I always think I'm prepared
but,
every time I bump into you,
my heart turns to a thunder clap in my chest and,
the world spins
a little.
Just before I left you told me,
you liked my hat.
I wanted to tell you,
I liked your everything
but,
you would know,
I never did corny very well.
So I just said thank you,
lit a cigarette with shaking hands
and walked.

I tear flesh from myself and toss it into the flames;
Not to watch it burn but in hopes I can make the hole in my heart a tangible part of my being..
I won't need a warning label if people can peek in and see for themselves there's nothing left of a real man.
Like Pinocchio I strive to feel a thump in my chest but a wooden core doesn't pump.
I'm dancing attached to strings like a Halloween skeleton in a bad movie.
All grin and nothing to back it up.
It's useless to think someone might share their heart with mine and bring me to life.
I'll fill the hole in my chest with clear apoxy and dance empty with that skeletal grin stretched comically over a hard face holding nothing.
Eventually I'll feed the fire with my bones and turn to dust,
as old toys do.
There's nothing like a paper man for tinder.

Time flies when you're having fun?
*******, time flies when you're down and done.
Time flies when you're dying inside.
When you're picking up the pieces and crying in need,
time leaves.
There's no time, to settle or ease.
There's no time, because time never sleeps.
There's no time, so don't beg and don't plead.
Time will leave you for dead.
Time left, and it doesn't care about the time that you spent.
You're going through the motions and you're barely alive but,
time flies when you're dying inside.

You died two years ago,
when she left.
Yea you're still walking but you're just a corpse with a heartbeat and you know it.
You're trapped.
She never bothered to release the restraints she placed on you so you stay shackled by misery in a room guarded by lonliness.
You sit as your heart tears at itself while your brain stands watching in callous disinterest.
Sure,
you breathe,
but each inhale leaves only the feeling of drowning without the sweet escape of death.
You beg the reaper to take you, he says he wants to see how this all plays out.
He's never seen a man eat his own heart.
Everyone else insists you must keep going but,
they don't know what you know.
They don't know you died
two years ago,
when she left.

It's easy to say,
You're a "good" father.
Much harder yet,
To prove it.
Mine,
Mine never failed.
**** a mailman,
Rain, sleet or snow?
Drive one hundred and fifty miles,
With the flu,
And talk to me of loyalty,
Of dedication.

Who would have thought,
How merciless a beast we could create.
Sure,
The weapons are scary,
But **** if that ring doesn't terrify.
Who's sighing?
Who's crying?
Who's dead?
At least you can be certain,
Of what's at the bottom of a barrel.
Unfortunately,
You never know,
Who or what,
Is at the end of the telephone.

I wear on my wrist,
A simple copper band.
Among my many bracelets,
Few understand.
So very few left to understand,
This band tells me stories.
It whispers tales of blood and of death.
Tales of luck and life and,
Brotherhood.
And of bravery.
This simple copper band,
Tells me of tales known,
And unknown.
And the few who know
Know.
Of the tales told,
By my
Simple
Copper
Band.

They never did,
Get it right.
The wiring inside my head.
Some switches flip far to quickly,
Some it seems,
Not at all.
I've come to accept it though.
I can't exactly get in there,
And I've never been much,
Of an electrician.
But hey!
That wiring is me.

Beware! My dear shepherds,
I think you've failed to see.
There are wolves among your flock!
And one of them is me.
Are you not aware?
That in a pack we hunt?
Or that sometimes there are better things,
To have as sheep for lunch?
We are patient and unkind,
We creep slowly through the dark,
You're so secure within your power,
I think it's made you blind.
We'll start with your dogs,
And then move on to you,
And then you'll know that these were facts,
You'd wished you would've knew.

What use is sleep when your spirit
And perhaps your heart,
Have surrendered to a power that you could not resist if you wanted.
The fire is lit anew and the engines,
Stoked as high as they ever have been,
Very rarely.
Forget sleep!
You can take sleep and stuff it!
We're running this train at full steam now boys!
We're plowing through,
Day and night,
Brick and mortar!
We're not stopping!
So you take your sleep,
And forget it.

She was a Black Rose.
A beautiful rarity,
and the essence of despair,
all at once.

It's funny how
lack of sleep will hit you.
It's six in the morning,
and I,
I'll tear up at almost anything now.
All sense of sanity
hindered by delirium
but I think of you.
Maybe I'm insane,
maybe I'm delusional,
but at six in the morning,
I still love you.

I've been awake
since five A.M.
I went to bed
at three.
And I can't decide,
if I want her,
or a bottle of whiskey.

I sit alone at night
with tears held in my eyes.
I sit alone at night
and hope that I may die.

I know, that it's no good
I'll get nowhere at all.
But without my Shady Grove
I'm broken and I'm small.

Shady Grove's, my little love
Shady Grove I say.
Shady Grove's, my little love
I'm bound to go away.

I wish I had a golden pen
that could write all my lines.
I wish I had a golden pen
then Shady Grove'd be mine.

Cherry's in the summer time
apples in the fall.
If I can't have the girl I love
I won't have none at all.

Shady Grove's my little love
Shady Grove my friend.
Shady Grove's my little love
I'm leaving in the end.

I'll always have the vague desire,
that someone will catch my work
and help it really get somewhere.
Then I remember,
I write drunk
and ****** up
at three in the morning.
"Nothing good ever happens after two in the morning"
right?
I'll just be content,
with writing for the drunks,
and the drug addicts,
and the sleepless.
I try to tell myself maybe,
that's who really needs it anyway.

I know,
I know there lies no answer
in the bottom of this glass.
On occasion though,
it certainly kills the question.
And yes I know,
this glass holds no peace,
but it certainly makes telling yourself,
you've found as much
a little easier.
And yes,
yes I know.
The glass holds little more than a slight reprieve
from self loathing,
from guilt,
from the colossal weight upon my shoulders.
But it seems you,
and hope,
are always gone.
And the glass is always here.

To watch a man,
attempt the washing of blood
long since spilled,
upon his hands.
Is to watch an agony I cannot describe.
How do you see yourself
when in the mirror,
there is a monster?
When in the shine of your children's eyes,
you see only reflected
a murderer?
Where do you find joy,
in life?
When you wish perhaps,
you'd been not so "lucky."

I was once asked
"where is home,
if not your house?"
My heart wanted to say
"wherever there is love,
and trust, brother."
My brain urged otherwise,
and so my response was only
"wherever you lay your head,
that night"

You do not piece back together
shattered glass,
you sweep.

I miss you,
when the wind flows like music
through the trees.
And I hear it as I once did your laughter.
I miss you,
when the sun sets
and I see it as I once did your smile
beneath your now sorrowed eyes.
I miss you,
when the stars hang high
and I find myself cold and alone in the dark,
for lack of your warmth.
But I miss you most at night,
when I wake up in an empty bed
searching for what's not there.

A rare night indeed,
when I find my whole world aflame,
with the light of life
and of love.
All the more noticeable
for my exit from the shadows.
All the more appreciated
for a life spent in the dark.

I must've heard the phrase
hundreds of times by now.
"My life's going to hell
in a handbasket."
Or some such variance.
Only recently have I become able
to tell you what that actually looks like.
See
you start with a cute wicker basket.
The kind grandma might give you muffins in.
Then you place all the things you've managed to hold onto
inside of it.
Your friends, your family, your job.
Next goes in all those possessions you hold dear.
Your car, your house, your dog.
Lastly
in go the intangibles.
Your hope.
Your dreams.
All your positive feelings.
Then you set the ******* on fire
and watch it all burn away.

The only thing
I have left.
Is the desperate hope
(an evil thing it is)
that long after I've departed
someone
somewhere
will read my words
and feel better for them.
I don't desire
to fix a soul
but I surely pray
maybe
just maybe
something I've said
will get you to tomorrow.

When you're afraid
you lose out.
You'll miss opportunities you could have had.
When you're angry
you'll ruin all opportunity set in front of you.
Anger leads to spite
and spite crushes all that lies in front of it.
When you're depressed
you'll just stop
or you'll want to.
Depression and sadness
lead to a path that ends where it began.
But hope.
Hope is our most dangerous of all emotions.
It comes from nothing.
We as human beings
will create hope anywhere
at anytime.
And
while to some this may seem powerful
I can't help but find it a flaw.
There is nothing worse in this world
not apathy
not rage
not terror
than being left without that spark you created.
There is nothing worse
than finding your hopes to be false.

Life never
turns out how you'd like.
It never steers you where you'd think it would
where you hoped it would.
Life constantly hands you a left
when you wanted a right.
Gives you a hand full of ****
when the other guy
gets a royal flush.
I've now come to know
that it's just inevitable.
Expect nothing.
Hope nothing.
Life will never give you
what you think you need.
It never gives you what you ask for.

Where?
Where does misery end
and
happiness begin?
I'm now certain
the line does not reside
at the bottom of a bottle.
I've finished many
to find nothing but an empty vessel.
I've chain smoked my way
through a thousand packs
to find myself still wanting.
I've loved.
I've hated.
And still I have to ask
where?
Where is the line one crosses
into happiness?
Into peace.

One night,
while on some tremendously great acid.
I watched the snow fall,
ever so softly,
illuminated by street lights.
It was the most beautiful thing,
I'd ever seen.
And truly,
it had very little to do with the drugs.
It was beautiful because...
Because I was there,
and because it was real.

It's always been difficult,
for me to communicate.
Friends, family, whomever,
I can't always express what I want,
or how I would want to.
I'll sit stern and stoic,
and tell all the people I know that,
I am fine.
Than I go home,
and between choking sobs explain to the dog,
or the cat,
what it is that ails me so.
The dog just stares,
the cat just purrs,
but I find more solace in that,
than the words of anyone I know.
Is that so strange?

I formed a personal goal.
I swore I'd be a more peaceable
a more centered man.
For a while I had maintained it well but
but now I'm finding I crack under the pressure
of what is a pseudo serenity.
A restrained anger
does not constitute a lack of it.  
I can't help but think
maybe rage hurts you
and maybe peace just adds another weight
on the back of a modern Atlas.
What more than the world can one hold atop his shoulders?

My heart weeps for those lost,
those yet to lose.

I have a friend
who likes to tell me
that I have a calming aura
as his litter of stray kittens
proceeds to envelop me
on my arrival.
As his dog lays at my feet.
Sometimes
I like to think he's right
that I exude peace and kindness.
Other times
I think maybe I just attract the sad and broken
the weak and needy.

I don't necessarily
think highly of myself
but
I live with an old dog
and a young cat
to whom I am the world.
Sometimes
I doubt my strength
but
I live with an old dog
and a young cat
both of which view me as their rock.
Sure
the dog whines constantly
poor ******* has arthritis
and sure
the cat's a little wild
I did scoop her up
crippled and alone
in front of my house.
And sure
sometimes I feel alone and broken
but I come home
to an old dog
and a young cat
and a small piece of my heart
finds its' way back.

At twenty-two years of age
I have experienced more death
than many of my elders.
In the past year alone
one expended his brains onto the ceiling
one died a mystery
face down in the river
one died in a car crash
on the run from the law
and the last faded into an ****** induced dream.
Twenty-two years
and I can no longer count the lost.

I listened to my younger brother
on the phone.
He told me
a friend had killed himself
shotgun under chin.
There was an open casket at the funeral.
They'd patched him back together
as best they could
but
some things you just can't fix.
My brother said he looked like an alien
foreign
misshapen.
Without thinking I responded
"You're at the age now brother
where people will start dropping like flies
for no good reason
and you'll have to learn to deal with it."
My brother is nineteen.
What is wrong with a world
in which that statement
is the truth?

We will NOT,
destroy this planet.
Long after the human race,
has dissolved into nothingness,
our earth shall remain.
We will however,
most assuredly destroy ourselves.
We will cloud the air,
we will poison the water,
we will soil the land.
In our arrogance,
we will destroy ourselves,
but not
this planet.

Ghosts
ghosts are real.
I know this
because I know men who see them.
Men who are...
to say the least rational.
Men who are of sound enough mind
not to believe in spectral forms
or fairy tales.
And still I've sat in rooms with such men
watched them cast a glance
toward empty corners.
Watched as their eyes glazed and brought them
elsewhere.
Ghosts exist in the mind.
And that which exists in the mind of men
is very much as real
as that which exists
in their physical worlds.

My heart aches
at the present condition of our world,
of our species.
We the mighty human race!
We who have conquered nature!
We who have grown from simple apes to explorers of space!
We,
who continue to slaughter and maim in the name of gods whose existence is at best,
highly questionable.
We the hateful.
We,
the broken.
If only tears shed by the masses
could wash away the blood of the few.
Pity not those of us who suffer,
but rather those,
who feel justified in their heedless aggression.

I'd searched many a day,
before I found what it was
that I wanted.
The first night I went to bed with her at my side,
and rested easily.
That was when I knew.
All I had ever wanted was some place,
or someone,
that made me feel like I was
home.

I am emphatically flawed.
I will make mistakes,
I'll be distant and difficult.
Things will rarely if ever,
be "perfect."
But I will always come back to you,
with a sad smile and soft voice,
and the most heartfelt of apologies.

On occasion I will be incredulous.
I'll question your actions,
and your motive.
I'll **** near border on paranoia.
But I'm easily proven wrong,
it won't take much to re-build my confidence.

I may very likely disappear,
from time to time.
I'm an enigmatic rambler,
and a vagabond.
I won't often buy you roses.
But I will show up after days in the wilderness,
with a heart full of love,
and a whiskey bottle stuffed full of wildflowers...

I don't claim,
to have an abundance of accurate knowledge.
I know I've too much yet to learn.
However,
after a bit of experimentation,
after years of trial and error,
I do think I've come to find one truth.
No one is ever what you expect.
Fewer yet,
are what you need.
They key I've come to find,
that one piece that makes the puzzle fall together,
is to find someone who makes your soul quiet,
but your heart scream.

The modern medicine man is subtle.
No longer,
is he held in high regard by his peers.
More often than not,
he is not even acknowledged for his power.
In a world that demands instant gratification,
it is difficult to appreciate a man who has what you need,
not what you want.
If you run across him,
notice he holds all those little vices,
the ones that open a man,
not numb him.
Admire his ease,
and the pivotal wisdom he's bound to drop.
Hold in high esteem his timing in arrival;
for it is not by accident you've run upon him.
Thank your local medicine man if you should find him,
for it is a subtle duty,
and one that goes too oft,
unappreciated.

Almost everyone's heard the old adage,
"You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink."
I believe this to be surely among,
the truer of truths.
The question I'm forced to pose however,
is does this mean you should in fact
not lead the horse at all?
I feel many in the world today would say yes!
**** the horse!
Personally,
I'll always show him the way if I know it.
Sure,
I can never force him into getting what he needs,
but in the least,
it could never hurt to point.

Goodbyes seem like a waste of time,
at moments such as this.
We'll meet again around the bend;
I'm almost sure of it.
If you don't believe me,
take a look at all the facts.
It's gone like this now all day long,
and yesterday at that!
I'd say it's best we walk away,
with a smile and with ease.
You'll find me floating down the road,
or see me strolling through the trees.

Does the **** have any less a right to grow,
than the rose?
Does the moon love the sun for lending it light,
or envy it for the same?
Does the wind bear ill-will to the trees for the obstruction,
or does it thank them for the music?
Are we all in this world marching toward an end,
or back to the beginning?
These are the things that keep me awake at night.
These are the things that impede my dreams.

There are places in this world;
places you'll find that'll grab you right by the heart.
Shaking you they will scream,
"This is it! This is where things are as they should,
not as they could be."
If you have the fortune to find that little slice of wonder,
absorb it as a sponge does water.
Breathe it! Eat it!
Let it soak to your bones.
More importantly,
do not ever allow yourself to forget how you felt when your heart was shaken.
Do not ever forget what you learned.

Never had I witnessed yin and yang,
in more tangible form.
One came in like a fire *******!
A bright flash and a bang you couldn't help but enjoy.
Then with a passion,
she'd gush in obvious pride
over the delicately crafted treasures before her.
The other blew in like the wind,
soft and mellow.
With an easy voice she spoke of her craft,
as if only natural,
a person could weave wire in such intricacy.
It was a beautiful equilibrium to behold
and something I'll always hold onto.

Some people,
are nearly indescribable.
But too prominent in the mind,
not to make the attempt.
I guess,
I guess I'd say she walked like sunshine,
and spoke like rain.
Where she strolled it was warm,
all the evidence could be seen in the people she met.
No one walked away without a smile.
When she spoke,
they all listened.
A gentle voice that hit you like soft drops,
in the summer.
Walking away I felt like I was watching the sun set;
disappointed in the loss of light,
but happy in knowing I'd witnessed something beautiful.

Everybody will tell you,
"Now don't fall in love with a poet,
or a writer.
They're all liars or manipulators or both.
They're twisted in the head!"
Now,
I won't even argue the truth in that however,
what the **** is life without risk?
I'll take your stale white bread existence and flavor it!
I'll weave words that'll hit your ears like silk!
I'll show you pristine mountain peaks
and dark alleyways from a perspective so radical,
you won't know the difference.
I'll show you the whole ******* world from your couch.
That is,
if you'd fall in love with a poet.