For years I've been trying to write
something that would cause the earth to shake--
maybe even slightly tip it off its axis.
Not because it possesses any eloquent grandeur
with words like "cataclysm" or "surreptitious"
nor due to any celeb-ritory status
that may befall my unkempt and ghostly pale person.

                      I just want people to think!

From the moment most of us
are pushed from our mother's dark, watery womb
it's like we're given a hardhat and a pick,
then told to find some gold in the mine
because if you want to keep working in the mine
you have to pay
and then as we try to explain that we're uneducated about mining
because we were just birthed we are told not to worry
because there are teachers who will educate us about the mine
and every so many days we're tested on what we learned about the mine
all the while being told to forget not about the gold in the mine
and sometimes we get a little tired or bored of looking for gold
so we're given a book to read about some guy named Mr. Brahmallah Siddhartahweh Christ
along with a few cigarettes, beer and lunch meat to relax
for a few minutes before it's time to get back to work to look for gold in the mine
to pay to look for gold in the mine
and lord help you if you can't pay to work in the mine because you need to work in the mine
to work in the mine.

                                                      Confused?­ That's the point...
Now, the metaphor above is a crude illustration
of what I'm talking about,
but I have confidence you understand what's gnawing at me,
AND what should be at you too.

                     Where is there time to think??

Even in scientific and philosophical occupations
there isn't much thinking these days.
Many take science as law
the same way extreme, right wingers from any religion
take their "religious doctrine" as law.
Our politics, technology and even reading is polluted
with derision and division into different schools of thought
from a Conservative Team Edward Apple supporting Griffendor Christian
to a Liberal Hufflepuff PC using Team Jacob Buddhist.
Now I understand why all these new agers
keep referencing The Matrix.

                           WHAT IS REAL!?
That must be a decent explanation as why people go insane;
suffocating on all the weighty labels
forcefully pinned to their soul.

And yet...
more people, like me,
are desperately clawing away at these labels,
attempting to find a little fresh air,
perhaps filled with the smell of paint,
graphite, charcoal, clay, **** and natural body pheromones
while sounds of music, chanting, cheers, sobbing, silence, giggling and *******
echo in the breathing room
as we feel the grass beneath our feet, wind matriculating through our hair, another warm and loving body embracing ours with cool water trickling down our backs...
People like me
wishing to be metaphorically, figuratively, theologically and psychologically digambara  
subconsciously evolving from sadhu to avadhuta
          preaching anekantavada
           while simultaneously revealing it all stems from ONE!

But...
many of us are caught in a dilemma best expressed by E.B. White:

[Arising] in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world, [making] it hard to plan the day.

These days, to the masses working in the mine,
if you're trying to improve the world you're a kook or a traitor,
just ask the SnowMannings.
If you try enjoying the world you're labeled lazy.
We all just want to be       FREE!!

Of course, Bill Hicks once said,
If you think you're free, trying going somewhere without ******* money.  

And when you THINK about that,
you start to get confused, right?
Maybe your head starts to hurt, right?
Because when you THINK about that,
and all the supposed enlightened people
from Siddhārtha Gautama who resigned from his royal trappings
to Yeshua HaNotzri who renounced material possessions with a needle
while the passive warrior Mahatma Gandhi thought western civilization a good idea.

Why are most children discouraged from being artists, farmers and the next far out thinkers?
Because      there’s        no          money        in         ­ it!  
Again, we’re back in the mine looking for gold.
But what would happen if you stopped?
What would happen if you got in the mine cart and said “**** it,”
then went careening down the shaft,
whirling and twirling faster and faster enjoying the ride!

But now I’m positioned in another quandary;
                       SOLUTIONS!  

While people like myself may have a few ideas
I think they are impossible to share at the moment
Because the majority of the population is too lazy
and complacent to do anything.
First we need to awaken!
First we have to get mad like Howard Beale!
We have to collectively reject the current frequency
and do like Tim Leary where we “turn on, tune in and drop out.”

Ok,
Let’s take five,
maybe more.
And when we reunite
let’s hash out some solutions,
**** out what does and doesn’t work.