I am a collective
an ongoing collaboration
a group enterprise

I revel in my diversity
sit in its lap
while being carefully groomed

Nothing becomes me
like agreement among friends
Nothing fills my sails
like the wind of good company

When all my words
are stilled
when every breath is drawn
then you might come near

When every tale is told
and when myth
becomes gossip among friends
then
and only then
will I willingly depart.

That's the day,
friends,
when we all meet
on that distant shore,
when sweetness dissolves
into the dark.

I have one foot
in the beyond already.
My ticket is punched
my resolve unmatched.

Give me your hand, my friend,
in good cheer
for nothing now will leave us bereft.

Never yet alone
never yet divorced from grace.

Amen.

I surf through a crowd,
click, click, click,
am I slick?
Am I sick?

The faces cascade, each one like a molecule
in a waterfall of desire and liars and fire.
Do we sit here to burn or to yearn.
Do we ever learn or feel concern.
It seems I will never tire to conspire
against my own soul on this wire.

I'm wired.
The screen crackles a strange glow.
The bits and bytes tell me there's hope.
Ones and zeroes like so much knotted rope.
I hang on her every word,
oh, my shame is ethereal.
I want to stop seeing her,
but my hunger is serial.

She whisper's, "But wait...
...
...
...
... there's more..."
and I die to be born her prisoner.

In lust we trust,
the internet anthem,
the trumpet of the millennia
our senses abandoned.
The cascading fire, behind the screen,
the ache inside: my mind? my spleen?
I must be rotten,
how could I not be,
their alluring words and forms,
imprison me.

Can I break free? Qui-qui? Hehe!
It's a total lie, there is no greener grass.
So I hunger for more of the poison that made me;
I seek to drown myself, like a manly baby,
"Gimme more! A little more!"
They stand in shock,
then retreat to their bottles,
ignoring the ticking clock.
Back to her and her and her,
the ones who will never love me,
who've ensnared me to drain me,
me and me and me.

There are different kinds of blindness,
many we will never be ****** enough to see
but when the blinds are open,
can we really change what we see?
Do we come awake to a ruin,
a festering, aching, screaming lump of chaos
that we are but fingers to... this abomination.

I surf the crowd
and when she comes again,
I'll just change the channel,
and a new face materializes,
her beauty renders me thirsty
I smile my sleekest smile,
I recite the uncanny words,
"Mirror mirror on the wall."