When up isn't up...
And down isn't down,
And the thoughts in your head
Spin round and around.
When every familiar thing I see
Has become an alien object to me.
When the air I breathe is solid, not gas
And things that were forever...no longer last.
When what I knew from time begun
Has evaporated...or started to run.
When chaos and confusion are all I see...
When there's nothing left but me.
It is the truth, we must all come to know.
This journey through life...is solo.
And the company we keep...
And the objects we claim...
Will lose their meaning
When we forfeit our name.
When we float like a cloud...
And stand deep like a tree...
When we stop all our running
And just learn to be.
When we grow beyond the puff and the stuff...
We become one with the universe.
And that is enough.

Cutting and slashing
Is love everlasting
Never breaking the skin
It mutilates from within

“hi, i’m wolf” his eyes were silver. the silvered-eyed boy with brown skin.

i remember this. i remember him, the way his tongue would fiddle with his silver lip-ring on the right side of his mouth. the silver pointed studs that hooked through his left eyebrow.

the way he said my name.

i was always “carnage” from where i came. i wasn’t named that, no. but they would say it anyway, just to see if i would flinch. if i fell for it, they would follow with “you break everything you touch”.

if i fell for that?

that was why my blood was usually the one running down the sink on those nights.

“your name isn’t carnage, really? you don’t look like someone who could hurt that many souls.” my eyes fell away from his, ashamed. “tell me you don’t believe that, little lamb”

so that became my new name.

Last night I went out for a beer
Down to my local bar
While I was there I do believe
I saw a falling star

I ordered up a beer and shot
Sat down, to waste some time
When I heard a gruff voice rumble
Two seats down from mine

"Shut that juke box off barkeep"
"I can't stand to hear that voice"
"I'd rather rip my ears off"
"If I truly had the choice"

The barkeep wandered back a bit
Turned the sound down for a while
I kept on at my beer and then
I ordered two more, with a smile

"Send one down to him" I said
"Let him pick a song on me"
"He can choose whatever song he wants"
"And tell him, this one's free"

The barkeep served the beer on up
The man turned and looked my way
He said "I thank you for the beer, kind sir"
"But there's nothing there to play"

About an hour passed before
The band took to the stage
They broke into an old, old song
And the man, yelled out with rage

"I don't need to hear that song"
"I hate it, don't you know"
"Play anything else you want to play"
"But, cut that from your show"

The band continued playing
The man got mad as hell
"I hate that song, I told you"
"You can all now go to hell"

I watched the barkeep move in
He whispered close so none could hear
The man, sat back in silence
I wonder what was whispered in his ear

I ordered up a beer for me,
With two shots, and then moved stools
When I got beside me
He said "Do you think that I'm a fool?"

I said, "just have a drink bud"
"Let the band play what they want"
Then he turned and looked on through me
With dead eyes and face so gaunt

"Son, I wrote that ****** song"
"I sang it all my life"
"I wrote it for the one I loved"
"She used to be my wife"

"While I was  singing songs for her"
"She was flat out on her back"
"For everyone who came for me"
"She had two more in the sack"

"I used to play the music boy"
"And I used to play it well"
"Now, I'm just a stinking drunk"
"With one foot set in hell"

"I used to have a tour bus"
"Play two hundred shows a year"
"Now, I sit and wallow"
"I live on charity and beer"

"I started drinking on the road"
"Couldn't sing, I couldn't feel"
"I couldn't sing the words I wrote"
"The feeling wasn't real"

"I fell into a bottle, son"
"About ten years ago"
"I haven't reached the bottom yet"
"I've still a ways to go"

"She took my words away from me"
"Stomped my heart and made it dust"
"She took all I ever had"
"My words, my love, my trust"

"I thank you for the beer boy"
"But, I am just a hopeless case"
"I used to be a someone once"
"Now, I take up space"

The barkeep, set up two more beers
He said "These one's here  are free"
"Your words, they still have meaning"
"At least they do...to me"

The band struck up another
It was one that we all new
I could see him start to shaking
I guess he wrote this too

He told me boy "it's kinda tough"
"Knowing all I had is dead"
"I keep hearing myself singing these"
"But, only in my head"

"Three nights a week I spend the night"
"At the lockup, drunk as hell"
"Because, I just can't stand to hear my songs"
"And the stories that they tell"

I finished up, and shook his hand
Paid my tab and turned to go
From behind me, I heard "thank you"
"I just thought that you should know"

Tonight, I went out for a beer
I went to my local bar
Two seats from me I guess I saw
A real life falling star.