I sit here again
with a beer and a cigarette
communing with a lost soul
my own?
    someone else's?
I read scripture and the
words dance around me
a thousand flights of fancy
on the page
my incense burning
this pure incense burning
this pure understanding
of the cruel nature
of humanity
of friends, heroes, lovers
I write it all down
try to solve it
it stands before me
a picture of my steps
to this point
I have reached the point
of unabashed unregulated
distorted reality
my daily life
the breathing
the eating
the sleeping
it doesn't seem any more real
than this life I live
in my head
or somewhere in my heart
and I long to touch the
part of me that is real
but I am so disconnected

flowers in the winter still grow towards the sun
and such is my soul
leaning leaning
toward the everlasting source
                                                     reality fails me
and lights go dim
and I cause the moon to glow for a light
somewhere in this dark night
                                                  and I can't stop believing in a God that doesn't exist
                      but which pushes further down this tunnel into the hell
of my eternity
and I can't
find simplicity
can't find purity
it's all convoluted
I hate the game
   shifting pulling
begging for release
and somehow I am
an ember in a fire
bent on burning out
forever
and I have a soul
I have a heart
someone acknowledge me in this newspaper grey world
I am flat lining
where will I go after
this life has sloughed off my skin
I know I am endless
and I am bound for a world
where opinion doesn't taint reason
                            and somehow
                            I will be there
                            where the sky meets space
                            I will be there
                                                   somehow.