I am writing these poems
From inside a lion,
And it's rather dark in here.
So please excuse the handwriting
Which may not be too clear.
But this afternoon by the lion's cage
I'm afraid I got too near.
And I'm writing these lines
From inside a lion,
And it's rather dark in here.

Well, my daddy left home when I was three,
and he didn't leave much to Ma and me,
just this old guitar and a bottle of *****.
Now I don't blame him because he run and hid,
but the meanest thing that he ever did was
before he left he went and named me Sue.

Well, he must have thought it was quite a joke,
and it got lots of laughs from a lot of folks,
it seems I had to fight my whole life through.
Some gal would giggle and I'd get red
and some guy would laugh and I'd bust his head,
I tell you, life ain't easy for a boy named Sue.

Well, I grew up quick and I grew up mean.
My fist got hard and my wits got keen.
Roamed from town to town to hide my shame,
but I made me a vow to the moon and the stars,
I'd search the ***** tonks and bars and ****
that man that gave me that awful name.

But it was Gatlinburg in mid July and I had
just hit town and my throat was dry.
I'd thought i'd stop and have myself a brew.
At an old saloon in a street of mud
and at a table dealing stud sat the *****,
mangy dog that named me Sue.

Well, I knew that snake was my own sweet dad
from a worn-out picture that my mother had
and I knew the scar on his cheek and his evil eye.
He was big and bent and gray and old
and I looked at him and my blood ran cold,
and I said, "My name is Sue. How do you do?
Now you're gonna die." Yeah, that's what I told him.

Well, I hit him right between the eyes and he went down
but to my surprise he came up with a knife
and cut off a piece of my ear. But I busted a chair
right across his teeth. And we crashed through
the wall and into the street kicking and a-gouging
in the mud and the blood and the beer.

I tell you I've fought tougher men but I really can't remember when.
He kicked like a mule and bit like a crocodile.
I heard him laughin' and then I heard him cussin',
he went for his gun and I pulled mine first.
He stood there looking at me and I saw him smile.

And he said, "Son, this world is rough and if
a man's gonna make it, he's gotta be tough
and I knew I wouldn't be there to help you along.
So I gave you that name and I said 'Goodbye'.
I knew you'd have to get tough or die. And it's
that name that helped to make you strong."

Yeah, he said, "Now you have just fought one
helluva fight, and I know you hate me and you've
got the right to **** me now and I wouldn't blame you
if you do. But you ought to thank me
before I die for the gravel in your guts and the spit
in your eye because I'm the nut that named you Sue."
Yeah, what could I do? What could I do?

I got all choked up and I threw down my gun,
called him pa and he called me a son,
and I came away with a different point of view
and I think about him now and then.
Every time I tried, every time I win and if I
ever have a son I think I am gonna name him
Bill or George - anything but Sue.

The moon has become a dancer
at this festival of love.
This dance of light,

This sacred blessing,
This divine love,
beckons us
to a world beyond
only lovers can see
with their eyes of fiery passion.

They are the chosen ones
who have surrendered.
Once they were particles of light
now they are the radiant sun.

They have left behind
the world of deceitful games.
They are the privileged lovers
who create a new world
with their eyes of fiery passion.

fuzzy buzzy flickering light fixtures
court me for days -
tired, unlatched
and in a daze

broken hinges hang from
untapped doorways,
painted with
shattered looking glasses
and laces overthrowing
unseen faces
crawling at ungodly paces,

blind red rages boil over
onto sentient pages to die
on unlit stages,
reeking with rows
of rotting audiences,
decomposing millions of
masterpieces.

sleepless death
undertaken,
like a sorry soul,
to a hole new level
six breaths under

reborn into a dogs tail
clenched between
it's own teeth.

Many times I've circled the solar system,

And as I age the colors fade. My world is old to me,

The magic leaks away.

The oppressive thoughts crowd and clutter,

Corporate Slavery takes president over fairy houses and tree climbing.

So when I see the world through the eyes of a lover,

It's as if I am a child again.

The pain has been washed away.
The monotony of this old world belongs to the true adults.

I'm light as a child, and free as a bird.

Through the face of my lover I see the whole world.

I guess that's what love is.
What love's meant to do.

Make us see the beauty again. Hear the music, feel the breeze, wish to soar,

Maybe it gives us wings to try.

And even the pain. The shattering of a beating heart.

The pain is potent
and real
and beautiful.

It's a child's emotion. Raw and important. We need it.
We need it to remind us that we aren't stone,
we are bodies that heal and regrow and adapt every day.

Lost souls, last words, Separation and the prayer for reconnection.

Kisses and being held, Feeling safe in the arms of another.

Being seen as a soul of purest light.
Staring into the eyes. Two bodies, one universe.

Makes me feel small and safe. Like a child again.
Being loved unconditionally.

Clicketyclick —

sickly screens,
shooting
sixty
picture-frames
per second

Tickety ticktock, rapid-fire
photon cannons,
ripping holes
through our
faces

rectangles,
riddled with anxiety ridden
read scripts

the resultant
retinal scarring

Wicketywicked, weary eyes,
dripping with serrated pixels

triple dotted,
typing-awareness indicators
create silly suspenses,
inducing temporal
dramas,
emotional
micro-traumas

every second a slice
through my,
now practically nonexistent,
patience

Am I a server,
or am I a servant?

Eyes, sunken, with
withered skin

I'm waiting for my fix

Ding-ding
Bloop!
Pinggg
Here comes the dopamine! —

—Clicketyclick

The frozen river,
Grey mist and cold air escape from little thankful lungs.
I hold your hand.
Your body walks beside me,
Our shadows blend to one.
On the outside your figure looks unscathed,

Your face is bare and clean, your eyes look out clear and blank and mild.

Your hands unclenched and loosely draped,
arms sway slightly from side to side as ballast
for the steps you take.

Broken though. Broken so very deeply.

So that every step your body takes,

you hear the sound of glass.
The ***** and jangle, the music of an utterly shattered self.

I hear you breaking, though you drown it in your headphones.

As you pass me in the street I hear the squelch of your shoes.

Soaked in your own blood so your socks are brown like mud.

And your eyes, they are unguarded as you gentley start to topple.

Vortex of pleaing pain and weighted silence.

A tornado of anguish inside your iris.

As you inhale, your scars are whiter than your teeth.
You pull me in, You want to grab me and beg for help.

For mercy, for release, for suffocation. But you have no voice,

Your tears are gushing but they don't feel wet.

You're flat, and shiny and utterly destroyed,

Beyond repair. The damage is done.

And so I release the mirror,

till our shadows blend,

and the blood is dried,

and the pieces scattered, and the shattered mirror will rest at the bottom of the river.

Only I stand on the bridge.

One body, not two.

Nothing to remind me of you.

But the shattered hole
in the frozen river,