I'm doing what I can
I can't do anymore
Be honest with myself
Isn't that what you want?
Integrity? Isn't it enough?
It had better be
Because it's all I've got
Not that it feels like it does me any good
I'm just tired
I fall asleep during the opera

A sharp blade slashes with divine precision
The softened heart
Leaving the most precious wound
That will never heal
A sign, a seal
Of all that is true
And all that is real
All that remains
When the blood is drained
Empty space
For the wind to fill

There were days
I used to dance
Alone
But never really alone
When I'd shake my spirit loose
From it's confining shell
To hover and watch
My clothes drench with sweat
To feel muscles wearing, tiring
The joy of movement
Whirling dervish
Marionette catharsis

I don't dance anymore
And I don't know why not
What have I to hide?
What is there to lose
But this melancholy
That's got me in it's grip
A helpless addict to
This endless ennui
Who will free me
To dance one last time?

Learn to love the smell of the stench
Then close your eyes and realize
That what you see
Is all there will ever be
Embrace the silence
The hardest thing to do
Everything that stands around you
Is meaningless
Impermanence reigns
Like it or not
Civilizations are spawned to crumble
Doomed to disappear
The grandest dream a mere vapor
Mist evaporating in mid-air
Absorb this wisdom
Let it permeate your intellect
See the devil in the details
And know that you were never truly a part of it
This cesspool you've subconsciously ignored
Your whole life
Is not your home
You are forever

The home and hearth is a welcome sight
On this dark and cold winters night
An evening of merriment, warmth and cheer
Has left me with one extra beer
To drink it, to save it, what should I do
With this lonely high-point imported brew?
I’ll give it to the lonely immigrant
Persecuted by an orange president
Drink deep, my friend from parts unknown
Sadly you must drink alone
For I must leave to use the phone
To tell my friends I made it home

Stood too close
Way too long
Lethal dose
Not too strong
Bring it on

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

Maybe 20 years
if I'm lucky
I'll waste every one
I know I will

Vultures winging lazy, hungry circles
majestic carrion
thinking of dogs
too lazy to chase them way

Maybe it's the poet
on the feeding trend
lifeless, soulless
his broken heart to mend

Apostate
the poet cannot be trusted
he has dealt with lies and half-truths
almost his entire life

He thinks he knows who his friends are
but he doesn't recognize the sound of their laughter
when he's turned away
guffaws, giggles, hateful, evil snark

But he deserves it
madman desire it
your useless, poet,
when your words have no use for you

who can save you now?
there's no more room in here
the rat won't stop growing
and you keep feeding it
and you keep begging us to feed it
but we are what you make us
so somehow or another we will keep it fed
either in your heart or in your head
disgusting vermin
you should have killed it when you could
who knows what that would have meant
but you're addicted to it's company now
it has **** on your masterpiece

They knew he was leaving the band
It broke their hearts
Like loosing an arm or a leg
Sometimes they cried about it
When they played the ethereal songs
They pictured stars in another universe
His was going supernova
Would never recover
He didn't feel as if he was being
Left behind
To a quieter life
A wife, a child, a Name
He'd done what he set out to do
The dream was no longer his to chase
It was his to share

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

when the road turns dark and I've lost my way
I'll call for you on that long day
wind blows bitter and shivers through
on that cold night I'll call for you

I may go gently, then again maybe not
if you are there with me, though only a thought
I'll go there willing, a simple goodbye
no longer frightened with you by my side

to hide my face forever in the shelter of your breast
to move from your suffering into your rest
through every dimension, viewed and unseen
to every fantasy, hope, wish and dream

on the other side of the mirror
things do seem much clearer

Could it be nothing more than
A changing of the hands
Maturity, responsibility
No easy transferral
Or could it be the time has come
To believe in something more than we can see
Sit down in the sand and breathe
These years depend upon
The passing on of dreams
All we can conceive
We must train ourselves to live
On the outskirts of
Light and darkness
On the fringe of our own minds
In the place where they all join together
Described but never revealed
There is no air in heaven
We glow
And a mighty symphony
Manifests into an awesome physical being
That morphs and mutates
Infinitely amazing we are forever content
To watch and listen
As we are part of that symphony
Being seen and heard even now
By those who came before us

Thoughts thoughts thoughts thoughts don't stop they won't stop keep coming unbidden don't stop try to catch one examine exhausting roll it over six sides to a die random molecular structure quarks misfiring

it
is
exhausting

Gotta tell someone gotta tell you big plans for everybody just another bubble rising from the bottom of a Pilsner glass don't wanna over think this but who am I kidding I've already thought it over and decided I've already overthought it the dictionary is my friend Roget is my partner in crime

it
makes
very little sense

...but I won't twist it or turn it, mold it or meld it, sing it or speak it, let it lie let it die let it be let me see...

A general rule of catharsis the recovery process is often difficult the changes it affords take considerable time to assimilate and this is not always a smooth process as one tends to gravitate

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

That's some weak death metal you're praising
Whatever works for you
Deeper levels of hell to be raising
Got better things to do
You say you want a revolution
It's nothing but a game
Pleased to meet you, mister, get your gun
Hope you guessed my name
You still believe everything you're told
Without a question why
Realize you enjoy being controlled
Accept you love the lie
Weak death metal is all that you've known
From the days of your youth
One day I will show you, when you have grown
Black metal is the truth

I looked to the western sky at sundown
I saw it as the Canvas of God.

I stared into the deep infinity of the night sky
I imagined every star a pin ***** in the black horizon
offering tiny glimpses of the Light on the other side.

I came to realize
heaven is to be found
in the moments after sleep consumes the intellect
just before dreams tease the spirit.

I feared inner peace and sought distraction
to the point where distraction took the place of inner peace
and I was content with it.

I sought to deny myself
thoughts,
beliefs,
experiences…
I had sacrificed them
to a code that prohibited them.

I tried to do the right thing
when most of the time I hadn't a clue
what the right thing was.

Awake now
I celebrate diversity
and seek to tear down the walls of intolerance.

I closed my eyes and thought
"This is all there will ever be".
Thus I taught myself to love darkness.

I opened my eyes and thought
"This is all there will ever be".
Thus I taught myself to love light.

A guru led me into a place within myself
neither light nor darkness
he told me "This is all there will ever be".
Thus he taught me that if I wished to find it again
I must empty myself 
surrender to the Supersoul.

It was then that I realized I knew nothing.

I read the Bible.
I read the Bhagavad-Gita.
I read the Koran.
I read a lot of other stuff, too.
It all made sense and I thought to myself,
"God has always been my favorite author"

Then I wanted to be a philosopher.
Then I wanted to be a priest.
Then I wanted to be a hero.
Then I wanted to be a famous rock star.
Then I wanted to be a mentor.
Then I wanted to be a scholar.
Then I wanted to be a Marine.
Then I wanted to be a champion.
I wanted to be a lot of things.
Too many things.

One morning I saw a storm brewing in the eastern sky
and I gave God a high five.

I willingly lost myself in the dreams of others
then felt used and manipulated
when the credits began to roll.

Science nurtured my intellect.
Thoughts nurtured my mind.
Imagination nurtured my spirit.
Dreams nurtured my soul,
satisfied with poet's nonsense,
content with someone else's song.

I never hoped to be a sage or a seer
I'm just another singer reaching for a song
Tired of asking the eternal questions
Not knowing if the answers that I think I've found are wrong
I've been looking out for something to believe in
But faith is hard to come by in these times
And I can't help but judge myself severely
Who can take the punishment and fit it to the crime?

I think I'm walking backwards
I don't trust my own mind
I hope I'm doing the right thing
Leaving all these things behind

I spent all my life searching for the meanings
Of some things I was never meant to know
Always on the outside, looking inside
Knowing I should leave but never knowing where to go
And all I know could fit inside a thimble
Just a drop of wine in the bottom of a glass
Frightened of the last breath I'll be breathing
There is no comfort now in knowing all things, too, must pass

I think I'm walking backwards
I don't trust my own mind
I only hope I'm doing the right thing
Leaving all these things behind

So if I seem a prisoner of my own thoughts
If I seem to mock reality
If my mind seems to slip into oblivion
I'm looking for the things I know are there but still can't see
I'll satisfy my soul with poets' nonsense
I'll be content with someone else's song
Their memories will keep me from believing
That all the things I thought were real, vapors all along

I don't want to walk away from you
But you know I've lost my mind
I hope I've done the right thing
Now that I've left it all behind

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

For hours I tossed and turned
     trying to decide
     if mania had come back to mess with my head
     or just the aged mattress on this king sized bed,
     much too big, swallowing me instead

Back into the spiral of dull vertigo
     the gravitational pull contorts my face
     so long, so hard, the grimace stays in place
     "your face will get stuck frowning", mother would say

I laughed at her then
I'm not laughing today

Pray for the poor bald eagle
Felled by a bullet from a gun
Killing eagles is surely illegal
You better harness your weapon and run

Play for the old bald idiot
Who pays to see your ****** old band
It's him who keeps hollering "Play Free Bird"
When you've just finished playing "Free Bird"

He's an idiot
Killed a majestic bald eagle
Someone took photos
Isn't that also illegal?
Just an idiot
weilding deadly propulsion
clinching the deal with precise aim
He's no amateur
Just sloppy, careless
Might as well be an amateur
Don't feel sorry for the creep
He killed a big old bald eagle

Stay in your homes, for no reason leave
Comfortably dumb in the webs that you weave
Trapped by the ridiculous things you believe
Pray for the eagle, and grieve

Now you come to realize
Roy Orbison was the man
But you never played any of his songs
In your dreadfully ****** old band

The crowd could chant "Pretty Woman"
For all the good it would do
Your ****** old band couldn't play it
Even if they wanted to

You've no idea
How high the wall
But even softer
The heart behind
Capable of such mercy
Squelched by the expectation of pain
Pure capacity for love
A misunderstood abstract
Long ago forgotten
Before given the chance
To blossom

It beats, it hurts
So many times per minute
Who will break it?
Who will scale the wall then tear it down
From the inside?
Teach me to bear pain
Show me that love is
Not what I though it was all my life
What it is
Suffering's reward
To share with the world

Without Love
Protons and electrons break loose
To float their separate trajectories
Into nothingness
Nucleus abandoned
Merges, One, Explodes
Into nothingness
Without Love

Without Love
Atoms rebel
Defy the sticky glue that together
Makes them matter
Trees and things
Reduced to dreams
None of which matter
Without Love

The heart grows hard without it
The soul can't live without it
How can the thinking mind doubt it
With so much revealed about it?

Without Love
People forget
Wonder and mystery, hope and memory
As if Love never existed
They strive for nothing more
Than a gentle death
And hope someone will remember
They existed
But the grand Valtari of time will ensure
Nobody will
Without Love

Without Love
Without light
Without the dividing line
Between day and night
Without belief
Without grace
Without any reason
To stay in this hard place
Without these things
Who can live?
With nothing offered
With nothing to give
There are no words
To make you understand
Not even these
O, loveless man

Ease me down gently into the Dream
Forget what I see, forget what I've seen
Hold me down softly, free me from sin
All that I am, all I have ever been
Gently, son, gently
Into the dream

Make me a home now, deep in your heart
So that time and space won't keep us apart
To dwell in your memory, free of the shame
As years and forgetting atone for the blame
A home, son, my home
Within your heart

Sing me a sweet song to put me to sleep
The one that I gave you and told you to keep
Until the day came I would need it again
To scare away gods and demons and men
No sad songs, son
But sing me to sleep

Remind me, my son, of the things that I said
Of no looking back, only straight ahead
Today is no different, though my eyes cannot see
This place where I go that my mind can't conceive
teach me again, son
These lessons I've taught you

One last thing now, before I begin
This eternal journey that starts at the end
Of a life filled with love, my last wish will be
Take mine with you, son, I'll take yours with me
Before I begin, son,
Ease me into the Dream

The best time to spit your chicken little poetry
Is during the sad hours between midnight
And four in the morning
When the words get swallowed up in hungry darkness
And those who have ears to hear
Sleep the slumber of infants

What are these
Wet and warm
Dripping down my cheeks
Moisture cutting scars in dry skin
Surely blood is thicker than water
I'd be a fool to ask from where they came
Rare as they are
I cannot bring myself to wipe them away
So I leave them to the air
Thankful as they evaporate

She was heading east
Arms folded to hold her coat tight
Against her *******
The wind was cold and made her grimace
This thing she had done
Without shedding tears
They would have frozen as they fell
Wasn't I the one who always said
"When are you going to leave?
You really need to leave"
She had to have seen me
Driving west in my dad's 72 Ford pickup
She recognized the truck
But she wouldn't look towards me
Bowed her head as if praying for forgiveness
Or more likely to keep it from the southern breeze
Perhaps had it been warmer
She would have read my lips as I hit the gas and sped past
"It's about time"

Decades have passed since that December afternoon
I don't forget even the tiniest details
Mainly I realize how wrong I was
Hindsight and revelation shame me
I drove her away
I pushed them apart
Not even knowing
I was the reason she was walking instead of driving
I was the weight that hung from their necks
With every bitter, loud and angry word
They were fighting about me
"It's about time," I said
"You would have been happier had you left years ago"
And maybe you would have
But I needed you more than I wanted to believe
And I needed him more than I cared to know
God, what a messed up situation it was
I'll be haunted by it for the rest of my life

"It's about time"
What a bunch of ******* that was

The waver in his voice
I'd never heard before
Though I heard him sing the song
A thousand times or more
Why am I only now hearing it?
It doesn't come close to derailing
His intonation
But gives the timbre of his voice
A weathered feel, older than his years
Turning workable hippie lyrics
Into sage sung wisdom
Picked up by the other voices
For three part harmonies
Some drug in charge of his mind
Allowing creativity an escape
Head's so high up in the clouds
He steals his best lines from angels
But he doesn't know what it means
He's been convinced that his entire life
Is one long journey to see what it means
Yet when they come to the end of the line
All that's there to find
Is
A mirror
A full size looking glass
For the wisdom he must make a pass
Straight through it's view of the world
On the one side
Wisdom lay on the other
And since he never got his fill of wisdom
He took a dive into the reflection
But he didn't come out on the other side
He fell and floated in a limitless pool of
Darkness
Black
He could only see himself and that from inner light
No rays touched him from the outside
Soon he became comfortable
Gliding on air
He decided he liked it better than singing
And wisdom
So he just sort of wafted away and
Disappeared
Leaving behind his song about
No simple highway
He accepted his passive role
And confesses from light years away
That he never knew the way back home

Stuck here in the middle
    with my thoughts swirlin' 'round me
Like a storm come to sweep me away

Too much thinking,
    I'm so tired of my own voice
Won't be quiet, ain't got nothin' to say...

...says it anyway.

Another day to drown in sound
Arms open, legs still, no struggle
I just drink it in then
I breathe it in then
I sink to the source
Where vibrations toll new tones

And I was Quasimodo, rope in hand
Ringing bells louder than the life I live
Sound pushing waves of air into me
Knocking me over, shaking my guts
I couldn't hear the sound of my own laughter
Or the screams of my ears bleeding

And I was lost in space, doomed to die alone
In silence
I did not realize silence could be deafening
A vacuum pops the only thing breaks is
I stopped talking to myself yesterday
I was driving myself insane

And I believed all music was from God
As He said
He would comfort me with songs of deliverance
And I may have been fooling myself
But I believed God was in all music
I still believe that

Open the gates of heaven, the first song I hear
Will be the best song I ever heard in my life
Peter will ask me what I think and I'll tell him
Then he'll tell me it's the weakest track on the record
"Wait until you get to the middle"
That's how I'll know I'm in heaven

If you've hurt me
I've forgiven you
Honestly
I have
If you've let me down
Deserted me
Pushed me to the ground
I have forgiven you

Not with hollow words
Forgotten when the memory
Comes back around to taunt me
When the past comes back to haunt me
But knowing full well
I have hurt somebody else
Let somebody down
Left someone when they needed me

You didn't have to ask
I did it for myself
To compass the distance
The east flees from the west
To see if I could do it
Though I never could alone
Break my prideful begrudging
On the precious cornerstone

And though I know you didn't ask me
You are forgiven
And you might not even want it
You are forgiven
And I don't expect a thing from you
You are forgiven
For I've been given
A reason to let it all go

This was my life's work.
It's all I had going for me.
A head in a hand basket.
A knuckle-rust sandwich.
Stored neatly in a corner
Reserved for mice and maggots
Wrapped in used aluminum foil
Just as I left it
on that cold and only day
Far away from grey skies and blue turtle tails.
Most days I could barely concentrate.
Too much pressure.
Too many distractions
...and though I realized this was to be
The last stand of my memorys
I couldn't help but feel as if more than time was being wasted.



Apologize.
It's the way my brain works.
Nothing gets done.
I fall in love
with the thought of impermanence
until the cold realization
it's my own illusion
whispering away on the wind
no one else's...
...so I fail again.

This beginning leans
towards the end
No indication
an anti-****** of sorts
and if there's a God in heaven,
if I haven't wasted all this life struggling against the weight of damnation in vain...
I will be redeemed in it's eccentricity


I've courted eccentricity
a blind lover
eager for the afterglow.
Expectations I've hoarded are staggering
They turn me into an eager handyman of souls.
An eccentric nature I've absorbed
Yet loathsome to me.  
Craving acceptance
but ****** the man who can figure me out.
It hurts so much to know I've missed you.
The signal resignation
I've been forced to grant normalcy.

I tried. It's too hard. Sleep is too deep within me. I make too many mistakes. I'll fall asleep

Judge for yourselves, brothers and sisters
The weight of your words
The worth of your thoughts
Before putting them on paper
If you choose to give them away
They must stand on their own
You must be prepared to be misunderstood

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'll write a list of all the things I'm thankful for
Then I'll write another of all the burdens I've carried
And I won't stop writing until one is longer than the other
Then I'll take them both and throw them in the fire
Do it again next year

Davar
Riding the speed of sound
Your command fills the room
How many heads turned
Looking for the Source
What was the question?
How did you know my name?
Her name, her name, her name, my name
Important words our parents used
To describe us

Davar
You must speak if you wish to be heard
First command respect
Next command obedience
Obedience to the power of a word
Don't tell me to read, I'm lazy with sloth
Read to me, let me close my eyes
And pretend creation is the purpose of the world
"Poets writing about poetry
I can't tell you how much they bore me"

Davar
The former word rides accompanied
One on the left side
One on the right side they fly
To the ears, the brains, the hearts, the soul
Speak it into being
Only one could
Speak it into being
Soon comes the day
Davar drips from my tongue
The air around me will turn from oxygen
To liquid to gel to something more durable
Inside this cocoon I'm walking into
I can manipulate all things
I can experiment with five, six dimensions or more
So that my cocoon
This eternal hibernation unit I've designed
And powered by my creativity
Is heaven
This cocoon, evolved brain
Is all I've wanted needed
All I'll ever need and want
Planted the Davar
Almost a century until it was ready
Blossomed now into
My beautiful reward

Laying back
Close the folds in on me
Only room for two
I lie in bliss
Waiting for you

For one second
I looked forward
To the day I've dreaded
All my life
My prayer now
Is that I might find it again
That I would live the rest of my life
Inside the eternal
Knowing that I was wrong
To believe I'd found heaven
In this world
When the Kingdom is on the other side of the door
So much more glorious
I cannot conceive
How long, how much longer
To sing this song
How much longer the weary soul
How much longer the persecution
How much longer the suffering
Only a moment
Seems a lifetime
Because it is

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