Why Men Cry in the Bathroom

For so many reasons.
I will tell you the why.
I think you know,
Or perhaps, you think you know.

Men are always O.K.,
Even when not.

We expect the worse,
Accept the worse,
Nonetheless,
We are forever unprepared.

Wearily, we cry,
In the bathroom, in private,
Lest sighs slip by,
We be unmasked,
Early warring, strife signs warning.

Copious, tho we weep
Before the mirror confessor,
It is relief untethered,
Unbinding of the feet,
An uncounting
Of beaded rosaries,
Of freshly fallen hail stones,
Of night times terrors
By dawn's early edition's light,
and welcomed.

But look for the mute tear,
The eye-cornered drop,
*** tat, that never drops,
But never ceases formation and
Reforming, over and over again,
In a state of perpetuity of reconstitution,

The tippy tear of an iceberg revealing,
And I see you peeping, wondering,
What is beneath

Look for:
the torn worm-eaten edges of spirit,
thrift shop bought, extra worn,
grieving lines neath the eyes,
where the salt has evaporated,
discolored the skin.
worry lines,
under and above,
browed mapped, furrowed boundaries.
the laugh line saga,
where better days are stored,
recalled, as well as recanted,
publicly, privately.

Why just men?

I don't know,
Perhaps,
it is all I know.


Jan 6, 2013

Tantalized by the fractious limerence of a vestigial habiliment of the old order, we conclude that hypertrophy leads to a limbo where random permutations alloyed by the rickety limits of concatenation subsume concepts that are equivocal but populate the imaginations of newfangled art forms that jostle the midwives of rumination to lead to unique pastures that are intuitively calibrated to correspond to definitive unitary events in conceptual space that sprawl unexpectedly towards the desultory but determinative conclusion of a meandering ludic sphere of rambunctious sentiments cobbled together to either rivet the captive audience or annoy the peevish criticaster when they dare to inseminate the canvassed and corrugated tract of intellectual territory created ad hoc to swelter the imagination with audacious ingenuity that is an inevitable byproduct of lexical hypertrophy. In this séance with the immaterial realm of concept rather than the predictable clockwork reductivism of a perceptual welter that is limited by the concretism circumscribed by spatiotemporal stricture we find that an extravagant twinge of even the smallest tocsin in the interstitial carousel of conscientious subroutines compounding recursively to pinprick the cossetted smolder of potentiality rather than extravagate into the vacancy of untenanted nullibiety can spawn a progeny of utilities and vehicles for dexterous abstraction that poach the exotic concepts we fathom by degrees of sapience malingering in lifeless bricolages of erratic abstraction in manners useful to transcend the repose of abeyance and heave awakening into the slumberous caverns of still-life to make them dynamically animated to capture ephemeral events that defy the demarcations of wistful indelicacy of the encumbered bulk of insufficient precision.

Today we embark on a quest to defile the anoegenetic recapitulation of canon that litters the dilapidated avenues of miserly contemplation that has a histeriological certainty and feeds the engines that enable novelty but ultimately remain rancid with the stench of the idiosyncratic shibboleths of synoptic alloyed impoverishment that leads to the vast wasteland of cremated entropy that is a stained foible of misappropriated context interpolated usefully as botched triage for daunting problems that require a nimble legerdemain of facile versatility that we easily adduce to conquer the present with the botched memorial of a defunct salience. Despite the travail of scholars to retreat from the frontier into the hypostatized hegemony of recycled credentialed information, we often are ensnared by the solemn attrition of decay as we traverse the conceptual underpinnings of all bedrock thought only to dangle precariously near the void of lapsed sentience because of transitory incontinence that is contiguous to the doldrums of crudity but nevertheless with mustered mettle we purport that the very self-serious awakening to our hobbling limitations is akin to a prosthetic enhancement of ratiocination capable of feats that stagger beneath the lowest level of subtext to elevate the highest superordinate categorization into heightened scrutiny that burgeons metacognitive limber. Marooned in the equipoise of specifiable enlightenment countermanded by the strictures of working memory we can orchestrate transverse pathways between the elemental quiddity of impetuous meaning and the dignified tropes of transitivity that bequeaths entire universes with feral progeny that modulate their ecosystems with both a taste of approximated symmetry and a cohesive enterprise for productivity that rests on the granular concordance of the highest plane to the indivisible parcels of atomic meaning that solder together to exist as intelligible if strained by the primordial frictions guaranteed by the brunt of motion incipient because of the metaphorical inertia created within insular universes to inform sprawling conurbations of mobilized thoughts designed to reckon with the breakneck pace of the corresponding reality to which they explicitly and precisely refer to.

We must singe surgically the filigrees that amount to the perceptible realities that transmute temperaments into the liturgy of routine conflated with the rigmarole of neural dragnets of reiterative quips in an elegant game of raillery with our supernal contumacy against the rigid authority of aleatory vagaries mandated by a dually arbitrary universe in a probabilistic terpsichorean dance with the depth of our dredge for subliminal acuity or the shallow bellicosity of common modes of glib contemplation characteristic of the basic nobility of improvisation. This basic interface with the world can either be mercurial or tranquil based on the interactionism of the enfeebled trudge of surface senses or blunt intuitions and the smoldering impact of the vestigial cloaks that deal gingerly with the poignant subtext evoked in the cauldron of immediacy rather than pondered with the portentous weight of imperative singularities of uniqueness derived from the plunge into the arcane citadel of microscopic introspection so refined that the ineffable drives we seek to fathom become amenable to the traipse of transcendental time that rarefies itself by defying the brunt of compartmentalized bureaucracies administered by the fulcrum of stereotypical notions of acquired gravitas imputed to mundane pedestrian quidnunc concerns that defile humanity rather than embolden the subaudition of gritty punctilios that show the supernal powers of the axiomatic divinity of sharpened sentience to reign with supremacy over the baser ignoble components of bletcherous nescience that leads to knee-**** platitudes that provoke folksy peevish divisions. We should rather orchestrate our activity by heeding the admonishment about the primogeniture of poignant sabotage buffered by the remonstration of innate tranquility and finding a whipsawed compromise of rationalization with true visceral encounters with the fulgurant quips of brisk emotions that grind industriously into amorphous retinues of the trenchant human imagination to either equip or hobble the leapfrogged interrogation of veracity and more consequently our notions of truth and fact.

When we see the hackneyed results of default ecological dynamics, we find ourselves aloof from purported transcendence because the whimpered bleats and cavils of the importunate masses result in a deafening din of cacophony because we strive throbbing with sprightliness towards the galloped chase of tantalization without the luxury of a terminus for satiation. Obviously a growth mindset is the galvanic ****** that spawns the imaginative swank of the pliable modulations of our perceived reality that, when protean, showcase the limitless verve of our primordial cacoethes for epigenetic evolution rather than the stolid and staid foreclosure of impervious sloth that memorializes the gluttony of speculation about fixed entities rather than imperative jostling urbanity that dignifies the brackish dance with dearth and the exuberant savory taste of momentary excess because it engages the animated pursuit of limerence rather than the exhumed corpse of wistful regret. Nature is a cyclical clockwork system of predatory instinct met with the clemency of the prosperous providence enacted by the travailing ingenuity of successive cumulative generativities that compounded unevenly and unpredictably to predicate a fundamental zeitgeist calculated to engorge the fattened resources of the resourceful and temper the etiolated dreams of the fringed acquiescence of a hulking prejudiced population of dutiful servants that balk at the diminutive prospects of a lopsided distribution of talent and means but slumber in irenic resolve created by the merciful hands of defensive designs that configure consciousness to relish comparative touchstones rather than absolute outcomes that straggle beyond a point of enviable reference to shield the world of the barbarism of botched laments clamoring for an uncertain grave from the gravity of the orbiting satellites of apportioned wealth both sunblind and boorish but simultaneously inextricable from the acclimated fortune of heaped nepotism and herculean opportunism. The intransigence of the weighted destiny of inequity is a squalid enterprise of primeval abrasive and combative tendencies within the bailiwick of the indignant compass inherent to the system that fathoms its deficiencies with crabwise and gingerly pause but airs a sheepish grievance like a bleat of self-exculpation but simultaneously an arraignment of fundamental attribution erroneously indicted without the selfsame reflexiveness characteristic of a transcendent being with other recourses to clamber an avenue to Broadway without malingering in the slums of opprobrious ineffectual remonstration against the arrangement of a blinkered metropolis of uneven gentrification.

We flicker sometimes between the strategic drivel of appeasement and the candor of audacious imprecation of the culprits of indignity or considerate nutritive encomium of the beacons of ameliorated enlightenment because we often masquerade a half-witted glib consciousness lazily sketched by the welters of verve alloyed with the rancid distaste of squalor and slumber on the faculty of conscientious swivels of prudential expeditions with an avarice for bountiful considered thought and wily contortions of demeanor that issue the affirmative traction of adaptive endeavor to cheat a warped system for a reconciled peace and a refined self-mastery. We need to traduce the urchins that sting the system with pangs of opprobrious ballyhoo and the effluvia of foofaraw that contaminate with pettifoggery and small-minded blather the arenas better suited for the gladiatorial combat of cockalorums tinged with a dose of intellectual effrontery beyond the span of dogmatism rather than the hackneyed platitudes that infest the news cycle with folksy backwardation catered to the fascism of a checkered established press that urges insurrection while tranquilizing dissent against the furtive actions of consequence hidden behind the draped verdure of pretense whose byproduct is only a self-referential sophistry that swarms like an intractable itch to devolve the spectator into a pasquinaded spectacle of profound human obtuseness that pervades malignantly the system of debate until the reductionists outwit themselves with the empty prevarication of circular logic that deliberately misfires to miss the target of true importance because of the pandered black hole easily evaded by creatures of high sentience but inevitably ensnaring the special kind of dupe into a cycle of bellicose ferocity of internecine balkanization. The vainglory of the omphalos of entertainment is also another reckoning because it festers a cultural mythos of glorified crapulence parading a philandered promiscuity with half-baked antics that gravitate attention and the lecheries of gaudy tenses of recycled tinsel alloyed by debased aberrations of seedy grapholagnia that magnetize as they percolate because of the insidious catchphrases embedded in pedestrian syncopation that ignite retention and acclimate to mediocrity the sounds of generations discolored by faint pasty rainbows rather than ennobled by majestic landscapes of ignipotent mellifluous sound that stands a supernal amusement still for the resourceful trainspotter.

Despite the contumely aimed in the direction of contrarians for deviating from the lockstep clockwork hustle of stooped pandered manipulation that peddles the wares of an entirely counterfeit reality, I stand obstinately against the melliferous stupefaction of entire genres of myth and subcultures huddled around the sentimental tug of factitious sophistries regaled by thick amorphous apostates that cherish the vacuous sidetracked spotlight with fervor rather than pausing on the enigmatic querulous inquisition about the penumbras that lurk with strained effort beneath or above the categorical nescience of the shadowy unknown that often coruscates with elegance even in obscurity. I fight with labored words to spawn a psychological discipline that invokes the incisive subaudition of the pluckily pricked exorcism of true insight from the husk of buzzwords that constellate auxiliary tangential distractions from the art form of psychological discernment that predicates itself on the concept that the rarefaction of rumination by degrees of microscopic precision enables the introspective hindsight of conscious events that can be parsed without the acrimony of cluttered conflations of the granular prowess of triumphant ratiocination that earns a panoramic perch with the added luxury of perspicacious insight into the atomic structure of the rudiments of our phenomenological field and the abstractions that linger beyond perceptual categorization. When we analyze the gradients of anger, for example, we can either be ****** into a brooded twinge of wistful resentment or we can decipher that through heuristics designed to cloister the provenance of subconscious repose with ignorance there exists a regimented array of tangential accessories embedded deep within the cavernous repository of memory that designates a cumulative trace of compounded symmetries of concordant experience immediately perceptible because of the tangible provocateur of our gripes and the largely subliminal tusk that protrudes because of primal instinct that squirms with peevishness because of the momentary context preceded by the desultory churn of smoldering associations swimming with either complete intangible sputtered mobility through the tract of subconscious hyperspace or rigidly fixated by an arraignment of circumstances with propinquity to the deep unfathomed flicker of bygones receding or protruding because of the warped and largely unpredictable rigmarole of constellated spreading activation.  
When we examine the largesse of the swift recourse of convenience we forget by degrees the travail that once bridged the span of experience from patient abeyance in provident pursuit to now the importunate glare of inflated expectations for immediacy that stings the whole enterprise of societal dynamics because it vitiates us with a complacency for the filigrees of momentary tinsel of a virtualized reality divorced from the concretism that used to undergird interaction and now stands outmoded as a wisp beyond outstretched hands straggling beyond the black mirror of a newfangled narcissistic clannishness that shepherds the ostentation of conceit to a predominant position that swaddles us with fretful diversion that operates on a warped logic of lurid squalor and pasty trends becoming the mainstays of a hypercritical linguistic system of entrapment based on the apostasy of candor for the propitiation of fringed aberration because of the majoritarian uproar about touchy butthurt pedantic criticasters with a penchant for persnickety structuralism. With the infestation of entertainment with the ubiquitous political cavils engineered by the ruling class to have a common arena of waggish irreverence we forget that sometimes the impetuous ****** of propaganda is cloaked by the fashionable implements of a rootless time writhing in a purported identity crisis only to gawk at the ungainly reflection of modernity in the mirror and remain blissfully unaware about the transmogrified cultural psyche that feeds the lunacy of endless spectacle based on the premise that one singular whipping post can unite an entire generation of miscegenated misfits looking for commonality to team up against the aging generations that cling to the sanctity of cherished jingoism against the intentionality of a revamped system that malingers with empty promises using exigency and legerdemain to obscure the mooncalves among their ranks that march on with quixotic dreams that tolerate only the idea of absolute tolerance and moderate only when feasibly permitted by the anchored negotiation of the fulcrum of totemic governmental responsibility between factions that wage volleys of invective at each other to promote a binary choice of vitiated compromises of mendaciloquence that ultimately endanger the republic with either the perils of hidebound conventionalism and nativist fervor or the boondoggles of fiscally irresponsible insanity cloaked with rainbows and participation trophies. Reproach can be distributed to both sides of the aisle because ironically in a world where gender is non-binary the most important reproductive ***** in the free world is a binary-by-default despotism that polarizes extremely ludic fantasies on the left met with the acrimony of the traditionalisms on the right that staunchly resist the fatuous confusions of delegated order only to the sharp rebuke of the revamped political vogue that owes its sustenance to a manufactured diplomacy of saccharine lies and ubiquitous lampoons that are lopsided in the direction of a globalist neoliberal bricolage of moderately popular buzzwords and the trojan horse of insubordinate flippant feminism that seeks to subvert through backhanded manipulation the patriarchy so many resent using lowbrow tactics and poignant case studies rather than legislating the egalitarian system into law using the proper channels. I myself am a political independent who sides with fiscal conservatism but libertarianism in most other affairs because the pettifoggery of law-and-order politics is a diatribe overused by sheltered suburbanites and red meat is often just as fatuous as blue tinsel and sadly in a majoritarian society the ushers of conformity demand corporate divestiture in favor of an ecological system of predictability rather than an opinionated welter of legitimate challenges to a broken system of backwards partisanship and wangled consent. Ultimately, I remain mostly apolitical, but I am a fervent champion of the mobilization of education to a statelier standard that demands rigor and responsibility rather than the chafe of rigmarole that understates the common objectives of humanity and rewards conventional thinking and nominal participation to earn credentialed pedigree when the bulk of talent resides elsewhere.

Ye learnèd sisters, which have oftentimes
Beene to me ayding, others to adorne,
Whom ye thought worthy of your gracefull rymes,
That even the greatest did not greatly scorne
To heare theyr names sung in your simple layes,
But joyèd in theyr praise;
And when ye list your owne mishaps to mourne,
Which death, or love, or fortunes wreck did rayse,
Your string could soone to sadder tenor turne,
And teach the woods and waters to lament
Your dolefull dreriment:
Now lay those sorrowfull complaints aside;
And, having all your heads with girlands crownd,
Helpe me mine owne loves prayses to resound;
Ne let the same of any be envide:
So Orpheus did for his owne bride!
So I unto my selfe alone will sing;
The woods shall to me answer, and my Eccho ring.

Early, before the worlds light-giving lampe
His golden beame upon the hils doth spred,
Having disperst the nights unchearefull dampe,
Doe ye awake; and, with fresh *****-hed,
Go to the bowre of my belovèd love,
My truest turtle dove;
Bid her awake; for ***** is awake,
And long since ready forth his maske to move,
With his bright Tead that flames with many a flake,
And many a bachelor to waite on him,
In theyr fresh garments trim.
Bid her awake therefore, and soone her dight,
For lo! the wishèd day is come at last,
That shall, for all the paynes and sorrowes past,
Pay to her usury of long delight:
And, whylest she doth her dight,
Doe ye to her of joy and solace sing,
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

Bring with you all the Nymphes that you can heare
Both of the rivers and the forrests greene,
And of the sea that neighbours to her neare:
Al with gay girlands goodly wel beseene.
And let them also with them bring in hand
Another gay girland
For my fayre love, of lillyes and of roses,
Bound truelove wize, with a blew silke riband.
And let them make great store of bridale poses,
And let them eeke bring store of other flowers,
To deck the bridale bowers.
And let the ground whereas her foot shall tread,
For feare the stones her tender foot should wrong,
Be strewed with fragrant flowers all along,
And diapred lyke the discolored mead.
Which done, doe at her chamber dore awayt,
For she will waken strayt;
The whiles doe ye this song unto her sing,
The woods shall to you answer, and your Eccho ring.

Ye Nymphes of Mulla, which with carefull heed
The silver scaly trouts doe tend full well,
And greedy pikes which use therein to feed;
(Those trouts and pikes all others doo excell;)
And ye likewise, which keepe the rushy lake,
Where none doo fishes take;
Bynd up the locks the which hang scatterd light,
And in his waters, which your mirror make,
Behold your faces as the christall bright,
That when you come whereas my love doth lie,
No blemish she may spie.
And eke, ye lightfoot mayds, which keepe the deere,
That on the hoary mountayne used to towre;
And the wylde wolves, which seeke them to devoure,
With your steele darts doo chace from comming neer;
Be also present heere,
To helpe to decke her, and to help to sing,
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

Wake now, my love, awake! for it is time;
The Rosy Morne long since left Tithones bed,
All ready to her silver coche to clyme;
And Phoebus gins to shew his glorious hed.
Hark! how the cheerefull birds do chaunt theyr laies
And carroll of Loves praise.
The merry Larke hir mattins sings aloft;
The Thrush replyes; the Mavis descant playes;
The Ouzell shrills; the Ruddock warbles soft;
So goodly all agree, with sweet consent,
To this dayes merriment.
Ah! my deere love, why doe ye sleepe thus long?
When meeter were that ye should now awake,
T’ awayt the comming of your joyous make,
And hearken to the birds love-learnèd song,
The deawy leaves among!
Nor they of joy and pleasance to you sing,
That all the woods them answer, and theyr eccho ring.

My love is now awake out of her dreames,
And her fayre eyes, like stars that dimmèd were
With darksome cloud, now shew theyr goodly beams
More bright then Hesperus his head doth rere.
Come now, ye damzels, daughters of delight,
Helpe quickly her to dight:
But first come ye fayre houres, which were begot
In Joves sweet paradice of Day and Night;
Which doe the seasons of the yeare allot,
And al, that ever in this world is fayre,
Doe make and still repayre:
And ye three handmayds of the Cyprian Queene,
The which doe still adorne her beauties pride,
Helpe to addorne my beautifullest bride:
And, as ye her array, still throw betweene
Some graces to be seene;
And, as ye use to Venus, to her sing,
The whiles the woods shal answer, and your eccho ring.

Now is my love all ready forth to come:
Let all the virgins therefore well awayt:
And ye fresh boyes, that tend upon her groome,
Prepare your selves; for he is comming strayt.
Set all your things in seemely good aray,
Fit for so joyfull day:
The joyfulst day that ever sunne did see.
Faire Sun! shew forth thy favourable ray,
And let thy lifull heat not fervent be,
For feare of burning her sunshyny face,
Her beauty to disgrace.
O fayrest Phoebus! father of the Muse!
If ever I did honour thee aright,
Or sing the thing that mote thy mind delight,
Doe not thy servants simple boone refuse;
But let this day, let this one day, be myne;
Let all the rest be thine.
Then I thy soverayne prayses loud wil sing,
That all the woods shal answer, and theyr eccho ring.

Harke! how the Minstrils gin to shrill aloud
Their merry Musick that resounds from far,
The pipe, the tabor, and the trembling Croud,
That well agree withouten breach or jar.
But, most of all, the Damzels doe delite
When they their tymbrels smyte,
And thereunto doe daunce and carrol sweet,
That all the sences they doe ravish quite;
The whyles the boyes run up and downe the street,
Crying aloud with strong confusèd noyce,
As if it were one voyce,
*****, iö *****, *****, they do shout;
That even to the heavens theyr shouting shrill
Doth reach, and all the firmament doth fill;
To which the people standing all about,
As in approvance, doe thereto applaud,
And loud advaunce her laud;
And evermore they *****, ***** sing,
That al the woods them answer, and theyr eccho ring.

Loe! where she comes along with portly pace,
Lyke Phoebe, from her chamber of the East,
Arysing forth to run her mighty race,
Clad all in white, that seemes a ****** best.
So well it her beseemes, that ye would weene
Some angell she had beene.
Her long loose yellow locks lyke golden wyre,
Sprinckled with perle, and perling flowres atweene,
Doe lyke a golden mantle her attyre;
And, being crownèd with a girland greene,
Seeme lyke some mayden Queene.
Her modest eyes, abashèd to behold
So many gazers as on her do stare,
Upon the lowly ground affixèd are;
Ne dare lift up her countenance too bold,
But blush to heare her prayses sung so loud,
So farre from being proud.
Nathlesse doe ye still loud her prayses sing,
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

Tell me, ye merchants daughters, did ye see
So fayre a creature in your towne before;
So sweet, so lovely, and so mild as she,
Adornd with beautyes grace and vertues store?
Her goodly eyes lyke Saphyres shining bright,
Her forehead yvory white,
Her cheekes lyke apples which the sun hath rudded,
Her lips lyke cherryes charming men to byte,
Her brest like to a bowle of creame uncrudded,
Her paps lyke lyllies budded,
Her snowie necke lyke to a marble towre;
And all her body like a pallace fayre,
Ascending up, with many a stately stayre,
To honors seat and chastities sweet bowre.
Why stand ye still ye virgins in amaze,
Upon her so to gaze,
Whiles ye forget your former lay to sing,
To which the woods did answer, and your eccho ring?

But if ye saw that which no eyes can see,
The inward beauty of her lively spright,
Garnisht with heavenly guifts of high degree,
Much more then would ye wonder at that sight,
And stand astonisht lyke to those which red
Medusaes mazeful hed.
There dwels sweet love, and constant chastity,
Unspotted fayth, and comely womanhood,
Regard of honour, and mild modesty;
There vertue raynes as Queene in royal throne,
And giveth lawes alone,
The which the base affections doe obay,
And yeeld theyr services unto her will;
Ne thought of thing uncomely ever may
Thereto approch to tempt her mind to ill.
Had ye once seene these her celestial threasures,
And unrevealèd pleasures,
Then would ye wonder, and her prayses sing,
That al the woods should answer, and your echo ring.

Open the temple gates unto my love,
Open them wide that she may enter in,
And all the postes adorne as doth behove,
And all the pillours deck with girlands trim,
For to receyve this Saynt with honour dew,
That commeth in to you.
With trembling steps, and humble reverence,
She commeth in, before th’ Almighties view;
Of her ye virgins learne obedience,
When so ye come into those holy places,
To humble your proud faces:
Bring her up to th’ high altar, that she may
The sacred ceremonies there partake,
The which do endlesse matrimony make;
And let the roring Organs loudly play
The praises of the Lord in lively notes;
The whiles, with hollow throates,
The Choristers the joyous Antheme sing,
That al the woods may answere, and their eccho ring.

Behold, whiles she before the altar stands,
Hearing the holy priest that to her speakes,
And blesseth her with his two happy hands,
How the red roses flush up in her cheekes,
And the pure snow, with goodly vermill stayne
Like crimsin dyde in grayne:
That even th’ Angels, which continually
About the sacred Altare doe remaine,
Forget their service and about her fly,
Ofte peeping in her face, that seems more fayre,
The more they on it stare.
But her sad eyes, still fastened on the ground,
Are governèd with goodly modesty,
That suffers not one looke to glaunce awry,
Which may let in a little thought unsownd.
Why blush ye, love, to give to me your hand,
The pledge of all our band!
Sing, ye sweet Angels, Alleluya sing,
That all the woods may answere, and your eccho ring.

Now al is done: bring home the bride againe;
Bring home the triumph of our victory:
Bring home with you the glory of her gaine;
With joyance bring her and with jollity.
Never had man more joyfull day then this,
Whom heaven would heape with blis,
Make feast therefore now all this live-long day;
This day for ever to me holy is.
Poure out the wine without restraint or stay,
Poure not by cups, but by the belly full,
Poure out to all that wull,
And sprinkle all the postes and wals with wine,
That they may sweat, and drunken be withall.
Crowne ye God Bacchus with a coronall,
And ***** also crowne with wreathes of vine;
And let the Graces daunce unto the rest,
For they can doo it best:
The whiles the maydens doe theyr carroll sing,
To which the woods shall answer, and theyr eccho ring.

Ring ye the bels, ye yong men of the towne,
And leave your wonted labors for this day:
This day is holy; doe ye write it downe,
That ye for ever it remember may.
This day the sunne is in his chiefest hight,
With Barnaby the bright,
From whence declining daily by degrees,
He somewhat loseth of his heat and light,
When once the Crab behind his back he sees.
But for this time it ill ordainèd was,
To chose the longest day in all the yeare,
And shortest night, when longest fitter weare:
Yet never day so long, but late would passe.
Ring ye the bels, to make it weare away,
And bonefiers make all day;
And daunce about them, and about them sing,
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho ring.

Ah! when will this long weary day have end,
And lende me leave to come unto my love?
How slowly do the houres theyr numbers spend?
How slowly does sad Time his feathers move?
Hast thee, O fayrest Planet, to thy home,
Within the Westerne fome:
Thy tyrèd steedes long since have need of rest.
Long though it be, at last I see it gloome,
And the bright evening-star with golden creast
Appeare out of the East.
Fayre childe of beauty! glorious lampe of love!
That all the host of heaven in rankes doost lead,
And guydest lovers through the nights sad dread,
How chearefully thou lookest from above,
And seemst to laugh atweene thy twinkling light,
As joying in the sight
Of these glad many, which for joy doe sing,
That all the woods them answer, and their echo ring!

Now ceasse, ye damsels, your delights fore-past;
Enough it is that all the day was youres:
Now day is doen, and night is nighing fast,
Now bring the Bryde into the brydall boures.
The night is come, now soon her disaray,
And in her bed her lay;
Lay her in lillies and in violets,
And silken courteins over her display,
And odourd sheetes, and Arras coverlets.
Behold how goodly my faire love does ly,
In proud humility!
Like unto Maia, when as Jove her took
In Tempe, lying on the flowry gras,
Twixt sleepe and wake, after she weary was,
With bathing in the Acidalian brooke.
Now it is night, ye damsels may be gon,
And leave my love alone,
And leave likewise your former lay to sing:
The woods no more shall answere, nor your echo ring.

Now welcome, night! thou night so long expected,
That long daies labour doest at last defray,
And all my cares, which cruell Love collected,
Hast sumd in one, and cancellèd for aye:
Spread thy broad wing over my love and me,
That no man may us see;
And in thy sable mantle us enwrap,
From feare of perrill and foule horror free.
Let no false treason seeke us to entrap,
Nor any dread disquiet once annoy
The safety of our joy;
But let the night be calme, and quietsome,
Without tempestuous storms or sad afray:
Lyke as when Jove with fayre Alcmena lay,
When he begot the great Tirynthian groome:
Or lyke as when he with thy selfe did lie
And begot Majesty.
And let the mayds and yong men cease to sing;
Ne let the woods them answer nor theyr eccho ring.

Let no lamenting cryes, nor dolefull teares,
Be heard all night within, nor yet without:
Ne let false whispers, breeding hidden feares,
Breake gentle sleepe with misconceivèd dout.
Let no deluding dreames, nor dreadfull sights,
Make sudden sad affrights;
Ne let house-fyres, nor lightnings helpelesse harmes,
Ne let the Pouke, nor other evill sprights,
Ne let mischivous witches with theyr charmes,
Ne let hob Goblins, names whose sence we see not,
Fray us with things that be not:
Let not the shriech Oule nor the Storke be heard,
Nor the night Raven, that still deadly yels;
Nor damnèd ghosts, cald up with mighty spels,
Nor griesly vultures, make us once affeard:
Ne let th’ unpleasant Quyre of Frogs still croking
Make us to wish theyr choking.
Let none of these theyr drery accents sing;
Ne let the woods them answer, nor theyr eccho ring.

But let stil Silence trew night-watches keepe,
That sacred Peace may in assurance rayne,
And tymely Sleep, when it is tyme to sleepe,
May poure his limbs forth on your pleasant playne;
The whiles an hundred little wingèd loves,
Like divers-fethered doves,
Shall fly and flutter round about your bed,
And in the secret darke, that none reproves,
Their prety stealthes shal worke, and snares shal spread
To filch away sweet snatches of delight,
Conceald through covert night.
Ye sonnes of Venus, play your sports at will!
For greedy pleasure, carelesse of your toyes,
Thinks more upon her paradise of joyes,
Then what ye do, albe it good or ill.
All night therefore attend your merry play,
For it will soone be day:
Now none doth hinder you, that say or sing;
Ne will the woods now answer, nor your Eccho ring.

Who is the same, which at my window peepes?
Or whose is that faire face that shines so bright?
Is it not Cinthia, she that never sleepes,
But walkes about high heaven al the night?
O! fayrest goddesse, do thou not envy
My love with me to spy:
For thou likewise didst love, though now unthought,
And for a fleece of wooll, which privily
The Latmian shepherd once unto thee brought,
His pleasures with thee wrought.
Therefore to us be favorable now;
And sith of wemens labours thou hast charge,
And generation goodly dost enlarge,
Encline thy will t’effect our wishfull vow,
And the chast wombe informe with timely seed
That may our comfort breed:
Till which we cease our hopefull hap to sing;
Ne let the woods us answere, nor our Eccho ring.

And thou, great Juno! which with awful might
The lawes of wedlock still dost patronize;
And the religion of the faith first plight
With sacred rites hast taught to solemnize;
And eeke for comfort often callèd art
Of women in their smart;
Eternally bind thou this lovely band,
And all thy blessings unto us impart.
And thou, glad

the thought of death is an uneasy thought
in my case it's a ****** nightmare

on the 16th day of May, 1967, Mr Youngblood took his 6th grade class to the playground as he always did, every Tuesday after lunch. The kids spread out to their usual positions. Some played catch with Mr Youngblood. A few, like Roger and me went to the basketball net and several played on the monkey bars, both of which were part of the big asphalt square. Just opposite this area was the soccer field and then some good distance between that and the Middle School. Lots of open space for a bunch of suburban kids to have fun. The Sun was bright and the wind was light and the temperature was right around perfect. We had been playing for 10 minutes or so when the wind picked up and clouds seemed to move in out of nowhere. We all thought it must be a storm coming...and it was. A distant laugh froze everyone. At first no-one saw him, but then we all saw him at once. He was walking across the soccer field towards us, long deliberate strides with long thin legs that seemed to bend once slightly below where the knee should be and again slightly above, making each stride awkwardly horrifying. Where he came from is a mystery as there was nothing but open land behind him for several hundred yards. He was tall and lanky and as he approached us, I noticed that his face was contorted and discolored...a pale, almost painted white and he had jet black hair combed back, long and greasy. His lips were thin and black and his eyes bloodshot and almond shaped. He wore a black suit, a black shirt and candy apple red tie. He looked like a mosh-up of Curry's Pennywise and Ledger's Joker, only I would have traded for either one of those ******* right now over this guy, ten to one. He came to the edge of the concrete square. Johnny ****** his pants and Charlene fell from the monkey bars, landing awkwardly on her left side and causing a compound fracture, her radius protruding from her skin leaving her hand dangling like a dead fish. She did not scream either because she was scared it might draw his attention or she was going into shock...or maybe both. He took two more steps forward and then began laughing as if he'd just heard the funniest joke he'd ever been told. His teeth looked as if they'd been replaced with shark's teeth. I swear there were rows of them and his mouth stretched inhumanly wide. His laugh slowly winded down to a snarl, and he gave a long look to each one of us, as if he was burning the faces to memory. And then he spoke..."You children just go on having lots of fun! Well, except for you Johnny...didn't your Mom just rip you a new *** for ******* your pants at Grandma's? shame, shame!" And Johnny was off...tripping twice before he got his feet under him. "You run home and ...Ha Ha Ha...oh my...change your pants, you pathetic little ****!" Mr Youngblood picked up Charlene and started to carry her inside. By this time her pretty pink dress was soaked in blood. The freak addressed him. "Nice man...but you can't save them. In a few days they will all be mine." He laughed again and every kid ran for their lives back to the school. I was the only one who stayed. To this day I'm not sure why. He turned and walked towards me slowly. "What have we here? The little man isn't running with the others. Are you not afraid Billy boy? Afraid for your life?"...and he leaned in close...close enough that I smelled a foulness that cannot be described. "Because that is what I'm here for...your life!" "Who are you?", I asked... and with that his dark black and pointed eyebrows raised and he straightened up. "Who am I...Who am I? My, my the boy has a backbone. The nerve to question while others lose control of their bladders. Well, I'll tell you who I am, child. I am God's worst nightmare. I am every ***** little secret thought you've ever had. I am evil in all it's forms wrapped up in one little package and sent to collect the souls of the innocent. All of you here today will be mine tomorrow. Roger will fall down the stairs off of his front porch and break his neck. Charlene will die from infection due to that nasty little accident and Becky will be hit by the school bus Thursday morning. That will be most nasty! Almost a decapitation. I won't bore you with the rest, but they will all die. Hmmm...you know what Billy... I like you, so I'm thinking, perhaps...yes, I'm going to make a special offer to my new special friend. I won't take your soul until you die from natural causes. What do you think of that idea? At that moment, when your family is gathered round your bedside after suffering that...well, maybe you don't want to know the details... you will see a bright light...but you won't be going towards the light Billy...at that moment I will place my hand on your shoulder and that light will slowly fade into darkness and we will meet again, and you will become my apprentice. So, what do you think of that, Billy? Do you want to be my apprentice, or do I **** you now? Come, come...I haven't much time!" I tried to answer, but my mouth was as dry as cardboard and I could only manage a weak gasp. That laugh again and he turned and walked away in the same direction..."I'll take that as a yes. Remember, you are mine upon your death, Billy boy!" The wind died and the Sun appeared again.
By the end of the week, every child on the playground that day had died...exactly as he stated they would.

And now you know why, even in my darkest days, I never, ever contemplate suicide.

Polaroids of the two of us scattered on the passenger seat
I drive down this endless highway
Everything seems to shimmer in the heat
A/C broken, windows down, Cigarettes in the ash tray
Bridges burning hot behind me,light the path
The car burning on fumes of hope and fear
The clouds behind me, thick with wrath
I drive towards the beach, i was never much of a romantic
I took you here once last year
We held hands an watched the sun sink into the Atlantic
I wonder what the hell drove me here
The memories haunt me like ghosts
All of them hidden deep in the vaults
But I am attracted to them like moths to a flame
I start wondering about faults
and who is to blame
And the what ifs and what might have been
Even the good times seem tainted
Discolored with anger and too much gin
All these memories and the picture the painted
All at the sight of dihydrogen oxide
They rushed forward like a flood
Overflowing my heart inside
I guess water is thicker then blood

A tomboy, naturally barefoot, gingerly walks the white painted line because the asphalt is just too burning hot.  Scrubby tufts of weedy grass are welcome respites on the way, briefly cooling her steps even if they are stickery.  The ***** soles of her now calloused feet were intentionally toughened just before school got out, with mincing steps across the roughest gravel she could find.  Her mother accommodates her preference, leaving a pan of water outside for her to scrub her feet before going in.  Even then, a black path has gradually appeared leading from the front door in the old orangish carpet.  Two months of summer barefoot every day when she had the choice. Keyed roller skates clamped onto last year’s school shoes were the exception.  She can flat out run anywhere.
  
This particular expedition began like every other thing they did, which was anything to fend off boredom.  She had been sitting on a cement step shaded by an open carport, just three oil-stained parking stalls for three small apartments on the tired poor side of town.  There is a little more dirt on the street here, and grass is a little neglected.  Just like the children, but these kids prefer that anyway.  Two scruffy friends stomp on aluminum cans, brothers sporting matching buzz cuts and cut-off shorts.  They are flattening them for the recycling money by the pound, so the carport smells vaguely of stale beer.  Another boy attempts to shoot a wandering fly with a home-made rubber band gun; rings cut from a bicycle tube made the best ammo.  “What do you want to do?” …”I don’t know, what do you want to do?”  Thwack…  The only requisite for friendship here is vicinity, yet it is still true.  The idea of choosing friends is about as odd as the concept that one could chose where one lives... Strengths and shortcomings are completely accepted because it is just what it is.  

Their amazing three-story tree fort with a side look-out had been heartlessly taken down by the disgruntled property owner last week.  Two months of accumulating pilfered and scrap two-by-fours, nails, and even a stack of plywood (gasp!) from area construction sites had yielded supplies for a growing fort.  A gang-plank style entry had crossed the ditch to the first level.  Nailed ladder steps to the second offered a little more vertigo and a prime spot to hurl acorns.  Another ladder up led up to the third floor retreat, with a couch-like seating area and shoulder high walls.  A breeze reached the leaves up there.   The next tree over was the look-out, with nothing but ladder steps all the way up to where the view opened up out of the ravine.  When the wind blew, it gave merciless lessons in facing any fear of heights.  But now that was all over, discovered gone overnight.

Someone says again, “What do you want to do?” …”I don’t know, what do you want to do?”  “ 7-11? ”  Good enough, so they head out.   Distance measures time.  Ten minutes is the end of the street past the cracked basketball court in the church parking lot.  Fifteen minutes and the lawns end at the edge of the sub-division.  Half-built homes rising from bare dirt and scattered foundations could offer treasures of construction scraps, (where she suspects the stack of plywood came from.) but they keep walking.  Twenty minutes is where industry has scraped away nature, and railroad tracks form an elevated levee.  But time is meaningless if there’s a wealth of it, so there’s no going further until an informal ritual is completed.  Wordlessly they each dig around their pockets searching for equal amounts of pennies.  Each of them carefully arrange them lined up on the rounded-surface rail, and they settle in for the wait.  It could be five minutes or it could be thirty.  They all understand it’s a crap-shoot of patience waiting for the next train. It’s an unspoken test; quitting too early means losing your coins to the one who stays, so that’s not an option.

Heat presses down and the breezeless air smells like telephone-pole creosote.  She sits in a dusty patch of shade found next to an overgrown ****.  She knows it tastes like licorice and breaks off a stem to chew, but doesn’t know what it is.  The boys throw rocks randomly until she finally stands up to join in, tempted by the challenge of flight and distance.  Then she stands in the center of the tracks, looking one way then the other, searching for the first random distant glimmer of the engine’s light at the horizon.   A flash, so she places her ear to the metal Indian-style, and the imminent approach is confirmed.  She calls out, “its here!” and double checks her pennies’ alignment.  Heads up or tails, but always aligned so the building might be stretched tall or wide, or Lincoln’s face made broad or thin.  That happened only rarely, since it could only be rolled by one wheel then bounced off.  If it stuck longer, the next wheels would surely smash it into a thin, elliptical, smooth misshapen disc of shiny copper.  Its only value becomes validation of a hint of delinquency, Destroying-Government-Property.  Once she splurged with a quarter, which became smashed to just a gleaming silver, bent wafer discolored at the edge.  Curiosity wasn’t worth 25 cents again though, so she had only one of those in her collection.

The approaching engine silently builds impending size and power, so she dashes back down the rocky embankment to safety because after all, she is not a fool, tempting fate with stupid danger. She knows a couple of those fools, but she finds no thrill from that and is not impressed by them either.  Suddenly the train is here, generating astounding noise and wind, occasional wheels screaming protest on their axels.  She intently watches exactly where she placed her coins, hoping to see the moment they fly off the rails that are rhythmically bending under the weight rolling by.  It becomes another game of patience, with such a long line of cars, and she gives up counting them at 80-ish.  Then suddenly it is done and quickly the noise recedes back to heat and cicadas.  The rails are hot.  Diligently they search for the shiny wafers.  Slowly pacing each wood beam, they could have landed in the gravel, or pressed against the rail, or even lodged straight up against the square black wood yards down the tracks.  They find most of them, give up on the rest, then continue on.

She has thirty cents and at last they reach the afternoon’s destination.  7-11’s parking lot becomes a genuine game of “Lava”, burning blacktop encourages leaps from cooler white lines, to painted tire stops, to grass island oasis, then three hot steps across black lava to the sidewalk, and automatic doors swoosh open to air conditioning.  She rarely has enough money for a coke icey; she is here for the bottom shelf candy, a couple pennies or a nickel each.  Off flavors but sweet enough.  She remembered when her older brother was passing out lunchbags of candy to the neighborhood kids for free, practically littering the cul-de-sac.  She had wondered where he got enough money for all that popularity, or could he have saved that much from trick-or-treat? She wondered until he got busted shoplifting at the grocery store.  The security guard decreed that he was never allowed in there again, forever, and the disgrace of sitting on the curb waiting for the mortified ride home was enough to keep him from doing it again.

Today she picks out a few root beer barrels, some Tootsie-rolls (the smaller ones for two cents, not the large ones that divide into cubes) a candy necklace and tiny wax coke bottles, and of course a freeze-pop.   Sitting on the curb, she bites off small pieces of the freeze pop, careful not to get tooth-freeze or brain-freeze, until the last melty chunk is squeezed out the top of the thin plastic tube.

“What do you want to do now?” …”I don’t know, what do you want to do?”

Dusk.* I won't paint you another sunset,
another beautiful striped sea; no, not today.
Picture instead a smooth discolored surface
on which a firmly gripped stone was roughly

ground, causing a painful chalky screech; the
misemployed rock left vague yellow scars and
lavender bruises on the horizon; the sun cowers
behind them fearfully, distraught by the undue

violence; this is the sunset I experienced at
your fragrant side, and wondered - not unlike
that astre - what could possibly justify the

yellow, spectral scars in my heart, the bright,
undue violence brought upon my pride, and
the slighted sunset in my soul. This is *Dusk.

I’ve grown tired of this suit.
I don't like wearing it anymore.
It’s not what it once was.
It’s a constant burden to me.
It’s discolored, faded, and worn thin, especially around the knees.  
It’s marred with tears and stains.
It embarrasses me.
It itches.
It’s suffocating.
It’s downright ugly.
I no longer feel comfortable in it. I haven’t for decades.
I’ve taken it to the best cleaners, the best tailors that money can buy, but it's still a tattered mess beyond repair.
People say I look good in it, that it’s me, it's who I am,  don’t be so self conscious.
But what do they know?
They're not the ones who wear it all the time. I ******* do, ******* it.
Maybe there’s some hidden truth in all of this that I’ve been bypassing all along?
I don’t have the patience and tolerance to keep wearing it.
The long-avoided decision to rid myself of my suit finally catches up with me.
I’m not timid, not scared, not anxious - just relieved. Excited. Ready to undress.
There’s a fresh, clean robe waiting for me, hanging from the mantle at the bottom of the stairs.
I prepare myself for facing the uncertainty.
So, here I go.
I undress.
It takes a matter of seconds before I rid myself of the suit.
I stand naked, towering over the folded mess.  
I think to myself, that wasn’t so bad after all…
Just like anything in life, it’s the anticipation that cripples us.  Remember that.
I lower my head and stare only for a few moments at my *****, mangy suit.
Nothing at all, no remorse, no guilt – only liberation.  I receive the peace that has softly spoken to me in my dreams, through music, by feeding ducks and listening to the early morning birds.  They usually have the first thing to say, and it’s the most beautiful message one will ever hear.    
I place my robe over my naked body and start walking up the worn, creaky stairs.
Distant laughter and muffled conversations travel down to me as I climb higher towards the thick, ornate door.
The voices are familiar.  
I push open the door, welcomed by the faces that have been gone for far too long.

It still hangs above the kitchen table
   Torn down the center and patched with a single strip of of duct tape
His skin painted white
   His eyes blue and bloodshot
His lips glossed with the color of blood from a fresh wound
  
   *He sits
unable to speak
   unable to tell of all he's seen
unable to share his knowledge with the clueless
   unable to warn them

He silently hangs on the faded yellow wall
   torn and damaged
faded and discolored
  discolored with splatters of this
or sprays of that
  
*no one knows but him
and there he will always be
   on the wall
above the kitchen table
   silent and watching

[[I found this somewhere the other day while I was looking through some stuff.  It is more of just an excerpt than a poem, but I gave it a poetic structure to make it easier on the eyes.]]


I am sitting in this ugly, worn out chair.  It is old, and there are obvious signs that it has been used and used again.  It is simply a seat in which I can rest my body after a hard day of work.  The carpet that this sofa-type-chair rests on is stained and discolored and hardly fitted for the room.  It doesn't even stretch from one wall to the other.  

Resting on my antique night stand is one of two vintage looking speakers that I stumbled across while ravaging through a dumpster behind the Goodwill.  [There's good **** in there:)  You should try it!].  

On the walls are old, used posters that I have had for years.  They are cleverly placed to cover glow-paint graffiti that the last tenant left behind.  Some of them have obvious sun damage, and a few of them are tattered and ripped.  

The bedroom suit is antique and has limped in here after being beaten and bruised since the early years of my childhood.

There are no tokens of wealth here, but there are obvious signs of hard work and many attempts to make the atmosphere as comfortable as possible for myself or whomever chooses to enter my humble dwelling. This is far from the place I dream to be, but I have always been able to make it my own.  This is my safe-haven, and for now, it is where I lay my head.

Don't get me wrong, I love spending my time here.  It isn't much, but I'm thankful for what I have.  I spend some of my most enjoyable time here.  If the walls could talk, you'd be enthralled and perplexed by what they would tell you.  Maybe sometimes you would even be disgusted ;)

I am free here, but there are still so many elements that can intrude from outside these four walls.  The boundaries can be broken by anyone who decides to turn the **** and give the aged, wooden door a little shove.  

I feel so mortal here.  
There are so many worldly implements.

It is much too humanistic and real for me.  It is just too hard to grasp the concreteness of things here.

There is a place where I like to go that I enjoy most of all.  I could never bring you here, but I can describe it to the best of my ability.

The inner workings of this place are not too solid.  the elements are much more fluid.  They can change their form beyond your will.  

I have been visiting this place for a long time;  as far back as my mind will take me, but I still haven't worn out my welcome because this place is just for me.  The temperature is neither too hot nor is it too cold.

The land here is more vast than the greatest plains in the world, but I have trampled on every square inch.

The ocean is deeper than the Earth itself, but I have swam the great blue depths.  

The sky stretches on and on beyond all Earthly possibilities, but I can reach to the clouds by just outstretching my arms.

The mountains reach to the stars and beyond, but I can trudge to the peak and slide all the way back to the bottom in the blink of an eye.

There are more people in this place than have ever existed since the beginning of time, but I have spoken a lifetime worth of deep thought with each and every one of them.

I pated the silver linings on every single cloud and tossed them up into the sky one-by-one.

I gave names to each and every plant and animal.

I paved all of the roads and built every structure without a single tool.

I created the entire world here.  This place holds my every want, need and desire.  It is my kingdom.  I can dream any dream.  Illusions become real at your desire, and everything that you ever believed was impossible suddenly lies within your reach.

Nothing can take over my will and break me down on these journeys throughout the eternal vastness of my mind.

As I leave my mind once again, I take a stroll back to this earthly place.  I find myself still encompassed by the staleness and placidity of this place.  I'm still here slumped in my aged, worn out, sofa-type-chair on its stained and discolored carpet that is still hardly fitted for the room.  It is still a pleasant atmosphere, but if I decide that I want to leave this place, I can take flight back to my immense kingdom and conquer the skies.  I can go as far as I want without ever moving a limb.

The best part about it is that you can never follow me here...

There is probably some place on this earth that is dear to you.  You most likely long to visit this place, and even find yourself there time after time, but there is only one place you can go no matter what is going on around you.  This place is not of this world, and you would never find it simply by just looking.  

Find a place with your own tattered, worn out sofa-type-chair.  Sit down and close both eyes.  No open your third eye, take flight, and start building your kingdom.

it became a perpetual motion
a dance
someone hands the card, another lights
the amount of aching discolored grazed fingers was immense
put your finger on the flint wheel
press it down

karen thought we should make a sign
the scrambles of bruised fingers for a piece of cardboard
my fingers throbbed as i scratched our message on the board
i kept the pink flower locked in the crease of my hand
and threw them in air
“draft card burning here”

it was 7 00 in the morning
october 21 1967
i was only 17
my brother jeffrey was flying a plane over dien bien phu
a friend richard was screaming in the trenches of xuan loc
a lover michael treading through a swamp in mui bai ****

i stepped up to The Police.
The. Men. In. Suits. Stared. At. Me
Blank. Faces. And. No. Expression.
I picked up my Pink Daisy, and brought it up to their bayonets
this is for Jeffrey, for Richard, and for Michael

the men in suits stared at me
in a world of chaos and confusion
all I heard was
Silence.

A bird glides gracefully whilst the discolored leaves are aflutter
   In the wind that rocks the cold rotted wood of the window's shutter;
   All while the obstructive trees cause the wind’s speech to stutter.
   Yet she still howls with an intense pressure on me chest; I can barely utter
   My feelings toward this heavy air of eeriness about me—
   Nearly as heavy as the insignificance in the noose of the tree—
   A decomposed mutilation of all that is good, hung for all to see—
   A shriveled neck and half-dissolved eyes that still long to be free—
   The blood long lost, the body now pale—why does it stress?
   Why is life in its eyes, why does it shrug off Death’s caress?
   And as the sun is fully blotted by the black clouds, unfatigued,
   A hot stench like the enhancement of rotten fruit—yet I am intrigued—
   Descends upon me with the force of a vise equipped with knives—
   ‘Tis the horror of what only the spirits of the dead can contrive.
  
   And visions—horrible visions!—overwhelm me and present terrors:—!
   Rain steadily falls and patters incessantly upon an accursed Earth;
   Surrounding the hanging man are graves—and so begins the second birth:—!
   The tombstones crack and crumble into hundreds of jagged stones;
   An earthquake manifests quickly, and violently rattled my bones
   And remorselessly disembowels the Earth of the trees’ roots;
   Suddenly far more prominent is the awful stench of the fruits;
   An unsettling revelation is brought to my undivided attention:
   The tombstones’ collapse and the earthquake are not in relation,
   But the earthquake is a result of monsters unleashing their power.
   And the tombstones—but what of the tombstones’ fall?
   Startled, I see that replacing the hanging man is a voodoo doll,
   Dancing with its tiny limbs and smiling nonstop, locking its black eyes
   On my horrified self; I cringe and tremble in this demonic guise.
   A screeching note erupts from its unmoving mouth; it hovers in the air
   While I am frightfully dehumanized by the doll’s inexorable stare.
   While the screech lingers, the wet soil of the graves shifts quietly,
   The noise of splitting, wet dirt drowned out by the screech of cruelty.
   As it becomes clear the voodoo doll’s dance is one of conjuring,
   ’Tis revealed to me that the tombstones fell because of remembering:
   The dead do not believe they should be remembered, reflected upon...
   The second birth’s process is agonizingly long as I become wan.
   But before I nearly faint—and leave the visions—I receive an unwanted help:
   The doll’s gesticulations are directed toward me; even so, she raises Hell.
   My mind is frightfully clear to see all before me, and the dizziness has left.
   Oh, why these visions? Why with this horrible curse I am blessed?
  
   I am met with the most terrifying sight of all; my heart quickens.
   As the rain falls harder and begins to puddle, my blood thickens
   And very nearly ceases to flow as I watch the dead come to life.
   Gnarled fingers, some broken and some missing, ignore Death’s inflicted strife.
   Fingers—disjointed, protruding in random directions, treelike;
   Grime under the fingernails—fingernails, chipped or long spikes;
   Hardly any flesh on the old, ***** bones; muscles dripping off.
   Bodies, mutilated by natural decomposition, burst with raging coughs
   From the eviscerated Earth, black with age, red with dried blood.
   The dead, limping and holding what organs they still have, slip in the mud,
   Fall, fill their empty ribcages with it, and scream as limbs are torn away;
   Scream, as they are free from the grave, the path that led them astray.
  
   Oh, the feelings of dread that are eroding my scarred mind!
   What awful horrors have I stumbled upon, what did I find?
   One undead woman is staring at me with unfortunately soulless eyes;
   A few long hairs messily fall from her shriveled head, infested with flies,
   And her eyes—oh, her eyes!—are as small as raisins, wrinkly and white;
   They hover in her sockets, the skull only half-covered—pure fright!—
   With dead skin. Why is her toothless skull grinning mischievously?
   Is she enjoying my terror that leaves my trembling grievously?
   Abruptly, the still, deformed grotesquerie releases a sickening gurgle
   And violently shakes, as if under some overwhelming mental struggle.
   Her jaw falls open, unattended from the necessary muscles’ absence,
   And screaming laughter flows out of her agape mouth; malevolence
   Seeps from it in the form of pitchy black smoke and tightens the air.
   And all the while is still her unfailing, gut-wrenching stare!
   Her chest, dilapidated from the Earth's engulfment of her, explodes—
   A black skeletal hand, emerging from the body that was its abode—
   A demon, a black skeleton, blood gushing from its mouth, fire in its eyes—
   And tattered wings spread as the screamer takes to the hellish skies.
   It hovers around the dancing voodoo doll, circling her,
   Worshipping the smiling thing that was sewn with maleficence and fear.
  
   “But what are these things?” I ask as the undead congregate.
   “Is this how horrible life will be beyond Hell’s gates?”
   But it is made revealed to me that the people are eternal
   Inhabitants of Hell—Hell inside me; the spiritual realm is internal.
   “Why do they gather around the doll and bow in submission?”
   But, to my dismay, there is no answer to this deathly war of attrition.
  
   “Vultures!” I hear, a thunderous, wicked voice from up above.
   “You do not know what you are to believe, or what to love!”
   The dead dance in slow, uncoordinated movements, circling
   The doll. Even the shadows ominously flicker, no longer lurking.
   The black demon floats and gestures to the moaning dead,
   Beckoning them to rise from their permanent deathbeds
   To chant and flail their measly arms in worship of the voodoo.
   What have I done to be cast into this dangerous world askew?
   “You are a vulture, searching helplessly for something to feast
   “When the desperate hunger is turning you into the demons’ beast.
   “And when the food is gone, you search for your next dying idol.
   “For you, the inevitable conquest for falsities will never be final.”
  
[][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][]
  
   The room of a once peaceful dwelling is a victim of an apocalypse:—
   ‘Tis as if it has mutated into the imagery of a drug’s dangerous trip:—
   The walls are bent in, threatening to collapse under the pressure;
   Books are shredded, shelves are upturned, and obliterated is the dresser;
   Blood drips from numerous cracks in the ceiling and paints the walls.
   ‘Tis many moments of being awestruck before I realize the mirror calls.
   Vision is blurry, a hollow ringing sings, and my surroundings fade.
   My legs of jelly drag my heavy body into the dark hall’s shade.
  
   I yell at the sight in the cracked mirror, but my voice is painfully missing.
   It appears as if my entire face is losing its grip and is slowly slipping.
   Gravity’s grappling hooks have taken a strong hold and are pulling.
   The entirety of my eyes is almost visible from the disturbing lack of coverage.
   My jaw refuses to rise back up, as if the muscles have lost their leverage.
   It adds to the terror—how unsightly I am! How revolting!
   I am no longer human but an otherworldly, disgusting being!
   A scream that is not my own bursts from my agape mouth and shatters the mirror.
   It deafens my ears like a knife; I feel the fiery tearing of my vocal cords.
   “Vulture,” I vaguely hear but clearly curl my dry, thin lips to.
   “Go, find your food, find your idol, bathe in what you think is true.”
   Violently, desperately, crashing into walls with wild, uncontrollable limbs,
   I purposelessly search for the spirit that will welcome my immovable sins.

Breathing dawn:
Cool breeze,
Quiet whirl,
Crumples in the purple cover,
Whiff of flowers from the wrinkled pillows,
Rumpled blankets,
Sleeping limbs stretching and awakening,
The call of feathered angels

Arising:
Bony copper-painted-toe-nailed feet
Slumping against a chilly wooden floor,
Burst of artificial light against reflecting tiles,
Water once smooth and clear in the bowl,
Red circular prints left on big brown thighs,
From lazy resting elbows,
The sound of a flush too loud,
Scalding hot water pounding,
Press of a thumb,
A minty blue worm

Preparing:
A wand and black coats from a baby blue bottle,
Soft white heads of cotton-buds turned black,
Timber home of nestling underwear,
Gray button,
Silver clip by the hip,
Spoon,
Chopstick,
Milk moustache,
Murmur of farewell

Starting:
Sliding elevator doors,
Buttons that light up with the warmth of my fingertip,
Then enters a stranger you’ve known all your life,
Awkward mouths moving,
Awkward Good morning,
Awkward lift silence,
Awkward who-goes-out-the-lift-first-and-who-holds-the-door politeness,
Awkward Goodbye,
Awkward realization they’re-coming-the-same-way,
Um, oh, hm? yeah…
Aversion.

Waking up:
Concrete walk,
Peeling red paint on rusty railings,
Moving figures,
Sunrays bouncing over murky polluted water,
Faces from a roaring water machine,
Same guy,
Same glaring pimple
White and yellow stripes

Bells the Dictator:
Piercing, infuriating shrill
Slamming doors
Pattering of running feet,
Instructive bossy voices,
Flick the switch,
Blinking electronic light,
Automatic finger exercise,
Droning lullabies,
Stifled yawns,
Quick chicken sandwich
Piercing, infuriating shrill,
Spark of inquisitive interest,
And there it… yes… dies,  
Remembering past mistakes are not always unpleasant,
Loud voices that encourage a fly-away imagination,
Numbers scrawled on a page,
Competition disguised as genuine interest and concern,
Inadequacy,
Arrogance,
Annoying shrill,
Stone steps,
Aching knees,
Clean plates dirtied with gravy,
Chilli specks swimming in soup,
Laughter,
Cluelessness given away by late laughter,
Fake un-sure smiles,
Laughter,
Pair of dark brown eyes,
Memories,
One secret hope,
A lifetime,
Big blue sky
Shrill,
Blanked-out,
Ashy stubble on a meaty discolored chin,
Shrill,
A boy with a guitar,
Mellow strumming,
That sweet earnest smile,
Another shrill too soon,
Lick of an eyelid,
Shiny shoes,
Squeaky floors,
Sweat,
Rosy cheeks,
The quick dance of a net with a ball,
Bruises blooming like inverted flower buds

Slowing-down:**
Clicking of plastic alphabets and symbols,
Dry patch of skin above the knee,
Itchy
Scratch
Scratch
Scratch
Big blue sky from the edge of a window sill,
Soaring, flying like an eagle up to the wispy white clouds,
Snaking through them like a sprinkler in the garden,
Blink of an eye,
Oh, a pile of homework,
***** statues behind glass,
Knocked down with a giant’s fist,
A great yellow eye with dilated pupils watching ferociously,
Sharp bob of my head,
Ahh, a pile of homework still waiting patiently
Give me a kiss and rest your hand on my head,
You know your love makes my day.

“There is a bitter sting to reality, an unfairness to it all.” These words echo in the young boys ears. Holding what is left of his sanity, he traces the damage; rubbing the now forming bump on his forehead. Fingers circle the discolored flesh then press hard against it till he winces in a jagged remembrance.

He still feels the full force of her bible belt beating down upon him. Open hands smacking him with the made up words of her own book of revelations.

“And the dead shall rise. To feast upon the unclean. “She ranted.

Now, the yellow superhero tee comes off slowly enough. She has stretched the neck of his favorite shirt. Of course he is partly to blame. He never should have had a favorite shirt. He tries to swallow, but his nerves force him to take two swallows for one. The first one descends halfway down his throat.  Catching his anxious breath the second swallow finally goes all the way, followed by a trickle of blood.

“It is what it is.” He thinks.

With soft poet hands he pulls a different shirt from the closet. His brown hair slides messily from the neck hole as the red wool rolls gently over is sore skin providing a small degree of comfort. Then he put his long goofy looking brown and darker brown jacket on.

“I’m done” he mumbles to himself, as he stuffs his journal, sketchpad, the book he is currently reading, and an extra set of cloths in his black back pack.

The white window pane vibrates with October winds. He slides it open, shimmying over and out into the frigid autumn night. A shiver crosses his skin. Then he closes the window as quietly as possible to avoid any more drama. His sad eyes scan the night trying to decide which direction is the right way for him to run away in. With no indication of which way will work best for him he turns left and starts walking.

A mile down the road he stumbles upon the remains of a partly chewed up possum. Empty eyes point deeply into the pine forest. The moist matted fur almost matches the road’s color perfectly.  Dark dry stains mark the grey road. Chunks of slimy viscera lay displayed from the flayed features of the decomposing creature.

In the distance he hears the howls of teenage boys.
“A bunch of screaming fools ******* around,’ he thinks. “I don’t need this ****.”

So, he turns off the road and heads into the trees. Brown pine needles break under his feet. The soft forest bed gives slightly beneath his treads leaving little footprints. As he scans the ground he notices that the earth is swimming with strange footprints.

With a little daylight left he finds the perfect spot to stop. A tree plays backboard to his tense and tired frame as he sits down to rest.

His mind turns to dreams of love. A female figure fills his thoughts. She is dark and lights. Pale skin, leather jacket, with raven black hair that shimmers in the night sparkling with the energy of infinity. She moves with all the destructive grace of Kali. She is a frozen skin scythe less death; Hopes and wonders mixed in with nightmare prophecies. Doom pervades his soul. He feels perfectly alone with no hope.

Which means it is the perfect time to write a poem. One line flits past then the next till almost the whole page is filled. Then he rewrites copying and improving. Till two pages later he is finally fixing the finished draft.

With the last bits of daylight he completes the poem’s final lines. Shivering and exhausted he decides it is time to find a place to sleep. He packs his backpack with all the finesse of a ninety year ******* boy and heads out into the night.

Suddenly he senses something moving behind him. A shadow crosses his path. Panic seizes him. Shady black tendrils run across the ground followed by the sounds of strangers moaning. He runs. The moonlight flickers fast behind the fading pines as he quickens his pace.
He stumbles into a clearing where the ground is punctuated by broken stones and white marble dust. Small monuments stand marking the past. Somewhere slightly off to the side a Sepulcher sits as a testament to a hundred years of death.

“How perfectly macabre, I’m in a cemetery at night in the bitter cold.” He thinks

The earth shifts and swirls beneath his feet like quicksand. Losing his footing he falls backwards. The contents of his backpack scatter haphazardly across the disturbed dirt.

A thin hand pierces the brown ground. Then an arm makes its way writhing from the soil searching for something. Boney fingers feel around until they fall upon a pen and paper. The pen scratches furiously on the pad.

The young man stutters trying to make out the horrible handwriting.

“g-g-get of-f-f m-m-y head.”

The earth tremors beneath his feet, causing him to jump back in fear. Then a skull ascends. Empty sockets stare menacingly at him. More of its body rises, until the full corpse form is free. The wind whistles through the rotten frame. The monstrosity turns his head and heads away. Shambling off into the night to frighten someone else.

A sigh of relief escapes the young man’s lips. His heart slows to a normal rhythm. The blank October sky fills his eyes. He laughs in gratitude, deciding to find a better spot to settle for the night.

Then a jaw chomps down on his skull. Rotten teeth shatter but the bony mouth still pierces his noggin. Red droplets drip soaking the journal pages. The poet screams. His voice fades slowly away, as he struggles. Dying in agony he becomes a feast for the undead horde. The red splattered page reads---




The Graveyard Poet
He walks without sleep
Restless and awake burning inside
With all of the secrets he keeps
His pen and his paper
Lay softly on broken ground
The dead are his keepers
Their stones stand scattered all around
So he put his pen to paper
Ink is turned to flesh
The words bleed into
Each other and start to mesh
Thus the graveyard poet is born
He writes with passion
His mind becomes a storm
His body begins to feel numb
But his heart is so warm
On and on from dusk till dawn
Words erupt from the poets pen
Still the cold bites bitterly
He stops only to turn the page and write again
Hours come and go in a blur
Until he can’t move his arm
Even he is unsure
Of what is wrong
His eyelids grow heavy
And soon he is asleep
Rest peacefully young poet
Now your secrets are mine to keep

The heart, full of hatred
Hardened with tarred emotions
It does not beat with rhythm of Love
Discolored beyond recognition
Pumping thick fluid of crass
Across all veins in the body
Paralyzing the mind and the limbs
Finally, hatred suffocates
Unable to breathe the fresh hope
As the body is full of vicious hatred
Asphyxiating the last breath of hope
To revive the chances of Love again
Hatred wins, and the soul, succumbs**



© Amitav (Radiance)

Note to stranger:

Don't let her long eyelashes fool you
Stemming off from eyelids filled with promise
Pupils composed of green and brown paint
Mixed and made permanent by the look on her face when you ask her what love means to her

Because to her
Love is an antique promise
Tic Tac Toed into her shoulder blades
Another lost game

Lonely is made apparent by the reveal of her hipbones
Sticking out from the belt loops on the waistband of her dreams
Her clothes become looser

She is welcomed by friends to parties that she refuses to go to
Because even in a room of people
The only emotion she is capable of feeling
REALLY feeling
Is lonely

And you may argue that lonely is not an emotion
But a state of being
But when she truly feels it
Lonely becomes both

Discolored tulips growing for a flowerpot of unfertilized dirt
Masked by a smile that could fool anyone
Even her own father
Sometimes even herself

Mascara stained floor tile
Quick change scenes
Equivalent to her multiple personalities
Sad happy sad happy
Sad...

She is capable of being both sad and happy
She is introverted AND extroverted
She is 5 million different people
Sometimes wishing she could narrow herself down to just one
She is ME

1
light falls in river
to red head
red ear
creating glares
of open spaces
in the shaking airwaves
of tapping shoe
slice paper
slice language
cut
to the core
of this planet
where solid liquids churn

2
repeat, go!
Slice into your  mind
Write the outline
Of everything…
Something…
This…
I think
What is left
when everything
disappears
into
something
that has never been
like a river
born from
phoenix ashes
rushing,
thundering
as it strikes, burns,
chars the unyielding
earth
the imprint hinting
at the boots
of an unwelcome hiker




3
(dreams of a wheelchair bound germophobe)

each finger map
creates a face
a person
with cheeks
rosy and full
like plump
grapes, falling
from the
wispy clouds
into footprints,
memories
of what?
Somewhere
A closed door
Hollow, but solid
Rat bitten,
The vermin, running
*******
Stinking of disease
As they squeak
Dying, in the wine
Spilled
In the corner of
Damp cellar


4
sandpaper chipping
contrasted fingernail
pale on brown
the world turns
upside-down
black powder
pencil shavings
fall
somewhere
without door
hallway, walls
floor, ceiling or..
no, forget it
there is nothing there
a black hole
against
untouched
white wall
her face
eyes hiding
behind
the world
as she runs
into the ocean
holding
fire
she discovered fire
the fire of…
of
nothing
of, afterthoughts
a period falls
from blue line
expanding
to form
entrance
to
sewers
rats with red eyes
stare out
that smell,
their breath…
mouthwash
and air freshener
too expensive
to buy
so
in revenge,
they fall
from an inside
pocket
and again,
you are alone
in a room
full of
eyes, which
lead
below,
above
and the world
turns, twists-
the horizon
becoming
needle-point
as they draw
blood


5
puzzle pieces
fall,
crumble-
sand sound
an ocean wave,
the tapping
of a blind cane
a language
unidentifiably
foreign
each word
burning
outlines
into…
what is an
outline?
A silhouette?
A silhouette…
There is nothing left
But a reminder
Of the past-
Filing cabinet
Names
Arranged
Tab by tab,
Letters go down
Stair-steps
Of and unending
Case
Trumpet case?
Violin case?
Or case of words-
Arranged
Letter by letter
Each starting
With “dear…”
Before they end
With blank edge
Discolored
And bent
A broken
Finger
Outlined by
Screaming recipient
Hotel bellhop
Misplaced bags
In the trash chute
And they slide
Into an unlit
Hole
They have yet
To install lights
And show the
Path
Which,
As a child,
The follower
Will not follow
But
Never will they
Know if their
Footsteps lead
Forward or sideways
Through
Night-forest
Of concrete





6
silence:
the existence
of nothingness.
Nothingness
Permits nothing
To be
Permits no one
To see
And in the shadows of un-being-
A sea
Of crashing waves
Colored
Pine needle
To
Watered blood
Shapes ebbing
And waning
In
And
Out
Of focus-
Giving
The effect
Of loose
Fitting
Glasses on
Someone
Otherwise
Engaged-
A jogger
Whose feet
determine
path and
distance-
whose minds
eye is the
only eye
working
ever.
Glasses
Fall forward
And are
Crunched
Underfoot.
Shadows
go black
again



7
nodding
and sniffling-
balding head
shining back
is field of
water-lapped
river-stones-
singular
tide
washing
them
bare-
gl­are
like
windshield
thrown
at highway
speed
onto
midsummer
tropical
gravel road.
gravel
under boots
sounds
eerily
similar
to hard
cereal
in
slime-chunk
milk,
each
grain,
or chunk
is its own
universe
ecosystem-
unaware
of the
rotten
space
in which
it is implanted-
a bullet
into a
tree-
not
piercing
but
remaining
forgotten
to rust
into
non-being
until
only rust
fragments
remain,
to be
scattered
and re-grow
forming new
shapes,
abstract
shapes
tilting
and
twisting
above,
below-
be­low
blue
boundaries
hinting at…
leftover
unwanted
but
envied
in form
by
lesser
beings,
bottom
dweller,
memories
of
ancient times


8
administration
location,
power
fall, topple
off, of your tower
into- elsewhere
but- where?
Does the world
Offer a choice
Of where we
Disappear
To?
Is so
That is
The only
Choice
Given-
Truly given
Upon inspection
Of society
And life,
The structure
Of the life
Of the living
And
The dead,
The dead
The living
Are dying
And in time-
Become-
The dead,
In piles
Of dusty
Tomes-
The past
Was once
Called now,
And now,
The future-
In only
The tick time
Of a second-
Now, will
Be long past-
In two,
The future
Also will be
Past.
Time has
Shifting names
Which change
Faster than
It passes




©Brandon Webb
2012

Shocking ends,
and brand new lies,
sit behind,
covered eyes.

Little tips,
and discolored lips,
strangely there,
in a discreet air.

Ticking clocks,
and mismatched socks,
unique ideas,
wrapped in tears.

Shaking hands,
and disheveled strands,
of long thin hair,
you're without an heir.

Strangled air,
and you're without a care,
that this lack of support,
is all you'll report.

And when you die,
you'll hear a lullaby,
of when lives tend,
to reach a shocking end.

the thought of death is an uneasy thought
in my case it's a ****** nightmare

on the 16th day of May, 1967, Mr Youngblood took his 6th grade class to the playground as he always does, every Tuesday after lunch. The kids spread out to their usual positions. Some played catch with Mr Youngblood. A few, like Roger and me went to the basketball net and several played on the monkey bars, both of which were part of the big asphalt square. Just opposite this area was the soccer field and then some good distance between that and the Middle School. Lots of open space for a bunch of suburban kids to have fun. The Sun was bright and the wind was light and the temperature was right around perfect. We had been playing for 10 minutes or so when the wind picked up and clouds seemed to move in out of nowhere. We all thought it must be a storm coming...and it was. A distant laugh froze everyone. At first no-one saw him, but then we all saw him at once. He was walking across the soccer field towards us, long deliberate strides. Where he came from is a mystery as there was nothing but open land behind him for several hundred yards. He was tall and lanky and as he approached us, I noticed that his face was contorted and discolored...a pale, almost painted white and he had jet black hair combed back, long and greasy. His lips were thin and black and his eyes bloodshot and almond shaped. He wore a black suit, a black shirt and candy apple red tie. He looked like a mosh-up of Curry's Pennywise and Ledger's Joker, only I would have traded for either one of those ******* right now over this guy, ten to one. He came to the edge of the concrete square. Johnny ****** his pants and Charlene fell from the monkey bars, landing on her left side and causing a compound fracture, her radius protruding from her skin leaving her hand dangling like a dead fish. She did not scream either because she was scared it might draw his attention or she was going into shock...or maybe both. He took two more steps forward and then began laughing as if he'd just heard the funniest joke he'd ever been told. His teeth looked as if they'd been replaced with shark's teeth. I swear there were rows of them and his mouth stretched inhumanly wide. His laugh slowly winded down to a snarl, and he gave a long look to each one of us, as if he was burning the faces to memory. And then he spoke..."You children just go on having lots of fun! Well, except for you Johnny...didn't your Mom just rip you a new *** for ******* your pants at Grandma's? shame, shame!" And Johnny was off...tripping twice before he got his feet under him. "You run home and ...Ha Ha Ha...oh my...change your pants, you pathetic little ****!" Mr Youngblood picked up Charlene and started to carry her inside. By this time her pretty pink dress was soaked in blood. The freak addressed him. "Nice man...but you can't save them. In a few days they will all be mine." He laughed again and every kid ran for their lives back to the school. I was the only one who stayed. To this day I'm not sure why. He turned and walked towards me slowly. "What have we here? The little man isn't running with the others. Are you not afraid Billy boy? Afraid for your life?"...and he leaned in close...close enough that I smelled a foulness that cannot be described. "Because that is what I'm here for...your life!" "Who are you, I asked" and with that his dark black and pointed eyebrows raised and he straightened up. "Who am I...Who am I? My, my the boy has a backbone. The nerve to question while others lose control of their bladders. Well, I'll tell you who I am, child. I am God's worst nightmare. I am every ***** little secret thought you've ever had. I am evil in all it's forms wrapped up in one little package and sent to collect the souls of the innocent. All of you here today will be mine tomorrow. Roger will fall down the stairs off of his front porch and break his neck. Charlene will die from infection due to that nasty little accident and Becky will be hit by the school bus Thursday morning. That will be most nasty! Almost a decapitation. I won't bore you with the rest, but they will all die. Hmmm...you know what Billy... I like you, so I'm thinking, perhaps...yes, I'm going to make a special offer to my new special friend. I won't take your soul until you die from natural causes. What do you think of that idea? At that moment, when your family is gathered round your bedside after suffering that...well, maybe you don't want to know the details... you will see a bright light...but you won't be going towards the light Billy...at that moment I will place my hand on your shoulder and that light will slowly fade into darkness and we will meet again, and you will become my apprentice. So, what do you think of that, Billy? Do you want to be my apprentice, or do I **** you now? Come, come...I haven't much time!" I tried to answer, but my mouth was as dry as cardboard and I could only manage a weak gasp. That laugh again and he turned and walked away in the same direction..."I'll take that as a yes. Remember, you are mine upon your death, Billy boy!" The wind died and the Sun appeared again.
By the end of the week, every child on the playground that day had died...exactly as he stated they would.

And now you know why, even in my darkest days, I never, ever contemplate suicide.

The age, when they are supposed to play with toys
Picking up the broken & trashes for others, these Garbage boys
In the piles of disposed plastic chocked their story sentimental
The boys, dusty body so frail & gentle
Wrapped in clothes, tattered torn, dull & discolored like them
Surviving against the rules of Darwin
Too starved & malnutritioned & no one cares
Only the open sky & thrown food, they share
In the chaos of every city they have to find a place to sleep
They collect the things, what people call waste & cheap
No parents, no future, just the harsh life on the road side
Living in their small world unaware with pride
Shiny cars & luxury clothes, sparks their eyes
Telling that they have dreams,
But Their memories full of hate, insult & razed
Which are permanent & can't be erased
Unexpected rains, deadly cold & sweaty summers
Not every one of them end up like a Kite Runner
When people sleep comfortably in their sweet home
They stand there with the fainted & blurred shadow alone

Down, you mongrel, Death!
  Back into your kennel!
I have stolen breath
  In a stalk of fennel!
You shall scratch and you shall whine
  Many a night, and you shall worry
  Many a bone, before you bury
One sweet bone of mine!

When shall I be dead?
  When my flesh is withered,
And above my head
  Yellow pollen gathered
All the empty afternoon?
  When sweet lovers pause and wonder
  Who am I that lie thereunder,
Hidden from the moon?

This my personal death?—
  That lungs be failing
To inhale the breath
  Others are exhaling?
This my subtle spirit’s end?—
  Ah, when the thawed winter splashes
  Over these chance dust and ashes,
Weep not me, my friend!

Me, by no means dead
  In that hour, but surely
When this book, unread,
  Rots to earth obscurely,
And no more to any breast,
  Close against the clamorous swelling
  Of the thing there is no telling,
Are these pages pressed!

When this book is mould,
  And a book of many
Waiting to be sold
  For a casual penny,
In a little open case,
  In a street unclean and cluttered,
  Where a heavy mud is spattered
From the passing drays,

Stranger, pause and look;
  From the dust of ages
Lift this little book,
  Turn the tattered pages,
Read me, do not let me die!
  Search the fading letters, finding
  Steadfast in the broken binding
All that once was I!

When these veins are weeds,
  When these hollowed sockets
Watch the rooty seeds
  Bursting down like rockets,
And surmise the spring again,
  Or, remote in that black cupboard,
  Watch the pink worms writhing upward
At the smell of rain,

Boys and girls that lie
  Whispering in the hedges,
Do not let me die,
  Mix me with your pledges;
Boys and girls that slowly walk
  In the woods, and weep, and quarrel,
  Staring past the pink wild laurel,
Mix me with your talk,

Do not let me die!
  Farmers at your raking,
When the sun is high,
  While the hay is making,
When, along the stubble strewn,
  Withering on their stalks uneaten,
  Strawberries turn dark and sweeten
In the lapse of noon;

Shepherds on the hills,
  In the pastures, drowsing
To the tinkling bells
  Of the brown sheep browsing;
Sailors crying through the storm;
  Scholars at your study; hunters
  Lost amid the whirling winter’s
Whiteness uniform;

Men that long for sleep;
  Men that wake and revel;—
If an old song leap
  To your senses’ level
At such moments, may it be
  Sometimes, though a moment only,
  Some forgotten, quaint and homely
Vehicle of me!

Women at your toil,
  Women at your leisure
Till the kettle boil,
  ****** of me your pleasure,
Where the broom-straw marks the leaf;
  Women quiet with your weeping
  Lest you wake a workman sleeping,
Mix me with your grief!

Boys and girls that steal
  From the shocking laughter
Of the old, to kneel
  By a dripping rafter
Under the discolored eaves,
  Out of trunks with hingeless covers
  Lifting tales of saints and lovers,
Travelers, goblins, thieves,

Suns that shine by night,
  Mountains made from valleys,—
Bear me to the light,
  Flat upon your bellies
By the webby window lie,
  Where the little flies are crawling,—
  Read me, margin me with scrawling,
Do not let me die!

Sexton, ply your trade!
  In a shower of gravel
Stamp upon your *****!
  Many a rose shall ravel,
Many a metal wreath shall rust
  In the rain, and I go singing
  Through the lots where you are flinging
Yellow clay on dust!

7:06
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she crushes ten 0.5 milligram pills of xanax with the **** end of a spoon,
puts half of it up her nose, mixes the rest into a bottle of water along with a koolaid packet.

8:47
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she pulls three more pills from an empty lipstick tube in her bag,
chases them with her koolaid xanax cocktail and checks her email:
for every day that she doesn't change her underwear, she makes twenty dollars,
mrsympatico@gmail.com tells her.

9:32
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she snorts three more fat discolored lines in a public bathroom with her best friend.
her friend crushed the pills with a pen that clicked every time she pressed down;
breathe in fast and hold your ******* breath.

10:15
bringing a new weight to the words "high and dry,"
she takes her last pill of the day.
today has cost her at least thirty dollars
as she makes a career out of killing herself.

This is what I want
A little house with an a frame top
And giant colored strands of lights in every window
With a huge tree , too big most definitely for the room
And a ridiculous mixture of old and new just covering the walls

I want wallpaper
Peeling from the walls
As though it almost hurts it to remain stuck on so hard
And I want it so be intricately ugly and old an’ discolored
In a cozy way

I want to live on a street of little houses
With potluck suppers
Small gardens that are improperly tended
Maybe with some oregano spread throughout

I want a little cozy life
With a tall cozy boy
We can pick our oregano and our turnips
Cook us a stew
Peel the onions
Like the wallpaper from our little walls

I want a Polaroid camera
So I can take instant pictures that I cannot regret
That I can keep in a tin beneath my bed
Forever they will stay etched

I want to ride trains everywhere
Sitting in my seat
Glaring out at the window at the little houses
With A-frame tops
Yellowing lights
Covered in that glinting snow

Today the snowflakes looked like real flakes
Like the ones you cut out of paper
And hang on the wall of your dorm
To cover up the stains and cracks
In the yellowing paint
As is peels from the wall
Like my dream wallpaper

The wind in Buffalo makes me cry
From my right eye
My wrong one just sits and wonders
“What makes the right one so weak?
It is just a little storm,
Why can’t the right ones just hang in there?
Without drowning us in their sorrows…

In the garden, which once bloomed
Is left with dry leaves and weeds
Unattended by any gardener
Shrubs and hedges grown out of proportion
Even the walls have been claimed by poison ivy
No visitor here, in this forlorn patch
Dried and desolated, bereft of all the juice
It can’t sustain beauty anymore
Reminiscing, its heyday, the bird’s paradise
Variety of flowers, thronged by bees
Sweetest of nectar have once been tasted
The wooden bench, discolored, and weary
Once part of the romantic words exchanged
Between lovers, and a place to rest
For the elderly couples, trying to revive old memories
Garden itself is now a part of memory
Listening to so many anecdotes, happy or gloomy
Yet, the garden, was paradise once
Welcoming everyone with open arms
Now past its prime, it’s in a dilapidated state
Not a soul to tend its broken heart
No one will be there, to mourn the loss of paradise

Moths—they are nearly all comprised of the same tender characteristics: empty colors that've somehow been ****** away like the nectar they digest, fuzzy abdomens that crumble within the softest pinch, and powder encrusted wingspans that fray with countless beatings from the wind. I have come to recognize that there are people like Her who dwindle within themselves among all of us, unheard; enthralled by color that doesn't exist to the naked eye, but rather to an imaginative mind and a battered soul. She is The Moth Girl and she, too is the epitome of simpler things. With Her fair skin and enchanting, grey eyes that **** you in with a single glance; lips so chapped and brittle that they're nearly as drained of pigment as the rest of her. I've decided that She is the reason oblivion hasn't doomed us all and obliterated our world to dust. I've imagined Her as oblivion itself, annihilating other galaxies and collecting the discolored soot from each explosion to sift it over the wings of every moth that has ever been criticized. With this, I have concluded that every moth must be a victim.
⠀
But, if given the chance, would they transfigure?
⠀
I've undergone the thrill of witnessing these moths revolutionize into harlequin humming birds that thrive at Her will. Wings that were once littered with dust are now far too rapid and swift for manifestation. The Moth Girl — She remains a flower of a woman, though now She is sprouting with petals that burst with color; filled with nectar sweeter than She. They are all rich with vibrancy.
⠀
With it, they have concluded that it's not much different being evocative.
⠀
After everything, I have decided that they were blooming with color all along, and it was the rest of us that simply couldn't see it.

My Night with Art Garfunkel


some years back wrote a poem titled
My Night with Paul Simon,^
so it seems that in time,
this his companion’s piece would find me,
reaching its own due date, the timing right,
indeed, perceived, by the muses
that this one, the poet who cannot sing,
needs urgently another soft poet’s voice,
to come to me at night, and so it came to pass last night

a regaler, the teller of tales, both of us looking admiringly upon what was our youthful appearance that only we see in a vintage Murano mirror

the where the why, no matter, just two NYC boys
in their declining years reminiscing about growing up
in Queens, telling tales with no need for exaggeration,
too old for that, for old men lying is always sadder than sad and the truthful stories are not stories, but harmonies

the voices are worn soft, the worse for wear, and the velveteen
is two shaded where usage has reduced the weave, and sunlight has discolored but not discouraged the aging agents

we exchange verses, the swapping of our ****** fluids,
I do not share my prior pope paul adventure,
a separate but now equalized recording

he signs his new book for me,
full of reminisce and new verses

and I am thinking
Art for art’s sake, or art for Art’s sake
or both

wistful higher and higher notes that can longer be reached
of no consequence,
for the body is the work and the work is from the body

let’s take a selfie I ask, but a polite demurral hints of better a preference remembrance of things the way they were, in the past, but I snap a quick photo and it resides on a Facebook entry, unless the muses deleted it without telling me

(which they do quite frequently,
hoarding the best I made all for their elusives elfish selfish-selves)^^


Dec 5, 2017 10:20pm

<•>
^
https://hellopoetry.com/poem/387251/my-night-with-paul-simon/

June 2013

^^
https://hellopoetry.com/poem/747333/the-elusives/

June 2014

the house was painted
a soft hue. an old tobacco trap;
discolored white where
pictures once hung.
in the kitchen, grease stains,
faded bluebird wallpaper —
long since ceased it's song,
and one cast-iron skillet off to the side.
pale and forgotten,
the fine china shrieks!
my barefoot innocence
is lost as the cold-colored
porcelain eats at the floor.
sometimes when I lay there covered in
turpentine, stars usually topple
out of the cabinet,
and my gas stove aspirations are botched.
the sink drain moans with the silent
invectives of an impure saint…
her rosary still atop the mantle.

just outside, a stone angel
that smells of lilies, —
savagely eats rosebuds over
an autumn bonfire.
from time to time
her face is one of lament…
it follows me from room to room,
and my hands shake for hours
while holding little antique figurines
in a basket full of milkweed…
they’d tuck at the curtain,
their little music box voices
complain about her eyes...
they'd scurry up the ivy on the side of
the house to avoid her
disappointed glance…
there was a sad wingbeat as
I stepped out on the balcony to collect
them one last time.

On the day you were born,
Two Candles were it.
They were two very different towers:
One just a lump of discolored, black, wax,
The other a solid Construction of white.

Now it's your first day of school,
Two Candles burn.
They are still very different towers:
One a hill of black wax,
The other a Mountain of white.

High school rolls along,
Two Candles blaze on.
They are shifting, changing shapes:
One is a small house of blacks and brown,
The other is a Mansion of white wax.

Your wedding day has arrived,
Two Candles shine.
They are nearly the same hight:
One is a dandelion of black,
The other is a Sunflower of white.

The day has come to light new candles:
Two Candles for a new life.
They are with no similarity:
A puddle of black,
A Waterfall of white.

You watch their candles change:
Two Candles for your child.
They alter:
Growing black
Shrinking white.

And as you watch theirs, you loose track of your own.
Two Candles dying.
A Tower of black,
A mound of white.

You're on your death bed.
Two Candles flicker
Black grows strong with a red flame,
white shrinks with a small blue fire.

They lower you into Earth.
One Candle rages on.
Black - strong and tall as ever.
white is no longer.

They place your Candle
With the billions of others.
You name engraved in silver.
That's what you will be known for: a tower of black wax.

Salt Lake City, 2015*

Like a tourist in my own childhood,
I wander the neighborhood of my youth.
It’s not quite a pilgrimage, as
pilgrims know what they’re looking for.

I stand at the flagstone fountain in the park
and gaze across the street
at the red brick bungalow
where my family lived until I was 13.

Am I supposed to intone something?
Summon a spirit? Or perhaps I’m the one
who’s been summoned. Ghost of myself.

On this spot, there’s the illusion of level ground,
but here at the northwest corner of this Victorian
mountain city, the ground slopes in every direction
if you walk a few yards. North up to the Wasatch,
east up to the Wasatch, south more gently but up again,
to the Wasatch, and west sharply down to the valley floor.

Set into the hillside, the house faces west.
A boarded-up plate glass window
makes it blind in one eye.
In the summer, from that window,
we could see postcard sunsets,  
fiery light sinking into the Great Salt Lake.
In winter the gray stasis of inversion.

The old brass address plate—61—still hangs
Slightly crooked on the molding below the attic dormer.
The steep cement steps to the wide front porch
look worn by nostalgia.

My grandparents bought this house in 1938,
and sold it to my parents in 1957, so dad,
the English professor, could walk to work
at the U., a half block away.  I was 1.

Double exposure.  I can’t separate this view
From old photos and recollections.

There to the right on the parking strip,
I once hid under a giant cardboard box
when I knew my sister was walking back from campus.  
As she got close, I jumped out,
causing a satisfyingly chilling scream.  
She tried her best to be furious at me,
but we were both laughing too hard.

1946:  Dad in black and white stands
to the left of the porch’s north column in his graduation gown,
his bachelor’s degree delayed seven years
by a Mormon mission to Scotland and World War II.

1955: all my siblings and all the children
of my mother’s sisters posed on the sweeping cement stairs
for an iconic black and white portrait. Only one missing:
Me.  Not born yet.  All those cousins
Sitting on my steps before I existed.  
There must be a word in some language
for the feeling that gave me. I never could name it.

I start up the alley to the north side
to take a lap around the place.
The brick’s discolored and damaged
from a half-century’s growth of ivy,
recently stripped away, like skin where a tattoo’s been removed.
A picture I took in 1985 shows ivy completely covering the dim brick.

At night, a car turning up this alley would cast crazily
dancing lights  on the ceiling
of my pitch-dark basement bedroom,
through this little porthole-size window.
My heart  would race, knowing it meant my parents were home.

The cement walk alongside the house is crumbling
and has started to melt into the wild grass.

The next window, at the landing of the basement stairs
is where a black widow lived, encased in the space between
inner and outer panes. I used to study the red hourglass
on its abdomen, and tried to draw it.
Couldn’t get it right. Was better at artillery.

In the back, against this wall, an old radiator was standing, waiting for removal  after home improvements.
It toppled over and landed on my brother’s foot.
Crutches for weeks.  Bad luck, but maybe it inoculated
him.  He’s still never had a broken bone.

Here behind the garage, the old crabapple tree still stands,
nurturing its sour but highly flingable fruit.
At its base a hamster lies buried.

The little side yard on the south looks the same,
though the old white trellis that I used to climb
when I was so tiny it would support my weight is gone.

Back to the ***** at the front of the house.
Leaving for school in the morning I would
leap this ***** in a single bound.

The old place looks creased and sleepy.
It doesn’t remember who I am,
is starting to fade into the past.
It’s only about half here.
The rest is memory and desire.

I painted your portrait today
your yellow hair suddenly
turned gray--
your green eyes went black
your smile
went slack
and the paint ran
down the canvas
in rivulets of what looked like
discolored blood
pooled  there on the floor
--formed it's own kind of mud
I stood there
not at all proud
of my rendition of you
yet--knowing your portrait
was something
I was compelled to do
and if ever you come by
to see me again
I'll let you have it
(the painting)
minus your evil grin.
(it's lying there on the floor)
Oh, you won't miss it, I assure you--
it's right here just inside
what used to be
our front door...

I hope you believe me when my I tell you my body is composed of more than a skin and bone frame.
My body is a picture book of times stained to me like tattoos of memories unable to be washed off.
If you stare closely enough my purple knuckles tell a story of walls caving in on days I can't remember.
My fingers are a light shade of skin because they have traced bodies who's pigment fell in love with my hands.
My palms are empty from receiving and giving a little more than I should of let go; some things I should of clutched onto for longer.
My arms are made of clenched embrace and have a scent of regret laced from wrist to elbow.
My shoulders hold individual carvings of finger nails and teeth marks from more than one individual night.
My lips are a discolored red from every poison stained mouth in which they've met.
My neck is a canvas of rough hands, ropes not tied tight enough and purple stains of affection from those who have lied about loving me,
and my eyes have turned grey from staring for too long into the forests and oceans they've met at three in the morning in the caves of unfamiliar faces.
So if you happen to walk into my room, don't be alarmed by the smell of apathy. Don't concern yourself about the bottles buried and broken under mounds of clothes that reek of Marlboros. Don't turn the light on, and don't open the curtains.
I have lived long enough, my body will tell you the story.
But before you read it, please trust me when I say "there is more to me than this."

There is a note that lives between thought and slumber,
That’s when I thought of you today
A harmonica lay in my hand, the reeds looking at me silly,
Play, I imagined it say, and imagined it was really there.

In my mind we are still walking a dusty bluesy road, our jeans torn and worn
In this midday dream the blues is red and wore a hat; I let out:
This, is not the blues from which my hippie son was born.
I sigh, at the sight of a synthesizer kissing a harmonica, the synth in your head, the harmonica pregnant with my heart.
Our blues drove us to momentary madness, because Syd Barrett was always jealous
Like fights that happened on Sundays and when we choose to mock, then cruelness.
Come midnight someone awakes and someone is being wakened,
And outside, nothing is lit, But she's not afraid, just letting you know she was waking.

Your bedside was colored, certainly psychedelic, but was almost always red
I lay there, like a pregnant harmonica making love to a trusty guitar, the guitar thrusting, the harmonica trusting.

I confront salvation with a straight face, a cigarette now intruding
No, I yell, the harmonica sounds the same, still on the key of C,
But by a synthesizer you sat, the harmonica lay there, heavy with child, looking at me,
And as I stare back, I've seen: indeed you have chosen the synth.

A note creeps in between the high and dry of low, I insist that kismet needs a little shove
Just a push, a new pair of eyes, another heart and a memory that knows only love,
Spiralling in Syd's Milky Way, me drowning, me begging in exchange for you,
I tried moaning a tune but the blues have discolored and turned simply blue.

I face the devil now, I try to bargain, but he sings, 'the blues trusts no one, no longer.'
The devil makes a face, sings to me then says, 'you've forgotten that I'll always remember.”