The light shines
Everything is fine
But over time
The light declines

The light grows dim
As the days grow slim
Making my mentality grim
When I feel I can’t win

My plight professor
Says I’m a light obsessor
So my sight is lesser
Given the right pressure
Days of shortened measure

The days grow dimmer
So I can’t find a glimmer
Of hope to cope
With the gradient *****
Of the light being choked

As the shadows grow longer
The darkness grows stronger
And ghosts start to wander
Through my past I ponder

The darkness has replaced
Your beautiful face
With a dimmer embrace
So I can no longer trace
My tie to the human race

The light they’re dimming
To continue sinning
Until the room is spinning
And they’re artificially grinning
Is my light of living
So darkness they’re bringing

Somebody shot the sun
With a tranquilizer gun
Now I’m totally stunned
As the plants are done
Growing as one

The light is dimmed
As I am skinned
By frigid wind
I’m living in

My light completely goes out
As faith loses to doubt
On this tumultuous route
Getting punched in the mouth

Criticism is often not taken or given well
Something that helps me
Is focusing on what people are doing correctly
It makes my criticism more genuine
Instead of focusing on how far they’re falling behind
I try to focus on how much further they can go
So I’m genuinely disappointed when they fail
And try offering advice on how to succeed
Which I guess you could call criticism
But it feels a lot less like it

God smites me
Because I'm smitten
He hates me rightly
For what I've written
I'm his beta kitten
And I walked away
Like Jason Witten
On retirement day
Avoiding a fiery fray
Because I'm entirely afraid
So I chose not to stay

I fell in love
Then felt God's shove
Pushing from above
With a punishing glove

I made a mistake
Then made it twice
That's all it takes
To feel God's ice
Then I made it thrice

Like 7 Brides For 7 Brothers
I've tried enough to know I'm a number
My deadened life's become encumbered
So my reddened eyes start to slumber

I don't listen
So I feel His scorn
Not in what glistens
But people I adore
Becoming those I mourn
Once they shoot me off
Into the lightning storm
Like Alex Killorn

I must pay attention
To escape the detention
Of my own invention
Ignoring what's mentioned
By God in His book
I feel the pawn and the rook
Can outmaneuver the King
All my pieces he took
And told me to sing

I'm home alone
McCaulay Culkin
I hear a groan
Wolves are stalking
Outside my door
And in my core
So I hit the floor
After seeing gore
For I have a sore
And don't want more

I realize they're fighting me
After they start biting me
As a way of righting me
Of the violent variety
Supported by society
Viewing the plight of me
As a fright unseen

The wolves don't need clothing
They just start voting
For a gun toting
Private boating
Guy caught bloating
To call their master
Making them faster
Bringing my disaster

Angry tracking hounds
Making attacking sounds
Start cracking ground
Chasing a slacking clown
Who's backing down
Back into town
With the frowns
Where I drown
Trapped in a lonely well
But as far as I can tell
The hounds of hell
Can't detect the smell
Of where I fell

My prudent propriety
Erased by anxiety
That lies to me
As I try to be
Righteously
Upright to see
Unlike the breed
Of dogs who perceive
Killing with glee

A canine
Fang lines
My mind
And grinds
My eyes
Blind
Please find
A justified bullet
To put in its gullet
For it's a dog bred to ****
Will your heart stay still
Until it has gotten its fill?

You came from Korea to start a farm
not to do any harm
just to build your barn
under Arkansas stars.

But you underestimated the pressure
of being considered lesser
in the land of western
hopeful investors.

All of the stress
to be the best
made you less
in this game of chess.

When the rain grows
one must lay low
by a tornado's say so
which is a brain blow.

Missing the old ways
your mother comes to stay
but you hope she doesn't sway
your children today.

Mother planted minari
where once there was none
it may not be a Ferrari
but it grows in the sun.

The innocuous plant isn't appreciated
when financial burdens aren't alleviated
the American Dream is steely gated
despite what it's really rated.

Mother had a stroke
the others couldn't cope
as lost lovers said nope
to their one true hope.

Surrounded by Christians
you concede your intuition
for American superstition
promising a healing prescription.

After the hard turn
of having your heart spurned
you watched your barn burn
like a form of heartworm.

You look at your wife
and she looks back
you see in your life
it's she you lack.

Now you understand what's important
and it's not business
you used to want to be a foreman
now just a witness.

I’m a small child reading
About a grown man bleeding
And the buzzards feeding
On his agonizing feelings

I look down the pike
Of an impaling spike
Through my life
Showing what I’m like

Hanging from the noose
Tied to mother goose
She can’t cut loose
So we fuse

I utilize her lessons
As my only weapons
To fight the deafened
Once I feel threatened

A decaffeinating
Decapitating
Trap is waiting
The wrath of hating
Is life fading

I grab my mace
But can only flail
I try to ace
This test I fail

I don’t find validation
At the salad station
Or in *******
But a taboo sensation
That entered the equation

Enemy archers draw their bows
Waiting for me to change
Once I decide what I know
They feel I’m in range
So they start killing me slow
Because I’m so strange

Even the dimmest guards
Hold scimitars
And rip apart
My different heart

Their prima donna
Japanese katana
Wraps me in drama
Like a hurricanrana

I hold my spear
To stave off fear
But darkness nears
So I switch gears

I find a mercenary
I hope can parry
The extraordinary
Darkness staring
At me so scary

But the bantam
Abandons
Our tandem
That slammed them

A cruel sly
Cool guy’s
Fool’s lie
Bullseye
To my fly
Hurt my pride

All alone
Weapons grow
Into modern woes
Making minds explode

An AK-47
Teleport to heaven
Leaves my body reddened
From bullets embedded

No medic around
I sink into the ground
Like a child who’s drowned
In the weapons he’s found

Time is fleeting
Winter is weaving
Coming and leaving
Stunning the seething
Gunning and bleeding
Running from needing
Honeys for breeding

The rabid and bitter
Look for a babysitter
But find Hades’ River
In a shady grifter

A timeline
Sidelined
By bribe buys
And tribe lies
Of pride cries
Decides why
Defiled guys
Have wild eyes
And exile ties
With bile tides
Of vile vies
For a piece of the pie

Those who worship aggression
Follow their idiotic impressions
From charismatic rally sessions
Of one-sided lessons
Based on dejection
Contracting an infection
Preventing self reflection
Halting their progression
With thought deflection
For emotional protection

So the recent challenger
Is the event calendar
Becoming a pal ender
For the scowl senders
Who’re foul lenders
Or growl at tender
Tower menders

My debt’s share
Of fresh air
In death’s snare
Is best spared
But pests stare
With test glares
So I get scared
And let blare
My fret fair
Nightmare

This emergency
Of an inferno sea
Must be urgently
Purged from me
So I can see
The way to be
Hate free
And not flee
From interacting

But the clients and buyers
Are tyrants and liars
While times are dire
The pirates set fire
And hydrants retire
As the world perspires
And starts to expire
The heart of the empire
Has parked the choir
And sparked this mire
Into a funeral pyre

So I can only hope
This lycanthrope
Likened trope
Will not poke
The bear we host
Who cares the most
Of the scares of ghosts

This reason to sell
Season of hell
Treasonous spell
Deletes the smell
Of seeds that fell
Who need to tell
Their creed is well
Yet we see the intel
Warning they’re bitter incels

The dimmer mention
The sinners’ tensions
And interventions
As an interception
Of their own reflection
Not passing inspection
Like a class in detention
They mask their perception
With political inventions
To explain the inception
Of their constant deception

Alone without friends
They follow the trends
Of political bends
As they like to pretend
They’re here to defend
But our country descends
Into a dead end
Of a red blend
When the ref spends
All his time deafened

There’s a daily ritual
of pain habitual
a desperate visual
when I fall in love
and you don’t return it
so I find a drug
and decide to burn it
as I try out discernment.

You only became hotter
after my ritualistic slaughter.
You cut me open and read my innards
informing you that you were the winner
as you ate them for dinner.

After your painful x-ray
I skipped the next phase
of averting my gaze
so I’m diverting to craze
through my ritual of shame
where I feel despondent
from the response sent
in our correspondence.

All my peers
act like seers
showing me their crystal ball
where I stand tall.
But the Ouija board
had me seething toward
a demon *****
who seemed like more
to eat my core.

The other animals in this zoo
are trying to be you
but I can see through
when they say “me too”.
They can’t impede blues
the way you easily diffuse
so I just drain the goats’ blood
at the shrine of no love
where I cry and eye rub
as they die in the dust.

I kneel before the altar of sorrow
that is my lonely bed
I lose all vision of tomorrow,
it’s replaced by red
and images of the dead
who never really lived
all they did was bled,
that’s all this ritual gives
a million shivs
poking torturously into my sides
I try to use one to cut off a piece of the pie
but end up gouging out my eyes
repeating a ritualistic chant of why.

Candles and pentagrams
are where the deadened land
fed up with the rules of man
I bring Satan my demands,
him and regret hand in hand
offering advice to the damaged ******.

I gave a blood sacrifice
to the needle
I stopped acting nice
to be evil
to deal with people
and their oppressive steeples.

I became cold
danced around an Asherah pole
then begged for mercy for my soul,
the one my rationalizations couldn’t hold
after breaking the hypnotic mold
of having my humanity sold.

These rituals I’ve performed
have summoned a storm
and left me forlorn.
My harvest of corn
came in barren
so now I watch ****
or go to a harem.

The sun slowly rises
My slumber it slices
Regretting my vices
With a blurred iris
I join ISIS

I’m not a morning person
After my sleep’s immersion
And my dreams’ dispersion
I have a light aversion

I develop gasses
As the day passes
So when a new day starts
I feel the need to ****
Or I feel a burn in my heart

Disrupt my circadian rhythm
To disorient my vision
And rush my decisions
With fatigue’s incision

Traffic jams
Laugh at man
Trapped in sands
Of supply and demand

When I feel like I’m drowning
I affect those around me
With cranky sounding
Foot pounding

The watch unwinding
Is anger designing
So I’m loneliness finding
In my own business minding

The sun isn’t out
Shining on doubt
So I sit and pout
With no way out

How I act now
Will be how I’m seen later
So I can’t have a cow
Or they’ll call me a hater

Once my mind is quick
I’m still seen as a ****
They couldn’t be tricked
So my actions stick

Once my mind is sharp
I play the harp
To play my part
But they’ve seen the dark
Inside my heart
And in the sky
In disguise
As the wise
Lying lies

Once the morning is over
I search for a four-leaf clover
To spin my rotors
But they sense my odor
And retreat into death
Until I’m in luck’s debt

It’s afternoon
And laughter looms
Yet my path of doom
Left a bath of gloom
So I splash in my tomb
Of morning dew

Walking is a horizontal climb
Like how we walk through time
While we walk in line
Chasing dimes
With **** crimes
Dazed and primed
To stray to lies
And decay in grime
As we walk to die

Jesus walked with a cross
Like I walk through the frost
Amongst the lost
In this world I was tossed

To not sit in a station
I walk to my destination
In silent contemplation
Through a contempt nation

I walk a tightrope
Over the word nope
That sits next to hope
On a precarious *****

I walk through salt flats
Where I can’t halt gnats
Who always talk back
I’m caught in the attack
Of a million microscopic bats

I pull myself forward with my feet
Then I put that motion on repeat
To stay on a progression streak
Avoiding motionless defeat

I raise my knee
I raise my chin
I pray I see
A way to win
But things get grim
When I’m asked to swim
In a bath of sin
Whose grasp will dim
The path I’m in

My feet experience ups and downs
To move me around
They can be loud
If I’m in a crowd
But they don’t make a sound
While I drown

I walk away
From the fray
To get through the day
But I’m left with nothing to say
Because my dues aren’t paid

I walk away from fights
I walk away from light
I walk into the night
And its trite delights
That block my sight
Of potential heights

My feet feel weary
From footsteps I’m hearing
Of death that’s nearing
I’m so busy fearing
I slow down my steering

Is this grief worth
The way my feet hurt?
Maybe I should leave Earth
And be one with the dirt
That I nonchalantly walked over
Stepping on four-leaf clovers
Like a trampling ogre
Wrestling with odor
That pushes me lower
Until I walk even slower

Biblical Egyptians benefited from labor
From their underpaid neighbors
Who looked for a savior

Long ago are the days of Joseph
Serving the pharaoh with his mind
Pharaoh hates the other kind
Working them as slaves
Who shall not misbehave
They must walk through the desert and make sacrifices
But pharaoh confines them to their quarters
And forces them to obey his orders
Not to leave the defined border
God hardens pharaoh’s heart
While he tears them all apart
So God sends a plague of locusts
And other kinds of hocus pocus
That’s not the focus
The country started to wither
From the snake that slithered
In its leader’s innards
Thinking he’s a winner
When he’s just a sinner
Making his once great nation grimmer
As the meek eat their last supper for dinner
They look to a leader
For a pharaoh defeater
But even though Moses had God preach to him
He still needed Aaron to speak for him
In order for the meek to win
We must seek to step in

Prognosticating patriarchs
pundits and priests
pencil paladins
in penthouse palaces
riding what they're writing
writhing while they're rising
everyone's got a chance
chants the gaunt equalizer
its equal lie heard
plunges us into the absurd
assured of justice and fairness
we become curt and careless
saying if you work in a hairnet
or get your verve from clarinet
you deserve less than a baroness
because she has parents best
but when I ask of the parentless
those talking point to the talking points
so what's the point of talking
when talking leads to pointing
the finger in anger at strangers
who they just called equal
but that was merely a platitude
I'm starting to hate people
and their selfish myopic attitude.

When I was younger
I had a hunger
To tear asunder
A life I wondered
Might be a meaningless schism
So I turned to hedonism
My coping mechanism
To set a mega rhythm
Guiding my decisions

My blood entered the syringe
And then it went back in
Along with all the ******
As I tried to put a spin
On a world that seemed grim
In a room filled with sin
I looked for a magical djinn
To cure all my issues
From heavy drug misuse
And rid me of shame imbued
By living in denial and not in truth

I was too educated
To be that medicated
But I saw a life predicated
On living to be hated
So I hesitated
Looking to get elevated
Or at least sedated

But I became miserable
In the drugs’ scissor hold
My health at critical
I was a lost individual
Seeking a different goal

Wandering in this ***** colony
Jesus Christ’s blood falls on me
As ***** as it was on Roman soldiers
Its cleansing quality cleans my shoulders
I feel a weight removed
From the hate that grew
From the life I knew

Jesus cleans my black marks
Jesus cleans my track marks
He shows me the track start
For how to act smart
Then nothing else matters
All the inane chatter
Exits out my bladder
Leaving my past in tatters

Relieved of the grime
I try to leave it behind
But God uses my mind
To provide perspective
To the dejected
I become a detective
For the defective
Using my past directive

But it’s to my chagrin
That I once lived in sin
And I just want to be rid
Of all that I did
Which throws me in a net
Filled with regret
Which Jesus had met
With a covenant set
Yet still I fret
Wanting to be the teacher’s pet

I feel Jesus’ blood get on me
Or maybe that’s a dead body
Warning my sins have caught me
From when I once acted naughty
Because even now that I’m godly
Those corpses haunt me
Does God actually want me
To be flaunting
These memories taunting?

I was a vampire
Whose sand spire
Spanned a mire
Over drug buyers
And **** liars
Whose guns fired
Into dumb deniers
So it makes sense I use discretion
Yet part of Jesus’ connection
Is through the redemption
In his glorious attention

Jesus was killed
So I could be chill
But I must pay a bill
Of spreading his will
By spreading his blood
By spreading his love
Without push or shove

Jesus has way more blood to be spared
Now that he exists in the air
So it doesn’t seem fair
That I wouldn’t share
His redeeming care

I was saved
I was rescued
A road I pave
For the next group
And the distressed youth
To see the best proof
That the lost uncouth
Can be redeemed
They just need to recoup
And live their dream
Following Jesus’ lead

My personality
Is the totality
Of the modality
That powers me
Hourly scouring
A culture souring

I begin to listen
To what glistens
Forming opinions
Gaining dominion
Halting my pure idolatry
By installing an ideology
Using this idol ecology
That falls upon me

I'm my own personality
Personified
Developing individuality
Is part of the ride
To not be as trite
As the banal blight
That dims our light

Uncertainty
Is hurting me
The introspection
Question
"Who am I?"
Dooms my mind
Clues I'll find
In due time
So I climb
But I slide
This "what am I?"
Pantomime
Slants the grind
Into being blind
Far behind

How will I change
Or rearrange
From the strange
In my range?
Will I be the same person
Or a traveling merchant
That sells then sails
From a personality stale

Born in a different time or place
Born of a different gender or race
What would be the problems I'd face?
What would be the benefits erased?
How would that effect me?
Would anyone protect me?
These worries are dissecting
With perspectives infesting
My mind directly

Every day a sequel
I become different people
Morphing my weak soul
Because of my meek hold
On the personality steeple
That makes this deep hole

My hairline is receding
my care line is receding
I'm a feline proceeding
up the wall to hit the ceiling
of what I've been feeling
which should have me reeling
but my blood is quickly congealing
thanks to this art I've been stealing
from the vault in my mind
that's guarded at all times
except when words on lines
crack the code's design
and redefine
what it means to be alive.

A horse clumsily and fatally steps on a dove
Which looks silly to a man watching from above
But what if that dove
Was the horse’s number one?
What if its life was fun
Before it was done?
In order to cope with this gaffe
The human just laughs
Wondering why God’s path
Involves hooves of wrath

Wanting to eat
we **** every animal that allows us to approach
until we’ve lost countless opportunities for domestication
and only the creatures that fear us or fight us are left.

The Moriori were a pacifist tribe living in the Chatham Islands
they ate well on abundant sea life until that secret got out
and they came into contact with the violent Māori from Wellington
this initial contact was a 12 year old girl’s flesh hung on posts
yet the Moriori council determined a peaceful approach to the Māori
who proceeded to enslave, ******, and eat the Moriori at will
the last Moriori descendant died in 1933, about 100 years later
Māori descendants make up about 16% of New Zealand’s population.

Wanting to eat
we **** every animal that allows us to approach
until we’ve lost countless opportunities for domestication
and only the creatures that fear us or fight us are left.

I hang out with friends
But I get an empty feeling
When the fun times end
After hitting the ceiling
Silence makes me descend
Until my brain starts peeling
From the heavy rain that's wielding
The emotions my friends were shielding

Life seems pretty hollow
After the friends I follow
Leave me in misery to wallow
With pills that are hard to swallow

There's a fly placed in the ointment
Prescribed to cure my disappointment
That became problem avoidance
Bringing agony's annoyance

Why did I feel so empty
Once they finally left me
In a depression hefty
Blocking the best me
With desperation testing
My desire to start texting
Looking for the next thing
Instead of resting
I keep wrestling
In my nest of stings

Once I go home
To my snow cone
Of a low tone
To throw stones
At ghost phones
I feel most unknown

I need purpose
I need direction
But all my searches
Are to satisfy my *******
For a loneliness deflection
That won't cure my infection
Of aimless dejection

Should I end my life in solitude?
Or would that be viewed
As way too rude?
I tried to summon a druid
To escape these ruins
But you became a bruin
Speaking anguish fluent

Save me from thinking
To save me from sinking
The alcohol I'm drinking
Is to avoid the stinking
Of us not linking

Without you
I lose
Then I use
To disprove
The sense of doom
That only grew
Once you withdrew

I heard on the news
there is a cream cheese shortage
now I want cream cheese

I was once aerial
Before my burial
In this scary hole
Where the stereo
Swears me no
Peace will be found
So I eat with the hounds
Ignoring the sounds
Of thunder clouds

Meat falls off the bone
In my carnivorous home
Where the treacherous tone
Keeps me alone
Deep in a zone
As a dreaming drone
Like a sleeping stone
In the dark unknown

A shift is coming
Of different drumming
Which may be stunning
After I’ve been running
With rabid hunting
Problem punting
Predators stunting
Like they are my proud pet
Needing money for the vet
Calling in a debt
That had never been set

Can I shake off the rust
And quickly adjust?
Surely I must
Before I’m dust
I will escape the cow herd
I shared with cowards
Wielding halberds
Against those with valor
And join the flock of seagulls
Running far away from evil
That holds me like an easel
I’ll wriggle free like a weasel
Thwarting devouring beetles

This is the test
This is living life
So I’ll do my best
To overcome strife
Which sounds trite
Because it’s right
Achieving flight
Is living in light
Granting sight
To fight polite
Against the night

I must go through evolution
To be part of the revolution
That finds humanity’s solutions
Instead of part of the problem
Never being able to solve them

I don’t want you to die
I want you to live
I wish I was blind
to what this world can give
I wish that my mind
could handle it
I wished for all time
to see your candle lit
I wish death was a lie
written in Sanskrit
because I cannot buy
that God planned it
don’t tell me that I
don’t understand it
I know everything dies on this planet
my question is why
do I have to live with the damage.

While I'm floating in heaven
My alarm hits eleven
From sins numbering seven
My transcendence is threatened

I lower my elevation
To experience sin
Giving empty stimulation
Where I don't really win

I fair in heights
50 below Fahrenheit
Like an imperiled kite
Flying a feral flight

Living in the clouds
I hear a thunder sound
So I look around
To see I'm lightning bound

A burn immense
From a herd of dense
Turbulence
Into descent

The gravelly ground
Wears gravity's crown
It starts grabbing me down
Until I'm gradually drowned

The weight is too much
And I sink into the dirt
I say enough is enough
Then perpetuate hurt

I couldn't fly
So I rule below
I'm not gonna lie
I wish I could go

The concrete jungle
Isn’t what God’s Son sold
Where injustices are untold
And senseless violence unfolds
Yet the homeless are trapped
In the cynical stone maze
Which might be mapped
But they’re caught in the ways
Of the trail they’ve blazed

They wander the streets
Looking for something to eat
Or at least drugs to defeat
All the ways they’ve been beat
They adapt to their environment
Their environment adapts to them
Never finding retirement
In ****** dens
But developing zen
So their mind can defend
What they see again and again

Some start infecting the city
With a mentality gritty
And an appeal to my pity
Doing drug dealer’s bidding
Rejecting society’s fitting
For their own personal living
Yet others bless the towns
With their communal sounds
Of philosophies they’ve found
After going round and round

They can hold pearls of wisdom
Or knives that cause incisions
They can help make bad decisions
Or tell you what not to do with precision
So they probably shouldn’t be treated uniformly
But then how should they be treated normally?

I come across two vagrants
One pulls themselves up by their bootstraps
Becoming someone fragrant
After falling into doom traps
The other offers to **** my ****
And make it quick
Or bust my lip
With a brick
To get their fix
These two must not be treated the same
And neither should be treated with shame
But we must resist playing their game
Of not cleaning stains and becoming lame

So I wonder where the kind treatment
From the compassionate elite went
When the fortunate used to act decent
For their memory of poverty was recent
But children don’t inherit memories
Only money and assets
So they feel wealth is their destiny
Ignoring negative facets

Vagabonds sleep near the intersection of my mind
Where fear and compassion combine
Creating a blurred line
So I can’t decide
Considering both sides
Of the personality divide
So I lazily imply
They’re both the same guy

I write them all off as evil
Saying they’re not even people
Unworthy to be inside a steeple
With the value of a benign beetle
I view them all as losers
And ******* drug users
And insane spousal abusers
And myself as supreme chooser

Not understanding the stakes
I joke let them eat cake
Suddenly emotions awake
They eat my head off a plate
I didn’t learn from history
Now I’m doomed to repeat it
So there will be no mystery
Once I’m eventually defeated

A con tricking one into focusing on the temporary.

I was miserable at 16;
math problems were
hypnotic hieroglyphs
lulling me to sleep
adding up fleeting years
until I was only myself
through transitive property.
All that seems so far away
now that a baker's decade
divides me from that negativity
—which is a plus,
no longer subtracting
from the remainder
exiting the X axis
shifting my gaze
to smokestacks on the horizon
protruding into the Y;
mysteries postponed
carry over into adulthood
pondering the permutations
of possibilities
had those equations been solved.
Nonetheless, I remained undefined
igniting infernos
to create smoke I could explain
like steam rising from the spoon
building facsimiles of smokestacks
multiplying scattered wildfires
until new generations
had smokestacks to stare at.
All that behind me
I've driven further down the road
yet the smokestacks
seem as far away as ever;
they never changed, I did,
adjusting to the variables
and my deciphering deficiency
enjoying each point on the line
especially when it seems like
I'm earlier in my sequence;
momentary minuses show me 16
and far off smokestacks
down a road untraveled
eager to accept my driver's license
so I could factor into the problem.

There was a point in my life
When I was so depressed
I became addicted to ****** for six years
My friends advised, "Drugs won't solve your problems."
And they were right
I didn't want to flee from my emotions anymore
Through immense pain I achieved sobriety
Afterwards I wandered around
Wondering how people dealt with depression normally
So I asked my friendly advisors
"How do people manage their emotions?"
They answered, "By taking drugs."

Time passes in seasons
The days form a legion
And then leave this region
For no apparent reason

The seasoning
Is bleeding me
Dreamily
Greedily
Feeding me
Reasoning
To leave this dream

The season of puberty
Was quite rude to me
As I grew to be
Afraid of ******

A season of sexuality
Affected my mentality
Seeing men phalically
I foresaw my fatality

A season of needles
Leaves me fetal
Acting feeble
Attracting evil

I spend a season hollow
As well as the season that follows
In misery I wallow
From pain I swallow

After I fall
A season of withdrawal
With nobody to call
Becomes my brawl

After pain so deep
From the way I weep
And too much sleep
A season of relief
Ends my grief

The season of death
Is the season I left
For a season of rest
Before a seasonal test
Of a season of pests

After my season of waste
Comes a season of haste
Running from a wraith
Of a bitter taste
And withered faith

A season of beauty
Was in blooming
But my human duty
Leaves me brooding

I fear what’s in store
From this season of war
Will we reach the shore?
Or rot to our core?
Please I implore
No more gore
Yet they ignore
My ridiculous chore

Seasons have come and gone
I am their simple pawn
Seeing to many dawns
Passing by as I yawn

I must seize one
Season
Of peak fun
Before I’m done

Seasons track time
I can’t get back in line
So I sit here and whine
Through my seasonal binds
In my treasonous mind
There is a serious grind
From the seasons I find

When you said your love couldn't be purchased
I didn't think you meant it was worthless
but after examining all of what I thought vs. what I got
you made funeral parlors out of churches
I misunderstood when you said you'd give me big top
I didn't think you meant the circus.

Here comes Auntie Taunting
frivolously flaunting
her jeering jaunting
acting like Don King
saying all the wrong things
behind the protection
of my own discretion
after toxic injections
dressed up as lessons
fly in my direction
I ask her to give it a rest
to be told it's only in jest
and she's just being honest
but those jokes aren't best
once it's her being prodded
because to deride and cajole
was always her prideful goal
how to stop her I don't know
because she hides behind my kindness
and possible social consequences
all I know is I don't like this
person of obsolescence
embodying annoyance
my only answer is to practice avoidance.

Orion's Belt is all I need to find Orion
three stars show me where to go

Alnitak brings frankincense
Alnilam brings gold
Mintaka brings myrrh

their constellation brings consolation
they bring their gift to me
—an introduction to Betelgeuse
(who I'm told will explode someday).

Three stars connect the top to the bottom
a sparkling connection helping us
connect the dots in the roadmap of the sky
showing a grander perspective
from that of the Earth.

Some see Earth as a desolate mountain
ignoring the burning bushes
building barriers of banality
but those who look toward the sky
are guided by three kings
illustrating a bigger picture.

I'm part of a community
working for an oligarch
who treats us with impunity
and without his heart.
Due to the utmost conceit
his throne is one seat
so if we want to come eat
we'll have to compete.

We fight for master's love through production
at the cost of energy reduction
begging for an elitist induction
to the more favorable side of how we function.

The leader is a speeder bleeder
draining liters to move meters
we teeter further down steeper
in this ditch digging deeper.
The guy running the floor
is running for more
so if I run to the store
I run to his door.
He's more decisive
and callous
granting license
to his palace.

Ball and chain
walls of pain
stall my lane
hall of flames
calls for rain
all the same.

Depletion is the mission
in this war of attrition
they want to take all of me and nothing more
compliantly beaten like a loving *****
manning the counter to this ****** store.
Pieces are falling off
my fingers are broken
so I can feed on my slop
with American tokens.

I need to blast home
from this blast zone
my last known
whereabouts
no one cares about
stuck in this warehouse.
My job is to die slowly
in this position lowly
where nobody knows me
isolated and lonely.

One foot in the grave
one foot out the door
no matter how much I save
I can never even the score
which is the reason I'm poor
I reach for the shore
but I'm rebuffed
by makers of stuff
like hatred and such
a hundred acres too much
separates us.
I can't make the miles
with a used up body
so I take up the style
of scratching and clawing.

There's a dead cat on the road
second one this week
I shouldn't be writing about other people's dead cats
I should be writing about my own
passed away many years ago
still occupying my memory
even as people have come and gone
—mainly gone
I only come once everybody's gone
everybody comes once I'm gone
they move in next door
leaving dead cats for me to worry about
while speeding off
frustrating me with blatant recklessness
we hurt one another and feel remorse—
never changing we continue to do so
the speed limit goes lower
because we keep going faster
painting the road with deer and auto parts
the lines on the road become hard to see
when smoke is the only signal visible
all I can do is pull onto a shoulder
and curl up for a catnap.

Don’t mistake my kindness for strength
or my treaties for tanks
or my beatings for banks
I’ll bleed just from blanks
then I’ll flee to the flank
to get free from their spanks.

All the mistakes
my mind makes
are mind snakes
of blind faith
that finds fate
in grind grates.

You must be mistaken
when you say I’m misshapen
and there’s no way I’m this craven
I just look for a bliss haven
where I can kiss mavens.

You must have me mistaken for someone who cares
I’m someone who cares too much
I make too many mistakes to bear
and lose your touch.

You say you have no ***** to give
because it ***** to live
without bucks to bid
on the luck to win
so you shuffle spin
off my ruffled ridge
for muscled sin.

It was a mistake talking to you
mistaking the color red for blue
mistaking what you said as true
that you had a bed for two
until I read the news
you had the best to choose
so I bled and bruised
mistaking your clues.

I'm trapped in inclement weather
All my other ties are severed
After finding someone better
Than the ghosts in this nether
So I decisively pulled a lever
Saying I'll love you forever
Even if you love me never

A volcano erupted
In my bed and in my head
But you disrupted
The magma flowing I fled
But with that snuck
A feeling of dread
That my heart was misled

I'm the introvert
Wanting in your shirt
But you're the extrovert
Causing extra hurt
Torrential rain spurts
Out my eyes of no worth
Wishing I had never been birthed

You caused this
So you should take responsibility
But you resist
Your lack of response is killing me
For you insist
On not following me willingly
I feel resentment filling me
Convinced of your villainy

Rain pours from the sky
After a million tries
To win you with lies
After lightning struck my eyes
Seeing you as a prize
Amongst flies

I load my gun
To shoot at a hurricane
For I'm not done
Fighting this absurd pain
Fear consumes me
As I think of losing
With a rejection proving
The futility of what I'm doing
The Earth quakes beneath my feet
Pushing heavy currents in my direction
All the water in the ocean depletes
As I see myself in a tidal wave's reflection

Conquered by the tide
I tried to abide
My eyes haven't dried
Not knowing your side
I'm pushed under by the waves
The water's weight I can't brave
So to the sea I'm enslaved
Chanting your name

The sky turns dark
As thunder booms
I can't find my heart
While darkness looms
My mind is fighting
An accidental sighting
Of chain lightning
That's brain frightening

The storm never ceases
On lonely beaches
So I cowardly retreated
From memories of being defeated
Towards a community of leeches
Yet all they teach is
Happiness will always elude my reaches
After they drained me dry
Leaving me in the desert to fry
In an arid drought of somber sighs
I look to God and ask why

The storm finally stopped
The flood finally subsided
But once I reached the top
Love arrived once again

Because I’m lonely
I’m desperate
because I’m desperate
I’m taken advantage of
because I’m taken advantage of
I’m distrustful
because I’m distrustful
I isolate
because I isolate
I’m lonely.

Does the pious man live the holy life
By avoiding demons
Or by remaining righteous in their presence?

I live between church and society
never entering either entirely
I go to church and sing with God in me
but each memorable melodic monody
sounds increasingly odd to me
when there are only flaws I see.

Last night I had a horrid dream
I was with my worship team
when their worship scheme
resembled war ship steam.

It seemed like a normal service
but tonight we had special guests
the kind that can afford to purchase
every bell and whistle, nothing less.

I was to be their guide on tonight's spiritual ride
I trailed them like their extravagant robes
wishing to be someone people flock to in droves
but all I have are my words
and the Holy Spirit
so I sing like a bird
with radio interference.

Despite my best intentions of making a good impression
the service was a disaster in need of a master
unchecked videos wouldn't work
preplanned cues were missed
responsibilities were shirked
and I was ******.

My worship team started complaining
in a manner I found to be draining
because my must-see team of trusty steeds
had morphed into prima donna demon llamas
passing the buck and saying "that *****".

Under our Jesus painting
a sight has shanked me
a fire breaking
through our mistaking.
When the fire is small
it's no big deal
but once it grows tall
it becomes real.

We all had to evacuate
for firefighting to actuate
our realization of facts too late
that we'd failed a task too great.
I take my family to the church attic
away from all the stampede traffic
I think up there we can hack it
and look at the area impacted.

The sanctuary is a giant ember
yet dripping wet
I want to return to sender
fire grips me best
and grows at my behest
an emerging inferno infects
the sanctuary's rest.

Understanding danger
I escape with my family
outside with strangers
who all stand with me
we cry over spilt ilk
and brick that wilts.

But people toned down their tears
and stifled their sobs
like silencing fear
was their only job
so as the church was mourned
a makeshift line was formed
to consign Satan's scorn
and be alive and born.

They lined down the street
a church without seats
they still needed to speak
and seek out the meek.
They started praying together
praying for healing
not for the church to be better
but each other's feelings
their friends that were reeling
still needed the word so appealing.

I look back at the church
but I don't see it there
I don't lament its worth
or complain it's unfair
I save my despair
for those that need care.
A humble abode has replaced the opulent cathedral
where the ****** of the masses once found its needle
now there's a house that's meek like the women inside
could this be the house by which God wants me to abide?
I open the doors
and walk right in
I can feel in my core
the removal of sin.

Respec / respecced / respeccing is
                                                 video game
I have respect                         slang for
for those who respec            redistributing
because it rejects                   a character's
that what was recent            skill points
cannot relent                          or attributes
so we can repent                   in order to
and reinvent                          change their
for a new intent                    specialization;
                       ­                          the word is
an abbreviation for respecialization.

Capitalists capitalize
markets become factions
purchasing power negated
by marketing power
attention betrays humility
the town crier speaks agreeable rhetoric
would you like to read more for 99₵?
man drops change reaching in his pocket
his eyes scan the paper without reading
he skips the climate content—
he just wants to know the weather
coins collected by the crier are tossed in wishing wells
money shimmers in the shallow waters.

Envying elevation
neon arrows direct us toward saccharine sonnets
the seating is comfortable—the costumes are immaculate
curtains raise revealing Vaudeville starlets
the audience sits and claps
dying in the silence between laughs.

The market speaks in tongues
its invisible hand strangles culture
PG rules programming for product generating
companies like Procter & Gamble to advertise,
The proctor sets strict rules to lessen the gamble.
Grief spreads through infantilized thoughts
like toxic waste dispersing through the tributaries of a drying river
the fish are dying—their offspring are mutants
ageless wonders that never see the shore.

Words are exchanged
words that are deranged

arrows are midrange
but words hit home
where our minds are made up
before we put on our make-up
to walk with our face up

into the public arena
pitting our words against others'
like we're not sisters and brothers
but words to discover

housing a stable of labels
protected by cultural shields
enforcing all the angles
of a rhetorical force field
we see the power words wield
and say "I go, you yield"

until we're talking to ourselves
and screaming into the void
checking into hell
where everyone is annoyed
yelling at text on computer screens

enacting prohibition
on others' volition
because we have different dreams
and other differences it seems
based on what we believe

which is expressed through words
to which we have different definitions
that at one point we learned
and now no longer want to listen.

Driving to bible study past Turfway Park
solitary stables line the road
horses fill them—broken—made to go faster
my car smells like cigarettes and sounds like Slayer
and is parked on its own.
A building next to the church is where we gather
once used to house missionaries, it has become our tent of meeting
we are watching a video of Ravi Zacharias talking for 40 minutes
received by heads planted on hands and dormant coughs
listening to him arrive to the conclusion
that homosexuals can't be proper Christians.

Having grown up in Kentucky, this isn't an unusual sentiment to hear
I used to not be gay or a Christian
internalizing homophobia: I told myself I didn't want to be part of their gay little club
internalizing ******: I ignored that which hurt me on a fundamental level
I lived like that for a while
—thinking I'd die like that
but once I could accept one, I could accept the other
—and accept myself.

Talking in circles in this square room
I used to think only bigots spoke like this
but these people have love in their hearts
Ravi Zacharias has love in his heart
they're just trying to guide people to the most direct route to Jesus
...which they say is a straight line.
Our circular saw conversation splits us down the middle
about whether militarism or hedonism caused Rome's downfall
about whether humanity dictates nature or is a part of it
about whether homosexuality is inherently harmful or not
we learn a lot about each other through this process.

Driving home on a winter night
I ponder whether I'm walking Jesus' path—am I living an examined life?
I want to make it about them—who are they to judge me?
But it's more about my relationship with myself and God
I take a half smoked bowl out of my center console and light it up
watching an entire city ride my *** in the rear view mirror
their headlights are blinding
so I turn my mirrors away.

My car wanders while I wonder
where I belong in the icy bluegrass
driving between dichotomies
directing my driveway deviation
finding peace in a portal to presence
noticing how the bare trees shoot up from the ground like
lightning bolts shocking a sky that rebukes their entry with turbulence
the trees do not belong to the sky or the ground—they keep reaching for both
the tips of desperate branches scrape freedom while their roots cling to earth for stability.

The road gets really narrow out where I live
so I drive down the middle of the blacktop
realizing that these are minds I can change
realizing something about acting locally
realizing the extent compartmentalization obfuscates love and hate
realizing the responsibility placed on me to change these people—and let them change me
the road that connects all driveways enters mine as well
as I realize I've finally arrived home.

In my mind there’s a thirst
For pain that’s the worst
So I self impose a curse
Until I’m ready to burst

My mind drifts to the ugly
That endlessly bugs me
Things seem so lovely
But my mind is hungry
For war drums drumming

In people
I find evil
They’re so jingoistic and aggressive
Following anyone they find impressive
Until they’ve reached the zone
Where my negative mind goes

In love
I find shoves
Would he love me if I was *****?
Would he love me if I was burned?
I wonder what it will take
For me to be spurned

And God
I find odd
Would God allow me to **** myself?
Or would he send me to the pits of Hell?
Where I could drown in a bitter well
Regretting trading my life for a cell

My mind goes to the darkness
In the ocean I see a shark’s nest
So it becomes my dark quest
To join the heartless
By forsaking my own empathy
Until there’s nothing left of me
So I can ignore the theft I see
Inside this negative mess I bleed

Can art and religion coexist
When art is about asking questions
And religion is about providing answers?

You’re my afterburn anchor
your array askew
alike an abnormal apparition
an affecting avalanche
asked to dance
with an atom ant.

Size is relative
to the hell you give.
You aggressively grow
in my mind
I shrink in size.

I feel your essence
weighing down on me
like an anchor in my cognition
scraping the bottom of my brain
kicking up dirt from the trenches.

Floating
in space
I find a black loop-
hole and crawl inside
to find the avarice
of imagination.

A fantasy develops
where a disciple
stands before God
and is treated as an equal.

A reality develops
where a heretic
stands before God
and is punished for living in a fantasy.

Living in a space station
the bottom faces Earth
life is lonely
hovering in the abyss.
Mentality heavy
feet get heavier as the mind sinks
until dying star feet become too heavy.

Every step taken
pushes the station towards Earth
intense fear                    sinking feeling.
Stay still                      don’t move
nothing stops the momentum of heavy feet
the station continues careening.

Panic                     panic
running around searching for answers
severe spinning starts
corkscrew bullet shot at Earth
no solutions                      pure terror
lead eyelids shield vertigo eyes.

Plummeting in an aerospace submarine
burning in the hellfire of the atmosphere
I keep falling until there’s nothing left.

I live out of a shopping cart
and sleep in a broken down car
I pray for a stopping heart
to end this life where I starve.

I’m outdoors people
because I ignored the steeple
and implored what’s evil
by sporting a needle.

I try to keep my windows up
in this lonely truck
but it gets hot as ****
and sometimes they get stuck
and I have to deal with bugs
that see me sleeping snug
and start reaping blood.

I can’t feel their biting tinge
while I’m sleeping off a binge
so mosquitoes feast on the unconscious
was it God who brought this
locust plague so noxious?
They eat my sleeping body
the way they eat the rotting.

The mosquitoes torpedo
into me like a needle
a million eels
poke into my skin
which has been unsealed
so they dive in
showing their hunger is real
and they’ll win
they cover my shins
and blanket my arms
their proboscis pins
build a blood farm
built on my harm.

I open my eyes
to my insect surprise
I detest these flies
covering my size
so I shake to try
scaring them from my sty.

A plume of black
lifts from my body
it’s blood I lack
to get them off me
so I’m left to their mercy
and they continue to hurt me
attacking en masse absurdly
eating the unworthy.

I feebly swat them away
while my body decays
I’m dispersing the fray
while hurting in waves
brought by a flood
of those that **** blood
I start to feel sick
but I guess I would anyway
when the needle sticks
this is the start of everyday.

I've spent the last ten years on repetitive tasks
ten years you've ****** my uncredited ***
just let me know how long the sedatives last
until your ridiculous reign is embedded in past
once I'm no longer called an iconoclast
just for avoiding your rhino blast.

Don't lecture me on my attitude
with your ******* platitudes
saying I should show gratitude
like I should be a happy dude
while you slap me blue
then call me rude.

Because I'm not trusted I'm paid by the hour
don't hand me a **** and call it a flower
don't praise my trailer from inside your tower
or scowl at my failure like Bill Cowher
let's just call all the resources ours
and watch you get devoured
by workers who've been soured
by deeds of the dour.

I don't know anyone with a nine-to-five
that doesn't cut them down to size
just don't present that as a prize
to fill the bags below my eyes
you're the lord of flies
tortuous guy
to which I applied
and you accepted
because numbers projected
I'd need to be there
in your carnivorous care.

Until the death of my soul do we depart
trying to maintain the hole in my heart
was your malevolent goal from the start
so I could be a robot part
for a machine
printing green
reasons to bleed
to get what I need.

You say you have a coalition of the willing
being obtuse about their need for shillings
and then close down their building
while your pockets are spilling
into the ocean of an offshore bank
expecting me to say "gee thanks"
while your greed breaks
the ends I make.

So even though I accepted your invitation
I'm having a tough time with assimilation
like your wages falling behind inflation
so please accept my insubordination.

I run from witches
On narrow bridges
Between frigid ridges
With avalanche glitches
When the weather switches
I’m swept into ditches
Of icy riches

A sorcerer finds me
And binds me
To my snowy grave
Where ice has paved
Over my eternal cave
Underneath frozen waves

A necromancer revives me
As the living dead thriving
On maliciously driving
The innocent to my tomb
Mother Earth’s icy womb
I grab my skeleton broom
And start to make room

Compulsion for motion overgrown
I experienced an ocean overload
After my warm emotions overflowed
And I was caught in their undertow
I thought of the spiel
Telling you how I feel
And how eyes of steel
Could rebuke the deal

That night I slept
And nightmare wept
As my conscience crept
From the depths

A group of faceless tourists and I
Saw a building shooting into the sky
I have no idea why
We decided to climb
I’m afraid to go high
But my compulsory mind
Determines the storyline

Going up flights
Afraid of heights
Where vertigo sights
Make me turn white
I feel the building swaying
But everyone else is staying
So I’m afraid of relaying
The reasons I’m praying

Tired of my doubting
The others went on without me
Because I am grasping the floor
Terrified to my core
Clinging the patterned rug
Wishing to be safe and snug
For at this humbling height
The building moves with might
Like a Kraken kite
There’s no way to fight
My high strung plight
Of skyscraper fright

Attempting to relieve me
An elevator retrieves me
As I lie there wheezing
I go to the ceiling
With the queasy feeling
That my brain is peeling
In need of grounded healing

The doors open to a staircase
Leading up to the scare place
I must dare to face
To bear the race
Of an empty chase
To witness beauty
That never knew me
Before it’s erased

My appropriate apprehension
Was all I would mention
Creating tension
With the others already there
I told them I wouldn’t dare
They said no fair
And grow a pair
But I didn’t care
I escaped the lair
Going back to floor level
Completely disheveled
Knowing if I’d been divinely dutiful
I could’ve seen something beautiful

I didn’t finish the job
So my vision is flawed
That my mission from God
Will leave me carelessly clawed

When I awoke I began a lonely cry
At my dream version of Vanilla Sky
Telling me I don’t try
Like a feeble admission
Of my fetal position
I use to hide from light
Creating a phobia night
Trying to match your height

You say you’re the perfect puzzle
and I’m just a crooked piece
that refuses to fit in.

You say I’ll never grow up
yet you’re Impeder Pan
living in Betterland.

If one is good and two is better
then you are two
and I am zero.

You say a blank white canvas is perfect
and my paint only obstructs the view
yet my blank canvas is just nothing.

I never live up to your measurements
because you only measure once
before you begin cutting.

So you give me a test to rate me 1-10
and tell me a perfect score
is the number one followed by a zero.

You ask me to rate Kevin in Kelvins
expecting me to cynically sell the Celsius
as not as fair in height as your Fahrenheit.

It sets you off
knowing I was turned on
like the freeway exit away from you.

You say I can’t see the forest through the trees
I say you’ll see the forest once you’re on your knees
then you say you will be a plains walker as you please.

You plant charges of C4
telling me “expect to see more”
submerging me under the sea floor.

You say the end
justifies you being mean
which just means being average.

You cut the cord
before I can pull the plug
once we’re at the end of our rope.

You say you’re perfect
as long as you’re without me
finally, something we can agree on.