Me and Terry
On a dusty road
Were singing songs
About Dusty Rhodes
We got hell to pay
But that's alright
Terry's got a credit card
A hogleg and a light

Terry, don't put out that hogleg
It's the only one we got

Tonight we're sleeping
In a satellite dish
Looking up at the stars
And making a wish
"If I had my way"
Terry spoke to me
"A thousand more hoglegs
Rolled up fat for me"

But Terry, don't put out that hogleg
It's the only one we got

Come on now, Terry
Look at what you did
Stayed home from school all day long
To kick a fat kid
Terry been a bad boy
Terry been a bad boy
Bad boy, bad boy, whatcha gonna do?
Whacha gonna do when they come for you?

Terry, better not put out that hogleg
It's the only one we got

I've been waiting

I've been here

Submerged in sorrow, drowning in fear

I'll be watching as they march tonight

Take my hand and we'll walk into the fire

This ain't no heartbreak

No one involved

Just some problems that I can't get solved

I'm the problem...a thief, a liar

Come take my  hand and we'll walk into the fire


The sound of gunfire

No gentle death

A final struggle for one last breath

I don't reject it...I couldn't be higher

You took my hand and we walked into the fire

I saw it eating out a hole in a cold stone wall
Feeding on fragments of nothing at all
It's just a mouse from a hole in my mind
It comes around with the whiskey and the wine

I've done days in the detox dives
Staring at the others, feeling half alive
Still can't believe half the things I see
Still convinced it couldn't happen to me

Black bat flew from out of nowhere
Flapping it's wings
These are a few of my favorite things
It sees the mouse
Color blind in the night
And the blood flows darker in black and white

I've spent nights tapped out in a daze
Sleeping with the others, it's all in a haze
This ain't the way it's supposed to be
Still convinced it couldn't happen to me

Bells are tolling once again
Do they ask more than you can give?
Existence in a vacuum is the way you choose to live
No thought of separation
Body from the soul
When the movie's over, nobody really knows
Fields of autumn...

Where is the reason we should offer sacrifice?
This god we've made of Man has given only lies

All that I know I will tell you
But I offer only truth
Dream on, your dreams will die
Live your fantasy, your lie
Until you find yourself wasting away in
Fields of autumn

Lying there without the will to comprehend
Left there without the will to begin again
Grey eagle flies into the south skies tonight
It is his shadow that eclipses pale moonlight

All that I know I will tell you
But I offer only truth
Dream on, your dreams will die
With your fantasies and lies
Then you'll find yourself
Wasting away
Wasting away
Wasting away

...in fields of autumn

Say goodbye to all your friends
This is where the story ends
The time has come to leave
You'll forget about me

I don't know where I'm going
Why do you want to come with me?
So many roads are closing
I've passed signs I didn't see
Hear them from the roadside
Praying for their rest
So far away from you
Here is my address

And I tried so hard to reach you
But you don't return my call
And I waited for your answer for to long

Here is my address
This is my new address

We all need somebody
Want another life
Someone to walk away
Or drive off into night
No, it's not so easy
To break those ties that bind
When all your dreams of yesterday
Still linger in your mind

But I tried so hard to reach you
You don't return my calls
I waited for an answer for too long

Here is my address
This is my new address

I've looked through your old records
And the books upon your shelves
I have decided
That you and no one else could understand me
Could understand the things that make me
What I am
And I wonder what you'd do
If you knew what I was thinking
That I've been sinking in a liquid sea of love
Since I first saw you
You're the One I'm thinking of

Sacred woman
Shamed and beaten
Shaman's offering refused

And it all comes back to you
It really all comes down to you, girl
It's like  my whole world's revolving
Around you
What I'd do to make you happy
Someday in this life
I could wish for such a balance
Oh, you simply take my breath away
And I don't miss it

Sacred woman
Shamed and beaten
Shaman's offering refused

Graven image
Blamed and broken
Shaman's offering...

A pixie marching band took their show on the road.
17 tiny horn players and a drummer
with a button for a snare.
Across the water they walked,
regimented in three lines,
playing "Has The Day So Quickly Ended" to the rhythm of water splashing
on finely cobbled pixie shoes.
Tireless they moved forward
across an entire ocean
seeking comfort and solitude of Icelandic shores.
Unnoticed by the many captains of the many ships they slipped by, their music nothing more than crickets chirping or the ringing in their ears.

It was a long journey and they never stopped playing once.
Seven hundred and seventy-six songs in their repertoire
they played each one at least twice as days turned to night
and the cycle would need to be repeated
Every pixie musician in the band had every one of those songs memorized
you could call the tune
at any time
day or night
he would pick up his pixie instrument and play it note perfect.
Not a single mistake.

Legendary songs of pixie lore, like "Call The Wild Dogs to Anglicize", "Too Many Curtains" and "Fill Your Cup With Salty Seltzer".
Popular pixie songs all pixies knew, like "Bertha You're a Hard Act to Follow", "Dropped My Horn in the Bay of Pigs", "Livestock", "Ain't No One Answerin' the Phone" and "Drop Yer Pillow, Samuel".
Sacred pixie songs celebrated their common faith in the one true God, like "God, There Ain't No Other God", "Our God Sails the Seven Seas" and "God Help the Fool Who Fools His God".
Pixie drinking songs, "Bottoms Up", "Can You Hear the Weeping Warm Beer?", "1-2-3 Let's All Get Drunk", "Pixie Drinking Song" and "Hustle That Swill".

A lot of songs.
A lot of moods.
A lot of reasons to go  home to Iceland,
as if they needed any besides the food.

The pixie band was pushing three-quarters of the marching journey across the ocean
when Big Jim Pixie turned around and scolded Billy Joe the trombone player.

"Bill, you clumsy *******!" barked Big Jim. "You just about hit me in the back of the head with that ******* trombone slide! Do I have to tell you what I'm going to do to you if you actually graze me with that spit-drippin' thang?"

Billy Joe, typically soft spoken, was not having any of this.

"It was a flying fish that whisked up 'gainst the side of yer noggin, not my slide. If I was of a mind to bean you with this here slide you'd be rubbing the back of your head right now and you'd be so shook up you wouldn't even know it was me that done it."

"You sure do talk tough now, don't ye?" asked Big Jim, reluctantly realizing that it could well have been a flying fish but not yet willing to let the trombone player off the hook. "Don't make me turn around cuz if I do you are going to be in the market for a new trombone."

"That's a well may be, Jim-Jim, but the hand that holds the pen that signs the check that pays for it is going to be yours. Let that stand as a natural fact."

If there's one thing in the world Big Jim didn't like being called
it was Jim-Jim.
Billy Joe was always calling him Jim-Jim because he knew it bugged him.
The pixies in the company had all used variations on his name when referring to him in the past  
Jimbo Johnson,
Johnny Jimson,
Little Jim Big Jim,
Jimmy Jolson,
George Jimson,
Son James the Ham Chef,
Carl Jim Has Been,
King James Version Abridged,
James Wainright Teller,
Jim the Traitor,
Jim the Christ Killer,
Jim the Destroyer of the World,
Jim the Enemy of the Known Universe  
each one of these appellations rankled him but none so thoroughly as the simple
Jim Jim
that Billy Joe would call him.

"I ain't payin' a ******* cent, trombone player."

"Then you ain't breakin' my trombone, Jimmy Jack Jehosaphath."

"Don't test me, you may have to arrest me."

"I'll bring you a file so you can get out of jail, Jim Jim".

"Well that's mighty white of you, pixie. Now what are you gonna do if that spit valve was leakin' and you got some of your nasty ebola saliva on the back of m'neck? You gonna come visit me in the hospital?"

"I might. But then again I might just wait and come visit your grave when they put you down."

"Joe, if we weren't still marchin' I swear to almighty God I would turn around and beat you so bad they'll be countin' a man short when we finally get home."

"Jim Jim, them's fightin' words but you ain't never fought nothing no tougher than the urge to **** in public. You ain't gonna do no permanent damage to me nor my trombone here. So why don't you put your money where your mouth is or keep that mouth shut?"

Big Jim turned around
hit Little Joe hard square between the eyes.
He heard and felt bone crack.

Joe looked stunned.
He'd never call that mean ******* Jim Jim again.
No,
never again
because he hit the water hard and sank down as the band marched right over him,
most not even noticing.

Jim looked for as long as he could then turned around and proceeded to march the rest of the way to Iceland.

"Don't call me Jim Jim," he said, speaking only to himself.

Then he heard a voice in the back of his head.
It was loud enough to be heard over the
music
and
the waves
and
the ocean breeze.

It was HIS voice,
but he had no control over it whatsoever.

"Jim Jim."

"Jim Jim."

"Jim Jim."

...and so it was Big Jim, whose trumpet playing had practically defined the style of this particular pixie band, lost his mind, eventually taking up residence in a Reykjavik sanitarium screaming every night, keeping up the attendants and making things worse.

"Little Joe Jangly Hops! Come here you ******* I got a lollipop for ya."

"Joe Joe Deathgrip Toenail! I'm gonna light your mama on fire!"

"Little Joe Clamfry, somebody took a **** in your bed!"

On and on he went until the people in the kitchen stopped giving him bananas. Then he stopped for awhile.

But only for awhile.

now
close your eyes
and dream
dream tonight
of the one who loves you

sleep
sleep tight
while the darkness turns to light
meet me tonight
the one who loves you

wake
wake in the morn
stretch your arms and yawn
then wait until the night comes
meet me again in your dream

Forgiveness
Is the only thing
Keeping me from you
And
You from me
I know I hurt you
You know you hurt me too
Forgotten transgressions resurrect
And breathe like Lazarus
On a bad day
Angry at being awakened
From dreams and visions
Of nothing at all

Will the healing words
Of Him who commanded the dead man rise
Have the same effect on us
When we hear Him call us by name
And tell us to leave behind
Enemies of love
To defeat them
Without mercy
With
Forgiveness

Love demands the strong embrace
The firm pressing of flesh
To explore the contours and subtle lines
With eyes, heart and hands
Forests and constellations to map out
Legends to calculate

Evaporates without the words
Or eardrums to beat them down
To play ring-around-the-rosy
In the fertile field of the brain
That seeks their comfort in every sense
Deaf, dumb and blind spirit

For love's a blinding supernova
Incinerating all who approach
Hungry for physicality
A moon to measure it's movements
Though that satellite be
Lifeless cratered rock

gotta go and get a gun
put a bullet in it's head
squeeze that ******* trigger till I'm sure
it's good and dead
should have been done a long time ago
should have been done a long time

push a little button send it
back where it belongs
i ain't coming back until i
know it's good and gone
should have never been done, my friend
should have never been done

gotta put it down before it
blows up in my face
now i know there ain't no use
in trying to run away
don't know what I was thinking, girl
don't know what I was thinking

nothing left but trouble if I
don't act pretty fast
nothing is forever, mister
nothing ever lasts
gotta find a way to move on now
gotta find a way to move on

looked for it in the mirror but
all i see is me
and that ain't even who I am
what should i believe
gonna hang it on a tree tonight, son
gonna hang it on a tree tonight

euthanize then eulogize
won't be much love lost
do the crime and do the time
it's how we count the cost
nails and wood, that's all
nails and wood

This is a song I'm working on. Not even half finished but I wanted to share it with some people here anyway.*


verse 1
Said a lot of things that needed to be said...yesterday
Woke up alone on the cold side of the bed...this morning
Somebody said that the truth would set you free
That somebody sure must have told you the truth about me
...and  now you're free... (chorus)

verse2
They tell me your choice is the straight or the crooked path...on your way
That he who was first stands a good chance of bein' last...on that last day
Well, I'll be the first to say you were good for me, girl
But I've been down too many dead end roads in this world
and now I'm

chorus
Free...like a bird from a cage with a broken wing
Free to be me, where what you get is always just what you see
Free, well nothing is free and tell me why would you want it to be?
Ain't nothin' free no good

I deserve this
Don't I?
It was my battle to win
In a war far from won
Who will take my reward from my arms?
Who would squelch the music in my ears
Or explain it's virtues with cold theory?
I have seized the moment
The day I have called my own
Will the morning sunrise expect me to be content
With victorious yesterday
Will the calendar's relentless trajectory
Put me back in my place
A paradigm of depression where I've convinced myself
I belong
Doomed to breathe borrowed oxygen
Or will chemicals and sleep
Ease me into another easy day?
Who among you would take that away?

She was a crazy catholic lady
With a crucifix dangling from a chain round her neck
Cheap Jesus pieces in her earlobes and
On her fingers, twisted against her wrist
The symbol of Christ's suffering and death
Molded in less than precious metals
To show allegiance to the cause
To prove membership in the club

I told her I was an alien
From a planet I pointed to
(Which was actually a star but she didn't know any better)
I gave some obviously typical dry science fiction name to the orb from where I came
A red planet,heated year round by hell fire
And the coup de grace
The people from my planet worship Satan and God

She took most of what I had to relate in comparative stride
Until I got to the part about worshipping the debbil
Then she began to moan ang groan about second thoughts
But second thoughts weren't part of my plan

"It's lunch time ,guys. They've got liver and onion on the buffet and it's going to be delicious"

"But O Holy One. We are not carnivores. We are Here to feast on all the bugs that have made themselves comfortable.

O Holy One did yet another double take and saw me bending down seeking out insects.
What she didn't see was Neolithic alone In the grounds area planting gummy bears and gummi worms and other insect  like critters. Insects like you .

When the arbolic lady sits I the grounds shelter she can't help but spot some of those cray college pestle shoot firsrms inside their belly
Just looking for tha pillowcase. ( that's where it was)

Catholic lady stared into that uncanny stew I did, too, and all the aliens with perhaps we shouldn't have been so cocky at first we soo began to respect the wagonmaster

One last gesture for the catholic lady
She sat across the room obviously devising plans of what to do when we got home
Home sweet himi took a magic marker
And drew a huge upside down pentagram acroo the whole of my palms
They didn't look like tats that were inked for fun or for hell
Theft tats. Were reminders of to WHOM you belonged.

I opened my hand, turned around and waved. It at her, a beautifully drawn Baphomet head smack dad center of my so realistic it looked like it might slide off of my skin and back to the loving arms of Boris Karloff.

The gummi bears were delicious
It was hard to pretend I was chomping a nasty X Y or Z, which were made an entirely horrendous smelling concoction for their entry but had almost become disqualified when it was found that she harbored secret  ideas. She's willing to talk about them on the phone.

Now he's here 5:00: o'clock early making soft, simple subliminal suggestions lull in conversation and I don't think anyone is individually off the hook for this nonsensse.

Catholuc girl saw his pentagram palm and almost had heart attack as well,I don't want to di early of hreart disease so I  hope it's some good old marihuana that gets us thru this hellish lost weekend


He didn't want to go stay with his parents but he did anyway dragging corpses behind him and begging the "old boy" to show him again how the **** never goes down. He heel used, martyred, confused

Catholic girl told my whole routine to the doctor. He thought it mildly humorous but felt obligated to be with
Her, she sufferers and her mind really reeled...she thought I ate bugs for dinner, what else was I telling the truth about?    Casting Crowns couldn't stay for our encore. We didn't expect them to,

SET LIST
10- "Mama ToldMe Not to Come" Three Dog night
9.- "The Pusher" - Steppenwolfe
8. - Goodnitr, Wake  Up Stonef" - Blind Society
7. "Madonna and the pope, swinging from arope" - my brother's least favorite band name
6. "1/3 of the Beast" the Beales
5. - Let's make this a short one
4. Dive hound ***** fu ka someone's in the house... I'd daddy, but your gun durum I'm only five and I don't know what thr g be this -

No dignity for the 4th Floor Psych Ward gang
Paraded about through the entire building
Rockin' and rollin' blue & white striped bath robes
Didn't bother with the belts, we coulda made it work
By sheer determination and the awkward looks on our faces
We set the trend for people who didn't know any better

Out for a trip to the commissary
Fifty cents in hand for a can of soda
Even though the medicine I was on
Made Dr. Pepper taste like club soda infused with flecks of rust
And a metallic, radioactive aftertaste
That was far from the sugar rush one would expect
Coca-Cola was even worst

Such dignity we carried, they called the food tray box "the chow cart"
And the food was barely fit for animals
Quickly transitioning from warm to cool
Always some ridiculously nasty chicken-based meal
I had never seen a fried chicken breast that was gray
But the sherbet was heaven for my cotton mouth
Dry as the tundra
I lost a lot of weight during those months
I survived on the fourth floor
I shot some 8-Ball pool with swagger and Sinatra confidence
Convinced I saw recognition in a visiting gal's eye
A flick of the wrist and this goofball magically exuded *** appeal
Nothing more than confidence
I could make those two girls smile and blush
Because they could sense the looseness in my crotch
They could see I was in charge, batshit crazy as I may have been
I had reached the perfect weight
For those blue and white striped bath robes to truly shine

I let them walk away, didn't say anything
I knew where they were going
I knew what they'd be doing when they got there
Always on their minds

Why couldn't the catatonic Ethiopian soldier girl do it like me?
She couldn't even hold a spoon
Psych techs had to feed her like a helpless baby child
Even then she resisted
So that food dribbled down the sides of her cheeks
But one day I passed her room, looking in
She was brushing her hair without a problem
There was some intelligence in her eyes
She caught me staring and with perfect ease she rose to close the door in my face
Catatonic no more?
Or was she ever?
Was ANY of this real
Or was it all staged for my benefit?
What exactly was I doing on the fourth floor?
Was it a test?
Was I a guinea pig?
That spot on my skull just behind my right ear
It itched a lot lately
Was that bump a quartz crystal embedded between skin and muscle?

Why yes, I believe it is

She pushed a strange religion
With hand-printed Southern Gothic tracts
Crumpled, wrinkled, stuffed in the pockets of her robe
Though the name on those notes was Yahweh
Her smile betrayed witchcraft
If you tried
You could read it between the lines

On the surface she seemed to assimilate well
The new rules ****** upon her
She tried and tried to take it in stride
But this new paradigm had broken stronger souls than hers
Days like months in the Year of the Snake
Slithered all too slowly towards yet another night
Spent under cover of darkness on hospital beds

She pressed those tracts on me all of the time
At first I'd read them, admire the artistry
The thrift store Ram Dass influences
Collected a few like flyers for R.E.M. shows in the early 80s
Until their true nature was revealed to me
By a voice that seemed to come from my crown chakra
The only aspect of my personality that I implicitly trusted

On the day I left she found out I was going
She could not care less, despite the "love thy neighbor" ramblings of her mission
It only meant that she was staying
Indeed it meant that she would be staying for a long, long time
Long, long, long
She only had so much religion to go around
It was failing her now

The last time I saw her, as I sprinted to the door finally unlocked
I stopped dead in my tracks
She lay on the ground, the ***** filthy ground
Face down, beating it with both hands
Her wails and crying filled the fourth floor
She looked up and her face was grotesque, dripping wet tears smearing and smudging shadow and mascara
Finally broken

I knew the feeling

Always some drunk ******* standing in the back of the bar who feels his life's mission is to continuously shout boisterous requests for "Freebird" during the encore.

Second hand smoke thick as English fog and deadlier than a toxic chemical spill in the middle of the driveway.

The load out and equipment set up in which the drummer inevitably excuses himself from working with any other piece of equipment besides his drums, since  "there a big enough hassle on their own".

The inevitable bartering for free beer which during later years became a case of being lucky if you got your drinks at 50% off but even then sometimes you wouldn't be given a tab.

The lone dancer at the very beginning of the first set, never the most attractive lady I in the house and all too often she made it through a whole song without a dance partner.  It always seemed like some kind if code, especially when an inebriated gentleman would hook up with her. But I never figured out what the jig was about.

Always a drummer in the house, the real deal or an enthusiastic amateur. They will find a way to play the drummer's kit. Don't even try to stop them, for any reason. They will play.

Likewise the older gentleman with the button up cowboyshirt, the one with the stale pack of Marlboros in the front pocket, he will try to impress you by claiming to know every song Hank Williams ever sang. The wise gambler bets that indeed he does have an encyclopedic knowledge of Hank's repertoire. Unfortunately he never claimed to have the pipes to pull one or two or three off himself...but that won't stop him from begging and soon enough he'll be under the spotlight singing "Your Cheatin' Heart" with every word and melody spot on but voice that could turn Hank's mother away. He is the anti-PR agent for Hank Williams. After people hear him butcher the songs they don't want to know what Hank sounded like singing them.

The bouncer is your friend. If such is not the case before the show begins make every effort available short of paying him your whole salary to secure his loyalty. Trust me here.

To be continued
Yep, much more to com

Now lay back and forget
All the days that brought you here
Or make a mental monument
Of hours painting empty skies
Of moments lost in wondering why
The colors bleed without the rain
To wash the canvas dry
Still they run, these memories
Together make a life
Flesh and blood for ghosts and stone
To wear out for a time
'Til entropy's harsh design
Leaves nothing left behind
That wasn't there before
The beginning of time

Good intentions buy nothing
In the formless space of this machine
Not even the soon forgotten happy dream
Comes without a sinister scheme
Dead weight of nothing, heavier than air
To the fish caught on the hook unawares
This monument would grow so large
There wouldn't be room anymore
To notice the moment before it passes
To find your way through to the door
That opens unto forgetfulness
Cursed but just as often blessed
So let it go, lay down, forget
You haven't really even started yet

Wipe the slate clean
Abandon preconceptions
I will prove your reflection a lie
As you turn to face the other way
As you turn to face another day
Don't you regret not being able to forget
When the harvest of your ego
Piles worthless memories at your door
More and more, how could there be more
Dismiss the reaper, send him home
With his razor sharp sickle so finely honed
Tell him "Leave me alone! Leave me be and go on!"
No longer scared of his skeleton bones
11:11, this must be the time
There must be something you need to be reminded
But what, that's the rub, where can you find it
Can't feel it or hear it or smell it or see it
And it travels the speed of light
Close your eyes and catch that flight
Dream your world and see the sights
Magical tygers burning bright
But no souvenirs, travel light

the window to the world
frightens and confuses
terrorizes
makes me grateful for distance
and an early bedtime

These lines are written
In the slow nowhere zone of sleep
My fingers animated with thoughts
All their own
I don't have to pretend
Ambien's licking in
Like a donkey straight
To the beck of my neck
I've seen it done enough time
Not to fooled into thinking it's here for
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna Krishna Krishna hara hara hara Rama. Hara Rama , ram  EMram hare hare.  
Maybe that's the strong wind that guided my pen
Benevolent trickster soon to.bury. The things
that make him whole
Someone is mowing theirbli
It happens on ambien
But I swear there's. Meaning somewhere hidden between bags of honey oil **** ands great changjbbbbb
He might be a nice guy......  Nice and buxom, he could eliminate the thy free of  before his Pixar
My mind thinks one thing and fgisvonytspio

I'll never forget the look on that dude's face
Walking through the door into the store
To pay for a tankful of gasoline
He reached into his pocket
For cash but he didn't mean to pull out
And drop that big sack of marijuana
That hit the slate floor with a "tap"
He pretended he wasn't embarrassed
But the expression on his befuddled mug
Told quite a different story
I knew right away
He wasn't the generous, sharing kind
So I just pointed and said "you dropped something"
Bending over I could almost read his mind
He was afraid I was going to call the cops
He needn't have worried but it ****** me off that he did
Even more so that he didn't offer me a bud as appreciation for my silence
But I suppose you get these kinds of people in all walks of life
Besides he'd never seemed to get over the shock
And covetous look in my eye when I first saw him lose control of the plastic bag
He paid for the gas without much of a word
Walked back out into the heat and his
Luxury automobile that was clearly outside of his price range
"Goodbye,"I said, "O selfish dope head
You would probably have been a drag to get high with anyway...make sure you didn't drop anything else on the floor, you stupid *****. I'd hate to be stepping over little chunks of hash you forgot were in your in the same pocket as the dope. "
My opinion of you has not changed
And it's been YEARS

11:11
Window of assurance
A break in the storm
Tell me it's not for nothing
Standing tall against threatening winds

Dizzy
Sweat dripping, fever rising
Had to hold myself up
Knocked back by the aura
Of Buddhist monks at the trough

I would have engaged one in conversation
Talked about dharma and the quality of the food
But not a single one spoke English
*******, real deal
Bald and robed to a man

I only want to know
What prankster spirit tells me
I'm a genius and a poet
So convincing I believe it for a moment
Time out of mind

11:11
20 minutes ago
That's how long it took
To comb the thoughts in my lazy head
To come up with this thing

Whatever this thing is
Devils tell me a masterwork
Though I know devils lie
The truth of the matter is in the heart
Not sleight of hand or speed of eye

My muse has abandoned me
****** because I called her my muse
She was a jumble of words on a canvas of light

Without her flattering words to guide
I've lost ambition, will and drive
I'm nothing left to my own devise

Tonight we enter into a covenant of lies
Sealed with the blood of a million dreams
Tonight you turn and walk away
Tonight I ask you not to pray
For me or anything in my life
Listen to your old reggae albums and
Waste the night wishing away
Wishing and hoping, hoping and scheming
If only things could be
The way things used to be
Don't you know it don't matter?
Hold on to your sanity, the little that's left

The angel stood on bowed knee
Waist deep in the shallows
His right hand cast miracles into waves of water
Threw ripples imbued with magis
Stirred and splashed until healing came upon it
Until the entire pool of Bethesda shimmered like glitter on the wet heat waves of the sun
That's when they all began to jump in
But could not linger long
The moment healing settled in
It's out of the pool, to the Temple song

But you stood still for so long
Watching the wretched washed
Cleansed of their sins
Whole of body, whole of mind
You never knew what that was like
You didn't know what that could be like

You would have stood there until the bubbling waters stilled
Cheated out of your mindful abundance
Had I not an incantation of my own
So I chanted "Pura Deva Honey Madme Plath "
Words of pure nonsense I knew
You'd take them as a cryptic challenge
Meaningless but they sounded right
The sheer repetition hypnotized you
And back, back, walking back slowly
Walking backwards towards the pull that still seemed affluent & fecund
You walked
In silence
Until your foot touched the water and you had to stop to absorb what felt like several hundred volts of lightning streaming up from your Achilles Heel to your Freud-ball skull and immediately you realized
Something big was happening
Lowering your waist the pain was transmuted
As clarity wiped the fog from the window of your perception
The songs that came unbidden
Overflowed your stained glass imagination
Forcing out demons and dumb ideas
Death and delusions and bad desires
Running like demons to the sow
Having asked permission
Your music-stuffed head went underwater
A practical baptism, a lesson in breathing liquid
When you were pulled out you had no use for what lay on the other side of the pool
The grassy meadow where I still stood
When the cancer was removed
I came to find what I always suspected
I'm a huge part of the tumor
Dug in on the other side of the pool
While your fool legs take you fast as you may run
To make an offering to the chief priest
Singing songs of praise and gratefulness

I find my own song to sing
The Angel says my burden
Must stick tight and bleed like leeches
Bad seed buried deep in the abyss of my being
An ugly man, face drawn from grimaces and frowns
Unloveable and beat to the bone
Without a single song of my own

Gently nudge or better shove
Push me into tomorrow
From blissful blessed Nirvana
Empty head and hollow
Sound bubble drone flight
Bent bludgeoned never loved
Bend time till tomorrow
From restful dreaded medication
Full of shine and shallow
Waiting for the whipcrack stripmine
Vaudeville blue light favorite
Poke the carcass with a stick
Cut from cloth of felt
From the hearts of the Feltmen
Trapped in Gormenghast
Or doomed Hagedorn
Seasons change our sole entertaining
Reasons vain our Souls rearranging
Feather duster birds take flight
In deep forests of the night
Flee from the Tyger's malicious eye
Have a slice of this delicious pie.

Dark clouds driftin' 'cross the sky
All my years, all of my life
But today's been a good day
I woke up dead

I am a vessel of experience
I'm only along for the ride
My prayers echo through dark chambers
Shining light into dark corners
Forgotten the second they've crossed my lips
Nothing but hope
No petitions to change what's already created
From the beginning of time
The inception of space
For grace and acceptance only
Are all I expect for my words

I am eternal
Having forgotten
What it means
To begin
Never conceiving an end
I am the conjunction of circles
Bridging light and darkness
The crux of duality
I stand on the border

I am the empty void you breathe in
A mirror
The reflection alive and swimming
A moving portrait of who you see me to be
But a stranger there to my eyes

I live to sleep
I sleep to dream
Sewage holes fill kinny bunk port out of the box Mr. Krull yer big headed Joyce fixation lets the dead dogs in leave the dead frogs to fry read a dull heart and mind
Down for the do little sing song hallelujah chorus let the whole world adore us we are the resurrection and you are the night take old children's programming to extremes and brainwash the yellow things
You asked don't tell so I wish you well and this drug you sling is a dangerous thing of letters and numbers all forced into the machine good girl great guns you'll do what I've done
It's a lie, my foot, there's a false ring to it's nose can you be so cavalier about things you don't know is the the grease going to settle and ruin your good clothes who knows Mr. Whitman, who knows
Words they say cut like blades in another setting where the mice eat men and dry ol' John Steinbeck writes with a pen fall out boy fudge to your granny sue I'm sure she'll agree that'll do, that'll do...bartle doo
Put 'em together yourself, old salt, here, every one on 'ems yerns, twist 'em and turn 'em, pick 'em and burn 'em, take a spoon or a spatula whatever you need to turn all this idiocy into a creed
Cut a few out they shouldn't be here what's wrong with the fool who gave 'em the time of day, there's surely a reason but his girl wouldn't say that evil ghost ***** with no reason to stay
That'll do.
Bartle doo.

This gallery of shape-shifting souls
Has become a theater of the obvious

Token observations presented as
Extraordinary divine revelation

A parade of window-shopping prophets
Pointing, praying, "oooh, I want THAT one"

Stuck in a mold, how many don't know any better?
Confined to their emotions

It's All they've ever known

But that's all it takes to get your foot in the door
Of this funhouse mirror maze

Listen now to the laughter echoing against the glass
Lon Chaney guffaws at all who got lost

Hopelessly walking in circles
Hungry snakes chasing their tails

I wonder how many bottles of beeu
I could stand and open, drink one after another
Slugging '. em down and ***** in' 'em back up when there weren't no room for ani more, not one more little drip yessiree bob and tell Katie Mae to bring some cleaning supplies
I done my time
Drinking cheap mad dog 20-20 wine and Schaeffers quarts
I  a rot gut mamA by nature and choice

Where are the bottles?
Where are the silverwar and glassware
Could it be a dry county we've stopped in ?
What were we thinking
Every man woman and child amongst us
Thirsts

A forest of trees
Sacrificed willingly
For the greater good
A medium of memories
Watch your step
The management is not responsible for personal injury
Refer to the Self-Help section
Second room to the right

The ghosts who congregate here
Holy and profane
Lament the passing of their generation
Guard against fire
For one little spark will bring the whole house down
With enough kindling to keep
It burning for days

I remember my first visit to the Bookery
The improbable tales of countless manuscripts
A sea of words, an ocean of ideas
Stories and poems to wear like clothes
A world on yellowing paper
Easier on the eye
A hundred miles I did drive
To find this treasure of treasures
When I got there I couldn't find a **** thing
But it was fine because I wanted everything

No out of the way bookstore or well organized library
The Bookery was a beast in it's own category
The disheveled nature of the books on the shelves
Made it a puzzle to solve
A maze you forget where center is
Distracted by the scenery on the way

It's a dangerous game I play
Kicking against the dead weight
A sullen ghost laughing behind backs
Daring heads to turn
Victorious when they don't
A treacherous game that kills me
Keeping the dream alive
Well past it's shelf life suspended
Fanning the sparks of cruelty
Battling the guilt
An ominous game of hide and seek
Hunting for treasures that aren't lost
They're right where they're supposed to be
But you don't know that, do you?
And so the fun begins

He stared at blank pages
His heart ached to fill
With nothing inside him
He'd sadly turn away
Leave till tomorrow
What he could not do today

His dream far behind him
Too short and too sweet
The ones who shared it with him
Lost in miles and years
The sounds of their voices cherished
A simple song, a picture in his mind

He felt like he was falling
Away from all that's real
Every day more disconnected
The sudden dawning realization
That some things weren't anything at all as he believed them to be
And so they became new

He thought perhaps it was a period of transition
From Egypt to Canaan
It should have been exciting
But it only confused him
A distraction
Wouldn't go there alone

The last time his pen touched fresh paper
He almost told the world he was through
The future held but one glittering prize
He wanted the race to be done
He searched for words, forget the rhymes
To share these dismal depths

The last time his pen touched fresh paper
It lifted without a stroke
Left behind a dark period that stained through to the back
He stared into it's center, as it were an abyss
He recognized himself in it's void
Falling, he'll write no more

I never felt the tears
Hot, salty drops of joy or anguish
Rolling down your cheeks to meet
A smile so wide to bless the years to come
Or
A grimace of despair, all hope lost for a future
You wiped them away
Until the only thing left was a stinging
Blush of red
That faded within moments

The only sounds I ever heard were muffled
A one-way communication through a thick wall
I didn't understand a single word
The sing-song inflections lost in translation
Barely disturbing the silence
I am content with
Darkness to float in, this is my world
Tethered not by gravity
But the love and nourishment provided
By Someone I will never know

My mind holds dreams
That are not my own
Visions I would just as soon
Not give up
Every name I have been given
By God and by Man
Is a lie
For my eyes are closed
I speak for an older soul
Unconcerned with a legacy

I have no need for air
I don't need your love
I don't want your compassion
At least, not now
Does it bring you sadness to think
I would ignore gifts you want to give me?
Does it break your heart to know
That I don't need anything?
Do you want so badly for me to want?
Do you want so badly for me to need?
I would never burden you
These things are for you

Go to sleep, mother
Find yourself in that space
Between sleep and dreams
Soon enough the dream will be over
Find me in that space
Between death and life
Soon enough the two will merge
And my dream will begin

You cannot **** me
I cannot die
I would be yours
But I would just as soon
Keep floating
Until the day you find yourself
In that space
Between death and life
Where we will merge
And our dreaming will have begun

I forgive you
Though you need no pardon,
If you need time to get there
I would only ask that you
Forgive yourself
You have done nothing wrong
Ignore the fools crying "foul"
The ones who never walked
From one side of the room to the other
In your shoes
They don't understand these things I tell you
They're blinded by reckless judgment and condemnation
I have no morals
I have no convictions
I have no beliefs
I have no thoughts
I cannot be murdered by the self-righteousness of men

But let our time together bring peace and enlightenment
Not guilt or shame
Let the tears shed for my memory
Be of joy
For I passed through unseen, unheard
Unknown by all
Except for you

Got a message from my half
Mrs. Hypochondriac
Moody right, moody right
Tell your CC
Let everyone know
Beatnik ****, beatnik ****
Listen to that beaten sound
Keeps me running, keeps the engines hummin'
Listen to that beating sound
Tic Tac Tic Tac
Got a lookout for King Me
Watch your Q's and watch your P's
Dot your eyes and cross your tease
You're gonna see what you still won't believe
Birth your rumors of immortality
Pound them 'til I can't help but agree
But when the truth slays the light
Don't blame me
King Me King Me King Me King Me
I'm the King, I'm the King, I'm the King, I'm the King
Keep your filthy black stained hands off of my crown
Take up your own bleeding cross and ride it to town
I'm the King
Too good for my own good and don't give a fu ck
Hatching plans to freak out the Man
Got a meanness in me that I don't understand
A lie for a dollar, a life for a dime
There's a well, a deep, deep well I fell
Into once
Where in the tumbling I found
The true hidden meaning of falling down
The treasure at the bottom wasn't worth the minute
It took to get there
King Mad, King Mad, King Mad, King Mad
These songs for a King
King You and King Me
King Kong's a Ding ****
Monkey Tales
Banana on a stick
Dipped in black chocolate
Rancid and arcane
Read in, read in
The main character wears a black tunic
His queen is the one with the brain
Better half, better half she tells him
It's best you stay quiet you'll give it away
You've done enough damage for one other day
What's done is done
Nothing but another bridge to burn
Another corner to turn
She says
You understand it less than I
And your understanding is void and dry
Quiet now, my loveless love
My misunderstood drug
My salt melted slug
Quiet now, before people believe
In the nonsense you write, the ******* they read

we shall name shadows
give weight to ghosts
enshrine our egos
throw down a gauntlet
take up a mantle
we shall sing colors
with tongues of fire
we will spit nonsense
and call it...

Well now Jenny Lee she was a ******
  She made about a grand a night
But Jenny, she weren't no looker
  She could give a man one hell of a fright
We used to wonder how she stayed so busy
  Good Lord, she was almost rich
The other gals on the corner didn't like her
  They all called her a skanky old witch
One night Jenny Lee was out working
  Making a midnight run
She was just gettin' done with a client
  Got a call from Reverend Simmons' son
He said, "Jenny Lee, you know I been lookin'
  "Been admirin' your stuff from afar
"And I'm hungry for what you got cookin'
  Could you meet me in a half of an hour?"
She said, "Ben Simmons, I just don't believe it
  "Mister, you ought to be ashamed
"Don't you care 'bout your reputation?
  "Why you wanna play this game?"
"I ain't nothin' like my daddy",
  He said, "Sometimes I gets me an itch
"And my daddy's money can't scratch it
  "Besides, he's a *******"
Now Jenny's jaw dropped wide opened
  Said "Simmons you just crossed the line"
Said "Your daddy's money can't scratch your itch
  "But it can sure as hell scratch mine!"

In the Light of the Holy
In the Light of the Holy
I can finally see beyond the Looking Glass
Questions few can bring themselves to ask
     I have found some Answers
For the Future and the Past
     No longer matter
In the Light of the Holy

In the Light of the Holy
In the Night there are songs I've heard
That Lift my Spirit to the Starlit Sky
That force the Teardrops from my stubborn Eye
     and I feel no Shame
Illuminate the Truth behind the Lie
     and ease the Pain
In the Light of the Holy

I will take no chances, it is worth the risk
No Sacrifice to see the World like this
My sole Regret is everything I missed
Before I opened my eyes
Before I opened my Mind

In the Light of the Holy
And the Light of the Holy
Shines brighter than it ever has before
Reflecting on the banks of Heaven's shore
     bright as sunshine
In the Light of the Holy

I want to share but I fear
The things I offer
Will be useless, unwanted by others.
Through painful experience
I've come to this conclusion.

I'd give it all away
If only someone wanted it.
Mine, all mine, mine alone
But none of it worth keeping
If I can't enjoy it with you.

Pick me clean before I leave
Behind these aspects.
Take what you want, take what you need
But take it, take it all from me
Before the rushing wind blows it all away.

Before the rushing wind
Kindles baptizing fire
To burn all I ever was to ashes
For to fill the gold or silver urn,
Precious to friends blessed by generosity.

A blessing I was more than willing to bestow
With love, thankfulness and appreciation.
All I had to share were seeds of memories.
I can only pray
The harvest will be bountiful.

You wanna know something about my life?
I was born under somewhat unusual circumstances
Ripped from my mother's womb by force
Of necessity
I laid her out and put her down
While I got my bearings
They say I roared like a lion in the jungle
Kicking like a mad *** ridden by my father
Who, I'm told, never wanted kids in the first place
I set my course to curse the time he had left
His seed had sprouted into ****
So I choked those last days good and strong
To crawl back to my mother's tomb
Lay me down to sleep and dream
Of comforting placenta
Until an all too patient God
Brought him back to her
Together again, food for the worms
And it was time for me to leave
That stone was only meant for two

To wonder at the sound of another's heartbeat
and marvel at the rising and falling
The colors of the rainbow first filling wide open eyes
how they take the breath away
Claiming shapes and sounds and smells
the entire universe a pile of jigsaw puzzle pieces
One day fit together
to reveal the most beautiful reflection

To hear every sound for the first time
and know silence as ending and beginning
From within
the spirit remembers
Struggling against and with another spirit
the soul is molded
Almost a fog, hovering around the body
it glows

Mine had grown dim
had become heavy as stone
A mocking albatross
with no patience for sluggish maturity
I'd begun to question it's very existence
convinced by a hateful science
Beaten so badly with the cudgel of years
I longed to be rid of it

Until you came along with your angel song
the very sound of our beating heart
Like the winging of birds
in free fall, ecstatic
You dragged me out of hell with the ringing of your voice
the singing of a song that pulled me into heaven
The sound of newborns crying in amazement
at the very rhythm of life itself
How bittersweet it is to surrender you
to the quiet from where you were born
I would hold on forever
but you fade even as my heart is filled
Not gone...
merged, quiet, waiting
You leave me knowing
you will never leave me
For you have become my soul
a partner in sound and silence
See the miracle of music
it glows