The krakken is always there
waiting to pull me under

the deep weight of depression that
seeks to destroy me.

I float adrift as if in the abyss
only to find myself  at the start again

where the journey is an uphill walk
through the mire and brine of foggy alcohol.

There is one thing that ought to be taught in all the colleges,
Which is that people ought to be taught not to go around always making apologies.
I don't mean the kind of apologies people make when they run over you or borrow five dollars or step on your feet,
Because I think that is sort of sweet;
No, I object to one kind of apology alone,
Which is when people spend their time and yours apologizing for everything they own.
You go to their house for a meal,
And they apologize because the anchovies aren't caviar or the partridge is veal;
They apologize privately for the crudeness of the other guests,
And they apologize publicly for their wife's housekeeping or their husband's jests;
If they give you a book by Dickens they apologize because it isn't by Scott,
And if they take you to the theater, they apologize for the acting and the dialogue and the plot;
They contain more milk of human kindness than the most capacious diary can,
But if you are from out of town they apologize for everything local and if you are a foreigner they apologize for everything American.
I dread these apologizers even as I am depicting them,
I shudder as I think of the hours that must be spend in contradicting them,
Because you are very rude if you let them emerge from an argument victorious,
And when they say something of theirs is awful, it is your duty to convince them politely that it is magnificent and glorious,
And what particularly bores me with them,
Is that half the time you have to politely contradict them when you rudely agree with them,
So I think there is one rule every host and hostess ought to keep with the comb and nail file and bicarbonate and aromatic spirits on a handy shelf,
Which is don't spoil the denouement by telling the guests everything is terrible, but let them have the thrill of finding it out for themselves.

There is something about a Martini,
A tingle remarkably pleasant;
A yellow, a mellow Martini;
I wish I had one at present.
There is something about a Martini,
Ere the dining and dancing begin,
And to tell you the truth,
It is not the vermouth--
I think that perhaps it's the gin.

Peace brought to the wrangling edge of my own being
I look and I find I search and I am lost

Keeper of secrets
So many evil ***** things lie in the recesses of my mind

I have forgotten more evil than most people truly consider
I have looked deep in myself
to see the wandering lust
that drives a community of mad
Yet mad
individuals

Women and men
who have found solace
in the darkest part of me

I take them all in
I care for the ideals they set forth
Yet they are lost
into the echoed chambers
of my mind

Each time I grow

Each time the line falls away

I see you all again
wandering deep inside there

Seeing some of you wandering
makes me consider
if what you spoke
was ever true to you

this is the lean season
where the weight of the world
is my weight

when I begin to have grand delusions
where I picture atlas

and think….

he and I are kin
quiet kin
begotten of Sisyphus…

ha! Leave no stone unturned
upon the landscape
from which you feed

each stone is mine
in this Sisyphus-ian dream
none to small
none to great
all things compared
I will wear this stone and road smooth
before too long

Each thing in its place and time
And to each place some time

I correlate the strain
that is blinding me

Looking for a cause in the universe
A common event

that brings down
the true space

That simple cell
that would surprise everyone.

I was given this exterior for many reasons
None I ever consider

I look upon it’s hues and textures
and consider many an item.

Cara de nopal

hecho de piedra y hierro


Lomo de Pipila



Con alma

esta alma

tan




Perdida

Anger,
as black as a hook,
overtakes me.
Each day,
each ****
took, at 8:00 A.M., a baby
and sauteed him for breakfast
in his frying pan.

And death looks on with a casual eye
and picks at the dirt under his fingernail.

Man is evil,
I say aloud.
Man is a flower
that should be burnt,
I say aloud.
Man
is a bird full of mud,
I say aloud.

And death looks on with a casual eye
and scratches his ****.

Man with his small pink toes,
with his miraculous fingers
is not a temple
but an outhouse,
I say aloud.
Let man never again raise his teacup.
Let man never again write a book.
Let man never again put on his shoe.
Let man never again raise his eyes,
on a soft July night.
Never. Never. Never. Never. Never.
I say those things aloud.

If I had seen your paradise,
I'd welcome rain come in again.
If you had to me entice.
Had I not born my soul, a drunk,
disguised as lust behind my cups,
my head'd lay softly on this bunk.
We should not us, dear dreamers,
think our words perfectly heard.
We are prone to fall awake.
As I am prone to cry by night,
when most clearly comes the light.

I have been happy two weeks together,
My love is coming home to me,
Gold and silver is the weather
And smooth as lapis is the sea.

The earth has turned its brown to green
After three nights of humming rain,
And in the valleys peck and preen
Linnets with a scarlet stain.

High in the mountains all alone
The wild swans whistle on the lakes,
But I have been as still as stone,
My heart sings only when it breaks.

Earth’s still-born sister

Cast-away
Aborted

Your ghostly image
Pock-marked and pale

Follows

A haloed haunting
Forever drawn
By primitive
Family ties

Shy sibling
Nightly your clouded iris
Averts our gaze

But this evening
In wonderful dilation

You stoop low
To peer

In magnificent bloodshot beauty

At what might have been

© Marcus Lane 2008