It seems I've performed this play over and over,
    maybe my entire life. I wish the playwright would
    at least listen to my ideas for a happy ending.
    He says it needs conflict and sorrow to entertain.

    I'm not sure where this play came from. It wasn't my
    creation. Maybe DNA carries it like a virus we live
    our lives through the sweat and flail with fever.
    My heart is a bonfire then a campfire then embers.

    3 acts seem paltry for a man and woman to love.
    True Love should last a lifetime I've been told.
    My love is mercury that slips through my fingers
    the more I try to hold it. I'll die disappointed.

We call it death
took final breath
why? Cruel ends
god's message sends
next in line to die
don't question why.

My mind is cavernous. There's enough
    room for madness and love and petty
    slights and high school crushes I
    thought I'd die without. Nooks and
    crannies where insecurity thrives
    are everywhere. Bats are in vast
    belfries. My giant eye that stares
    me down each night sits where it
    pleases. Old lovers swing from
    drafty eaves flipping me their
    birds. My heart bleeds into a pool
    where all my mistakes feed endless.
    Guilt has its own penthouse suite.
    I dream among the attic's memories.

Your gold hair is a halo in the
     heat lightening of our summers
     growing closer to kisses and touch.
     Our gravity was lost. You drifted
     into other orbits. I heard things.
     I saw tracks on your arms and your
     bones turning tricks on the Strip.
     You still have a halo in midnight
     neon.  I stare from my bar stool
     as you pass in the night searching.
     We're both lost together, just
     lost souls in different places.

Your golden hair is a halo.
     Heat lightening makes it so.
     Our gravity was lost, we go
     in other orbits. I hear things,
     needle marks, attached strings
     bones turn tricks, cheap flings.
     Still my neon saint at midnight,
     need you from bar stool flight.
     You pass by in our neon light.

Your gold hair is a halo in the
     heat lightening of our summers
     growing closer to kisses and touch.
     Our gravity was lost. You drifted
     into other orbits. I heard things.
     I saw tracks on your arms and your
     bones turning tricks on the Strip.
     You still have a halo in midnight
     neon.  I stare from my bar stool
     as you pass in the night searching.
     We're both lost together, just
     lost souls in different places.

We would do well to die before our dreams.
  I stare vacant where I was aroused, an old fool.
  How do I limp to my finish line? Help me
  know my place now that I've packed my life
  in boxes. I yearn for my big sins. Where is
  lust's object of desire? Where is my ******?

They fussed over my birth like a Christ
child born in a manger. A toast to our new
boy with special in his bones and heart.
He'll suffer all our pain silent and with
laughter. He'll climb into many wombs to
find comfort but always birth himself to
slain what he needs to for his old dames.
I love them and raise a glass to toast them.

We unwashed seek to protect us
from rich gods to give us access
to our own needed food and water.
Kings will die in the slaughter.

Blood flows in the empty streets.
My brave one eye cat finally meets
her maker on a street called Lost
as a witness to our final Holocaust.

Fat ladies in drag beckon me then
  wish I were somewhere else. I ease
  my way into a thousand hearts and
  they soon know I'm life's sweet lie.

  I'm just an actor with a beating heart
  who pretends love but never knew it.
  I jump into gay bars for the music
  and drinks. I never stay for last call.

  Self loathing is a Catholic thing. I
  seek a stage with a dom to pretend
  whip me with Bohemian Rhapsody as
  the soundtrack of my humiliation.

  The final act is louder and brighter
  and with the colors of India it makes
  promises that it can't possibly keep.
  We are just actors with beating hearts.

Fat ladies in drag beckon me then
   wish I were somewhere else. I ease
   my way into a thousand hearts and
   they soon know I'm love's sweet lie.

   I'm just an actor with a beating heart
   who pretends love but never knew it.
   I visit gay bars for the techno music
   and drinks. I never stay for last call.

   Self loathing is a Catholic thing. I
   seek a stage with a Dom to pretend
   whip me with Bohemian Rhapsody as
   the soundtrack of my humiliation.

   The final act is louder and brighter
   and with the colors of India it makes
   promises that it can't possibly keep.
   We are all actors doing what it takes.

I've held on as long as I can
to this slippery eel of life
that feels all wrong for me.
I never found "The One".
I never measured up.
I float away from time
with a needle in my arm
and finally a true smile.

There's a place among the living
   we've provided for the dead. Remains
   in graves we never walk on. Bad luck.
   Superstition keeps our dead harmless.

   I died helping the sick and dying. Ha!
   I actually died in my sleep. I was dreaming
   of being strapped in a guillotine during the
   French Revolution and I lost my head.

   I've lived a good and bad life. Depends on
   who writes the moral code. Do we condemn
   our lustful desires? Do we arrest for stealing
   a loaf of bread or meds for our children?

   Society has a lot to answer for. Who died
   and left you boss? My chemistry and my
   biology are my puppet masters. I am a naked
   ape who has been "Blessed" with self awareness.

I started it at birth
when evicted to light
tiny fists clenched
begging for a fight.
Angry always angry
Punch you in a bar
buy you a sorry drink
drive you in my car.
I'm the only war dead
buried in my sick head
I surrender to myself
I lie dead on a bar shelf.

I'm my own worst dichotomy.
Hold me in your fist like mercury
I'll slip between fingers on the floor,
quicksilver you're wanting more.
I need to taste your secret garden.
I leave it empty. I beg your pardon.
I always starve for youth's pleasure,
old pirate wanting buried treasure.

I'm my own worst enemy.
Hold me in my fist like mercury
I slip between fingers on a floor,
I'm always left wanting more
I need to taste your secret garden.
I leave it empty. I beg your pardon.
I always starve for youth's pleasure,
old pirate hunting buried treasure.

My life has been lived in a pinball machine.
    Neon acid obstacles wreaking havoc on me.
    Beer, ****** and smokes kept me semi sane.
    Met Aphrodite naked at a party set me free.

    There's always another ball. Another chance.
    This time I'll make it better. Trust my luck.
    I know all the angles!It's in the bag.
    Ding, ding, ding. Into the dead zone. ****.

Do with it what you will.
  Ignore it. Glance at it briefly.
  Bleed inside it. Die within it.
  Find solace or rage in a single line.
  I give it to you with no strings.
  It can be a fist or a cup of tears.
  You might find a bit of you there.
  Hate it. Love it. It belongs to you.

Sometimes a poem
I write scares me
with its honesty
I never share.
Truth bleeds
from my eyes
into the poem's
sun that I stare.

Selfish words mention
  from a wanting womb.
  Crying for attention
  seeks an Attic room
with no pretension.
Available real soon!

Poverty is poetry.
Addiction is poetry.
Madness is poetry.
******* is poetry.
A girl is poetry
A boy is poetry
A dog is poetry
A crack in the earth
is worrisome poetry.
Cry and laugh and
****** and die
We are our poetry.

We all make promises that we can't keep.
"I'll love you forever's", until we don't.
I could never love another, but then I
meet the love of my life forever and ever.
'forever and ever' doesn't exist here and now
unless the graves will keep remains and only
then as long as this spinning rock we call home
keeps its place and the sun keeps shining but
it's burning out like my porch light and will
one day keep the celestial pizza guy from
finding my house for my ******* delivery
and we'll all starve to eternal death as
everything we ever knew will go back to
being cosmic dust that might start again
and in a gazillion years maybe some old
dude named Bill will curse Dominoes pizza.

I write My Prayer so as not to be forgotten
  by the time my funeral service and the casseroles
  and my cold ashes in some anonymous jar are an
  afterthought while the living move on as we do.

  Know that I was born March 23, 1949, at 5:32 am
  in Cincinnati, Ohio. Named William John Donovan
  the second. Firstborn son, 2 older sisters. I'm sure
  I was shriveled like a prune and PTSD after the chute.

  I lived a typical baby boomer life in that time.
  A whole bunch of hi jinks and other mistakes marked
  my time. A million laughs, a billion grins and pain
  and regret, etc. The scale is centered as far as I know.

  I'm now 69 (oh how long I wanted to say that) and I'm at
  a delicate place. I must dismantle my life. The **** collected
  is monumental. It's precious to me, only me. Proof of stuff
  I did at school, sports, work and clothes that defined me.

  Books are my essence. They map my life more than anything.
  I pile myself into boxes. I drop them at Goodwill. Goodbye.
  Soon I'll be empty enough to disappear. Please read this
  prayer and put me in a special place inside your heart.

I rent your body for the hour.
I smell your hair and feel you.
I adore all my absolute power
move strings for what you do.
They get hard as I touch them
like my lover's hopeful ****.
******* cut glass play a hymn
as we **** to a ticking clock.

I talked my way
into your broke
smile and *******
Mr. happy woke
tall at attention
the rarest *******
my sweet affection
another misdirection.

I sit here stunned stupid by wine
   finally happy but still not satisfied.
   What's missing? What will fill the void
   of all the lovers who went wrong?
   I just can't find the right song to soothe
   my savage beast. I don't have a lot of time.

Stained ruined tattered shredded.
      These are the saints who saved me
      from myself. They knew my frail
      needs firsthand. Baptism by fire.
      We met on the path to Golgotha.
      I learned to love imperfectly
      and hoped within despair. They
      quenched my thirst with tears.

When your shrink pays a *****
   he swears is his wife
   you pay by the hour
   his pills keep me sane
   my eye always burns
   my psyche always yearns
   for truth not found on couches
   answers asked as if he knows.

Without sin I'd be a cardboard
  cutout of a plastic life lived.
  I burned bridges and made
  impossible vows and charmed
  ******* off and excited *******
  and made lovers wet and happy.
  We all felt alive and touched
  for years in our golden dreams.

You're my mirror. I see my true self.
Thank God you have a sense of humor
and the kindest heart of anyone I know.
You're a bit askew. People hate perfect.
Sins are forgiven for shots and laughs.

It's furry and meows at night
in the full moon's crazy light
Quincy my soul with one eye
good enough to watch me die
cares about me more than I
ever could. She helps me fly.

Is it more than just a hole
to bury gods priests nuns?
Keep a count of sins.
My soul is my heart
reaching for hands
she who understands.

a stirring need
a wasted seed
at light's speed
midnight's bleed
nothing's born
the fabric worn
survive a storm
the womb's torn
let's not fight
the silent night
my angel flight
into the light.

My scarecrow has a brain.
My Tin man has a heart.
Dorothy circles the drain.
She went back to the start
Her lion found his part.
Time moves us all apart.

When my turn comes
I'll disappear like those
before me. I won't ask
why I must disappear.
There's a reason for it
I'm sure. She said so.

We would do well to die before our dreams.
  I leer where once I aroused, an old fool.
  How do I limp to my finish line? Help me
  know my place now that I've packed my life
  in boxes. I yearn for my big sins. Where is
  lust's object of desire? Where is my ******?

Woman, You bring me hope and fierce love.
  You give me strength enough to vanquish
  the threats we face. You hold me close and
  whisper words that bring me to our tears.
  Woman, You bring our child into our world
  and humble me with your strength and love.
  I swear myself to you, my love, until our
  last breaths are past us and forever after.

Picasso Dali Escher Dylan,
     The force that through the
     green fuse drives the flower
     drives my green youth
     is my destroyer. Life Story.
     Black ink portraits of me
     begging for colors corpses
     whiter shades of pale.

We came to in the morning
naked stranger's hang overs
unsure of aching etiquette
should we be pretend lovers
or should I take French leave?
Call a cab and be on my way
I'll call but we don't believe
nothing more we need to say.

agent orange in the wind
kept our eyes burning
as the fortunes of the war
just kept on turning
now we're just gray and angry
for the friends long dead
without any proper goodbyes
words  from the heart unsaid

There's an ounce of truth
in a landfill made of lies.
The best politicians money
can buy. They become rich
delivering milk to lobbyists.
USA sold off pennies on the $.

I'm a stooge on a stage
in a life ****** on me
not of my choosing. I'm
Shakespeare's Romeo to
a lost *****'s Juliet.
We wind our way forward
on a wind most foul
to Bethlehem's manger.
I curse the fools on the
stage ****** into nailing
my son upon his cross to
eat madness we embrace.

I'm a stooge on a stage
in a life ****** on me
not of my choosing. I'm
Shakespeare's Romeo to
a lost *****'s Juliet.
We move our way forward
on a wind most foul
to Bethlehem's manger.
I curse the fools on the
stage ****** into nailing
my son upon his cross to
eat madness we embrace.

God's universe mutinied.
The planets ignored gravity
and the suns lost their light.
Atoms lost their attraction
and everything fell apart.
God went blind in despair.
We were locked in ecstasy
lost in an eternal dream.

Left or right near the brink
doesn't matter what I think.
I lose a daughter to TDS.
CNN is her bent goddess.
She's dead to me forgot.
Fruit from my tree to rot.

It was on a cardboard sign
held by a hobo 5th and Vine.
Shame on the cars waiting
for the green lights hating.
No eye contact made
when I drive off you fade.
Was he in need or a fake?
Jesus heartbreak or a snake.

Addiction's sweetest sting
  darkness under her wing
    dreams just beneath eyes
  we believe the best lies
    mirrored truths blurred
  broke vows useless word
  light stretched, time slows
  longer he lives less he knows
  one more shot the brass ring
  addiction's deadliest sting.

When you find something
you like, steal it.
When you find something
you love, ****** it.
When you find a sealed
letter, read it.
When you find no way
out, take it.

Plants will die
children cry
wives suicide
pigs will fly
promised regret
can never forget
owe forever debt
no love in neglect.