These are the days
Of the Great Divide
One says they're wrong
While the other says they're right
With a passion that burns
Hot on both sides
On this hill they've made the deal
Where they're all willing to die

To turn a few heads
They lay out the facts
On what they are fed
What others have said
All hurried along
With not much time left
Before this game of craps
Loses all bets

The Great Divide
Moves right along
Both can't be right
But both could be wrong
May not have our backs
But put on a good front
What both sides are missing
Is brotherly love

I've made it past adolescence
Years and then beyond
Into a personal goal of mine
Far too old now to die young

Not one to admit that I'd ever go back
And relive it all again
No need to think twice, not on your life
Once around the block is plenty my friend

Would I want to change the mistakes I made
That made me out the man I am
No second thought to whether or not
I've earned every scar I have, good or bad

On the outside of me they're quite easy to see
It's the ones deep beneath I guard
Hang around long enough they'll eventually show up
Giving glimpses of life's old school yard

From beginning to end can't say that I've been
Always on my best behavior
But one thing I can say that I'll take to my grave
Along the way I can thank my Maker

From here I'll just stick with the chances I get
Until I'm met with the great beyond
And be thankful with the days I have left
Being too old now to die young

Like a dog that returns to his *****
I continue in my sin
How badly I must want it
Time and time and time again

I hate I'm that way more often than not
Shackled like a runaway slave
I want what I don't, and I'll take the whole lot
Straight down with me into the grave

With little hope I too often go it alone
Desiring that which I lack
Chilled to the bone by a heart that's grown cold
The devil must get a good laugh over that

As I once again eat from the dumpster of sin
Not realizing what it does to my pallet
When every excuse I dare care to use
Is at its worst a word salad

I try and clean myself up then jump back in the mud
At the height of this worthless endeavor
Continuing on, getting it totally wrong
In a world, missing rungs on its ladder

I won't find the cure if not deep in the word
There simply is no doubt about it
This acceptance of sin in its own sour time will do me in
Like a dog that returns to his *****

Who’s out there these days
Not taking something
For mood enhancement
No worries, it’s prescription

Who is counting the ways
People don’t listen
All second guessing
On what they are missing

Who’s too confused to say
What they are thinking
Not good at crowd reading
Believe what they’re seeing

Who always craves
At needing a reason
Prideful chest beating
A man for all seasons

Who’s giving away
Their soul in searching
A lifetime of flirting
To come up with nothing

Seventeen without a clue
With no idea of what to do
You just do what they say to
But what are they really telling you

You have a full life that's ahead
And don't need this to hold you back
It's easy to remove this mess
Never mentioning once, the regret

As you're wheeled into the room
Behind the masks a smile or two
The speakers play an unfamiliar tune
With no one here to comfort you

Who's in control of this life
As you perceive what's wrong and right
You've heard how justice can be blind
Could this be one of those times

You had the truth in front of you
To help you choose what you should do
When in the end you had no clue
And now somehow it bothers you

When poetry grabs ahold of you
It latches on real tight
Takes you to a place of rhythm
On up into rhyme

Maneuvering its many moves
Through the maze inside your mind
Ninety nine percent loose as a goose
With one percent, hold on tight  

Soon enough is when you find out
Imaginations running wild
Like a feral stallion in open field
Or an up too late unruly child

Flashes its ideas up in lights
Like a Broadway night out on the town
Just as easily lifts you up
As quickly as it throws you down

The moment that it grabs you
And holds on for dear life
Poetry is all you think about
Most all of the time

Being a blessing or a curse
Is all in how you read the signs
Along with how far you've crossed
Over poetry's high-wire