THE PREACHER GOODY GOODWILL walks center stage and steps up to the Dias; eyeing his congregation with a seriously serious frown. Clears his throat, takes a tissue and blows his nose. Then resumes eyeing all the families sitting before him. Finally-

PREACHER GOODY GOODWILL
Were you unsettled? Did my silence catch you off guard? Or was it my frown, sure that was it, you're not used to seeing me frown, you're not used to me stretching out the silence. And yet I wonder: why is it you were uncomfortable? Surely, even though you weren't prepared for it, it wasn't as if I came here with accusations of you - you Charlotte Ray, or you Jimmy Matheter, or any random one of you for that matter - accusations that you had sinned 'for you surely did as the Good Lord intended you too, you sinned and you will be forgiven if you simply give in to the Good Lord's Word and his wholly Holy embrace.
(BEAT)
And so I wonder - and I ask you to ask yourself - why were you uncomfortable when I stepped up in silence? Have you sinned and are ashamed? Too ashamed, perhaps, to confess said sin? 'For if that's the case then you are truly ******, having committed not just the sin you are ashamed to confess but now in the Good Lord's own House you are committing the sin of pride, you are certainly not humble as the Good Lord asks of us all, are you?
(BEAT)
Are we not told that "the meek shall inherit the earth" as written by the Good Lord's very own, very Good Hand in our Holy Bible?
(BEAT)
So who are you to walk with pride when He asks you to be humble, that's all he asks of you my friends; be true and humble, be meek among men, and He - the Good Lord Himself - will surely welcome you through the pearly gates of Heaven and into his warm embrace.
(BEAT)
It is not for you to be your own judge nor are you tasked with judging others; surely you must see how full of pride one must be to imagine he can rightfully judge others or himself, for that matter, and not be full of pride if he dares take on such a task.
(BEAT)
And let us be clear as He the Good Lord is clear, that to be Holy is to be prideless, to accept Him into your heart is to accept that you have sinned - and you have, each and every one of you - 'for we are imperfect beings in an imperfect world and who among you would claim to be perfect of His Own Son, Jesus Christ himself, was a sinner among men... oh, I see, I literally see your raised eye browse as if you truly don't believe me or perhaps you don't understand. So if I may let me give you just one example which is the one that speaks most true to your very own Preacher Goody Goodwill who does not and has never claimed to be great, oh no have I ever claimed that my good friends? I certainly have not 'for I choose to be good, just good at what I do which is all the Good Lord asks, while his own Son Jesus Christ, he too was a preacher like me, but he was great perhaps the greatest yes! the greatest of all time thus he wasn't very meek, to be great is to have pride and in pride we live in sin; and so, as the Holy Book informs us Jesus Christ died for our sins but consider that he, too, was a sinner among men and so he died for his sins too, he had surely lived in pride and he had not a confessor so he died a filthy man.
(BEAT)
Yes that's right he died as he had lived, full of pride and not so meek, do you see now what I say? You are not too full of pride that you'd consider your own sins and believe that you may judge what is right and what is wrong? No, I know you all as I do myself and you are Good Folks with good hearts and meek as lambs, are you not?

The congregation nods whole heartedly.

PREACHER GOODY GOODWILL
Good good, I know you are, you're good and meek at heart as the Good Lord intended, and so when it's your turn to confess I expect you'll remember this talk we just had, and confess as the Good Lord intended, let me hear all the sins you sinned for you surely sinned, and let me then offer you his Holy reassurance that the penance I deem is the key to your salvation and once you clean yourself of sin then salvation will be yours.

Now the Preacher Goody Goodwill scans the congregation, eyeing them all, one by one; then he smiles and they smile back - all is as it should be once again - and his warmth radiates within the Holy House as he concludes this Sunday's sermon by making the sign of the Cross across his chest.

PREACHER GOODY GOODWILL
You may rise.

You need to go.
And I don't know how to do it.
I don't want to forget you, to cut you off. I don't want to shatter my love for you.
There has to be another way.
But... you need to go.
I can't keep waking up sore every morning. Raw.
I can't keep talking myself out of tears.
I can't keep wondering why the hell you matter to me, and abusing myself for caring about you.
But I don't know how to do it. It's not in me to extinguish a love.
I have sacrificed every part of myself at least once to avoid it.
It has been the single thing I am unwilling to do.
The one unwavering line in the sand.
And I know where this leads- this trying to erase it.
I know because I've tried,
In pain,
In desperation, to destroy a love before. And I couldn't do it.
I threw more and more at it, unleashed every weapon I had.
And by the end...
I had caught the rest of me in the crossfire, and the only thing that remained untouched was that love.
You need to go.
But that will happen again if I try to uproot you from my soul.
It is a humbling lot. A prideless realization. That I must wait.
That I must serve the part of me that holds me captive, the only part of me I know as indestructible,
The part that reigns because nothing can dethrone it.
I must bow to it, because I like what else I am.
I know that even if I tried with every ounce of courage and hatred I have built up over my years to demolish my love for you, the dust would clear,
And it would be the only thing about me left.
And I don't want it to be.
I don't respect it enough to let it be my defining factor.
And so I sit and stew and wait, for it to loosen its stranglehold, or for you to come back.
It is a prideless thing. And I am a proud person.
And it chafes every single day.
And I swallow it, and go on.

I.

Prideless, they tore railroad men’s brown *******
lurking the thirsty Kenyan banks.
Red moonlight sluiced from brambles and linen skins
pressing upon tawny flesh, igniting fire of feline eye.

Imperious, they patrolled the union jack encampment
lingering in shadows of long-labour’s dreamless sleep
until the smoldering campfire morning
when one hundred hammers lean in one hundred corners.

II.

Maneaters in glass houses can’t throw stony glances—
the power to haunt having run off with the ghost.
Now, they reign over the acrylic savannah
sneering—not out of regal disdain, but mild discomfort
from dust mites nitpicking at tautly taxidermed pelt.

Rebel eyes that halted an empire now cast
dull marble stares at fossils in the floor
and derailed trains of un-terrified school-children
near a hissing robot-box called Mold-A-Rama
spewing magma into plastic tyrannosaurs.

By: David Wayne Clare

Sad commentary on society
**** of the earth
Killer of innocent children
His ugly mamma gave birth

Slime dog is a quack
Sells dope and smacks on
I ask you kindly
Where is Michael Jackson?

Take a walk through the forest look up at the trees and hills
Show me one tree that actually grows pills

Bring back the guillotine
Abolish civil rights for uncivil wrongs
The 8th amendment is a shield
To the drug-dealer… we must not yield!


(Anagram: MANIAC PRIDELESS FOOL = MEDICAL PROFESSIONAL)

© In Perpetuity – All Rights Reserved By The Author: David Wayne Clare  


In Asia on the airplane embarkation card it reads... Death to drug dealers in Asia!
I lived in parts of Asia many of the drug dealers get caught and shot...see YouTube

Willows weep
Shadows grin
Mothers lie
Daughter sin

Feelings bleed
Hyped minds spin
Colors clash
Mouths of tin

Sleepless nights
Shark's black fin
Cracked up bowls
Want to win

Roses red
Smiles of gin
No fix real
Unwashed din

Honeyed song
Prideless kin
Jesus waits
Pull this pin.

I thought of how much time it's been since i first realized you were special.
I don't remember the moment i first loved you;There were so many times.
I don't remember the moment i first felt a crack;There were so many times as well.
I remember the feelings;the agony,the pain,the joy,the passion;All of them.
Love is prideless,love is mirthless.
My heart was a ******* for cherishing what was bad for her,and i was a saddist for letting her do as she pleased.
Each time was different and each time was the same;
You talked and talked,thinking i would never mind
And i closed my mouth and gulped my feelings,because i would never try.
Such is the fate i chose.

These clouds linger
Like the thoughts storming through your head,
And it is here that I wonder,
If I am already dead
To you who I layed my soul down
To you who picked it up,
Deemed unworthy
I find myself unable to settle
For another who accepts the pieces you rejected
For another who can fit within the confines of my mind,
You left a hole
In the shape of you
And I wear that scar on my skin like a prideless reminder of my arrogance
For falling in love with an angel
Because who am I,
But a simple man with simple wants and nothing more
You who has taken the world by storm
Me who has been capsized by its raging seas
You who held me as I cried
And then proceeded to leave

I, before your hands found me, would fly
Past murky, flaxen winds and uncloaked, brittle trees
While ticking, tocking years marched by.

How could the earth behind the bleeding sun so simply sigh
At prideless princes, careless bees and frightened, frigid fleas?
I learned before that I, without your hands, should always fly.

Speak and thread the eye of quickly and softly luring lies.
Until I play in clouds of light, gently, sweetly, please
Forestall those ticking years that slip so easily by.

Wearily I pull worn reins, thinned and tattered, below the tie
Then pray for whispered secrets and rolling, trusting, fearless seas.
I wait, but still without your hands, I learn that I may fly.

Without much left within me but a withered, ragged cry
I’ll offer up the edgeless, vast and countless shuffling sea.
We’ll watch and share those ticking years that go so quickly by.

The smell of autumn rainfall, filled with dew and golden skies,
We lay beneath and count the scars the swindling jet planes leave.
Unlocked and healed, without your hands, I know that I can fly,
But pray that ticking, tocking years go slowly, slowly by.

When you're feeling down & worthless
Hopeless
Helpless
Because you're loved less
Depressed
Filled with unhappiness
Sadness
I feel lifeless
Prideless
Striving less
Thriving less
Deserving of my sad mess
My slow progress
I deserve my loneliness
My unsuccess
I am laying my soul to rest
Because my life is in distress

These clouds linger
Like the thoughts storming through your head,
And it is here that I wonder,
If I am already dead
To you who I layed my soul down
To you who picked it up,
Deemed unworthy
I find myself unable to settle
For another who accepts the pieces you rejected
For another who can fit within the confines of my mind,
You left a hole
In the shape of you
And I wear that scar on my skin like a prideless reminder of my arrogance
For falling in love with an angel
Because who am I,
But a simple man with simple wants and nothing more
You who has taken the world by storm
Me who has been capsized by its raging seas
You who held me as I cried
And then proceeded to leave
And I was foolish enough to believe that I knew everything
At least about this one thing
That you and I were destined for something greater then anything I had ever dreamed,
That your high rise state of mind would ballance out my desire to settle,
I would love with a ferocity I had never shown in anything
I would hold one truth apparent above all others that life would be lived not as one but two,
And I had the ring to prove it,
I guess we'll never know which knee to bend down first
Because life isn't always fair and it isn't everyone who cares,
And I wish I had the depth of character and the state of mind to climb outside of the walls my mind has hid behind,
It's a terrifying place to be at this time of night.
And it's these truths I hold to be evident in light of the current circumstances,
Love is a sham,
I've said it before and I'll say it again
Love is the most destructive force known to man.
And it was all at once I knew that she never loved me.
It wasn't because of spite and it wasn't because she never tried,
It just was
She thought she did,
But love is elusive and it's easy to love someone in parts,
And in parts she loved me well,
Until I fell to pieces
And then it came,
The I can't do this, the I's in her eyes
And I knew she didn't know,
I wanted to be angry,
Because I loved her with all of me
But she only loved me with pieces.
And maybe one day she'll know
I truly hope so,
But for now I'll remember the pieces.
The smiles,
The quiet whispers,
The love,
The truth,
The lies,
The laughs,
The walks in the snow and in the rain,
The pain,
Because it's these pieces that formed the life we had,
And even though it wasn't what we hoped,
It was fun while it lasted.
And so here lie the pieces,
Of what we had,
Of who I used to be,
Because there he lies in pieces,
And there isn't enough crazy glue in the world to glue him back together.
So I'm starting from the ground up,
And with god as my witness and with the odds against me I'll fight with tooth and nail for every inch of ground to stand on,
And maybe we'll reconnect in our thirties,
Maybe we won't
Life is funny that way.
But either way I just need to say,
Thanks for the pieces,
I've learned so much,
And it'll be hard without you,
But I'm going to be okay.
I always am, I always will be.
It's who I am.
I hope you find peace, and love, and prosperity.
And I hope you find your pieces.