For as long as there has been a cerebral cortex, there has been teaching
Humans, even the dumbest among us, for knowledge we are reaching
But somethings happened to the state of our education
And I speak from experience, in the trenches of our education nation
Something is wrong, something must be done, the war cry began
Teachers were fired, and some couldn't get up again.
Schools went their separate ways, like fighting friends
Some took up the new approaches like the latest fashion trends
Skinny jeans now, but bell bottoms were all the rage I remember when
Then there were the school takeovers by the State and army then
School became a grind, of test scores and dead students filling in bubbles
And that's pretty much where we're at, and still, yeah, there's troubles.

that advice, it's amazing
take the weekend off
do what you want
I did
Yesterday, dark glasses
crying up a mountain
today, swimming
I'm feeling better
So good in fact, could it be this easy?
Am I cold?
Turn off the TV
silence
Tears again
I love you, I will always love you
I hope you are in a better place
Stolen from me,  by cancer
I did all I could, but it wouldn't be enough
I knew from the start
Everything as planned and well executed but horribly scathing
all the feelings back, saturating my soul
unbearable
an empty place that can only be filled
by pain in order to heal
subsides
Some quiet again

let them drift by
let them turn on and off
like stars in the sky
open your palm and let them float free
blowing into the wind
you will see
your new self
created in air
its up to you if you want to share

one of the most difficult things
something that can relieve you of want
is to find a place to just be here
no thoughts to be clung to
they pass by like clouds on a windy day
only the present moment
4:42, rain drops on the porch
refrigerator hums
bring this hereness to your biggest challenges
into the throws of your battles and deepest sorrows
let it ground you like a ship's anchor
to your true self

I have them written down for the big scary meeting
Yet my mind races, reviews the scene again, creates dialogue
find new innuendo
Anxiety.
It can be quiet now
I know what will happen, I know how I will be painted
as an incompetent
And I now what I will say in return...variations on
I don't agree

Sometimes you do things that are stupid
And you don't want people to know you did it
And depending on how far you're stuck
It can really feel like way too much
It's kind of like trying to swim in snow
You can move around, but you can't go
It's very uncomfortable and you'll get all wet
But it isn't the dumbest thing anyone has done, not yet

to feel a part of this world, to feel the air that is being cleansed
of the filth and rot of civilization and to see the dry creek out
back that kids built a fort around last summer, with a filthy mattress as a bridge
fill to the brim with cold muddy water that will run through the artificial pipes and what little is
left of what was once a beautiful and natural valley, now paved over and trod upon and
suffocated by humans and the cold rain touches my bare arm and reminds me that I am
a part of this world, even as I struggle against it as we humans do.  And I wish I was far
away from this place, far away from all this crowding and muck and ceaseless competition
and wrong moves and attacks and I wish I could have only the silence of a loud storm
cleanse my consciousness and make me believe again that there is hope in this world and the
rain hits my watering can with a ping, ping sound and wind roars into my third floor apartment
and I feel alive.

A different view on the world
birds, a flock today so high up
how I wish I could just jump off the
ground and fly
in a strange formation, coming together
moving apart, not how they're supposed to be
they looked confused and sometimes there's clouds
Cold clouds, even rain, and I track the shapes and every
move that will reveal the sun and warm this place

You know it won't help you
But you do it anyway
When the going gets tough
You try to look the other way
You try to ignore that gnawing feeling
You know if you do it it will send you reeling
Maybe you have your little stash
Or maybe it's a phone call away with a little cash
Or maybe you've put it in a far away place
Hoping against hope that it's there you won't race

And time and again, no matter how much you try
You can sit still, you can't cry
You turn to that thing you use
To take away those terrible blues
You want it so bad, your fingers tremble
And when you get it you feel real nimble
But also a sickening sensation inside
Your dissapointment in yourself, you can't hide

After it's all over you resolve again
I'll never, ever to this again
And really, I hope it's true
But if you're like me, when you come up blue
Time and again, you'll end up using
Even though you know it's you who is losing

You must never give up
You must always try
And one fine day
You'll get it right
You'll sail into some dark abyss
And find, you can handle this

I saw you today but I must not dwell and not
get drawn in again by your enthusiasm for me
that lasts only as long as I become interested and then
disappears

You are a mirage, a man I see and can only wonder about
and now you sense my distance--how hard I've worked
for this distance--how much therapy meditation hypnosis
and now there you sit coyly beckoning that if I
answer it will disappear like a mirage

It is not real
You are not an oasis in the desert
You are a fantasy rising from the wavy heat of
my worry and anxiety and sadness
which blurs my vision and makes me vulnerable to
your sweet little smile and sidelong glances
and the feeling that you'd like for me to
flirt again and feel excited to see you every day
only to be avoided as I reach out
I can't go back
I must not go back

Woke up this morning, thought I overslept
Eyes swollen shut from all the tears that fell
I just don't know if I can keep up going on

Keep thinking bout the time when we first met
You were down and out
I worked up a sweat
Never knew it'd turn into death do us part

Think of all the hard times we been through
No matter what went down, you'd see me through
Now it's like a part of me is gone

You were a part of me, now I see
I can't restart, don't know what to believe
There's a hole inside and it hurts like hell
In my emptiness I'm not doing well

I know we saw this coming a mile away
doing all the right things,
then all you can do is pray
So God take your soul now and please treat it well

And now that you're in that better place
I'm still here tryin' to keep my faith
that everything will turn out all right in the end

Wander around like a zombie
Feel like  losses, they just keep coming
But there's one thing that I want you to know
I always and forever and ever will love you so
always forever and ever I will love you so

Crunch time, life time always in the way
Going through all the drama day after day fall away
things are never smooth,
I thought, I had an apartment, for my next move, now not
and I drive, hours and hours and fill out applications for threadbare little places
in a student's world, and there's a process and suspicion and a guy walking a dog
with a million tattoos and a beach about five minutes away and just give my this apartment today
So I can write, finish my great tapestry, my mastery of this storyline that has been in my mind
for ages, needs to be fleshed out, so I can get it out, of my head
and stop this disease, so please, let me stabalize enough inside and out to make it
put it out, on that computer screen,
until I have that, I am nothing.

Ain't no love in my life
I don't wanna hear about it
Can't even think about it

Inside me rocks an ocean
Waves push me this way and that
Can't tell what's wrong
When a dude goes bad on me

Just sit there like a sea anenome
Feel the pain and never move away
Let him push me all the way
Think it's love and it's only pain

I don't want no love
Don't know what it is
Can't see it if it's right in my face
Maybe that's a disgrace
But it's the truth I can't erase

Saw it coming five miles away
"Not a good fit" as they say
Thought the place was wacky from the start
Didn't want to take the job, but that's all they got

Now I'm struggling with conflicting feelings
Should feel bad, but my mood has hit the ceiling
Free at last, is on my mind
I'm not in jail forever, can go back in time
and take that other turn down the road
I feel better now, like a firework ready to explode

Quaking with fear all day
as I was going to follow through
with plans to say what I believe to be true
and now to have my thoughts known to authoriy
to say it into the air in his private space
in the company of the protection
Tears could be squelched
I felt wobbly and drained but not defeated
The aftermath was solid ground, not road ****
A strange new world of dignity for myself

He's not your type, not even in the top 200
before the Gothic drama had even escaped my mouth
Therapy.... can ....blow...your mind
I highly recommend it
Except its frustrating like watching laundry
roll around and around, the same patterns are found
over and over, and just when you thought you were so over that
you are back again running down dark alleys of your mind
splinters and nails stuck in your feet but you keep running to and from
in the dark so certain this is the thing to do
She is there to stop you
"you like the idea of him, not him, just like with _
ITS AN OBJECT ATTACHMENT"
there's been a lot of 'em
So what if someone you don't like goes out with someone else at night?
Why couldn't I see that before?
I was spinning out that door
at the same time watching him strut
away, duck feet, an apple core in his milk crate
and still no chin
His messy hair slicked down
resembling a piece
ready for his big date
hopes to fornicate
a day's sweat coating him
and still no chin and afraid of socialism
and darwinism and not a believer in global warming
or that scientists ever harm lab animals or make them suffer intentionally
every day less attractive, without those rose colored glasses I see
I don't really like him at all

because it's been quite a day
and then I hope my memories will just slide away
no one likes insults
no one likes low blows
it's like bandages in your nose
so gross
so just leave them there is a pile
in the wreckage I call work
one road was wrong
but I was a coward and so I stayed on
afraid to incur someone's wrath
I took myself to task
Until another order
from a higher plane
made me have to change
and i had to drive through that blast all the same
but offending high, or offending low
I guess it's low or it's no go
and then I went threw those flames
and how she cursed my name
and how I fear what she'll do
i wish I could work with someone new
but I have to let it go
i've done my best and so
I have to leave it there
like a sleeping cat on my favorite chair
there won't be twenty vodkas,
they'd offset my chakras
naw, i can't do that
i can just. let it go. leave it at that.

My crazy mind, roller coaster mind, mind is a whirl pool can't comprehend
Makes no sense, comes in waves, a moment ago I was broken and done for
over some dude I don't care for and now he's forgotten
Is my head filled with cotton?
This makes no sense,
I'm crazy as all hell
Can't you tell?

Work and work and nothing else on my shelf
Accomplishments, yes...in work, no less
But I'm ready to escape and live a little
No longer this fear...don't know what happened to it
everything bad has already happened so
the bear crawls out into the Spring sunshine
Not really lonely, just curious about what's out there
want to sit on a bar stool in a tight dress and sip a drink and flirt
Want to wear those six inch heels and laugh and be tipsy
dance to the beat of life and forget about it the next day
Want to buy that corset and denim at Fredricks and wear it with the
mad high heels and see what happens

And my tormentor, my soon to be X boss, he flew back to the midwest
where his dead brother lay and it must be a terrible thing
and I know he didn't die suddenly like my cat, with the benefit of a relaxant and then
anesthesia, and then a heart stopped, because it kept beating past the point of where
the body could keep up, and the door to the next world opened up to him

And I know this person's heart didn't stop suddenly,
there was pain and gasping and desperation as the heart attack took hold
and a life flying past his eyes and falling and finally a comforting white light

And it's the living who grieve, including my soon to be X boss
who grieves now, naturally, this man who has tormented me and
taken the pleasure out of many days like mud wipes across a windshield
and I always thought, as he contentedly read his computer screen staring
into that as if it was a window to the next world and held the answers to all
creation in it
I thought, he never suffers, only I suffer.
The cold people never suffer thought I as I looked down at the latest bruise
and ached and found a slow way out
but it's not true
they suffer, he must be feeling the pain I can't imagine, the loss
and fear and reminder of mortality and the void that can't be filled,
but only by time.
And he is in this void, somewhere in the midwest
perhaps fielding calls about who he wants to replace me
and he suffers, he is not immune

Creating is part of living and it can't stop even if there is hardship
and that won't help because if there is hardship
the worst thing is to just freeze and hate yourself because you are there
and not here, over somewhere better
so the blood must continue to pump through the veins and your dreams must continue even if they are now more furtive and furious than ever,
that is the life force and there is nothing,
nothing that will stop it
but death

You walk across the street
and get run over by a truck
It happens to the best of us
Even those with luck

First there comes the adrenaline rush
Then comes the real hit
You're spattered across the pavement
Thinking, this is it

I'm being metaphorical, so I don't mean it's real
It's just what happens when something bad
finally slips, and you reel

There's tears in awkward places
You discover that at work
No one bothered to design a place for crying
So you're feeling like a dork

There's sleepless nights
Trips on your break
to buy some premium Visine

Time goes on and a new plan emerges
from your psychic mist
And even if you still feel down
You know everyone takes a hit

The thing is to keep going on
take on the role of gracious loser
That's really all that's left
Now you can't be a chooser

Gradually, you become attached
to new goals, hopes and dreams
and looking back
maybe it won't be
as bad as it seemed

"But what are their jobs?" she asked
my mother, the only one in the world
who would demand that cats have jobs
or perhaps it is only a requirement from another era
they should catch mice, except there are no mice
they should catch snakes, but  I've never seen a snake in my apartment

My cats keep house
A stack of papers needs to be spread on the floor
This makes it more comfortable to sit on

Small objects must be knocked from raised flat surfaces
Cats like to be up high
and they like to have plenty of room

First, there is the interest of knocking the object,
watching it's movement to the edge
How much effort does it take to move it?
Does it slide?
Or does it lurch and stop.
And how does it land on the floor?
Does it break apart? Splatter? Bounce?
Flat surfaces are for sitting and sleeping on
Small objects get in the way, and should be stored
on the floor

Mostly, my cats jobs are to be cute
And that they are very good at

What is my job?
That could fill a small report
But really, what is it?

Maybe, it is to enjoy life
like my cats
breath by breath
no matter what happens

for one in a series of misrepresentations
at last the army went home for dinner
after I threw a grenade
one given to me by the union
and my friends
one from a small cache
all I have against their hundreds
but it's the first thing to come over the wall
clink down into a safe a well
and do it's best to detonate and make alot of noise
and it reminded them there's something alive
on the other side

I've been here before
So many times
My brain erases the memories
Can't hold this discordant pain
It happens again
This feeling--must record this
Evidence that proves
Not forget, never forget

I am grieving
Something important to me is being lost
It is sad to me, doesn't matter what it is
The line to my family runs dead
Sympathy should exist here
but never did
An echoing space
A roar of nothingness
The sound of a large empty room
where life should be, but isn't
the  mirage of the safety net of love disappears
Like 2pac's hologram--so real but then absolutely gone
I fall into the abyss, a black hole
pulls me forever deeper into the vacume

Curl up in the corner of nothingness with the pain
Soothe the self with the self
Watch life whip by outside
where I was before this hit
Remember the concern of aquaintances
who mimicked a worried friend
because I was in their way
And like my family
they have now vanished

Sometimes too many bad things hit at once
My eyes stay open, but see nothing
The world goes by in muted colors and noises
Not quite sure I am where I am
Staying steady becomes the priority
No time to let go into grief or even anger
that would let my guard down
put my focus inside
right now, I can only think about
what is happening outside
make vague calculations about
how much it will hurt
later

I was accused, I thought you were me, and you thought this of me but really
It was pointed out to me and I think it's more correct that this is what I think of
you, who have taken the pleasure out of my days more than once,
caused tears to fall, resemble my mother's sharp and sudden cruelty
it is you, who I believe, are the devil incarnate
and not the other way around
breaker of rules, betrayer of confidences, dissembler, user, you are to me
a nightmare

I can't pretend I don't see
that you're with her...married no less
arching her back, crossing her legs with her foot in a high heeled shoe and sitting so close to you
why is she there every day for those important discussions to be made
and you act like you don't even know me, around them
You invite me on ski trips, day trips and when you see me
around her, I am nothing
nothing to you and I can't do that
it hurts too bad, so it's over before it even started
I see that warning sign.  I'm not blind
Try to talk myself out of it...
Life so stressed, now I'm more of a mess
because of you, never prepared for this
only if it was easy, and not hurting and burning
because I'm already on a knife's edge
so you're number is gone from my phone
my drug, I've thrown away the last bottle
if you want to talk to me, then see, me
there, in front of her, and let her see what you said to me
I'm not a hidden woman, letting you play
Let the cards fall as they may, but hurting this bad, please
let this be the last time
over you.

Rain all around, and then a clear sky
I went looking for a place to swim, but all lanes were deserted
I ended up down in a basement pool, backstroking with a view of a roof
and I began to feel dizzy, like I drank something 150 proof
So I got out and put on my brightest warmest best
Made it to that cheap old grocery store,
and they gave me a free bobble head
and as I walked out to the parking lot a sweet old lady said,
"You f'n b--, for hatin' that N--" and I looked, could I have imagined it?
And a younger woman sat and  just looked on
and the old lady with the Santa hat well she just wouldn't stop
and I thought, maybe she'd like my bobble head
maybe then she'd calm down, but I wasn't brave enough
so I got in my car and drove on

Eyes dart around
Shoulder twitches
thoughts dart around like flies
this worry, that
work---will start
what will it be like?
He, I will see again
can I make it normal
Script done in time?
cat, when will he die
can I handle it?
weight, never budged
must live with it
age, goes up
continues
no turning back
he, what will happen?
Script, is it good
Money, can I stretch it?
I'm
just
supposed
to
notice
these
thoughts
and
let
them
go

Right now, you know your truth
You may be separating from yourself, one half on the roof
the other half with the fool you're trying to impress
Is he really different from the rest?

Oh, I've been all through it
Those beautiful beginnings, just be receptive, don't stir it
Make like he's the best,
Like his conversations are never less
important than what you're thinking of
Bury yourself in it, let it carry you off

You can live like that for years, even your whole life
You can hide all the conflict, all your inner strife
You can submerge yourself so deep
It would take a detective to find it, and then it would be asleep

But you know what you know
That will always be there
And if there's some kind of friction with reality
You have to care
You have to listen and honor this for yourself
Otherwise, you'll spend your life gathering dust, numb, and hidden on life's back shelf

You say, I love your body
You only have a picture and I liquified it to make me skinnier
never thought I'd get a notice, now you invite me
It would take me out of my loneliness
but can I expose myself to the pain of
seeing me for real? what a stupid predicament
Oh, my body, I changed my meds, gained even more weight
God. The softness of vulnerability
I want to take your invitation
should...but I am sealed over
plastic veneer breaking, want to reach out and touch
want that human warmth, to destroy me

My Facebook friend turned cyber lover
no, I won't send you any those kind of pics and
you say you like me,  then my voice on the phone
I forgot if I like you
we both like to crawl up steep hills but who
are you?
I am afraid, this just early stage or ending/beginning that
never went anywhere what is this? Silly cyber friend
so new to me and maybe in my worries I forgot to ask
do I like you?

I walked on, years ago
Listening to the roar of the surf
Watching the tide go out and come back in
to greet me
I saw what nature brings
during a storm
debris: driftwood and death

I didn't know you then
And I walked along
the same landscape
the same sands
was a part of the same eternal beat of time
and I was fine and
I will do this again

No, you say
too obvious you must think
She looks confused
You were all up on her a second ago
Her pregnant body
swelling *******
Calculations of a lifetime
How to play them
Those little women
with a wife at home
What can you get before you
steal away to the next
That glance
That stare
How far has it ever gone
A long marriage
Your shrine to it
Perfect family
The lady doth...methinks
How far has it gone?
Have those lingering stares made you
enter darkened rooms
and fumbled in the dark for that fire
Have you ever found it
Does she care?
The little woman at home?
Or is it only, you come home to her
and that's what matters

What am I doing
I don't even know you
I'm done with this, everything warm and vulnerable forever you know
was betrayed, now closed up shop, the end
love can't touch me
why open myself to hurt again
that felt like it would **** me?
and yet, still alive
I move toward you

When my mind is quieter from torment
When my inner world has "settled down," I will find you
who you are, where you are, I don't know
We won't meet on College Walk or in the library
It won't be so bright and innocent
but it will be a better match and knowing my past mistakes
we will find each other, not just kids anymore
but now fully formed, who we really are
and ready to match together

Wedding band on your finger, it's a mighty thick piece
I know cuz I looked when I found I liked what I see
And today, I see you, no one else around
But your attitude has changed,  it's obvious even the sound
of your voice is different, it's charged and a bit gruff
Sensual, urgent, like you didn't get enough
of something and now you've found you need it now
and perhaps it's standing right in front of you, not back at home in town.

"My hairs a mess, I was wearing a hat," you say
That's really strange, you usually don't act this way
Then you're getting all personal, right off the bat
Where I live, who I live with, stuff like that

And you find I've been divorced for eight years
You're so surprised, it's such a long time, and I see your leer
So what you care?  Why you all up in my junk?
Seriously, you are sort of, kind of, some kind of hunk

But that band on your finger, I can't miss that
That can only mean pain, so I'll leave you to your hat

it will prove
how smart and lovable I am
not overworked and still sick after
a month of coughing and pain
if he calls, I will be redeemed
not rejected and secure and safe
not nervous and frightened about
what the future holds
if he calls, it will prove nothing
it will be a momentary drug that won't last
because he's have called before
and I feel wretched in this moment,
working on a weekend
still sick
and unable to be at peace with myself.

I look for love here
the only place I know to look where
love doesn't exist here
Never existed
but here is where I looked for it when I was so young
and it's the only place to look: the love place
in a man who has better things to do, more important people to see
the love place a little girl looked at for her whole childhood
now in a man who can't deal with her, doesn't want her

It's like waiting at an abandoned train station
where no trains come or go,
and you can hear them at the new station
but you come here
because that's where you've always come
and that's where you grew up
always looking down the track
hoping the train would come in and you'd have that endorphin
rush and every so often it would and for a day or so a train ride
and then back to the empty station, waiting
feeling sad, because you want to ride again

The power, willingness, energy of another train
on a different track you see it
and people get on and off and go on their way
but I stay put, trying to love him who can't love me

Sometimes in my life, I drew a deep breath, and hoped against hope
and closed my eyes, and let go of my fear
and I joined the people at the train station
where trains actually still come and go

But it's always been a round trip ticket
and back I come, and wander off again
to the empty, falling apart, spooky, windswept station
where there is no life, no love
but it feels like home
and it is dead

And I'm throwing it off the pier
I want to hear it as it hits the water
see the splash and feel
a drop come back up in my face
the ***** diesel water will cleanse
and maybe then I'll finally be on the mend
I don't even know much about him
Just talked to him a few times, but already
that thing is kicking in and I don't feel fine

I asked like I was back in school
I had a headache from the outer limits
and aches to boot
and he came over and gave me that little massage
and I felt those masculine fingers
dig into my shoulders and neck
and give elief, and move my clothes, oh, it was a treat
Not soft, yet pliant and warn, not like mine
but different and seemed born
to give pleasure to the likes of me
I'll call you tonight he said and inside I felt glee
but by the time he called I was only half human
memories of his hands were hazy and far
and he said we'd talk when I'm well
and that all right, don't know him that well,
don't want him to see my plight
a flu shot, hand sanitser and still I just fall
sick

It to be hot
That you'd find me just sublime
That I'd see you waiting for me
For just a glance or chance conversation
A little time in privatization

For you to notice I look nice
For every sighting to be  like spice
In my day
To have you in my way
would make me melt

I wanted you to seek me out
for a little private time no doubt
For you to forget everyone else
A huge smile at me
and I'd melt

But the lake just froze over
You run around like a busy mouse
Sniffing what's ahead, not looking about
Finished work, headed for your house
And for me, you could care less
And its making me a bit of a mess

chemistry, yes
I feel it
so hard to just not think say
ambiguity
uncertainty
you are welcome here and I can
just sit with you and s'ok I don't have to know
how this is where it is going how it will
end

Drain the moat
Let down the draw bridge
excuse the body guards all of my mind

A frightening prospect
But the only way to be close
How will I know?
Whitney Houston never had an answer
for me in that song

Can't do it yet.
Only ponder what it might feel like
Just wait, no desperation
No fear

If I was then who I am today
I would have left the hopeless hurtful marriage and not
fallen for your words which tell me, over and over, you are too sensitive
you spend too much money, too
and I do,
but I would have left because still, no one deserves to be abused
I always think, I stay, no matter what they say or do
I don't pull out, no matter how much it hurts
but a month ago I did, when I hurt to badly
from a man, and he still wanted me to stay and I said no
I am not having fun anymore and it was over
and no I didn't need help with my script
and no, we aren't friends because we never hang out
and this must be the new me
because I will never be destroyed again by a man I pick out myself
I have changed

The parent loves the child
and the child learns to love itself

But what if your parent basically put you on a shelf
What if they had you to prove they were a true couple?
And were then horrified at the child, and all the trouble

Then the child learns she is a problem, she is not good
And grows into an adult with the same idea, which is not good
She never learns to stoke the fires within
That she is worthy, as good as anyone, not full of sin

So she looks to others, especially for love just like she found it
from people who didn't love her, didn't like her as she was
She has to chose men who care only a little
and tantalize and tease with their daliances in her direction
while she forever yearns for their affection
So she can feel good inside

That most desperate bond she first formed with the parent
Can be a life sentence to terror and torment
Unless she can learn to fill the empty space inside
With love that should have been there, from the start
She doesn't know how, so she struggles
How to do it?  How not to be dependent on others?

The blows come, the lies
the incompetence that frames you
the person who doesn't mind destroying you
if it will make her life easier for a moment
We are rocks beaten by waves every day
Sometimes a storm, but always that ceaseless battle
And yet, inside ourselves can be a safe haven
or a basement of agony, if we side with our attackers
against ourselves.

"I'll probably be in the bathroom before it, throwing up," says my Union representation
I'm in her office, seeking her advice
And she knows exactly what I'm going through
Except for her it was because of another him, not you
And now it's you.  Now it's both of our plight.

You sent me to her because you're "concerned"
If I don't play my cards right, from you I'll be burned
"If he doesn't know what to do,
if he feels cornered he'll get abusive and attack."
Says another ally who has my back

My union rep feels my pain
Why are we on this sick train?
Bossed by people with no people skills
Do they think they don't need to deal with human beings?

Lies about me, you think are truths.
Can I shake loose?  
Or is this just going to turn ugly

Take the higher ground, she says
Document everything says the other
One way or another
I feel the crowd closing in
Targeted, cases made against me about how I don't fit in
Willfully ignore the rules

To think I once thought we'd be friends
Well, that is at an end.
I don't know if I'll survive
Now I can barely look at you, barely say "hi"

Always at the end,
I gather around women
we help each other
we must defend
against the gathering male onslaught
people who attack without thought
Never a man in sight
The knight is a myth, it's right
The knight is the one with the weapon
And we women must gather together for protection

And it's all just a blur, like out of body experience as I
take risks I never used to take like singing
into the microphone, and really I never sing
and I sang "I Believe in Miracles" with feeling
and what is happening to me, as  I just kind of ooze from one hour
to the next and I asked a guy to see a movie with me
but that's weird I never do that and the fog has lifted
and I take a picture of myself in blue
like I used to when things were simpler and happier
and I can't tell why I used to be so stressed and anguished when now it
seems like there may be hope after all and escape
and a job you hate can really be a kind of jail of pent up
feelings of anger and it just kind of rots you and makes
you hate life and even if you only have a vague notion
kind of a fuzzy, idea of the future, kind of like
walking on cliffs in Marin county with clouds, thick ones,
rolling in so fast you can see them and you can feel them
on your face as well but you can't see the trail ahead
but it is so beautiful and bracing and alive