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Hank Roberts Dec 2013
Money keeps the world going round
while it straps us down.

money gets us what we want and when
but loses the mother we need

money makes us buy beer and hold hands
but it made Jesus flip ****

money is what we go and earn while
fathers cry because the

money could buy them bread but
not their lovers back.

money can buy lust and ***
and along with that a STD

money is earned but only
burned on sports and dvds

money can be lucky if
money is the only way out

money creates and destroys,
monopolizes and liberates.

money says things the
same way twice even though

money reads in "God We Trust" but
it should declare "trust in you".
She sets fire to everything she touches,
I think as my mind burns.
I can't have anything, she takes it away.
Engulfs it. Entraps it.
Monopolizes it.
I can't have anything of my own.
I am sent spiraling into a retrograde.
Screaming at her to stop
as I try to grab the things out of my
burning house.
"DON'T TOUCH THIS, DON'T TOUCH THIS DON'T TOU--"
Everything she touches turns to ember.
She will ruin everything I love.
I just need to hold on to one thing.
Anything.
She sets fire to everything that is mine!*
My mind burns.
I scramble to save anything I can salvage
as the flames bellow in
and the smoke engulfs the room.
"COME BEFORE THE FIRE GETS TO YOU.
DON'T TOUCH IT, DONT TOUCH IT, DONT TOUCH--"
It's a race between me and the flames
as they dance around the floor, walls,
ceiling.
The room is swallowed in smoke,
and I stagger outside
coughing and swaying.
I can't salvage anything before the entire
house burns down.
I look,
disheartened at the place where
foundation used to be.
Nothing now but rubble and wispy smoke,
knowing this would happen from the beginning.
"Look what she did," I say as I clutch the lighter.
Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned.
-Buddha
SALaprade Sep 2013
The pain of a broken heart is real
It's a physical pain, like an open wound
Raw, stinging, burning, aching flesh
It even has a smell all of its own

Yes, I can smell it, it burns my senses
It assaults my ego as it comes in waves
It invades my dreams by night
It selfishly monopolizes my days

My every thought is consumed
By the bitterness of my heart so bruised
By the man who in one moment loved me
And in the next made me feel so used

But now I've found a way to dull the pain
A way to numb myself
A way to stop the flow of tears
A way to make it through the days

You should be happy for me
Why aren’t you happy for me?
You should be happy… For me.
But I'm not even happy for me.
Your voice is like a virus
Infectious and deadly
It invades my thoughts
swims into my nervous system
your malicious words manifest in me
and overcomes my benign state of being
manipulates the cells into a chain reaction of shock
you monopolizes every motive
I have no other defenses to call upon
my movements become slowed
you settle into the control room
and shut me down
I force a wall of white cells
to guard what little I have left to salvage
but I know it is futile they replicate in a frenzy
with the pressure of time as motivation
to curdle my cells to a pulp
my mind is racing and hot
sending signals but getting no response
searching for a way to help
Everything inside me boils
The heat contained beneath my skin
is like a furnace releasing heat waves
visibly manipulating the air around me
like acid moving across the thick tracks
of an oil painting and instead of steaming out of my pores
most of it stays trapped inside trying to mend the attacked tissue
putting my inside into an endless world of hell
but once you are defeated
You will be apart of me
I will know you inside and out
I'll be immune to your type for life
George Grogan Jul 2017
I roll from bed.., awoke: too a strong a word
My head aches and my frame shivers and shakes
A sick feeling washes over me and I lay back down

It was a great night …it must have been…right?
Guilt washes over me..
with a furtive glance i look around
Did I leave some sign? Does she know?

I see her watching me from the shadows with a withering look
Her arms crossed together, eyes that no longer cry tell the story
The hurt, the pain, the lies have all taken the their toll
And I wonder if today will be the day she goes
or if shes’ already gone

my wife no longer longs.
life a dull drudgery
like a hiker lost in the woods
head down, she slowly moves
one foot in front of the other…
hour by hour and day by day…
knowing the end is inevitable

Our romance is like the silver ash of a fire
that once burned bright
now cold and dry
it didn’t break
just crumbled under unspoken weight

Deeper than passion
has been our friendship
and that has been trodden on,
pressed into the ground

Love is not enough,
it may keep us together
but my sin keeps us apart

I know she is here because her shadow accuses me every day
but am afraid that her heart has left
and withdrawn deep inside of her
to a safe place where I can no longer touch it
For you see, we are no longer …two in one, …but three.
Her…Me…and the Drink.

When we started she was my mistress..
we would sneak away and play late into the night.
I looked forward to the times we had together.
No one understood me… but her
I could relax and be myself,
laugh, cry and shout
But somehow she has become my master
and it is no longer want, but must that drives me to her.

She even sleeps with us,
invading the most intimate place of our lives.
She eats my food..leaving me with no appetite.
My dreams have faded until they are ghosts,
purpose, passion and destiny are words that now mock me.
She monopolizes me…taking all my time,
I look at them, the kids... need the father I once was,
especially the little one
, .. tomorrow…soon, I will make it all right
And put away the Drink

But somehow she has taken my energy “to do”.
I haven’t quit wanting..i have just quit doing
She has drained my spirit and stolen my soul
not in a rush like a hurricane
but like a hidden cancer slowly eats away a hole…
making me fat, lazy, stupid and grey
grey in heart, like a sail with a gaping hole
The winds may blow but have no affect on me

AH! But I will stop all of this…
I will be what I once was, ….NO! even better.
I will do it! Yep, tomorrow, or the day after.
After all there is no need to waste what I have hidden…
I will get rid of it tonight and then I can quit.
It will be easier if there is no drink laying around


The car door closes and they drive away
I can’t believe my good luck! Alone for the day!
I open the closet, pulling back the wall I pry out the hidden bottle
I smile.. my wife is clever and thinks she knows everything about me and my ways
Oh but she could never guess how clever we are!
She calls it “sneaky, lying and decieving”…
She is soooo serious! Lighten up, babe!
its just a game! Right?
I win this round! Ha!

I pull the lid and move the bottle to my mouth
No, not here.
This is a special moment that deserves preparation.
I go into the living room
move the chair toward the tv
and put in the tape that I will soon forget
Fumbling in the kitchen I get a small glass
(no wanton wanting (at least not now) no sloppy rushing the trough
but slow and deliberate alcoholic foreplay..
Like a doctor preparing for surgery
i make ready for my private party
I slowly fill my glass halfway
eager anticipation and a sense of fulfillment overwhelm me
I laugh out loud and make a toast
…one of many that I will make tonight.
The first (from The groundhog day movie) is to world peace.

There are stages I go through or places I land when I drink
The first is a wam feeling of relaxation
My Irish heritage crying out “drink and be merry”
(it must have been the Germans or some other overly organized race who inserted...for tomorrow we shall die!)

I find myself laughing hilariously
at the movie, myself, the world in general
I know what I need I think to myself!
Something to eat!
Not too much
because I wouldn’t want the food to dull the power of my drink
I stumble into the kitchen and prepare a huge meal

I am halfway through it when my laughter turns into crying.
Like it was only yesterday
I cry with bitter grief over my dead father, my sister, and on and on…
My heart is flooded with painful memories and in anguish I weep

I believed for a long time that this crying was good for me
An emotional release that allowed me to vent past pain
But I am convinced that alcohol is a magical drug.
It can raise the dead and resurrect memories long buried
It brings to life every hurt,
offense, shame and pain with amazing power

Like a trapped and tortured animal the pain turns to anger.
As a thunderstorm moves across a purple sky
A deep and dark rage begins to rise
A sense of outrage that crys NEVER, NEVER AGAIN!
Like a chained dog teased by those just out of reach
I find myself shaking my fist at ghosts and days gone by

But this also fades… at least for the night,
like an extinguished fire leaves a blackened forest
the rage leaves a dark sooty stain upon my soul
I feel exhausted, very tired and sleepy
The black and gray screen on the television flickers
I can’t remember what movie I was watching or when it ended

I roll from bed.., awoke: too strong a word
My head is aching and my frame shivers and shakes
A sick feeling washes over me and I lay back down
It was a great night …I am pretty sure.
Guilt washes over me..
Did I leave some sign? Does she know?
And I see her watching me from the shadows with a withering look
Her arms crossed together, eyes that no longer cry tell the story
The hurt the pain the lies have all taken the their toll
And I wonder if today will be the day she goes or if shes’ already gone
D**n, I need a drink!
alternately titled: tick tock runneth amuck
seconds elapse imperceptibly
leaving me dumbstruck,
how quickly fleeting tempus fugit;
ofttimes imagined as time thief.

Hence following vignette: quiet as a mouse lurks the time thief

The invisible hours hoarder stealthily steals precious seconds (like minute hors d'oeuvres) away during the dead of night surreptitiously and unsuspectingly robs and buries me alive by subtracting each and every precious second of my tender life.

As the world spins, the days fly by at nearly the hummingbird wings at the deathly hallow supersonic sound, this little elfin grot sized goniff (groomed by Father Time) monopolizes and usurps a greater role like some unwanted guest who overstays his welcome.

Mortality (visited by quick and painless demise) on the other hand would be an especial balm, relief and tonic to my countless decades long existential slog, which this model ’59 hew man cargo happens to be in sore need and want of that fairy tale genie in a bottle to grant me eternity.

How quickly the hands blindingly **** by instantaneously eclipsing memories from yesterday (when all my troubles seemed so far away) as I just barely shucked off the frock from today.

Meanwhile faint hints of tomorrow (albeit dark shadows creeping imperceptibly closer from the edge of night as all my children frolic in the summer of their blissful innocence totally oblivious to the galloping generational gourmand grandfatherly clocker) hungrily prowling on the outskirts of styx strewn groveling grooved globe.

Nocturnal creatures emerged from respective hideouts regaling in fleeting festivities (apropos to their species/ genus) before the curtain rises on another dawning day.

Although an unseen yet palpable grim harbinger (per prescribed existential allowance) precedes, and allocates finite years sans spontaneous birth of life, the daily hubbub finds this introspective individual self-absorbed in gloom.

Thus, he infrequently finds himself conscious of that eye popping, jaw dropping, mind boggling sheer speed of light flash representative of his passing life. Where in the world did those days, weeks, months, years, and decades go? Try as one might to catch the robber baron of ages, he/she also appears to be at least one second ahead.

These immeasurable micro moments appear to leap ever faster as one inches closer to that average length of longevity. Odd though, that these indiscriminate discrete constituent parts of being consciousness well nigh impossible to isolate, yet recognition prevails at cradle to grave cycle.

I feel utterly dumbstruck at diminishing residence on this planet now while walking along the boulevard of broken dreams. An indistinguishable blur (akin to the brushstroke of an artist across blank palette yet to be covered with an unpredictable product) the only evidence that tempus fugit.

Now as one crotchety curmudgeon contemplating cumulative chapters of mein kampf (from childhood to doddering sexagenarian senescence), nostalgia for yesteryear like a parasite symbiotically festering inside for unrequited liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

The second these minute, gnarled, bent arthritic fingers manage to lay hands on that bleeping son of a blank, hours and days will be like one endless months long week-end without parental supervision.

Throughout mankind's awakened consciousness
elusive abstract notion
identifying past, present, and future
adopted as avuncular personification;
Father Time an apropos sobriquet
impossible concept to grasp
within the mind of one Finnish huckabuck,
whose clodhoppers get mired in muckamuck
analogous to quicksand yours truly stuck
markedly challenged, hence
mission scuttled when attempting to zuck.

Ever since the advent of civilization
contrivances crafted to measure
days, weeks, months...
years, decades, centuries...
analytical “gifted” anonymous minds,
wrought ever more sophisticated inventions
to divide existence into manageable units.

Now twenty first century **** sapiens
technological atomic clock work mechanisms
markedly catapulted by quantum leaps
immense degrees of precision  
extremely accurate types of devices
linkedin with state of the art electronics.

At this fleeting instant
(approximately 8:18 AM
September 13th, 2022)
ever so briefly wedged between
what elapsed and future events to arise)
impossible mission to isolate
that illusory present,

not only cuz the herein now
flits away at light speed
(or greater - you're right quite dubious),
but also everywhere within
cosmic space/time continuum
infinite microscopic and
macroscopic events occur.

As an amateur thinker
I feel baffled when pondering
that crude convenient schema
whereby greater minds than mine
devised devices to measure passage of time.

Yours truly can barely articulate
his farfetched dumbfoundedness,
me merely a simple brute
(shortish but not so nasty),
whose permanently creased
furrowed brow courtesy
his scrutinizing noggin
encasing fifty plus shades of gray matter,

whereby one percent bonafide Neanderthal
deoxyribonucleic acid explains
atavistic predilection issuing primal grunting,
when foraging for small (lame) game,
cuz feeble minded twenty first century
run of the mill garden variety **** sapiens
amuses himself (mentally)
toying with Einsteinian paradigm.

Though barely able to fathom
mind bending and boggling concepts
theoretically linkedin if an object
subjected to travel speed of light
(particularly an objet d'art - ha

think The Persistence of Memory
series of clock paintings by Salvador Dali)
mass becomes infinite
as does energy required to move entity.

Obviously the ability to wrap one's head
(or hands for that matter) around,
humongous (super sized) material essence
filling subsequent seconds, minutes, hours...
defies feasibility to grasp,

neither could ways nor means
allow, enable and provide
any semblance to hold (tangibly) as solid
something so abstract
as a singular moment, yes?

The above (ambiguously stated) thought exercise
equally as challenging where to locate
beginning and/or ending point
upon Möbius strip.

— The End —