EFFECTS OF CHILD ABUSE ON PERFORMANCE OF PRIMARY SCHOOL IN KAPYEMIT WARD, TURBO CONSTITUENCY, UASIN-GISHU COUNTY.





BY
ERICK NYAKUNDI
KIS/03013/14




A RESEARCH PROJECTSUBMITED TO THE SCHOOL OF ARTS AND SOCIAL SCIENCES, DEPARTMENT OF SOCIOLOGY AND PSYCHOLOGY IN THE PARTIAL FULFILMENT FOR THE AWARD OF THE DEGREE OF BACHELOR OF SOCIOLOGY



MAY, 2014

DECLARATION

I, the undersigned, declare that this project is my original work and that it has not been presented in any other university or institution for academic credit.

Signature...............................................­..... Date...................................
ERICK NYAKUNDI
KIS/03013/14






SUPERVISOR
This project has been submitted for examination with my approval as university supervisor
DR. W. O. ABUYA
Signature..................................................­.. Date....................................




DEDICATION
I dedicate this work to my Dad, Mom, my sister Lydia and my lovely brother Dun who contributed in one way or another to make this project to be successful.


















ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
I would like to thank all individuals who contributed and sacrificed their time towards completion of this project.
To my supervisor, for the guidance and support in the development of this research project, His advice and criticism made this project what it is.
Thanks to colleagues and friends for their suggestions, advice and encouragement. To all of you may God bless you abundantly for your tireless effort.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Contents Page
DECLARATION i
DEDICATION ii
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT iii
TABLE OF CONTENTS iv
LIST OF TABLES vii
LIST OF FIGURE viii
ABSTRACT ix
CHAPTER ONE 10
STUDY OVERVIEW AND STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM 10
1.1 Background of the Study 10
1.2 Research Questions 13
1.3 Research Objectives 13
1.4 Justification of the Study 13
1.5 Significance of the Study 14
1.6 Scope of the Study 15
1.6.1Assumptions of the Study 16
CHAPTER TWO 17
LITERATURE REVIEW 17
2.1 Introduction 17
2.2 Common Forms of Child Abuse 17
2.2.1 Child ****** Abuse 17
2.2.2 Physiological or Emotional Abuse 17
2.2.3 Physical Abuse 18
2.2.4 Child Neglect or Abandonment 18
2.2.4.1 Physical Neglect 19
2.2.4.2 Educational Neglect 19
2.2.4.3 Medical Neglect 19
2.2.5 Child Fatalities 20
2.3 How Child Abuse Affects Academic Performance 20
2.3.1 Child Abuse and Academic Performance 20
2.3.2 Child Abuse and School Image 23
2.3.3 Child Abuse and Dropout Rate 25
2.4 Strategies that Schools can Employ to Curb Child Abuse 26
2.4.1 Role of Public Regulation 26
2.4.1.1 Nurturing and Attachment 27
2.4.1.2 Social Connections 27
2.5 Theoretical Framework 27
2.5.1 Learning Theory 28
2.5.1.1 Relationship with the Study 28
2.5.2 Family Dysfunction Theory 29
2.5.2.1 Relationship with the Study 29
CHAPTER THREE 30
RESEARCH DESIGN AND METHODOLOGY 30
3.0 Introduction 30
3.1 Site Description 30
3.2 Research Design 30
3.3.1 Target Population 30
3.3.2 Sample Size and Sampling Procedure 31
3.4 Description of Research Instruments 32
3.4.1 Research Instrument 32
3.4.1.1 Questionnaire 32
3.5 Data Collection Procedure 32
3.5.1 Validity and Reliability of Research Instruments 33
3.5.1.1 Reliability of Research Instruments 33
3.5.1.2 Validity 33
3.6 Data Analysis and Presentation 33
CHAPTER FOUR 35
DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS 35
4.0 Introduction 35
4.1 Background Information 35
4.1.1 Age of the Respondents 35
4.1.2 *** of the Respondents 35
4.1.3 Education Level of the Respondents 36
4.1.4 Marital Status 36
4.2 Specific Information 37
4.2.1 Effects of Child Abuse on Academic Performance 37
4.2.2 How Child Abuse Affects Dropout Rate of Students in School 38
4.2.3 Proposed Strategies that Schools can Employ to Curb Child Abuse 41
CHAPTER FIVE 43
SUMMARY, CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 43
5.0 Introduction 43
5.1 Summary of the findings 43
5.2 Discussion of the Findings 44
5.3 Conclusion 45
5.4 Recommendations 46
REFERENCES 47

LIST OF TABLES & FIGURES
Table 3.1 Target population 32
Table 3.1 Sample size 33
Table 4.1 Age of the Respondents 36
Table 4.2 *** of the Respondents 37
Table 4.3 Education Level of the Respondents 37
Table 4.4 Marital Status 38
Table 4.5 Effects of Child Abuse on Academic Performance 38
Table 4.6 How Child Abuse Affects Dropout Rate of Students in School 40
Figure 4.1 Views of the Pupils on Abuse 41
Table 4.7 Proposed Strategies that Schools can Employ to Curb Child Abuse 42





















ABSTRACT
Child abuse is the physical, ****** or emotional maltreatment or neglect of a child or children. The consequences of child maltreatment can be profound and may endure long after the abuse or neglect occurs. The purpose of the study was to investigate the effect of child abuse on school performance in Primary Schools in Kapyemit ward, Uasin-Gishu County. The objectives of the study were: To assess the impacts of child abuse on academic performance; to determine the effects of child abuse on schools image, to identify the impacts of child abuse on pupil drop out rate, to investigate the effects of child abuse on pupil transition rate. The study employed a survey study design. The study targeted 160 respondents which includes; 5 Head Teachers, 40 Teachers, 70 Pupils and 35 parents of which a sample size of 48 was obtained from using 30%. Purposive sampling technique was used in selecting the head teachers while simple random sampling technique will be used to select the teachers, Pupils and parents who formed the respondents of the study. Questionnaires and interview schedules were used as data collection instruments. Data was analyzed quantitatively and qualitatively and presented in form of tables, percentages and frequency. The study helped in the understanding of the effects of child abuse on the school performance, the realization of the roles parents and teachers play in the curbing of child abuse among pupils and raising awareness on the same.
 
CHAPTER ONE
STUDY OVERVIEW AND STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM
1.1 Background of the Study
Child abuse is the physical, ****** or emotional maltreatment or neglect of a child or children. The consequences of child maltreatment can be profound and may endure long after the abuse or neglect occurs. The effects can appear in childhood, adolescence, or adulthood, and may affect various aspects of an individual's development (e.g., physical, cognitive, psychological, and behavioral). These effects range in consequence from minor physical injuries, low self-esteem, attention disorders, and poor peer relations to severe brain damage, extremely violent behavior, and death. In extreme cases, child abuse affects the performance of schools in the affected region (Daniel, 1978).
Performance refers to how students deal with their academic studies and how they cope with or accomplish different tasks given to them by their teachers. Performance is also the ability of a school to portray a good image which can influence the public (Decastro, 1978). There are several factors that influence the performance of a school at large, however, there is a critical factor that most researchers have avoided to discuss, and child abuse has been a crucial factor that has contributed to children’s dismal performance. Apart from children’s personal intelligence, child abuse is among then key factors contributing to poor performance of learners. Child abuse can lead to school dropping, emotional trauma or can even be fatal, hence destructing or even terminating the educational ambitions of a child. (Harris, 2005)
Worldwide, according to World Health Organization (WHO, 2000) approximately 40 million children are subjected to child abuse each year. According to Human Rights Watch (2001) about 30% of all severely disabled children relegated to special homes in the Ukraine died before they reached 18 years of age. UNICEF estimates that two million children died as a result of armed conflict during a recent 10-year period and that another six million were injured or disabled. In Canada, the U.S. and Mexico, over 6.5 million children annually are exposed to unwanted ****** materials over the internet; over 1.7 million of these report distress over exposure to these materials. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Department for Children and Families (DCF) define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or other caregiver that results in harm, potential for harm, or threat of harm to a child. Child abuse can occur in a child's home, or in the organizations, schools or communities the child interacts with. Each year, approximately one million children around the world are introduced into commercial ****** exploitation despite this problem; these developed countries have put measures to curb the vice. Rehabilitation schools have been formed and introduction of counseling centers as well. Despite the prevalence of child abuse in this developed nations they narrowly affect the academic performance since there are organizations put in place to curb the situation e.g. child associations, guidance and counseling institutions, and school based counseling programs (Giles, 2001)
Concern for victims of child abuse in Africa expressed by the African network of the International Society for The Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (ISPCAN) which gave five main presentations of child abuse: child labor, street wandering, ****** abuse, child battering and abandonment (Elma, 1977). Child labor according to the international labor organization (ILO), about 10 million children less than 15years in Africa are in formal employment, working long hours with poor pay and are exposed to substantial health hazards. Wandering of children refers to children, usually unkempt and with delinquent propensities, living rough in town. The reasons for children taking to the street remain poorly understood particularly in relation to factors in the child rather than parental hostility and economic (Dubowitz, 2002)
****** abuse is another. For example, arranged under-age marriages are common in some parts of the continent and doubt was often expressed as to whether a young girl fully gave consent to being betrothed (Galdsone, 1965). Prevalence rates in Africa are very difficult to ascertain because of the fear of disclosure by victims and lack of proper documentation. Most of the girls by reasons of shame fear or surprisingly respect for their usually older perpetrators. Physical battering is also eminent. Physical abuse of children is widely claimed to berate in the third world; however, there are anecdotes from east Africa skeletal frame or localized body areas of all first attendees aged 0-12 years at this hospital during the four-year period 1 January 1987 to 31 December 1990 (Garbarino, 1975). Sixty-nine of these reports reveals evidence of multiple bone fractures wither without evidence of rib or skull fracture. Abandonment of children to roam around the streets in what we call street children is also eminent in Africa, though valid and adequate information on abandonment are difficult to obtain due mainly to failure of offending parents to show up out of guilt, shame, judicial repercussions or a combination of these. However, some euro-American missionaries identified inter alia breech birth. (Erickson, 2003)
Child protection measures in Kenya are currently not implemented effectively and fully (Galdstone, 1965). Compliance with such legislation would increase if the magnitude of the problem and better knowledge about the factors that put children at risk was available. Additionally, involving stakeholders, especially agencies charged with protection, as well as involving affected children, will highlight the issues and thereby promote adherence to protection policies. Kenyan children, child activists and children organizations are pinning their hopes on the implementation of the Children’s Act to improve the lot of the nation’s youth. The Act, which came into effect on 1 March 2002, puts in place full safeguards for the rights of the child. Its passage was a giant stride in harmonizing the national laws with international agreements which Kenya has signed such as the UN Conventions on the Rights of the Child (CRC, 2002)
There is hope that the new legislation will dramatically change the inattention, neglect and abuse towards child rights. The Act outlaws any form discrimination of children, and forbids Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), child prostitution, and child labor, among other forms of abuse. The Children’s Act has immensely improved the lives of many Kenyan children plagued with high illiteracy levels, frequent **** cases and child labor since it guarantees children the right to health and medical care, provision of which is the responsibility of the parents, the extended family and the government (Erickson, 2005).
Cases of child abuse in Uasin-Gishu region have been so eminent in the recent years ((Kenya Media Report, 2004). In the year 2010 and the year 2011, there was a program started to rehabilitate this behavior. This problem is clearly evident when you first arrive in Eldoret town, it is among the towns in the country with the highest number of abandoned children who keep on moving from one Centre to another seeking help from passersby. Parents have developed behaviors of abandoning their children and deliberately sending them to the town so that they can benefit from their borrowing. So to say this has led to child labor in this region. High profile cases of school dropouts have been recorded regarding the environs of this region. Young school children from different locations in Eldoret converge in town to persuade people to offer them financial assistance. Some attend school in numbered days and decide to spend some good number of days out of school.
The communities and societies around tend to assume this situation and term it as norm. A few who might seem concerned lack cooperation from the rest. This has adversely affected the performance of most of schools, hence leading to poor living standards of the people and a poisoned future of a young citizen. The problem has affected learners in regions like many areas in Uasin-Gishu County. It has really affected child development and affected their attendance and performance in school. Little intervention measures has been taken to advocate the holistic development of the children. It was to this reason that the researcher conducted the research in the named above region
1.2 Research Questions
The study was guided by the following questions;
1) What is the effect of child abuse on the academic performance of students in Kapyemit Ward?  
2) What are some of the proposed strategies that schools can employ to curb child abuse?
1.3 Research Objectives
The study was guided by the following research objectives;
1) To identify the effect of child abuse on the academic performance of students in Kapyemit Ward.
2) To identify proposed strategies that can be employed to help curb child abuse.
1.4 Justification of the Study
It is becoming increasingly difficult to separate child abuse prevention into separate categories. For instance, strategies on the societal level include increasing the “value” of children, increasing the economic self-sufficiency of families, discouraging corporal punishment and other forms of violence, making health care more accessible and affordable, expanding and improving coordination of social services, improving the identification and treatment of psychological problems and alcohol and drug abuse, providing more affordable child care and preventing the birth of unwanted children.
Very little analysis has been done to estimate the total cost of preventing child abuse and neglect or the long-term social costs of not preventing it. There is now a move to situate child abuse and neglect within the continuum of intervention which addresses multiple aspects of family behaviors. The efficacy of tackling portions of the problem of child abuse apart from broader societal needs is not known. And, perhaps prevention can only come in tandem with efforts to reduce poverty, improve health care and make children’s issues a national priority. However, despite these constraints, evaluations of prevention programs can be improved by coming to terms with definitions of key varia

I’ll split the hairs, I’ll split an atom
And never leave the bedroom.
I most identify with December,
Not because of the crushing temperature
But the lack of cosmic dawdling
Is no more mesmerizing than a frozen phoenix.

And as she arrives by train from Phoenix,
I study who she appears to be, the atoms
Composing her auburn hair with dawdling
Authenticity shout “Take me to the bedroom!”
While the wedge of geese in this temperature
Head to the Southern Hemisphere’s December.

The common chill of this morning in December
Prevents us from rising from out the covers like a phoenix,
And our blankets like ash defend us from the temperature
That stills the vibrations of the atmosphere’s atoms.
I curse the insulated walls of the bedroom,
Trapping in heat and discouraging our dawdling.

A rafter of turkeys outside my window are dawdling,
Printing their runes on the documents of December
Between the thickets surrounding the bedroom
While the sun, golden like the plumage of a phoenix,
Awakens in my bones every dormant atom,
Instilling in me courage to brave the temperature.

I follow her, dressed, from the bedroom
And her footsteps serve to punctuate the temperature
Like the smoldering beak of a phoenix
Too busy being risen for dawdling.
She leaves, by train through the chill of December,
Me daydreaming of fission. The splitting of an atom.

I’ll split an atom daily, safely within the bedroom
And sleep through December’s pitiless, hollow temperature,
Waking only for dawdling until Spring is a phoenix.

books written by men, for men, while only read by women... that's sexist mon... books written by men should also be read by men, not some sexist housewives... hence the dire need for househusbands, and stopping sexism against these men as bending over and needing a ***** pucker.*

you hear of it: oh ****, so much of woman
in everything pro contra wom-ah...
  she just said it was weird that a guy
wanted to **** her her on her period,
thankfully this time round she mentioned
mr. rubber, and doing  it in the bathroom...
   because, "apparently"
a lot of guys found it
disgusting... then she said: take the rubber
off, let's make a baby! oh right,
heliums around us? no? ****...
     what's become disgusting
is yet another question of: huh?
        you can do unprotected ***,
but when it comes
to some sort of "emotion":
say hello to ms. ****-buddy-****-forever...
ah, but she's a rich *****...
     has a prior boyfriend in the russian
defence etc., and has a st. petersburg
     apartment... it's not like she's poor...
hence me waiting for a bolshevik defence
to hand the **** and ****-loader
unto the guillotine...
        come on, the guillotine is,
to be honest, a rather civilised method
of execution...
       better than hanging...
    with a gamble of: high enough
to break a neck, or low enough to dangle and
choke on the suffocating ooze of state sponsored
monday...
           i never thought
the guillotine was brutal,
    i always thought the guillotine was
humane in comparison to the practice of hanging,
or decapitation with a blunt axe...
  sorry...
    but at least there was some humanity
worth engrossing oneself in a faking of an escape:
to prove the point of the spirit of propagandism,
i.e. default "failure",
           or rather failure via "default" -
at least there was an attempt that required
a failure to prove its success in being a failure...
let's applause!
      shame to see such "loss of interest" in terms
of spelling...
   when so much can be given in
the aggravated form,
some say charlie wished di, the fate current
for ***** and harriet as now prescribed..
                who the hell asks for writing to
be akin to an i.k.e.a. manual?
most probably a pseudo-irishman...
             i can't believe some people want to write
an an i.k.e.a. manual....
                 and never have the imagination
to invoke a chance for nuance, suspicion,
or a "fictional" monochromatic "bias" of
q. vs. a., as is usually the case;
it's rather abhorring to be demanded
             an i.k.e.a.. form of narrative,
without a necessary imperfection that's necessarily
perfected...
                     having a plan breeds actors,
not having a plan breeds characters,
  which also means that by being
discouraging of characters, the narrators can
unshackle himself from the narrative role...
well, sure, great, women first,
i am pro matriarchy, but can i be the first,
officially recognised and respected
house-husband?!
                  no? guess not.
                       that's sexism!
                        why can't i be a househusband?!    
why are you being sexist?! we don't you
like coal-mining?! you're being sexist!
sexist! sexist! why can't men be househusbands?!
******* sexist feminists.

I need to try and stop saying discouraging words when I look in the mirror
I need to stop wincing at reflections in the buildings windows
I need to purposely not look at my reflections to spare the pain anymore
People can't believe I hate myself when it comes to physical appearance
But the small jokes I make are as serious as my outlook on myself
And walking down the hallways is an effort to mask my face and body
And I'm desperately trying to patch the holes in myself
The holes that allowed my self confidence to leak from me in the first place
The holes drilled over and over by the repeated words that weren't meant to hurt
But I knew the hidden meaning, I knew the real thoughts underneath
And as people constantly hammer in to me you are beautiful
It becomes a familiar sound, a phrase more cliché to me than yolo
And as the dark cloud of self hatred looms ominously overhead,
It is only visible to those who truly know me, those who see the thunderstorm
It's funny how the people who try and lift you up end up slamming you to the ground
And when you hit rock bottom you stop trying to disguise the rocks that are ugly
You stop trying to cover them with make up, you stop trying
Because a rock is a rock no matter the cover up, and it'll be ugly no matter what
And if I'm a rock someone hand me a chisel so I can carve myself down
And shape myself into the girl in the ******* magazine,
Because who could ever be a attracted to a girl who wouldn't date herself
Who would love someone trying to make up for their lack of love for themselves
By loving everyone else, and patching their holes leaving myself empty
It's funny how the people who say I'm beautiful would never date me
It's funny how my mother will not utter the words that would save her drowning child
Yes honey, you  are  beautiful
But instead I have sunk to the pit of the ocean, who cares about trying to hold my breath

There is something special about poetry.
Something about how there are line
breaks and deliberate diction that draws
your senses into something melancholy.
The way it can be purely fiction
or nothing but the truth and it’s
all up for interpretation by someone
who stumbles upon it scribbled
on a napkin in a nearby nook of a bookstore.
How when you complete a poem
that you’re particularly proud of,
its satisfying and provides a sense of purpose.
But the hardest part about poetry,
is sharing a selection you love,
with someone else.
The nervous feeling as they read it,
and the mounting disappointment as you realize,
that the work you’re so in love with
doesn’t connect with their pleasure centers
as it does with yours.
Don’t let this be discouraging.
For I believe that if you love something,
then it doesn’t matter if no one else does.
Because if it makes you happy,
that’s all that ever matters.
And if a poem comes from your soul
not everyone is going to love it,
but maybe you’ll find someone who does,
and you’ll be able to talk about all of the
things that make a poem special,
and the way there are line
breaks and deliberate diction that draws
your senses into something melancholy.
And you can fall into circular patterns with
someone who gets what it feels like
to have your poetry appreciated.

From the very start, it was what schools to chose
There were so many schools you became confused
You were looking for schools that would meet your academic agenda
Beginning from the start and graduation achieved
But it was hard, but you sacrificed
Yet you asked if education was worth it, and the answer is yes
Look at you now you are in your Cap and Gown
Tomorrow arrived being your present day
Today is what I call “DEGREE DAY”
It took persuasion and certainly a lot of praying
Heaven’s wonder and education going yonder
But you proved to yourself that you can achieve
You are the witness to that
This is nothing to sneeze at
As you walk out of the educational institution doors being not for the last time, but always keep education in mine
As you go out always remember to come back
Whether it be education continuing or just encourage students
But you are the mission that education does happen
Success seems far off
Yet it’s closer than you think
Now education has pushed you in the career moving forward  mode
Decisions upon Decisions
What career should I chose?
Where your talent lies you shouldn’t be confused
It will be challenging and discouraging
Yet with your ability to present
It will be your educational institution that you shall represent
You are prepared to step out
You know the concepts from theories that everyone will be talking about
Apply and do your very best
Success will be your testimony in confess
However, except nothing for less
Your educational institution achieved and you are their Scholar
There are no goodbyes, but a commodity of excellence being an everlasting good try.

The undeniable sense of presence, seen through the realms of deception...
Amidst the very capillaries strung infinitesimally throughout our bodies...
Overwhelming at times, the very concept cripples our thoughts,
Circling us back to seemingly endless questions -
Endless roads without a point of reference,
Leaving us standing in a dark crowded space searching for the unreachable light...
Yet, the meaning behind the unseen presence forces the deluded mind to forge on -
Stretching our morbid ideals even further...
Leaving us the inhibited beings we possess...
Still concluding at plebeian answers -
Fitting, yet discouraging...
The common capacity of our restraining thought process, leaves us almost hopeless to accumulate the information needed to fulfill our determining destination...
But it is that feeling,
That inkling sensation of the undeniable presence that keeps us searching -
That gives us hope...
And in that minute innovative state we dwell on what could be...

I instigated the most soporific cephalic act, An Argonaut sailing within your strange eyes of others pointed retina membranes, An unsaid exodus wishes to browse your meridians sunsets tainted of that meridian, As evening falls back upon you bathed the earthly mud, Nymph Ninfuceanicus sheltering your labours of bird waste in galactic extinction and creation...

For soft aromatic worlds, you went by your house ruined Zodiac
Blurring the lost romance policy profiles, threading peat spinning the metafhysist think of his tabernacle.

The ship in question was the beautiful delicacy of numbness primary Sun, Lost Halo where one day there was countless number age, to get lost in the cold of your trellis resigned and touching your going through the watery landscape of your soul cornered iron., Spark fleeing evaporated...

How many times my Ninfoceanicus very thin you migrated with your frosty, almost scary legs traveling in a foreign-owned bird…?, Where migrating is hard to see his crosses snowy mountain plants.

What if you. Ninfoceánicas lines will plan my rickety Saturn's own trapeze degraded never stood the lofty life of the living present all this happened? Divided scratchy body plowing all unexplored fountain.


Among several of them, thousands of them managed to be among others, but one of them, violated any protocol as beautiful geese and ducks in the window of my sky, coming to ask for my company, just on the threshold of spring, next to the threshold of my window and yours…, adopted eternal brother.

She mimics the snowy Nymph the feet of all the courts of the world freely, Dancing in tight spaces where sounds beautiful my favorite track other stragglers lost images of my beautiful bird of beautiful threshold of my window as timeless dances belfry rusty sounds.
For the dark wall between your gene, which will open the whistle of your detachment, every time your commander demolition subdued light and energy to take my humble mischief…
by the way, your eyes and mine, in the vigor of sepals loved everlasting flowers insults.

Together unfairly they united as dim flowers in the air,
Divided separately exile scattered your garden,
My chronic bad inside my hundred chronically ill
I will see  Nymph hiperoceánicus, hyper rusty
By iron hanging over the mask gestures cold weather martial iron watering soil and branded satin mask stays plebeian worms my ruined face of phases of my face closet and wardrobe.


The upward castle by fierce hillsides, notify more rasterize
Your morning visit.

Among many castles many seas gang signs of femininity,
As a sliding plushy receiving a Nymph Satardia;
The first and most powerful inhabitant of the ascending Ninfuocenicus castle.

When I'm alone,
I am on the side of the broth augury sling,
Holding my application
Almost like a plumber object in the hands of a blind astronomer.

Only three steps income
Where three steps have to meet me on the runaway shadows
Of my ancestors, right neighbor pine crafty,
That hid my totemic animality...
As the blood currents green,
I lost myself…

As a front polygon,
As a front wormy adventure story demolished
In the densest darkness of your house arcane absence ashes
The cadaverous presence of the wind of my roles in pain and ossuary  of that princely that emotional solstice who anchored in your flowery landscape of love,
Spinning wheel to square steps
As contraindication to love, then need you more.


You jump on my doorstep, plain unlicensed...
So the propaedeutic of Ninfaoceánicus begins,
You write my signs and my losses as prescribed
The loneliest adage constantly fading green robes.

I often feel sad as all times outside the elapsed time,
When I feel the absence of your webbed feet oily,
Aligning by walking wearing my sun off you,
With foreign attire migrating my sunshine clothing doze...
As a gale of tulle for the South Seas who died in the wreckage of a pirate ship Pliocene…

And your sea south sorry awakening as between species
Jungle, eater vampire  as the swirl start your being lost in my
Desert be... want to be mummy augur…
Lips worst evils of unrestrained fantasy tribal worse,
They concluded entirely confined irritability.
As the bipolar lost hope,

The graft of your nomadic existence and entrepreneurial ship traveling
settled that the bipolar economy of your means of anti-life,
Closing my eyes... black aniline,
Black lost roads dancing notch watermark,
Of the hypertensive empty string, as the rope pulls and
Solves the crescent of your face depressed ocher rain.


When river, and watch your lips precursors,
I watch the surf offshore devouring my joint,
In search of  nymph Titania, your age who live with me,
My Perfect for you and my image, my imperfect picture of you and me, silky movement shores of my soul looking for you,
When I sit at the knee I bend my knee for you,
I sit on the bank remains with you.
My codex collected from you, only you...

When the cave steppe fear rages,
Tongues of fire gigantic move me by your rivers adventure
I park in your loud voice drawled from the acute bonfire
In the wooded rested than ever, it grew on your side close.

Your life was almost a straight bipolar errors,
I am now businessman making your life nearby,
Hit blowing winds greater...
And at your life in my financial life,
If you think with your hands clasped over your face
know that almost live together with you,
unbecoming my libertarian release of master your flight
hell, beastly dessert.

Most hellish ******* lastly zain,
Of the greatest forces of your body eater the myth king, fabulous race The disabled senior verse confined treaty,
Confined you that is farthest from you **** nymph Ninfuoceánica,
requalification boiling in behaviors you to exist in the relief of your abysmal way but your gooey body resting on you..., rests meditating  Do not get tired, you do not pretend to be the ruin of your prey voice sound muffled, only animals that disturb you bring your pursue days true…

Your lovers sulfur knew your colors and smells of the most pestilential entity, that overshoot and tone your threefold, as a roar of the soul that comes from your soul, do not let mental baseness mimics with anemic,
lower hostile masts your anti angels have to ride on gold gatekeepers... For the spot, if mythomania and your alcoholic schizophrenia infinity, ...

hulks  of alcohol vapors in the pulmonary vessels by butterfly flocks,
They roam the reins of collecting and rasterized your weakness sudden death, As well as the sudden resurrection of my body.
And rebukes the storm, rebuke thy right entity endowed *****'s nerve
That's where I have to pursue your side embraces more hug me,
More than your own warmth, rather than your own bravery, unbridled carriage.


I often repeat a million times,
The times I did not hear your perpendicular attentive pauses, stutters hurry ****** your frequent alcoholism, not to distinguish only slicing nonsensical attitudes sometimes slow thinking agility of a lover, Thinking that ****** and reduces that sinister and discouraging, that scrape thin that limits who want to be and not dominate.


Mapping by hiding places unusual materials,
Brochures polished of the scruffy codex and guide you an  unguided
By the groves close views as telescopic sights that are lost.


I know, my biggest Ninfuoceánica death may not be reborn on the third day…!!, But if it is not to lose lost when the day ends.
Wise ancestry and slavery will govern the pale fronts
Your hidden and mobile lives on an olive orchard,
Hiper meditate funny without feeling any known gene passed ******, nor read past experience in your prodigious map of oblivion.

Satardia; He lit a match just as night fell,
Sea and sky colours compressing regrets that burned their matches

It burned his blessed same figure as the little pair of gifts
That remained on hold as senior Ninfuoceanica,
Only his dark side Petric windmill stone...


Someday reborn to confuse his disciples confused gentlemen,
And their abandoned phrases that he dominates.

Feverish ardor,
Feverish torpor
Every living illusion is extinguished...
Go to your coward stampede
Of gatekeepers on buffalo between bloodthirsty goats...


Jose Luis Carreño Troncoso Copyright 2015
Related  August 2006

Taco bell in my body
It aint no shot bus shawty
2 Am munchie run
Driving high, much fun
Crashed into a pole
Driving high not so much fun

Get to tacobell what joy
I want to eat it now o boy
Forgot to order how embarrassing
She staring at me, looks discouraging
order caramel apple empanada
She asks for money, I have nada

Go back to car forgot it's totaled
crashed into pole earlier, to much yolo
walk home tired and hungry and pretty sad
Forgot about this blunt I never had
light it up and I now feel glad
Life without tacobell not so bad

To all dispairing of the future:
Fret not.
No lie, I lived the full average, mediocre mortal span;
and I have learned more than most,
in terms of starting from flat scratch.

This is a brief autobio to see if there is an autopoet
me, who may tame the beast,
before we are forced to take its *******
being gone, as a given,
ere we chase off on our own to catch the glimpse again,
pursuing haps of enlightening worth,
it must needs be an ox
for a true zenful experience... the option,
a full rut bull,
at first glimpse, who could know, is it
bull
or ox?
{see his mind wandered, a meander at the edge of any gulley,
looses little flecks of common truth we notice, you may
miss. Not intentional,
a man's treasure is where his heart/mind is balanced toward
goodness sakes alive,}
I never seen the like...

The bullriders in my past, all first rode sheep.
Beguiling creatures,
especially the little lambs from 4-H.

sappy provencal call me all the hicky names you know,
but I say true,
according to Ancestory.com, my line
was never civilised...

so call me stupid, as you wish... we
was never civilised... kind and helpful strangers, at best.

The kind of people who came to America to be true.
No other reason nor intention.

It was ten, tied to the mast, or one and run to the jungle,
so we run, son, so we run

run past the contender temptation,
run past the life of a rockstar on tv,
run past pickin' grapes as scabs on historic times...

Starting over and over and over again, in

interesting times, historic times, may you live on and know,
these are those.

And there remains, as long as you function in full double sapience,
time to start all over.

Imagine that. Speed of thought, weighing each ought for significant
power to frame evil into engines of provacative

encouragement.
Known magic spells loosed in silent songs, sung to the tune
of the assembly line,
or the helicopter encompassing my viable space,

at the time, a certainty appeared and dared me see, the worst
possible
place, imaginable and it took no time at all.

Actual worthlessness is as unthinkable as nothing, itself.
Sophists of no evil intent,
serve us well, life goes on, starting, after sudden stops,
if possible at all,
is possible to do with more sense of the blue marble being

only a tic of a historical cultural clock from any point
where ever began in the past,

a tic ago, we saw earth, from the moon, with trusted augmented eyes.
Who imagined these eyes we have,

we earthling intelligences, we thought experi-mentalists,
generally as intelligent as any mortal before us.

So, 2020 kicked ye in the buts, but but but button, button,
who has
got the button?

All life requires of you is that you honestly, honed and sharp,
slice it thin enough to see through,

one side, soul, one side, spirit. Clap that hand, bro

and agree the nobelest quest in life is happiness, as imagined

in times of chaotic order rebalancing at the next level of complexity

-- some young folks continue to study war
-- that is not as wise as once tradition claimed, great worth
-- is waisted in fitting glory on war,
-- as vain as fitting a proverb in the mouth of a fool.

So, as I was intending to do, I have done.
Is there more I can do?

I may remind you, I do not boast of knowing been-there-done-that,
as a believable state in which to play this game.
But I do know it.
-- I live in a beautiful world every time i check, the shadow
of a neighborhood raven just now cooled my toes.
Start. from any stop state,
think
I can not lie. I think. I can. Reapeat as needed for fifty years.
Lemonade, persuaded, tasted,
ah, not impossible to eat, very sweet,
would you wear a tie again for sugar?

learn the lie told true through
plastic teeth in my dotage, donchaknow, we learned some things
the hardway, but did them easily ever after.

Go find the essence of the society of the free and easy,
then join, the right
of passage is pouring peace into the pool,
trouble the water and listen,

I believe I once was worth dying for, in a story I told.
Each time, I am finding, scientifical magi-techknackical,
augmentalated me, the made up mind, integrated,
I am thinking
I am thinking.
This is good. This works.
- it goes around, and comes around
wait,
suf suf ficientcy of evil is just enough,
knowing is a connection to truth,
knowing evil is
not the push
against your shove, or the pull on your tug of war,

proud knowers rise and come to heads,
like pimples destined to defile a mirror in those years of
Anxious, 'twixt twelve and twenty-seven or so,
to be safe... when patience first ****** you off and rebel
autopoet mode kicks in a
rush to finish
urging understood shelters to form
paths through the meatmind's frontal corext
before she gets pregnant and he goes to war, in shame.

But, even after that, if I were you, I would be happy.
Far happier than any imagined hell,
formed from bigscreen
ludological plots lacking the mortality sense real war has.

War is not needed in times of peace and common sense.
These interesting times,
consider, the actual minds who intended to imagine
a benign means of publishing truth,

Turing and Feynman and Chomsky 'n'em,

those guys made their disciples believe, this "global-brain",

serves mankind, all varieties and flavors...
therefore,

they built it to survive thermo-nuclear war.

With a we-bit of faith, any sane-hope can begin to be
re
alized, and seemingly suddenly, after fifty years,
and 68 different pay-masters, reboot
seems common as any
starting from scratch after losing every thing,
as if this
is the price my kind pay to keep from fretting about
civilization defiling the earth, i.e,

to keep from fretting that it is my fault
and my response
ought to be FUD

or fuggitit. Nay

I sigh, and say breath is our common function,
breathing is my job.
Resting in peace before its too late.

Ready reader and dear writer converge to make

sense of a reason, over looked, until the observers toes touch
the brink,

I can't go on, look up, I can't fly. Look, raven thought thought

there, a ledge, a trail, imagine that... magic as if
life could call you on an adventure,
and you know
you can
survive 2020 and beyond.

i have a headache
i’m sad for petty reasons, its very discouraging
maybe its the rain
i want sleep, i want to dream
i, i, i, i
shut up
not satisfied
i, i, i, i really am a happy person
the acne really shows in the white room
especially if its bright
a bleak white room with nothing in it
except my face
i wanna slice my skin off with a knife. it'll look better
im scared of trying to make this good
because if i put in effort, it won't be that great
people will say “oh its pretty good”
but they wont think its good at all
i don't know how to try
i, i, i, i

When you wake in your crib,
You, an inch of experience--
Vaulted about
With the wonder of darkness;
Wailing and striving
To reach from your feebleness
Something you feel
Will be good to and cherish you,
Something you know
And can rest upon blindly:
O, then a hand
(Your mother's, your mother's!)
By the fall of its fingers
All knowledge, all power to you,
Out of the dreary,
Discouraging strangenesses
Comes to and masters you,
Takes you, and lovingly
Woos you and soothes you
Back, as you cling to it,
Back to some comforting
Corner of sleep.

So you wake in your bed,
Having lived, having loved;
But the shadows are there,
And the world and its kingdoms
Incredibly faded;
And you group through the Terror
Above you and under
For the light, for the warmth,
The assurance of life;
But the blasts are ice-born,
And your heart is nigh burst
With the weight of the gloom
And the stress of your strangled
And desperate endeavour:
Sudden a hand--
Mother, O Mother!--
God at His best to you,
Out of the roaring,
Impossible silences,
Falls on and urges you,
Mightily, tenderly,
Forth, as you clutch at it,
Forth to the infinite
Peace of the Grave.

The sun, so lover-like, ran her fingers
Through the glistening leaves,
Movements soft, so full of intention
Their waxy dew, shuttered in response,
A low moan played in the breeze,
The light of sonority contrasts the electric
Disharmonies in the stormy afternoon.

Though I could feel a forest now eased
The river that runs through
Carried the blood of a plural heart
Beating with a passion akin in power, though enemy in fashion,
As its waves beat the banks
Eroding them into, eating up the aridness
As though slaking were its due, muddying the sky’s blue
From its surface, piercing the eyes from its reflection
Discouraging, this turbid froth, from worth of further inspection.

It rages and rages over rocks so violently
Picking at its slimming walls, making and claiming
Detritus along the path so that all the beauty a river is
Crashes, collides, and disfigures—a chaos growing
Bigger and bigger—the speed of its wrath
Bespeaks of its wake, blasting the earth (Watch it dissipate!)
Out of my sight it runs its due course south
Spitting the detritus that arrives
At the mouth.

Dear Dexter,

All of your poems are filled with hatred with a deep underlying pain. You convey messages of undeserved hurt through your poems so well I am hurting with you.

Every poem is beautiful, no matter how dark the subject. There is even a beauty to the raw, ugly ones that show truth.

I chose a few of my favourite lines and responded to them.

“Everyone was so consumed in their own sadness that they failed to notice mine.”

You have been noticed. All of your poetry is amazing, but it breaks my heart. I can relate to your feeling of being overlooked. When everyone has their problems and you try to say something about yours, but no one has the time to here them and eventually you just fade into the background. No one has to be entirely alone. even if you only reach out to people on hello poetry, there are people here, myself included that care a lot about other people’s pain and through poetry you can feel it so much clearer than you can in conversation.

“Your self worth
runs even deeper.”

You make a poem about self hate sound hopeful with these lines. It is supportive and beautiful.

”because how do you tell someone 
who has never shed a drop of blood in 
their life,
that every part of you is bleeding.”

These lines break my heart. They are so full of pain and truth. It is really astounding poetry.

“because no matter 
the number
on the scale, 
you will still
call me at 3am,
begging for a 
reason to live.”

You capture the human nature so well. We have feelings that run deeper than instincts, think beyond logic and explanation, but when it comes down to it, we still have a survival instinct, that begs us not to **** ourselves.

“Stop making the hurt you feel sound cool and trendy. 
Tell the world what it's truly like
because lately people have sewn the words 
"Beauty" and "pain" into a cute little pink sweater in white lace.”

These words are so true. It seems like everyone is romanticizing pain, instead of discouraging people to follow in those footsteps.  I know that there is no one in the world who would wish this upon their little brother or sister, son or daughter, friend, any relative. It is a pain no one should experience and it should never be advertised. I think you capture this in your poem/rant very well.

Dexter,

I feel your pain, you cynicism about the world, your hope that shows up even in some of the darkest of poems. I don’t know you except from your poetry, but it seems that life has been cruel. I sincerely hope that life decides to stop being such a ******* and turns around for you, soon. I believe that things will get better, for anyone who suffers anything, if you give it a chance. I think you have waited long enough and deserve something good now. You are a good person, you care about others, I can see it in your poem, Pain isn’t Beautiful which is entirely true and I have seen people making pain seem desirable. Your words ring truth and support for people who are suffering. Keep writing.

Love,
Ena

Paratroopers free fall,
'chutes coiled and caught in a grease ball afro curl
reaching down perplexed ****** frames.
Diligent chortling mimes trapped in handmade indecision cages, tapping a telling tune of tired games played day after day.
A right brained boy with a head full of clout
miscommunication with a leftist expat from the north
to the south.
Jostled connections send out fizzling sentences
through blown speakers and an overheated circuit -
Bored of the excuses whispers the nameless
without a reason there isn't a purpose.
Shoot an accusing glare past Father Time
overlooking treasonous discouraging crimes
Open those whale blubber caked eyes
to the other side.
It's not what this has done to you
but what this has done to us.
The hitchhiker gave up, traded his thumb for a seat on the bus.
Never was he lost, but given more than one chance.
He, no, she, no we
were thrown away with his walking stick and his waterproof nap sack.
Will we cross this road again?
And pick up from where we began?
Or never turn back?
Always was he lost, but given one too many of a chance
But was it worth it?
Upholding the "right and proper" stance?

Ever get that feeling where there's so much to say
But then you pick up your pen and bring out your notebook
And you just sit there, and fail to write what it is you even wanted to say?
That's how I feel whenever I write about you
And it's so discouraging because it seems that there is so much flowing through my mind whenever I fail to keep my thoughts anywhere else but you.
It's because she is everything
All that goes on in my head before writing even one line is simply just you
Those booming voices, blissful delusions, ignorant realizations, unwelcome ****** recollections of long-ago, humorous admiration,
It's because she is everything
Yes, you are everything.
Everything I think about, everything I dream about, everything I talk about, everything I write about, everything
And I really don't think that that's fair, my love.
That is why I strive to be your everything.
Yes, I want to be the one that creates those booming voices in your head
I want to be the one that makes you have those blissful delusions
I want to be the one that initiates you to make those ignorant realizations
I want to be the one that brings those unwelcome ****** recollections of long-ago
to you
And I can go on and on about everything that just the thought of you does to me
But I dare not waste your time any longer
Because the way I feel could be sufficiently expressed in any moment-no matter if I'm miserable, infuriated, ecstatic, or anything- by just two words.
You're everything
And I bet that that's the reason why at times it seems there's so much to say, when in reality there really isn't a need for it.

Alas, awakened to the glorious smell
Of grieving petrichor and lichen
Intoxicating scents of spells,
Has left my thoughts forsaken.
Aggrieved, unclean,
I wash myself in the river,
Alone again, once with my mind,
The cold water does bring a quiver.
Rushing gently across its bend,
Its current does drag along
A heartache inside a massive depth,
A misery that floods it anon.
It seeks to help wash stains of past,
Blood from mistakes without thought,
Caressing my hands as I dip them in,
It cleans at the souls I’ve wrought.
I’ve brought spite to all I’ve been,
I bathe in hatred and stigmata,
Correctional growth of paradigmatic folly,
Proves equality to tumultuous fodder.
-
There has been death here,
Drowning and sickness,
Villainous nature subjugated
To corruption and bleakness.
Disparaging remarks whispered of men,
Bring to light lost life and love,
Discouraging thoughts of mine herein,
Anticlimactic and soulless above.
The trees began to whisper,
Moving slightly in the breeze,
I thought I would move quicker,
But something that couldn’t trapped me.
-
Bringing about a fallout cloud
That kept my mind thus smoked,
It is hard to cherish anything
That the water itself could soak.
-
I wanted to leave,
But I was locked in the wood,
I began to need it,
Like any Stockholm would
The treasure trove in which I was kept,
Was something of a fairy-tale
It hid monsters, death,
And only one nightingale.
Its swansong allowed me to sleep,
Gorgeous at night, it cast in weep,
A story of one so scared, The fear of bleeding out
One day upon the growing creep.
Vines and lies surrounded me,
Its whole existence was false,
Nothing could be this natural,
And the dead forest scoffed.
-
Could there be someone else here?
Doubtful, I began my search,
Through vasts I spied, time again,
But nothing upon this earth.
The forest fell in love with my heart,
Its emotions curious to her,
She tortured me with affection,
My reality was blurred.
I found my way across her floor,
Trekking miles to a never-end.,
Purgatory does not know this pain,
Hopeless abandon, fell unto myself to fend.
A trip, a fall, unique and random,
I impaled myself with a sharp cry,
A sharp palisade jutting out, I then whispered
“What if I don’t want to die?”

Press on the brakes
Red lights
Slow going.
Discouraging.
Just across the way
White lights shine
So promising.
Full of hope.
And happiness.
A color of encouragement
and a better day.
Yet sitting, stuck,
amid a sea of red.
Let me remind you
of the most crucial
detail you forget:
Behind every white light
glows a red.
And preceding every red,
just out of sight,
is a pair of white lights,
shining brighter than day.

"LOOK!" So quietly you choose to speak...
I hear the sweet vibrations of your voice
my eyes lift to search a dark night sky
and you say, "There! Did you see?"
miles distant, shadowy light flashes
flickering over the mountain shades
lightning slicing through that atmosphere
and I answer you, "Yes.
"I wish that the thunderstorm was here."
you respond with your enigmatic silence
yet still I strain my ears
hoping to somehow maybe hear something from inside of you
even just a faded echo of your unshared thoughts
because you are my deepest desire
it's you alone that I most desperately crave
I'd sacrifice everything I have in this life for you
for only just a fleeting moment, I would
a moment in which you were solely mine,
worth more than I could ever have to give
my very soul cries out, agonizing, for you
my heart begs for your love to fuel it's own love
my flesh, my bones and blood burn to feel the warmth of your embrace
my lips quiver at only a thought of brushing against yours
my entire being tingles and aches to find solace in your affections
I'd rip my very soul from my deepest depths and place it in your hands
my heart I'd also eagerly tear right out of my chest
my promise, my solemn vow I'd gift with my bleeding wounds
never would I- could I, forsake you
if I could keep you, keep you, I would, indeed
a treasure I'd never relinquish willingly
passion, grace, unconditional love, yours forever and free
A picture of these, my most fervent of prayers and dreams...
split- second bursts of color and light
electricity, a bringer, a conveyor of destruction,
birthing fires in the brush and trees, and, mocking, denying me my love...
in that far away storm, a creeping portrayal; image, stretching wide:
I see a vision of your cherished face
I feel unbearable, disabling pains commencing
there's unfathomable sorrow, misery within me
I realize my heart is about to crack, break, shatter to dust and ash
no mind to how great and vast my love for you
no heed to my willingness to give up everything; anything
I glimpse it all in that fraction of a second
those stars; twinkling eyes, tell me an entire story, at the speed of light...:
so unfortunate, that you won't be mine now,
never else either, shall you ever belong to me
my gaze is drawn away, and departs from the place where the mysterious and celestial dwell
relinquish their view of power unleashed, blinking far off, in the sky above
I turn my head; swivel towards you,
for dire, is my need to take in every aspect of your beloved face...
maybe I'd misunderstood; maybe I'd been mistaken,
maybe a bit tired, rather easily confused,
or perhaps, it was a lie that the lightning storm's vision, sly and sneaking, portrayed...
but I can see the tangible, physical you, before me right now,
and, the truth - - -
(which I cannot positively know, for certain,
perplexed and having some doubts...)
- - - an obvious, unpleasant, ugly reality...
my tears have already begun brimming, as I watch, through a blurred void,
and prepare, because that mouth of yours is, once again, opening to speak
a bullet, slivers, pierce through to my soul when I hear you softly utter my name
"Alex, what's wrong? What is your problem now?"
how can you be so oblivious, as I feel so transparent? I ask,
but only to myself; not in such a way for you to actually hear me,
giving you, instead, yet another of my head shakes; slow, speechless reply...
I'm broken, and it's painful when you look at me,
what if you were to notive the sadness and hungry longing buried within my eyes?
please, please don't you look at me!
all of your questions, I'm incapable of answering,
never could I openly share with you how I so intensely feel
my fear of rejection has given me an answer in your stead
and, thus, this love shall go on only inside of me, in silence, secretly
despair, loneliness, burdens so heavy; wicked,
thick enough to rot me inside-out...
torn down, destroyed by love; my very own love - - -
(mine, a love undescribable... immense, immeasreable love;
love which was borne of my seeking indifference, but finding you...)
- - - until my savior of death comes,
will be working diligently to ******, slowly and bitterly, my life force
and impatiently, I'll live out the remainder of my days waiting and suffering;
looking forward to the moment when my black-robed executor shall, at long last, come,
and set me free of these suffocating bindings scarring, straining my heart...
for without you to hold, I am empty and lack purpose
I've no other hope on which to let the weight of my hurt bear
still hoping, inanely, for some unforseeable chance;
a growth of buds sprouting forth from the blooms of God's grace...
"Alex...?" oh, the way you say my name...!
"Say it if you have something to say!"
but still, once again, I say nothing at all,
just give another of my small, weak, neck-twist type of shakes;
a minuscule gesture that gets neither of us closer to anything, or anywhere...
I wipe away, quickly, a single tear that's escaped to leak down my face; slide down my cheek
you are the happiness of my world; my everything,
and yet, here I am, excruciatingly frightened, and left alone with that fear
paralyzing terror, stalking, menacing me into remaining silent;
horrors feeding my tentative heart cruel and brusing, nasty notions,
convincing me it's my destiny to uncover a crushing ruin of defeat, unavoidable,
if ever I was to make an effort to reach out
pitiable... I'm a motionless, frozen captive to its stagnating, discouraging taunts,
a demon, so intent upon pushing me to my hope's final demise...
until then, I'm just some pathetic subject to ludacrous torment; prisoner to torture
shuttering, I hear gleeful whispers in my ear - a surreal voice saying that all my fears could,
maybe, just possibly, maybe, be a confining falsehood; a tower of cruel lies...
...but then again, how could I ever find out and know for sure...?
condemned I am, by my own terrors; haunting fears of loneliness and rejection,
and so, I suppose, I'll never discover what you truly think and feel...
as I sit here, the passenger in your car, I'm so desperately wishing,
~ wishing that my lips and tongue could remember how they used to work;
~ wishing, so fervently, that my mouth, sewed, cemented, and stapled shut,
would somehow break itself open, and then, free, suddenly speak,
something! anything! any words at all!
a simple sentence could potentially be sufficient; could be enough to break these chains, to set my thoughts free...
perhaps, all it would take, language - me, bringing myself to fearlessly say,
"John, do you think you could ever love me?"
but no, I stay void of speech or sound
for now that's it, and there's no more to do - that I can do...
maybe the strength to ask will arrive on another, different day,
only, I hope, that if that could be true, it won't be too far off from now,
because, by then, it may have gotten to be too late...
SILENTLY, secretly, my very pulse screaming of my emotions;
declaring, to no one other than myself, my feelings, my love for you...
and without my vocalization, you just may never know,
but still, sweet man, my beautiful John, I so very greatly love, love, love,
everything about you...

There will always be someone who wants what you have, for its easier to steal from someone who has already performed the work, whether a material object, idea, or talent, etc.. Someone who takes credit, where it isn't due, for what you have accomplished, worked hard to attain, or saved for a special purchase. Hence, the PLAGIARIST!

The counterfeiters, whether it be money, or the reproduction of the "Old Masters" oil paintings, claiming it was purchased at a garage sale, or found in an old trunk in the attic of an old house they purchased. Many scenarios, many such events, and mostly untrue. Plain, and simple, they are nothing but "THIEVES." They have been around for thousands of years. Aggravating, yes! Frustrating, absolutely! Discouraging, you bet! The difficult part is knowing"they don't care!", as long as they get what you have, or think they can.

To my friends at HP: Regardless of whatever name they wish to use at the bottom of your piece, your signature is still inside the piece itself. Whether it be a particular phrase or word meticulously placed, the style of your writings, the way you approach your thought, the rhythmic flow of your prose, the softness or harshness of expression. All which has created "your signature". That, cannot be reproduced.

To those literary "thieves: You will continue to try and steal our work. But, for each letter stolen, for each word stolen, only creates another rung on your ladder, leading you deeper and deeper,further down into your abyss of loneliness, until the blanket of your depression, discontent, and hatred suffocates you. That is when your name will become known only as, "WHO?"

copyright: Richard Riddle September 08, 2014 10:00am(CDT)

Throughout my whole life I was taught not to feel
Discouraging put downs had first spun this wheel
Later the numbness extended to violence
Inequity towards me was stuffed until silenced
This armor had left me with no wounds to heal

This type of existence proved no way to live
My walls were torn down by my wife and my kids
Sensing such weakness and seeking to profit
She sunk the knife deep into me and she lost it
With shoves from my daughter to anguish I slid.

A child gets the access to do the most damage
Her taking advantage of weakness was savage
The lies and deceiving had gone on for years
Once I could see that it brought me to tears
This wound that she made will take so long to bandage

the mystery of lawlessness is bound to the "transcendence" of phonetic application of phonetic encoding... some call it the whirlwind of confusion, but somes also call it E-près and then write Ypres... well, the confusion is all but apparent... i left that in "     " to stress the ambiguity... yes, the -s is optional... it's neither possessive or plural... that, i could have learned in prison, had i ever been a Becontree purple (bishop)... dictionary moment: cranium, crimson, cradle... cardinal... but all these positions of power are on their knees (there's me trying in vain to underline that), they gobble-quote what they quack... which ends up being a circumflex and a wanking hand, embedded with "touching" Adam. oh sure they bypassed the contemporary-of-contemporaries... it was never a grey-matter affair... it was always a gangster's drill-to-the-bone moment... wait till he squeems! i don't mind ******, given the person is dead, i just hate half-asked half-baked half-bollocked Dr. Dre attempts and then failing and then, like a whining dog with its tail between its legs going back to the mantra of mother fiction... i ******* hate it... i start looking like a ******* ******! i hate it... mutter fiktion... all i'll say of a Jew: don't ******* bring an argument against the Palatine Schting right now... i have as much abhorrence against all things Egyptian as i do about English tea, which i deemed liquidated Werther's Original... and then there's this Russian ***** i'd like to the village bicycle... she's had more spare parts done unto her than the working limbs ever gave her the tilt... feminism and the sacredness of all women... name that movie quiz show... charlize theron... aileen wuornos! woo-or-nose? never mind...
   a 1K spectacle at Hastings... that's invoking quid...
and you'll feel more tonguing mollusks than
                          touching a frightened ****** quill-thread's
worth of deer with that lingo, had you ever had one...
              MONSTER!      yes, they all dream of a breakfast
at tiffany's... and i'm john paul the 2nd, and
     henry viii was a joke nursery rhyme
  when charlie bid farewell to diana...
there was no:
         divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived...
there was only a car-crash... you can't make
    a king out of swine... well... you can... Sweyn...
                  but **** me... and i thought i was naive...
guess the ***** didn't kick in when it was supposed
to; once true journalism became the ****** of what
was once the ****** of the people...
             religion... journalism these days is rotten,
it's an Aristophanes to what's really happening
defined by Socrates... it's a schoolyard...
  journalism these days is best defined by Aristophanes;
and who's the globe-trotting-gobbler of all misfits
is not the would-be diarist of returning back to
the local, the usual, the sanctimonious mundaneness
of it all; you **** only once in your life,
you end up having a **** the rest of the time,
either with your hand, or with another body.

oh i'm not bothered about the "perverts"
(funny how only men are concerned with
being named that) -
                               that are watching you,
those third party incisors of
             the bony-**** (hey, you
could be yodeling **** by now) -
                          what i'm
worried about are the perverts that provide
the "perverts" with material,
it's all very much a Turning test...
               that robotics testing ground
of: i can't keep eye contact...
   the lesser privy of psychiatry?
eye contact and biting your nails...
if that can be engaged with and subsequently
avoided:
you're as chirp as chips! honey b.
          can anyone white
feel glamorous using language in order
to tell a joke?
   that's not the question, the question is:
why call it witty comedy...
     but still employ canned laughter?
it's discouraging, i don't know when the joke comes,
all i know is that the editor finds it funny
as that particular time,
                    and that's when he inserts canned
laughter... you can get it with the most
"witty" comedies there are...
  a bit like black girls trying to be white without
the frizz of afro curbing the afro with vaseline...
i've seen catfights over this "third limb"
scenario... afro is no go in catholic schools...
you have to... yum... cow lick that ****
into place... use vaseline...
      and that's an advert-and-a-half.
but you know what really ****** me off?
philosophers... they attacked poetry because
they couldn't care two-****'s worth about
whether language could be musical
or simply communicative... they're the ones
that wrote books without using
grammatical words such as verb, or noun,
because they made them excuses to
their muddles when hoarding from poetry
words of equivalent categorical weight
such as metaphor... so attacking the practice
of poetry, but then encouraging
the categorisation of the spoke
with poetic categories rather than grammatical
categories? can i see Hegel use a noun?
no... but i can see Heidegger using
  the metaphor with two labourers utilising
a hammer... that's the thing concerning
a building site: you either pass the time
tellings jokes... or you don't work
on a building site and hold a hammer
  and question whether someone else might need it...
philosophy is not about the existential dittoing
of the i...
    it's a book, but there's a new category of pronoun
due to universal bewilderment once childhood
finishes... ? opened the door, in stepped !
and said:
     shouldn't we make the stillness of the lake
into a mirror to banish but at the same time
          domesticate narcissus -
yes, replied ?, i'm glad you thought of it...
               domesticating demigods...
                    narcissus was a stillness of a lake,
sisyphus was a stone,
    hercules was bicep,
              achilles was a tendon...
                                       our current affairs are far
from democratic, but at least our history is,
  you get ******... you get protractor...
you get mona lisa... you get 'let 'em eat croissant!',
       too many points of divergence
  in a democracy to craft a convergent "democracy",
what the politics says is that we are all
slaves to what's called a *status quo,
  i hate the fact that western "democracies" are
no longer tagged as merely status quo...
abuse of nouns... or how philosophy attacked poetry
and never spoke a theory concerned with
language per se being evidently categorised...
     how status quo is actually a -nomer without a mis-
of democracy...
  funny, the spanish... i have no idea
why can i have some ice-cream?
      has to become ?can i have some ice-cream¿
           i guess it's like the english " and '...
  who said what, and who said what for whom?
    is there a narrator?
      is that " + 1 people speaking, or quoting a quote?
or is that direct convo... '   ',
later retelling the tale "     ",
and after that it's all but an urban myth
akin to the kentucky fried mouse...
                the French that blè blé blé blé....
and somewhere in between was the Transylvanian comma...
hmm...
                             i mean... the perverts...
   thanks for the invitation, r.s.v.p.; of sure, great mixtape...
funny thing is... i never filmed myself jerking off...
        i do a 3-in-1... take a ****, take a ****... and
clean the ****-talk ducts of banal sprechen while
      watching a monkey strutting down memory lane
of when i had a girlfriend... and had to juggle,
and go for lunch, and this that and the other,
and a dalmation... or the reflection: but i had a mother...
huh?     i never felt this much ingratitude
for occupying the premises of the oval chamber
as i did creating a signature or inserting
  myself into the least convenient space to have
later come out off using only one digit's worth of
accountability... but hey... that's life.
          are you feeling the guilt trip drug pushed
by your mother from Syria, or Somalia?
     you owe her! you parasite... makes easier argument
for the billion Blue Indians and Chinese to get on
with it and eradicate the over-sensitive ivory dodo;
or at least in Siberia with the mongols...
              so i'm guessing eskimo is the new
                        squint to what's butchery ethics in Kosovo
as: look away... nothing to see.
               still... why call it a witty comedy when
you nonetheless have to utilise canned laughter?
             and that's a novel in itself...
? went up the stairs and ? met ! questioning <
whether ? should be questioning <... instead ! suggested
that ? should be questioned by >, since ? was already
on the 1st floor, having ascended the stairs from
the ground floor...         can you write me
     a novel... replacing all the correct pronoun usage
with mathematical ambivalence structured toward
a mostly unread existential dogmatism using
  mathematical punctuation?
no one will read it...but hey... either you do something
like that... or own a dog or a cat...
           and yes, they call them diacritical marks
when they're within letters... but in between letters?
they call them punctuation marks within words...
or the microcosm of punctuation: syllabification...
          the French just gobble down a lot of
  deviation... mon fhhhhhhhhhhhhré!
don't ask me how they do it... ask Nápŏlyon,
yes, the half-wit from Li-ą... oh no... not
                                               Monsieur Dynamite.

Klauss Ritkke collector leaves and representative of Beggars, with their 76 autumn and semi-dead body of downstroke of insect. I used to walk through its narrow streets serenades as liquid pearls, as clusters of dreams omnipotent ogres and fetishes; owners of old Avignon, iridescent moist soil marshes bringing minerals liquids Gotthard massif, ancient drains into the Rhone. Owner dreams and curses weak burst administrators of the house of God.

         August 4 in the year of our Lord 1617, when it was asset Klauss cleaning the largest stained glass, heard heated dialogues between Fraile and Gentleman, who was in another time assistant clergy? You could approach Klauss and listen more clearly their conversation, until the Friar Andrew, stammering, Raymond Bragasse demanded indulgence, or one or the other.

Fray Andrés : How many times hopefully I struggled to reform you ... Raymond!
  
'O virga ac diadema diabolus thirst ...!!
  'Oh ****** the Devil smiled ...!!

Raymond  : It is to live more question if I failed something, take me to the sulfurous emanations from Averno. But my faith lies mildewed on the seabed, sacred myth ... my truth, and my beloved Marielle ... Meanwhile,

Klauss envisaged to play the window and looked her tongue to pray for them. Fray Andrés, paced back and forth wondering what to do...?
Raymond  : There are fifteen thousand demons possessing my body ... fifteen thousand demons to attack the sacred mystery of the Holy Rosary ...!                

Fray andrés : Oh great cause ... How I have to ****** your soul whose darkness of flashed light ...!?

Raymond  : Marielle was my light, my Eve Edenic, admirable land. Now, it's my I spell, my blindness or my constant bleed sharp, not knowing where to elapse...?

         ...To a memory that night, that dismal night, giving up my final vows of faith and consecration of my soul. I broke my bonds and ecclesiastical chores all by Marielle noble descendant of the Quentinnais.

            Never believe such grief in my fate I do love her, but his misfortune was to meet me. That night when I went to the edge of her house, I walked through the kitchen window. Everyone was asleep, except the albi-blue reflection of the last gasps of the deadly round of Quentinnais Mansion. I thought rescue and salvage something from those cheeks kissed by me, but their heart wiping her heart and lungs.
     It is possible to recall the last roses I took her hands.   Danced with her, next to the old hymn and lamentation of prestidigitations made by the monk, played alongside cartomancy having abolished the minute of darkness take her with her beautiful bare feet. What a pain, I could not rescue her, and snatched me death! His parents hated the mere fact of having their priest ruled by a wicked heart, so I turned to the pagans and dark gods to heal Marielle, and his heart transplant it for mine.
              
Since that day, I'm still burning in hell polisatanic to take little breath of kindness and seize transparent liquid plaguing their existence and serene Diadem metal to learn that his friend possessed by the devil fall into any infection endemic evil ...; endemic of his love, crossed himself when he saw that turned into a horrible one.

Humble as leaves in the garden became the Bible leaves torn from the bound fillings. Saints lepers shriveled down her columns. Heaven proclaimed hemorrhages and wind festering stinking gases, which in the sky sprouted in clusters clots on the Papal Household.

          Fray Andrew threw the rosary on the neck of the possessed, and asked the Demons who feared more ...?. A question answered this question Demons, which fell shrieking vertical down the aisle ... and.... fell, rose!

              
       Klauss fell to the ground in horror, and the demons not to respond, fell into tears and regret shaped so plaintive and poignant, many dark beings holed up in fixtures and embankments, they began to mourn moved by natural compassion ... and saying pained voice by the mouth of the possessed...:

...Andrés, Andrew ... ... have mercy on us!
              
Meanwhile, Klauss ran away screaming the place ... could be heard in the distance ... Marielle ... have mercy on us!

         Sparkling lights fell on the dome, covered with orange and creamy luzbels horror. Apertures fulminations betrayed contained emancipate the shackled muses leaping vacuum; discouraging reddening chinks bad ..., saturating every form, every place, and every interlocutory benign breeze.
Most animals vomited on the walls; carbonated some ****** walls and curdling the soul of the people. Other remains of vomiting sulphurous radiated papal house, initialing the firing squad diabolical image of Raymond and Fray Andrés; they are swallowed by the Cancerbero. So flayed bats were issued by the campanile, mistaking the red sunset in penitence with blood dripping thick alleged by the Buttress and reach a churchyard to embryo.
            
Got home, tightly closed the latch, feeling strangely his wife Danianne; which saw his face isolation. Then he went to his bedroom and closed the curtains, warning yellow lights in progressive outlook towards a corner of the mirror. Then he lay down on the bed and prayed for himself and others ... "Today, when I walked by my office and my prayer my clothes pilgrim incense drove away my voice ... as if Fray Andrés, still whispering my ears..."

I close my eyes listening to litanies and prayers ...
         O ****** by virtue of your rosary, directs these enemies of mankind to respond to my question...!
                
Klauss saw the exorcism using the mirror. He made a prayer, came a radiant ears, nose and mouth of the possessed flame. Fire flowed like laba of the Holy Cross, which destroyed the wicked and the most worthy wisdom worked against the satanic specter fire and hot rosary fell on the hot heads Fraile and Raymond. It was what translated his shadow in her room.

         Klauss Rittke, returning the next day moistened his clothes by the dense fog that covered the sacred place, then when picking up     leaves plucked Bible found a Diadem with an initial contained a    backwards W, whose image pointed to Marielle triumphing evil. He   tried to leave but nothing left pulled, so refugee took the   diamond and warily Diadem led her pocket.                                                          ­                          

Little bit could do that dark and rainy day, as an insurrectionary devotion that day begged her angelic singing to heaven; that enveloped the sky in order to transport to the cemetery to sleep next to their parents.  Diadem virtue to useful lives and reigns in the footsteps passerby Baal runaway spirits. All with their malodorous footsteps, they vomited and flying in higher meridians, like the giddy exorcism in the house of the universal Shepherd.
           The same day, August 5, 1617, Klauss arrived tired with the diadem cast in her hand. Thus, ceased to exist and its long sleep would walk with his white robe and crown throw with his eyes came from the Sea blankets the oceanographic serpentuous within Marielle, whose hairnets they are containing its essence. His agony lasted three days, and around Avignon no who could wear mourning. His children and wife lost their voice to utter.

Go in peace Benedict Klauss...!

Memories of Malinda
@2013 Linda Barrett

Whenever I saw you at your computer terminal,
my heart pounded with fear
You stood five feet and two inches tall
weighing twice your size
obesity bloated you
In your tight velvet tunic and tights
Your face resembled a ball of fat
lips ****** out in a sullen pout
Small brown eyes glared
At your computer monitor
underneath  your bobbed golden hair,
you held onto vindictive bitterness
hatched plots and drama
from all the television shows
you came home to watch
after keying in millions of medical forms
for five days a week
and seven hours a day
The hatred you felt in life
came out in disgust
and revulsion for me
You despised me for being the way I am:
told everyone in the office
of all of my crimes
against common sense and logic
How I couldn’t do anything right
I sneezed in my hands
keyed in the wrong information
picked my pimples in public
forgot to wash my hands
after going to the bathroom
To get rid of me once and for all
You took matters into your own hands
When our supervisor went on maternity leave,
you sabotaged my work
on the computer
verbally abused me every day
played cruel games on me
whispered about me
to your catty little friends
as I sat directly behind you
at my desk
until I started calling out sick
then searched for a psychiatrist
To unscramble my brain
and discover


why I couldn’t keep down a job
like other “normal” people
For a final analysis
I sought out God
If I prayed hard enough,
would He hear me
and pull me from the miry
clay of my office torment
or let this woman win?
I doubted Him at first
until two others caught
you in the act of sabotage
wrestled the claims I entered
into the company’s data base
Out of your self-made drama,
you almost lost your job
When Human Resources investigated
the other department’s members
about the sabotage issue,
you escaped from their questions
by fleeing for the parking lot
and speeding for home
You tried to get your friends
to gang up and save your job
from the others
who exposed your tricks
of data entry daring  do
The quiet speaking blonde H.R. manager
decided to demote you down
to a regular clerk
You went into tantrums
when the new auditor
revealed the mistakes
you used to hide from us
slammed your document folders
over her overhanging desk lamp
spat out obscenities
In childish rage
After a few years,
you quit your discouraging job
said to everyone
you found work
at a dentist’s office
in far away Dublin, Pa.
Even after two decades,
Why do I still
fearfully cringe
whenever I think of you?

The phone sings into my life from
Its still place in the corner,
Fulfilling the role of messenger
Holding onto elation or devastation,
Chit chat or sales voice of persuasion.
A tracking device linking into our whereabouts,
Held on our person, in car or walking mode,
Connecting us with another soul.
At one time these sentences would wait,
Storing up conversation and expectancy,
Now, the turn off mode rarely used,
Its surface new alongside never ending
Chit chat from keys depressed at expert
Speed and dialogue, via shortcuts
To the english language,
Discouraging correct terminology, a dislike
To some, taught in the old school.
Shall we exercise our way back from here
I doubt we can...we never will

This never ending chit chat mode.

I sat there staring at her from across the table
as we shared yet another quiet meal together,
observations buzzing around in my already crowded mind.
Her face looked clean and resheshed,
her hair soft and coifed and freshly washed,
her white gloves unstained and clamped snuggly
around her slender arms.
Would she noticed my threadbare coat,
the circles underneath my tired eyes,
the cloth cap that used to sit upon my head?
Was I truly good enough for her?
Her smile said yes, but the condescending
grimaces on the faces of her parents upstairs said
no.
I didn’t need to see them to know that they were there.
I just knew it. I just knew.
How discouraging.
I looked at her, watching her silently from across the table,
eating with one hand
and fumbling the lump in my pocket,
running my fingers over it,
meditating whether or not I was foolish enough
to claim her,
whether or not I was selfish enough
to want her to be mine.
I was a narcissist to even think of it.
What would her parents say?
I bit my lip and pulled the parcel out,
summoning her attention toward my hand,
eyes glowing with curiosity and anticipation.
I stood up, but paused.
Just say “Will you marry me?”
It’s that easy. Only four words. Just say it!
As I opened the box with numb fingers,
I began to stutter the words,
like my humble tongue had been enchanted with some
kind of curse.
Cowardice.
I slid the parcel back into my pocket,
having been defeated without even having fought.
The look in her eyes shifted and it took me a moment
to fully process what was going through my
beloved’s head.
As she slowly returned to her meal,
I recognized it as disappointment.
Somehow, the feeling was mutual.

i am abel’s fiery tongue upon this earth,
cannibalistic in the raw sense of things,
i spoil my kittens like i might a human being,
which does not mean philosophy meets status quo
whereupon no thought is doubted or thought doubted
equates a sensual realism, for the stalemate, this no man’s land
of lettering suggested we go one step further -
i can peer into hell and only see personal misery,
and in all that i see heaven as a collectivisation of misery
of the parched lips riddling the desert sands -
without asking whether thought is truly doubt
or a moral compass we decided upon, that the senses be doubted
and thought proclaimed freer than our allowances consider utilised
or without utility essentially kept (it’s what’s
called congregating on the word reality without a congregation
on the word thought that speaks to western society the most),
for i can allow one thing but not the other -
i too claim the cartesian mechanisation of the senses
by the double inversion of thought: a. doubt thinking to provide existence
without thinking - automation,
b1. doubt the doubting thought and enclose zoologically
further in, to stress the coordinates of preplanned execution doubtless,
b2. doubt reality to undue the method of doubting thought that encompasses
the prime realism of things without thought,
b3. doubt the existence of things to think - keith lemon saying the word... tragic.
but the revisionary trick came when the cartesian model imploded
and said: thought proves being! thought proves existence!
hence no doubt was allowed, a bit fahrenheit 451 to be honest:
i.e. read any book you like... but don’t doubt its content,
think it through, think it out, elevates you into the agglomerate inclusion
with favoured numbering - keeps the “idiots” out, steady on
the beef in the banquet **** of bulimic excesses... steady...
rein in the oesophagus octopi - or like cancer and lobster in italy said:
death by numbers - bulging weight of the nuns chuckling a cha cha cha.
so why did post-cartesian thought engage with heidegger, why
did thinking suddenly uncouple itself from doubting to provide
the “perfect” existential parameter of undoubted sight
given that doubting passed from the realm of thought and into the realm of being?
‘i doubt i was there, i doubt it, i thought about it, but thinking about it
was truly discouraging to be here, so i thought i was there,
and that mediated the equation perfectly: i doubted i was here
but thought i was there, in the end i was here and therefore couldn’t doubt it,
but thinking about being here bored me, so i was “there” doubting
hopefully - rather than doubtfully hopeful of not being there and thinking
that being "there" was me being there would justify thought and doubting ease erasing, i came to the conclusion that being the lambs for the slaughter was enough, so i was here and thought... dasein! in the rally of relays i was "here" disclosing what thought was supposed to be when usurped from doubt and made surprisingly moral. posterior interior pumped suffocating by the toilet rim signalling blitzkrieg ***** and goosebumps on the guillotine ready to pluck a goose for broth instead of flight!’
sage of the black forest has spoken, shush: all the rat skeletons will now
be used for a xylophone symphony.
well it was once called mathematical akin to grammatical,
but so much was lost in the forgotten art of teaching grammar -
adjectives were used to allow timing, adverbs for spacing -
and a lot of emoticons replaced ****** features used once - like an itchy nose
or a half brow of sympathy stretched into an expression of surprise -
but so much was lost, the arts became post-cubism exact in
lacking all inspirational overtones enraging a schooled expression to canvas
a pope might admire, least the randomised passerby.

You know me as the monster
That's always been my role in this B movie we've been creating with our faulty equipment

But I've been trying so hard lately to shed my skin
I want to ditch the claws and the fangs
And just be me

Honestly, I love to make people happy
But I've been told so many times that I'm no good at it
And it's sent me down a lonely and discouraging path

Please forgive me for the blood shed and the people I've eaten
And give me another chance to prove there's some good in me

Surprisingly enough,
this little vile of some
horrible stuff
called "Pink-Pink"
is actually rather
musky.

And to think,
after three months
and then two more,
I would get six checks.

Micky Mantle captivated
the nation,
and Lars Montannaro
is captivating
this town.
All the while
Michael Moore is killing God
and God is killing us.

One must ask oneself,
did God create me,
or did I create God?
Is God within me,
or am I God myself?

Throughout John Carpenter's life
many questions plagued him,
most remained unanswered,
few allowed him to live
and one killed him.

He lies dying,
gasping for air,
with nothing but
Steinbeck and brandy
to bid him farewell.

On a bed without sheets,
in a motel without a kitchen,
in a town without a theater,
in a state without a king,
in a land without hope,
God lays dying.
With nothing but the prayers of
Mary Stein to bid him goodnight,
he prays himself.

Every man is a believer in the foxhole,
just as he is a saint.
Praying and praying,
the fire rallies
around a man,
his emancipated guts
lay spewing blood in the dirt.


Without a clear objective man is nothing.
Nothing is everything,
and everything is unexplainable
just as nothing can be explained.

The Dark sings a song it believes to be beautiful,
and the Light finds it discouraging to it's attempts
of what it believes to be beautiful.
So the Light chases away the Dark
and the Wanderers wonder where it went.

Wandering this world,
they try
and try
and try
to find it.

They are looking in the wrong world.

The man with a gun
runs to the store and back
and back
and back again.

The willows whisper a tune for their god
that the oaks find blasphemous.
The oaks chant louder and louder
so as to please their god.

Life goes on
and life goes on
and life goes on
and then it doesn't.
Then suddenly it  begins
in a thousand more forms
and in a thousand more lungs
it breathes.
Life will continue to exalt God
and God will continue allowing life to breathe.

For as long as there is air,
breathes shall be taken.