“Breathe it in
The stardust air
The lung-clamping smoke
And vile pious inflammation.”
Listening to sounds of irritation:
Humming of the fluorescent bulbs;
Shoes sticking to linoleum tiles;
Flies buzzing behind my ears,
Leaving me to count the years
And spaces between spaces
Fill the lonely night
until


All is silent now.


Then,
Tooth and nail and eye crust
Fading away to off-beat lunacy.
Her spine slithers sinisterly as she performs
With Vaseline greased hair that stands like horns
People stalking like beasts with mental disorders
Hobbling penguins and droll-*** walrus punks.
Cold liquor manipulating my contemplation
And I have moments of primal desperation
A monster suckling another monster
Bodies tangled like olive tree roots
Delicious and dreadful
Fraught and shameful


It’s the way of all flesh.


Among
Modern Soothsayers
and plenty of culinary racists,
Spraying ***** onto parchment pages
With forked tongues dancing on ***** stages
Coffee for blood and computer screens for eyes
With cool cats strutting to unknown leeching voices
Bottle-slung pistol whip hooligans with eyes of yellow stains
From chronic ink-sprayers of riots in narrow sectioned lanes
Snapping fingers to juke box ghosts and royal jazz sires.
Fourteen gypsy demons wanting to pull me apart
Showcasing trinkets and rubies she adorned
All while she smiles and performs
And the weight of the world
falls between my fingers,


Like cascading sand.


As I write,
The rhythm is changing
Like seasons in secluded eternity:
Orchestrations of sexplosions overtake the carnal scene
With hair pulling and gnawing teeth on the table in front of me
Those Bohemian idolaters basking in acid kiddy pools
Using tired variations of apologies in eastside sin city  
Arousing the vortex of virtuous degradation
In a hole of sunken matchstick validation.
Eyes of judges like the public census
And taboo connotations
Rule this attrition.
Rusting
Leaking stalls
Blue-plate special
Of sprayed blood on walls
The essence of color and voice
The culmination of illusory choice
Dances of erasers and procreators
Fever dreams of police shooting children
Like movie monsters and misunderstood heroes
Specters and Banshee sympathizers
Marching to ******* synthesizers
Burning ***** blue postmen
With afropunk priests
Of astonishing feats
To whom
May
Be


Concerned.


This deep sleep exists
To mediate the social cysts
The reprimand the blundering kids in the mists
From dreaming of their world without the risks
Of falling into fields of blackened earth
Where it all burns like a first world birth
And greater souls speak of my worth.
So I cannot wake up

The deep sleep
Is there for that.

[Fade in, Opera hall; Orchestra is tuning. There is a murmur of people whispering.]

Once upon a time
There was the House of God
And the stage of life

Its key players were man and woman
Supported by Sin and Death

The masterstroke of creation was not of the flesh

But of the souls

[Audience laughs]

I hold in my hand
The diary of a madman

Lined with notes and scribbles
Rotten thoughts to nibble

Food for thought
Or all for naught

Such eloquence and strife
From a torturous life
For these we must share
Alas, who would care?

Would you?

Let’s find out

For in this show tonight, in the heaps of winter fables
And changing seasons
The spectacles and visions shall not be enough


On a magic carpet set for Baghdad
In the Mirror sea of Venus
The performers are all here
For your entertainment

The illustrious Obsidian Theater beckons you all
The Masquerade of the Dream Catcher Ball


With masks, we put on our true faces
Our bare faces are mere disguises
That we wear in public places
But here we’re full of surprises

Mrs. Jujubee isn’t a housewife here
But a sultry dancer, moving to the tune of
Cat house romances

Mr. Wukanlyck isn’t an account anymore
But an eccentric ******* who plays at
Both ends of the field

If you know what I mean.

All these people are able to be their true selves in the light of the stage
How come they cannot be this way in life?
Why can’t they laugh with the bohemians?
Why must it all be a secret life?
Why can they not tell their spouses?
Their parents?
Their bosses?

Why can’t they be what they want to be?

Because…

Their spouses mock the idea of such silly notions and aspirations.
Their parents disregarded their dreams in the hopes they will one day:

“Wake up, get their life in order, so they can get a real job, earn a living, buy a house, get married and contribute to society like a normal person; have a decent life.”

If you can call that a decent life.

Why become another cog in the gears of the economic machine that fuels the fire of excess industry?

Why owe more money to lawyers, bankers and debt collectors in the hopes of owning a piece of property that is just like everyone else’s?

Why push out more unwanted kids into the world where there are already millions without homes, food or even families?

Those “free nations” are ok with owning guns than knowing what’s really happening in the world.  

If another opposing religion or country threatens your comfortable lifestyle then you’re ok with having your government go to war.  

You are slaves to your TVs

Your smart devices

Your phones

Your social networking

Your computers

Your shopping rituals

Your misunderstood purpose

Your narcissism

Your arrogance

Your defensive self-righteousness

Your thin empathy
An obtuse apathy

Indecisive, nail-biting listeners of classroom objectivity
Ridiculing social solicitors of mall shop dogma
The young millennial generations stamped with no discerning identity
Than the loss of critical thinkers which are replaced with
Cultural zombies and robotic masturbators dripping over
Dim screens of cyber people in the millions, filling minds with
Misconceptions, misguided eroticism, racial diabolism that will be
Passed on to friends, family and teachers who will disregard sources and substance
But use the same destructive and dividing strands of unrest
That will define their day to day lives
From the words
The minds
Of frustrated, opinionated
Suburb bloggers
Middle class pioneers that one day
will rule the country
Preaching of the day that all are troubles will be
“Resolved”
And all our past misdeeds and sins shall be
“Absolved”
The crusted, rustic chains of our forefathers’ bane shall be
“Dissolved”

And then maybe we’ll be able to embrace each other
Like in the storybook pages of our dreams
Where men can love men
And women can love women
And the faces, the masks
Will not be needed anymore
Because what we present to the world in the face of that
Higher being
Or simple sun
Will be what we truly are
We will have one life and one face and it will be all we need
Not like before, where our closets have that hidden space
Where we hide our real faces
With that suit of dusty skin
That everyone once in a while we have to sneak away and wear

Little Colette De Salle
Petite college student with features like
Audrey Hepburn
Singing in the underground garage
With Stevie and his troupe
Her songs haunting, elegant and pure
About people she once knew
Her parents
Beaten to death on the streets
By simply reporting the truth to the world
Which their bosses and media supervisors
Will determine what the “truth” is
And what is newsworthy at 7pm

She is Ms. Colette de Saille
And will be dead before she graduates
Because someone didn’t like what she said that one night
Calling out the Pigs and suits making sure no one paid
For her losses


This is Ken Sosnowski
But tonight on this stage he is Aveda Cicada
And she is who she is from birth

Like you all that sits before me

With shadowy smiles
And grins holding flowers, doves
Secrets

And

[Applause]