Please don't save me from myself
I have my needs and want them.
My shaking hand will write my song
just a ***** with his sharp pen.
The needle holds the promise
of a heaven and an Amen.

There are just 3 things I need.
A heart and brain and courage
will conquer a world and fill
it with love, care and strength.

We're angry angels
   with broken wings
   and tortured souls.
   You think we'll save you?

I wake each day in a house of mirrors.
I stand inside of a different me.
I see me ******* a *****
who begs me to love her
for the kid's sake. I can't.
I want a mirror to fool me.
I see my kind friend Joe
who always saw the good
and was killed picking up
a hitchhiker after all.
I want a mirror to fool me.
I see my father still wet
behind the ears flying
a bomber in a war as a pawn
for them who don't care.
I want a mirror to fool me.
I see my cousin with ancient
broken heart, the wound
that never heals, choose
slow suicide by *****.
I want a mirror to fool me.
I see a man who doesn't
know how to love a wife
no matter how many times
he tries. He writes poems.
I want a mirror to fool me.

We come from hopeless histories
  to America with hope in pockets.
  We work like madmen tireless to
  earn our keep and feed we Irish.
  I feed coal to iron furnaces and
  load cargo in ship's hot holds.
  We won't starve to death here.
  My great grandson scratches
  my story into your memory.

5am we crowd in the rickety cage
   to take us down to hell's cold entry
   into the mines. We stoop and dig
   claws into the rock to drag coal
   into the carts we roll to a rich
   man's greed and we end our days
   in poor man bars swallowing the
   dust into our angry hearts where
   we keep score and wait for God.
   We sleep with our sacred wives.

The night is ending
   the light is bending
   into another day we  
   live as if we planned
   the whole **** thing
   all along but we know
   we're lost in riptides,
   swept up in tornadoes,
   we're dice tossed in a
   drunken frenzy crossed
   fingers and the house
   always wins. Hangovers
   are our mornings and
   a hair of the dog gets
   me to work on time for
   Friday donuts and smiles.

Love, hate, indifference don't
matter in this thing we live.
Passion moves mountains.
It can save hope we need
in these hopeless times.
We lose friends to what we
believe. We make new bonds
as we fight against this enemy.

Life isn't precious. It's comical.
It's a wonder the human race is
still here. We're addicted to any
thing that makes us high enough
to escape the dreary life we live.
We **** everything. We put ****
in our veins for a minute of peace.
We die to escape loneliness finally.

I've lived all your lives.
I've felt all your joys and
suffered your pains.
My poet is empathy who
shares your shadows and
neighborhoods and *****
dishes and ******* and
broken hearts and promises
made among tangled webs
we navigate so poorly.