clocks
stopped,
then what is the point?

Your lives can be
tragically
tinted
by your profession
and studies
but equally elevated
by the same.

Tears scar
my fevered
red face
as I rage
against
these
unites states.

Pillars of pain
pushed to the point
of bullets and
blood stained
t-shirts.

To young,
to run
far enough
away
that day,

Now politicians
send thoughts and
prayers
but that is
much too little
to even be late.

The media
garners
silent stares
of inaction
while anonymous
internet commenters
call grieving parents
crisis actors.

facebook posts
of dividing positions
put friends in
combative opposition.

I would like
to be fair and neutral,
but the roots
run red and deep
as this dark sea of grief
rises from its sedated state.

So,
I keep on asking
how many more children
have to die
before people do
something right.

Let us all stand united against the hate and intolerance that ignites violence and oppresion, whether it is in foreign lands or in our own nation. Let love reign supreme and hope that hate fades.

For the ecstasy
of love
I would have
cut my tongue,

I would have
silenced myself,
suffocated my outrage
for the chance to exist
in the elevated state
of her embrace.

I would have
slowly sliced
the essentials
of my identity
to feed said addiction.

So, in losing
even the illusion
of the chance of love
I am freed from
the strangle hold
that it would have.

Even though,
these are the truths
that I know,
I am certain
that I would
happily relapse.

The laws of man
are stretched and torn
worked like taffy.
They are the
sustenance and armor
of the wealthy
while the rest of us
are crushed
beneath their weight.

It is the heart of me
that she does not
even bother to see,
a red bridge that breaks
collapsing into
a darker crimson pool,
I set this mess
before her,
expose my scars,
as I worship hers,
whisper gentle affections,
promise fierce protection,
but she turns away
unswayed by the fruits
of my heart,
and I turn away
forgetting the self-love
I struggled to attain
and succumb to
that old familiar pain.

It is a cold pose
of white folds
on top of snow,
as thin arms wrap
softly around
the soft porcelain
skin we have found.

It is a possessor’s fury,
false identity
unearned aspect
of desire denied,
pursuing that
which does not want
to be pursued
by you.

So, she places you
in a friends position,
which should be enough,
even though you are
truly in love,
and you try
to be satisfied
while she tells you
about these other guys,
alcoholic abuser,
toxic users,
who gets her drunk
so they can **** her,
while you want to
hold and protect her.

One day she tells you
how great they are,
the next time you see her
they are *******,
but she just goes
right back,
and your pain grows,
transforms to rage
and turns inwards
cause you know
for her to choose
those dudes
who hurt her
over you
must mean
there is something
spectacularly wrong with you.

I come from
a myriad of
multiverses,
all times
and spaces
that converged,
all potentialities
that led up to me,
to the river that
will flow,
and the mountain
that will rise,
climaxing
in the epic apogee
of the death
of this frail body.
I am
a prisoner
of that certainty.

As humans we all start and end the same. It is only the journey we take that is different.

A simple storm
can washes us clean
but a bigger one
will blow through town
huff and puff
like the big bad wolf
and blow our houses down.

Everything is everything
while I walk in
human suffering,
buts that’s ok.

We’ll work the wreckage
if we can
build back up
from this here land,
and when
the floods
come back in
we’ll keep on
rebuilding.

Everything is everything
while I walk in
human suffering,
buts that’s ok.

The earth will quake
when the tremors come,
but we’ll still stay
while others run,
the damaged
cannot be undone,
but we can rebuild.

Everything is everything
while I walk in
human suffering,
buts that’s ok.

Tornadoes or hurricanes,
when they come
not much changes.
Stubborn pride
keeps us alive,
and we rebuild
resolute to stay
where we intend to die.

They seem like creatures
cut from some
merciless mythology,
these demons that haunt me,
working hard,
while I try to be
a decent human being.

So, I seek peace in nature,
loving the earth,
but it seems
the monsters are now coming
for that to.

Still, I look down with a smile
cause their winter war has not yet claimed
grasses’ lush green demeanor.

Can I learn to forget
someone I love,
someone who hurt me
not necessarily intentionally,
but enough that it would be
insanity to try and remain?

It’s a shame
that I let my
heart break,

when I
should have
just let it
rest in pieces,

let those
pieces bleed
and set myself free.

A hungry heart
hurts like hell,
devours itself
searching for
something
that isn’t there.

So, my innards ache,
my fists break
hard
against solid objects,
tears threaten me,
come dangerously
close,
but never flow.

I wish to speak with the elegance of a poet, the wisdom of a philosopher, and the intelligence of a scientist.

Lovely light hearted Layla,
my lyrical inspiration,
the source of my hopeful heart
and tear felt frustration.

I want to ride the night,
to stand by your side,
and hold your hand
as we cross this land.

I’ve heard the tears
other broken hearted lovers cry,
and seen nothing,
but the blackness of the otherside.

Oh, treasured friend of mine
is there something there
behind your eyes
that I might find,
perhaps a slight spark
lit in your heart
that parallels mine.

Layla, I long to hold you by the hearth,
hot and ***** loving affection
that burns against the dark
of the cold winter woods.

Layla, you are my wild one,
in whom I trust
but I doubt that my love
will ever touch
the summit of your desirous affections.

What is it like
to live on
the storm front
in the USA?

When clouds of discontent
come close and portend
agents of our
shared destruction;

When poverty’s blistering winds
blast the faces of
the poor women, men,
and starving children;

When the sounds of sorrow
swoosh in a swirling
tornado,
even though,
the wealthy know
that those
tax cuts don’t grow
our system
but push it to the brink;

Till, the storm drops
and this farce we
call democracy
is washed away
in favor of
an uncertain future.

What a dashing figure,
shirt unbuttoned halfway
as he delivered
his lines with grace.
However, this is not a gay man’s appraisal
of another man’s handsome face,
but a straight and secure observation,
a poet’s reflection
informed by the actor’s
performance.

We were stripped
of the multi-colored
diverging multiverse
as each dimension
collapsed
with each decision passed
till only one reality
emerged triumphant.

The stars crash and collapse.
Our time has finally past,
and I no longer wonder
if our love was really meant to last.

I don’t want to go.
I don’t want to leave.
I would like to stay
but you don’t need me.

Eternity’s a lie
we like to tell ourselves,
but the truth is sadder
cause we got played
by those madder
then the mad hatter.

I don’t want to go.
I don’t want to leave.
I would like to stay
but you don’t need me.

There is sorrow in
my spoken words,
tears in the songs
heard and unheard,
and this is the year
someone will fade.
Its okay if you want to stay.
I’ll take my leave
to end these days.

I don’t want to go.
I don’t want to leave.
I would like to stay
but you don’t need me.

Its so hard to write
a one to two page
short story,
and almost impossible
to write
anything longer then
five to ten
pages
because the flow
will only go
on for an hour or so,
and when I lose that river
it’s hard to get back
and deliver
anything I think is good,
and because finishing a story
means I don’t get to
follow it through
any new twists, turns,
or diverging tangents.

Let the world rot
Let it sink in decay
because I got no faith
in this human race.

What a folly
I live at a fools address,
try not to deceive myself
but give so much
to touch and support
the one I love
with no reciprocation.
I live in the wasteland
of alienation
leaving with the taste
of nothingness on my tongue

I render a tender defeat.
Submit to the dudes who
manage to control you
with hateful lies.

Do you know how to love shadows
sit in a sick stew of solitary confinement
for a crime you did not commit?

Do you know the feel of someone else’s violence
the stinging lashes, reddening
rage distorting
fury unleashed
by someone who seems
to hate you
as much as they
hate themselves?

Do you know the flinches,
the constant guarding,
the tears cried
only when no one else
is in sight
cause why
give those ******* the satisfaction?

Do you know the self-deprecation
self-debasing
pretending that your pain
is so freaking hilarious?

Do you know the loneliness
of the vacuum
cause you distrust
any stranger
who might touch
you?

Do you know the shame
and pain
when people push
and claim
that you should let
the perpetrator
back in to your life again?
Do you know
how it feels
to press down
on the skin that swells
while tears and snot
stifle your breathing
after a beating,
how the physical pain  
of the abuse
seems to weaken
but the other stuff
leaves you wishing
you were never born?

I drive.
Each night passes by
cold shadows
tell no lies,
by flicker strangely
like specters
dying before me.

The road is mine
and I am its,
possessed by quiet reflections.
Daylight finds
hills that ride
and roll
up and down
all around me.

Stimulants,
set to see me
safely home,
little nicotine sticks,
not actual cigarette
of vapes
but gas station
electronic
devices,
stacked with
lots of caffeine.

Music and podcasts,
audio books
play by to fast,
they never seem to last,
because the drive never ends.

Hotels,
hot showers,
more caffeine
then overtime hours.

Until,
they settle me down
to one worksite
and that rogue
road work life
fades fast behind me.

Part of me misses
the unpredictable madness.
Part of me is grateful
for the stability.
Its healthy
cause I get better sleep.
Now I drive the same route
every **** day,
but I miss the strangeness
of the different roads
I used to take.

There’s blood in the sky
fits the tears I cry.
I walk the streets
each and every night.

There’s strangers here
but they don’t’ have to be.
I could fully engage
our shared humanity.

A smile to go,
in a big mac bag,
I’m working on
my mcdonald heart attack.
Its just that
the big breakfast
is the one thing
I look forward to.

Its an empty life
It’s a lonely place
but I never let them see
the ****** tears on my face.

Its three to eleven
or eleven to seven.
It’s a gym membership
that gets me fit.

It’s a caffeine addiction
with a video game problem,
But all I work for
it isn’t love
its just enough money
to get me by.

You
dear humanity
have robbed me
of my sanity,
stealing my solace
and left a disease
of emptiness,
but I will
have my peace
when I leave,
when I am deceased.

He is not here
and there is
a clear fear
that my dear
brother
will die
in some other country.

Perhaps, a plane will crash
split and bend
while it spins
spiraling
like a wild football,
and fire will rain,
and there will be pain,
and I will not see him again.

Perhaps, some religious sect
will find and collect
my brother and his new bride
to collect a ransom check
or **** him for his religious views.

Other deaths come in to my head.
Unbidden nightmares
that wake me.
Then I daydream
that he returns to me.
A small red breasted robin
singing joyfully,
a reincarnated being.

Sadly, I do not believe such things.
So, I still dread the day
someone comes and says
your brother is dead.

To see you smile again
to play a game of
Chinese checkers
and then dominoes
watch wheel of fortune
to see who knows
the answer faster
then those *******
on the show.

To see your
scraggly face
half-grown beard
silent strong type
who smoked a pipe
who worked the campground
near the end of his life
just to make a little more money
and have something extra
to do at night

To go back to when
we three were traveling
together to New Salem
me the small skinny
child with tubes in his ears
and you two old farts
who took me there

Now I only see you two
in dreams.