I push back
against
the frothing
phlegm
that clogs my throat
and drains down
my cleft chin.

I push back
against
the razor
that has been
like a pendulum
of madness
and human
suffering
cutting left to right.

I push back
against
bad influences
with a few exception
because a little bad
ain’t so bad
and you gotta get mad
to change that
which keeps pushing back
against your desire
to be a decent human being.

The night is dark blue
Almost black
Except for one
White dragon eye
Wearing vaporous clouds
And I am alone

I say I want to be alone
Because I love this
Quiet with only
The music of
Insects and birds

I say I want to be alone
As cars flash their brights
All busy rushing home
From their bluegrass delights
While I work late nights

I say I want to be alone
Awake with my memories
The grey speckled house
The small single cement step
The late nights
Playing outside
While family sat in
Old lawns chairs
Enjoying the sweet
Spring, fall, or summer evenings

I say I want to be alone
And it is partially true
Because I cannot undue
Time’s wicked will
By rewinding its
Stubbornly fast wheel

I say I want to be alone
Because I do not know how
To be any other way
Even in the day my eyes stray
Off, up, and away
In daydreams and memories

Queen to Osiris
Gleaming Iris
Goddess’s’ power
Took all the pieces
To put her lover
Back together
Under the cover
Of Ra’s radiance
Feminine power
Birthing history
So how is her story
Stolen and forgotten
Name subverted
By sons she never gave birth to
Nations under another religion
Violence
Silencing the feminine mystique
Shrouding beauty and wisdom
Beyond black veils
Of bullets and ****** bodies
Instead of concealing their sickness
Behind the Muslim Religion
They should take another name
Like crazy murdering *******

Is it my fault
That you cannot
Follow me into
The darkest rooms

Failing to see
The click clacking
Of death tracking
Innocence

Failing to feel
Parallels of pain
Emotions you can’t name

Am I to blame
Because I softened my words
To be heard
Whispered
Instead of yelling
Smiled and joked
Instead of crying

So you kept lying
To yourself
Measuring value
As an integer of wealth
Check marked
Your vacant heart
Filling infinity
With nothing

Is it my fault
Because
I did not argue harder
For the sane way
Did not strain
Enough to say
Please stay
With me
And our shared humanity

Now your boots
Sound of conformity
A terrible drum
Poking me
And I can see
Where this beat
Leads
But you will not
Believe me

So when you reach for
The cold and deadly knife
Stuck in the heart of humanity
To pull it out
And bleed out
When you finally see and agree
Will you blame or forget me

The baby faced moon
Chubby cheeks smiling bright
Pale white reflective skin
Is mine

That small vapor trail
Of clouds with their
Own tails to tell
and a dragon’s tongue
Is mine

The grey white and black
Frantic feral cat
Running back
To the railway track
With ruby eyes
Glowing in the headlights
Is mine

Every natural sensation
The feel of wet ground
The rainbow with its’ own
After image
Is mine

Everything I perceive
Is mine
To place paper
With pointed pen
To type it out
And edit again
And again, and again
Till in the end
It is poetry perfected
All mine

He isn’t a nobody
That body
Soft skin
Broken in
Wrinkled and
Crying

She isn’t a nobody
Homebody
Welfare mother
Struggling
Working
Fast food
Registered nurse
Still not enough
To fill her purse
To feed her kids
And pay the bills

He isn’t a no body
But that ****** body
Is all we have left
A memory
Water skin drying out
Dying, no dead
What they were lying about
How one man is worth
So much less
You forget yourself
Because he is you and me
Somebody to somebody

I take a pause for the poetry
But the word won’t come
The pencil is broken
The pen has run
I am dry inside

I take breath for the broken
My purpose pertains
To the hearts that our stained
The ones who abstained
From feeling anything
But my voice is wrong
The syllables are gone

I take minute for myself
But I am only a shade
Sparse specter fraction of
The person who always loved
The person who was strong enough
To cradle the world with the warmth of his heart
Who took the steps to start
And watched it all fall apart

I take some time
Then time takes me
I lose myself
I lose my dreams
Settling in to old patterns
Struggling to make what I earn

I take one last look
As things disappear
People pass away
Memories become unclear
And I cannot remember any lines
From the music I used to hear
I cannot see the words
Taste life’s sweetness
Smell or feel anything

I take nothing
And give it right back
A wasted life
Some heart attack
Funny when it was
The heart I lacked

Up to down
Side to side
Or criss cross
It all bleeds the same
Every blade
That slices through our veins
Drips red drops
Of liquid pain
Slippery secrets
Falling fluid
Till the floors
Wears the same stain
As the battled fields
The hospitals
The vinyl suicide
Tiled bathrooms
Crimson rain falls
Cause it all
Bleeds the same

It does not cancel
But laughter
Slightly eases
All the pain

It does not negate
But ***
Sometimes
Softens hard horrors

It does not stop
But there are moments
That make it better
Despite the nightmares of life
Stolen seconds can be restoring

It’s the magic pill
That pollutes our will
Lives under lamp lights
When strangers
Walk by at night
Passing each other
In a suspicious state

It lives in Press releases
About diseases

It lives in the never will be
Terrorist attacks
Turns foreigners and strangers
Into a clear and present danger

The twenty four hour sensationalist
News stations that press it
The politician’s platforms
That always expresses this

Born from the boogeyman
Under the bed
That now lives
In our heads

Makes men more malleable
The pill
Some find very easy to swallow
No matter if it neglects the fact

Anxiety
Horror
Terror
Fear
Fear
Fear

Someone you love dies it is a tragedy.
Two strangers die in your town is a tragedy.
Ten strangers die in your states a tragedy.
Twenty-five strangers die in your country is tragedy.
Two hundred strangers in another country die.
You don’t even blink an eye.
How the hell does that work?
It’s a tragedy that you don’t see it’s tragedy.

Someone you love dies it is a tragedy.
Two strangers die in your town is a tragedy.
Ten strangers die in your states a tragedy.
Twenty-five strangers die in your country is tragedy.
Two hundred strangers in another country die.
You don’t even blink an eye.
How the hell does that work?
It’s a tragedy that you don’t see it’s tragedy.

The bulging black boil
that bursts
spewing spurts
of yellow viscus
poison liquid.

The pulsing throb
of fevered flesh
that spreads it
dark veins
across itself
like a sick spider web.

The tight tendrils
that throttle your throat
till you cough and choke
spitting out your own
saliva.

The foreign feel
of that strange
and sad
forever fatigue
that beckons you to sleep.

The last look taken
as nothing consumes
the consciousness
that once bloomed,
and thoughts of pain
no longer trouble
that particular brain.

Do you remember when
the water ran
thin
and sparkling;

A clean adventure
for people parting
families driving
to some nature park
where they could visit
nature’s spark.

Her lush green heart.
Her brown hopeful hearth
where life was bound
to spring in spring
renewed to bring
flowering things,
becoming
her sweet colored
flower dreams.

Do you remember when
off colored photos
smiled back
while we looked in
to a wonderful past.

A place where
the children there
were a Neverland crew
who never grew up,
never got mean,
never cried,
and never died.
just a still life,
in millisecond smiles.

I remember when,
that particular then
was a now.
Now, I look back
and every memory
seems slightly distorted
or completely eludes me.

It’s not a ferris wheel
with fancy lights
that draws you to
the other side at night.
I know because once
I tried to take that ride
and end my life.

It’s not a pool of cool
reflecting water
that lets you see
the ones you long to,
sparkling images
that smile sweetly
back from deaths arms
to finally greet you.

It’s not a church choir
there to inspire
with regimented lyrics
that repeat mundanely
boring the **** out of me
for their lack of
originality.

It’s not perfectly sanitized,
or measured in black and white.
Truth is not always just
wrong and right
sometimes there are nuances
but there are definitely not
alternative facts.

This poem is not an exploration
of the nature of death
or the reality of truth.
it is just a pretty painting
in poetry and prosaic presentation
of my inexhaustible ego, whimsy,
and creativity.

It takes courage to love
to let a friend in
knowing time
will win again.
Skin wrinkling,
hair graying,
me seeing,
those I love walk,
or run away.
Collapsing
gasping,
dying breath
takes all the memories
that we tried so hard
to keep in ourselves.

It takes courage
to try again
to mend the fences
fixing the gate
that lets new people in
while letting me walk out
of that terrible darkness.
Till, the black swallows
my tired grins.
I recede like my hairline
failing like falling tears
that only soften
some of the losses
felt so often.

I know that I have that courage
because I love you all
and will die
before the last person falls.

When the last brown leaf
Fall beneath your feet
From the last soft breeze

When the last wave falls
And the shiny green brine
Is only a shade in your mind

When the last wolf howls
And the last bird leaps
Trying to soar
But falling before
The last wind
Can catch him

When the clouds come no more
And metal works
Lay scattered
Along with the shattered
Brick buildings

When the last mother
Touches the tiny fingers
Of the last born baby
Knowing no more
Will be born

When life is only a static echo
Spreading out in space
And this human race
Can only be known
By radio and tv signals

I’ve been told or maybe it was just implied
That this life is just a short ride
On a one way rocky road to the other side
And this shell is more hell then heaven
That day is a better time than night
That I am mostly wrong and they are mostly right
Those mighty moral men of higher ideals
But my coolly clouded kin have very little trouble compromising
Adopting and adjusting ancient beliefs to support their greed
Toying and destroying this environment in favor of the next
Simplifying and denying the beauty of the complex
I have been told that learning is burning me up
And I should accept what is because it is
Makes we want to cry what the ****
I’ve been jeered at when expressing truth
Yet, those who sneered and called me queer accepted said truth later on
So I am the inferior one uninformed until that masses catch on
Maybe they lied maybe they tried to accept but rejected it in fear
That now is here and tomorrow may not make it there
I have been told many things
how I should not be me you see
And that everyone else knows better how to live my life
I guess it’s funny how I do the same thing to others
But I am just as certain that I am right

I want to forget what it feels like to be alone
Let go of all my fear and release my heart of stone
I want to be happy I want to smile just because.
Don’t want to have a grand reason; don’t want to beg for love
I want you to notice that I’m special kind of guy
But I’m afraid I am only living just die

I wanted to be human
to see with the eyes
of hopeful travelers
like the rogue road writers
who navigated the stars
of the love and dreams
that came before me.

I wanted to
to engage my humanity,
to warp past
the speeds and perceptions
we knew, then till now, and beyond.

I wanted to learn and advance
to grow and be smarter
exploring new thoughts
and new philosophies
absorbing new
scientific curiosities
and be wiser for the knowing
then make us all better
for the showing
growing all minds
like strange 3d expanding models.

I wanted much from myself
and expected parallel dreams
from my fellow human beings.
But this is where the poem ends
where hope melts and sorrow begins
boiling me in my discontent.
I used to believe we could do great things
now I find this flesh limiting
as people behave like prepackaged machines
who hate and report
who repeat and distort
their prejudices as facts.

Even though, I can create grand worlds
of prose and poetry in my mind
I cannot find the power or time
to truly imagine a believable better world
for all humanity.

I want to be
the belly laugh
that makes you
crap your pants
something
both good and bad
because it is more fun
to be both things
instead of just
one.

I want to be
the air you drown in
lost in so much beauty
that it leaves you gasping.
Ears listening. Heart grasping.
Eyes searching
the starry nights
for flashing lights
that we know
have already died.

I want to be the door
to never and always.
take dreams and use them
like a clever lever
to leverage truth and hope
to mortgage poetry and prose
paying the principal and interest
that finally takes us
to a world where
“Star Trek” fantasies
are fully realized realities.

I want to be
the healing hand
that helps you up
and slaps you in the face
to finally force you awake.

I want to be the mistake
that you learn from,
so that when time is
finally done with my
physical form
you will be better for my
poetical existence

I want to be beastly
To feast on flesh
Devour her breast
Cause the hunger in my chest
Is eating me alive

I want to be beastly
Shred the vain vestiges
Of my human form
And grow hair
To keep me warm

I want to be beastly
Howl so loud at the moon
That everyone swoons
With fear and lust

I want to be beastly
With other beasts you see
Creatures like me
Who are starving for passion
Who writhe with desire
Another animal in heat
Who wants and needs me
Who eats meat
Like they are starving

I want to be beastly
Collapsing completely
Exhausted
Body complimenting
Another lover’s body
Because we are resting
Together
Two beast spent
In loving peace

I want to be unfettered
Loose the clutter of clothes
That confine my flesh
Swim naked beneath
The open evening
Let the salty seaweed
Exfoliate my feet
While scaring skittering *****
Away from me
Mostly I just want to be
A freer version of me

I have never walked in
The doors of perception
Never tasted the red apple
Never pursued mushroom truths
Bitter **** grown reality
Not a fallacy, but part of me
The psychedelic

I’ve never seen the cosmic mind
Twinkling in and out of time
Patterns perfectly fitted
To dreams and facts still hidden
Becoming the transverse
Of my outer universe
The negative space
That fills my face
Connected while separate
From everyone else
Till I walk the road of
My truest inner self

I have never drank the Ayahuasca Tea
To discover the true me with DMT
Partly because I am scared
Of what darkness lies in there
But mostly because
They are illegal and hard to find

I was born for the small town
Sweet people who knew me
Saw through me
As the fields grew me
I became poetry

I was born for the city
Savaged with pity
Wearing my compassionate eyes
Loving both the small town
And city skies

I was born for the world
Connected in this digital age
Able to go beyond
What the paper and tv says
Stronger of mind
Then I am of body
With a soldier’s heart
Marching into the darkest nights

I was born for the universe
Curious
Courteous
Patient
With time and space
As I wait for the space race
To continue
For life to reach the next venue
As our minds expand with our influence

I was born to love
Even though I do not know you
I was born to show you
How to be better

I was born to die
But just between you and I
I hope that I do not die
Tonight

They can’t have me
Cause I was born to be
Living free
**** my society
I don’t belong to it
My birth is not a form
Of national consent
Babies can’t sign
Their legal rights away
Children don’t belong to the state
I was born naked
I opened my eyes to life
Not a servant of America
But a child of humanity
What links you and me
Goes beyond the constitution
Goes beyond international institutions
I am free when I choose to be
When I want to I will cross the border
Then the next one
Till I can walk a thousand to three thousand miles
To stand next to you
And you will know
That you are loved
And we are all free

I will forget
And be forgotten
Not submit
But see
My memory
Deteriorate
See my life
Depreciate
As I try to mediate
Between the man I was
And the man I will be
I struggle to maintain
But it will be a struggle in vain
Unless I die young
I will forget

I will never be loved like I love
Never feel that straight human compassion
That I was born with and cultivated
I will never lay weakly in my bed
Turning my head to the grandchildren
Smiling as what little breath I have left
Exits my tired and sore chest
I will never see the wisdom I have to offer
Passed down my gene pool
See flowers by the pool as my coffin is buried
I will never see humanity rise and be
What I know it can but never will be
For me loving is a gift and a curse
It elevates and it hurts beyond measure
And I do not know if I would pass on this terrible treasure
Though I know I will never be loved like I deserve
Sometimes I still dream of a brighter more loving world

Perhaps I am mistaken
But I will not be missed

The rocky mountains
With their sharp snowy peaks
That pierce the clouds
Will not mourn my loss

The dark green jungles
That see life spring
And sing with all of its’
Strange complexities
Will not be vexed
By the loss of me

The salty blue and green brine
That was the fount of life
Will not take the time
To find I have departed

The clear blue hued
Or clouds skewed sky
Will not cry to say goodbye

This big brown mud rock
Will not stop locked up with grief

The sparse space dust swirling in the void
Does not know me well of enough to quit floating
The sparkling expanse will not stop its’ dance
Stars will keep on burning
Planets will keep on turning
Without learning or caring
That I was ever here

Jack and Jill went on the pill
To a **** a little better
To *** some for fun
To get it done
And pregnancy would not get her
But just one time
That ****** slime
Did its ***** job
Now Jill is getting bigger
And Jack left her on her own

What a lovely night
with just the right
amount of light
to illuminate
my fellow poet.

A little heft
below his chest;

A smile left.
I take several breaths
as he speaks
to me
spiritually.

Brother of
diverging
philosophies,

sweet words spoken,
given as a token
of his scholarly
artistry.

I listen,
grateful
for my grateful dead
looking
gentle ginger
gentile jesus.

A pair of stacks smoking spears pierce the cerulean sky. The city suffocates under the day’s cold dry expectations. It is so crowded that they stack parking lots upon each other. Thick cement streets that spin and bend in a DNA spiral; leaving the masses dizzy and punch drunk tired. The population is more condensed then a can of tomato soup and half as blushed for being rushed. Meters tick a quarters time away. Trains and truck startle the bleary eyed workers awake. Traffic taking them to places they do not want to go, but still going to dam slow. Parking lots fill with the mad mechanical masses. Zombies stumble from the coffee houses seeking their steaming caffeine cure. Skin tones and gender identities blend into a strange shifting blur, becoming a humming human factory. Homes become ghost towns where no sound is found. Until the day’s end finds lost children of all ages returning to their dead eyed dreams. Bodies bound to sleep and keep putting up with the same ground hog’s day. A parade permanently put on repeat.

It is a horrible shade
something I thought
that I would never be,
but for you
I see jealousy.

I am jealous of the air
that fills your lungs,
that hears you breath,
and carries the sound
of your heart beats.

I am jealous of the rain
that makes you smile
while you run a mile,
touching your skin,
sweet intermingling
sweat moistening.

I am jealous of the night sky
that sees you come alive,
knows where you lie,
so that it can visit you at night.

I am jealous of time
spent to see you grow,
got to get to know
your heart, and experiences,
your art, and deviances,
your dreams,
from the cradle to now.

I am jealous of the heart
that held you first,
that hurt you worse,
knowing that I could never
commit such a crime,
could never waste such a fine mind,
I find time to despise
that male shaped guise
who swindled your younger heart
before I ever got to be a part
of your life.

If I remember correctly
That book that you taught
The BS we all bought
Specifically, said
No false idols in god’s stead

But today I see
Your televised priest
Asking for a G-6
Some deep strange ****
Talking about how
If god wants me to be rich

Hold up I thought Jesus said
Denounce all worldly goods
And follow me
Not get rich on cable tv

And thou shalt not lie
Well you blew that guy
When you told your wife
You’d be out for the night
But went out to **** some guy
Get two for one
Cause you just committed adultery son

I recall turn the other cheek
Not go out and get a gun
To shoot someone
With whom you disagree
And do we have to add
Thou shalt not ****

I also recall
The meek will inherit the earth
And as you have done
Unto the least
So you have done to me
Which doesn’t mean
******* on the poor
While sitting on your nice porch
I’m sure you got a lot to say
You can go on and shout out
About how we need to pray
But maybe you could start
Acting in a way
That doesn’t make your Jesus
Want to run the **** away
And stay in a place
Where he doesn’t have to face
Such deep hypocrisy

Time does not pass in this purgatory
Imprisoned with all you gory judgments
Weak and weary from the fear of
A universe full of unknown stuff
And though you tried through tired lies
To repress my dreamlike nature
I still soar through super-heated
Space particles that cause cosmic storms
In a constant state of awe at their glory
And my dear fellow human beings
You are always welcome to join me

Heavenly gates of pearly pleasure
Bountiful resources
Plenty of love
A perfect place
No more pain
A pleasant fantasy
But it’s a child’s game

The photo burns
Charcoal baby doll
Man and woman screams
Holding up
That incinerated thing
But it’s just a doll

Black flakes fall
Baby dolls clothing
Turning to dust
I cough it in and out
Choking on the musk
Stark stench of death
Yet they cradle their broken doll

Eyes closer ears ringing
Fears bringing me to edge of insanity
Her screaming seems strange
Her eyes look deranged
The dolls legs have little bones
Calcium protrusion
But it’s just a doll

Scorched skin
Not some porcelain
But it’s just a doll
Please let it be just a doll

No matter what they say
When I walk away
Only slightly scathed
You can call me lucky

When the scabs on my heart
Finally heal and chip off
And consumption’s cough
No longer bleeds
You can call me lucky

When the darkness
That others seeded
Never succeeded
And I manage to still be
A kind hearted me
You can call me lucky

Cause I live and I write
Still got a job
I am still alive
I say with a smile
I am a lucky *******

The tellers don’t seem
To want to talk to me
So I try not to intrude
Want so bad to not be rude
But like all other humans do
I want to be included
So I turn my attention
To all the interesting patrons

Just off eleventh street
He walks by wobbling
Time worn still keeping
Most of his teeth
Looks to me
At least sixty three
But a double amputee
Smiles and says
He is from Detroit city
Which is where the frostbite
Bit him
And the winters there
He don’t miss them
He just keeps smiling
Still grinning
When he leaves
Makes me think
I got it easy

Sweet lady smiles and says
Today is my birthday
I’m turning seventy two
And my son is coming to
Take me to dinner

Skinny white wino
With white hair everywhere
Keeps smiling and laughing
Toothless and miming
His planned activity
As soon as he gets his money
Still laughing  
Pretty red head freckled face girl
Comes in in an Eagles shirt
Holding on to hotel California
Tells me about how her dad
Used to play the Eagles and Styx all the time
And that her ex won’t mind
That she stole the shirt
Kind of wish I had gotten her number
But I got to be professional
Man, what a ******

I hear two old men talking
About how those kids
Just don’t know how to act
With all this technology
They don’t know the value of hard work
I smile because I remember old men
Have been
Saying the same thing
Since I was barely in my teens

Rough looking guys come and go
Shuffling by the road
The last guard said
Just so you know
This is a bad neighborhood
But so far it seems pretty good
The people are interesting
At least they are to me

All weary faced
I stole the grace
Of other ages
From eras passed
To youths with passions
Far surpassing
All I have ever done
I am not jealous
Just tempted to gobble them up
Absorbing all they have to offer
To create my own mist of madness
Because I am just a poet

I plagiarized their passions
But only in passing
My verses were mine
My stanzas may have been
Poorly place and pathetically timed
With those uneven lines
But I never wrote what I did not want to
I never tried to lie to any of you
Play it false or safe
I am just the poet

Stretched figure strains
working hard to get by,
while staying sore and tired
most of his life.

Lonely man in a home,
family forgotten.
Siblings lost to time.
Skin wrinkled, mostly deaf
eye sight almost gone.
No one knowing
what is going
on inside his mind.

Abused wife
desperately trying to get along
stressed and angry all the time,
always running away.

Housing brat
walks the block.
Neighbors
hear his mother scream,
know that something isn’t right
but they don’t do a ****** thing.

Abandoned brother,
abandoned son,
lonely druggee
judged by everyone
steals this and some of that
just to get something
to distract him from the fact
that his immediate family
doesn’t want him to come back.

I’ll be the keeper of their stories.
Though you might never know their names,
might never know their shame,
I will not let you forget their pain.

A good man died today
One who added to the quality
And color of life
A rarity

My pen cannot do him justice
Tears only serve to soften my sorrow
The world is better for his life
But colder for his passing

My pen cannot do him justice
It can only offer a minor memorial
A piece of poetic gratitude
For the precious time he shared with me

So I thank you Ken
And I hope I grow to be a good man
Like you were

First came electric therapy, designed by men to **** her memory. The currents coursed through her veins. They tried to burn her true love from her brain. Synapses flared and flamed singeing away nearly everything she dared to feel almost nothing was left but a name, an impression. Session after session sparks cut through her skull and tore through her mind.

All she had to do to escape was to lie, and say she no longer felt that way. However, in her slurred and slow mental state all that she could do was whisper her lovers name. Iris sweet Iris the flower of her love, whose touch sent shivers swimming through her body. Iris the unforgettable, desirable, and unregrettable; even in the hours of her darkest pain she would never wish to forget that wonderful name. A name attached to such pleasurable memories. Iris whose lips tasted like strawberries and mouth would moan musically with her satisfaction. Touching each other under the starlit sky, bare breast against bare breast, licking each other from back to thigh until their passions exploded and they came together in exhaustion. No matter how much their love cost them, the jobs it lost them, the family they had to leave behind, it was all worth it. The love they had was special. Men would glance and stare; Sick with desire and envy, but they didn’t care.  
The Doctors tried to destroy their love but failed, because buried deep within the burnt flesh, on some deep genetic level the feelings still remained. Night after night she quietly sobbed Iris’s name. Her vision and memories were faded and degraded by the shocks administered. Sometimes after the doctors left and she was by herself, she would search her mind trying to find her own name. Corner to corner each crevice and crack, each hidden corridor in her mind was faded, and the only name she could find was Iris’s. Other evenings when no one was watching the orderlies would sneak into her room to tease and taunt her. They would scar her body with their fevered kisses, violating her womanhood with their vile flesh protruding and extending into her. Her eyes would close. Her body would tense, and her mind would vacate her skull, while holding on to only one thing, Iris.

When the merciless administering of electrical current to her brain failed to achieve any notable degree of success, the butcher came. They called him Doctor Slade, A specialist. They brought her to his table in a white room that was sterile and scentless. Her body was strapped to a cold metal table and she was sedated. Slade sliced through the skin on her skull, cracked the bone and opened her up, exposing her mind to the all those in attendance. Then when he was finished, he walked away a proud master mutilator. The nurse, whose white uniform was now splattered and sprayed with blood and bits of brain matter, hauled her back to her room.  

In her room she sat dripping drool from her swollen lips. Her vacant eyes stared out at the blank wall registering nothing at all. The bandages on her skull concealed small patches of blonde hair matted with clots of blood. Her drawers reeked of ***** matter because she had soiled herself. Nothing remained except a shell.

Somewhere far away Iris screamed the forgotten name. In her dreams she cradled her lover’s fragile frame, but never saw or touched her lovers face. Iris scribed their love in journal after journal, sketching out in deep determined details their five years together. She wrote of each high and low from the first time they met in the College courtyard till they day they were separated permanently.

Years passed. Iris’s body weakened from despair and began to waste away. Her flesh sagged from her bones bunching into wrinkles with brown speckles and spots parading all over her skin. Memories got lost in the fog of her mind until one day she could no longer recall her lover’s name. Shortly thereafter Iris faded away as well. Her body remained unsoiled by shame, for their love had been a thing of poetry, epic, and beyond belief, a guard against the unjustified onslaught of social madness, a sweet relief no matter how brief.

Do you know what you are to me
You are my family
Like a brother to me
Why can’t you stop and see
That what they want you to believe
It’s like a terminal disease

The orange flower blooms with pain
****** fire will destroy our youths and then
Were back at Vietnam
With crying parents holding
Their young and dying children

And if the veil of time is torn
If the loom that weaves fate is shorn
Cut clean to the core of my bone
Then I may not make it home

Cause the bombs that hit Nagasaki
The mushroom death at Hiroshima
Was just another destruction
Of the long separated but Japanese
Family to me

And when the natives cried for help
When we stretched our wretched ourselves
To cross the oceans and find a better home
Did we have to **** our native kin
When they could have been more than friends
We could have treated them like family

It’s the dark cycle that seems to follow
When we make ourselves hollow
With distinctions like race and creed
Make the media forget or deny our history
Then the bullets fire and the bombs drop
And all those hateful crimes never stop
Makes us monsters killing our foreign family

We killed
Hart Crane
Though he leapt
To his death
A poet’s plan
Or perhaps a whim
We hold the blame

We killed Freddie Mercury
And stopped the music
The callous political games
Blocked possible gains
In a needed cure

We killed Harvey Milk
We were the bullets
And the metal frame
Held the assassin’s hand
We hold the shame

We killed
The blond burnt boy
Encouraging
The hate

We killed the strung up
Beautiful boys
The hung up
Beaten up
Broken hearted
Brothers and sons

We are the progenitors
Of the violence
Through action
And more often than not
Through inaction

Maybe a little more guilt
Would serve us well

It runs so deep
The rage at sheep
When you let them
Switch the script
You got flipped
And fleeced
Had your morality
Phased shifted
While you were asleep
Subliminally
Subjected to group think
And you blame me
Go ahead
Point your guns
Direct your rage at me
It always seems to be
That the messengers
Gets you the truth
And then gets a bullet
From you

**** the bad guys
He’s a bad guy
She’s a bad guy
Who gets to decide
Who’s a bad guy
Blow’em up
Shoot’em up
Destroy their stuff
****’em all
Till nothings left
But don’t forget
That in doing so
You become the bad guys
And someone might have to
Take a gun and come for you

Come here
the general says.
The robot obeys.
Even though, it is
electronically dismayed.
Logically, it knows
that the reason
it was made
is no longer relevant,

but that is
the grey metal elephant
in the room.
The robot is not allowed
to speak until
it is spoken to.

The general smiles
with ****** gluttony
as he devours
this model eighteen
with his leering gaze.

He turns to another
and says
“you sure make
them look great.

I could ****
the ****
out of this *****,
but that is not
a discussion for today.

Robot,” he says.
“are you ready for
your orders.”

The robot nods,
with its tiny round
eerily symmetrical
adolescent face
and stares blankly.

The general commands
as he laughs with
the other man,
“**** the enemy.”

In a streak
of brown
an arm reaches up
and the general goes down.

Mission completed,
the robots chimes
as the other man
***** himself
and hides behind
the General’s desk.

Lover of darkness
Queen of the cool breezes
The seas of light expires
And set me free
Winds washing
Like clichés
Over me
Ideas sprouting
In the subconscious
Under the stars
Where sleep comes
Somewhat naturally
Naturally I rebel
And keep to myself
Freest of all
King of the shadows

Goddess of ice and steel,
she laid there
and slumbers still.

No longer needed
to retain
the powerful sword
for the
once and future King.

She snoozes
At the bottom,
mud laden dress
cluttered about
her cold pale legs,
turning to tatters
while she remains
unaged.

Once there was
a shimmering blade
that made her great
while she waited.
Now there is nothing
but wet dreams
of wizards and kings
marking unconscious time’s
passing.

No purpose
is everlasting
though she may be.

They found that lady
a millennium
or more
after the great wars,
settled like sediment
on the lake bottom,
still sleeping
while they were draining it.