Why'd you say those words to me?
               "You'll never be h__*y."
I believe that it's true,
but I wouldn't say those words to you.

I've fixed on fixation fulfilling your divination
well!
Happy is as happy do
now i have some words for you!

When you look you never find.
Love is fleeting, never blind.
All good things come to an end.
Have a taste of your own medicine!

I am that black hole.

For others,
I wore that mask.
For you,
I thought could
shed for but a moment.


Then the door flung wide.
You fled,
and the void inside
became my whole
Instead

Disbelief
is not reflection
nor reaction
It is the natural state

Divine bolts and
Watchers from above
Below flaming chariots
And squealing torment

Before I met you
Fear and wonder
Were not absent in me

But now even those
I temper with doubt

Yet disbelieve
and all
  I know
   is this

     A champion of reason
       is alone in the abyss

the further i stretch
the more painful the retraction
and the more brittle the substrate
it feels too late for
discipline and temperance
to slow this roll
it needs to break

Ah,
I'll ne're be empty
When I'm so bottleful.
Drink to the heathens,
And sip to the ne're-do-well.
Cheers to seers, scheming
Lewd in their freshed hell.
Give thy sighs arresting
Forthwith with them a thpell.
Bartled body brandyful,
a bottled bag of burgundy.
Bourbon, bourbon, bourbon
bourbon, brandy, brandy,
Yup.

I'm trying,
as fast
as I can
to run out
of things
to say
so I can
go back
to being
a productive
American,
but that's
not likely
to happen.

I fell right down the stairs.
With a tumbling joy.
And laughed at the bottom.

Disappear in your
new delusion.

Fear.
Hate.
Money.
God.

Consume.
Consume.
Doom.
Doom.

You bought it.
You ate it.
But who is eating whom?

Delusion.
Delusion.
Delirium.
Obsession.

Tiki torches are on sale
for seven ninety seven.

You swallowed
your ideology
whole.

But, you'll never
be full again.

So, where do you go,
when crossroads
circle back to where
you began?

Oh, I know.

I unravel the mythology.
The narrative laid bare
as crude, exposed anatomy.

A relentless disavowal
of essence.

But discarded truths
Are pages torn
From something incomplete.

What I need
May be among
that parchment
I sent flying.

I will dance in brightness.
Though diffused and overcast,
With scattered rays I fight this
Shadow from my past.

"Boys will be boys"
"He just got carried away"
"You're just seeing things"

The same words mothers use
to defend their ****** sons.

You didn't birth that man,
so why are you defending him?
You handed your dignity away,
so what have you got to lose?

Oh right—
ideology is everything.

The Nazis were not above sentiment.
They spoke of fatherland and Fuhrer,
with tears in their eyes,
and hands on their hearts.
At once,
deeply earnest,
and deeply sadistic.

For a while I dreamed,
we were self-aware enough
to recognize this hypocrisy...

but here we go again.
Same hands
Same tears
Same excuse

Did you know how much of everything you lack?

Did you know that lonely people are more likely to die?

Did you know that context is entirely subjective?

Did you know that suffering on an innumerable scale is happening, at this very moment, on this very planet, right under our very noses?

Did you know that it's all your fault?

Did you know that no man is an island?

Did you know that family is everything?

Did you know.

Did you know that every joy you feel is a reaction against a cloying despair?

...

Yes  I did but do I?  No.

You're not dumb.
You're not blind.
You know what you see.
You're not half as weak
as they claim you to be.
So Speak.
Speak your mind.
Be free.

Don't follow me.
Don't like me.
I'm not going anywhere nicely.
I've walked all my darkest paths,
and I did not tread them lightly.
I'd say "look before you leap,"
but more than likely,

I'd obscure |
                     | the destination.

Say, Have you seen
my latest painting?

It's a dog. Isn't it cute?
I could paint one of you.
I'd capture all your beauty.
Or perhaps your heart too.

You could give it to me

I would craft my worship
to suit everything you need.
Your vessel would be holy,
while enshrined in my belief.
Wait.
Don't look.
Don't turn on that light.
When the brightness shines
upon my path,
All my darkest nights...

would only make you laugh.

I try to believe in nothing.
My teeny toe is dipped in nihilism.
But nothing, I struggle to attain.

To be a sponge, a vessel of
absorption
An empty state of being,  but still
grasping at the feeling

That someone will fill me with desire.

-----

Am I nihilistic, or just burnt out?
Neural pathways terminate in "X".
Do not pass. All roads lead to pain.
Oh, you've let me down again.

Pain isn't nothing.
I should heed its alarm.
But believing is something
I fear more than ego-death.

Boogey boogey boo
the government's coming for you.

You claim to speak the truth,
but I can smell the bull-doo.

Suckered into algorithmic chat,
you swapped out your foil hat.

Yeah,
you got plenty to say about that...

"Do your own research," you say
in that smarmy, satisfied way.

A Cheshire grin of vapidity
stretching across the infinity

of your insipid, stifled ignorance.
Well, maybe just for once,

instead of condemning us to hell,
you could try questioning yourself.

I'd say a character with no self doubt
is guaranteed to be wrong about

quite
a
lot.

A movie became manifest
I left with an axe
Awkwardness
I ran
And thorns caught me in the ***

...another ideal to be fulfilled.
There is no vessel without intent.
I'm pretty sure a lake holds water.

It happened matter of factly
Exactly as proclaimed to be

Before I had the time to see
I chose the path they chose for me.

Now...
I'm their worst enemy.

I'm very lucky
I've always had a family
In the back of my mind
I don't know why
I can't
Reach them

I've been a dismantler
Half deceiver
Wannabe wanderer
Part drifter schemer
That's just who I say I am

Really I'm so frightened
I've run so much from loss
That all my days I live in grief
For things I never had

Drifting further
That reach
stretches
But they're
still there.
My family.

I remember them standing there,
watching me try to reel it in—
their sardonic expressions
as I complain.

I'm six years old.
The pole bends hard.
I feel like I'll be pulled in.

A rust-red shape arcs in the water.
The line snaps.
Their eyes widen in surprise,

but they say nothing.
They quietly hold their shame,
and take the rod from me.

"I don't miss her, I swear!"
"We were miserable in the end."
"But I fear I may never feel that way again."

"Each new love
that follows the last
is so much nuance wrapped in intention."

—

What was easy before,
could be so much more,
if he could reach beyond his ignorance.

But his inherent void
drives him toward
the desire of pre-oedipal innocence.

It's just how life goes,
tip-toeing about.

A friend here, a friend there.
In my heart they've not gone anywhere.

I may see them next Tuesday,
or perhaps, never again,
but in my heart
I will always call them friend.

Hello, Depression!
It sure is a fine day we're having.
You look good.
Is that a new shirt?
(Don't worry...
I won't ask you
that question.)

But I was wondering...
Do you still have
that book I lent?
or that dance step
and that drum set
and that pile of projects,
or that relationship
and that tiny pit of—
-not despair-
we used to sit with?

And what about that
career path,
or that time we had
or that moment of belief,
where sorrow was reprieved,
and we knew—
we knew
that love was something real?

I know you're very sensitive, Depression,
but if you don't give them back—
I'm going to have to ask you...
That question.

We do not heed the call.
Would we even hear the trumpets blare?
Illusion is our dissolution.
It escalates on every front.
It's happening right now.

Toss me another fishy, human!
I'll do a trick for you!

But in those fishy depths
I've got some work to do.

Survival Thriving Dolphin Time
but some day I will meet you

'tween the mystic barrier
of H2O and O2.

(actually it's N2, O2, Ar, CO2)

...and as the dolphin descended
i could sense his withering glance...

Wait come back,
my dolphin friend!
I didn't mean to offend
my knowledge is at ocean level
whose makeup; chemical
is as foreign to me
as you are slip-per-y!
Ack...

I'm never gonna see that dolphin again...

I can't stand that man's face
or ruined words of hate
but I'm really stupid now
he's all anyone talks about
I'm really really stupid now
my reaction is automatic
a dumb-en-ing numb-en-ing
strangling in my frontal lobe
his pursed words
******* rancid
into heaving, swarming,
zealous crowds
of barely individuals
who sup upon the fear
they self-righteously accuse
the other of.

I'm so stupid now.
I can't see.
I can't breathe.
but what I can do is
BLEEEEP
_ %&;! you  $#*!!!
$#%$ *&'
%$##*! I'll 5*@##$
**$%*# *
_
(continues...)

I forgot. I forgot.
There's a war.
There's all those things
I said and did,
but I still dig,
unironically, elevator music,
or the cheesiest 1950s tiki.
Half-Whitest Wannabe
Jazz Enthusiast
innocently appropriating
joy.
I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
There's a war.
There's an endless culture of consumption
of which i find myself embedded,
but I must head to joy,
whenever, wherever,
or find myself indulging
in murkier depths of idiot longing.
Please.

I need permission.

I am frivolous.
Pain equivalence.
What I feel,
is it real,
or is it just perception?
That's the question
I'm begging you
for answers to.

Reaction
guides my action.

Chemical and automatic,
Stagnant and static

These thoughts of me..
frozen in immobility.

I'm not doing
too good today.
I've been around
for far too long,

just taking my time,
doing nothing
at all.
Watching the sun
and the moon
revolve.

I don’t wanna look
where I don’t wanna go,
so I stand at the window,
looking in
my own home.

There’s my brains
on the wall,
and the floor.
Scoop em on up
and I'll try once more.

I’m
doing just fine
today—
I got my new
medication.

Sunshine singing
on the birds
in the rain,
sunshine calling
my name.

Until I look I'm happy
And then, y'know... I see.

It's so much nicer without
that shallow corporate "squee".

The diatribe of private dictators
so self-servingly

Proclaiming that their failure is
the fault of their employee.

Their mistake is in the hiring
of those who will not sip

That rancid, unappealing
Kool-aid fed by drip.

I shut myself away again
Enrapt in the trapping of
whats, forgots and don't have.
The emergence is anticipated.
Soon a butterfly. Or pupated nymph.
The new me!
Emergent emergency!
Trapped in the smoke
with nowhere to go.
No one to be.
Don't read
Kafka Nietzsche or Dostoyevsky

I lost my work ethic
(if I ever really had it).
No more drive in me
to be a cog in society—
Builder, maker, creator.
Business owner, slaver.
Delusional entrepreneur
(You know who you are).

Burnout, failure, disgrace—
Never show my face again.
The career path ends.
Let’s just call it what it is-is:
mid-life-crisis-es.
I’ll pick up the pieces-es
and find...
ellipses.

Name yourself "Truth"
to mask your lies.
Claiming none can see
without your eyes.
You fear to face inward,
so in words you hide.
But blatant analogy
reveals your disguise.

You got a taste as
The teeth sank in.
A Mouthful of guts.
Spitting Ravenous,
Hungry savage.
Chase em with
the noose tied.
Burn a house down
with a family inside.
No escaping this time.

Sparks. Shatter. Glass.
The hateful gather.
Tongues pointed, lusted.

Mob Justice...

Deny. Deny.
A distended death cry.
Woke with the taste of blood,
and never know why.

"Got carried away"
"Just a little mistake."
"A good person, I swear."
"You just had to be there."

"The blood. The blood."
"Was all up in my head"
"You didn't hear what they said."

"Guilt is dispersed."
"You can't blame me."
"I'm just one of the many."

Retract. Retract.
Rejects those facts.
"What you saw was fake."
"We were heroes that day."
"Propaganda, you see."
"What was done unto them,
was done unto me!"

Forgive and Full Pardon.
"We were right! We were right!"
"What fire? What night?"
No screams. No bodies.
No guilt in sight.
No Justice.
No...

Just...

...

Why do I only trust _ ?
Metaphor obscures,
Aesthetic dilutes
intent.

In summer’s garden witness:
A brightening twine,
Along with elder brother,
Two bees fighting.

There,
a battle seemed unnatural.

Toiled once in unison,
But here they tousled.
Buzzing.

Hive and Harmony.
Discordant.
Buzzing.

Efferent corbiculae,
Of twelve legs,
Of a thousand eyes.

A brightening twine.
Two bees fighting.

Their
battle is unnatural.

Can you show me
The only way?
Do you know it?
Can we go
Together?
Is it heaven today
When it rains forever?

To true believe
Consciously,
I sleep under
Hypocrisy,

And wonder.

Hypocrisy
Make a fool of me.

And the good will acting,
Acting selfishly,
And the boulder rolling,
rolling, falling.

No real desire,
But to push again.
The myth of nihilism.
Where all I find is much
too much.

Then what is this call?

I need another name,
but "God".
Of "Him" I cannot drink.
Or "death drive", or "entropy",
Or a "sharp wave cascade",
Or the "heat death of the universe"
Theory.

Belief.

Hypocrisy.

Abandon all ye subtext
all them who dare enter there.

They do deserve to be picked apart,
not to be danced around.

Look a Neo-Fascist in the eye
and tell them who they are.

Make them Sieg Heil
as many times as it takes
for them to know
they actually mean it.

Like a little child who
smokes a pack of cigarettes.
They're gonna like it
or *****.

an absence of your presence
is another neural taboo
a place i won't go
i won't wonder where
arcs that electricity
i cut it at the nerve
ending in the place i don't look
but each thought dismissed
is not transcendent
it adds to the heap
i'm not prepared for
grief.

Tired of the
People
Rapping
on the window.
Running through
Room,
After empty room,
After empty room.
Where
did all the people go?

I've searched all ways
but behind me.
I hope
they never find me.
Do Not Turn Around.
I run through empty room,
After empty room,
Do Not Turn Around.
After empty room,
I Am Found—

She's driving fast
on the winding road,
and she won't
listen.

Sign says thirty,
She's going fifty-five.
"Jess, Please Slow Down"
She Doesn't.
She Won't.

My Pleas induce
her acceleration.
Eighty-Eight.
"Stop the car!"
"Let me out!"
Ninety-Five.
She hits a sign.
"Stop the ******* car!"
I pinch her side.

"STOP. STOP NOW."

She does and I get out.
And then it's all my fault.
Her eyes roll, at the same time
asking for forgiveness.

"I'm not riding with you," I say.
Incredulous, she drives away.

I don't know where I am,
but a crowd has gathered.
I follow them into the building.
A store. A small town gathering.
I draw attention to myself.
The small, gray man,
who disappears in the city
but stands out among the folk.
The eyes want contact,
but their faces turn from lack
of recognition.

I feign a smile, and a polite air,
as I shuffle through.
Making one circuit,
then back to the exit.

I'm walking home.
A two day journey.
Or a single flight
of screaming terror.
Is that irony?
No.

Two large men corner me,
as I amuse myself with
my suffering.

They speak as if I'm not there.
Sizing me up.

"He doesn't look dangerous."

For some reason I say,
"You don't ******* know me,"
and this makes them laugh,
as though confirming my
impotence in their eyes.

They stop following,
and I start walking.

I've got a long way to go.

I forage the grove,
or grave
of tangled thought.

Like a wild wood
what grows there,
was not planted.

Seeds are scattered,
thriving, but entwined
along the animal path.

The birdsong carries
a distant echo...

     memory...

       ...the detritus
          of what I know.

May the edges of my intellect only be eroded by the efforts of oceans. A fortress of stone enduring endless waves but never breaking. Only successive shedding so imperceptible that time before forgets its form.

A poison seed is furtive in neglected soil.

From scorched earth it emerges with the aroma of cunning veracity.

But no truth will grow.

Pardon me, sir.
Could you direct me toward the exit?
I seem to be lost in here—
oh...
You're just my shadow.
Well...
do you know?

(Shadow Sighing)
Of course, sir.
Follow me.
Right this way.
Mind the gap.
Mind the trash.
Mind the forty year impasse.
Mind the—

(Interrupting)
Pardon me, Sir
I was asking for the exit,
not a lecture—
oh...
Hold on,
there's a phone call.

(Shadow Waits)
I—think you have the wrong number.
Uh, Shadow, do you know a Jod—I mean God?

(Shadow shrugs)
Yeah. No. Sorry.
Uh, y—you have a blessed day, too.
So...

About that exit.
Wh—
Shadow?

Where'd you go?

He knows your desires.
He know your hopes and dreams.
He knows that you know
He is not what he seems.

Your hope is so great,
that you will not see his smirk.
While he winks at your faith,
You take him at his word.

When reality serves
his unsavory dish,
Know only you have been
as deceived as you wish.

I do. I do.
I do care.

Though not-doing
is the guilt I bare

My inaction leads
to things undone.

The shame I feel
for things un-won.

Can I be
as I'm perceived?
(The face they see.)

For once, just let me—
please.

I'll admit that rhyme and meter don't mean too much to me
I like the flow of words without structural integrity
If it rolls off my tongue but lands on deaf ears
Blibbity dibbity doo da dib da diminy
who cares...

Reward system's been ******.
Once we had too much.
Now, not enough.
We're gonna need a hard reset.
Definitely not looking forward to that.